We stood like that for a long time, letting our supernatural connection tether us closer, healing unspoken wounds.
After a while Tyler started to speak. As if opening ourselves to our Vital Bond had opened some emotional block, he began telling me about his mother. He told me she was a single parent, and he never knew his father. She was a ballroom dancer and used to drag him to the classes she taught in the evenings.
As he told me how close she was to my mother, I got a lump in my throat. His pain directly mirrored mine. I felt every affectionate smile on his face, every chuckle at a silly memory, every wistful look as if they were my own.
We slowly moved to a more comfortable position on the floor, me leaning back against his desk, his head in my lap.
“And she loved ice cream. Used to make it from scratch. It was the creamiest, most delicious ice cream you would’ve ever tasted. And whenever it was her birthday or my birthday, there would be ice cream. It didn’t matter that my birthday’s in the middle of winter.” He chuckled, his shoulders bumping against the side of my thigh. “She would make it anyway, and we would bundle up under a million blankets and eat it.”
His ice cream story gave me an idea. “Keep talking, I’m listening,” I murmured as I pulled my phone out of my pocket.
I absentmindedly ran my fingers through his hair again as I typed out a quick text to Josh.
Can you guys come to Tyler’s office please? Bring ice cream.
I hit send and then hesitated, not sure I wanted to send the next bit. Reminding myself this was about Tyler, I typed it out quickly.
And bring the “Master of Pain.”
Josh’s reply came quickly.
Great idea! Done and done. :)
I smiled.
And get the good stuff. Ben and Jerry’s or something. None of that cheap shit.
Yes, ma’am.
I put the phone away and focused on Tyler once more.
It couldn’t have been more than ten minutes later that we heard footsteps in the hallway and the door handle turned.
Tyler sucked in a sharp breath and shot up from his horizontal position. He was propped up on his elbows, one knee bent and ready to push himself up farther, when he realized it was Josh walking through the door, with Ethan behind him and Alec bringing up the rear.
Josh paused but didn’t allow any surprise to enter his expression. “Chill, man. It’s just us.”
Tyler relaxed, although he didn’t return his head to my lap. Instead he shifted into a sitting position next to me, our backs against the desk. I immediately missed the warmth of his head on my legs and bent my knees up to ease the empty feeling.
The guys joined us on the floor, and Alec extracted three tubs of ice cream from a little plastic bag. It wasn’t Ben and Jerry’s, but it was amazing.
“It’s from a small local producer,” Ethan explained, getting that spark in his eye he had whenever he talked about food. “There’s only one grocer in the area that stocks it. Luckily it was on Alec’s way here.”
He smiled at his cousin, a genuine smile that made his dimples appear. Surprisingly Alec smiled back. It was the most relaxed I’d seen him since Studygate, and it reminded me of honey-voiced Alec. A pang of longing slowly blossomed inside me and settled somewhere deep inside my chest.
What had caused such an improvement in his mood since last night? I studied his face as he’d been studying me lately, trying to puzzle it out, but all I could see was the physical damage from the fight. The cut over his eyebrow still had a dressing on it, but the eye was less puffy, and he wasn’t moving as if he had a broken rib anymore.
Our talk of dead mothers was abandoned in favor of lighter topics. Josh played some music on his phone, and we chatted and joked, the guys teasing each other. Even Alec joined in, giving me a rare glimpse into their group dynamic. It was nice to see them like that, to see how people who weren’t related by blood could still be a family. It was even nicer to be included in it—another stark contrast to the previous night.
I hoped things would keep moving in this direction. That we could have more of this and less of the tension between me and Tyler, less of the hostility between me and Alec, less of the barely restrained physical pull between me and Ethan and Josh. Less of the drama and angst of the night before.
We polished off the ice cream, passing the three tubs around our little circle as we talked. Then we picked ourselves up off the floor.
Stacey had canceled the rest of Tyler’s commitments for the day, and Ethan, Josh, and I agreed we would ditch the rest of our classes. Even Alec made a few hushed phone calls before we piled into the elevator and headed off campus. The fat gray clouds hadn’t dissipated, but it wasn’t raining either, so we walked past the heavy security and headed into town on foot.
As we strolled the tree-lined streets of Bradford Hills, Tyler fell into step next to me, the other three having become engaged in a heated discussion around football, guaranteeing I’d tune out immediately. He grabbed my hand and gave it a firm squeeze before quickly releasing it.
“Thank you, Eve,” he said softly into my ear.
I’d actually managed to make a difference. Even if it was only our supernatural connection that had done it, I walked with a lightness to my steps, knowing that something in me had helped to heal something in him.
“Don’t mention it.” I smiled, injecting every bit of my affection for him into my expression. I hoped he could see how happy I was to do something for him when he’d already done so much for me.
Eleven
Things settled down over the next week, and we all fell back into our routines. On the morning of my next session with Ty, I woke from a dreamless, deep sleep to the sound of my backup alarm.
I knew he wouldn’t mind me being a little late, but I still swore under my breath as I threw back the covers and jumped out of bed.
The time for showering had long passed, so I just brushed my teeth, splashed some water on my face, and pulled my hair up into a messy bun. Rushing back into my room, I realized I had another problem. Between classes, the drama of the past week, training (of the Variant and the self-defense type), and taking care of basic human needs like food and bathing, I’d severely neglected doing my laundry.
I was pretty casual in what I wore, perfectly happy to get around in jeans, leggings, and loose cardigans, but even I wasn’t so blasé about my appearance as to spend the day in public in a stained pair of sweatpants and one of Ethan’s white T-shirts that I’d stolen. But that was all I could find that wasn’t in my overflowing basket in the corner.
“Zara!” I yelled, reaching into the back of my closet and praying for a miracle.
“What?” she replied, sounding just as hurried.
“Can I borrow some clothes? Literally everything I own is dirty.”
“Eew!” I heard her unlocking the several locks on our door. “Help yourself to anything in my room, you slob. I gotta run.” The door slammed behind her just as I pulled an item of clothing I’d completely forgotten I owned out of my wardrobe—a white linen shirt. It buttoned up the front but was soft and flowy, not at all constrictive. Slipping it over my head, I ran into Zara’s room. I only had five minutes to get out the door.
Zara and I were similar in size, but her hips were a little narrower than mine, so I ignored the jeans and grabbed the first skirt I found, figuring if I wore it a little higher on my waist, it should fit. I pulled the black plaid number on as I hopped awkwardly back to my own room. It fit pretty well but was a little shorter than I was used to. The only pair of socks I could find were a knee-high white sports pair. I shoved them down so they pooled around my ankles before quickly pulling on my Converse.
I didn’t have time to check myself in the mirror, but surely I couldn’t go wrong with black and white. Hopefully I wouldn’t be too cold with my legs so exposed.
I grabbed my bag and my oversized cardigan, shoved an apple into my mouth, and rushed out the door, racing through campus.
I mad
e it to the admin building in record time, dumping the chewed apple core in the trash as I approached the stairs. A large group of black-clad Melior Group agents were standing together off to the side, and I cursed mentally when I saw Alec with them, seemingly giving instructions. He had his back turned to me, one hand resting on his hip near his gun. Not that he needed a gun—I’d seen him incapacitate dozens of people with a single focused look. Hell, I’d helped him do it.
I slowed my pace and made my steps as light as possible, keeping an eye on his broad back. As if he had a sixth sense for people avoiding him, he turned just as I reached the bottom of the stairs and looked at me over his shoulder. The expression on my face must have been shifty, but his attention was drawn down, his eyes flicking over my body before he muttered something to the agents and walked over.
Before I had a chance to declare I was late and run off, he leveled me with an incomprehensible look, crossing his arms. “Is that what you’re wearing for your session with Gabe?”
I blinked at him slowly, unsure I’d heard him correctly. A sarcastic comment, a grumble about my presence, an exclamation declaring I was the most irritating person in the world—any of those would have made sense. Alec caring about what I was wearing? It just didn’t compute.
I went into worry mode. “Oh shit! Is there a stain or something?” I twisted awkwardly on the spot to try to look at the back of my outfit. “I woke up so late, and I didn’t get a chance to check myself in the mirror, and then . . .”
My eyes narrowed in suspicion. He was smirking, mischief dancing in his bright blue eyes. His face had almost lost the constant underlying intensity and broodiness. Almost, but not quite. He was amused, but there was a cruel tilt to his smirk.
He was making fun of me. He broke his important work conversation, came over here, and was making me late just to make fun of me.
“You are such a fucking asshole,” I muttered as I spun on my heel and stomped up the stairs.
“Have a great lesson, precious,” he called after me with mirth in his deep voice.
I gave him the finger over my shoulder. As the glass doors slid closed behind me, I could have sworn I heard a chorus of manly voices laughing.
In the elevator up to Tyler’s office, I huffed, annoyed, but then took a few deep breaths, trying not to let Alec get to me. My day had started off badly, and he’d made it worse, but I was trying to wipe the slate clean and go into my lesson with a fresh attitude.
As I entered Tyler’s office, however, my day got weirder.
The door was ajar and I let myself in. “Hi.”
He was sitting behind his desk, his face buried in a pile of paperwork as his pen scribbled furiously across the page.
“Hey.” He glanced up, returning my greeting before dropping his head back down. “Let me just . . .”
The pen stilled, and he raised his eyes once more, slowly. His gaze flitted up and down my body very quickly, as if he were worried he’d go blind if he looked in my direction too long.
Eventually he cleared his throat and placed the pen down with unusual stiffness. His fingers raked through his hair, pushing that persistent messy bit off his face, as he glanced at me again before looking away.
“Have a seat.” His voice sounded strained. “We should get started. We’re behind.”
As I took my notebook out of my bag and made my way over to his desk, my brow creased. Why was everyone acting so strange? “No, we’re not. We’re way ahead.”
“Right. Yes. Ahead.” He punctuated every word with a glance at me.
“Are you OK?” I was getting worried. Did this have something to do with the events on the night of Alec’s fight? We’d never talked about the way I’d rubbed myself on him on the back of the bike. I was still mortified every time I thought about it and was living in fear of him bringing it up.
He took a deep breath, closing his eyes as he exhaled, then looked at me directly.
“Yes,” he said with a reassuring smile. But it didn’t reach his eyes, and I could still see tightness in his shoulders. “Let’s begin.”
I thought about pressing the issue, but he launched into the history of Variant suppression in Eastern Europe during the eighties, and I dropped it, focusing on our work.
The rest of the hour lacked the light atmosphere and casual back and forth of our usual conversations. He remained seated behind his desk, and considering that every other time so far he’d come around to sit with me, that was odd in itself.
By the end of the session, though, he was almost acting normally, telling me which journals were good if I wanted to do extra reading. “There’s another one, but I can’t remember . . . I think it was on one of the printouts . . .”
He started rummaging through the books and papers on his desk, but I knew what he was looking for.
“Oh, it’s under this . . .” We reached for the same book at the same time, and our hands accidentally touched. I froze, my words dying in my throat. To my utter astonishment, he stopped moving too.
For a beat we just sat there, the tips of our fingers touching. Then his hand moved, brushing the backs of his fingers against mine. My lips parted, my breathing becoming shallow. I dared not look up for fear of breaking the spell.
With slow, cautious movements, I turned my hand to rest palm up on the desk. He responded by covering it with his, the tips of his fingers at my wrist. As he dragged his hand lightly over mine, our fingers caressing each other’s palms, I slowly lifted my gaze.
His other hand was flat against the desk, fingers splayed, and his downcast eyes looked almost hooded. He was staring at my chest, which, I realized, was heaving with how hard I was breathing.
Sudden, loud laughter in the corridor snapped us almost violently out of the moment. I startled, flinching, and he pulled his hand back quickly. Our eyes met for the briefest of seconds; then he looked away and cleared his throat.
Both of us rushed through goodbyes as I scrambled to pack up, and I walked out of his office thoroughly confused and a little crestfallen. Despite the perplexing moment of intimacy, I saw him heave a sigh of relief as I closed the door behind me. I’d thought we’d taken a step forward last week, that he was finally letting his carefully built barriers down a little.
As I walked through the lobby on my way out, I saw Alec coming my way. With considerable effort I squared my shoulders, pressed my lips together, and avoided looking at him.
He laughed, drawing the attention of the women at reception, and then mumbled at me as he walked past, “Went well, then?”
I kept walking, determined to ignore him, but as I stepped into the sunshine, I wondered if maybe Tyler had told Alec about our bike ride and Alec was using it to make my life miserable. They were both acting strange, and clearly I was missing something.
Ethan and Josh confirmed my suspicion when they came up to me at the bottom of the stairs. They slowed their walk, and both of their eyebrows shot up as they looked me up and down. Ethan grinned, while Josh puffed his cheeks and blew the air out slowly.
Either I’d been hallucinating the clothes on my body and had actually been nude all morning, or there was some tear in the space-time continuum and they were seeing something I wasn’t. Either way, I’d had enough. My morning was ruined and I wanted answers.
I crossed my arms and jutted out one hip. “OK. What the hell is going on? Alec was a dick to me this morning, which isn’t that weird, but he went out of his way to do it, and then Tyler was acting strange through our whole session. Now you two are giving me weird looks. Start talking.”
They exchanged a glance.
“It probably has something to do with the fact that you’re walking around dressed like Gabe’s wet dream, honeybunch.” Ethan sounded as if he was explaining things, but his statement only made me scrunch my face up in confusion.
Josh snorted. “Eloquently put, Kid.”
“Thanks, bro!” Ethan slapped him on the shoulder and beamed at me. I just frowned and turned back to Josh.
&
nbsp; “Tyler has a . . .” His eyes darted around uncomfortably as if looking for the right words. “A thing . . . for . . .”
“Eloquently put, Joshy!” Ethan mocked.
“He has a private schoolgirl fantasy,” he whispered, pressing his lips together and shoving his hands into the pockets of his perfectly pressed pants.
“What?” The conversation had taken a turn I definitely hadn’t expected.
“Like, sexually,” Josh elaborated, looking a little worried.
I rolled my eyes at him. “Yes. Thank you, captain obvious. What the hell does that have to do with me?”
“Seriously?” Ethan couldn’t seem to stop smiling. “You’re basically wearing a school uniform.”
“The knee-high socks.” Josh pointed at my feet.
“The pleated skirt.” Ethan lowered his voice, lightly caressing the fabric at the hem of the skirt in question.
“The white shirt.” Considering we were in public, I was a little surprised when Josh stepped forward and gently tugged at the collar of my shirt.
“The sexy messy hair you have going on, and . . .” Ethan tucked a loose strand behind my ear. They were no longer smiling, the situation having apparently lost its humor. Stupidly, I was fixating on Ethan’s use of the word sexy.
I got there in the end though. “I look like a disheveled private schoolgirl!” I said a little too loudly, and they both chuckled. “Shit!”
I wasn’t sure how to feel. I didn’t want Tyler to think I’d intentionally done this to provoke him. Or did I? Of course I was attracted to him, but I also respected him, and he’d very clearly set this particular boundary from day one.
Before I could continue to unpack the situation, I heard the man in question coming our way, his voice carrying through the building’s front door. We were standing at the bottom of the stairs and off to the side, not immediately visible but close enough to make out his words.
Vital Found (The Evelyn Maynard Trilogy Book 2) Page 13