And then she spoke, and just when I’d thought I’d emptied myself out for her, she yanked the rest from me.

“Why me? Why’d you tell me all of this? I don’t see you going to lunch with the other professors; you don’t appear to be close to any students. No one else at school seems to know what happened with you. Why tell me?”

“Because I like you.”

I wanted to fucking disappear as soon as I said the words. I’d meant to fob her off and instead I’d put it all out there. And even worse, as soon as I said it, I realized how true it was. It wasn’t just about sex anymore. I did like her and I had no clue how the hell that had happened. I’d definitely never meant to like her.

This was so fucked-up.

Her cheeks colored at my announcement and another wave of embarrassment sucker punched me. I waited for the polite dismissal I definitely deserved, but she stayed silent, nailing inscrutable.

“What happened with your fiancé?” I asked again, returning to her earlier announcement, needing to shift the focus off of me, not ready to expound on I like you, not sure I even had more to say. I hadn’t even worked out my answer and I definitely didn’t like the way she sat there studying me. She might have been twenty-three, but she had old eyes. Scarily perceptive eyes.

“He cheated on me,” she answered, her voice soft. She looked away from me, staring down at her hands and something clenched in my stomach.

Fuck.

If I’d wanted to put some distance between us, mission accomplished.

“What happened?”

“I found him having sex with his best man in the changing room of the church on our wedding day. I was nervous; I think I knew things weren’t right between us, and I went to talk to him before the ceremony.” She let out a sad laugh. “I don’t even know why I went or what I was looking for. I think I just hoped that he would make me feel better about everything. That he’d convince me that we were meant to be together. But the second I caught them together that was it. I found out he was gay and they were in love. I called off the wedding.”

Jesus.

“My father tried to spin it—reelection season and all that—but that stupid Capital Confessions blog got ahold of the story and we’ve been plagued with gossip ever since.” She looked up and met my gaze, her voice strained. “So I do know a little something about having your dirty laundry aired for the world to see.”

“It’s not entirely the same, though. What happened to you wasn’t your fault. What happened to me was mine.”

“I don’t know. I keep thinking I should have realized something was off. That if I’d paid more attention, if I’d been honest with myself, I would have known. I should have known. Who misses something like that?”

“It’s not your fault.”

She shrugged. “Regardless, it stayed with me. He was at my parents’ party. I owe you thanks for that, by the way.”

“What did I do?”

“You distracted me. I was so nervous about seeing him and, at the end of the day, I didn’t even think about it.”

“After all that, your parents invited him to their party?”

“Wealthy donors with deep pockets are hard to come by,” she answered, her voice quiet.

“Your father’s an asshole.”

“Yeah. He kind of is. When the engagement fell apart my parents sort of lost it.”

“They were pissed at you?”

“They aren’t big on scandal. Ironic given everything that’s happened with my father lately. The wedding was supposed to be a PR opportunity right before the election. Camelot and all that. I sort of ruined the image. Law school was a compromise.”

It sounded like less of a compromise and more like her trying to fulfill everyone’s expectations of her.

“You’re not close?”

“Let’s just say things with my family are complicated.”

“More complicated?”

She nodded. “I’m guessing you also missed the news that my father had an extramarital affair and fathered a child?”

Jesus.

Maybe it was how spectacularly I’d fucked up my own life, but I was impressed by her ability to keep her shit together in spite of all that drama.

“You always seem like you have everything together. Grace under fire and all that.”

She shook her head. “Trust me, it’s not necessarily what it looks like.”

“It’s exactly what it looks like. Other people would probably lose their shit in the face of all the things you’ve dealt with. Not to mention, your first semester of law school can be its own brand of hellish torture. You’re doing really well. You should be proud.”

Blair

I didn’t feel like it. In fact, lately it felt like all I heard was all the ways I was fucking up. His words meant a lot more than I thought they would.

Each one loosened something in me, and I moved closer to him without even realizing it, as though I wanted the comfort he gave me, our bodies inches away from each other.

His eyes darkened, heat blasting back at me. I swallowed, my stomach tight, waiting to see what he would do next.

Everything about him screamed bad idea. I’d just ended a relationship with a guy who cheated on me on my wedding day, had seen the devastation my father’s infidelity had caused. Had seen firsthand how power and greed could wreck lives. The last thing I needed or wanted was more baggage, especially someone dealing with some dark stuff I wasn’t equipped to handle. And he was my law professor. I needed to keep reminding myself of this.

“I want you,” he whispered, the confession sending another tremor through my body.

Fuck.

It was the whisper that did me in. There were so many tones to his voice and they each showed a different facet of his personality. The professor gave me arrogance delivered with cold, clipped words. The man who was surprisingly easy to talk to gave me patience and even laughter. And the man who looked at me now like he wanted to strip my clothes from my body and fuck me in the backseat of his car gave me whispers throbbing with temptation, sex, and promise.

I closed my eyes, rooted to the spot where our flesh met. Bound by his hand and his words. This was a moment for whispers, a moment when the images we showed the rest of the world were replaced by the people we were underneath all of the pretense and civility.

This was madness. Undeniable madness.

I didn’t know if it was the dance, or the kiss, or all of the restlessness that had been building inside me for months—Thom, law school, this crazy arousal that hummed in my veins—but sensible had gone out the window. I was so sick of playing it safe, of hiding behind a mask that sucked the life out of me more and more each day.

“Why me?” My voice shook as I pushed the words out.

I needed to understand; some secret, dark part of me wanted to hear him say he felt the same way I did, that I wasn’t the only one who had completely and utterly lost control.

I’d never had a lot of power with men. I saw how Jackie was with Will—all she had to do was look at him, and he would do anything for her. He was hooked by her and she by him.

Even before I’d found out why my fiancé didn’t seem all that into me, I’d known he wasn’t hooked by me. He was sweet, and—I’d thought—loyal, and things had been easy between us. We hadn’t been the type of couple to get into fights or break up a lot. We hadn’t cared enough to. He hadn’t cared enough about me. I saw the virtue of easy, but sometimes easy was lazy, and in that moment, I didn’t want easy.

I wanted a man who would walk over glass for me, a man who would care enough to fight for me. I wanted a man who would work for me, so my gaze narrowed as I made him work for it.

Gray shook his head, breaking the connection between us. His voice was sandpaper sliding over my electrified, sensitive skin.

“I don’t know.”

I forced myself to look at him, nowhere near satisfied with his explanation. He’d given me easy—a boy’s answer—and he was all man.