“You even had me going and I know never to believe your goofy ass,” he gripes and rolls his eyes at me as he leans against the table.

I chuckle as I gather my notes and tuck them into my thick, leather folder. “It’s twenty-five pages. They’ll get over it—so will you.”

“I, for one, could have used two weeks of extra study time,” he pouts.

Shoving the folder into my messenger bag, I raise an amused brow at him. “Really, Cort? You typed up the rubric and input my notes into Blackboard. Did you really think I’d waste all that work and you’d get off easy?”

He runs a frustrated hand through his overgrown blonde hair and frowns. “Wishful thinking I guess. I’m stressed and have a lot going on right now with my classes—all of which are unloading a crap-ton of assignments at the last minute. But I should have known better with your hard ass.”

I stand and walk over to him and then slap him on the shoulder. “Come on. I’ll take you to dinner, you big baby. I’ll tally the topics as they come in today and tomorrow and then add them to the spreadsheet. You can,” I throw up air quotes and mimic him in a whiny voice, “study.”

He swats me away as he laughs and shoulders his bag. “You’re a prick, Chase. No wonder you can’t keep a girlfriend.”

I flip him off and grab up my messenger bag. “I think you deserve an ‘F’ for that smart-ass comment. Besides,” I tease with a wag of my eyebrows, “They couldn’t handle the Chase.”

He shoves open the classroom door and I follow out after him. “Most women,” he mutters as if he’s the professor and I the student, “prefer to catch the one they’re chasing. You never settle with any of them.”

I scratch the dark scruff along my jawline as I ponder his words. “I stayed with Savannah for a while.”

He scoffs from beside me. “A while? Chase, you dated her for three weeks. The girl had practically planned your wedding and named all your future kids. And when you got bored of her and broke it off, who do you think she pestered for weeks afterward?”

Cort may be my teaching assistant and eight years my junior, but we’ve become pretty good friends. Unfortunately for him, he’s been privy to several hairy breakups. Including Savvy.

“She didn’t pester you,” I laugh and hold open the door that leads outside and to the parking lot.

This time he bellows. “Fucking asshole! She stalked me on Facebook and sent me like fifty-seven messages asking me to ‘talk’ to you. I finally had to block her ass. So yes, she pestered the hell out of me.”

My thoughts turn to Savvy. Sweet, petite, pixie of a woman, Savvy. Her bobbed brunette hair and dimples drew me in. Her neediness and pressure to define our relationship was what drove me away. The woman was great in the sack. It was after we crawled out of bed that things became a problem.

“Maybe I should call her up. Invite her to dinner with us,” I poke at him to see if he’ll bite.

“Do it and I’ll torch your baby,” he threatens, taking my bait.

As we stride through the parking lot, I search for my baby. She’s all curves and gloss. My baby doesn’t whine or complain when I leave the toilet seat up or ask me to call her my girlfriend. In fact, she purrs when I get her all revved up.

“Do it and I’ll torch you.”

He bursts into hysterics as we approach my midnight black with charcoal racing stripes, Dodge Challenger. I bought her new in December—a little present to myself. Her payment is more than my mortgage, but she’s worth it.

“You know,” he muses as we toss our bags into the back and climb in, “maybe I should become a college professor instead. Dr. Murdock drives a six-year-old Toyota Camry with hubcaps and wears stained button downs. You, on the other hand, look like you fell out of a magazine with your model hair and drive a badass car. I wonder if I could convince Mom to skip on my interning with him and change things up a bit. Chicago needs better professors. Who better than fresh from the class of 2015?”

I shake my head ruefully at him and push my key into the ignition. After I turn her over and rev the engine, I glance over at him before putting it in gear. “Considering Dr. Murdock is the partnering psychiatrist at your Mom’s private practice, I don’t think that’d be a good idea. Besides, I like when she invites me to dinner a couple of times a month. She’d kick my ass if I influenced you to switch careers and my home cooked meals would dry up.”

Rolling out of the spot, I lean back against the cherry red leather bucket seat and cruise out of the parking lot. I hang a left onto 59th and head toward our favorite Irish pub, O’Malley’s which sells the best Galway oysters and draft beer.

“Unfortunately, I don’t think my mom would ever cut you off. She says I need a good, male role model in my life.” He growls out the last part with a bitter bite.

I clear my throat and change the subject. Cort has the corner on deadbeat dads. But, he doesn’t like talking about it, and I don’t push. “How’s Blair?”

Glancing over at him, I’m rewarded with a toothy grin. “God, man, she’s amazing. I’m going to marry that girl one day.”

“Did she finally start giving head?” I laugh.

His cheeks redden, but he nods. Lucky bastard. “Like a champ,” he says with a whistle. “But that’s not why. She’s great and I love her.”

Love.

Such an unfamiliar word in my head.

No matter how many times I lecture on the topic of love and mating from a psychological perspective, I have a hard time grasping it in my own head. Aside from my mother, father, and sister, I don’t love anyone. Several girls I dated came close, but it was never more than a lovely infatuation. Never love. Never the all-encompassing, do anything for the other, blinding type of love.

I wonder if I’m even capable.

I wonder if I even deserve it.

Once I thought I was in love and it was torn from me.

Love’s a touchy fucking subject.

“Blair’s a good apple,” I agree, driving out depressing, self-loathing thoughts as I pull into O’Malley’s parking lot. “She’s good for you.”

We climb out and make our way inside the smoky pub. Claudia owns the place and squeals when she sees me walk inside. The fifty-something woman with her horrible blonde dye job painted on her shoulder-length hair bounces over to me, suffocating me with not only her hug but also with her God-awful perfume she no doubt hoarded from the eighties.

“Missed you, handsome,” she gushes and finally releases me. Her brown eyes are dulled from years of drowning her sadness in alcohol. Tiny wrinkles around her heavily rouged lips though, indicate she’s spent the past few years finding happiness again.

I chuckle and flash her a flirtatious grin. “You saw me Saturday, gorgeous. It’s not like I don’t come in here at least once between weekends.”

Her cheeks redden and she waves us over to a booth near a window. “You’re too young to be flirting with an old lady like me. Sit your cute butts down over there and I’ll bring you a couple of tall boys. I’ll have Baxter throw in a batch of fried pickles too.”

Cort rolls his eyes at me as we slide into the booth. He’s used to my effect on every woman I encounter. Claudia’s different than most women, though. She’s a true friend and we understand the pain we each force below our surface, hidden by jokes and smiles.

“Maybe you should hook up with her,” he jests after she scurries off. “That is unless you’ve already hit that. You dirty bastard.”

“She’s my friend, asshole. We’re in the same group that meets each Saturday.” As soon as I blurt out the last bit, I clamp my mouth shut, grinding my teeth into dust and wishing I could erase my words.

He quirks a blonde brow in question, the clever guy not missing a beat. “You ever going to tell me about this group? What is it? A singles group? It can’t be AA because you drink more than me and I’m the college kid.”