The image of professor Black’s rain-streaked face glaring at her to get in the car sprung back to the forefront of her mind. For some reason, Everly couldn’t help but think, did the professor ever smile? Looking at the charmingly wicked smile from the man in front of her now, she wondered if the serious professor could ever smile like that.
“Actually he…”
“Hi Zane,” the simultaneous feminine chorus from two girls at the doorway of the break room interrupted them.
Quickly, the charming smile on Zane’s face disappeared as he turned and gave the two girls a hard look of evident annoyance. Just as intended the look worked like an immediate repellent sending the girls scurrying away. Astonished, Everly watched him coolly turn back around towards her, relaxing back into his easy smile.
“I’m sorry about that darling,” he drawled as if nothing happened. “What were you going to say about your grouchy teacher…”
The harsh beeping from the walkie-talkie hanging from his thick cargo pants went off.
“Zane pickup,” a man’s voice called out through the walkie-talkie.
The whispered oath underneath his breath made her eyes widen. Even after two years of being out in the real world, the secular world, Everly still had to stop herself from blushing at people cursing.
The beeping stopped. Neither one said anything.
Looking at him expectantly Everly waited. Zane sighed in annoyance, his face hardening again at the interruption, snatching the walkie-talkie from his clip he answered the call.
“What?!” He answered brusquely, reminding any and all listening with his tone alone that he didn’t like to be interrupted during his break.
Looking at her own watch as he spoke, Everly began to clean up the remainder of her lunch. Stepping up to the counter she began to pour the water for her usual customary tea she had at the end of lunch every day. Finishing his call, Zane snapped the walkie talkie back onto his clip.
“Hey don’t you dare leave, I know you still have ten minutes left,” he stood up from the chair, now at his full height he gave her a challenging smirk, daring her to argue. “I’ll be right back.”
“But…” She began to say that she really did need to head back, but he cut her off as he walked to the door turning to give her a devastatingly handsome smile over his shoulder.
“If you leave, I will just find you at your desk,” he threatened in nearly a sing-song tone, just as he left the room.
Sighing she turned back around and stared at the electric tea kettle in mild annoyance. Zane knew she hated it when he came to her desk to pester her, meaning she had no choice but to wait now. The looks she got from her boss when the tall handsome construction worker was around were highly unpleasant, not to mention the green-eyed looks she received from her fellow female coworkers.
“Hey Everly, you seen Zane around? His boss Todd is looking for him.” Turning around to the familiar voice, Everly had to force herself to smile politely at the young man.
Taylor Lancombe was the bank’s young incompetent security guard. With a town filled with affluent families and equally rich-spoiled kids and virtually no real crime, Taylor’s position was more for decoration and errand running rather than security. The lean sun-tanned kid with unprofessionally long snow-boarder hair was the perfect example of the youth in the well-to-do ski town. Taylor was the guy who spent his summers down in California surfing and his winters back home snowboarding and the off-season working a job nepotism surely landed him.
“Yes, he just left,” though she was certain he had to have seen Zane leave down the long hallway.
“Ah, okay then,” pushing back his long hair in the same practiced move she had observed him use on the other girls, Taylor stepped further inside the small break room.
Without Zane’s large presence in the small break room, it felt barren and isolated without his dominating aura.
Hearing the ding of the electric tea kettle, letting her know the water was boiling, Everly turned her back to Taylor hoping he would leave. Grabbing her cup with her teabag already in place she began to pour the steaming liquid.
“Hey let me ask you something,” Everly could hear Taylor’s voice come closer behind her. “I’ve been wondering ever since I heard they hired a pregnant chick, who is the daddy? Does he live around here?”
The flash of panic immediately caused her hands to shake and the scalding water to splash against her hand holding the cup. With a painful cry, she dropped the porcelain cup from her burned hand, shattering into pieces in the metal sink. Holding her burned hand close she tried to fight back the tears from the pain.
“Shit!” Taylor panicked as he came around in front of her. “Why did you…”
“What the fuck!” Zane’s thundering voice from the doorway stilled both of them, even despite her pain.
Striding towards her in long angry steps he wrapped his rough fingers around her wrists and forced her hand under the icy water of the faucet he flipped on with his other hand.
“I don’t know what happened, man, I swear!” Taylor began to defend himself to the obviously enraged superior male in the room. “I was just…”
Still holding her red hand under the icy water, Zane shot Taylor the coldest look she had ever seen over his shoulder, shutting the security guard up immediately.
“I heard what the fuck you said,” he snarled through gritted teeth. The large warm hands cupping hers beneath the water tightened around hers in anger. “Get the fuck out of my sight Taylor.”
Zane had her corralled and practically enveloped between his large muscular arms as he held her to the sink. She couldn’t see Taylor, but she could hear his footsteps as he obediently began to walk back towards the door.
“Oh, and Taylor,” the vibrations from Zane’s chest infused themselves to her back, shaking her whole body. “Don’t ever speak to her again, do you understand me?”
The frightening, unspoken threat to his tone made her want to immediately answer herself for the scared boy.
Nervously Taylor’s stammered a reply. “Yes, I understand.”
The quick retreating steps told her they were alone now.
With her heart pounding and her hand now numb from the icy water Everly tried pulling her hand out of his grasp, but Zane only held her tighter.
“That fucking idiot,” he muttered under his breath as he examined her hand closer. “It doesn’t look too bad,” he was speaking to her now. “But I want you to keep ice on it. Just wait a second.”
Turning to the fridge, she watched him with wide-eyes as he clawed at the ice along the sides of the over-iced freezer with his bare hand. Crumbling under the pressure of his strong fingers, Zane scooped the ice into her old empty carrot Ziploc bag.
“Keep that ice on it for the rest of the day darling,” though his words were softer she could still see the muscles in his neck flex with his lingering anger.
The playful charming man she had come to know wasn’t standing in front of her right now. Looming in front of her seemed like a different man altogether, a more threatening man. The type of man women in her community warned girls about, a predatory man. Zane just proved to both her and Taylor just how scary he could be if provoked. Maybe, even possibly the type of man who was quite capable of luring and deceiving young women just like her mother warned her about. A man like Peter was, maybe.
Wincing at the mere thought of the man that betrayed her, Everly looked at Zane with an assessing eye. No longer wearing his thick construction jacket, Zane stood towering over her in a simple white long sleeve shirt and khaki cargo pants. The strength in his powerful figure was more than evident by the way his muscles moved beneath the clinging fabric with each motion. This man wasn’t just the harmless joking man she thought him to be. No, this was a wolf in sheep’s clothing, and no matter how nice he was, he had the potential for danger. And that was a factor she couldn’t even risk being too friendly with, especially with someone as charming as Zane. One disastrous mistake with a man was
plenty for her, Everly refused to take that risk again.
Averting her gaze from his keen narrowing gaze she accepted the ice with a quiet “thank you.” Turning back to walk to her office she didn’t dare look back to those piercing blue eyes.
That night, after finally getting home through the falling snow and traffic, she peeled off her boots at the door and flopped onto the bed, jacket and all.
Golden Creek, Colorado was the polar opposite of the small town in Tennessee she grew up in, they got snow there but nothing on the level of Colorado. Slowly sitting up she began to stiffly work off her jacket, she needed to take a shower, but all she really wanted to do was crawl under the covers and go to sleep. With one arm over her eyes, she silently thanked God tomorrow was Saturday, and she was off.
Turning to her side she snuggled the pillow closer, catching a glimpse of her bandaged hand, reminding her of Taylor’s insensitive words. Grimacing at the memory of her own reaction she turned deeper into the pillow’s smothering softness. Ever since she moved here, she had been trying to forget Peter, to forget the man that broke her heart and forced her to start her life all over again as a single mother to be.
But every day she was getting a little better, the pain was slowly being replaced by anger, and the memories of his sweet sounding lies were fading. Soon, she would forget all about him and then maybe one day she would open her heart and take a chance on another man again.
Chapter 3
There was nothing she didn’t like about her Saturdays, everything about them was great. The college library was virtually empty, giving her free, unlimited, and uninterrupted access to their top-of-the-line computers. Growing up in her small, insulated community she only had access to a library computer that was nearly older than her. Being able to work on the large pristine dual monitor before her now was a pure pleasure.
Wearing a pair of dark jeans and a pink cream cable knit sweater, she sat cross-legged in the large leather office chair. With her work pulled up on one screen she used the second monitor for her music and her instant messenger.
The dinging of the message notification sounded off through her headphones. Looking to the first screen, she smiled at the message.
2Blackhearts: So, what’s on the agenda today?
Pulling the keyboard closer in her lap Everly responded.
AdamantEve: update the blog. Scan the pictures. Clean and edit scanned photos and try not to get distracted by the Internet.
2Blackhearts: Don’t worry I will jump on every fifteen minutes or so, to crack the whip to make sure you’re working.
Laughing silently Everly focused back at the scene she was editing on the other screen. Five years ago, she started an online comic in secret. A futuristic story based on her life set in a secluded space station far out in the lonely depths of space. At first, the artwork simply started as personal drawings she uploaded online for her own cataloging purposes. Secular artwork was forbidden in her household, especially work considered a personal diary of sorts. A diary that expressed all of her fears, anger, and dreams. Throwing away the pieces she created hurt just to think about, however, continuing the risk of hiding them in her crowded household was simply not possible. Scanning and uploading the work under a pseudonym AdamantEve gave her freedom and a sense of control she never once experienced in her household. The popularity however, was completely unexpected; the comments, donations, and overall love she received from her work kept her motivated to share more.
Switching out the paper in the scanner she replaced it with another for upload, an emotional scene with her main character arguing with one of her mothers. The inside world of the taboo polygamist family really captivated her followers. It was a world very few people heard of much less experienced. Growing up, Everly and all of her siblings were taught that nonbelievers were simply unenlightened lost souls doomed to live their life in ignorance and these people would never understand their upbringing. Multiple mothers, scores and scores of siblings, and the harsh abuse under the guise of strict religion was something her fans loved to read about in her comic.
Especially 2Blackhearts. Around the time she moved to Golden Creek, Everly started getting funny messages daily from the fan. At first, they simply discussed the comic and the direction she was taking it, but it didn’t take long for the quirky messages to become a favorite part of her day.
2Blackhearts: you better not be wasting time on that useless digital hoarding site Pinnster.com again….You know the one you got me shamelessly hooked on.
AdamantEve: I will have you know that I just finished my fifth picture out of ten, so there!
2Blackhearts: Sure sure. Oh, did you listen to that last album as instructed?
AdamantEve: It’s actually playing right now and you were right by the way, it’s amazing.
2Blackhearts: You are damn right I am. Linkin Park’s Hybrid Theory is a work of art and a right-of-passage I could not let you just go through life without it. God there is so much to catch you up on, I’m still debating if I should introduce you to rap next up and if so which album. There are just so many things to consider…
AdamantEve: LOL well I will let you get back to that important decision.
Dear God that girl’s head was all over the place Everly thought with a laugh. One minute 2blackhearts could be dead serious, complaining about her decision to change her major from illustration to business management or the next she was joking and sending her funny pictures. Everly liked talking to the mysterious girl, it was fun and easy and there was absolutely no pressure to delve into her personal history like other persistent fans have wanted her to do in the past.
Noisy rapid beeps coming from the scanner followed by a vague but ominously worded error message on the screen halted the steady work pace she had going. Restarting the scanner, closing and opening the program, even rebooting the computer did nothing to stop the error or stop the annoying beeping, all it did was make her want to scream. Leaning back in the chair with a groan, Everly stared daggers at the stupid piece of machinery. Out of all the days to mess up, it chose her off day to do it.
Leaning to the side, she peered around the computer and saw that the lab assistant’s desk, was empty—as usual. Frustrated she grabbed her pen off the desk and began clicking it furiously as she tried to think of another solution.
“Having problems?” The familiar rough textured voice startled her in her chair.
Turning, Everly looked up to see Dr. Black standing next to her desk giving her an inquisitive look with one dark eyebrow slightly arched.
God, why was he here? She did not want to see him. Standing next to her chair his waist came up to her head forcing her to lean back to look up his long body and up to his stern set face. The man probably took showers and went to bed with that serious look she thought. Today he was wearing pretty much the same thing she always saw him in, a pair of dark jeans and a dark top. Though she did admit as she turned her face back to her computer screen, the dark pullover sweater he was wearing today was much different than the starched long-sleeved button-down shirt he normally wore to class. The knitted sweater clung to his torso, sinfully so, highlighting the muscular bulge of his biceps and his narrow waist on his large athletic frame.
“Ummm yes,” keeping her eyes focused on the error message on her screen she avoided his searching glacial gaze. “The scanner keeps giving me…”
The sudden pressure on the back of her chair as he leaned one hand on the headrest of her chair and one hand on her desk caused her to unintentionally swivel back to facing him. Much closer to her now, he caged her in as he casually leaned closer letting her inhale the earthy scent of his very subtle cologne.
“I know we are in a library Everly,” God her name sounded so different when he said it. The rugged pitch of his voice made her name sound like no way she had ever heard of before— nor any way she ever wanted to hear it again. “But you and I are the only ones here, so you have my special permission to speak up.”
The pr
ofessor’s deep blue eyes pinned her to her chair, waiting patiently, as if he had all the time in the world for her to respond. Uncomfortably, she shifted at his overwhelming closeness.
“I was saying,” she began louder this time, trying to ignore his steady gaze. “The scanner stopped working and there is no lab assistant here to fix it.”
“Then let me take a look,” grabbing a nearby chair the professor pulled it next to hers before sliding the keyboard out from under her hands.
Sitting stone still, Everly tried to ignore the anxious feeling that instantly sprung to life inside of her stomach. This was terrible, this was the second time she reacted this way around a man, first with Zane and now with Dr. Black. Trying her best to focus on the screen in front of her, Everly unwillingly let her eyes fall on the massive shoulders next to her and she felt her pulse quicken. Was it just large men that she had the problem with? Why was she feeling this nervous around men now? It had to be their size, what else could it be she thought, never before had she felt so anxious around men. It was true she had never been around very many men in her life but it was especially true she never been around such obviously fit and powerful men like Zane or her professor.
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