by Geneva Lee
“22.”
“Seriously?” Brad looked at the rest of the committee. “Why are we even here? If they had met four years ago, they’d have been undergrads. This sounds like two consenting adults to me.”
Heads bobbed across the panel, agreeing with him. I had no memory of who Brad was. He couldn’t have been terribly exceptional if I couldn’t recall training him, but right now I wanted to kiss him. It was reassuring to know someone on the board could still scrounge up an ounce of logic.
“I suppose that Mr. Andrews’ complaint is found to be without merit,” Lauren said through gritted teeth as though the words pained her to say. She’d probably hoped to see me hanged in the public square.
“Talk about a case of sour grapes,” Brad added, shooting Brett a dirty look. “If you want to file a counter-allegation—”
“No!” I held my hand up. “I don’t.”
Brett might deserve it for being a jackass, but to me it felt like I’d snagged a get-out-of-jail-free card. Not only was Brett’s complaint being dismissed, I’d dodged a bullet—one headed straight for my heart. If I’d never gone to Mexico with Cassie, I might be engaged to Brett right now and who knows when he would have finally shown me his true colors. It could have been after I’d married him, I realized. The thought made me sick. But even though I’d escaped that pain, I’d managed to get hurt all the same.
“You’re dismissed,” Lauren said. She didn’t bother to look up from the notes she was making in her folder. She was too busy recording the outcome of the hearing.
Lillian steered me out the door, past both Brett and Roman. I snuck a quick glance at Brett, who was glued to the wall, still glowering. It struck me that he might have actually wanted to see me expelled from school, which was all the proof I needed that he had never loved me. I couldn’t bring myself to look in Roman’s direction. Even though this had been decided in our favor, my last exchange with him still tugged at my heart, threatening to break the still healing organ all over again.
Outside the door my friends were waiting and as soon as we were through I winked at them. Jillian screamed and threw herself on me.
“I couldn’t have lived without you,” she whispered in my ear. She embraced me for a long time, and I tried to draw strength from her. Now that I was in the clear, the reality of my relationship with Roman was setting in. It had never been inappropriate or wrong, but we’d been too caught up in what others felt about it to see that. We’d let it dictate too much of our time together. Now it was too late to see what might have been.
When Jillian finally dropped her vice grip on me, Liam drew her back into his arms and nodded to someone behind me.
“Let’s give them a minute,” Liam suggested, pulling Jillian away. She protested but he didn’t listen.
“If you want me to stay, I will,” Cassie offered, but I shook my head. I could handle talking to my sister alone. She’d gotten me out of this, and she knew everything. It wasn’t a victory that would earn her partnership in her law firm or acclaim, but I needed her to know what it meant to me.
“Thank you,” I said, turning to give her a hug. She squeezed my shoulders and gave me an encouraging smile.
“You have one last person to face,” she whispered. Then she joined my friends, leaving me alone with Roman.
Chapter 26
My friends had deserted me. I considered running, but that wasn’t really my style. The last time I tried it, I’d wound up in Mexico. I needed to stay here and face this. I needed to face Roman and what happened between us, especially if I was ever going to get over him. But as soon as I turned to him, I regretted my bravado. My knees weakened and my stomach flipped over. It was that peculiar combination of happiness and nerves I’d always felt when I ran into an ex for the first time after a break-up. But this wasn’t as simple as hoping he was a mess without me or that he wanted me back. We hadn’t been there for each other. We failed an important test, and there was no coming back.
Roman didn’t look like a mess—much to my chagrin. He looked perfect. Sure there were dark circles under his eyes, but he probably got them staying up late to read, and he’d always looked better when he’d let his 5 o’clock shadow turn into sexy second day scruff. I could have eaten him up with a spoon if I wasn’t frozen to the spot. Instead I stood there, feeling silly and girlish, while I waited for him to say something to me. For him to say anything.
“I assume that was Lillian,” Roman said.
It was the last topic of conversation I expected him to broach, but it was a safe one nonetheless. I was less likely to break down sobbing if we talked about my sister. I smiled as I answered. “The one and only.”
“Why didn’t it occur to us to point out that we were both students?” he asked.
“Because it was too easy of an answer. Lillian makes her living by finding the simplest argument to present to a jury and then intimidating them into buying it,” I reminded him. While the rest of us overanalyzed, worrying about every little decision we made, people like Lillian saw the simple answer that was right under our noses.
“I guess you’re right.” Roman paused, providing me with a clear invitation to change the subject, but I still couldn’t think of anything to say, so he continued, “but maybe part of the attraction was feeling like we were doing something wrong.”
The butterflies in my stomach turned into a hive of pissed off bees. My anger practically wafted off of me. I hadn’t expected that we could fix things, but did he have to make it worse? “Was that it? Tapping a student felt dirty to you?”
“Jess.” Roman’s voice was low with warning. “You know what I meant.”
“No, actually, I don’t. Not anymore. If you really think it was wrong of us to hook up, to, to…” I tried to find the words to describe what had happened between us, but I couldn’t. “…then you’re right, I guess that was part of the attraction.”
“Maybe it was at first,” he said. “You deserve to know that much. A man’s mind isn’t always the most chivalrous place in all the land. But we both know that it’s more than that now.”
“Wrong again,” I said. I didn’t even feel like crying as I confronted him. Instead, I wanted to scream at him or slap him or curse or throw his shoes at him.
Great, I’d turned into Cassie without the fabulous sense of style.
“You know how I feel about you!” His words were angry, passionate and unreserved, and his eyes reflected a stormy interior that he rarely allowed to break through to the surface. I’d glimpsed it before.
“I do?” I asked. It wasn’t a question for me. It was one for him.
“Staying away from you and letting you go through this alone almost killed me. But I had to protect you. I couldn’t let you walk out on everything you worked for here, Jess. I couldn’t let you take the fall so I wouldn’t get in trouble. If I had to lose you—if I had to lose everything—to protect you, I would have.” Roman’s hand shot out and grabbed my wrist, but I tried to wrench free. My anger churned into confusion and I didn’t want him to see it any more than I didn’t want to feel it. The only way to ensure neither of those things would happen was to get away while I still could, but Roman wouldn’t release me.
“You let me walk out on you again,” I said in a cold voice.
“I didn’t want to.” His words were whispered vows. There was no mistaking the truth of them.
When I asked my next question it was in earnest. “Then why did you do it?”
“Because giving you up hurt, but I had to face the idea once before that I’d ruined your dreams. That was one time too many for me. I wasn’t about to let it actually happen. You will graduate college and go to med school and continue to be amazing. But the only way you were going to do that was if I let you walk out that day.”
“What about what I wanted?” I asked. “I could have transferred. I wanted to.”
Roman shook his head as though this was impossible. “I couldn’t let you do that. In fact, I came prepared today in case th
e board found you in violation of the university’s ethics code.”
He thrust an envelope into my hands. I turned it over, but the only thing on it was the school seal.
“It’s a letter of withdrawal. I was going to drop out of this semester of course work. If it came down to me staying at Olympic State or you, I knew exactly who needed to be here.”
“But you just defended your dissertation.”
“Yeah,” he said. “And that’s a collection of pages. It’s nothing compared to you. I will always choose you.”
He had been prepared to abandon his own success for me. The knowledge stuck in my throat, impossible to swallow. If things had gone differently, he would have given it all up for me. We’d avoided that fate, but I couldn’t allow him to risk everything for me again. It wasn’t his job to save me.
“I think it’s too late for that,” I said, willing myself to stay strong.
“I know you’re hurt and I know I’ve screwed up, but I will spend the rest of my life making it up to you.”
My lip quivered, but I bit down on it so he wouldn’t see that I was near tears. “I’m sorry, Roman. I can’t.”
Maybe our relationship was never meant to work. Maybe it wasn’t too late to face facts. I’d been a never-ending source of drama since we got together. He deserved someone better.
“Can’t what, Jessica?” he called after me as I fled from him. “Can’t forgive me or can’t take a chance?”
But this time it wasn’t about can’t. It was about knowing what I should do, which started with letting him go.
Chapter 27
No one asked me what happened when I got back to the apartment. Jillian had occupied us by choosing outfits for our official end of the semester Garrett’s night, which was also going to be an impromptu girls night. No one had asked me what went down with Roman. They hadn’t needed to. Cassie would be here any minute, and with any luck, I’d be too drunk to remember my own name–least of all his—in the next hour.
“You should bring Liam,” I said to Jillian as she tossed a tank top at me.
“No way.” She waved me off like this was no big sacrifice on her part. I knew better.
“He’s leaving for Scotland next week,” I said.
Jillian shot me a bright smile that was a little too Barbie-perfect to be believable. “All the more reason that I need to get used to him not being around.”
I couldn’t think of a thing to say to her. Jillian was in love with him and he was in love with her, and they were about to lose each other because they’d had the bad luck to be born on different continents. The rest of us didn’t stand a chance at happy endings.
“We want you to have a celebration,” Jillian said. “I thought maybe we could boycatch for old times’ sake. I’m an excellent wingman.”
She laughed at this suggestion, bumping my hip as if to urge me to get excited about the prospect, but the idea of bringing home a random guy stabbed me straight through the chest. “Not really feeling that right now.”
“Maybe a rebound is what you need,” Jillian suggested.
“The last time I utilized a rebound guy, it didn’t turn out so well,” I said.
“Maybe some loose change? The guys that belong in the crack of the couch,” Jillian said. “I mean there are always some hot ones at Garrett’s who should be seen and not heard.”
I tried really hard to crack a smile at that one. It definitely would have made me laugh any other night, but right now it felt like I’d been put through the ringer inside out. I wasn’t myself.
“We want you to be happy—whatever it takes,” she promised.
“Just dance with me and make me laugh and make me forget…”
“Forget what?” she asked. She was challenging me, trying to make me see that the only way I was going to get over Roman was by admitting that he’d broken me in the first place. But I wasn’t about to give in that easily.
“That I made a mistake.” I meant it. I was certain of that.
“Did you?” she asked, surprising me.
“I thought I should get over it.” I eyed her with suspicion. She’d gotten increasingly philosophical this year, and I had to admit that with her track record, she knew more about romance than I did.
“I’m just trying to piss you,” she admitted, “so you can see that you’re being stupid. You want to be with Roman. Why are you fighting how you feel about him? I feel like we’ve already had this conversation.”
So did I. I leaned my head against the wall and sighed. “It’s not that simple. He was ready to give everything up for me. He would have dropped out and lost his doctorate. That’s not healthy.”
“That’s love.” Jillian glared at me like this was obvious. “Caring about someone else’s happiness more than your own? Putting them in front of you? It’s like the dictionary definition.”
“Yeah, well, I need to put him first then.” It was the closest I’d come to admitted how I really felt about him.
Jillian opened her mouth but the front door slammed shut and we jumped. Cassie flew into the room a second later. She had half her make-up done-literally. Only one eye had any liner or mascara, and her hair was still in curlers.
“Okay, I need you to just listen to what I have to say before you flip out,” she said, her eyes trained on me. Hearing those words out of Cassie’s mouth was never a good sign. Her personal motto was Freak Out and Panic On.
“I had to turn in a final paper for my Theories of Comm class.”
I nodded, even though I already dreaded where this was going. Roman had ruined communications for me. It was going to be a long hard life without the use of I-statements, but I was done with the subject.
“Anyway,” Cassie continued, “as I was leaving it in Professor White’s box, I overheard the department secretary telling another instructor that Markson was leaving for Puerto Vallarta immediately.”
“So?” I asked. “He’s running away from his problems to Mexico.” It was hardly the first time any of us had done that, but pain shot through me. I’d gotten what I wanted. He was leaving. It didn’t matter that I knew it was for the best—not to my heart.
“No,” Cassie said, shooting me the you-promised-you’d-wait look. “Apparently there’s been a family emergency.”
All the blood rushed out of my head, making me so dizzy I had to sit down waiting for Cassie to recount the rest.
“She didn’t elaborate further than that,” she said instead.
“But you found out the rest, right?” Jillian asked.
My fingernails were in my mouth as I waited for Cassie to confirm what I already knew. They’d be stubs if she didn’t hurry up.
“Of course, I did. This is me we’re talking about,” she said. “I put on my best sweet and concerned student face and asked her if Markson was okay. I may have mentioned he was my favorite teacher, and I was sooooo worried.”
“Nice,” Jillian said. I couldn’t help but notice that Cassie didn’t mind Jillian’s interruptions as much as she seemed to mind mine.
“Jess, it’s his grandmother,” Cassie confessed in a whisper.
I knew that, of course. I’d known since she said he’d gone back to Puerto Vallarta, because Roman had told me he only got down there once a year if he was lucky. If he was going back this soon, something had to be wrong. But the thought of anything happening to Aba…
“Did she know how bad it was?” I asked Cassie.
“She told me she expected he would stay down there until final arrangements had been made.”
A choke escaped my body and I clutched my chest, trying to hold the rest of them back. “She’s dead?”
“I don’t think so,” Cassie said. “But it sounds like it won’t be long. She said Roman would be lucky to make it in time.”
I didn’t think. I was on my feet and in my dresser drawer before Jillian could wrap me in a hug or Cassie could give me any more details.
“What are you doing?” Jillian asked, moving to stand next to m
e as I rummaged through my drawers, tossing underwear on the floor, until my fingers closed over what I was seeking.
I flashed her my passport in response to her question.
“I thought you wanted to let him go,” she reminded me.
“I did!” I said, “and I don’t. He’s…he’s my family. I need to be there.”
Jillian and Cassie said nothing else they simply flew to action helping me pack. All they knew was that I needed their help. They didn’t need to understand how confused I was about Roman. They’d been there themselves. Besides, that was the one thing I could always count on with them. In the end, there were no questions. They were there. Always.
Cassie began rattling off flight times.
“I don’t care which one,” I said, tossing her my credit card. A flight down there would eat up the rest of my available balance, but I knew with absolute certainty that I needed to go. Roman needed me. He’d tried to tell me so this afternoon and I’d ignored him.
“Crap!” I stopped packing and banged my fist into my dresser. “I took my car in for maintenance. We’ll have to go get it.”
“It’s too late. They’ll be closed,” Cassie reminded me. “I’ll need to check the ferry schedule and the sounder.”
I swallowed back a scream of frustration. “I can call a cab.”
“That will cost a small fortune,” Cassie said. “If only I still had Trevor’s credit card.”
“The world would be in another financial crisis if you still had his credit card,” Jillian said as she zipped my suitcase shut. I grabbed it from her and started hauling ass to the living room where I’d left my cell phone.
“It’s called helping the economy rebound,” Cassie argued with her as they followed me into the living room.
“Wait!” Jillian snapped her fingers. “Lillian!”
“I am not calling my sister in on this one,” I said emphatically. She was probably halfway to Seattle.
“She can’t be far,” Jillian said, as she tugged her cell phone out of her pocket. “And luckily, I have her number.”
