Page 6 of Love Me Boldly

Couldn’t blame him there. “You ready for the test then?”

“I’m never ready to listen to that man. Is he even alive?”

I snorted. Dallas wasn’t far off. Sometimes I swore Professor Morgan talked in his sleep and only stayed on his feet by his firm grip on the pedestal he used for his handwritten notes. The man had to have a laptop or computer somewhere, but everything he taught was hand-scribbled messily on a large whiteboard. I started taking pictures at the end of every class so I could decipher his writing on my own time.

We’d gotten stuck with the hardest professor and the professor with the worst personality. He was dry as campfire wood in a drought, which only made staying awake for Derivatives and Financial Risk Management more difficult.

Ironically, I hated math. Finance degrees were not only highly employable, but careers with the degree not only made decent money but also came with a high percentage of stability. They were the only two requirements I had for a career. I didn’t care what I did, as long as I made enough to someday have my own home and not worry about fighting for government assistance or worse, going without.

We headed up the stairs together. Dallas and I weren’t close, but we’d had dozens of classes together, and the older we got, the classes shrunk, which meant we’d been in small group assignments and projects multiple times over the years.

“Any plans this weekend?” he asked as reached the top floor.

I opened my mouth to answer and then froze. Dallas didn’t realize I was still stuck on the top step until he was five steps away.

“Holly?” He glanced at me over his shoulder and then shifted his gaze to what—or rather, whom—had snagged my attention.

Graham.

“What are you doing here?” My feet remembered how to work at the same time my mouth did, and I took one step toward him.

Graham was leaning back against the wall, one booted foot propped against it. His arms were crossed, but our school’s NCWU logo was plainly stamped in bright yellow against the forest green sweatshirt.

“You didn’t answer your phone.” He shrugged and gave me a look like it was possible the very idea of not calling him back or answering any of his dozen texts had simply slipped my mind. In the last month, probably more, since I met him, Graham hadn’t only somehow secured my phone number—something I was blaming Tracey for even though she swore she didn’t give it out—and had taken to texting. Calling. After his first dozen texts asking me how I was went unanswered, he switched courses. Now, the unanswered text threads from him had dozens of memes and even more TikToks. Most were stupid animal videos.

Almost all of them made me laugh.

He’d clearly never heard of the termghosting.

“I figured you’d get what that meant eventually.” I grabbed the straps of my backpack and rocked back on my heels.

“You coming, Holly?”

I glanced at Dallas, who stayed standing where I left him, glancing between the two of us. Clearly, he’d heard. “I’m good. Save me a seat.”

Dallas gave one last lingering look toward Graham and then left.

“Is he the reason you haven’t called me back?” Graham’s gaze was on Dallas’s back and stayed there until he opened the door to our classroom.

A half dozen other students headed down the hall toward us and the stairs that I was blocking, so I was forced to step closer to him.

Or run.

I preferred not to show fear. I made the step toward Graham.

He smelled like spring mountaintops and warm sun. Clean and fresh and my favorite time of year.

“He’s none of your business.” It came out harsher than I intended, and I sighed. I was used to being alone, but I wasn’trude. “And no. Maybe I’m not interested. Have you considered that?”

“No, actually, that thought hadn’t crossed my mind.” There was that boyish grin again. It did funny things to my stomach and to my common sense.

I tightened my grip on my straps so I didn’t reach out and flick a lock of his hair out of his eye.

“What do you want?”

The guy was relentless. He clearly wanted my attention. I was certain he’d been only looking for a fun time, but he hadn’t given up. And now he was in front of me, looking all shameless and cute.

And somehow…he knew exactly where I’d be.

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