Page 64 of Give In

Moving quick, I jerked my head and shoulders forward like I was about to attack.

And he flinched, moving enough for me to walk through the doorway without shrinking myself.

In all I’d said, it was his flinch that’d haunt him.

Which was why, despite the fact I’d missed Damien’s deadline and had likely just thrown my job out the window, I was grinning as I changed and packed my bag.

When I was done, I found one of the more professional bouncers and asked him to walk me to my car. As soon as I stepped outside, I scanned the parking lot, but I knew.

Damien was gone.

I shivered, though it wasn’t because of the bone-deep cold that swirled around me. It was the adrenaline crash and disappointment that left me shaking.

Driving home, I tried to convince myself it was for the best. All of it. If I was fired, it’d make leaving easier. With Damien, there was a crazy chemistry between us—a pull we both felt—but we couldn’t seem to get it together. We frustrated and infuriated each other.

Hurteach other.

Our dysfunctional pendulum kept swinging.

With as many thoughts as I had running through my head, I still wouldn’t allow myself to think about what he’d done to me that afternoon. Or more specifically, my reaction to it.

It would be like holding a mirror up to a locked away part of my soul, and I wasn’t ready to see that reflection.

Exhausted and wrung raw, I curled into bed that night.

Sleep was elusive.

But the feeling of isolation was suffocating.

Chapter Fifteen

Saint’s Horns

Damien

“Why?”

Eden’s gaze shot up from the notebook in her lap. Her lips were parted, and her narrowed eyes guarded. “What?”

I tapped one of the papers she had spread on my desk. “Why was there such a marked trend toward a pragmatic approach to politics? What influenced that change?”

There was a flash of surprise—relief, maybe—in her wide eyes that she quickly concealed by looking down to jot a note in the paper’s margin.

Eden had cancelled the independent studies meeting we’d had scheduled for the beginning of that week, which hadn’t been a surprise. She’d still come to class, though for all intents and purposes, she’d been absent. Pulled into herself, she hadn’t seemed to be listening. I’d have called on her to answer questions, but I hadn’t wanted to put her on the spot if she’d been as lost in her head as she’d appeared.

I’d written lengthy feedback on work, treating her as though she were any other student when she wasnot.

She’d yet to mention the change, though I hadn’t expected her to.

Just as I hadn’t anticipated her keeping our Friday meeting. Thankfully, I’d waited because she’d shown right on time.

She hadn’t looked nervous when she’d knocked on the door. Her expression, tone, and words were all professionally cold.

Wrong.

It wasn’t until we’d dug into her research that her sky-blue eyes had glowed with life. Her graceful movements and passion had increased as I’d challenged her research ideas.

We talked for a few more minutes before her eyes landed on the clock and her shoulders tightened.

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