Page 82 of The Assist
I shake my head. “That isn’t accurate, and even if it were, I’m not yours to protect anymore.”
My words cause him to frown and step back. “See you tomorrow,” he says and gives me a salute.
I bite my tongue as Joel’s car stops in front of the house. He waves from the driver’s seat. I don’t miss the grimace on Wes’s face as he slumps into the seat. His foot has to be killing him.
The next morning, I sneak out an hour early to avoid any possible Wes run-ins and hole up in my new cubicle at the tutor center. I’m teaching my first workshop on goal setting and career planning today and, though the timing sucks with my peers all having seen me naked recently, I’m excited.
My excitement is short lived.
“That’s it. Thank you so much for coming.” The words are barely out of my mouth before the three people who stumbled in run for the door. I dig around in my backpack for a stray Spree. Certainly surviving that is cause for a reward. I exit the classroom, flipping off the light and pushing the door open with a hip, and stumble into a wall of muscle and my backpack lands with athudnext to a black boot.
Wes leans down and scoops up my bag.
Fingers brushing as I take it from him, I manage a mumble of thanks.
“How’d it go?”
“Only three people showed up. Luckily, they seem to be the only three people on campus who haven’t seen me naked.”
He pulls a bag of Chewy Spree seemingly from thin air, and I salivate like a dog in one of those Pavlovian experiments. “Now, how could you rephrase that to better represent your achievements instead of focusing on the things you can’t control?”
I balk, staring at him, delicious candy not forgotten but temporarily moved to second position of things of interest.
“You were listening?”
He shrugs. “We spent a lot of time together, some of what you said was bound to stick.”
I quirk an eyebrow and cross my arms over my chest. “What are you doing here?”
He looks down at his shoes before meeting my eyes. “I wanted to make sure you were okay.”
“I already told you, I’m fine.” I move to step around him, but he’s quicker and sidesteps with me.
“Also, I wanted to apologize again. Not for what happened with David. For everything before. I acted like an ass.”
“Apology accepted.” I take another step around him, but he cuts me off and shakes the bag of candy above my head.
I sigh. “Three people showed up today. That’s three more people that I’ve helped and three people who might tell their friends.”
“Good job.” He pats my head. I’d love to be offended, but the goofy smile on his face makes him look young and carefree. Like the Wes I fell in love with.
I swipe the Sprees from his hand. We walk out of the university building together. I can feel him watching me, but he doesn’t say anything.
“How’d you find me?”
He waves a hand as if it isn’t a big deal, but there is a pleased grin on his face. “I follow all the happenings of the career resource center.” His expression falls. “Actually, I probably should stop in now that it’s time to start thinking about what I’m going to do after graduation.”
“Where are you headed next?” I ask after he goes silent.
He points to Moreno Hall. “I have macroeconomics.”
I scrunch my nose.
“Eh, it’ll be fine. The professor doesn’t mind if I sleep through class like Professor O’Sean.”
“It’s infuriating that you can sleep through and still manage to get an A.”
“Wasn’t so infuriating when I was saving your ass from failing.”
