Velvet Kisses

  “Then why did you do it?” Just when I didn’t think I could feel any more indignity my barometer goes up a notch.

  “The truth?” She closes her eyes and dispels a heavy breath. “I thought you might come by to get your briefcase, and I didn’t know if I’d have a chance to go over it.”

  “Keeping it around for some light reading?”

  “I wanted to see what you were getting yourself into. I swear I was going to burn it. I just never got around to it.”

  “Did you have anything to do with that article?” For the first time in weeks, I’m starting to open up to other possibilities, other people to blame, and my adrenaline skyrockets because finally there seems to be a resolution to this nightmare that I can sink my teeth into.

  “No.” She spits it out emphatic, so convincingly she kills my building buzz.

  “I’m not so sure.” I take the paperwork and head out the door.

  Every part of me screams go home, but I head over to Whitney Briggs, instead.

  There’s a coed I think I’m finally ready to speak with.

  Claim to Fame, Walk of Shame

  Marley

  Annie keeps murmuring I love you into the phone to Blake. If she says no, you hang up, one more time I’m going to take her phone and plunge it into the toilet. I couldn’t care less about the plumbing in Prescott Hall. I get it. Annie and Blake are happy. Baya and Bryson are happy. Izzy and Holt are happy, blah, blah, blah. And they will all live annoyingly happily ever after. And here I sit broken and alone—let’s not forget cursed.

  A gentle knock erupts at the door. Annie and I both freeze and stare at one another as if a serial killer just arrived in the most polite manner. It’s probably just Baya. I jump up and look through the peephole.

  A familiar, vexingly sexy, hotter-than-a-house-fire face of a man stands on the other end, and I can’t catch my breath.

  “Oh, my, God!” I hiss to Annie. “It’s him! It’s Wyatt!” I shoo her into the bathroom, and she’s happy to comply.

  “Who is it?” I try to play it cool as if a stranger knocking on the door at ten-thirty is just something we live with here on campus.

  “It’s me, Wyatt.” He rumbles low, and my hand touches the door as if it were his skin.

  There are so many things I want to say, so much went wrong so fast. I have a feeling there aren’t enough words in the dictionary to convey how much hurt I’ve caused him—even if it wasn’t me who published that stupid article. I have my suspicions, namely an ex who I happened to have emasculated less than twenty-four hours prior to the debacle, but he’s been just as good at denying it as I am.

  “Can I come in?” Wyatt’s warm voice vibrates through the door.

  I want to say yes! I want to fling the door open and ravage him, but something in me hesitates. Maybe letting him in is just another error in a long line of mistakes. I’ve already caused him so much pain. I’m horrified at what’s happened between us.

  My finger clasps the knob, and I crack it open slowly.

  “Do you come brandishing weapons?” I see him for the first time with the naked eye, in what feels like forever, and that sweet spot between my legs pulsates in response. A heavy groan rises up my throat, but I forcibly swallow it down. Wyatt James is gorgeous in a way that makes my bones ache.

  “Not unless you count my smile.” He pushes out an easy grin that dissipates as quick as it came.

  “Come in,” I whisper, stepping aside as his woodsy cologne saturates my senses.

  He turns to say something, but I stop him. My arms find themselves wrapped around his body like some autonomic response I can no more control than breathing.

  Wyatt. His hard body is pressed against mine, solid and warm, alive—his beating heart thumping over mine like a prayer.

  I pull back, my vision blurred with tears. “I didn’t do that to you, Wyatt. I would never in a million years do something so deplorable. That was Will. He took what I wrote and changed the details. That was his name, not yours. I don’t know how he published it, but he must have stolen my password. It was easy enough for him to hack. I swear to you, I would never dare hurt you like that. I would never say those horrible things about you. I’m sorry for all the pain I’ve caused.”

  Wyatt’s eyes explode in crimson tacks. “So am I subject number two?” He gives a wry smile.

  “Yes.” I swallow hard, glancing down at our conjoined chests a moment. “And no. I’ve decided to scrap the memoir. I don’t plan on expanding my database any further,” I whisper that last part, thick with shame.

  “Okay.” He closes his eyes for a moment. “I just wanted to let you know I found a copy of our contract in Monica’s house.”

  “Who’s Monica?” An entire array of girls scroll through my mind, but I still can’t seem to place the name.

  “Professor Nicholson. We used to date. We were pretty serious.”

  I pull back a notch as my mouth drops open. “It all makes sense. And here I thought she hated me for no reason.” I shake my head. “She’s been saying these snippy things to me all semester. Wait—why would she have a copy of the contract?”

  Oh, God. I bet Wyatt has penned a million of those demented documents. No wonder he came up with it so quickly. He was simply pulling it out of the drawer—using some boilerplate contract he outlined years ago.

  I clear my throat. “Just how many of these documents have you been party to?” No wonder he voluntarily had himself tested for STDs. It was probably a routine visit!

  His chest bucks with a silent laugh. “Just the one with you, sweetheart.” He says it a little more curt than expected. “Monica took my briefcase by mistake one night at the Black Bear. She rifled through it and made herself a copy for God knows what reason—bedtime reading.” He winces. “I don’t know what’s going on.” A pained smile comes and goes. “All I know is that I miss you fiercely, Marley. I miss you so much it hurts more than I can stand. And, on top of that, I’m not sure what to believe.”

  My breathing picks up until I’m panting right over him. His mouth is so close it’s like holding back a granite wall not to kiss him.

  “I swear on all that is holy I didn’t publish that horrible article.”

  Wyatt bears into my eyes as if vetting me for an inkling of dishonesty. I’d swear on my mother’s precious life, on a pile of Bibles that stack to the moon if he wanted me to.

  “Okay, Marley.” He gives a single nod. “I think I need to go and clear my head.”

  “Please don’t go. I can’t stand to be apart from you. Without you in my life, every day feels barren—empty. I can’t bear another hollow hour. I need you in my life, Wyatt. I’m begging you, don’t shut me out.” There. For once in my life I shed my feelings—easy as breeching a dam. Now if only he accepts what I had to say, we can finally move on. And that would be a miracle. Nothing ends well for me—ever. I’m not sure why I thought this might be the exception.

  “Thank you for those words.” Wyatt rubs his thumb over my cheek with a pained look in his eyes as if he were trying to wipe away some incurable wound. “I needed to hear them. I think I’d better go and try to figure things out. How about we meet tomorrow afternoon? We can go for a hike near the Witch’s Cauldron?”

  “Yes.” A flood of relief takes over as I exhale for the first time in weeks. “I would love that.” My arms cinch around his body ten times tighter than before. My lips demand to crash to his, but I hesitate. If I start I won’t know how to stop. I want to do everything right, and if that means waiting until tomorrow to lose myself in Wyatt then so be it.

  He gives a careful nod as if agreeing before heading out into the night.

  He’s back.

  Wyatt is back in my life, and I’ll do whatever it takes to get to the bottom of the catastrophe that put a wedge between us—even if it means getting kicked out of Whitney Briggs.

  * * *

  “What good is another article going to do?” Annie keeps pace with Baya and me as we head to class. “And,
I’m sorry to remind you, but they kicked you off the paper.”

  “I know, I know. I just think I need to get my side of the story out there somehow. You know, balance the scales.”

  “Yes, but how? And is balancing the scales really necessary? Does Wyatt care one way or another?”

  “I care. I’m going to wallpaper this place with copies. One thing I don’t care about is if the Dean himself gives me the boot. It sucks that Wyatt’s good name—not to mention perfectly good and fully capable body—were waylaid into something so awful.”

  “There she is!” Baya freaks out at the sight of Professor Nicholson. I made it clear that I felt the need to confront her.

  “Here goes nothing.” I speed over just before she heads into class. “Excuse me?”

  She turns abruptly, and the smile slides from her face once she spots me.

  “Can I help you?” Her eyes sweep over my body from top to bottom. There’s an arrogance about her that would make it easy for me to hate her, but, knowing that Wyatt once loved her, I don’t have the heart to do it. I don’t need to imagine how much it hurts to lose him—I already know.

  “Would you mind if we talked?”

  “That’s what office hours are for.” She pushes on toward class, and I block her before she hits the door.

  “I know you have a copy of a very sensitive legal document of mine in your home—without my permission or Wyatt’s.”

  “Is that what this is about?” She huffs out a laugh as if it were a minute detail. “Listen, I was merely protecting a friend. You can call off the faux legal team.” Her gaze drips down my body with a look that says I’m better than you in so many ways. But she’s wrong because for one, I would never make copies of someone else’s sensitive information, and, two, it’s me who Wyatt is interested in, or at least he was. “Besides”—her expression sours—“I don’t have it anymore. He took it with him.”

  “Did you have anything to do with the article that was published in the school paper?” I’m not sure why I went there other than the fact I feel the intense need to scratch all suspects off the list, and, up until last night, I had no idea she was a person of interest.

  She blinks back in surprise as if I just coldcocked her. And, judging by her response, she didn’t have a thing to do with it. A part of me wishes she did so I could pin her self-righteous ass to the wall.

  “How dare you accuse me of something so wretched,” she seethes out the words, corrosive as acid. “And how dare you use a wonderful man for your own advances. It’s despicable. Wyatt deserves someone so much better than that.”

  “And that would be you?” A part of me wants to laugh in her face. I could never see Wyatt with someone so black-hearted, so jealous over a student that she’d use her authority to put her down.

  “It was me once.” She looks past me into some unknowable world where she’s still with the man of my dreams. “It can be again.” Her eyes dart to mine. “It will be.” She heads into class, and I’m slow to follow.

  It will be? She seems pretty confident. Wyatt didn’t stay last night. He said he needed to think about things. Maybe she was one of those things.

  A pinch of jealousy ignites through me like wild fire. I wish I didn’t care. I wish I never hung my heart out on the line just to have someone like her hack it to pieces. This is exactly why love sucks so damn bad. If you’re not careful, it will gut you when you least expect it. It always does me.

  Baya and Will sit huddled in the corner, and I head over to join them.

  “Rags to Riches has filled two hundred orders in the last week and a half alone.” Will offers a fist bump, but I don’t meet him. “Hey, we’re making bank. Thanks to my app we’ve tripled sales. In the last three days it’s brought in sixty percent of sales. So pull that stick out of your ass.” He reverts his attention back to his laptop. “Look, I’m sorry things have gone to shit for you. I don’t know what else you want me to say. I told you I didn’t do it.”

  “Who else would have access to my passwords?”

  “I don’t know, but I suggest you make them a little harder to guess.” His fingers stab into the keyboard as if he were genuinely frustrated with my lack of belief in whatever spews from his lips.

  Baya scratches her nails softly over my hand like petting a cat. “Who else could possibly know you that intimately?”

  “My mother. Jemma.” I pause a moment considering this. “She is a wild card, but I doubt she’d ever do something so low, plus she loves the idea of me with Wyatt.” I wrinkle my nose toward Will as a semi-apology. Not sure why I feel I owe him one because I don’t. After all, he cheated on me with my own partial relation, Cat… “Cat Alice.” I slam my hand down over the table so hard, half the room jumps to attention. “She did this, didn’t she?” I glare at Will.

  He tips his head back and closes his eyes.

  “That’s all the confirmation I need.” I pull my things together and bolt out of my seat.

  “I didn’t say shit!” Will calls after me. “I’m fucking Switzerland!”

  Coward.

  Coward’s are Switzerland.

  * * *

  I send Jemma a 911 text, and she tracks down Cat Alice to the Chicken Fried Filet. Jemma is a freaking sleuth when she needs to be. She managed to bust those cheating ex’s of hers all by her lonesome. Hey, she should totally consider this as a side business! Jemma’s Cheatin’ Hearts Club. I bet she’d make a killing—from the ex’s begging her not to divulge any info.

  By the time I show up at the restaurant, Jemma is already inside.

  God. I give a slight wave to my sister. I can practically see the steam coming from her ears. Her fists are planted solid into her hips, and, judging by the leather pants and chains wrapped around her waist, she looks as if she’s about to help me take on Cat Alice in a good old fashioned beat down. I hope she left the brass knuckles at home. When I gifted her those last Christmas, it was tongue-in-cheek. The only reason I was able to purchase those more-than-slightly illegal baubles is because they were labeled as paperweights. Hopefully the only thing Jemma is guilty of so far is putting in an order for a chicken fried burger. I’d hate to give Cat Alice the leg up by giving her a chance to prepare for my wrath. I want to catch her off guard, throw her off balance, then kick her in those perfectly veneered teeth of hers while she’s on her knees. After all, that’s her favorite position. She didn’t get the nickname “Bob” for nothing.

  “Morning sunshine!” Mom is the first to both catch me off guard and greet me. I didn’t even see her when I walked in. Had I known she were here, I would have rethought this scenario, but, it’s too late, my blood is pumping, and my fingers are twitching to skin a cat alive.

  All I can see is red and Jemma, never a good combination. I give a quick glance around as if coming to. The dining room is sparse with patrons. It’s a wonder this place stays in business, but, for the sake of my mother, I hope they do.

  “Morning,” I chirp trying to act casual. The reality is, Will most likely already gave Cat the head’s up.

  “What’s it going to be?” Cat Alice snarls into the keyboard as she types in her cashier code. She looks her usual ornery self. Her dark berry lipstick looks caustic against her ashen skin. Her hair is spun up in a beehive, and her eyes are lined thick with black kohl. Cat Alice is sporting her signature raccoon look, still trying to make vermin the new trend in face fashion. Scratch that, she is vermin. Suddenly everything makes so much sense. Her fingernail polish is badly chipped, and she’s sporting a chipped front tooth to match. That permanent scowl is plastered to her face, and just the sight of her turns my stomach.

  If I ever need to engage in some serious weight loss, I’ll simply tape Cat’s picture to the fridge. I’d lose my appetite for weeks. In fact, maybe I should start that up as a business venture—the Cat Alice diet. Just stare into her cold countenance for thirty seconds at mealtime, and be amazed at how quickly your appetite vanishes! But don’t look too long into her dead, wicked gaze—she
might steal your soul.

  So this is what Will really wanted. I take a breath and try not to judge. Cat Alice is an asshole, but for reasons that stem from her personality, not her unfortunate looks.

  “Well?” She snarls at me in her routine manner, so it’s hard to be properly offended. “What’s it going to be?”

  “It’s going to be a confrontation.” My chest expands as if prepping for a fight.

  “That’s right!” Jemma is quick to jump beside me, shoulder to shoulder, in a show of sisterly solidarity.

  “What’s going on?” Mom says it with the smile still frozen on her face, but her eyes let us know she’s morbidly concerned.

  “Did you publish that article about Wyatt in the school paper?” I shoot the words out like bullets, point blank.

  A steady breath pushes from Cat’s cheeks as if she were expiring the air from an old tire.

  “I can’t believe this.” A spike of anger sirens through me, violent as a lava burst. I jump over the counter, screaming, as I dig my hands in that rat’s nest she calls hair. My knee finds its way into her gut as I claw at her like an animal.

  A couple of men from the kitchen rush out and pull us apart as I swing mercilessly in her direction.

  “You bitch!” I roar so loud my voice rubs raw. “You can’t have anything for yourself, so you decide to take everything away from me!”

  “Is this true?” Mom barks so loud everything stills around us.

  Cat Alice heaves out of breath as she releases herself from the stronghold the cook has on her.

  “You called me a slut!” She wags her finger in my face. “You said Will would never go for anyone like me! Why should I let you get away with everything? Yes, you stole Will from me, only you were too stupid to realize it!”

  “What?” Do I need to slap her back to reality? “He dated me for two years!”