A sharp object digs into my chest. I’ve caught my father in a weak moment and now he’s lashing out. It’s not unusual. He’s never been a kind person. He expects perfection. Demands it. Anything less turns him mean. “I haven’t gotten into Harvard yet.”
“Oh no?” He pounces all over that. “Well what are you doing to guarantee you do? At this very moment, daughter, what are you doing? Are you volunteering? Doing extra credit for your AP classes? Or are you just fucking standing there questioning me, the one who put this ten-million-dollar roof over your head?”
“I’m not questioning you,” I murmur, trying to hold my ground. “I just want you to be careful.”
“Me? You just made yourself a witness, you brainless child.” He laughs bitterly, then starts gathering the paperwork with hasty movements. “Goddammit, Grace. Why didn’t you just stay upstairs?”
Is he right? Did I put myself in danger by accidentally revealing my presence?
Is the information I have now so important that telling anyone could get me…killed?
“Well I see you’ve realized the severity of the situation,” my father snaps. “You’ll spend the day upstairs working on applications. Writing essays. I want to see copies of everything you’ve done by tonight. Then we’re going to dinner at the club. I’m meeting with some associates and you’ll be on your best behavior. Make me look good, since you appear to be incapable of anything else. Don’t even think about leaving your room until then.”
Until my father banishes me to my room for the day, I don’t realize how much I was looking forward to seeing North. Whether or not I’d acknowledged it to myself, my plan was to get dressed and hope he calls, so we could make plans. I want to kiss him again so badly, my lips are already tingling. And now…after the conversation I overheard, there is a layer of ice on my skin and only his arms around me is going to make it better. How crazy is that after only knowing him one night? It’s just a fact, though. There is something…magical about North. About me and North together. It can’t be denied or explained.
My father dismisses me with a wave and I quickly retrieve coffee and a muffin from the kitchen, bringing both up to my room. I eat and guzzle coffee while reluctantly firing up my laptop, pulling up an application for one of my fall-back schools. I work on it for a few hours, then decide to take a shower. I’m halfway through undressing when a text message comes through on my phone. It’s probably one of my friends, but I check anyway, my entire body flaming when I see the text is from North.
You free to talk, Gracie?
My nipples turn into tight pebbles over those five digital words. I can hear them in his rough accent. Can hear that adoring way he says my name. With my heart ticking madly, my fingers are unusually clumsy when I reply.
Yes.
The phone rings literally one second later.
I answer out of breath, even though I’m sitting on my bed. “Hi.”
“Hey, beauty.”
His voice wraps around me like the warm hug I’m craving. “Took you long enough.”
He laughs. “I’ve been pacing with my phone in my hand for hours. Been wanting to call you since last night, but I…shit, Grace, I don’t want to come across too eager and scare you.”
“You couldn’t. You won’t.”
North blows out a long, unsteady breath. “What are you doing?”
“Working on an application,” I say, wrinkling my nose at the offending laptop. “It’s not how I wanted to spend my Saturday, but my father didn’t give me a choice.”
“How would you normally spend it?”
“There’s a shelter for animals where I volunteer sometimes.” A smile curves my lips. “I get to play with puppies. Sometimes I read or go swimming at the club or see friends.”
A beat passes. “You’re not seeing any friends today?”
There’s a hard note in his tone and it takes me a second to read between the lines. “I’m not seeing Collier, if that’s what you’re asking, North. I told you, he’s not my boyfriend and he never will be. I can barely stand him.”
North’s breath caresses my ear. “You don’t…God, Gracie, I shouldn’t be demanding explanations from you like that.”
My hand tightens around the phone. “But you can’t help it?”
“No,” he says, hoarsely. “I can’t.”
Slowly, I lie back on my bed, looking up the ceiling but seeing only his face. His golden eyes. “What if you could demand explanations from me? What if you…”
“What if I was your boyfriend?” He half-laughs, half-groans. “You should probably know this whole conversation is making me hard as a motherfucker.”
“Oh,” I breathe, my toes curling into my comforter. “I’m sorry.”
“Yeah, you sound real sorry,” he teases, releasing a long exhale. “You really want to hear this?”
“Yes.”
His exhale bathes my ear. A few seconds tick by in silence. Then, “If I was your boyfriend, you’d walk around looking so dazed and satisfied from being fucked, no other guy would bother trying to run game on you. They’d know I have it locked down tight. They’d smell me all over you. They’d see the suck marks on your neck and your swollen-ass lips—and they’d know it’s no use trying to compete.”
Lord. Tingles cascade from my head down to my toes. I have to roll onto my stomach momentarily to whimper into my comforter, before bringing the phone back to my mouth. “You don’t talk like an eighteen-year-old boy.”
“I had to become a man a lot faster than most.”
“Why, North?”
He clears his throat. “That’s a conversation for another day. I called to talk about you. All these applications you’re filling out for college…you know exactly what you want to be someday?”
My lips twist. “Well, it’s a little complicated. My father already has an internship lined up for me at one of his friends’ funds. I’m expected to go into finance.” Curling up on my side, I lower my voice. “But secretly, I’ve always wanted to be a teacher. For little kids. I was super shy as a kid—and awkward. With these glasses that made my eyes look magnified and a substantial lisp. But I had this great kindergarten teacher named Miss Griffin and she made me love school. She had glasses, too, and she called me her twin.” My smile blooms at the memory. “I want to make the different kids feel less alone. Like Miss Griffin.”
“I can see you doing that. Easy. You know…” He hesitates before continuing. “We talk a big game in the Hellmouth. Especially me. I might not seem intimidated on the surface when a bunch of rich guys show up throwing around more money than I’ve seen in a year, but it stings. And you picked me. Right in front of them. I still can’t believe it. You’re already like Miss Griffin in a way, Gracie. You’d make a great teacher.”
“Thank you,” I whisper, touched. Shaken. North pays attention. He feels a lot. He says what he’s thinking without worrying about being too honest. Too real. And it makes me want to do the same. Makes me need to share that kind of intimacy with him on a constant basis. “I wish you were here. So I could kiss you for saying that. And so I could tell you that I don’t care how much money you have. I don’t care.”