Elle blushes but laughs in a good-natured way that makes me hate her even more.
“I’m not sure that’s such a good idea—” She starts to object when Luca cuts her off with a sharp shake of his head, guiding her with a hand on her back to our table the second she has her coffee in her hands.
“Nonsense. It’s a fantastic idea. I know Landon will be thrilled to have you join us.”
“Motherfucker,” I hiss out, my hand gripping the side of the table so hard the wood creaks and our mugs sway. Two seconds later he deposits Elle—a woman who looks just as unhappy to be sitting with me as I am with her—in the seat he vacated, asking a neighboring table if he can borrow a chair before scraping one over.
“Now.” Luca claps his hands, his gaze flittering back and forth between us. “This is fortuitous, isn’t it? We were just talking about you.” He gesticulates at her.
I kick him under the table, but since he’s my goddamn twin, he knows it’s coming and scoots his foot out of the way so all I do is hit the leg of his chair. Unfortunately not hard enough to tip the bastard over.
Elle raises a dubious eyebrow at me, her eyes sparkling as rays of sun shining through the window hit them at the perfect angle. I hate being this close to her. I can practically feel the warmth of her skin. Smell the hints of her shampoo or body lotion or whatever that incredible fragrance is. Note every perfect line of her face.
Every synapse in my body is firing, making me feel strung out. Edgy.
“Is that so? I can only imagine what was said.” She smiles coyly at me. The woman is being fucking coy, and that smile—just fuck. She turns her penetrative stare back at Luca. “I hope you didn’t sit me down to offer up some kind of crazy twin ménage scenario.”
“What?” Luca chokes, the sip of coffee he was just taking spraying right back out of his mouth, narrowly missing us as it coats the table in splattered mocha-colored drops.
“It was in a book I recently read, but really I just wanted that”—she points at the spittle of coffee running down his chin—“reaction to happen.” She smiles, sitting up just a bit straighter, looking entirely too pleased with herself. “Payback and all since I know you knew about the whole name switch-a-roo. And since I can already tell you’re the one with the bigger ego of the two of you, you should know I would have gone to bed with a garden hose that night if it got me off. It had nothing to do with the guy and everything to do with starting my new life out on an orgasm.”
I rub my hand across my twitching lips, falling back in my chair, utterly floored. My eyes blink so many times I’m shocked I’m not damaging my contacts. Her mouth. Her dirty, impertinent mouth. The one smiling at me like the evil temptress she is.
Damn vixen. Now I remember why I kissed her in her classroom.
Every time she opens it, it not only takes me completely by surprise but makes me hard as a rock. The only thing I can think of to stop it is to shut it up, and the only way to shut it up is to kiss it. Or fuck it.
Jesus. This is why I’ve been avoiding her.
Whenever those hazels cut to me, I get chills, and any time she speaks, I respond just to keep her talking to me longer.
I drag a hand through my hair, squeezing the back of my neck that’s loaded with tension. She takes a sip of her coffee, seemingly satisfied with the way she just put both of us in our places.
Luca is completely stunned, staring at her like she’s a rare hundred-carat pink diamond in a pit full of rubble. Seriously, he’s about to go all Blood Diamond on my ass and kill me for her. Neither of us can think of anything to say back, any possible retort dead on our lips, because let’s be honest, what the hell can anyone say back to that?
She stands, taking her to-go cup with her. “Thank you for the coffee, Luca. This absolutely made my entire morning.” He gets a wink, I get a blown kiss, then she’s gone, walking out of the café. The only thing missing from that was her dropping the mic.
He turns to me, a smile on his lips like I’ve never seen. “Yeah. I get it now. You’re in a lot of fucking trouble with that one.”
Thanks. Tell me something I don’t know.
11
“All right, y’all, let’s get this moving. It’s a beautiful fall day. The air is cool, and the leaves are falling, and we’re going to get our nature on.” That’s when everyone groans. I can never tell if it’s from the y’all or the trying to talk middle school. Either way, they move their butts into gear, which is the equivalent of a teacher win in my opinion.
Basically, I’m rocking at this teaching thing.
Even if sex education starts in four motherfluffing weeks!
Bridget says I just have to follow the curriculum, but have y’all ever tried to put a freaking condom on a banana in front of a group of snarky as hell thirteen and fourteen-year-old kids? Yeah, didn’t think so. It’s a Shakespearean tragedy—or comedy—in the making.
We wind our way around the grounds of the school, following a path that cuts through the woods in a giant loop that leads from one side of campus to the other. If we veer right at the fork halfway through, we’d be heading in the direction of Wilchester Prep high school, where most of these kids will be attending next year.
I’ve never lived in New England. In fact, I’ve only ever lived in the Southern half of this country, so fifty-five degrees in the middle of September is a new thing for me. Even when the kids remind me it’s not usually this cold this early into fall. Shockingly not an unwelcome thing, though. I’m enjoying purchasing sweaters and jackets and fleece-lined leggings and boots. God, so many boots.
But the kids like to tease me because I’ve taken to wearing mittens and a hat on our hikes. I tell them my Southern blood has yet to acclimate to their cold weather, but I’m thinking once it drops below freezing, we’ll be getting our wellness on indoors.
“What kind of tree is that?” Justin Thomas asks, walking right by my side. He likes to do that. He’s fourteen and already way too flirty for a kid his age.
I give him a side-eye, noting the tree he’s questioning. “Some kind of pine tree?”
He gives me the same flirtatious grin he always does. “You’re a teacher. Aren’t you supposed to know that kind of stuff?”
I snort. “History and wellness teacher, Justin. I’m hardly an arborist.”
“How much longer?” Mandy Vandelay whines from the back of the pack.
I check my watch just as we reach the clearing that will circle us back to our side of campus. “Three more minutes, Mandy. You can make it three more minutes.”
“I’m not so sure about that,” she grumbles. “I can see my breath. That means it’s too cold out.”
“I can smell your breath,” someone else comments. “And it ain’t pretty. Did you swallow a dead cat before our walk?”
Everyone laughs, and I hold my hand up. “What’s the rule?”
They collectively moan. “No teasing, lying, cheating, or over pleasing,” they all repeat in unison, making me smile. Talk about a life lesson, especially that last one.
“And?”
“What happens in wellness stays in wellness.”