“Please rest assured that this conversation won’t need to be repeated.” Her fingers, wrapped around a ream of blue paper from the supply closet, didn’t tremble, and her eyes didn’t lower from his. “I apologize if I’ve made our working relationship awkward.”
She was apologizing? In what world did she need to apologize?
“You didn’t.” He let out a slow breath, regret seeping into his instinctive panic. “Rose, I don’t—”
But she was already turning for the door. Which had remained cracked the entire conversation, he now realized. And was opening, inch by inch, to reveal—
Oh, no.
The vulpine face of Dale Locke, suffused with the eager glee of a man who’d finally, finally cornered his prey. Keisha stood beside him, brows drawn in distress.
Martin would like to believe they’d just arrived at the door. That they’d heard nothing.
Dale’s first, overloud words smashed that hope. “You’d catch more flies with honey than vinegar, Brandi. Thought you were old enough to know that.”
Brandi?Was he talking to Rose?
She held Dale’s stare, silent.
To her credit, Keisha tried to intervene. “Dale, she goes by Rose, which you’ve known for fifteen years. Please call her that. And we can look at the numbers later. We should let them finish their conversation in peace.”
But Dale didn’t move. Didn’t look away from Rose.
God, he must hate her. Loathe her with every fiber of his unfortunate being, every beat of his piggish heart. A woman like her would be a waving red flag to a bully, an invitation to charge and break through that pride, that pristine self-containment.
No wonder he’d fucked with her schedule. No wonder he’d struck at the heart of her AP program. No wonder he’d taken away her classroom for both planning periods.
There she stood, a woman. To be blunt—although Martin didn’t consider it an insult, not by any means—a fat woman. No longer a young woman. Dale’s inferior, if only in organizational terms.
But she wasn’t conceding an inch. Not in height, not in dignity. Wasn’t deigning to acknowledge his faux-jocular insult with a single sound.
Somehow, Dale didn’t realize he’d already been beaten. Already declared irrelevant.
“Sorry we overheard your conversation with Mr. Krause.” Dale offered a sly grin. “Hope you’re not embarrassed.”
Each sentence meant its opposite, and they all knew it.
Then Rose smiled, and Martin realized he hadn’t truly seen her before now. Not even a sliver of her.
Because that smile was bright and terrifying and cold enough to shatter them all into glittering shards. She’d gone beyond ice. She was absolute zero in female form, so frigid no life could survive in her presence. Certainly not a prick of Dale’s insignificance.
“I’m not. Please excuse me.” With another glorious, annihilating smile, she left the office.
Dale stepped out of her way, the glee scrubbed from his face as if it had never existed.
And then, for the first time, Martin understood. Not everything, but enough.
He should have realized it before, but he’d been too deep in his own muddled head to piece together an accurate representation of hers.
A woman capable of such sincere, bone-dissolving warmth toward the young and vulnerable didn’t armor herself with fierce, chilly composure for no reason.
Rose had dealt with bullies before.
Rose had been hurt. Badly.
Rose would likely understand his own fears. Might have even been patient with them. Might have helped him overcome them.
And because of those fears, he’d just turned down her unguarded overture of interest, hurt her feelings, and pricked her pride. All in front of the last person she’d ever want to see her vulnerable.
