His daughter needed practice interpreting body language, because his new colleague didnotlike him. Not in the slightest. But it was sweet that Bea considered her middle-aged father someone who could interest a woman like Rose Owens.
“I’m not going to date Ms. Owens. Or anyone, for that matter.” He kissed Bea’s forehead and nudged her inside her room. “But I love you. Good night, sweet Bea.”
“So stubborn,” he heard her mutter as he closed the door. “Love you too, Dad.”
Three
Rose sippedfrom her enormous mug of black coffee and surveyed her classroom.
As always, she’d arrived over an hour early, before almost everyone else, to make sure she had time for any last-minute adjustments and to enjoy the final few minutes of quiet she’d have until late that evening.
Her desk, cabinets, and shelves contained all the supplies and papers she should need for the foreseeable future. The student desks and chairs had been arranged in neat rows, and the seating chart—useful for taking attendance until she learned all the kids’ names—was posted in several places around the room. Stacked copies of the day’s schedule rested on a side table, laying out what would happen during class and roughly how long each activity would take, as well as the state objectives met by the lesson and any homework she might assign.
For all their avowed laziness, kids liked to know what to expect each day, and they responded well to structure, as long as that structure came coupled with a sense that their teacher actually cared about both her students and her subject.
She did. She loved both.
As soon as kids entered her room each day, they received a task to complete. Usually annotating a document, in the case of the AP students, or answering a review question or two, in the case of the regular history students. Otherwise, the beginning of class could devolve into chaos within moments.
Today, they’d immediately fill out introductory paperwork about their interests, their contact information, etc. All standard. And then she’d go over the syllabus and introduce another getting-to-know-you activity, one she’d formulated last month with photographs from the National Archives.
Every year, even if she kept the same preps, she tweaked her lesson plans. They could always be better.Shecould always be better. Pedagogical research and historical research both advanced inexorably over time, and she needed to do the same. Otherwise, she’d be a substandard teacher, not to mention a bored one.
She was neither. So everything lay in wait, ready for the whirlwind of students that would shortly blow into the building, and the rapidity of her heartbeat told her she needed to slow her coffee roll before she shook herself to pieces.
A light knock on her half-open door heralded company. She straightened in her chair, setting aside her mug. “Yes?”
A now-familiar head of neatly combed brown hair poked through the door. “Good morning, Rose. Sorry to bother you, but I was hoping to drop off some of the papers I’ll need for second period.”
One of her two planning periods, which she could no longer spend in her classroom. Lovely.
She stood and gestured for him to enter the room. “Come in.”
Then there he was, lingering just inside the doorway. Martin Krause, the paragon. Such a paragon she couldn’t really even hate him anymore, although she was petty enough to try. But hating a man who listened so intently, spoke quietly but intelligently, and never seemed to impose himself on others had proven more difficult than she’d hoped.
Almost two weeks of teacher workdays and staff meetings and department gatherings, and she still hadn’t spotted anything loathsome about him. Sure, she’d tried to despise his ever-present blue button-downs and striped ties and dark pants, and the careful side part of his hair, but that was a stretch even for her.
He didn’t bluster. He didn’t presume his authority over her or anyone else.
He was just another teacher put in an awkward situation by Dale Fuckwad Locke.
So as long as Martin minded his own business, she’d mind hers, and they’d get along fine.
Preferably, he’d also refrain from laughing or smiling while in her presence, because when he did either, he became entirely too attractive for her peace of mind. She couldn’t exactly make that demand, though, much as she wanted to.
He wasn’t smiling now. But why was he still lingering near the door, studying her like that?
She raised her brows. “Do you want me to remind you which shelves and cabinets we designated as yours?”
“No.” He tilted his head to the side, a pile of papers tucked between his arm and his body. “You just…never mind. I’ll drop these off and get out of your way.”
She didn’t want to know. She didn’t want to know. She didn’t, didn’t, didn’t want to know.
Christ, she wanted to know. “What?”
He put his papers on his allotted shelf, turned back to her, and seemed to consider his words carefully. A habit of his, she’d noticed, and not an unwelcome one.
“Are you okay?” He crossed and uncrossed his arms over his chest. Strong arms, as she’d discovered the day he helped haul textbooks to various department classrooms. “Because you seem a little…not yourself.”
