Her expression sharpened because she heard the trap in my words. I continued gently, “But you won’t.”
“Why?”
“Because a part of you still wants to see whether you can survive it. Pull off another con.”
She looked away first, out toward the courtyard where the fountain water trembled under the wind. For several seconds, she said nothing.
Then, quieter, “You don’t know anything about me.”
What a foolish thing to say to someone who was actually paying attention.
“I know you are very good at being wanted,” I said. “I know you dislike owing anyone but have built most of your life from borrowed access. I know you prefer admiration to affection because affection asks questions, admiration does not. I know you are dating Chad because he gives you a future that looks safe from the outside.”
Her face went very still. “His name is Thad.”
“Yes. We have established that.”
“You don’t get to talk about my relationship.”
“I just did.”
Colour rose lightly in her cheeks.
Not embarrassment. Anger again. Good.
“You’re my professor,” she said.
“I am.”
“Then act like it.”
I stepped slightly closer. Not enough to touch. Enough that she had to feel the decision not to step back. “Break up with him.”
The words landed cleanly between us. For the first time, she looked genuinely startled. Then she laughed once, soft and disbelieving. It was not a happy sound.
“You’re insane.”
“Occasionally, perhaps. Not about this.”
“You have no right to ask me that.”
“I did not ask.”
Her fingers tightened around the folder. “You think because you forced me into your lab, you can tell me who to date?”
“No. I think because I can see you, I have very little patience for watching you waste yourself on someone who cannot.”
A flicker passed through her face. Pain first. Then something dangerously close to longing. She buried it quickly.
“You don’t see me,” she said. “You see whatever strange little theory you’ve made up in your head.”
“I see both.”
“No.” Her voice turned colder. “You see what you want to use.”
Thad appeared again at the far side of the courtyard, still on his phone, one hand tucked into his pocket. Céline saw him too. The change in her happened immediately. Her shoulders softened. Her mouth loosened. The mask returned so completely that anyone else would have believed it was her real face. She started to move past me.
I caught her wrist, and her breath stopped. Students crossed the courtyard around us, laughing, carrying coffee, and complaining about assignments. It was a public place. A safe place. A respectable place. That made the contact sharper. Her skin felt cold beneath my fingers.
