When he breaks the kiss, his forehead dropping to mine, I watch his eyes clear slowly, and with it, the reality of what he just did sinks in.
“Silas,” I whisper, as my hands close over his.
Because he wants to run, I can see it. I can see the panic beginning to consume him, and I wish his reaction didn’t hurt as much as it does.
I want the Silas who looked at me with wonder and something like reverence, as though I’m the only one of my kind on this earth. Not the man standing in front of me now, full of doubt and regret.
“Say my name again,” he whispers, drawing a slow breath.
I listen, and I say his name once more, then twice, like a small prayer, hoping to make him understand that it’s okay not to know what is happening, but begging him not to run.
Not to leave me again with this avalanche of feelings that is just as unfamiliar to me as it is to him.
“My brain is telling me to walk out of this library, call Rodolfo to move you out of my class, and pretend you never existed, Amalia.”
I swallow, and I can’t look away from the pained expression on his face.
“And this,” I tap his chest three times with my finger, “what does this say?”
I watch him look at me again with that warm look that makes me feel like I’m floating.
“That this is the first time it’s beaten this fast for someone who isn’t my family. That this is the first time I don’t care that it isn’t moral or ethical. I want you, Amalia. I want all your attention, every smile, and every bit of that sarcasm that no one else on this campus would even know what to do with. I want every scrawl on every page, this scent,” he draws a slow breath, “of flowers and chocolate, but most of all, I want this.” His fingers come to rest at my temples.
And the problem with this confession? My heart dissolved completely because I want him too. Somewhere, in one small corner of my mind, I can hear my brain trying to inject a little reason into this moment.
But it’s not loud enough, and I shut it out, because now I understand Lupe and that feeling of walking on air. That no one can touch you, that you matter to someone like him. And it feels damn good.
I hold his gaze for a second, my heart going crazy inside my chest. The corner of my lips curves up before I can stop it. “Well,” I say, and I’m surprised by how steady my voice comes out, “you’re in for a hell of a ride.”
The corner of his lips lifts, with infuriating control, into something that looks dangerously close to a smirk. “I’d be disappointed if I wasn’t.”
Icheck the clock and wrap my hands around my mug of tea. Seven minutes and twenty-one seconds until I see her.
Forty-eight hours. I don’t know how I lasted forty-eight hours without going to find her, without touching her. All I know is if I don’t see her today, someone is going to end up in a body bag, and I’m not particular about who.
I’m still trying to understand what qualities this woman possesses that make me forget all sense of reason with a single smile.
Yesterday I spent two hours going through the entire campus in my head — every female professor, every female student — and not for one of them did I feel even the smallest flicker of interest. Nothing.Nada.
But the thought that I’d have a lecture with her today was enough to make my chest tighten in a strange way, similar to how it tightens when I see Karina and Seb, but different at the same time.
I need to find a book and read up on what the hell might be happening to me.
In the six years I’ve been teaching, I’ve never found myself drawn to any student, and yet here we are. Amalia Sanchez has managed the impossible.
Two weeks. That’s how long I lasted before I went looking for her in that library corner where I knew I’d find her, and when I saw Hugo Duarte sitting ten centimeters away from her, all I wanted was to drag him into Andreas’s ring and wipe that irritating smile off him with my fist.
We haven’t revisited the tutoring situation, but if she thinks I’m going to stand by while she spends time with that guy, who is legendary across campus for collecting STDs like they’re achievements to unlock, she’s wrong.
She might think she’s not the kind of girl who draws attention, but it hasn’t escaped me how everyone looks at those colorful blouses, her perpetually flushed cheeks, and the strands of hair that frame her face.
She’s every guy on this campus’s fantasy, and ever since I kissed her, something territorial has been sitting in my chest, getting louder every time I let myself think about her near someone else.
We didn’t discuss anything else afterward, we just sat in silence for another hour until she had to leave for home.
She doesn’t know, but I followed her to her front door and then found myself standing on the corner of her street for another twenty-two minutes and ten seconds.
Because I wanted to go back and knock, just to see the surprise on her face.
