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“Yeah, because I can’t stand the guy.”
Her smile lasted. “Well, we won’t talk about him anymore.” She patted him on the arm again before another silence arrived. However, two noteworthy differences caught his eye.
The truncated length of this silence proved to be the lesser of the two differences. It lasted only a few moments, long enough to notice but not long enough for him to begin to worry. The greater of the differences ensured that he didn’t fret.
A gleam, like spotting a flare light up at the end of a dark tunnel, seized his full attention. With it so far off in the distance, he couldn’t make out the details of what surrounded it, only the sudden burst of pyrotechnics. However, it massively piqued his curiosity. So did Tess’s next statement.
“This whole dreadful situation has provided some very tactile experience for the education I provide my students. Both in the proceedings of a divorce for a woman and the aftermath.”
Liam raised an eyebrow. “You plan to share what you went through with your students?”
“I’m considering it for future classes. I do prefer to maintain a level of personal distance from them as their professor, especially given my gender. However, there are components of my experiences that I feel better capable of teaching, even if I ultimately don’t elect to share that they are, in fact,myexperiences. Specifically for my sexual ethics class, this upcoming semester is well-timed with my divorce’s completion. I am now a newly divorced woman in her early forties. There is an opportunity for all manner of ethical debates involving such a topic.”
“Really?” he asked, though he could easily imagine a few viable topics. “Like what?”
Typically, a flare lasted for its allotted time, growing no brighter or dimmer during its lifespan. Yet, he watched breathlessly as the light painting the distant end of the tunnel suddenly burst with new and enhanced vigor, as if seeking to illuminate enough of it for him to make out the details of what awaited him there. Focusing his attention hastily, he tried to make out the newly revealed thoughts shimmering within Tess’s eyes.
Only for the vilest, most insufferable, most wretched noise to cause her to submerge the flare into a nearby water basin. As her eyes flew toward her entryway, Liam clenched his jaw tight enough to crunch gravel between his teeth.
Somehow, someway, he knew he’d potentially missed a significant opportunity.
All because of a doorbell ringing.
Chapter Three
Ice
With their strange and uncertain moment severed by the accursed ringing of Tess’s doorbell, Liam swallowed an audible groan. Tess had twisted her upper half to look toward the path leading to her doorway, allowing him only to see one side of her gorgeous face. Yet, he thought he saw an aggravated flex in her jaw. After a moment, when she spun back around to get up from her couch, she appeared back in control of her expression, which she’d parked firmly in neutral.
“That’ll be Victoria,” Tess said. “I’ll be right back.”
Still mildly stupefied by the events moments before, he nodded dumbly as she trotted out of the room. Seconds later, he heard her door click open, Tess welcoming her apparently expected guest, and Victoria’s response. The door shut, their conversation continued, and Liam waited for their footsteps to bring them back toward him.
Tess appeared first, leading the way with softer, shoeless footsteps. Peculiarly, she seemed pensive as she rejoined him in the living room. Liam didn’t have much time to dwell on it, though he would later that night. Only a step behind, a woman in brown leather ankle boots entered the room. She then became aware of him. And frowned.
From the moment he’d met her, he’d assumed that Tess would vastly outshine any woman who dared stand beside her. It was like comparing the pinprick of light squeezed out of a penlight to a floodlight pouring out waves of blinding radiance beside it. No one bothered comparing those two things because there was no comparison possible.
For the first time in his life, unaware that he’d meet two more worthy options before the week was up, he found a comparison was due.
Tess was an angel descended from the heavens; no one could convince him otherwise. Meanwhile, her friend looked more like a Black Widow type…or whomever Angelina Jolie had played in Wanted.
Huh, I can’t believe I remember that movie,Liam thought.
He also remembered that her character had killed a lot of people in that movie. Which, if Tess’s friend were so inclined, might give him a reason to worry. For she looked none too pleased by his presence on Tess’s couch.
“Victoria, this is Liam,” Tess said, providing a subtle but noticed elbow bump into her friend’s side upon noticing her glare. “Liam, this is Victoria. She’s another professor at Bellmore and a very close friend.”
Victoria stood a couple of inches taller than her friend—and then a couple more due to her boots. Dressed in tight jeans that greedily coveted her long legs, she still wore a thick winter coat over her blouse, though even with its interference, Liam could tell that Victoria was even bustier than Tess. A very dark brunette, she had an olive complexion and a pair of eyes as sheer and severe as ice, so much so that he could barely make out the hint of blue in them. Given the sharpness of her apparent displeasure with his existence in this space, he decided to tread carefully before he understood just why she looked like she wanted to jam a pair of icicles into his ribcage for the perfect murder.
“Hi, Victoria,” he said, standing. “Yeah, I’m Liam. I live next door.”
Victoria’s gaze flicked briefly toward Tess, which further piqued his curiosity. As her attention returned to him, her lips, a pair as luscious as he’d ever seen, promised he wouldn’t find a smile no matter how hard he looked. What could he have done to earn such vitriol so soon after meeting the woman?
“Nice to meet you, Liam.”
It was all she said to him. Following those stiff words, she turned and reappraised Tess wordlessly. As a witness to their telepathic conversation, he kept his eyes at an appropriate level, even though Victoria presented him with a prime opportunity to compare her shapely butt to Tess’s. Tess met her taller friend’s gaze, and Liam spotted a recalcitrant burr embedded in her eyes. Folding her arms and lifting her chin, the two women engaged in a silent battle for several uncomfortable seconds.
Whatwasthe issue here? Liam couldn’t help but wonder.
