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“It’s fine for you. You’ve not just been scarred for life. You know what? I’m going to your house. If you and Aster are here, I won’t be caught off guard like this again, and Matty and Jackson have breakfast burritos.”
I laughed as she swanned past me, shunting me on the shoulder as she did. “See you later, T.”
With that, I walked back to Aster’s room. The only noise was my sister’s grumbling as she waited for the elevator. I just shook my head in amusement and opened Aster’s door.
“Everything okay?” I asked, surprised that she was already up. It was still early and after all the sex we had last night, I’d have thought Aster would have slept in. Aster’s feet were perched on the edge of the bed, showing off her slender legs as she looked at her phone. With her hair still mussed and wearing my t-shirt, she was a wet dream come to life.
I placed the sodas and nut bars on her desk before making my way over to her and kissing her on the forehead where a few worry lines had appeared. They didn’t go away, and she didn’t look up.
“Aster?” I tried again, dipping my chin so I could look into her eyes.
She hummed out, finally looking at me, but there was no expression in her eyes. She was just emotionless, and I immediately balked. Did she regret what happened between us?
“Is everything okay, Teach?” She blinked a few times, finally registering I was standing in front of her, and staring.
“I’m fine. Sorry, I was just reading an email.”
“All good?”
“Yeah.” She notably flicked out of it before I could see what it was about and turned her attention to her phone log. “I missed a lot of calls from the Dean’s office last night because I was a little distracted.” A small smile curved on her lips when she said that, but I could tell something was bugging her. “They were just emailing me to see if I could have an urgent meeting with the Dean today.”
“The Dean? What about?”
She shrugged, the unease clear in her demeanor, but she was doing everything she could to try to hide it from me, which I didn’t like. I wanted her to feel like she could open up about anything with me.
“I, uh, don't really know. I'm guessing it's about tutoring a new student., or something. I should have just answered the phone yesterday when they called.” She raised the phone before dropping it next to her so she could clasp her hands together.
“If it’s just a new student, why are you worried? It’s not like you would have been able to tutor them immediately. You were tutoring me.” I winked before shoving a shirt over my head and reaching for a pair of ripped football leggings that I'd turned into shorts.
“I believe it was more like you were tutoring me.” She replied despondently, her gaze was fully focused on her phone and there was a niggling feeling in the pit of my stomach that made me think there was something wrong.
“Are you sure everything is okay? If there's something going on, you know you can tell me.” I tried to sound casual, but internally, I was worried. I hated to think she was trying to deal with something on her own.
Swallowing, she stood, already fully dressed. “Nope, it's all good,” she piped out before coming my way to give me a kiss on the lips. “I've got to head out early, too.” She lifted a laundry basket and smiled. It was weird. Almost as if that conversation we just had never happened. “Someone has been creasing all of my skirts. I need to do at least three loads of washing and ironing.”
“Okay. Can I see you tonight?”
She shook her head. “I'm sorry, I'm tutoring Hazel, but I could meet tomorrow?”
I wrapped my arms around her waist, not letting her get too far. “Or” I drawled out. “You could come and visit meafteryour tutoring session. I don't care, even if it's late.”
Kissing her lips, she let out a little mumble as she backed away and looked to the side. Not the normal reaction I got from her, and it was definitely feeling like she was hiding something now, but what could I do? If she didn't want to tell me, then I wasn’t going to force her.
“We’ll see. Who knows, you might be knocked out by the evening with your training session.”
I blew out a breath. “I think if anything was going to knock me out, it’s last night.” I took the aces of her laundry bag and hauled it over my shoulder.
“What are you doing?”
“You said you were doing your laundry, so I’m helping you.”
“Tanner, I don’t want you to be late.”
“It’s not. The machines are on the way to the gym. Think of it as my pre-gym warm up.”
She rolled her eyes but shoved on a pair of jeans and grabbed her purse, no less. The small semblance of a smile beamed through as she laced her hand around my arm.
“Come on.” She dragged me out, and I hoped that small gesture had made her feel better, but I wasn’t too sure.
