But he was smiling. “I was just thinking how nice it sounds.”
I blushed, and just as quickly, the concerns started crowding into my head. What kind of person gets into a relationship less than two months before graduating from college? Was I mad? Jamie was in law school, here, at Eli, for the next two years. I had no idea where I’d be. When I left town at the end of May, there’s no way our relationship would be ready for the long-distance thing (if it even lasted until then), and I had no intentions of sticking around New Haven for a boyfriend I’d just started dating. This was silly. I was setting myself up for an even worse heartbreak come commencement.
“I should go,” I said.
“What?” he shook his head in disbelief. “I don’t think so. You can’t just show up on my doorstep, drop this bombshell on me, then disappear.”
“I have work to do….” I began vaguely.
“You just got off a twenty-hour car trip.” He caught my hands in his. “You have relaxing to do.” His thumbs slid over the scabs on my wrists and we both winced. He looked down. “I’m glad I wasn’t there that night,” he said softly. “I don’t think I would have trusted myself.”
“You? Mr. In-Control Poe?” Crap.
He wagged his finger at me. “See? And yeah. I might have killed that kid.”
“You wouldn’t have been alone.” Half my club had wanted to kill Darren Gehry for drugging me and dragging me off in a twisted, dangerous version of what the teenager had convinced himself was a society prank. I was the only person who understood that we might have been to blame for giving him that impression.[15]
My hands had somehow escaped Jamie’s and become balled in my lap. He noticed, in that way he had of noticing everything.
“Stay here for a while,” he said. “I’ll cook something for you, and we can talk. You can ask me all those personal questions you’ve been so relentlessly curious about, and I can…” He trailed off.
He could what? Give me a foot massage? Seduce me? Lecture me about the importance of tofu in cuisine? He knew everything about me already. He had researched my past exhaustively when they’d tapped me into Rose & Grave. Scary thought. I’d never before dated a guy who could name all my elementary school teachers, who knew every one of my worst fears and how best to exploit them.
It’s kind of like dating your stalker.
“We’re a little past first-date conversation where I’m concerned,” I said. And then it occurred to me. Back when he’d done all that research, he’d felt nothing for me but contempt. In Jamie’s opinion, I hadn’t been good enough for Rose & Grave. He’d changed his mind now, though. Right?
He cupped my face in my hands and kissed me, and all my fears dissolved. “We’re a little past first dates, too.”
After dinner, Jamie walked me back to the gates of Prescott College. I swiped my proximity card at the sensor and pulled open the door. “Well,” I said.
He rested his hand on the bars. “Well.” A flash of memory: Jamie’s hand gripping these bars as we shouted at each other. I wouldn’t let him in, and I’d left that evening with George.
“Come up for a minute,” I went on. “You’ve never seen my suite.”
Here’s something new: When Jamie looks at me now, his eyes, those cold gray eyes of his, almost smile. I didn’t know eyes could do that.
We wandered through the courtyard, which remained mostly devoid of students. Spring break came to a shuddering stop, as folks drifted back to campus on their own schedule. Some of the lights were on in suites, but the room I shared with Lydia remained dark.
Jamie caught my hand as I crested the steps to my entryway, and he tugged me back into his arms.
I laughed inside the kiss. “If this is supposed to demonstrate our new ability to kiss in public, you picked a pretty pathetic venue. No one’s here.”
“Baby steps,” he said, as I unlocked the door and pulled him inside. As I wrestled with the doorknob to our suite, he nibbled along the neckline of my shirt. I flicked on the lights to the common room, but Jamie showed no interest in our décor, he just pulled me onto his lap on the couch and started kissing me for real.
A moment later, someone cleared a throat.
I looked up to see Lydia and Josh standing in the doorway to her bedroom. The former looked amused, the latter, gobsmacked.
“Amy,” Lydia said. “You’re home!” She looked at Jamie. “And you have a guest.”
I slid off Jamie’s lap and we stood, knees knocking against the coffee table. “Just got home,” I said. “I didn’t realize you were here.”
“Clearly,” my best friend replied, not even trying to hide her glee. She shoved her hand at Jamie. “I’m Lydia, Amy’s roommate.”
“I’ve heard about you,” he said. “Jamie Orcutt.”
“Nice to meet you.”
He then turned to Josh. “Jamie,” he said, and stuck his hand out.
Josh shook himself free from shock. “Um, Josh,” he said, a moment too late, and with a complete lack of believability.
Lydia rolled her eyes at the boys. “Give it a rest, you two. I know where Amy spent her Spring Break. Where else could she have met him?”
Jamie looked at me, eyebrows raised in disapproval. But Lydia wasn’t about to let an opportunity like this pass her up. “So, what college are you in, Jamie?”
“I’m at Eli Law, actually,” he said.
“Oh.” Lydia frowned. “I thought you were a…senior.” Meaningfully.
And now Jamie did smile. “I was a…senior. I graduated.” He looked at me. “Your definition of secret differs from most people’s.”
I shrugged. “Some things are impossible to hide.”
“Apparently!” Josh blurted. Everyone stared at him.
“I guess you want to catch up with your friends,” Jamie said. “I have some reading to do, anyway.”
I thought of him walking all the way back to his apartment, alone, in the dark. But what could I do? There was no way I was about to invite him to spend the night. He gave me a quick kiss. “I’ll call you.”
As soon as the door closed, Lydia let out a strangled squeal. “Oh my God, Amy!” she grabbed my hands and led me over to the couch. “That was a boyfriend ‘I’ll call you.’ You have a boyfriend. I leave you alone for two weeks and you have a boyfriend. And he’s cute! And he’s tall! And he’s at Eli Law, which means he’s brilliant, to boot! Tell me all about it.”
“Lydia,” Josh said. “Leave her alone. She’s had a traumatic week. She’s not—”
“Thinking clearly?” I finished for him. “Is that your theory?”
Lydia waved her hand at him dismissively. “Shoo. We’re having mushy-wushy girl talk now.”
But Josh was not the type who could be shooed. “Who else knows?”
I lifted my chin. “Whoever wants to.” George, to start with, and probably anyone else who’d ridden back to Eli with me in the van. “It’s no secret.” What, did he want me to make a formal announcement?
“I want to hear everything!” Lydia pressed. “Did all this happen before or after…you know.”
Before or after I was kidnapped, she meant. I wonder what else in my life is going to fall under that before or after. I don’t want it to be like that.
“We’ve known each other for a while,” I said. “And our feelings just…grew.”
“They didn’t have far to fall,” Josh said with a sniff.
Lydia whirled on him. “Would you get out of here? You’re ruining her story.”
“It’s okay, Lyds,” I said. Josh’s reaction was the one I expected. “We can talk about it later. Tell me all about Spain.”
“Spain was great,” Lydia said. “But I need to hear about your adventures.”
“Specifically, the one where you were almost killed,” Josh added.
Ugh. Maybe I should have stayed with Jamie.