Bitter Sweet Heart (Lies, Hearts & Truths #2)(19)

“It smells a lot better in there.” I run my hands down my thighs. “Anyway, that’s not really the point. When I got home, I realized I might have made you feel vulnerable. And I shouldn’t have said I could report you for . . . what happened in the summer. That wasn’t right, especially under the circumstances. So if you want to report me, I completely understand, and I will corroborate your story.” I wait for the sinking feeling, the panic now that I’ve laid it all out for her, but it doesn’t come. I know I’m doing the right thing, regardless of the cost.

“Corroborate my story?” She fingers the buttons on her cardigan.

“If you want to tell them I was in the women’s sauna and shouldn’t have been, that you were alone and I made you feel unsafe, I won’t deny that it happened, and I will take full responsibility for my actions. Even if it means facing an expulsion.” Or losing my potential career.

She clasps and unclasps her hands. “You’re telling me you’re willing to risk an expulsion because you might have made me feel unsafe?” Skepticism laces her words.

I glance toward the door and blow out a breath. I don’t want her second-guessing my reasons for doing this. “I can imagine that having me in your class this semester hasn’t been easy for you.” I tap on the arm of the chair. The semester ends in five weeks. She’s a visiting professor. Whatever I tell her isn’t going to matter in the grand scheme of things.

So I give her more truth than I probably should.

“My younger sister goes to school here, and she lives with me. If some guy surprised her like I did you, I’d kick his ass. Maybe even worse. No.” I shake my head. “I’d definitely do worse than an ass kicking. But since I can’t kick my own ass, I wanted to at least tell you I’m sorry. And that it won’t happen again.” I set the key on the edge of her desk and add my printed-out, revised creative writing assignment that meets the minimum word count.

“The key works in the athletic facility and nowhere else. Thank you for hearing me out, Professor. I’ll see you in class on Tuesday. Unless I’m expelled. But if I’m not, I promise I’ll keep my mouth shut, and I won’t approach you again.”

I grab my bag and leave her office before she can say anything else.





Seven





Down the Rabbit Hole





Clover





I sit there for a minute after Maverick leaves my office, trying to understand what his motive could be. It almost seems like he wants me to report him. That doesn’t make a lot of sense—not from what I understand about his potential career trajectory. While I’ve tried my hardest not to pay attention to him—other than being annoyed when he shows up for class late or checks his phone messages while I’m teaching—I am aware, based on what I’ve read in the school paper, that he shows real promise, along with a few of the other students on the school hockey team.

I’m also aware that for every student who thinks they’re going to get called up to a professional sports team, there are another dozen whose dreams are going to be crushed. I don’t know enough about the sport to be able to say which category Maverick fits into. Not that it should matter.

I pick up the key and flip it between my fingers. It could be any key. The only way I’ll know if he’s lying or not is if I take it to the athletic facility and see if it works. And there’s no way to know whether he’s made copies.

The question remains: Where did he find it, and how long has he had it? How many offices or changing rooms has he snuck into? Would it give him access to personal files? His own? His teammates’? As soon as I think it, I brush the thought aside. He seemed so contrite.

I remind myself that my feelings about this could be skewed. Particularly since I’m still dealing with the man I married and his attempts to pull me back into a relationship I don’t want to be in. It makes sense that I don’t have a lot of faith in the authenticity of the opposite sex.

I put the key in my purse, so it’s out of sight. I’ll take it with me the next time I go to the athletic facility and find out how honest Maverick was.

My phone buzzes on my desk, startling me. MOM flashes across the screen. Normally, I would message back right away, but this morning is throwing me for a loop, so I leave it for now and turn my attention to the revised paper sitting on my desk. I leaf through it. The font hasn’t been enlarged to make it seem as though it fits the word count, and the spacing doesn’t look off, but it seems awfully convenient that he’s handed in a paper copy.

I log into my computer to check for an emailed version. I notice a message from Maverick received about ten minutes before he showed up at my office door. I read through the first few pages of the paper, aware that I need to pass it over to my TA for a revised grade, but it doesn’t hurt to have a look.

Students were supposed to write the story of a childhood memory from the point of view of someone other than themselves. As I read through the first few pages, my stomach rolls and sinks, because the story is about a little girl who goes missing at a carnival.

I perform a search with Waters + carnival + abduction, and a slew of headlines appear.

Most of the articles chronicle the brief abduction of a little girl at a local carnival more than a decade ago. They don’t name her, but they do name the family. The case seems to have been high profile mostly because the girl’s father is hockey legend Alex Waters.