Loathe to Love You (The STEMinist Novellas #1-3)(61)

Uh? “Why are you giving this to me?”

“Because I want you to look through it. The passcode is 1111.”

I glance at his face. “1111? Are you joking?”

“Yeah, I know. Just ignore it.”

I snort. “You can’t ask me that.”

He sighs. “Fine. You are allowed one comment.”

“How about one one one one comments—”

“That’s it. Your comment, you used it up. Now—”

“Come on, I have way more to—”

“—will you please unlock the phone?”

I pout but do as he says. Mostly out of sheer bewilderment. “Done.”

He nods. “If you click on my email app, you’ll find my work correspondence. Most of those messages are highly confidential, so I’m going to ask you not to read them. But I want you to search for your last name.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Because it’s all there. The emails. Me requesting your thesis. Me circulating it to ProBld like an asshole. A couple of instances of me generally discussing your writing. The timeline should confirm what I already told you.” I stare at him. Speechless. Then he continues, and it gets worse. “This is all I can think of, but if there’s anything else I can show you that will help you believe that Gianna misinterpreted things, let me know. I’m happy to leave my phone here. Take however long you want to go through it. If someone calls or texts, ignore them.”

It’s the calm, earnest way he’s looking at me that does it. It snaps what’s left of my terror of being rejected, and I’m abruptly done with whatever fearful bullshit my brain is trying to feed me.

A new knowledge uncurls inside me, and I instantly know what to do. I know how to do it. And it starts with clutching his phone tight, stepping closer, and sliding it into the pocket of his jacket. I let my hand linger inside for a second, feeling the warmth from Erik’s body. The clean cotton. No lint or candy wrappers or empty ChapStick tubes.

I adore it. I love it. My hand wants to slip inside this pocket on rainy fall afternoons and chilly spring mornings. My hand wants to move in and just live here, right next to Erik’s.

But for now, there’s something else I need to do. Which is holding out my own phone to him. He looks at it skeptically, until I say, “My passcode is 1930.”

His mouth twitches. “Year of the first FIFA World Cup?”

I laugh, because . . . yeah. Out of everyone, he would know. And then I feel myself starting to cry, because of course, out of everyone in the entire world, he would know.

“Unlock it, please,” I say between sniffles. Erik is wide-eyed, alarmed by the tears, trying to come closer and to pull me to him, but I don’t let him. “Unlock my phone, Erik. Please.”

He quickly punches in the numbers. “Done. Sadie, are you—”

“Go to my contacts. Find yours. It’s . . . I changed it. To your actual name.” It’s hard to sustain high and prolonged levels of hatred for someone who’s saved on your phone with a cutesy nickname, I don’t add, but the thought has me chuckling, wet, watery.

“Done.” He sounds impatient. “Can I—”

“Okay.” I take a deep breath. “Now, please, unblock your number.”

A pause. Then: “What?”

“I blocked your number. Because I . . .” I wipe my cheek with the back of my hand, but there’re more tears coming. “Because I couldn’t bear to . . . Because. But I think you should unblock it.” I sniffle again. Loudly. “So if you decided that you don’t mind the fact that sometimes I can be a total lunatic, and if you want to give me a call and give the . . . the thing we were doing another chance, then I’d be happy to pick up and—”

I find myself pulled into his body, hugged tight against his chest, and I should probably insist on apologizing properly and offer an in-depth debriefing of everything that has occurred, but I just let myself sink into him. Smell his familiar scent. When he smooths my hair back, I bury my face into his shirt and melt, soaking in the silence and the relief.

“I think I just really suck at one-night stands,” I say, muffled into the soft fabric.

“We didn’t have a one-night stand, Sadie.”

“Okay. I mean, I don’t know. I’ve never . . .”

“I’ve had enough for both of us, and then some.” He pulls back to look at me, and repeats, “We did not have a one-night stand.”

I don’t make the conscious decision to kiss him. It just happens. One second we’re looking at each other, the next we’re not. Erik tastes like himself and a late-spring night in New York. He holds my head in his palm, presses me into him; he groans, bends down to push me into the wall, and licks the inside of my mouth.

“So we’re good?” he asks, coming up for air. I want to nod, but I forget when he bends down for another kiss, just as deep as the one that came before. Then he remembers his question and repeats, “Sadie? Are we good?”

I close my eyes and bite into his bottom lip. It’s soft, and plump, and I remember the patient way he worked between my legs. I remember coming over and over, the pleasure so strong I couldn’t comprehend it—

“Sadie.” He’s not breathing normally. He takes a step back, like he needs a moment to get himself under control. “Are we good? Because if you think this is a one-night stand, then—”