Tutoring the Player (Campus Wallflowers #1)(23)

She looks like she might be seriously regretting agreeing to this, but she rattles off her number, and I put it in my phone under Sweet Daisy. “Perfect. I’ll text you when I’m done, and I can come to you if it’s easier.”

She nods.

And I walk away before I say or do any more dumb shit.





11





DAISY





“He’s coming here?” Violet drops her phone to her lap and sits up on the couch. She glances around at the mess of her and Dahlia’s sewing stuff around the room.

“Maybe we can move this upstairs,” Dahlia offers weakly. Even if I wanted that, he’d be here before they got it all moved. Two fashion design majors can accumulate a lot of stuff.

“It’s fine. Jordan and I will study upstairs.”

“In your room?” Jane asks, peeking out of the kitchen. Her smile starts slow and builds until I’m certain I’m blushing.

“Is Liam coming too?” Violet asks.

“No. I don’t think so.”

Her brown eyes narrow. “It’s weird that he didn’t just ask Liam to help him. Don’t you think?”

“Maybe. I don’t know.” Frazzled, I can’t think through the strangeness of the situation. Jordan Thatcher is going to be at my house. All weirdness pales compared to that.

A heavy knock on the front door pushes my pulse into overdrive. I smooth a hand down my dress and take a deep breath before I hurry to answer it.

Jordan stands on the other side in his standard backward hat, jeans, and T-shirt. A smile tugs at one side of his mouth. “Hey.”

“Hi.” My voice sounds entirely too breathy.

Instead of making a move to come inside, he points to the house next door. “You live next to The White House.”

“Yep. That’s right.”

I open the door wider, and he steps through. “I didn’t even know this place was here.”

“We get that a lot.” Violet waves from the couch.

“You remember Violet. And that’s Dahlia and Jane,” I say, introducing him to my roommates.

Dahlia’s eyes are wide as she takes him in, but she doesn’t speak. I forget how shy she is sometimes since it mostly surfaces around the opposite sex.

“Nice to meet you,” Jane calls from the next room. She moves closer, unabashedly watching as Jordan walks in.

I have to say, Jordan in the middle of our living room is a strange sight among the fabrics and sewing machine occupying most of the space.

He nods to my friends and then looks back at me.

“Ready?” I ask.

My roommates are so intently staring at him and now me.

“Yeah.” He adjusts his backpack and follows me to the second floor. The four bedrooms and the only full bathroom are up here. My room faces the house on the opposite side of us from The White House. This street, as well as the one behind us, are primarily rentals for the university.

As he walks into my room, I feel like I’m seeing it with new eyes—the simple metal frame, the light-yellow comforter, the raggedy stuffed bear that I’ve had since I was seven. The only other furniture besides my bed is a desk, chair, and my easel.

“You can have the chair,” I say.

The wood floor creaks with his footsteps. He takes a seat and drops his backpack to the floor in front of him, then continues to look around the room.

“Drawing?” He points to the easel. “Or painting?”

“Mostly drawing.”

“That’s awesome. I can’t draw for anything.”

“It’s just a lot of practice.”

He nods slowly. “Bad at taking a compliment.”

“What?” I ask with a light laugh.

“Just adding to the list of things I’m learning about you.”

“Thank you,” I relent with a smile. “Did you have something in mind that you wanted to work on? I pulled up some study notes from physics that might help.”

“That sounds fine.” He brings out a notebook and pencil.

My laptop is on my bed, but I suddenly feel weird about sitting on it in front of him. I perch on the very edge and open my computer.

He slides his pencil behind one ear, and I move so that I’m closer to him but still sitting on the edge of the bed. He smells like soap again, sans beer. Turning my laptop, I say, “Do you want to go through the lab questions or…?”

“Sure.”

I start to read through the first one, explaining as best I can. His brown eyes are pinned on me so attentively my pulse jumps, and my voice quivers. I stop and sit back. “How about you read it and just tell me what questions you have?”

He sits forward and stares for a minute. The silence in my room is suffocating. Even my breathing sounds too loud. I try to do less of it, but then I feel like I’m going to pass out.

“I think I’ve got it.”

“All of it?”

“Well…” He glances from me to the screen and back. If he expects me to read his mind and magically fill the gaps in his knowledge, he’s going to be seriously disappointed.

“I don’t know how to do this,” I admit.

“Me either.” He sits back in the chair. “Are you hungry?”