Mine

Chapter 10.

"What happened to you at my party? I thought you'd stick around 'til the end."

"It was getting late and I don't really do late hours." I'm such a liar.

"Really? Well maybe I can make it up for you today at lunch, what do you say?"

"Uhm, I think-" I can't finish my answer as a woman breaks into the office, making us snap our heads at her.

"Babe I was-" She stops as she looks at me. "Oh, didn't know you had clients, sorry, I'll come later."

She even blew a kiss at him. Damn, must be serious.

"Hope you liked my books. Have to get back to work." I say standing up from the chair.

"Emma, wait." He does the same. "Let me explain."

"Oh no, no, seriously. It's all cool. See you around." I say smiling heading out of the office pretty quick.

As I return to the conference room, I find it empty, but Dean's perfume is present, and I close my eyes to take in the hipnotizing scent.

"What are you doing?" His voice interrupts my stupidity.

"Nothing, I was just trying to remember something." I say quickly as I take a sit, not before checking him out, as pretty much every time I see him.

He's wearing a white t-shirt, so transparent that something catches my attention. He has another tattoo. It's like a paragraph on the left side, over the rib. I wonder how many tattoos does he have? Or what do they mean? Or when did he get them?

As I'm deep in my thoughts, he looks up and I immediately snap, to try and make it less obvious that I was staring. Like always. But I fail miserably. Like always.

"Smooth." He teases.

"Hmm?" I play dumb.

"It's almost 12pm, don't you have somewhere to be right now?"

"Shit, yeah." I say, realizing he already knows I'm always in a rush at this hour of the day on Mondays and Wednesdays, and it's only been a week. "Thanks, see you tomorrow."

"Or later." He says, without taking his eyes off his laptop.

***

I have to admit I was a little bummed Lucas wasn't at the center to have a talk today, I have this feeling he's not okay and he needs help. I couldn't help but think he might not come back and I'd have to switch therapists, which would be annoying and stressful. Also he must be going through something all alone. Damn. I thought he'd be the one. Guess surgeons die too.

"Do you know who Dean West is?" I ask Keith as we walk towards our literature class.

"I've heard some stuff. Why?"

"What have you heard?" I dig.

"Uhm, he's on the soccer team, apparently he's like a legend and he's just in his second year." He tells me. "Oh, I heard some girl say he's quite the catch now that he worked his way out of all the trouble he got in last year."

"How come I haven't heard anything about him but you have?"

"Remember Lindsay from Narrative?"

"Yep." Our curly big girl.

"She told me stuff."

"You and your stuff, dude." I punch his arm in a friendly way. "Come on, spit."

"Why are you so interested? Got a crush on him?" He makes his eyebrows dance.

"What?" I frown. "No! I just work with him, but he's so... I don't know. Mysterious?"