I tapped it out on the screen, and when I passed it back, he caught my hand in his. He used his hold to draw me close, slipping an arm around my back. His warm breath on my neck made me shiver. His power over me was intoxicating.
“Think about what we just did when you touch yourself tonight.” His tone was non-negotiable, a strict order.
If I was brave enough, I would have told him there was a one hundred percent chance of that happening, but I couldn’t work up the nerve. Instead, I nodded quickly. He glanced at the screen of his phone as if checking the time, and he scowled.
“I’ve got to go.” He crushed his mouth over mine, then his mouth traveled to my ear. “That was easily the best meal I’ve ever had.”
I turned my apron in and the manager waved me off, mumbling something about a text message from Joseph, and it was all right not to come back.
I should have felt guilt about my total lack of professionalism, or shame at what I’d done, but I didn’t. All I could think about was doing it again. The wrongness felt good on me, an odd, new sensation.
My phone rang as I plodded through the snow to the CTA stop closest to the restaurant, and I sighed when I saw the name on the screen. I’d just doubled the number of men I’d slept with, so of course he would call.
“Hey,” Ross said. “What are you doing tonight?”
“I’ve got a group thing, that case study for MacKenzie’s class.” I didn’t bother to point out that I had it every Monday night since the beginning of the semester. Ross couldn’t remember when we were dating, he wasn’t going to start now. “Why? What’s up?”
“Can you blow it off and help me out? Gillian’s having a wine tasting with a bunch of alumni tonight and invited us.”
Us. I ducked into the stairwell, grateful to be out of the wind, but instantly irritated. Gillian was the professor that Ross was a TA for. There’d be opportunity for networking for Ross. I’d have gone if I was his girlfriend, and I’d have been bored out of my mind. But we were friends now, nothing more.
“I can’t, sorry.”
“Come on, Em, please? This could be really important for me.”
For a moment, I considered caving. He’d been trying so hard to get his foot in the door somewhere, either an interview or an internship. But I shook my head, not that he could see it. I’d turned down dinner with Joseph tonight. I was trying my hand at being bad now, and sticking with my studies was as far as I was willing to go with being good.
“You can’t go by yourself?”
He hesitated. “It’s a couples thing.”
The train rail rattled overhead and I hustled up the stairs to the elevated platform. It was loud enough I thought about asking him to repeat it, but I knew what he’d said. “We’re not a couple anymore.”
“I know, but we could fake it if we had to for one night.”
Joseph had unleashed something inside me, and the words tumbled out. “No, I’ve faked it enough times with you.”
“Wow,” Ross said, his tone harsh and condescending. “That’s fair.”
The train clattered to the platform and I darted through the open doors, finding an empty seat. “I’m sorry,” I muttered, although I didn’t really feel sorry. “I get that this thing tonight is important to you, but you’ve got to understand my grades are important to me.”
A noise like he’d scoffed echoed through the phone. “Yeah, like your dad’s not going to find you some cushy job, no matter what.”
What the hell was he talking about? He’d known my family his whole life. “Um, have you not met my dad? Because if you had, you’d know how likely that is.” This conversation needed to be over. “It doesn’t matter, Ross. You said we should focus on ourselves. So you should go do that.”
“What the hell’s gotten into you?”
Joseph Monsato. “I’m just doing what you told me to. I’ve gotta go. Good luck finding someone to fake it with.” I ended the call and tucked the phone in my purse. It had to look ridiculous, me sitting alone on the El, grinning like an idiot.
The rest of the day dragged, but I did my best to stay active in the case study group. A text message came through late in the evening, when I’d gotten back to my apartment, shed my winter clothes, and put on my most comfortable pajamas.
I sighed in relief. I’d struggled with paranoia that I’d never hear from him again since I’d already slept with him. At the time, a tiny, bitchy voice whispered his dinner invitation had been the fastest way to brush me off.
I laughed, and then realized he didn’t know what building I actually lived in. I wasn’t about to get into it through text messages, so tomorrow I’d have to hang out in the atrium of the building one block over.
I almost dropped the phone. Even in text messages, he was commanding and it was thrilling. Where was the shame in what I’d done? In what I was doing? I’d slept with a man I knew almost nothing about, and I’d let him take me right out in the open. Who could I become beneath him?
I curled up under the covers in the bed Ross and I had made love in, but I’d never felt an inkling of what I’d had on the table with Joseph. Being wrong and bad was just as I’d hoped it would be. It was so, so good.