These Thorn Kisses (St. Mary’s Rebels 3)

“I’ve been thinking about how to answer it. How to get my message across.”

“Your message?”

“Yes.” A thoughtful frown appears between his brows but his eyes — at least to me — appear darker, shinier. “See, it’s troubling. The contents of that letter. And I’ve been trying to think of a solution.”

I want to smile then. At his ‘troubling.’

But all I do is blink innocently and ask, “Can I help? With figuring out the solution. I’m good with them. Solutions, I mean.”

“And here I thought you were just the artist.”

“I’m —”

“Thanks for the offer though.” He at last gets moving, taking another step back before he says, “But I think this one I’m going to have to figure out on my own.”

With that, he leaves and I think I’ll combust in my chair.

Especially when Poe looks at me and winks.

And Salem giggles in her soup and Callie murmurs something along the lines of her big brother acting extremely weird.

“I don’t think he’s ever said the word ‘correspondence’ in his life before,” she says. “I don’t even think he likes receiving correspondence.”

He read my letter.

He did.

He did. He did. He did.

And so the next day, I stand in front of his office with another dream for him, wrapped up in rosy pink, with a smile. And again like yesterday, he opens the door before I can slide it in his mailbox.

In fact he opens the door way before I’ve even reached my arm out to put the letter in.

He opens it as soon as I get there.

Like he knew I’d come. Like he was waiting for me.

“Hi,” I whisper. “Happy Tuesday.”

My greeting, like yesterday, like always, makes him frown and I, like always, keep going. “I have another dream for you. This one picks up right after the first one.”

His chest moves sharply with his breath. “Get in.”

“What?”

“Get inside my office.”

I press the letter to my chest. “But I… I have class now.”

His teeth clench, his features set in stone. “And you’ll go to your class. After I’m done with you.”

After he’s done with me.

Sounds ominous.

But okay. Fine. I can take him.

“All right,” I say and pass him by.

As soon as I cross the threshold, he shuts the door and locks it too.

Spinning around, I face him and find that his eyes are running over my body.

Slowly, methodically. Lazily.

This time of day, I’m all put-together and tidy.

Though that doesn’t mean that I’m neat and tidy on the inside.

I’m all chaotic actually.

I’m all heated and restless.

All because he’s watching me like that.

When he’s done making me a mess, he looks up. “Stand over there.”

He jerks his head in the direction of ‘over there.’

It’s the bare wall adjacent to his desk that I wanted to paint that first day. I wanted to paint it with colors and flowers so he could have something interesting to look at.

Something that might give him joy.

Now I go to it, on trembling legs and buzzing thighs. And stand with my back to it.

I press my back to it even, not only to give myself some balance but also to become a painting myself.

A flower stuck to the wall.

For him.

It’s as if he can hear my silly, fanciful thoughts.

Because his eyes flash and his chest moves up and down in a couple of rapid breaths before it calms down and he thrusts his hand, the one with that big silver watch, inside his pocket.

Only to bring it out a second later with his fingers clutching something.

The rosy envelope identical to the one that I’m holding in my own hand.

My letter from yesterday.

“Read it.”

I lick my lips and ask, “What?”

He puts the letter that he was holding in his hand on his desk and slides it over to me. “Read the letter.”

I look at the letter sitting on his desk.

It’s folded in the middle and its edges are crumpled and look handled. I ask, glancing up, “You want me to read the letter I wrote you?”

His jaw ticks. “Yes.”

“But I —”

“If you can write it,” he says almost bitingly, “you can read it too. Now pick it up and read what you wrote to me.”

That’s when I get it.

I get what he’s asking me to do.

I want to laugh then.

Smile at least.

This is his solution? For the trouble that is me.

He thinks this might put me in my place, reading my own words out loud to him. Like I’m a wayward child.

He’s an idiot.

An adorable, angry idiot.

Fine, I’ll do it.

So instead of laughing or smiling or shaking my head at him, I step forward to pick up the letter from his desk. “Okay. If that’s what you want.”

The muscles on his biceps go taut at my words and I can totally see that in his navy blue t-shirt and no hoodie.

But then he casually props his hip against the edge of his desk and folds his arms across his chest. “Whenever you’re ready.”