He rolled his tongue inside his cheek, as if thinking carefully about his words. “There is a chance that I’ll be moving to Boston.”
She blinked at him, confused. Moving? He’d be moving? “What?” No. What was he saying? Adam was not going to leave Stanford, right? He’d never been—the flight risk had never been real. Right?
Except he’d never said that. Olive thought back to their conversations, and—he’d complained about the department withholding his research funds, about them suspecting that he was going to leave, about the assumptions people had made because of his collaboration with Tom, but . . . he’d never said that they were wrong. He’d said that the frozen funds had been earmarked for research—for the current year. That’s why he’d wanted them released as soon as possible.
“Harvard,” she whispered, feeling incredibly stupid. “You’re moving to Harvard.”
“It’s not decided yet.” His hand was still wrapped around her neck, thumb swiping back and forth across the pulse at the base of her throat. “I’ve been asked to interview, but there’s no official offer.”
“When? When will you interview?” she asked, but didn’t really need his answer. It was all starting to make sense in her head. “Tomorrow. You’re not going home.” He’d never said he would. He’d only told her he’d be leaving the conference early. Oh God. Stupid, Olive. Stupid. “You’re going to Harvard. To interview for the rest of the week.”
“It was the only way to avoid making the department even more suspicious,” he explained. “The conference was a good cover.”
She nodded. It wasn’t good—it was perfect. And God, she felt nauseous. And weak-kneed, even lying down. “They’ll offer you the position,” she murmured, even though he must already know. He was Adam Carlsen, after all. And he’d been asked to interview. They were courting him.
“It’s not certain yet.”
It was. Of course it was. “Why Harvard?” she blurted. “Why—why do you want to leave Stanford?” Her voice shook a little, even though she did her best to sound calm.
“My parents live on the East Coast, and while I have my issues with them, they’re going to need me close sooner or later.” He paused, but Olive could tell that he wasn’t done. She braced herself. “The main reason is Tom. And the grant. I want to transition to doing more similar work, but that will only be possible if we show good results. Being in the same department as Tom would make us infinitely more productive. Professionally, moving’s a no-brainer.”
She’d braced herself, but it still felt like a punch in the sternum that left her void of air, caused her stomach to twist and her heart to drop. Tom. This was about Tom.
“Of course,” she whispered. It helped her voice sound firmer. “It makes sense.”
“And I co
uld help you acclimatize, too,” he offered, significantly more bashful. “If you want to. To Boston. To Tom’s lab. Show you around, if you . . . if you’re feeling lonely. Buy you that pumpkin stuff.”
She couldn’t answer that. She really—she could not answer that. So she hung her head for a few moments, ordered herself to buck the hell up, and lifted it again to smile at him.
She could do this. She would do this. “What time are you leaving tomorrow?” He was probably just moving to another hotel, closer to the Harvard campus.
“Early.”
“Okay.” She leaned forward and buried her face in his throat. They were not going to sleep, not one second. It would be such a waste. “You don’t have to wake me up, when you leave.”
“You’re not going to carry my bags downstairs?”
She laughed into his neck and burrowed deeper into him. This, she thought, this was going to be their perfect night. And their last.
Chapter Eighteen
HYPOTHESIS: A heart will break even more easily than the weakest of hydrogen bonds.
It wasn’t the sun high in the sky that woke her up, nor housekeeping—thanks to Adam, likely, and a Do Not Disturb sign on the door. What got Olive out of bed, even though she really, really didn’t want to face the day, was the frantic buzzing on the nightstand.
She buried her face in the pillow, extended her arm to grope her way to her phone, and then brought it to her ear.
“Yeah?” she bleated, only to find that it wasn’t a call but a very long string of notifications. It included one email from Dr. Aslan congratulating her on her talk and asking for the recording, two texts from Greg (Have u seen the multichannel pipette? Nvm found it.), one from Malcolm (call me when you see this), and . . .
One hundred and forty-three from Anh.
“What the . . . ?” She blinked at the screen, unlocked her phone, and started scrolling up. Could it be one hundred and forty-three reminders to wear sunscreen?
Anh: O
Anh: M