The Secret (North Woods University 3)

I have every intention of doing nothing more than opening the door and pointing her in the direction of her room leaving her to figure out the rest for herself, but that’s shot to hell as I walk up to the front door and the figure of a female body comes into view. Even through the frosted glass, I can tell that girl is petite.

The doorbell rings again moments before I make it to the door. Annoyed as all hell since I’m already on my damn way to answer it I open the door using much more force than necessary, a snide remark on the tip of my tongue, ready to be used, but it never passes my lips. In fact, I freeze… shocked into silence. I blink, thinking maybe I’m seeing an illusion, but I’m not… it’s her. The mystery girl. What the hell is she doing here?

Blue doe eyes gaze up at me with an anxiousness that I’ve seen once before, red hair glowing from the sun like a sunset on the beach, flows freely down to her breast, while countless freckles decorate the bridge of her nose and cheeks, just as I remembered them.

“You…” she whispers, those blue orbs turning from anxious fear to shock.

“You,” I echo her. “What are you doing here?”

“I… my father sent me here. I think your father used to be his business partner…” Her meek voice trails off and it’s so fucking adorable I just want to make her continue to talk, but there are prying matters that we need to figure out, like why she is here.

“Wait,” I interrupt her, needing to piece this fucked up puzzle together. “You are Emerson?”

“Yes… and you must be Clark?”

I run my fingers through my hair angrily. Jesus fuck, she’s Emerson. The mystery girl. The girl I’ve been thinking about for weeks is standing on my front steps. Mystery girl is going to stay with us, in my house…so fucking close to me yet, so far away.

“Can I come in?” she asks after a moment of silence, her gaze on my lips rather than my face, just like that night. I stared at her for a long moment, taking in how tiny she is compared to me, how beautiful she is—

“I… I can leave if you don’t want me here,” she interrupts my thoughts.

Like an idiot, only then do I realize that she asked if she could come in. “Whoa wait, look I’m sorry. Come in, I was just surprised to see you here, that’s all. When we parted ways last, I didn’t get your name, so…”

I pull the door open all the way and wave her in, but then I realize the huge suitcase sitting beside her. “Here, let me get that,” I say as I reach for it swiftly. As if I’m about to attack her, she jumps back two feet, almost falling down the front steps in a haste to get away from me.

I look over at her dumbfounded as to what I did wrong. All I did was reach for the damn suitcase and she’s standing there with her hands clutched to her chest and a petrified look in her eyes. Anger ripples through me, not at her but at her fear of me. I must have really freaked her out that day if she reacted to me like this. I was sure I had made it clear that I wasn’t going to hurt her, but obviously she’s forgotten that, either that or she never believed me.

“I’m sorry. I get startled easily,” she admits bashfully even though she looks more like she was about to have another panic attack then being startled. I’m certain if she knew how badly I wanted her here, or how much I’ve thought about her over the last couple of weeks, she would have more than a panic attack.

“It’s okay, don’t worry about it.” I take her suitcase and start to pull it inside. “Let me show you around the house and to your room.”

She follows me through the house as we walk up the stairs in stranded silence. This is strange, everything about this feels strange, because Emerson isn’t like any girl I’ve ever met before. Most…okay, all…the women, minus Ava, end up on their backs, but that’s not going to be the case with Emerson, and I don’t know how to handle it. Pushing the thoughts away, I focus on my steps and not scaring the living shit out of the tiny girl walking with me.

My father told me to give her the bedroom at the end of the hallway, the most secluded, and farthest away from mine. Five minutes ago, I was jumping for joy over her being as far away as possible, but since discovering who my new sidekick is, that feeling has changed. There’s no way in hell I’m putting her at the end of the hall.