“We spend all night and morning together. Then I can give you a ride to school if you want.”
I could always use more time in my classroom and knowing he, too, dedicated so much time to it made me swoon. “That sounds perfect.”
“Then tomorrow could be part two of our date.” He grinned and dropped another kiss on my mouth before taking a sip.
“We’re not done with date one yet, Callahan.” I let my voice go low, and his eyes widened. “Let’s enjoy the rest of tonight, hm?”
Chapter Twenty-One
“Hey,”Christopher said, nudging me with his shoulder as we stood in the teacher’s mailroom, checking our boxes and totally not flirting at work. “Nice dress.”
His gaze dropped to my red polka dot outfit that I loved, but his heated stare made me blush. He had stayed the night, again, a week later, and had fun reaching under the flared skirt before we left for the school that morning.
“Behave, Mr. Callahan.”
He winked before rubbing his hand against mine for a quick second. Then he exited with a large pile of papers from his slot. I had a few envelopes that I hoped were last-minute donations for the Future Teacher Scholarship that I wished Kayla would win. I had to drop all the funds off at the bank that afternoon. I shoved the letters under my arm as I carried a large stack of old magazines down the hallway. We were doing a messy creative lesson where students got to build their dream cast of a story we read, and it required glue, scissors, and a broom.
Many brooms because last year I’d found little pieces of cut paper months after the activity was done.
“Gilly, got a second?” APD said, poking his head out of his office. His eyebrows were drawn together like normal, but there was more tightness around his eyes.
“Sure, yeah.”
I went in, and he shut the door. That was the first sigh of alarm. He never shut the door unless it was a private conversation, which could be a lot of things. Maybe he’d found out about Christopher and me, and there was an HR rule or something. That was probably it. I took a deep breath and tried to decipher his mood. He didn’t seem angry—if anything, he looked irritated. He spoke fast and tapped his pen against the desk.
“How are you?” he asked, sitting down in his squeaky office chair and putting his arms on the desktop. He sat still and tall, and I arched a brow at him.
“Dave, what’s going on? I’m fine.”
“I’ve dealt with a lot of crap in my time as an AP, but this is a first.” He ran one hand over his face before opening the right side drawer. A yellow envelope came out. It was large and had Dave’s name written in all caps. “I debated telling you about it because for one, I don’t care. I need you to know that. It’s your life and your business. There is nothing newsworthy of this. But I’d want to know, and I’m pretty sure you would too.”
“What is it?” I asked, my voice going three octaves too high. Was it a bank statement? Proof of my money? A flash drive with evidence of me doing a kegstand in college? A photo?
Shit.
The photos Samantha took.
The magazines fell from my arm, making a loud slap on the tile, and Dave seemed to wince. “This.” He pulled out some card stock and pushed them across the top of the desk.
Sure enough.
It was the photo of me on top of Christopher—who remained hidden—where it was clearly me. She had to have gotten right next to the car to get this detail, and damn. It looked raunchy. I was on top of a guy, in a car, making out with fogged windows and everything. I sucked in a breath, and all the blood rushed to my face.
How goddamn embarrassing to have this conversation with my boss.
“I-I…” I couldn’t finish. Shame and anger consumed me. I stared at the ground instead of his face. If he was disappointed or disgusted or anything, I didn’t want to know. “Was there a note or anything?”
“Just a sticky note saying did I really know my employees. Honestly, this doesn’t even get my blood pressure raised. Someone has beef with you, they don’t do this kinda bullshit at a school. Again, this isn’t going to get you in trouble or fired or anything like that. I just want to warn you. Something doesn’t sit right with me about it. Have you gotten any threats or messages like this?”
Just Samantha.
“No,” I lied, gulping and meeting his worried gaze. “Nothing.”
“Be careful. If you do, I think we should file a report that you’re being watched.” He took the photos of me and Christopher and shoved them back in his envelope. “I’m going to secure these in a file cabinet for a few weeks, and then we can destroy them. I don’t want to get rid of evidence if we need it later.”
“Right, yeah,” I said, trying to relax and settle the blood from rushing to my ears. This was a whole new level of bullshit from Samantha. Telling Fritz or even Christopher was one thing, but the pictures? To my boss? At my job? This was a new low, and that meant she was getting desperate.
“You’ll tell me if you feel unsafe or anything, right?” he asked, his tone reminding me of my father’s for a second, and it made me smile. He did look out for his staff, and I appreciated his anger on my behalf.
