“Would you—uh, I just wondered if you’d want to grab dinner tomorrow before class? I could show you what I come up with and get some pointers before taking it to twenty-five hopefuls.”
My gut reaction—that he’s asking for a date—is quickly snuffed by the reality that he just wants help with his class. He is clearly insecure, and I’ve dropped this on him at the last minute. The last thing we need to do is engage in date-like activities. My brain doesn’t need that kind of confusion.
“You’ve got this, Dorian,” I say, slapping him on the shoulder like a chum. “You don’t need me to look over your notes. It’s going to be great. I have total faith in you.”
Dorian looks like he wants to protest, so I reach around him for the door handle and push it open. He twists as I do it, letting me pass him. I hold the door open with a smile.
“Total faith,” I reiterate, walking him back through the store. I can’t get enough distance between myself and this man fast enough. Mostly so I can call Elena and demand an explanation. We pass the endcap Ravi had been working on, and I come to a halt. “What the heck, Rav?”
“Half and half,” he says innocently. But I know better. He’s trying to prove a point. He didn’t put Dorian’s books on top and mine below; he put D.M. James books on the left side and Clancy Calloway books on the right. Some little indie author that we stock out of the goodness of my heart and because everyone knows thrillers are my favorite genre. To be fair, my pen name has gotten big enough that people come in looking for her books—she follows directly behind him on all of Amazon’s best-selling thriller charts—but just like D.M. James, no one knows Clancy Calloway is me.
Which means I’m the only one who sees our college rivalry in the flesh right now, with his books directly stacked against mine.
I chose to have a pen name so I wouldn’t lose control over how I’m perceived—to keep a solid separation between my emotional wall and reader opinions. But this situation is leaving me feeling a little helpless. It’s the first time my pen name hasn’t protected me. It’s blocking the things I wish I could say.
“May the best man win,” Ravi says, walking away.
I’m definitely changing this the moment Ravi leaves for the day.
“Woman,” Dorian mutters.
“What?”
He tips his chin toward Clancy Calloway’s books. “I did a little digging once because the name can go either way, and it’s apparently thought to be a woman. But just like mine, no one really knows who she is.”
We are reaching a danger zone here. He swings his attention to me, and I want to melt away.
I give him a bright smile instead. “Then I’m rooting for her.”
Dorian flashes his teeth as he barks out a laugh, which courses through my veins like a drug. “Of course you are.”
Woo. He needs to leave before I do something reckless, like tug him down by the collar and put my lips on his. I’m sorry, but did you hear that laugh? Music. The man is intelligent, his forearms are sculpted from some sort of regular exercise beneath that professor’s sweater, and hewriteslike a king. His storytelling chops are a divinely appointed gift. It’s a very dangerous combination for a nerd like me.
“Good luck with everything,” I sing out, opening the front door to my store. “Let me know if you need anything.”
“Okay…how?”
“How what?”
“How will I let you know if I need anything? Should I call the store?”
“You can text me.” I open my phone and create a new contact, then hand it to him so he can put his number in. “I’ll send you my number.”
“Great.” He plugs in his phone number, then slings his hands into his pockets and walks away. I only watch him for a moment. The view is just so good I can’t resist.
Once he’s out of sight, I immediately call Elena. The customer is still browsing the shelves, and Ravi is keeping an eye on her, so I speedwalk to my office as one of my oldest friends picks up the phone. We met in high school, roomed together in college, and her revolving crushes on Dorian’s housemates were partially to blame for why he never left my sphere during our four years at the University of Tennessee.
“Hey,” she says, answering on the fourth ring. “I’m picking up Harper from the sitter, so I only have a second.”
“You see Dorian McConkie?” I close my office door behind me and drop onto my sofa.
Her silence is incriminating. She coughs lightly. “I mean…occasionally?”
“Are you asking me?”
“No?”
“Elena.”
