That was the part making me lose my mind.
Not the sex.
Okay, fine, also the sex.
The sex was absolutely not helping.
But it was more than that. It was the way he met me every single time. If I threw sarcasm at him, he caught it and threw it back sharper. If I hid behind something stupid, he knew where the door was and knocked anyway. If I said I hated him, he heard the part under it. If I tried to make myself smaller, easier, less complicated, he looked at me like I had personally offended him by attempting bad math in front of his engineering major.
By the time I reached the ABC apartment, I was so worked up that I almost walked past my own door.
Aura opened it before I could get my key all the way into the lock.
She looked me up and down once, took in my flushed face, my messy hair, and whatever expression was currently betraying my entire bloodstream, then stepped back without a word.
“Oh no,” Charm called from inside. “She has the sex face.”
I froze in the doorway. “I do not have the sex face.”
Charm sat cross-legged on the couch in a matching lounge set that looked too expensive to emotionally support anyone, a glossy magazine open on her lap and a bag of sour candy beside her. “Baby, you look like you discovered a new religion and it has hockey thighs.”
Aura shut the door behind me. “Charm.”
“What?” Charm lifted both hands. “I’m happy for her.”
“You’re harassing her.”
“I’m celebrating her body’s victory.”
I dropped my backpack near the door and covered my face with both hands. “I hate living here.”
“No, you don’t.” Charm patted the cushion beside her. “Sit down and tell us everything.”
“I’m not telling you everything.”
Aura moved toward the kitchen, already reaching for the iced coffee in the fridge because she was a best friend and knew I was a menace for an iced mocha. “Then tell us enough to explain why you look like you’re trying not to levitate.”
I sat beside Charm and immediately pulled a throw pillow into my lap like it could protect my dignity. It could not. My dignity had been missing since Cade used his knee to spread my legs in my own bed while I threw all reasoning out the window.
My face heated all over again.
Charm’s eyes widened slowly. “Oh, this is going to be good.”
“It’s not.” I squeezed the pillow harder. “It’s actually terrible.”
Aura handed me the coffee and sat on the arm of the couch, one leg tucked beneath her. “Define terrible.”
I took a sip, buying time, but they both just stared at me with the patience of women who had known me long enough to weaponize silence.
So I cracked.
“It’s unbelievable,” I said, and the words came out in one breath, fast and horrified and way too honest. “Like, actually unbelievable. Not normal. Not regular college-hookup unbelievable where you’re like, wow, that was fun and now I need Gatorade. I mean the man understands assignments Idid not even know were assigned. He looks at me like he’s studying for a final he intends to ruin the curve on, and then he says things, and touches me, and I forget basic government structures.”
Charm pressed both hands to her chest. “I have waited my whole life for that exact paragraph.”
“You’re welcome.”
Aura’s mouth twitched. “Government structures?”
