Living in Shadow (Living In…) (7 page)

“No of course not. He’s a student. Practically a child.”

“Good plan,” Victoria said, pushing aside her glass. “You don’t want to touch that kind of thing with a barge pole. Not after Piers.”

“Exactly. I told Kahu—”

“I only have your best interests at heart, Ell,” Kahu said, toying with his wineglass. “Anyway, are you going to tell me what happened with him?”

Victoria’s dark eyes were now looking at her expectantly. Bugger it.

Eleanor shifted on her seat. She’d finished her wine and wanted another, then taxi it home, but perhaps it wasn’t a good idea. She had a shitload of papers to mark and a lecture to prepare for tomorrow. “Nothing happened with him.” She fiddled with the paper coaster her glass had been sitting on. “I told him I wasn’t interested and he backed off.”

Kahu snorted. “Christ. How am I supposed to uphold my reputation of sexual fairy godmother if you keep telling men to piss off?”

“I didn’t ask for you to be my sexual fairy godmother.”

“No, but, honey, you damn well need one.”

“Well, this is all very interesting,” Victoria interrupted, “but is there any more gossip or is that it? I’ve got a presentation to give on Friday and a metric ton of reading to do before then.”

Eleanor glanced at her friend. Victoria was always working these days, putting in long hours at her firm. Had done so ever since she and Connor separated six months earlier. It was a worry. As was the way her tall, normally curvaceous figure had wasted away into a shadow of its former self. She looked thin and spiky in her black suit, her caramel-colored skin, legacy of a Polynesian ancestor, had a pasty tinge to it that didn’t look in any way healthy.

“Are you okay, Vic?” Eleanor asked, partly because she was worried and partly because she wanted to deflect Kahu’s attention from the subject of Luc. “You’re looking pale.”

Victoria shrugged, picking up her handbag and briefcase. “I’m fine. Just tired. I’ll see you guys next week, okay?”

“What about coffee this weekend?” Eleanor persisted. She hadn’t seen Victoria for a while, come to think of it. And from the looks of her friend, a little heart-to-heart wouldn’t go amiss.

The other woman’s expression flickered. “Can’t, sorry. Working.”

It wouldn’t have surprised Eleanor if Victoria
had
been working, but that momentary flicker told her that her friend wasn’t being entirely honest. For a second she wondered whether or not to press her, then decided against it. Victoria could be damn stubborn when she wanted and if she was lying about something, it was probably for good reasons. Didn’t mean Eleanor didn’t worry about her, though.

“What’s going on there, do you think?” Kahu mused, watching Victoria’s tall, thin figure stalk through the cluster of tables on the way out the door.

“Definite stuff, from the looks of things. Have you heard from Connor lately?”

“Yeah, saw him last week. He’s doing about as well as Vic is.”

“That’s not good.”

“Tell me about it.” He glanced toward her. “And don’t think I’ve forgotten about your young man either.”

“Oh for fuck’s sake, Kahu. He’s not my young man.”

“Then why are you getting all irritated every time I mention him?”

“Perhaps because you keep mentioning him every five seconds?”

Slowly, Kahu sat back in his chair, crossing his muscular arms, his dark eyes piercing. “You regret it, don’t you?”

Eleanor sighed and glanced down at the table, noticing she’d ripped the coaster up into a million tiny bits. Jesus, what was wrong with her? She wasn’t
that
fidgety normally, was she? Brushing off her fingers, she pushed the bits into a small pile in the center of the table. “No, of course not.”

“Ell,” Kahu said quietly, “it’s me.”

She didn’t look at him, staring at the ripped-up coaster. Maybe it wasn’t not seeing him that she was regretting, but the way she’d handled it.

Sure, Luc had been inappropriate but he’d also been brutally honest about the fact that he wanted her and she’d responded to that honesty by being a bitch to him. Hardly her finest moment. No wonder he’d got angry—she’d hurt him.

“I wasn’t very nice to him,” she said finally, a prickle of shame crawling over her skin. “And I do regret that.”

“Did he deserve it?”

I want to take that fear away…

“No. No, he didn’t.”

Kahu’s dark eyes were impenetrable. “Well then. Maybe you need to apologize.”

A part of her curled up in instinctive denial, though she didn’t want to examine her reasons too closely. Because Kahu was right. She probably did owe Luc an apology.

The idea stayed with her the rest of the night and it was still there when she went into work on Friday, papers marked and lecture prepared.

Once again, Luc wasn’t in the café when she bought her morning latte and it made the regret inside her even worse. He was doing what he’d promised, even after she’d said those things to him. Even though she’d hurt him.

God, she should never have thrown that honesty back in his face. Shouldn’t have let her anger and—
yes, go on, admit it
—her fear get the better of her. She was normally so much better at handling those situations, and she couldn’t think why she’d lost it with Luc.

Keep telling yourself you don’t know.

Eleanor ignored the snide voice as she walked down the corridor to her office. She wasn’t going to think about the feel of his hand around her ankle. Or the way he’d taken her chin in his hand. Those feelings weren’t ones she wanted anymore and she needed to stop thinking about them.

And then, ahead of her, near her office door, she saw Luc standing with his head slightly bent, deep in conversation with James. Instantly her heartbeat accelerated, her palms sweaty.

Fuck, this teenage-girl bullshit was getting old.

Eleanor tightened her grip on her coffee, concentrating on the burn of the hot liquid through the cup and not the tight ache that sat down low in her gut.

She could apologize to him now, couldn’t she? And hell, perhaps if she did, she’d stop all this thinking-about-him nonsense. Kahu would be so proud.

You want to see him…

Telling her head to shut the hell up, Eleanor slowed down as she approached the two men, her gaze riveted to the starkly beautiful lines of Luc’s face.

“Eleanor,” James greeted her, smiling. “Morning. Are we in the way?”

“Since my door is right there, yes.” She shifted her gaze to Luc’s, her pulse beating unnaturally fast. “Good morning, Mr. North.”

The smile he gave her was completely impersonal. “Same to you, Professor May.”

No heat in his gaze now, none of that intense focus. His expression was neutral, as if she were a stranger he’d only just met and not a woman he’d wanted.

He stood there, tall and lean in a plain, dark-red T-shirt and jeans, one hand casually gripping the strap of his backpack. And she found her gaze drawn to that hand. To his long fingers and the strange black tattoos covering the backs of them. The thick fabric cuff that circled his wrist. That was the hand that had taken her chin, forcing her gaze to his.

God, he’d been so angry and she’d…
melted
.

There was a silence and she realized it was because of her. Because she was staring. At Lucien. Fuck.

She took a silent breath and twisted her mouth into what she hoped was a cool smile. “I’m sorry, gentlemen, but you’re still in my way.”

“And I have a lecture to give in five minutes.” James grinned at Luc. “I’ll see you this afternoon.” His attention switched to her. “Lunch?”

“Of course.”

“Great.” He glanced at his watch before striding off down the corridor toward the lecture theatres.

Luc adjusted his grip on his backpack, shifting on his feet, ready to leave too.

Now. She needed to speak now. “Can I have a word, Mr. North?”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.” He didn’t look at her, glancing off down the hallway. “Besides, I have a tutorial in ten minutes.”

“It won’t take long. I just need to…tell you something.” She didn’t want to do it out here, where anyone might hear.

Finally his gaze met hers, his expression unreadable. “I told you I’d back off. I meant it.”

“Yes. I understand that but—”

“But what?”

Shit, he wasn’t going to make this easy for her, was he? “Can we do this in my office, please? I don’t want to apologize in the hall.”

His gaze sharpened. “Apologize?”

Down one end of the corridor a couple of staff members were chatting as they walked, followed by a small group of students.

Eleanor dug her office key out of her bag and moved to the door before she could second-guess herself. “Come in here. It’s quieter.” And she pushed the door open for him.

Again a brief pause and that level, assessing gaze watching her. Then he moved past her into the office without another word.

A certain amount of relief filtered through her, along with a healthy dose of some other emotion she didn’t want to acknowledge. Something that felt horribly like excitement.

Ignoring that, she came into the office after him, deliberately leaving the door open, rounding her desk and dumping her briefcase and handbag beside it. Then she placed her latte on the desktop.

Luc stared at her, the force of his gaze pinning her to the spot. “You said you wanted to apologize. For what?”

Voices drifted down the hallway, getting louder as the two staff members she’d seen earlier passed by the open doorway. That and the weight of his stare made her feel stupidly self-conscious.

With an effort, she forced herself to calm the hell down, letting her fingertips rest on the cool wood of the desk. “For the way I spoke to you last week. When you…ah…told me how you felt and I said—”

“That I should try English instead of law? That I was telling you what I thought you wanted to hear?” His voice was cold.

He was still angry, then. Well, fair enough. “Yes,” she said. “I shouldn’t have said those things.”

He remained silent a couple of seconds, staring fiercely at her. “Damn straight you shouldn’t have said them.”

She swallowed. “I didn’t handle it very well, I acknowledge that. I…don’t get very many students coming to me with that level of honesty.”

“What? You’ve never had a man tell you he wants to fuck you?”

The words hit hard, like blows. The kind that used to give her pleasure before Piers changed everything. And the thin thread of fear, the fear she’d convinced herself for years wasn’t real until Luc appeared, pulled tight.

“Don’t,” she said, trying to keep her voice level. “Don’t keep saying those things to me.”

Anger was sharp and hot in his eyes. “Why not? You like it, I know you do.”

“You think I won’t go to the dean?”

“You think you don’t want me to come over there, bend you over that desk, pull up your skirt and fuck you so hard the whole law school will hear you scream when you come?”

A wave of heat gripped her, so strong she couldn’t move. She could feel it, the need rising up inside her. The craving for those strong fingers on her, holding her down, ripping her clothes away, pushing inside her, taking her hard, so she couldn’t think of fear or betrayal. Or anguish. So there was only pleasure.

It’s been so long…

In the hallway there were more voices, the group of students passing by her office.

She had no idea what she’d do if they came in because the sexual tension in the room was so thick it was almost visible.

But they didn’t come in, moving past the doorway, talking.

“Did you think this week was easy?” Luc went on, that fierce thread of anger running through his voice. “Did you think I dismissed you like you were nothing?”

She was shaking and she couldn’t deny the fear now. It glowed inside her like a hot coal. “Of course I did,” she said hoarsely, fighting the emotion, trying to hold it together. “You looked through me as if I barely existed.”

“I told you I would. That’s what you wanted, wasn’t it?” Intensity burned in him, his anger filling her small office like the heat from a roaring fire. “Tell me, what did I do, Eleanor? What line did I cross?”

And she saw it then, behind the anger in his eyes. Pain. She
had
hurt him. Jesus.

She pressed her fingertips hard against her desktop, bracing herself on it. “What line?” she repeated. “Do I really need to remind you that you’re a student and—”

“I don’t mean that line. I mean, when I touched you. Did I hurt you? What?” His expression hardened. “Or is this some kind of test? You push me into the truth purely for the pleasure of telling me to fuck off and seeing if I’m as good as my word.”

“No of course not,” she said sharply, unable to stop herself. Because she couldn’t let him believe that. She didn’t manipulate people. It was too much like the games Piers had played with her. Such as telling her about hard limits and asking her what hers were, only to break every one of them.

“Then why?” He took a step forward, closer toward the desk. “Why did you tell me no?”

He was so tall and broad, filling the room with his presence, with his anger and with that strange kind of pain she didn’t understand. And some lost part of her wanted to go to him and kneel at his feet. Calm whatever it was that was hurting him.

“Why?” Her voice sounded strange. “Because I…I want you. And I can’t, Lucien. I just can’t.”

He looked at her, standing straight and poised behind her desk. Today she wore a tailored silk blouse in a soft blue, her light-gray skirt following her figure exactly, right down to the kick pleat near her calf. Her blonde hair was tied back in a loose bun at the nape of her neck. Simple, elegant. Beautiful.

And he knew he should feel satisfied that finally she’d given him the truth. But he didn’t. He was too fucking angry.

She would never know how difficult this week had been. How hard it was to pretend that nothing had happened between them. That he hadn’t felt the soft, smooth skin of her jaw beneath his fingertips. That he hadn’t seen her become motionless as he’d gripped her chin, seen the flare of desire in her eyes, bright and unmistakable. He’d been afraid he’d gone too far and yet he’d been so fucking angry at her assumptions he hadn’t been able to help himself.