Page 2 of Irrevocably

My post-pain calm evaporates as I hurriedly get my crap together, then rush for the bathroom door. But I’m not looking at where I’m going, too busy stressing about being late, and as I step out into the corridor, my shoulder bumps into someone hard. I stumble and my backpack slides off my shoulder, and I must have forgotten to zip it up, because all my stuff spills out of it and onto the floor.

“Shit, shit, shit,” I mutter, trying to ignore students streaming down the hallway, all giving my pathetic little pile of items a wide berth. I crouch down and start grabbing things, only to have my fingers almost close around a very large, tattooed hand.

I jerk away in shock, going down on my butt, squinting through the lenses of my glasses at the shape crouched in front of me. The shape resolves itself into a man – tall, with wide shoulders, dressed all in black. He has short, inky hair, winged black brows, cheekbones to die for and a hard, faintly cruel looking mouth. But it’s his eyes that pin me to the spot. They’re the most intense blue I’ve ever seen, and I can’t stop staring.

He says nothing and doesn’t smile. Instead, he picks up the tampon that had been lurking in the depths of my backpack for weeks and holds it out to me, his gaze utterly unreadable.

My chest tightens, my lungs desperate for air, and it’s not because of my anxiety this time. This time it’s because he’s the hard thing I ran into, and he’s the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen, and, oh yes, he’s holding my tampon.

I flush, my cheeks burning as I hurriedly get up and snatch the tampon out of his hand. “Sorry,” I mutter, pushing my glasses back up my nose. “I didn’t see you.”

“Clearly.” His voice is very deep, and very cold, and there’s an edge of darkness to it, like sin wrapped in black velvet.

Discomforted, I tear my gaze from his and grab at the rest of my things, trying to stuff them awkwardly back into my backpack.

I’m the quiet girl. The girl who sits at the back of the class at school, not drawing attention to herself. The girl in the background whom no one notices, and whose name they can’t quite remember. The nerdy girl whose idea of a fun time in high school was looking through a microscope and watching cells divide.

I’m not the girl that hot AF guys look at or even see, so I don’t know what to say to this one, with his blue eyes and his knife-sharp cheekbones, who I ran into like an idiot. Who picked up my tampon like it was no big deal.

Instead, I concentrate on stuffing most of my stuff away before turning to grab my laptop, only to find him holding it out to me.

I reach to take it and as his fingertips brush against mine, a sharp prickle of electricity casts a net over my skin. I freeze, staring up into his eyes, like a deer staring at the headlights of a car. My God, he’s so tall. He has to be like six-four at least, and there’s something about him, something dark and dangerous that steals the breath from my throat. If I’m a deer, he’s a wolf, and he’ll eat me alive if I’m not careful.

“Be careful next time, hmm?” he says, and before I can reply, he rises smoothly to his feet and walks past me as if nothing happened.

I clutch my laptop to my chest, my heart beating fast, and as I straighten, I turn to look after him, only to find that he’s disappeared into the milling crowds of students.

I blink and turn back, still clutching my laptop, my fingertips prickling from where they brushed his, my brain in a kind of stasis. As if my thoughts have all vanished and the only thing in them is the image of his face and those impossibly blue eyes. Even the dull ache of my cut is forgotten.

Get it the fuck together. You’re already late. Don’t make yourself even later.

This is true. I give myself a little shake, get myself the fuck together, head to my next class, which is across the quad, in the Carlisle building.

Blackwater University is a pretty campus, all Gothic architecture – think spires and turrets and buttresses and Oxford – built of dark stone, with ornate windows better suited to a church than a college. But two hundred years ago, when they built it, I guess the architects thought learning was akin to religion.

Everything is clustered around a central quad with green lawns, brick paths, and trees. In the summer, students lie around in the sun on the grass, but now it’s late fall, and the weather’s crap, and while the oaks look beautiful dressed in red and yellow leaves, no one wants to be lying out on the grass admiring them while freezing to death.

I put my head down and head to the main lecture-hall complex, hoping like hell I’m not as late as I fear I am, but Professor Cleary must have been late himself, since when I get to the lecture hall, he’s only just started.

I spend the class paying close attention, typing notes in a fury.

Applications for med school go out this month, then there’s study for midterms, and I can’t afford not to get As. I have a lot of work to do if I want to turn that B plus into an A, which means I can’t afford any distractions.

At the end of the lecture, I pack my stuff away, intending to go straight to the study hall, but as I exit the lecture, I hear someone calling my name.

I stop in the middle of the vaulted hallway, noisy and crowded with students heading out of class, and turn to find my friend Rowan standing behind me.

I don’t have many friends. I’m too quiet and reserved for most people, and I’m not into the whole music/boys/fashion thing that other girls are into. It’s not that I’m a “not like other girls” girl. It’s just that most of the people I knew growing up had families, a mom and dad and brothers and sisters. They went to girl scouts, and had birthday parties, and went on trips to Silver Lake, the largest town close to Blackwater to hang out at the mall.

Their moms never died of cancer when they were little, and their dads were never so deep in grief that the distance between him and his one daughter became so vast it couldn’t be bridged. And they never had to worry about whether that dad was eating or check the levels in the liquor cabinet to see if he was drinking, or listen for the TV late at night, hoping not to hear it because that meant he was sleeping.

I’m not totally friendless, though. I have Wolf, whom I’ve known since I was a kid, and Rowan, whom I met in high school. She’s one of those extroverts who randomly befriend an introvert, then make it their mission to drag said introvert everywhere they go. I don’t know why Rowan chose me, but she did, and I’m glad, because God knows I don’t have any other college friends.

She’s heading into tech research, which suits her analytical brain, and her schedule isn’t quite as full as mine, so she’s got more time to party.

On cue, her hazel eyes fix me with a steady look. “Whatever plans you have tonight, cancel them,” she says. “You’re coming out with me instead.”

This can only mean that somewhere there is a party happening, and Rowan will not rest until I have given a firm commitment to come with her.