Page 11 of Beneath the Beauty (Beauty 2)
“I don’t know, but I couldn’t do it anyway. The surgery will make it so I can’t do hard labor for four weeks. I can’t take off work that long.”
Erin closed her eyes. “Mom, if he says you need the surgery, we’ll find a way.”
“No, I’ll figure it out, Erin. You don’t worry about me. Focus on school.”
Focus on school, and not an illicit relationship with a man way out of her league. Yeah, that was a fair request. Only she wasn’t sure she could actually follow it. Leave Blake? Chills raced through her body. Wrong, all wrong.
“I will, mom. One more semester.”
“One more semester and you’ll never have to clean houses for a living. You’ll never have to deal with this kind of problem, of not being to afford your surgery or take time off to have it. That’s all I want for you, kiddo. All I’ve ever wanted for you.”
Her heart squeezed. “I know.”
“That’s my girl.”
“You and me against the world,” she said dutifully, as she always had since she was a kid. It was their thing. A secret club with just the two of them. At one time it had been a comfort.
Her mother’s goodbyes were happy and heartfelt as they hung up, but Erin felt stricken. Did it really come down to choosing between school and Blake? After all, when she eventually had a career, she’d have to juggle them, so she might as well learn to do it now. She laughed humorlessly. Although maybe Blake would take the decision out of her hands. He might decide to rekindle what he had with Professor Jenkins. Then Erin’s problems would go away…
Ah, but they wouldn’t. She loved him, simple as that. And it superseded so much. She wasn’t willing to sacrifice her degree for that love, or her future, but she’d give up her pride. It wasn’t worth much anyway.
* * *
A low growl emanated from Blake as he watched Erin turn the corner away f
rom him. Their sexual encounter had been mind-blowing, more than he’d ever expected or hoped for, so much that his usual sense of foreboding had abandoned him completely, but it had all come crashing down.
Because of Melinda.
She was still here, coming up behind him, giving that trill laugh he’d once thought endearing. Fuck, he should have handled that better. Should have handled her better. He’d been so damned surprised. Bowled over by the orgasm, by the shock of seeing that woman after so long. And her innuendo that they might rekindle their relationship. Shit. No way in hell, and he’d been ready to tell her that.
He’d been ready to throw the position away. What did he need this job for anyway? He had already turned it down once. It wasn’t worth upsetting Erin, and it sure as hell wasn’t worth losing her. So he’d been about to tell Melinda exactly who Erin was, but maybe it was best that she’d interrupted him.
Erin was more than his lover; she’d been his ray of light in a dank, dark place. He wasn’t even sure she knew how much he had relied on her presence, looked forward to her visits. If he told her, she might run.
Hell, he thought with a sinking feeling, she’d already run. Down the hallway might as well be to the moon for all he could talk to her now, with Melinda breathing down his neck and a meeting with the dean in twenty minutes.
Frustrated, he turned and brushed past Melinda. His palms were sweaty, his heartbeat erratic, and it wasn’t just the great sex or awkward encounter. The students outside his office sounded like a herd of elephants, their voices augmenting one another and bouncing off the white-bright walls until his head pounded. He’d thought he was over these damn flashbacks, but it turned out he’d been avoiding them, staying home where no one ever came. Now he was immersed in people and drowning, suffocating.
Melinda followed him inside, propping a hip on the edge of his desk. “What was all that about?” She smirked. “I think she might have a little crush. Did you see the way she was looking at you?”
Jesus, he needed to end this. “Probably the way everyone looks at me. Like my face is messed up.”
“The way they used to look at you. You were the handsomest man on campus then. And when you wore your uniform? None of the girls could keep their eyes off you back then.”
“Stop,” he said dryly. “You’ll flatter me.”
“Oh, don’t tell me you’re offended. If there’s one thing we’ve had between us, it’s honesty. Your face is not handsome anymore. I can live with the scarring.”
“Funny, that’s not how I remember it.”
Melinda gave him a small smile, a pout that he assumed was contrite. “You have to admit it was a lot to handle.”
Long-buried frustration surfaced. “Which part, Melinda? Because I didn’t ask you for a damn thing before you walked out my door for the last time.”
His bandages hadn’t even come off yet. “It just isn’t going to work out between us,” she’d said, but inside he’d heard, you’re hideous, you’re disgusting.
Over time his anger at her had dissipated, because he was hideous. He was disgusting. And he’d been stuck in that place for a full year, swinging back and forth between waking depression and haunting dreams of his time overseas, of a blast that had shredded his life to ugly, misshapen pieces.
