Page 4 of Lessons in Touch

Chapter 2

Gabriel

“Do you want to meet me for lunch later?” Elliot pops his head through my office door.

Eliot’s been a professor at Wolfswood Institute far longer than I have. And yet, even though he is in his fifties, that has not stopped us from becoming friends.

“Absolutely. In the dining hall?”

“Where else?” he laughs. “Wolfswood has the best food in the area! Are you still going through the admission files, Gabriel?”

“Yes, I’ve been at it all morning. It feels like everyone—and their mother—has sent an application to Wolfswood. I don’t think they realize how selective this place really is. What makes them all so sure they belong here?” I say, louder than intended, to my friend and fellow professor.

“I don’t think they believe themselves to be good enough, Gabriel. It’s just the label they’re after. The status. I graduated from Wolfswood. Aren’t I something?” Elliot laughs.

“I guess so…”

“Well, you can tell me over lunch if you found a good candidate, then,” he says and disappears just as quickly as he popped up.

I pull another file closer to me and open it. Rose’s photo slips free, and my pulse quickens. She’s exquisite—porcelain skin with a delicate flush, like dawn on a winter lake. Her dark chestnut hair, long and slightly wavy, frames her face in soft cascades, begging to be touched.

Light blue eyes, clear and piercing, hold intelligence. And her slender frame, curved with elegant poise, speaks of grace under pressure.

She’s not just beautiful; she’s a vision, delicate yet strong, the kind of woman who could unravel a man like me. I can fall for her, damn it, despite the warning in my mind. She might be a student, or even my mentee soon, but her image stirs something deep. It’s a hunger somewhere very deep inside me.

I focus on her application essay. The pages reveal much more than her photo, and the words are beautiful.

She’s a Devereaux.

My hands hover over the pages of her file. An actual Devereaux. The lost one. The missing third heir. God.

I grab her essay and begin reading it out loud. Her words start materializing in front of me—like a spell or a conjuring.

Reading has always been at the center of how I live and think. Books offer depth, companionship, and a clear sense of direction. I return most often to Wuthering Heights and Mrs. Dalloway—two novels that examine the inner complexity of people and the layers of time that shape them.

Art holds the same kind of meaning for me. I’m drawn to the precision of the Pre-Raphaelites and the force in Turner’s storm-lit seascapes. These works hold the same depth and force I find in literature—they offer ‘direct’ access to emotional knowledge that only forms over years of real-life experience.

At Wolfswood, I want to bring together these two familiar parts of my world—a deep relationship with language and art—and combine them with something I’m yet to learn: mastering business processes. My goal is to honor the legacy of my extended family—my parents in Britain and the Devereaux relatives I’m about to meet—and to create a legacy of my own.

Rose’s application essay is probably the best I have read. She, of course, already has a place secured at Wolfswood. But what impresses me the most is how seriously she is taking this.

Seeing that she is a Devereaux and is obliged to join Wolfswood, she could have turned in a little note or an essay copied from somewhere. Instead, she took the time and the effort to craft this marvelous piece of writing, resting in my hands like a fragile dove.

This girl is something else. I just feel it.

I’m 38, a billionaire and co-founder of this university, a professor shaping elite minds. Still, one sentence from her leaves me exposed—pulled toward her in ways I can’t justify.

For the first time in my career, I’m eager to meet a student.

This student.

My student.

***

At noon, I meet Elliot for lunch in Wolfswood’s dining hall. The old walls and dusty paintings show its fancy history. Elliot, a language professor with a charming smile, is sitting across from me. His tie is loose, showing just how relaxed he is, despite the professional setting.

“Gabriel, you look distracted. Are the admission files that bad? Or is your campaign for Senate not going well? What’s your advisor saying?”