Page 25 of Apparently, I’m Trouble

I was muttering to myself–and to the universe, really–because despite what Lilly thought, something I had no control over was happening here.

I made it to the empty staffroom, grateful that the hot, stagnant air of the day had cooled down, and snatched my tote bag. It carried a week’s worth of essays, and though I was freaking out about the fact that I’d just felt Theo’s cock, I wasn’t about to forget them.

“Mia, that wasn’t–”

I screamed, jumped, and slapped a hand to my chest. My heart was racing under my palm, and why wouldn’t it? The scariest possible sight was right in front of me, standing in the staffroom doorway.

Theo’s brows were drawn tight over his blue eyes, and his honey-brown hair was tousled from rushing after me.

He looked miserable. Gorgeously desolate, if I wanted to wax Shakesperean about it. The perfect image of a man filled with regret–and it was horribly attractive.

Since we’d met at that godforsaken fundraiser, I’d worked hard to shove his physical appeal to one side. The man didn’t like me. Worse, he didn’t respect me. He’d just cornered me, for cripes’ sake. He’d forced me to touch him. I should be livid.

But now that I knew what he felt like, a switch had been flipped, and I didn’t know how to flip it back.

As he stepped into the room, his dark gray shirt strained against his thick shoulders, and–damn it if I didn’t love a good set of shoulders. Warmth pooled between my thighs, low and thick, and I clenched them tight as I backed up against the round wooden table behind me.

“This isn’t fair,” I grumbled, gritting my teeth.

Without any way of knowing what I meant, Theo agreed. “I know. You’re just trying to do your job, and I crossed a line.”

Was he about to apologize? I waited, but it didn’t seem like he was going to say anything else.

Instead, he stared at the ground. With his feet shoulder-width apart and his hands on his hips, this whole pensive thing was really working for him. Which didn’t work for me at all.

I felt hot and itchy then, and recognized it as something I almost never felt anymore. I was desperate. I needed to get out of here before I did or said something stupid.

“Can we just… forget it?” I asked, knowing I was speaking to myself as much as I was to him.

He lifted his eyes to meet mine, and my skin prickled all over.

Oh god, this is not happening.

“If that’s what you want.”

I inched closer, trying not to touch him as I made my way to the door. “You should go back to the amphitheater. I don’t want Kira worrying about you.”

Keeping my eyes on him, I turned and backed out of the room as if Theo were a spooked animal about to pounce.

But I didn’t need to worry.

All Theo did was swallow in this impossibly sexy, throat-bobby kind of way and nod. I ran out of there before the universe had any more bright and horrible ideas.

Mia’s Apartment

Friday Night

In my orange-walled apartment, couched between my one square window and dark blue kitchen, I sat on my mustard-brown sofa and stared at my phone.

Tonight was another clear sign that something was happening, and I was starting to think my horny-novel-obsessed best friend was right–even if she was only joking at the time.

But if I was trapped in an enemies-to-lovers plot, what did that even mean?

From what Lilly had explained, the two strangers often started off as enemies, then something happened, and they turned into lovers somehow. From there, they’d fall in love.

Utter revulsion twisted in my gut. I’d never felt anything close to a love like Lilly described before, and I wasn’t about to feel any of that for Theo.

But the lover part?