Forbidden Heat (Firework Girls #1) (23 page)

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Authors: J. L. White

BOOK: Forbidden Heat (Firework Girls #1)

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“What did you just say?”

This time he does hold me by the arms and firmly pull me away, and I let him. He’s giving me an alarmed look. I drink in his eyes, the little specks of blue around the edges of green, every detail. Oh how I’ve missed him.

“I want to stay here,” I say. “With you.”

“But...” he says, looking at me with disbelief. “Harvard. I can’t ask you to give up Harvard.”

“You’re not asking. I’m offering. I love you, Shane Brooks.”

He blinks and his hands come up to my face.

“You do?”

“I do. I do. I love you so much. And I need you. Please let me stay.”

“You’re...” he falters, furrowing his brows at me, “...willing to give all that up for... me?”

That’s when I realize that even though he’s no longer my professor and I’m no longer his student, the uneven balance of power we’ve been trying to avoid all along is now here. I will do anything for him. I will give up anything. For him.

Now he knows it.

So, yes, he has all the power over me, but I don’t care. So long as Shane’s by my side.

“I love you too, Isabella.” My heart swells briefly upon hearing those words come out of his mouth. “But...” And my heart clenches.

No.

“I can’t let you do that.”

“But Shane...”

He pulls away and holds up one finger. “Just,” he says firmly. “Wait here a moment.”

Stunned and numb, I watch him walk away from me and disappear down the hall that leads to his office.

I wrap my arms around myself and start to tremble. I think I need to sit, but even though I’ve sat on Shane’s couch a million times—and done more than that on it—I don’t know if he wants me on his couch.

He comes back with a piece of paper in his hand. I numbly watch him approach.

Maybe I can’t talk my way out of this one.

Maybe this is really how it ends.

He holds out the paper and I watch myself take it.

It’s a letter.

From... Boston University?

Dear Mr. Brooks,

Thank you for your interest in Boston University. We’re pleased to offer you an adjunct teaching position in the Department of Philosophy, concurrent with your admission to the Doctoral program in...

I drop my hand, still holding the letter, and stare at him.

“Would that be alright?” he asks.

I raise the letter and look at it again. I re-read the opening lines. I look at the date in the heading: it’s dated four days ago. “When did you get this?” I ask stupidly.

“The mail came about twenty minutes ago. They have a good philosophy department and one of the professors is intrigued by my thesis. He helped me get on the waiting list for this fall, otherwise I would’ve had to... you know, wait a year. There in Boston. If you’d let me.”

I just stare at him, tears brimming in my eyes, holding the letter in my hand. When did he do this?

“It’s a good program,” he says, “but that’s not why I want to go.”

He cups my face in his hands as the tears stream down my cheeks. He brushes them away with his thumb. “After that night at the cabin,” he says softly, “I thought, what if we don’t have to be apart? What if we got to be together after all?”

“But this is your dream job. Here.”

“Ah, Isabella,” he says, rubbing his nose against mine, “you’re my dream girl. I can get a degree anywhere. But there’s only one you.” I grip the back of his shirt. “I want this,” he says firmly, “so you wouldn’t have to worry about that. I want it and I’m okay with it. If it means we could be together, I’m more than okay with it. So please,” he says, “can I come with you?”

“God, yes!” I say.

I wrap my arms around his neck, still holding the letter, and kiss him firmly. Again and again until he laughs and picks me up. I wrap my legs around his waist and he spins me around, but I was already dizzy with the knowledge that I would get to keep Shane Brooks in the end.

Chapter 26

Two days before our lease is up, the apartment is more or less a mess. Boxes are everywhere.

Sam and Ashley are going to be the first ones to go. Sam got the job she wanted in Portland and starts in a few days. Ashley’s staying on to get her master’s, of course, but couldn’t afford this place on her own. She got her own little apartment not far from here.

She and Sam shared the cost of a moving truck. We’ll move Ashley to her new place first, then load up the truck with Sam’s stuff and she’ll take it up to Portland. Jack’s even going with her to help with the move, but he’ll be back by Monday.

Sam just got back with the van, which is parked out front, but we won’t start loading up until Jack and some guys we know are here to help with the furniture. Shane’s on his way too.

He’s hung out over here several times since we got back together and loves my Firework Girls almost as much as I do. They like him too. Even Jack approves.

Ashley, Sam, and I are standing around the kitchen island, chatting about nothing much. We’ve taken to pretending the Firework Girls aren’t coming to an end, at least, not as we’ve always known it.

“I wonder what Chloe’s surprise is,” Sam says.

“She should be here by now,” I say.

We hear the front door open and Chloe calls out to us.

We go into the living room to see a big grin on her face. It’s good to see her smiling again.

“So what’s the surprise?” I ask, noticing she’s empty handed.

She grabs the hem of her shirt and lifts it up so we can see her stomach and... her new belly button piercing.

“Whoa!” Sam says as we all go in for a closer look.

It’s a stud, bigger than the one in her nose but with a stone the exact same light blue color.

“So pretty!” I say and everyone else nods.

“I’ve been wanting one forever but Brad was always talking about the risks of infection with belly button rings, and
blah, blah, blah.”
She grins broadly again. “Screw him.”

I smile. I think Chloe’s going to be just fine.

Chloe and I are packing up the last of our things tomorrow. She got a respectable job with a mid-sized shipping company in Swan Pointe so will be moving there. Jack wanted her to coordinate things so he could help her with her move too. She thanked him but ultimately said no. She seems determined to do things on her own, “Without the help of a man,” she said, “no offense, Jack.”

Through the living room window, we see Jack’s truck working its way toward our apartment.

“Has Jack found anything yet?” Ashley asks.

“I don’t know if he’s even looked,” Sam says. “I think he’s hoping he can just stay in the dorms forever.”

“Well if anyone could pull that off, Jack could,” I say.

We watch Jack silently for a moment. Something about seeing him pull up to the apartment, with all of us here for the last time... Well, it’s sure making it hard for me to deny we’re about to be separated.

“This isn’t the end you know,” Ashley says. “We’ll see each other in a few months.”

Rather than let Chloe spend the night of what would have been her wedding alone, we’ve planned to reunite in Swan Pointe for the weekend and make it fun instead.

But looking around at my girls, I know it’s not going to be the same.

“Friends forever,” Chloe says.

“Forever,” I agree.

Ashley is fighting tears so she can only nod, but she’s smiling.

“Well,” Sam says grinning, “until I forget all about you losers, anyway.”

“Har, har,” Chloe says.

“Alright, alright,” Sam smiles. “Forever.”

Shane and I are sitting at the bar in the airport, waiting for our flight. All our things are in moving crates on their way to Cambridge, but we’re headed down to Dana Point first so he can meet my parents. From there we’ll hit Chicago so I can meet his parents before we continue on to Massachusetts.

We order a couple glasses of champagne to celebrate. We’ve been celebrating a lot lately.

The bartender leaves to get our drinks and Shane smiles at me. “It’s been quite the year,” he says.

I nod. “Yes. There’s only one thing I regret.”

“What’s that?”

“We never got to have sex in your office.”

He raises an eyebrow and says, “Um... we
totally
did and I can’t believe you don’t remember that.”

“Not
that
office,” I say, the heat rising to my cheeks at the memory of it. “I mean your office at school.”

He laughs. “You wanted to have sex in my office at school?”

“Oh yeah. It would’ve been totally hot.”

“Hmm,” he says, getting that scrumptious look on his face. “Maybe we’ll have to figure something out if they give me an office at BU.”

“Why Professor Brooks! I’m scandalized.”

He grins and kisses the back of my hand. “That’s what you get for joining forces with a heathen.”

“Somehow I think I’m the one who was a bad influence on you, and not the other way around.”

“I think I’ve done all sorts of bad things to you,” he says wickedly. “But we’re not going to tell your mother that.”

“No, no. She thinks you’re a good little Catholic boy.”

“What?” he says, looking mortified.

I laugh. “Just kidding.”

He gives me a look as the bartender brings our drinks. We each grab one. I go to clink my glass against Shane’s but he pulls back slightly, stopping me.

He looks me in the eye. “To us,” he says firmly.

I smile broadly. “To us.”

We clink our glasses and drink. To us.

The End

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