Chapter Nineteen
Molly
Evan gathers the index cards, taps them twice on the table with a little flourish, and lines them up into a perfect stack.
Then he slides the neat arrangement precisely between us, right in the dead center of the map of scribbled napkins and scratch paper.
The lamp above our booth spills gold over his forearms and turns the dregs of the cheap wine in our glasses into something that looks expensive and rare.
The bookstore bar is almost empty except for us and a pair of grad students arguing about poetry in the corner, each trying to out-obscure the other.
We are the last survivors, the stragglers on the far side of last call.
My brain still feels like a battered drumhead, reverberating with equations and concepts, but the panic has faded into a manageable hum. In its place is this quiet, comfortable warmth that feels dangerous in a different way.
I cradle my mug of cold coffee and stare at the last scribbles in my notebook. The pages are a mess, but they’re my mess, and suddenly I feel a kind of pride in the chaos.
Across from me, Evan sits back within the U-shaped booth, arms stretched over the seatbacks, as if this is his living room and I’m the only guest worth having. “That’s it,” he says, but his voice is soft, almost reverent.
I blink at him. “That’s it?”
He nods, stacking the satisfaction on top of the note cards. “That’s it. You just bullied macroeconomics into submission.”
“Bullied?” I try to sound offended, but I can’t quite muster the energy.
He grins, showing a sliver of front teeth. “You’ve got the intimidation down. I think you scared the IS-LM curve into behaving.”
“The IS-LM curve wasn’t the problem. It was the bullshit open economy stuff.”
“Ooh, listen to you,” he says, like he’s genuinely impressed, like I didn’t just parrot the terms minutes ago from his own mouth. “You’re going to destroy that quiz. You’ll see.”
I shake my head, but I’m smiling, which feels like a weird betrayal of my own principles. “You should go into motivational speaking. Seriously.”
Evan leans forward, resting his elbows on the table, his fingers interlaced.
“I know effort when I see it,” he says, so softly and plainly that it lands with the weight of an anvil. “You could do anything if you wanted to.”
I look away. Something in my throat wants to escape, and I bury it under a scoff.
“Now you’re just making stuff up.”
He shrugs. “You don’t believe it, but I do.”
I glance away, because if I hold his gaze too long, I’ll do something stupid. “So now what? You going to give me a gold star?”
He huffs a laugh — real, low, warm. “If you want a gold star, I’ll find you a gold star.”
“I don’t want a gold star.”
“Sure you don’t,” he says, and the teasing edge in his voice makes my stomach flip. “How the hell could anyone not want a gold star? Or a sticker, for that matter?”
“OK, you didn’t say stickers were on offer,” I say, smiling despite myself.
A server swings by, clearing plates and chocolate wrappers and the last remains of our fruit. “Need anything else?”
Evan looks at me first. Always me first. “You good?”
I should say I’m leaving. I should say I’m going home, alone, where my rules can wrap back around me like armor.
Instead, I hear myself say, “I’m good.”
The server grins like she can smell trouble. “All right. Call me if you need me.”
When she leaves, I shove the pens and cards into my bag with more force than necessary. Evan watches me with that patient calm that makes me want to throw something at him.
I stand. “I should go.” I check my phone and blink. Holy shit, it’s late. It’s been way more than an hour, though it doesn’t feel like it. Being with Evan, studying with Evan, has felt… not unpleasant.
He stands, slow, giving me time to calculate the variables and decide if I want to bolt. I should. I always do. Instead, it’s like there’s a magnet in my chest and he’s wearing a whole hell of a lot of iron.
“Yeah,” he says softly. “Okay.”
We leave the booth together. My boots hit the scuffed linoleum in time with his.
The overhead lights hum, and the bookstore’s main drag looks impossibly long.
We pass the grad students, still arguing about a woman named Sappho and something about islands.
The smell of old paper and coffee is so strong I want to drown in it.
Evan’s hand brushes the small of my back — not touching, just close enough for the air to buzz.
I tense, but he doesn’t press. He walks just behind me, letting me steer.
It’s annoying and sweet at the same time.
At the door, he reaches past me to push it open, and the cold hits my face like a baptism.
I stop in front of him, close enough that his gaze drops to my mouth like it’s a reflex.
My “no way” rule kicks up in my chest, sounding loud, sharp, familiar: no relationships; no attachment; no men who make you forget you’re supposed to be careful.
I swallow hard. “Hey.”
His eyes lift to mine. “Hey.”
I don’t know how to do this. I’m not good at soft.
I’m not good at asking. I’m not good at wanting.
All those things that mean letting someone in, letting down my guard, letting people see the person inside of me that doesn’t always have it together, that doesn’t always run the room — or the bar — with perfect command, scare the living bejeezus out of me.
“I have a surprise for you,” I blurt.
His brows rise. “A surprise?”
“Yeah.” I nod once, firm, like I’m giving an order because it’s easier than admitting I’m nervous. “Get in your car.”
A beat. Then his mouth curves into something that isn’t cocky, just amused. “Yes, ma’am.”
I jab him in the chest with a finger, and it’s like touching a live wire. “None of that ma’am shit. I have a name.”
He grins, lifting his hands in surrender. “Noted.”
The night air in Briar Glen tastes like pine, wet asphalt, and the last drag of someone’s cigarette. The parking lot is almost empty; the lights reflect in puddles from a late drizzle. We walk together, him just a touch behind me. I shiver, partly from the cold, partly from something else.
We reach the vehicles. His sedan is the color of an old penny and so dull it can’t even summon a proper reflection.
The glass is still flecked with rain from the earlier drizzle; the beads catch the parking lot lights and fracture them into little constellations.
It’s a nothing car, a car that’s meant to disappear, and I know he hates it.
He glances at the car with a look of pure, cold contempt.
“You hate that thing,” I say, low, not even intending to.
He snorts. “It gets me from point A to point B.”
“That’s a yes,” I say, and the corner of his mouth does this thing—like it wants to smile, but doesn’t quite dare. “Come on, follow me. I want to show you something.”
I turn away before I can see what the rest of his face is doing.
I go to my truck, which is battered and half-rusted but honest about it.
I get in, start the engine, and roll down the window.
I wait until Evan’s car blinks to life behind me, headlights catching on every raindrop, and then I take off.
We drive in silence, two columns of light splitting the darkness, winding through the slow, damp arteries of the town.
The drive is short — out past the last strip of town, up a wooded road that curves into darkness. An overlook waits at the top, unofficial, half-gravel and half-dirt, the place locals go when they need quiet or trouble.
I kill the engine and sit for a minute, hands on the wheel, watching my breath fog up the cab. My pulse is a hive beneath my skin. I’m cold, but I don’t move to turn the heater on. I just wait.
Evan’s sedan rolls in beside me, cutting its lights so abruptly the world seems to get ten degrees darker. He sits there, hands on the wheel, the dash lights painting his face in sickly green shadows. He doesn’t move. I get out, slam the door, and walk around to his side.
My boots crunch on the gravel. The sound is enormous in the silence. Town lights glitter far below through the trees. Somewhere out there, the river is a black ribbon. The wind smells like pine needles and wet earth.
He tracks me with his eyes, but doesn’t open the door.
For a second, I wonder if maybe he’s changed his mind, or if this was some kind of game and I don’t know the rules.
I knock on his window, a slow, deliberate tap.
He rolls it down just a couple of inches, and I can feel the warmth from inside the car, see the little swirl of his breath in the cold.
He looks up. “What’re we here for?” His voice is steady, but there’s a thread of something under it — hope or dread or maybe just plain confusion, the way I feel when I have to take a test and half the study guide is missing.
I lean in. My hair falls forward and brushes his cheek, static crackling between us. I smell coffee and cheap wine on his breath, something sharp and citrusy from his detergent. His skin is pale in the moonlight, almost fluorescent.
“This,” I say.
And I kiss him.
I don’t do polite, not anymore. I don’t do careful, either. My mouth finds his like it’s supposed to, open and bruising, and he’s there, soft at first, then hard and hungry. His hand finds my waist, pulls me closer, and the angle is all wrong, but it doesn’t matter because it’s him. It’s all him.
He pops the door and pulls me in, and suddenly I’m half in his lap, my knees against the dash, my coat bunched up behind my shoulders because he’s got both hands on me now, not letting me go. His mouth is warm and alive and desperate. I don’t want to stop.
He bites my lower lip, just a little, then opens his eyes. “Jesus, Molly,” he says against my mouth.
“Don’t talk,” I say, and kiss him again, harder.
His fingers slide up my thigh, slow, asking without asking. I answer by shifting closer, by letting him feel exactly how much I want this — want him.
He breaks away for a second, forehead pressed to mine, breathing hard.