14. Lynn
— ? —
Lynn
I have lost my mind.
There’s no other explanation for why I’m currently on my hands and knees behind my desk, scrubbing the floor with a toothbrush at seven o’clock in the evening while a storm brews outside my window.
“He’s a lycan,” I mutter to Mr. Darcy, who’s watching me from his cage with what I can only describe as judgmental concern.
“He can smell everything. Every unwashed shirt. Every midnight snack. Every time you’ve farted in this room, Darcy, and don’t think I haven’t noticed you doing it more often lately. ”
Mr. Darcy blinks slowly.
“Don’t give me that look. This is serious. He’s coming over tonight and I refuse - refuse - to be humiliated by my own living space.”
I called in sick to work. Actually picked up the phone and told Diane I had a stomach bug, which is the first time I’ve voluntarily missed a shift since freshman year. But desperate times call for desperate measures, and the state of my dorm room qualified as a desperation emergency.
The deep clean started at four o’clock.
It’s now seven, and I’ve:
- Washed every piece of clothing I own, including three sweaters I forgot existed
- Scrubbed the bathroom until it sparkled
- Organized my bookshelf by color, then by author, then by color again because the author organization looked chaotic
- Changed my sheets twice (the first set had a small stain from where I’d spilled coffee last week)
- Vacuumed under my bed and found seven hair ties, a fossilized granola bar, and my dignity (misplaced since approximately the library incident)
- Lit three candles, decided that was too obvious, put out two of them, then relit one because the room smelled like cleaning products
“Do you think he’ll notice?” I ask Darcy. “That I’ve been cleaning manically for three hours?”
Darcy doesn’t respond, because he’s a hamster.
“You’re right. He’ll definitely notice. He’ll probably smell the anxiety sweat.”
I sit back on my heels and survey the room. It looks good. Better than good, it looks like a functioning adult lives here, which is generous considering I’m a twenty-two-year-old with a hamster and a concerning romance novel addiction.
My phone buzzes.
Nothing from Milo.
I’ve texted him twice in the last hour, once to confirm tonight’s plans, once to ask if he was still coming given the weather, and gotten no response. The storm outside is building, black clouds rolling in from the west, thunder rumbling in the distance.
Maybe he changed his mind.
Or he woke up this morning and realized that grinding against a student in the mythology section wasn’t his finest moment and decided to maintain professional distance.
Maybe-
A knock on my door makes me jump so hard I nearly brain myself on the desk.
“Lindsay? You in there?”
Not Milo. My neighbor, Priya, whose room shares a wall with mine and who has the hearing of a bat crossed with a CIA surveillance specialist.
I stand up, brush off my knees, and crack the door open.
“Hey, Priya.”
“Hey yourself.” She’s wearing pajamas and holding a bag of microwave popcorn, her dark eyes gleaming with curiosity. “You taking out trash this late?”
I glance down. I’m holding a trash bag. I’d been about to dispose of the evidence of my cleaning spree.
“Just… tidying up.”
“Uh-huh.” She leans against the doorframe, popcorn bag crinkling. “You know, the walls in this building are super thin.”
My stomach drops. “Are they?”
“Oh yeah. Paper thin. I can hear everything.” She pauses meaningfully. “Including conversations.”
“I talk to my hamster.”
“Your hamster has a really deep voice.”
Shit.
“I also - I watch a lot of movies. Period dramas. With male leads.”
“Period dramas,” she repeats, not buying it for a second. “At two in the morning. With dialogue that sounds suspiciously like ‘tell me to stop and I will.’”
My face is on fire. Actual flames. I’m going to spontaneously combust.
“That was - that’s from - it’s a very popular audiobook-”
“Lindsay.” Priya grins, and there’s no malice in it, just delighted curiosity. “It’s fine. I don’t care if you’re sneaking a guy in. I just wanted you to know that if you’re going to have visitors, maybe invest in some background noise. White noise machine. Fan. Something.”
“I’m not sneaking anyone in.”
“Sure you’re not.”
“I’m not. It’s just me and Mr. Darcy in there.”
“Mr. Darcy.” She snorts. “Is that what you’re calling him?”
“That’s my hamster’s name!”
“Your hamster that you have deep, romantic conversations with at midnight.”
“I lead a rich inner life.”
Priya laughs, pushes off the doorframe, and heads back toward her room. “Whatever you say, Lindsay. Just remember - thin walls. If Mr. Darcy’s going to come over again, maybe give me a heads up so I can put in my earbuds.”
“There’s nothing to-”
But she’s already closing her door, waving over her shoulder, and I’m left standing in the hallway with a trash bag and the sinking realization that I’m going to have to be a lot more careful.
The storm hits at eight-thirty, right on the heels of that conversation.
One minute it’s just threatening, dark clouds, ominous rumbling, and the next the sky opens up like someone’s turned on a celestial fire hose. Rain lashes against my window, lightning cracks across the sky, and the thunder is so loud it shakes the glass.
Still no response from Milo.
I’ve texted four more times now:
hey, just checking you got my earlier messages
pretty bad storm out there, let me know you’re okay
you ARE coming tonight right?
milo????
Nothing. Not even the little dots that indicate he’s typing.
I pace the length of my room, which barely counts as pacing, and try not to spiral.
He’s fine. He’s probably just busy. Maybe his phone died. Maybe he’s in a meeting. Or he’s a lycan who got distracted chasing a rabbit or something, I don’t actually know what lycans do in their free time-
A tap on the window.
I spin around so fast I nearly give myself whiplash.
Milo is crouched on the narrow ledge outside my third-floor window, completely soaked, rain streaming down his face, his eyes wild with something that looks like relief.
I wrench the window open. “What the - how did you - get in here-”
He climbs through the window with a grace that shouldn’t be possible for someone his size, and then he’s inside, dripping water all over my freshly cleaned floor, and his arms are around me so tight I can barely breathe.
“I’ve been worried sick about you,” he says into my hair. “You didn’t show up to work. I went to the library and Diane said you called in sick and I thought - I thought something had happened-”
“I’m fine. I’m fine.” I pull back enough to look at him. “I was worried about you. You didn’t answer any of my texts!”
“My phone’s dead. And then the storm started and I couldn’t-” He cups my face, searching my eyes like he’s checking for damage. “You’re okay. You’re really okay.”
“I was just cleaning.” I gesture at the room, suddenly self-conscious. “I wanted the place to look nice before you came over.”
His expression softens. “You cleaned for me?”
“You can smell everything. I didn’t want you to - I don’t know - judge my lifestyle choices based on my laundry situation.”
He laughs, a real laugh, warm and surprised, and the tightness behind my ribs lets go.
“Lindsay Crowe,” he says. “You are the most absurd woman I’ve ever met.”
“Is that a compliment?”
He’s still holding my face, thumbs moving slow along my jaw like he’s memorizing it. “I panicked. When Diane said you were sick. I’ve never moved so fast in my life.”
“You climbed three stories in a thunderstorm.”
“I’d climb a hundred stories.”
“That’s structurally improbable.”
“I’d find a way.”
Lightning flashes outside, and I suddenly realize he’s shivering. His shirt is plastered to his body, transparent from the rain, and his skin is covered in goosebumps.
“You’re freezing. Here-” I dart to my closet and grab the biggest towel I own, which is still probably too small for him. “Take off your shirt, you’re going to catch hypothermia.”
He freezes. “What?”
“Your shirt. It’s soaked. Take it off.”
“That’s-” He runs a hand through his wet hair, looking almost… embarrassed? “This isn’t how I pictured this going.”
“How did you picture it going?”
“I don’t know. Candlelight. Music. Some semblance of dignity.” He gestures at himself, dripping wet, shivering, hair plastered to his forehead. “Not looking like a drowned rat.”
“A very attractive drowned rat.”
“You’re mocking me.”
“Only a little.” I hold out the towel. “Come on, Professor. Shirt off. Doctor’s orders.”
“You’re not a doctor.”
“I have a first aid certificate from summer camp. Close enough.”
He sighs, but he’s smiling, and then he reaches for the hem of his shirt and pulls it over his head.
Oh.
Oh.
I’ve seen his arms. I’ve felt his chest pressed against mine through layers of clothing. But seeing him shirtless, actually shirtless, standing in my tiny dorm room with water running down his abs, is something else entirely.
He’s beautiful.
Muscled in a way that suggests function over form, all coiled power and barely contained strength.
There’s a scar on his left side, a thin white line that curves around his ribs.
His skin is golden in the lamp light, and there’s a trail of dark hair that leads down from his navel and disappears beneath the waistband of his pants.
I forget how to breathe.
“Lindsay?” He sounds amused. “The towel?”
“Right. Yes. Towel.”
I hand it to him, and he starts drying his hair, the movement making his muscles shift in ways that should be illegal.
“I’ll just-” He turns, looking for somewhere to put his wet shirt. “Where should I-”
He leans against my desk.
And yelps.
He spins around, and there’s Mr. Darcy, attached to his hand by his tiny hamster teeth, looking absolutely murderous for a creature the size of a dinner roll.
“What the-” Milo shakes his hand, but Darcy holds on with the tenacity of a creature defending its territory. “Is this - is your hamster biting me?”
“Darcy! Bad hamster! Let go!”
Darcy doesn’t let go. Darcy, in fact, bites down harder.