Rough and Ready (More Than A Cowboy #2) - Vanessa Vale Page 0,10

wasn’t tiny at five-eight, but still.

“I heard you’re a professor,” he commented. “Impressive.”

I glanced up at him, but he looked forward, almost scanning the block.

“Impressive?”

A couple came out of a restaurant, and I stepped out of their way. Reed put his hand at my back, and I felt it through the soft layer of his coat as he guided me around them.

“I teach Art History and have been told it’s really dry. Stuffy.”

“You don’t seem the stuffy type,” he countered without delay, as if he hadn’t taken time to consider.

“Oh?” I couldn’t help but smile. “What’s the stuffy type look like?”

I saw the corner of his mouth tip up. “Tweed jackets with arm patches. Old.”

“That’s more my English counterparts than me.”

“You like to run.” He switched topics as we stopped at an intersection, waited for the light to change. The wind kicked up when a car sped by.

“I do. Good exercise.” And stress relief.

“I run as part of my training,” he said, glancing down at me. “But I hate it. I do it for the endurance and only three miles at a time.”

“But then you do other things… as part of your workout. I mean, it takes a lot to win those matches.”

I hadn’t known who he was at the time, but I’d seen him once at the gym. He’d made my head turn. He’d been in a class and someone was demonstrating a skill, so everyone had been sitting on the mat watching. He’d had his eyes on the teacher, and I’d had my eyes on him because… wow. I hadn’t been around when he trained with Gray or got in the ring and fought. Emory had said they trained in the early mornings. That was definitely not my time to work out.

He shrugged. “You teach. I fight.”

We stopped in front of a pizzeria, and he held the door open for me. The scent of garlic and marinara sauce surrounded us as we entered the crowded restaurant. It was warm from the ovens and the windows were a little fogged. It was casual, low key and my stomach rumbled. After my seven-mile run, I needed calories. Gooey, cheesy calories.

“This is your job then, fighting. It’s not a hobby for you.”

He shook his head.

“Surely, you’re more than just a fighter,” I replied, having to raise my voice over the din.

I joined him in the line at the take-out counter.

He glanced down at me, eyes roving over my face, dropping to my lips for a moment. “Nah, I’m just a fighter.” He held up his hands, showed me the big knuckles, blunt fingers. “Always have been. That’s all I know.”

I wasn’t so sure about that, but I didn’t say anything.

“Everything I learned came from the streets not books. I see you as a prep school kid.”

“That would be me,” I told him. There was no reason to deny it because it was true. “Went to a fancy place in Denver.”

It was a fancy coed private school that required uniforms and a huge chunk of cash for tuition. My parents had the means and the expectations that came with that kind of program although while I’d gone on to Cornell, an Ivy League school, I’d chosen to study art history, a complete disappointment to them.

What else was new?

“Prep school, then college, right? You have a PhD?”

I nodded.

“In what?”

“Medieval and Byzantine art specializing in gothic architecture.”

It was a mouthful, and his eyebrows winged up.

“Impressive,” he said slowly. “My fights? Let’s just say I’m getting my PhD in fighting.”

“When’s your next competition?” I asked. The people in front of us took their pizza box and left. We stepped up to the counter, waited for one of the busy workers to come over.

“Fight,” he explained. “January.”

That wasn’t far off, only a few weeks, and the idea of him in the ring made me nervous for him. “I’ll come watch, but you have to win.”

He looked down at me with a sly smile, but his eyes didn’t meet mine, they were squarely focused on my mouth. “I always win. Especially when it’s a hard fight.”

I swallowed, thinking he might not be talking about MMA any longer.

“Hi, Reed.” The counter girl interrupted us and gave Reed a very bright smile. “It’s been a while.” And a perfect view of her breasts in her snug t-shirt. The restaurant logo stretched snugly across her ample curves. She was probably twenty-one, blonde and smart in a way I never could be.

There were book smarts, which I had, then street smarts.