Learning Curves - By Elyse Mady Page 0,24

out of my way.”

The fine arts building was on the other side of campus.

Still trying to close her mind to the image of Cora sifting through her own unsuccessful dating history, she tried to act naturally. “Well, I really appreciate it.” From the tittering and wide-eyed stares of her students, she was pretty certain that plan wasn’t going as well as she might hope for. She slipped the tickets inside her day planner. “What do I owe you for the tickets?”

He scoffed. “They’re a gift, Leanne.”

“I hardly feel…”

“If you don’t use them, they’ll just go to waste. You’re the one doing me the favor here.”

“Well, if you’re sure.”

“I am.” He moved aside as he spoke. The students from her next class began to file in. She gestured apologetically at the new arrivals, all of whom openly gawked at his presence in the room.

“My next seminar starts soon.”

“No problem. I’ll let you get on with your class,” Brandon said easily.

Too easily. The thought popped into her mind before she could crush it. Oh for heaven’s sake, she was trying to get rid of him. She didn’t want him to stay. This was getting ridiculous. He’d entered every aspect of her controlled life. Her teaching, her free time, even her dreams.

Then Brandon did something absolutely unexpected.

Raising a casual hand, he lifted it up to her cheek. He didn’t touch her; it simply hovered millimeters from her face. But his eyes glittered with an unspoken message that Leanne was unwilling to decipher. It was all she could do not to bend her neck and feel the warm strength of his fingers against her skin. Was he trying to say what she thought he was saying? She was giddy and a little breathless at the mere possibility, even though the risk to her carefully laid plans made her feel sick to her stomach.

A one-night stand was one thing.

Even a no-strings-attached affair, where both participants were aware of the rules up front.

But the look in Brandon’s eyes seemed to suggest that he at least might view their one-off encounter not as an end but as the beginning of something more.

He’d bearded Cora in her den.

Visited during seminars.

And withstood the withering curiosity of nearly three dozen undergraduates, whose well-honed noses could sniff out the merest whiff of a hookup.

Those weren’t the actions of a fling, were they?

And if they weren’t, where did that leave her?

Their eyes met and Leanne’s knees shook with lust.

In a low voice he said, “See you tomorrow night, then. I’m looking forward to it.” Turning, he strode from the room, leaving Leanne perplexed and aroused and anxious all at once. Realizing she still clutched her planner to her chest like a life vest, she loosened her fingers from the leather book.

Around her the chatter of the seminar ebbed and flowed. Before she could question the impulse, she darted into the hall.

“Brandon?”

He turned, his satchel slung over one broad shoulder.

“Yeah?”

“Do you…I mean, do you have plans for tonight?”

Striding closer, he shook his head.

“You won’t let me pay for these,” Leanne said, holding up the tickets. “But if you’re not busy tonight, a bunch of grad students I know get together every Tuesday for a potluck dinner.”

“Potluck?” His mouth curved into a small smile, as though the word amused him.

She rushed through the invitation before she could change her mind. “It’s just a casual thing. Everybody brings something, and we hang out, eat, maybe watch a movie or play cards.”

“Are you sure?” he asked finally. “I wouldn’t want to impose.”

“You wouldn’t be imposing. It’s very flexible. And casual,” she said. Perhaps she’d stressed the word casual a little more than she’d intended, because his warm smile dimmed. “People usually just drop by when they can.”

“What time do things start?”

“Seven, seven-thirty,” she said, hardly believing her own audacity. What was Cassandra going to say when—if—he showed up at her place tonight? How was she going to explain that a one-night stand seemed to be, against her better judgment, morphing into something else entirely? This was a bad idea. A horrible, terrible, no-good, very bad idea that was going to cause her no end of trouble.

She had no time for anything but school right now.

Certainly no time to incorporate a man into her life.

But it was too late to rescind the invitation. Despite her intentions to the contrary, their lives were intermingling in ways she’d never have anticipated Saturday night.

“I’ll be there,” Brandon said. “Why don’t you write down the address for me and I’ll see