 
### Never the Right Time

### Part I

### Lizzie Socorro

### A Thousand and Seventeen Nights

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Copyright © 2015 Catherine Matamoros & Dolores dS Hernandez

Back cover of Never the Right Time part II

Copyright © 2015 Catherine Matamoros & Dolores dS Hernandez

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### For Daniel

My first book, I wrote for myself. The second, I wrote for you.
Table of Contents

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

The next installment

About the Author

### PROLOGUE

It was with no small amount of trepidation that Anna Beth Hardwick dropped the last of the boxes on the badly carpeted floor of her new dorm room. The large pink stain at the midpoint between the closet and bedframe bespoke many desperate and failed attempts at cleaning up a preferably unknown substance before resorting to the disinfectant and destructive power of bleach, and while the sparse furniture—two each of beds, desks, and strangely upholstered chairs—did not tempt one to say it had been well-loved, did look as though it had not been new for several decades. So far as dorm rooms went, it could be far, far worse.

Despite the many flaws that were neither cute nor endearing, it wasn't the challenging prospect of softening the Spartan edges of the room and generic, pseudo-oak furniture that filled freshman Anna, newly minted English major, with such encompassing nerves. In fact, she was rather looking forward to making her new home—well, homey—she thought, unrolling the first of many posters, this one commanding its viewer to "Dream Big."

Rather, the source of Anna's apprehension could be blamed squarely on this, the biggest of all life changes she had experienced in her 18 years. Her decision to attend Rice University had sent her mother spiraling into consternation only slightly worse—and considerably more passive-aggressive—than Anna's own anxiety. Anna had grown up and spent her entire life until this point in the same four-bed, two-story house squarely set in the Atlanta suburbs.

The Hardwicks were deeply attached to Georgia clay. Both sides of her family had lived in or near Atlanta for the past five generations. But as proud as Anna was of her heritage and her home, by the end of twelve years of public education, she was decisively ready for a change of location and culture.

Unsure of any part of her future other than a strong desire to pursue literature, Anna had sent her college applications as far-reaching as California and New England, lured by the seductive promise of artistic communities and publishing loci. She had deliberately avoided applying to a single Georgian institution. Months of agonizing over application letters and scholarship requests came down to three coldly impersonal rejection letters and five acceptances that, despite their veneer of eager personalization, still managed to be somewhat lukewarm and detached.

The choice of where best to throw buckets of student debt on the blazing inferno of increasingly requisite higher education had been difficult for Anna, but she had ultimately decided on the sole institution located in the South that she had applied to. Finally having to face the reality of what it would mean to be separated from her family for semesters at a time, Anna had chosen the location that she believed would make her the least lonely.

And so Anna had decided to go to Texas, where, she believed, she would be among more like minds than she would find in the cold North. Where being Southern was a benediction, not a curse.

All the same, it was unfamiliar territory, and Anna did not know a single one of her new classmates. The plan of attack—for friends must be made—would have to be on the offensive. Active participation in orientation-enforced fun, casual social follow-ups through messages, and engaging conversation over meals. Stick to the plan, and the friends will gradually fall into place.

***

The plan was, on nearly all fronts, a failure.

By the middle of her second week at Rice, Anna had exactly one confirmed friend, and that was only because they lived together: her roommate, Carmen Garcia. And Carmen barely counted, because she was so outgoing that she made friends with everyone. One had no choice but to be close to such an open, warm person as Anna's pretty, Hispanic roommate.

It was time for a new strategy, Anna decided early Thursday morning. Friendliness wasn't enough. Now, Anna grimly plotted, she was going to have to resort to strong, affected confidence and daring bravado.

The best place to unroll the new campaign was, she thought, perhaps the main campus atrium. She'd heard rumors of a secret billiards room on campus, which intrigued Anna to no end. Her RAs had bitterly mumbled a comment or two about the secret "boys' club." Then, eating alone yet again in the cafeteria (every empty seat at tables for freshmen was taken, apparently), Anna had overheard two upperclassman boys making plans for an informal tournament in "the hall." If she did a little more digging, asked around, hunted a bit, she'd probably be able to find the place.

In all the stress of planning, packing, moving, and being at college, Anna hadn't had time for a good game of pool in months. She was starting to hanker for it with some desperation. There was nothing quite like the thrill of winning for Anna. She craved the excitement—and hopefully it would help to relieve the anxiety she was beginning to feel over the state of her social life.

And who knew? Maybe she would make some friends.

### CHAPTER ONE

_Year One_

William took a lucky shot against the green bumper, and it did not pay off. Charles grinned as he took William's place, easily sinking the eight ball and waited for the groan of defeat. He didn't have to wait long.

"So close!"

"I don't know whose definition of close you're going by, but you still had three balls to sink—not exactly a nail-biter," Charles laughed, white teeth flashing brightly in his dark face. "So that's...three to one?"

"In my defense, I didn't exactly have time to hone my billiards skills over break," William said with a self-possessed swipe at his long, curly hair. "Not all of us have nothing else to do at night."

William nudged his roommate and temporary rival playfully, his olive skin contrasting with Charles' mocha tones as much as their brown eyes matched in vivacity and mischievousness.

"Ouch!" Another friend looked over in the middle of aiming his own shot. "Low blow, William."

"He can take it," William said, nonchalantly shrugging one broad shoulder. "He's had two years to adjust to the fact that his empty social calendar will never reflect my own raging popularity with the ladies." They laughed while Charles scowled.

William always enjoyed taking an opportunity to poke fun at his roommate and friend. When they had begun attending Rice two years ago, Charles had been certain that his gymnast's build and brilliant writing skills would enable him to secure as many dates as he desired. The journalism major was convinced that women were to be wooed by poetry and sweet-spoken words.

In an ideal world and an atmosphere of ardency, he would be correct. To Charles' dismay and William's delight, it had quickly become apparent that Rice University was not an ideal world, and even as an upperclassman, he continued to lack the confidence to extend his sweet nothings past the limits of paper. William, on the other hand, had easily discovered that although he lacked the quick wit to produce winsome verses in a girl's ear, he did have readily available a smooth touch and a rich accent, born of growing up in Italy, that he'd yet to have proven resistible.

It was William's turn to rack up, but he couldn't resist one more jab. "Tell me, amico mio," he said. "What is the point of writing all those pretty words, with no girl to use them on?"

Charles did nothing but roll his eyes and take the triangle, but Aiden, with pale freckles, milky skin, and brown hair with the slightest hint of red that bespoke an Irish heritage, had no compunctions about encouraging William, who clearly wanted to share.

"So..."

William raised one eyebrow over playful brown eyes. "Sì?"

"Well?" Aiden, as always, was overeager for details. "What or who were you doing over break?"

"Aiden. A gentleman never kisses and tells."

"Some gentleman you are," Charles muttered, but the junior's snide words were ignored.

"Ma! Since you asked." William took a confident perch against the pool table, effectively hindering Charles's attempts to get a new game going. "Unlike dear old Chuck here, who had no other outlet to pour his time, money, and attention into besides trying to beat me in pool, I had to get a job this summer. And there was this—" His cheerful tale was rudely interrupted, not by any of the other players, who were all wrapped in their own games, but by a distinctly feminine voice.

"Well! So it does exist." A girl stood at the top of the stairs, looking down into the room. Twenty male heads swiveled to stare at the interloper in their world of dim lighting and rock music. "I tell you what, you would not believe the trouble I had findin' this place," she drawled.

There was no hint of embarrassment in her voice at so rudely invading the one remaining bastion of masculine diversion on Rice's campus. No note of shyness, just a Georgian accent so thick you could spread it on a biscuit.

"Not only is it practically hidden by that little secret door—"

"That's the point," someone muttered.

"—but every single person I asked for directions looked at me like I was a two-headed calf. Not exactly helpful." She shrugged and began down the stairs—without invitation.

Slithered, more like—at least that was the word that appeared in William's stunned mind. The way she slinked down those stairs drew way more attention than was necessary to her clingy mini-dress that hit all the right curves.

Freshmen! The clothes they started wearing once they got to college! She had to be a freshman. William would have remembered seeing her around before this year.

"Would one of you boys be kind enough to show me where the cue sticks are? I've got such a hankering to play a game!"

Wordlessly, one of the boys closest to her pointed to the cue wall. She strutted her way over, deliberating over her three choices with a finger tapping against the indentation of her upper lip.

A senior closer to William and Charles's table made a crude gesture. "I've got a stick you can hold, honey," he called to her curvy back. There were a few snickers, but the guilty party kept a straight face. If she turned around to see who said it, there would be no way for her to distinguish the guy in the back of the crowd.

Slowly she turned around, now holding a pool cue, and looking straight at the one who had said it, pinned him down with a stare.

Amiably, she smiled. "I'll pass, sweetie."

Lewd bravado withered into a disappointed blush.

Her remaining hand went on her hip. "Well boys, now that we've got that settled....Do y'all have restrictions against laying bets in here?"

The players, who had been thrown into confusion and disgruntled shuffling of feet at her disruption of their masculine sanctuary, perked back up at the suggestion of a bet. Back into their territory. A few even shook their heads in answer, beginning to grin. Oh, this was going to be too good. This girl's defeat would put some shine back into the hazy room.

"It's not quite fair, darlin'," a boy tried to tell her. Someone trying to be the nice guy. How cute, William thought. "Not quite right of us to try and take a lady's money."

"Hmm." She all but ignored him. "Any takers?" she challenged.

Brady Altan had an answer. "I don't know what you heard about the billiards hall, but we don't play games for lip gloss." His friend laughed. "Why don't you go check out Sorority Row? I'm sure they'd be glad to have you." Most of the room was smirking by now.

Unfazed, she smiled back. "Tell you what. I got a hundred bucks right here that says not a one of you boys can take me on. Now then, who wants to try for it?"

One hundred dollars made a difference. A few of them stood a little taller, appraising her. One even checked the stack of bills he'd already won that day, seeing if he had enough to match the wager.

While the others were reconsidering the situation—and the promise of an easy win, William's gaze hadn't strayed from the trespasser. And in an instant, he caught it: a little triumphant smile that flickered and was gone. Staring at her more intently, he wasn't even sure that he had seen it. Her face was composed and confident, but her eyes had a glint to them that made him smile, and the way her fingers curled around the cue hinted at expertise. She knew what she was doing.

William knew a con artist when he saw one. And he knew an opportunity when it was staring him down. A cut of her winnings would do pretty nicely. William could do with some more wine money. But just a hundred? They could do much better than such a paltry sum.

"Come on guys, don't waste your time," he called out, interrupting her negotiations with a piss-poor sophomore. He caught the angry glare she sent him, but he couldn't exactly wink at her without the entire room seeing it. "She's bluffing. Look, principessa," he said as he turned to face her livid expression, "just because your daddy played some pool when he was at school here doesn't mean that you should try the same. There are easier ways to get a guy's attention." As if the dress hadn't already done the trick, he thought.

Several of them were already nodding in agreement, including Aiden, ready to show her the door and watch her leave. Perfect.

"Don't feel too bad, though. You hit on the right amount of money. Just enough to pretend that you're serious, without having to take a real hit on the wallet." That should do it.

"You don't think I'm serious?" There was definitely no smile now. The girl looked ready to throw a ball at his head.

"Just standing up there holding a pool cue doesn't exactly prove anything. Sorry, principessa. Unless, of course, you wanted to raise the wager to something worthwhile..." He gave a shrug that clearly said he didn't think she would. And she took the bait.

"All right, Fabio. What about three hundred?" Her index and middle fingers flicked up, holding three hundred-dollar bills.

"Where was she keeping them?" Charles muttered.

"Still too scared to take me on?" she taunted.

"Me?" William pointed to his own chest, like he was surprised at her challenge. "Allora, you're not going against me. I'm hardly a worthwhile opponent at the moment. Even this guy can beat me." Charles rolled his eyes.

"Oh, I see." Her patronizing tone made it clear that she thought he was too big of a coward.

Another voice spoke up. "Three hundred!" A small path cleared through the crowd to show Roger, one of the best billiards players on campus, throwing the requisite bills on a table.

"I'm happy to make a little extra pocket change, if you don't mind me taking Daddy's money."

The girl smiled in acceptance of the challenge and slapped her money on top of his. They shook hands. "Rack 'em up!" she said brightly.

Suddenly bets were getting called all over the room. Very few wanted to put their money on the perky freshman, but the odds were so ludicrous that some were taking it.

William sidled up to her as they were waiting for Roger to set up the table.

He had to lean down what felt like a foot to reach her. Even with her high heels, she was tiny. Did the South breed dwarves? Down, down, down, until he could lean in close enough and whisper, "You're welcome."

She didn't jump in surprise. He was a little disappointed, but her answer made him chuckle anyway.

"You mean 'thank you,'" she replied. "You're welcome that it's not your money that I'm taking."

"I just tripled your profits for you."

"You seem awfully confident that I'll be the one profiting. Why don't you go lay a bet yourself?"

"Oh, no, cara." He leaned in closer. "I want in."

"On what?"

"On your winnings, obviously." She turned to face him, and the way she opened her mouth had him jumping to answer her heated retort before she could voice it. "You wouldn't have made nearly as much if I hadn't helped. I earned at least half of that."

The table was ready, balls in position, cues chalked. The challenger gestured patronizingly. "Ladies first."

"Thank you, honey," she said right back. To William, she only gave an abrupt "I'll think about it."

It was a very short game.

William couldn't decide if his favorite part was seeing Roger's stunned face—who needed taking down a few pegs as it was—as she walked all over him in her hot pink stilettos, or watching the girl aim for each shot. The way she bent her body across that table gave the most tantalizing curve to her spine, and the position of her legs had a majority of the room wishing that the girl's skirt was just a little bit shorter.

"Right corner pocket," she called sweetly, and barely took a second to aim before her cue twitched and the eight ball sank home.

She looked up, eyes wide, at the men still gawking at the table. "Does that mean I win?" she asked innocently. William had to cover his mouth to hold back the laughter that threatened to burst out.

Then she was collecting her winnings, putting up her pool cue, and turning back at the foot of the stairs. The room was silent, every eye watching her exit.

"Thank you, boys," she said. "This was fun!" With a giggle and a swish of her brown curls, she skipped up the stairs.

It wasn't until she had disappeared through the door that William remembered to gather up his wits. "Hey, wait for me!" he called, jogging after her.

She didn't wait for him. His longer legs gave him an advantage, but she moved fast for a woman in heels. He caught up halfway through the university center.

"You owe me," he puffed as he came abreast of her brisk strut.

"I most certainly do not!" was her spirited rejoinder.

"Look at it logically." She rolled her eyes and kept walking. "If I hadn't spoken up, you would have made a whole lot less money. You are now three hundred dollars richer. I think you could show a little gratitude."

That made her slow down. "You may be right," she said slowly. She turned to him and gave that bright smile. "Thank you!" And kept walking.

He kept up. "You know that's not what I meant."

"And how much did you intend to take from what I've rightfully won?"

"I should think I earned half."

"Look here, honey," the girl said severely. "I won three hundred dollars. You're telling me that you want half of that?"

"Certo." His bluntness made her laugh. "That back there—that was brilliant." He may be laying it on thick, but flattery, William had learned, got him everywhere with women. "Play the clueless girl, walk away with a smile—and all their money. You could have gotten more. I can get you more."

"Are you offerin' to be my accountant?"

William shook his head. There were more fun ways to make money. "You want to hustle, I can help," he said. "Have you ever heard of a plant?"

She blinked, comprehension notably absent from her eyes. "A...plant." Her uncertain gaze flickered to the trees they were passing under. "I've heard of plants," she said, voice puzzled.

William shook his head. Not flora. "What about a stooge? An ally in the audience."

"Ah." The girl considered the idea, understanding dawning. "That would be you, I assume?"

"Exactly." He was excited that she had caught on. "We do the same thing that just happened in a few pool dives around the city, and we could both be rich."

"I don't want to be rich." A gentle sigh to the setting sun. She almost sounded disappointed.

"You don't want to be rich?" Who didn't want that? It was all William had wanted out of life since he was old enough to start working. Although he could be a little biased. Growing up with a single mother and no money did that to a person. "Well, what do you want?"

Finally, her steps halted as she stared towards the trees that lined the entrance to campus. William blinked, getting his bearings. They had walked out to nowhere.

"I want a friend," the girl whispered. She looked ready to walk out the gate without a backwards glance. First week of college and she was ready to give up?

William surprised himself by saying, "Well, I could do that too. I'm—well, my friends call me William. Econ major."

She stuck her hand out matter-of-factly. "Anna Beth Hardwick. English major."

They shook hands, formalizing the introduction, no matter how silly it felt. She'd done this so many times in the past few weeks that it was instinctive by now. Orientation had been a busy time—so many meetings and greetings and majors and forget all of it by the next conversation with that person, if that next conversation ever comes.

"You said people call you William," Anna said. "Is that not your name?"

"So suspicious already?" He smiled down at her, but the girl looked away quickly. Not that his boring brown eyes were anything mesmerizing, but it still stung a little.

"No," she replied. "It's just a very...English name. And you're...not very English, are you?"

Ah, yes. The same question, posed a hundred different awkward ways. It was almost as bad as asking after a student's major.

"What gave it away, cara?" William said with an outrageous wink. "My dashing good looks? The Old World charm?"

"Naw, you talk funny."

She was accusing him of speaking oddly? With her drawl and her "honeys" and outrageous accent? William was affronted.

"Allora, l'impudenza della ragazza questa," he muttered to himself. "Se lei pensa—"

"Now, see, the thing about Italians is," Anna said, talking over his outburst, "you can never tell if they're actually from across the pond or just putting' on airs. You get a lot of that from Yanks, you know. You from New Jersey?"

"I moved to this country when I was fifteen, ragazza," William said stiffly. "Forgive me for not curbing my tongue to your barbarism."

"Barbarism! Well, don't that just beat all," Anna said. "All I did was ask about your name."

If he told her, he would be subjected yet again to the painful butcherings. "Julian? Guiliano? Uh...Jugilmo? Julio?" And yet again, he would have to surrender with a sigh: "Just call me William." These people with their uncultured tongues demanded too many concessions.

"No, my given name is not William," he said. "And no," he forestalled the impending question, "I will not tell you what it is. It's stupid and long and hard to pronounce. William will suffice. William Forte."

"You'll tell me the real name someday," she said confidently. "If I stick around that long, that is."

"Reconsidering your desire for friendship so soon?" William couldn't help teasing her, but he knew what she meant. She was still looking toward home so longingly that he could feel the tinge of homesickness from where he stood.

She granted him a small smile. "Not just yet."

William turned for the dorms and she followed. Best to get her home if she was already considering bolting.

"You know what a friend would do, as a show of goodwill?" William said.

"What?" she asked warily.

"Give me my cut of the winnings."

She laughed, really laughed, in surprise and delight. The sound of it made William smile.

"Tell you what, Will. You do something that assures me of your goodwill and enduring friendship, and I will happily give you what you have earned."

Finally! "Yeah, sure, anything," he said. "What, do you want to hang out sometime? My roommates don't spend a lot of time in our apartment, so—"

That sly expression was back on her face. She was up to something. "Sure, I'd love to hang out. In fact—" she looked at her watch—"what are you doing tonight?"

His heart stuttered, and his tongue was in danger of doing the same. Tonight? He never moved that fast with a girl, but—well, this one, she was—"Tonight?" he croaked. "Uh—nothing much." Hey, if she wanted to be with him tonight, William wasn't complaining.

Should he put an arm around her now, or go straight for the kiss? If the kiss went well—and William was confident that it would, as he'd yet to hear a complaint—this boring night could go from dull to very exciting. Anticipation curled in his gut. It was so easy to picture getting her to his apartment, pressing her into the wall with kisses that promised so much that he was eager to deliver, getting his hands on that dress—

"Fantastic!" Anna linked her arm through William's, cutting into the picture. "See, I signed up for this yoga class on Thursday nights, and I've been looking for someone to go with me. I really appreciate you being willing to do that."

"...What?" William struggled to get a grip on his mind—and body—and catch up to her words. "Yoga?" Seriously? She'd tricked him into going to a yoga class. This girl was devious.

"Yoga."

His mind raced. How could he back out of this without blowing her off? "I...uh...don't have a roll, mat thingy...so...I guess I can't go." From what little nothing he knew of yoga, William knew that the rubber mat was absolutely required.

"Oh, that's no problem," she said easily. "I have an extra one. You're set."

He was trapped. The determined glint in her blue eyes told him that there was no way he was getting out of yoga. "Great," he muttered, conceding with ill grace. Yoga was the very last way that he wanted to spend his Thursday night, ranking only slightly below homework.

"So I'll see you later tonight?" Anna said, but it wasn't a question. "The basement of Cox." She smiled wickedly. "If you ever want to see your prize money again..." and with that she vanished into her dorm.

***

William couldn't believe that he actually went along with it, but the yoga itself turned out to be tolerable. He did as many of the poses as he could, and while it was awkward to the point of embarrassment being the only guy in the room, the view was well worth it. An entire room full of women contorting their bodies? He could understand the appeal.

Still, an hour of just stretching felt a bit useless. He couldn't see it doing much good for him, and told Anna as much when it was over.

"Well, what did you think?" she asked brightly as she rolled up her mat.

"I don't really see the point of stretching without an actual workout." And he didn't exactly enjoy finding the very finite limits of his flexibility. He couldn't even get into half of the positions they tried.

"Working on your flexibility and breathing will actually do wonders for your muscle tone. You'd be surprised."

They strolled out of the building and into the balmy September air.

William shrugged. "I still prefer the gym. No offense."

She nodded, unsurprised. "To each his own. Oh!" Her fingers flashed, holding up a fifty.

For the second time, the question had to be asked: Where was she keeping it? Her tight yoga outfit had no apparent pockets, and there were no lumps hinting at hidden bills. Invisible purse?

"Your money," she said.

William accepted it with alacrity and unfolded the disappointingly singular bill. Only one?

"Where's the rest of it?"

"Think of it as a down payment, William," she said, linking arms again with easy familiarity. "The class meets once a week. You have to come to the next two times to get 'your' money."

"You're going to force me to this for two more weeks? For your own sick enjoyment?"

"It's a down payment. It's up to you to decide how it's going to pay off."

"All right," he said, lifting his hands in mock-surrender. "You win. You must really enjoy watching a guy make a fool of himself for a little money."

Her mouth quirked up a little higher. "It'll be nice having something funny to watch while I'm there. Yoga can get so very dull."

"Far be it from me to let you get bored." Whatever else could be said about the way he treated women, he made sure that they never had a dull moment.

She giggled, and William found himself smiling.

Silence fell between the two of them. He was walking her home, and her home was approaching fast, but not fast enough. If he didn't say something soon, things were going to get awkward. The interminable walk to the door during which neither one has anything to say. And the dreaded "So..." at the parting, at which point they both decide there is nothing to talk about and actively avoid each other for the rest of their lives.

"So..." he managed. She did nothing to help him.

"Yes?"

"Have you had much trouble finding your way around yet? Rice isn't that big, but it can be confusing for the first week or so." Could he possibly have come up with anything less interesting to talk about?

She glanced up at him ruefully. "That obvious, huh?"

"Well, you did kind of advertise it this afternoon."

"Hey," she said, "that's different! I bet most people on campus don't know where your little secret society meets."

"It's hardly a secret society," he scoffed.

"No? Has a woman ever set foot in that room before?"

"I'm sure. Maybe."

"Well, you don't exactly roll out the welcome mat."

"Don't feel too bad," he said. William honestly didn't want her to take the lack of hospitality to heart. She had handled the situation masterfully. "It's a very exclusive room. Even when I was a freshman, it took a while to get invited in."

The look she gave him was dubious at best. "Really."

"Oh, sì," he said, nodding in earnest. "I had to make the right connections, drop the right hints...why, it was two full weeks before I was given an invitation."

There was that laugh again, the one that told him she was caught off guard and delighted by it. It was heady stuff.

"The story of your struggle gives me strength to carry on," she said sardonically.

"That's a good girl, cara mia," William said. "But how did you ever learn to play like that?" Her skill was expert-level stuff. How does an eighteen-year-old girl play like she's at the world series of billiards?

She gave him a sly smile. "You know, if I told you, it would take all the fun out of destroying you when you and I get around to playing."

She didn't want to tell him? William shrugged. He could wait. He'd learn.

"Fine," he said. "Keep your secrets."

She laughed then stopped. It took William a second to notice that she was no longer at his shoulder. He looked around wildly, wondering if she had disappeared into the dark bushes lining the path, and found her halted at the fork ten steps behind. The right led to the dorms and the left led to the gym, but it was impossible for a new student to tell which led where from their vantage point.

"Feeling lost yet?" She sure looked lost, tapping her finger on her lip to think.

"I found my way earlier, I can do it again. It shouldn't be that hard..."

"Here," William said, walking back up. "Wait for me. I'll show you."

Within a few paces he had reached her and turned her around, so that she was facing the way they had come. "One wrong step and you'll end up in the woods. Look," and so that she would know where, he pulled her against his side, wrapping an arm around her waist. The thin fabric of her tank top kept his arm from her warm skin, but did not hamper William's enjoyment of holding her there. "If you ever get lost, just look for the weird arrow on top of the cafeteria. So long as you follow where it points you, you'll always find your way home. It's our second star to the right."

She nodded and walked out of his embrace. Huh. He usually got a girl to linger a bit with that one.

"Why is that thing up there, anyway?" Anna said, moving down the right path. William caught up again with ease. "It looks like it's pointing straight at you when you're walking into the café."

"Who knows?" William replied. "A lot of people say it was a senior prank administration couldn't get down. Like one of the art students welded it to the building's framework, or something."

"Nice to know we can leave a lasting impression on this place."

"Comforting, isn't it?" he said cheerfully, waving her into her building.

### CHAPTER TWO

For the next two weeks, William went to yoga class. It wasn't bad (the view helped), and getting fifty bucks at the end of each session definitely sweetened the deal. And each time, he walked Anna back to her dorm, trying to squeeze in as much conversation as possible into the ten-minute trek across campus. He actually liked talking to her, which surprised him. He wasn't used to spending time with girls for their conversation. But it was entertaining enough simply talking to her—so much so that he almost felt regretful upon saying goodbye.

At least he saw her more often as the weeks went by. They both had class on campus, and there was a good chance he'd run into her at least twice a week. It was good seeing her in something other than those yoga outfits. Not that what she wore normally was that much different. She didn't walk around in spandex, but she had a penchant for clothes that clung to her small frame that made her body difficult to ignore.

At least it was easier to ignore that undeniably appealing figure in favor of her endearing personality. In fact, the first time he had seen her on his way to class, she had waved at him with such cheerful earnestness that he had no choice but to laugh and return the wave. No, the problem was that her clothes made it difficult for other guys to keep friendly intentions in mind.

On the Tuesday after their second yoga session, he had been walking across the quad to stats class when he caught sight of Anna enjoying the midday sunlight. She was hard to miss in that tight, teal skirt. Some freshman was hanging all over the poor girl, moving in, moving around, nervous but eager, touching her arm, laughing a little too hard.

William rolled his eyes. You never act so obvious. Women can smell desperation. Anna wasn't necessarily encouraging his attentions, but then again, she didn't have to. Her flirty cleavage, showcased by the lacy top, was encouragement enough to any guy. Every time Anna looked away, the kid seized the opportunity to grab a peek.

William, already late for class, reversed course and walked over. He hadn't gotten a chance to speak with Anna since Thursday night. They were friends, weren't they? Friends talked before class. Totally normal. Had nothing to do with the asshat ogling her.

She waved when she caught sight of him. The freshman beside her simply scowled.

"Ciao, Annabelle," William said. The grin upon speaking to her was unplanned, but not inopportune. Made for more of a friendly greeting.

She wrinkled her nose at him, but didn't lose her smile. A good sign.

"It's Anna Beth," she said. "Or Anna."

"I like Annabelle," he replied, considering. "It suits you." Anna bella. She was a pretty one.

Anna shrugged, gracefully conceding. "I've been called worse," she said. "The accent doesn't hurt."

Score one for the exotic factor. She hadn't even looked at her hanger-on since William had come over.

"Shouldn't you be in class?" he said. Patronizing.

She smiled and shook her head. "I have lunch right now," she said brightly. "No class until two!"

"That must be nice." He didn't even spare a glance towards the kid.

Anna, unfortunately, did. "Oh my word, where are my manners!" She turned to introduce them. "William, this is Joe."

They shook hands. "Pleasure."

William immediately turned back towards Anna. He wasn't here to make friends with a desperate pimplefest.

How to keep her attention focused? From the little that William had gleaned about the girl so far, he knew that she liked stories. She'd said that's what drew her to literature, although he also knew that she loved history with an enthusiasm that was almost unhealthy. On one of their walks, she'd practically talked his ear off about the Spanish monarchy. William knew exactly one historical anecdote, but he was going to use it to his fullest advantage.

"My professor just told us the funniest story about Calvin Coolidge."

It worked; she was immediately hooked. "Really? Tell me!" she demanded.

He made a show of checking his watch. "Well, I would, but I really need to get to class. Maybe I'll remember the next time we run into each other?"

"Nonsense. You can walk and talk, can't you? Or do guys have too much trouble multitasking to manage?"

"Well, I guess I could tell you on the way to class..."

"Great. It's settled." She turned back to Joe as an afterthought. "I'll catch up with you later, okay honey?"

"Yeah. Sure." The freshman wasn't happy about getting ousted, but somehow, William couldn't muster the energy to care. He had to work to smother a triumphant grin as Anna started walking away with him. He'd won.

"Okay, so you know how he was called Silent Cal?..."

***

Finally, William had all three fifties. It wasn't a large sum of money, but maybe he could keep working on her to hit the real pool halls. And then serious money would start rolling in. He resolved to bring it up the next time he saw her.

But the week after their third yoga class passed without one sighting of the girl. William had to admit, he was curious what she had been up to. It was fun talking to her, and after a week, he was missing it. Had she been hiding from him?

Thursday evening came again, and it found him putting on his sweatpants for another night of yoga. It wasn't until he was halfway out the door that he remembered he'd gotten all the money she had promised him, and he didn't have to go anymore. But for some reason, he kept walking. It was a silly enterprise, but he enjoyed getting to see Anna and talking to her afterwards. He hadn't seen her on campus all week, but he knew that she would show tonight. So he went.

***

Anna had no delusions that William would keep coming to yoga. He had gotten his money. That was the only reason he had been coming. She wasn't even expecting their friendship to really continue, either. Oh, sure, they would acknowledge each other as they passed on campus—the dreaded and all-too-convenient silent, jerky nod of the head—but that would be the extent of it. No pausing on the quad to tell each other funny stories, no more help if she got lost (which, to her credit, had only happened once more), no warm arm going around her waist so that he could speak warmly in her ear.

Anna sighed. She'd miss their conversations. She always enjoyed talking to him. But school had been going for over a month now, she was starting to make other friends, and had gradually abandoned her dreams of running out the gates and never looking back at the loneliness. She had no illusions about the handsome junior and his lack of interest in their friendship.

Which is why, when she happened to look up from unrolling her mat in the basement of Cox and caught sight of William in the doorway, the same as he'd been for the past three weeks, she couldn't stop herself from letting out a huge, ridiculous grin. It actually made her happy to see him again, and even happier that he had shown up here, with no incentive of bribery to entice him. He gave a small arrogant smile of his own when he saw her looking at him. Smiling at him.

The mat she had lent him was tucked under one arm.

Of course, she quickly reminded herself. He was only here to return her mat. But instead handing it over and leaving, he simply unrolled it beside her and went into position, same as before. Well, okay. Maybe he was here to do yoga.

And he did. And just as he had the past three weeks, at the end of the session he walked her home.

"The darkness can be dangerous, signorina," he'd whispered when she protested at the end of yoga session number two. The words would have been almost frightening if they hadn't sounded so tempting. "It is always better to have company."

So Anna had shrugged and accepted the habitual escort. She wasn't about to further the death of chivalry.

Now, however, she was putting her foot down. "You're not getting any more money, if that's what you were hoping," she said tartly. Anna didn't stop walking, however, and he kept up with her easily.

"Oh, I know." Movement in the shadows, a scraping—William rubbing at the two-day-old stubble dusting his jaw. "You don't think I can do a friend a favor, without expecting payment? That hurts."

Did this mean they were actually friends now? That was exciting. She had a cool guy willing to be her friend!

"Although now that you mention it, I was hoping that we could make another deal." Here it was: the catch.

"Do tell," was all she said.

"Well, you want to have a friend to go to yoga with. I don't hate going, so I can still help you out there."

How generous of him, Anna thought. She kept her thoughts to herself, however, and said, "Works for me."

"I have one condition. I do this with you, and in return, you come to the gym with me. That way we'll both get a real workout."

She made a face. "Ugh, I hate going to the gym. The soreness the day after...I hate the pain."

"Life is pain," William quipped. "Anyone who says differently—"

"Is selling something!" she finished the quote excitedly.

There was a pause, then they laughed.

"Great movie, right?" Anna said.

"Oh, yes," he replied. "I have a fondness for it. It was one of the first movies I saw when I moved to America. My favorite part is the hunchbacked Sicilian."

Anna cocked an eyebrow at him. "You didn't find it offensive?"

"Hardly," he said with a laugh. "The Sicilians deserve a few jokes. They think too much of themselves."

"They must be your Texas," Anna said, eyes twinkling.

"Basically," he agreed. "But you're not going to distract me. The gym. You must come."

She huffed an irritated sigh. "Oh, fine...But I don't have to enjoy it."

"You do not. But I will see you bright and early on Saturday."

"Sure...Saturday morning...great."

William was enjoying her reluctance. He had a workout buddy and she had a yoga partner. Everyone wins.

Anna's mind was on another track already, apparently. "Speaking of the weekend, you mentioned something about there being real places to shoot pool in this one-horse town?"

He grinned in the darkness. He didn't even have to bring it up. Fantastic. "There's a couple, actually."

"Because I was thinking they really wouldn't be excited to see me again in the campus one—"

"After you wiped the floor with their faces? That's probably true."

"And I do have to practice somewhere. I can't get rusty."

He was a little disappointed, but tried not to sound like it. "So you just want to go there to practice?"

She slid him a sideways glance. "Well, is betting common?"

Excellent! "Oh, sì," William said, all seriousness. "Like, it's almost odd if you don't want to put money down. People go to play and to wager."

He could see her lips curl up into that little triumphant smile again. "I think I can handle it."

William tried to resist rubbing his hands together in glee. Tried. "Excellent. Cutting the pool sharks down to size, one—wait a second, you're not going to fight about me getting a cut again, are you?"

She laughed melodiously. "Oh no, William, if we play this right, you will have earned every dollar."

And play they did: he the crowd; she the tables. Sometimes Charles and Aiden would come along for the show, but it was usually just the two of them—and they didn't need anyone else, they quickly discovered. They would talk all the way to the bar, talk all the way back, talk every time they ran into each other on the quad or in the buildings.

It was easy for William to talk to her. She smiled, frowned, and laughed easily. She was like quicksilver. Mercurial, flashy, but really quite fun. They never ran out of things to talk about, were never tired of each other's company. It was refreshing. Not that Charles or the other guys were dull, but he'd never known another girl who was so...engaging. He never got bored around her.

William found himself seeking out Anna's companionship more frequently than just the weekends they would go out looking to hustle some pool. As the semester progressed and their course loads grew heavier, they began meeting up on weekdays to study. As entertaining as his new friendship was, studying still bored William. At least half the time, he would succeed in tempting her away from the books to play a video game or watch a movie—William hated homework, and an hour spent with Anna only counted if they were talking.

When midterms approached and Anna's stress level rose, William encouraged her by cheerfully reminding her that school only got worse from freshman year. In retribution, she started guilting him into studying by resisting any distraction he tried to lure her away from responsibility with, instead insisting that study time should be better allocated. By the time the fall midterms had passed, they were meeting up at least twice a week—once to waste time in fun, and once to study. Anna was always eager to edit William's English papers, and he would flip through her handwritten Italian vocab flashcards, quizzing her in return. If she'd asked him to, William would have happily tossed the cards and reverted to his native tongue to help her with her foreign language class, but Anna insisted that making the cards helped her remember the words, and she spent so much time working on them that it would be a waste not to use them.

To celebrate them completing all of their finals, William and Anna had gone on an overeager strike, hitting three of the city's four pool bars in one night—gathering up some extra Christmas money, William had called it. Flushed with her victories at the tables, and the relief of completing her first semester of college, Anna had finally agreed to teach William some better billiards moves. To his self-loathing regret, William had paid much more attention to the way Anna bent her body on and around the pool table than to the coaching that she had tried to give him. He did pick up a few tricks—enough to beat Charles occasionally—but far too often, his eyes had been drawn by her perky body, her shapely legs, the sparkle in her bright blue eyes.

Over Christmas break, William discovered that he didn't want to lose touch. Not a week passed by that didn't find one of them calling the other up to talk.

William couldn't say when a girl had become so important to him. All he knew was the excitement he felt when break was finally over, when classes finally resumed, when he and his spunky partner in crime were reunited. Without him ever consciously noticing, Anna had become his best friend, and they had formed a well-matched team that was known all over campus by the dumbest nickname known to man.

Billy and the Bookworm, people called them. William hated the name Billy, but he didn't mind it so much when they were together. He was the one who had started calling her Bookworm in the first place, after all.

"Hey, Bookworm! Wait for me."

Anna turned around, her nose already starting to wrinkle. "You know I hate that."

"I know," William said easily, jogging to catch up to her. "But you've earned it." Considering the ever-changing stack of thick books she was always lugging around and her near-encyclopedic knowledge on the literary classics, "Bookworm" certainly suited her.

"Lucky me."

"So what's up?" he said, ignoring her sarcasm.

She shrugged. "Lunch, I guess. Class got canceled."

She looked disgruntled at the change in her schedule. William envied her. He only got an hour between classes and labs, and hadn't had a class canceled in a year. The economics department took everything too seriously, especially now that the spring midterms were looming.

"You want some company?" he found himself saying.

Anna shrugged again. "If you want," she said indifferently. "Do you have the time?"

"I always have time for you, Bookworm," he said with a grin. "Let's go."

She rolled her eyes, but followed him. Even though William hadn't been in the cafeteria since last year, the food hadn't appeared to have changed a bit.

"Allora," he said, grabbing a seat as they put their trays down, "we should talk about this weekend. I know last semester we sort of ran an aggressive campaign against the bars, but this time we should take a more subtle approach."

Anna lowered herself into the seat across the table. "Do we have the time for that?" she asked.

Pushing his hair back, William started shoveling food into his mouth as he spoke. "We still have some good weekends left. Maybe you should lose a few more games to give us an edge again."

She immediately shook her head in answer, a frown quickly appearing. "Losing? I don't throw games."

"It doesn't have to be that many. Just a few," he cajoled. "We want people to want to play you."

Still she was shaking her head. "I can't do that."

"Sure you can. It will mean that we can keep going to the bars. If you win too much, they'll throw us out."

"William," Anna said, an edge of desperation in the name. "You're the actor. Not me."

He stilled, a roll halfway to his mouth. Put the food down. Focus. Blue eyes had started to ice over in her resistance. Something was wrong. This wasn't just an issue of honor.

"Annabelle," he said, his brown eyes warming hers back to the melting point. "What is it?"

She spread her hands wide, frustration evident. "I don't know how to lose!" she said.

"Oh, is that the only problem you have with it?" William said, leaning back. That was a relief. "I can teach you that. We can go to the pool hall tomorrow night and we can have a few lessons. After 11 on weeknights, the place is deserted."

Still she hesitated. "I don't know..."

"And while you're over there, you might as well return the favor."

"How?"

"You can show me some more of your moves. Get me up to your level."

"In your dreams."

"Oh, come on, Anna..." He was getting desperate. William had been craving another lesson from Anna since Christmas. He needed to know her secrets. "Per favore. Don't you get bored being the only billiard savant in the state?"

"If your question is do I ever get bored with winning, the answer is no," she shot back. She crossed her arms, looking determined.

William had to focus on his glass to resist the urge to stare down her shirt. It was another one of her silky ones that gaped in the front and back, and with her arms pressing tempting expanses of skin together and up...

He took a gulp of water. "No," he said slowly. "That's not what I mean. But wouldn't you prefer having at least one other person at your level, so that you would have more of a challenge? It's not like you would be teaching me how to beat you. I just want to be able to match you, and one lesson was not enough for that."

"Well..." She was wavering! The logic was undeniable, and she had to see that.

William had already started to grin in victory when her answer came, sudden and hard.

"No. Wait. I can't."

"What? Why not?" he cried. He felt betrayed. She was considering it, and once he got a woman to consider something, he could convince her of anything. But instead she had ripped the possibility right out of his eager fingers.

"I can't this weekend, anyway," she said.

He groaned. "Why not?"

"I have a date!" she said brightly.

"A date?" he said blankly.

"Sure do!"

Anna rose with the remnants of her meal. William did the same, and they left the cafeteria. He still wasn't done with the topic of her date, however. They lingered at the cafeteria exit, not quite ready to return to academics.

"Who do you have a date with?" He couldn't believe she had actually taken up with one of those pups who followed her around. Couldn't she see that they were only interested because of the way she dressed? Surely she didn't want to be with a guy who objectified her so blatantly.

"His name's Kennedy. And he's really sweet." The warning of a frown dared William to disagree.

"Would I know him?"

"I don't know. He's a freshman. He's on the baseball team."

So were some of William's friends. He could send out a few feelers. Just to make sure the guy wasn't a sociopath.

With an annoyed tsk, William was tossing his hair back yet again. The unruly curls were getting longer and longer and starting to fall into his eyes. He could barely see Anna to talk to her.

"You know, if you got a haircut, you'd be able to see better," his companion was kind enough to inform him.

The nagging always began eventually. Everyone from his mother to his one-night stands were happy to suggest he cut his hair.

"It has been my experience, Bookworm," William said, ready to begin the fight anew, "that women prefer the long hair. Gives them something to hold on to, certo?"

Anna flushed bright red in a matter of milliseconds. Well. Perhaps that had been too forward. Though they were friends, there were some topics that one did not discuss with one's female friends. Especially topics that alluded to one being naked with other women.

"I'll grant you, you do look good with the longer hair," she said. "Gives you this whole 'untamed Italian stallion' vibe, and I do like the curls. I'm just sayin', if you're annoyed with it being in your way, you can always cut it a bit."

Anna thought him attractive? Was this normal? Girls did compliment each other freely. Surely this was no different. Right? William was speechless for a moment—a moment too long. By the time he'd decided on words, she had rushed on without him.

"So!" Anna said, in a blatant bid to change the topic, "Are you ready for next year?"

William grimaced. "Hardly. I've got an internship lined up over the summer, so that should help, though."

"And then you come back and graduate?"

"That's the plan."

"Solid," Anna said absently.

"Problem, Anna?"

"No," she said. "It's just that I should probably go study. I have a quiz in an hour."

"Well, don't let me keep you." William started his trek back to the business building. "Oh, and Anna?" he said, turning around.

"Yeah?"

"Call me if anything goes wrong."

"With my quiz? You want to take it for me?"

"No, with your baseball player." He waved a farewell before he could think too much about his offer. He didn't want to be bothered at all hours of the night with a girl's problems, but at the same time, he could be more help than her freshman girlfriends. It wasn't an open invitation, he told himself. Just in case she really needed help.

### CHAPTER THREE

He didn't see Anna again until she was pounding on the door of his apartment in the middle of the night on Saturday.

William had pulled open the door, expecting to find Charles' crazy ex-girlfriend drunk and furious, but had instead found Anna, her cheeks blotchy and her eyes swimming with unshed tears.

"Anna?" he said, opening the door wider. The faint light of the living room fell on her. "C'è—what are you wearing?" he said as he finally, blearily, took in the rest of her.

She was in some tight button down shirt and one of the smallest miniskirts William had ever seen. This was how she dressed for a date?

"What is wrong with you boys?!" she cried. "Is that really all you can think about?"

He tried shushing her. "You'll wake my roommates," he entreated. "Here, let—let me get my key, and we'll sit out here. Allora? Just wait for me."

Key retrieved, William shut the door behind them and led her to the curb. They sat together.

"Allora, ch'è successo?" It was too late at night to worry about the tissue-thin barrier between the languages. Not that it mattered. Anna would have understood the reluctant question even if it had been spoken in Arabic.

"He—he tried—I told him no!" was all she could get out. She sounded livid.

"Told who no?" William wasn't exactly awake yet. He was used to staying up late, but he'd always had trouble with the waking up part.

Anna fiddled with a piece of grass. "My...the baseball player."

William saw red. Had he tried...? He'd always thought that the baseball players were a bit too pushy for his taste. He took a deep breath. Calm down. Get the whole story first. Then get the shovel.

"Told him no about what?" he said carefully. Maybe she had just changed her mind about going out tonight, and had canceled the date. That was always possible.

But not tonight, apparently. Anna stayed silent for a long minute. Was she blushing? William thought that he could feel the heat even several feet away, but it was dark. He couldn't be sure.

"We went to a movie, and he tried kissing me," she finally said. He raised an eyebrow. She was pitching a hissy fit over one kiss? "Which was fine," she rushed to say, catching his look. The wrinkled nose she sported didn't speak well of the kiss itself, however. William fought back a smirk. The baseball guys needed to work on their skills.

"But then he tried..." Words failed her. Anna made a swooping-up motion with her hand, and then peeked up at him to see if he understood.

William rubbed the sleep out of his eyes and refocused. "He tried..." He imitated her motion but at a higher level. Going for second base on the first date was bold, but not worth him having to teach the guy some manners. "Or...?" He did the motion again, low this time.

"The—the second one," she whispered. She put her hands over her face and groaned. "I didn't understand what was going on at first, and then he kept trying...and I said no."

The rushing in William's ears was so loud that he had difficulty hearing her words.

"So he took you home, sì?" he prompted. He better have.

She nodded. "But he was angry. And then in the car, when we got here, he kept...and he wouldn't stop..."

Her hands were firmly fastened to her face now. As much as neither of them wanted to hear the question, as much as he didn't want to hear the answer, William needed to know.

"Annabelle," he said, very, very carefully, "did he...hurt you?"

At first there was only a shudder, but then she shook her head. "No," she said. "But...I hit him."

Calm down. One deep breath. Two. He put a hand gently on her shoulder. It was a good sign when she didn't shake it off.

"You did what?" William started to smile.

"He wouldn't stop," she said, defending herself. "And by that point, I was fit to be tied. So when he tried getting...I punched him and jumped out of the car."

"And came here to brag about your brawl?" His attempt at levity didn't go over well.

She rolled her eyes and shook her head again. "When I got out, he said something...rather rude," she said. That delicate Southern mouth. "And then he started to get out as well."

He'd tried to follow her? The instant William saw this guy...

"Well, I had hit him," Anna said, as though that excused it. As though she should be defending that creep. "But I wasn't quite sure what he would do, so...I ran. I thought if he followed me, you could at least hide me in your apartment until he gave up."

If the idiot had kept up, William would have done a lot more than hide her. Hell, he would hide the moron to an inch of his worthless life. Closing his eyes, William took a few more deep breaths. Getting angry wouldn't help anyone. Especially not her. When he opened them again, he found her studiously examining a thumbnail. Her hair swung forward to hide her face from him. It bugged him more than it should, her still being nervous. Anna was with him. She shouldn't be nervous any longer. He wanted her to feel safe.

"Are you thirsty?" he said, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear. That was better. Now he could see her.

She stared up at him in shock, unprepared for the topic shift. "What?"

"Sitting outside in the middle of the night isn't doing either of us any favors," William said. "And you've had quite a run from the dorms over here. Can I get you something to drink?"

She swallowed instinctively at the offer of a drink. William followed the movement down her slender, smooth neck. She must be parched. It was nearly a half mile from the women's dorms to the apartments across from campus, and she had run it in—of course, William nearly groaned—heels. The girl was crazy, he thought. She was going to get herself killed.

"I might could drink some iced tea," she allowed.

William shook his head as he led her inside, cautioning her to stay quiet. Iced tea. It was an odd practice to him, putting ice in tea. Tea was meant to be brewed and drunk hot. Still, this wasn't the first time Anna had come over, and he'd bought a can of powdered tea mix for when she socialized. He pulled it out of a cabinet now and started preparing a glass of the stuff.

Anna sat on the couch, looking a little lost. He'd never known her to wither in the face of a guy trying to put the moves on her. She'd had it happen before, and would again. She dealt with it with her usual charm and condescension, but this looked more like defeat. William had never seen her so afraid.

"Here," he said, thrusting the drink in her face, hoping to jar her out of whatever dark place her thoughts had taken her.

She smiled vacantly at him and took the glass, sipping automatically. William sat in the recliner across from the couch. He waited. She wasn't going to speak until she was ready.

Eventually, she leaned over to put the glass on the table. William found himself following the line of creamy skin that her position suddenly made visible, down into...he jerked his gaze back to her face, feeling guilty. She'd already had one randy guy panting after her tonight. She didn't need another. Not that she made him randy. He knew how to control himself—and she was a friend. He couldn't deny that she was a very attractive friend, but she was a friend. You aren't attracted to your friends.

William was so focused on not looking at her that he almost missed when she shivered. Just once, but it was a bad sign. Either she was cold (entirely possible with her outfit) or shock was setting in.

"You okay?"

She didn't look convinced by her own "Yes."

"You're safe now," he assured her. "He can't get to you here."

She nodded, but her expression didn't lighten.

"What is it, Annabelle?"

"It's just...I was so scared," she confessed. Like it was a secret she was ashamed of.

"Well, you did good," William said. "Clocking him did the trick."

He'd hoped to get her to focus on him and make her smile again. One out of two wasn't bad.

She finally turned stricken eyes to him. "The only reason I got away is because he was so surprised," she whispered. "What if there's another? What if I can't get away?"

William didn't know what to tell the frightened girl sitting across from him. Short of never dating again, there was always a slight possibility that something could go wrong.

"Hopefully you'll improve your taste in guys," he said, trying for levity. "The baseball boneheads usually aren't the best choice."

She caught the ghost of a smile. "He seemed so nice."

"Of course he seemed nice," he said, almost snapping in impatience. "He was trying to get in your pants." Just like every other guy who asked her out. None of them paid any attention to the girl herself; all they looked at was her chest, her hips, her rear—all of which were admirable assets, but paled in comparison to the unequivocal ecstasy of her smile and the brightness of those big blue eyes.

Anna blushed. "Clearly."

The red stain flowed so easily, so smoothly from cheeks to slender neck, drawing the eye down to the beauty hinted at beneath—nope. Smile. Blue eyes. Pretty blue eyes. William cleared his throat, trying to remind himself of the issue at hand. Not her delicate hands that promised graceful, enjoyable movement the way they had wrapped around the glass—which had nothing to do with the issue at hand!

"The next time we go to the gym, I'm teaching you some fighting moves," he decided. "You'll feel better if you know how to floor a man."

She swept her hair over one shoulder—a good sign. "I already know how to do that," she said with more of her usual bravado.

"Then we'll go over basic punching, kicking, and you'll be better prepared for this sort of thing."

She nodded, considering. "That might be good."

"Another way to help prevent this..." William hesitated. He knew all too well how a guy's mind worked, but Anna had proven herself too innocent, too foolish to know. This was going to be uncomfortable.

"Yes?" she prompted.

"Well—your wardrobe might..." He floundered helplessly as she narrowed her eyes at him.

"What's wrong with my clothes?" She made the question an accusation.

"Niente!" Absolutely nothing. He rather liked what she wore, in fact. "It's just...a lot of guys see it as an invitation."

"Then that's their mistake," Anna snapped.

Yes, that was true. It being a misreading didn't change the fact that it still happened. "You're right," he said. "But they still think it. I'm just saying..." He scrubbed his hands over his face. Was there a way out of this conversation?

"What?" Her tone was icy by now.

He'd started this; he would have to see it through. "If you wore something a little less...sexy, then guys would be less likely to assume..."

"Let's get one thing straight right now," she hissed at him. He jerked back. Now he was scared. "I will dress however I damn well please, and that is no one's business but my own."

William stared at her, slack-jawed. Had she ever cursed before? The strongest words he'd ever heard her utter were "bless his heart." The anger was unsettling, hinting at an argument that she was tired of fighting.

"I wear clothes like this because I like how I look in them. I'm not going to change my style to gain or lose a guy's attention, and if he can't respect me enough to listen to my words, then that is his own fault and his own lack of control."

"Anna, per carità, half the guys at this school look at you like...boh, like you are an easy target!" He knew that she enjoyed attention, but they were like wolves circling their prey, and William was not going to let them attack.

"If they'd rather act like animals than rational men, then that says more about their character than it does mine! I don't encourage it. I dress for myself, not a bunch of slobbering goons!"

Fury was creeping its scarlet way up her neck and the volume of her voice was quickly escalating. She was going to wake his roommates. Charles might roll his eyes and be able to go back to sleep, but Oliver...there had already been two fights this week over the noise level in the apartment, and William didn't feel like watching another one erupt.

"Okay," he gave in, sliding to his knees before her. "Okay, Annabelle. It was just a suggestion. You're right."

That shut her up. She fell silent at his surrender, although her hysteria faded more slowly. Her chest continued to rise and fall rapidly as she fought to control her temper.

"For what it's worth," he said, picking up her empty glass and heading for the kitchen, "you do look good in them." He could feel her eyes follow him, but when he came back from the sink, she was looking down.

"I want you to stay here tonight," he said once he was sitting.

He saw the mutiny in her expression as she opened her mouth, and forestalled it.

"For all we know, Kennedy could still be looking for you. So long as you stay in here, you'll be safe. Besides, you must be tired enough already." Lord knew he was. It was already past two.

Caution won over the protest. William knew how much she hated being told what to do, but even she had to admit it was smarter to stay.

"You can sleep on the couch." He nudged it with his foot. "It's lumpy, but it's warm."

"It's new," she said with some surprise. The last time she had been in here, the couch had been ancient and plaid. She now sat on an updated, beige model.

"Yeah, the new roommate brought it with him. It was an improvement over the old one."

She nodded, barely listening.

"Shame we can't play foosball right now," he said. "There's nothing like getting your ass handed to you right before going to sleep."

It worked; she laughed, and the shadows finally fled from her eyes. William had been teaching her how to play ever since he and Charles had gotten a table for the apartment. He had been surprisingly pleased to find that although she was a veritable pro at pool, Anna's hand at foosball was abysmal. She got too immersed in the game and forgot about half of her little men. He thought it healthy for her to lose at something.

Anna yawned, reminding William to let her go to sleep. It had been a very long night for her. And for him.

"Right." He couldn't stay there talking to her all night. That would be rude. Pushing himself off the floor, William stood and stretched before heading to his room.

"Pillow, pillow..." His options were limited. William grabbed the least-battered of his pillows and a soft blanket he'd stolen from Charles and carried them back to the living room.

To find Anna already asleep, curled into one of the couch cushions. William sighed. She was always so impatient. And small. She barely took up half the length of the couch. She looked so fragile like this, even with the unconscious enticement of the swell and dip of her curves. Impotent rage boiled in William's veins at the thought of someone trying to hurt her, force her. Anna deserved to be wooed, treasured, pleasured....

William slammed a window shut on the direction of his thoughts. He wasn't going to be the one doing—or thinking about—any of that. She was his friend. He gingerly tucked the blanket around her, taking care to avoid touching any part of her body, before heading to his own bed and the sleep he had had to abandon.

William was still in bed when Anna appeared in the doorway to his bedroom. Was she still worried? Did she need something? His concern had him sitting up and preparing to go to her, but she stilled him with a beatific smile before he could even swing his feet over the side of the bed. So he sat back against his headboard and watched her step into the room, a question in his eyes.

He wasn't sure what he was more surprised at: Anna's quiet, or the fact that she hadn't blushed and averted her eyes when he'd sat up. William never slept with a shirt on—Texas was too unbearably hot for it, especially in September—and hadn't made any effort to hide his bare chest from her. But Anna, who had always studiously averted her eyes each time she encountered a shirtless man, even when they were in the gym, had yet to look away from William's half-naked body. If anything, her smile had widened when the covers had fallen away to reveal more of his skin than William had ever intended for her to see of him.

"What is it?" he whispered. "Stai bene—?"

She silenced him, holding one gentle finger against her lips, and still approached, her bare feet making no noise on the ugly apartment carpet. Slowly, slower than William could have ever wanted or endured, her finger slid from her lips, down her neck, and came to rest on the first button of her shirt.

William had spent so long avoiding looking at any of Anna's best features that his eyes, starved for the sight, couldn't look away. He hungrily followed the movement of that single hand as it undid first one button, then another, then a third, and his mouth went dry. A knowing smile curved up on Anna's lips as she held his gaze, the kind of smile he'd seen time and again when she was flirting with a new target, but never had it directed at him. It had a powerful effect on his ability to think clearly. Anna was all he could see, all he could think now.

To William's great regret, she left off unbuttoning her shirt after the third button came open. Now she was slowly skimming her hands up to her hair. Her fingertips were torturing William, languid in their mission. Far too slowly, they entered her hair and began discarding pins one by one, until William wanted to surge up and finish the job himself, burying his hands in the butter-soft thicket of her hair. His restraint was rewarded, however, when the final pin finally came out and her curls burst free of the confining bun that she had started damming up her hair in lately, tumbling down in a torrent of cinnamon. With a coquettishness born of natural instinct, she shook her head slowly from side to side, letting her hair settle into its own patterns. The movement sent a wave of her perfume towards William, a mix of gardenias and lavender and something that was purely Anna, like an old book that you find, a treasure you've been searching for, that you can't help but bury your nose in to take in its essence all at once. He was starved, he was as thirsty as the desert, and she was a banquet fit for the gods.

As though she sensed his longing, Anna's fingers finally returned to the buttons on her shirt. One after another, they were released from the straining fabric until the shirt began to part, revealing to William for the first time the swells of Anna's breasts. He couldn't stop looking.

All of the buttons finally undone, Anna only paused for a moment, her hands gripping the edges of her shirt, before pulling it fully open and shrugging out of the garment. William was frozen, unable to move, unable to think, for fear that it would break the spell and she would disappear.

The shirt hit the ground with no more noise than a sigh. Louder was the growl that William could feel reverberating its way up his chest and out of his mouth at the sight of Anna standing before him. And as she slipped out of her skirt as well, he could not contain his moan of desire.

By everything that was holy and profane, he wanted her. This woman, standing here before him, clad in nothing but her undergarments, was the sexiest sight that he could have ever imagined. Anna's breasts jutted out proudly, their round shapes begging to be touched, demanding attention. Her waist nipped in gently, small enough that William could probably encircle it with his hands, and flowed out into trim hips that were perfect for grasping. She was a Botticelli made flesh, a Venus rising from the waves of the sea-foam green carpet.

Abiding by her rule of silence, William said nothing. At that moment, he was beyond speech. Silently, he held out his hand to her; just as silently, she took it.

There was exactly one place that she belonged in that moment, and that was in William's bed, in William's arms. Obeying his wordless tug on her hand, she slipped into bed with him, folding her body into his with a contented sigh.

As her bare skin caressed his chest, William had the oddest sensation of homecoming, like Anna was finally where she was always meant to be. Unable to wait any longer, William bent his head and captured her lips in the kiss he'd been needing to give her since she'd appeared in his life. She was everything sweet and passionate, and William couldn't get enough of her. This was where Anna was always meant to be: in his bed, in his arms, and...in his heart?

No time for that kind of thought, when Anna was kissing him back and sighing his name in sensual delight. The sound of his name on her tongue was a pleasure that William hadn't been prepared to face, and it sent a jolt of excitement straight to his cock.

He kissed her more deeply, brushing his tongue against hers, tantalizing her, urging her on for more. With a flick of his fingers, she was finally, perfectly, naked in his hands, and it was all William could do to hold back his groan at feeling her skin for the first time. If he'd known that she felt like this, he would have gotten her into his bed within a week of meeting her.

The smoothness of her skin, the twitches of her body as she responded to his touch, and her gasp as his fingers grazed her nipples all swirled together into a fog of pleasure in William's mind. Her body was everything that he had ever wanted, ever needed in a woman, and her smile as he kissed her until she sighed with contentment was everything he'd ever needed in his heart.

As he reached for his own pants, her fingers joined his, pulling the cloth down with an equal urgency. He needed to feel all of her, and give her all of himself. In a mercifully short time, the covering of cloth was replaced by the sure stroke of her hands. William almost came from the sensation of her touch alone, but he needed this to last. He needed to last for her.

With a sudden movement, William rolled on top of Anna. His hands never strayed from her body—he could not stop touching her, even for a second, but he needed to see her face as he entered her. She was ready for him—and lord knew, he was ready for her—and joining with her, oh, God, it was pleasure beyond anything he'd ever experienced—

William awoke suddenly, a raging hard-on the only reminder that his dream had left for him. The image of Anna beneath him, sighing in pleasure, lingered in his mind, like an annoying song lyric that would not leave, even after it had overstayed its welcome. The memory of what Anna's body had felt like under his hands...William shook his head, desperately trying to shake the thoughts from it by physical effort. It wasn't real. It never would be.

That night, for the first time, he had dreamed of Anna. And knew he was in trouble.

***

Anna woke slowly to the sound of doors opening and closing, a shower, a squeaky faucet. Footsteps shuffled, clothes rustled. Ugh, it was too early for this. After the night she'd had...

She rolled over and was startled to feel warmth roll with her. She investigated without opening her eyes. A blanket. There hadn't been one on the couch when she'd passed out, she was sure. Someone had put it over her as she slept. Well, that was sweet.

Maybe she should think about getting up and going home before anyone came out and saw her. It would be awful if anyone caught sight of her terrible bedhead. Her makeup had probably slid sideways in the middle of the night, too. She must look a fright.

The footsteps became louder, quickly approaching the living room. Uh-oh. Too late. She was trapped. The footsteps ceased when they reached the room, then turned and marched away. There was a sharp rap on a door—loud, too loud. It was definitely too early for this.

"William!" a deep voice said.

Not Charles. She didn't know the voice. It must be the new roommate, then. An unknown factor.

A door opened.

"Yes?" Well, William was up. Not mad at being woken. His voice was more bored than anything.

The new roommate did sound angry. "I don't expect you to stop bringing women back here when you feel the need, but I do expect a little common courtesy. Two other people live here, you know."

She could just imagine William leaning against the door jamb, contemplating the roommate with that impenetrable look of his. "What are you going on about, Oliver?"

"It's one thing to have your endless parade of women coming and going from your room—"

There was a rustle, and William cleared his throat. "'Endless parade' is a little—"

"But on my couch, man?"

Anna's cheeks burned. He thought that—

"And then you just leave her there, like—"

"You're presuming a lot there, Oliver." Now Anna could hear the quiet anger simmering in William's voice. "How do you know she isn't Charles'?"

And now she was getting angry. They were talking about her like she was someone's baggage, passed around from hand to hand until they found her owner.

There was a snort. "Be real. Charles?"

A sleepy voice mumbled a protest through a door. "Hey!"

Neither paid attention to it. William wasn't done.

"I suggest you give me a little credit. She's just a friend. And keep your voice down. She's had a rough night of it."

Anna waited, face on fire, for him to tell Oliver the entire sordid story. He would be well within his rights.

"She couldn't get home last night, so I said she could sleep on the couch. I figured you wouldn't be using it at two in the morning."

"Fine," Oliver snapped. "Just make sure she doesn't make a habit of it."

"She'd better not," she heard William mutter darkly. Sure, like she'd intended to have a date like that?

If the footsteps would just quiet down, she could drift back to sleep...But it was not to be. They were insistent and unlikely to cease. She had interrupted Oliver's morning routine, it seemed, and he had to return to it.

There was a second pair of footsteps, quieter ones, now. Probably William.

Someone sat beside her. Was she going to get yelled at now?

She could feel movement. A hand, maybe. It felt like—like a feather light caress on her hair. Anna held her breath. There was nothing and then—a heavy hand landed on her head and shook, mussing her hair.

Anna groaned in protest and swatted at the rude appendage.

A voice whispered in her ear now. "Buongiorno, Annabelle." It was William, but in a tone she'd never heard before. Maybe because she'd never spoken to him first thing in the morning. It sounded so...intimate.

She squeezed her eyes more tightly closed. Had someone opened a window? All-too-bright sunlight was piercing her eyelids now.

William tried again. "Wakey wakey? Eggs and bakey?"

"Food?" Anna popped one eye open hopefully.

"That got you," he chuckled. "Just kidding. No food."

Grumbling, Anna closed her eyes again. If there was no food, it wasn't worth waking up. Not this early, anyway.

"Oh, no you don't," William said. "Up." When she continued to ignore him, he sighed. "We have cereal?"

Anna allowed herself to be placated with the offer of cereal and finally sat up, pushing her mass of curls up and back. She allowed herself one sigh of regret for the lost sleep, and then it was time to face the day.

"I take it you're not much of a cook," she said, running her fingers through her tousled hair. Such a waste of that Italian blood.

It took William a minute to answer. Finally, he said, "No, not particularly." He rose and headed for the kitchen cabinets. "I do great things with a microwave, though."

That drew a smile out of her, William thought as he pulled down two bowls. He kept his eyes firmly fixed on the cereal, the milk, spoons. Not Anna emerging from that couch, looking deliciously rumpled, warm and soft...He'd had to fight back a natural reaction. It looked like she was rising from a bed after a busy night of not sleeping. And with her waking up in his apartment, seeing him first like this, it was all too easy to imagine that it was his bed she was coming from. Which was a bad thought, following a bad dream. Or what he told himself was a bad dream.

"Here," he said, carrying the full bowls back.

They ate on the couch, both sneaking looks at the other. It was the first time they'd seen each other like this, and Anna was consumed with curiosity—William was consumed with other thoughts. Consumed with not thinking other thoughts.

"So," she timidly broke the silence, "I guess it's still too early to play?"

Stupid thing to say, but it was the first idea that had popped into her head. Less personal than asking how he'd slept. Not that she was curious. Playing foosball would dispel this weird aura of sharing the night—and the morning.

How many of William's girls got to share the morning with him? Anna tried not to wonder, but the unwelcome thought popped in without invitation. She'd been witness to at least three of them leaving his apartment late at night, when he'd invited her over after he had a date—and had run into William walking out of the women's dorms, shoes in hand, several times. How many did she not see? How many did he have breakfast with? It was not a pleasant conjecture.

William's words recalled her to the question at hand—not the ones nibbling around her mind. "Probably." He was rubbing his forehead. Still tired. "I usually get a headache if I play this early, and I think Charles is still pretending to sleep."

Another muffled "Hey!" issued from the only closed door left in the apartment.

"It might be better for us to play something where you have a fighting chance," he teased.

Her eyes lit up. "You're finally getting a pool table?"

William laughed. "Yeah, with all the space we have to put one," he said, gesturing grandly to encompass the tiny apartment. A footstool wouldn't fit in the space they had left. "I guess I should have said something where we both have a fighting chance." He tossed a video game controller in her lap. "You game, Bookworm?"

Anna took up the challenge eagerly.

The first time that Anna had visited his apartment, William had been surprised to find that she enjoyed shooter games so much—and owned some he'd never gotten to play before. Their skills were complementary enough that both enjoyed themselves whether they played on a team or against each other. The last time they'd played together, Charles was holding an informal tournament in the apartment for a group of people avoiding midterms, and the host had not enjoyed being tag-teamed. They had destroyed him.

Today, Anna really needed to shoot something. Her partner put up a spirited fight, but this morning, it was William throwing down the controller in disgust.

"You got lucky," he accused her. "If you hadn't regenerated right where I was hiding, that never would have worked."

Anna crowed with victory. "Doesn't matter; I win!"

"Not this time!" Without waiting for her to be ready, William had started a new game and was pounding at buttons furiously.

"You cheat," she shouted at him, feverishly fighting back.

He spared a grin sideways before foiling her defensive onslaught. "Won't matter if I win!"

"Big 'if,'" Anna shot back without taking her eyes from the screen.

They made short work of the morning and most of the afternoon. Oliver left for work, Charles finally got up—it was a rare Sunday that saw Charles rise before noon had passed—and William and Anna were still playing.

It was one of the best days that Anna had ever had. By the end of it, she'd practically forgotten all about the disastrous date of the night before. The taint of Kennedy's kiss and roaming hands had all but disappeared into nothing. Having several glorious victories to boast about helped.

The sun was setting by the time they put down the controllers for good. Anna made a face at the rays coming from the west as she stretched.

"Ugh," she groaned. "I need to get home."

William had reached the same conclusion. It would be beyond foolish for her to go walking around in the dark again.

"My roommate's probably starting to think that I got kidnapped instead of lucky," Anna groused, pulling on her shoes.

"Good thing it was neither," William said firmly. There was no way that she was going to get lucky with some baseball-tossing snake.

Anna nodded absently. "Yeah, guess so."

He opened the door for her without thinking about it, let her pass through, and followed. After the night before, William needed to be sure that she arrived home safely. "You got any big projects coming up?" He sure did. He was supposed to have been working on his economics presentation all weekend. It was half of his grade. Good thing there was still Sunday evening left.

"Not huge," Anna said. "Just a few papers."

"Anything interesting?" He doubted it, but she enjoyed describing her projects to someone so that she could flesh out the ideas, and he never minded listening. She got so passionate about each new topic.

"Actually, yeah! We've been studying Dubliners for the past couple of weeks and now comes the paper."

"Oh, Dio," William groaned. "More Joyce?"

Anna swatted him as they headed for her dorm. "Excuse you," she said. "James Joyce is like a modern-day Dante. Both men lived their lives in exile and created literary masterpieces that—"

"—Are incredibly boring."

"They are not!" Anna was not going to stand for his maligning her new favorite author. "I get that it's not your fault that you're thicker than an ole coon dog, bless your heart, but that doesn't mean you can say that about every long book you're forced to read. Dubliners is fascinating. The way it's both a satire of and a call to action against the Dubliners' paralysis—it's brilliant!"

"It's certainly what his writing causes..." William muttered.

"Heathen. Anyway, the problem I'm encountering is that I see the ending as inherently optimistic, but then that doesn't fit in with the whole paralysis thing. Unless..."

He let her talk out the issue until she sounded satisfied with the solution, which brought them almost to her door.

"What about you, though?" Anna said. "I've been monopolizing the conversation."

"Nah, it was fine." William enjoyed hearing her think. "Besides, you already know the one major thing I have due soon."

Anna nodded sympathetically. "Still working on the big presentation, huh?"

"Still?" William laughed. "More like, 'Still haven't started.'"

"What?" Anna was flabbergasted. "William! I thought that this was basically like a thesis project!"

William ran a hand through his hair. "Yeah...it is. I mean, I have all the data. You remember the simulations I ran."

"Yeah, but you haven't written up anything yet?" Anna peered up at him anxiously. "And you're presenting Thursday?"

"That's about the look of it."

"How long is it supposed to be?"

"Eh...fifteen pages." William shrugged unconcernedly.

He really didn't want her worrying about this. He especially didn't want her worrying that she had made things worse by taking over his weekend. Because really, who ever got homework done on a Sunday afternoon? William never had, and it wasn't like he was going to magically start now.

"I've had worse," he assured her. It was mostly true.

"Still..."

"Go on," William said. He pushed her toward her door. "Go work on your boring Joyce."

"Do that again and you're gettin' hog-tied," she warned him. William turned to go when she got her dorm room door open, but she called after him: "And he's not boring!"

He looked back just in time to catch the twinkle in her eyes as she slipped inside and snapped the door shut.

Carmen, who was lying on her bed studying, had looked up at Anna's entrance and rolled into a sitting position.

Anna looked defiantly at her roommate, daring her to say anything.

Her roommate was not going to pass up on the opportunity. "Well."

Anna ignored her and went to put up her shoes in the closet.

"That was possibly the longest date ever." Carmen didn't even bother trying to hide the laughter in her voice. "And he walked you home? That's quite the hookup."

"No, that wasn't him," Anna said. A headache, compliments of a day spent indoors playing video games following a stress-filled late night, was tickling the edges of her mind. "I was with William."

"Oh, really?"

Too late, Anna heard the relish in her roommate's voice and caught up to what she was thinking. Carmen loved a good story. Anna was convinced that all the time that her roommate spent observing people behind a camera had made Carmen into an incurable gossip.

"I really thought that William would at least buy you dinner first."

Anna was already shaking her head, not that Carmen was paying attention. "Land sakes, no."

"So how was it? I've never had the good fortune to see William unclothed, but I'm positive he looks even better out of a shirt than in one. All that tan skin and the Mediterranean physique..."

"Spying on guys at the pool again, Carmen?" Anna retorted. She really didn't want to think about William naked. That was just...no. Tempting, but—no. Ew. Gross.

Carmen ignored the jab, stuck on her train of delusion. "How did it happen?"

"It didn't," Anna said forcefully, finally shutting up her roommate. "Kennedy got really creepy and pushy, so I went over to William's place and he let me sleep on the couch."

A raised eyebrow and a pointed glance at the clock met her words.

"And we've been hanging out the rest of the day," Anna concluded defensively. "It's the weekend. I'm allowed to have a day off."

"Sure." Disappointed, Carmen shrugged. "Shame, though. I always thought you guys would be good together."

Anna rolled her eyes. "No. That'd be weird. He's a friend."

"Friends hook up," Carmen said. "Remember Josie and Ian?"

"Yeah, because that turned out great."

Given Anna's resistance, Carmen wasn't going to press the issue too hard. "So they're a bad example," she conceded. "But it happens. I'm just saying. Better someone you know than some baseball creep you don't."

"How's the essay coming?" Anna said, deliberately ignoring that last comment. "We should talk about your exciting love life if you're doing homework on Sunday night."

Her roommate just smiled, refusing to react to the barb. "I am content watching the drama of yours," she said. "I don't need a man."

"You need help," Anna muttered.

After changing into more comfortable—and clean—clothes, Anna grabbed her own book and clambered into her bed. Time to work. This essay was due in two days.

She had just flipped the book open when Carmen whispered, "So what happened?"

Anna didn't look up from the page. "Well, apparently when Kennedy says, 'Let's go see a movie,' he really means 'Let's grab a hotel room.'"

Carmen gasped. "He didn't!"

"He might as well have." Anna shuddered in disgust.

There was silence for a moment before she suddenly turned to Carmen, ready to talk. Maybe if she could make this funny, it wouldn't be such a bad memory.

"And you know what the most insulting part of the whole thing was? He didn't even bother propositioning me."

"So what, he just assumed...?"

"That is exactly what he did. I mean, not that I would have exactly welcomed it if he had put...that...into words, but still—a girl likes to at least be asked."

"Sure," Carmen said, nodding. "Who wouldn't swoon at 'Hey baby, let's do naked things'?"

"He didn't even bother trying to get to the naked part! No effort! No bed, no questions, no nothing!"

"What?" Carmen's screech reverberated around the small room. Finally, Anna felt herself begin to smile.

"Okay, you're...you're just going to have to start at the beginning," Carmen said. "This is sounding too weird. What did he do?"

When Anna told her, the noises of horror only grew more frequent. By the time it was over, Carmen's hands were hiding her face and she was shaking her head back and forth, making half-articulated groans.

"What would possibly possess someone..." she was muttering.

Anna half-chuckled. "So then I punched him and ran off."

In retrospect, she could have just called someone to pick her up at the theater, instead of resorting to violence. But who would she have called? Carmen didn't have a car and most everyone had been at a party last night. Maybe she should have invited Kennedy to the party, rather than trying to go on a corny date. And maybe she should put Kennedy as far away from her thoughts as she possibly could. There was no sense in going down the long road of what she could have done.

"So are you gonna see him again?" Carmen had finally recovered from her shock enough to wink.

Anna rolled her eyes. "Oh, sure. I really discovered how much we have in common in that movie theater."

"Maybe next time you won't bail on me to go on some lame date."

"That's all I'm supposed to get from this? To always be your backup at a party?"

The books lay forgotten by now. Anna had been nervous about getting her roommate assignment—nervous about everything actually, since she had flown halfway across the country to go to Rice and hadn't known a soul when she moved in—but Carmen was outgoing enough to make friends with anyone. It hadn't taken long for the girls to spend hours talking and helping each other work through all-nighters. Carmen was a little too fixated on her camera and reveled in gossipmongering, but they had nail polish and English literature to tie them together insolubly.

"Last night was disappointing, anyway," Carmen said. "Without you, there wasn't anyone interesting there."

Anna started working the snarls out of her hair. "I would believe that."

"Which is why you need to come with me next time," Carmen admonished. "And bring Billy with you."

"Why?" Anna was genuinely confused. William would never care about going to underclassmen parties. It wasn't his scene.

"Because he's nice to look at, Bookworm. Duh."

"...You want me to bring William to a party because you want to stare at him like a stalker?"

Carmen scoffed. "Don't be ridiculous. I just think he might enjoy himself with us. We do have fun."

"I don't know..." Anna shrugged. "That's not the sort of thing he goes for."

And it was strange for Carmen to be so determined to get him to a party. She never cared before about who showed up at those things. Unless, of course, her plan was something more suited to Carmen—like getting drunk and hooking up. She was plotting to hook up with William? Carmen and William? Anna couldn't quite put her finger on it, but something about that just sounded...weird.

"He's not your type, Carmen," Anna said. She wasn't going to waste time wading through the layers of excuses Carmen was likely to have laid down. Too tired to deal with that right now. It wasn't going to happen, and that was a fact.

Although she started, Carmen recovered quickly. "Don't be ridiculous," she said, tossing her wild, black hair back with a confident smile. "I'm everyone's type."

Which was almost true. Carmen's warm chocolate eyes and plump lips were always tilted up in a smile that encouraged both friendliness and flirtation and her spunk had a way of endearing her to everyone she met. It was difficult not to admire a girl who wore her Hispanic-bohemian style with such panache. But when it came to William...Anna just didn't see it working out.

"Not his." Where was that note of warning coming from? Anna certainly didn't mean to sound threatening.

"Unless, of course, you have some problem with me being with William..." Carmen said, suddenly crafty.

Not this again. Anna tried backpedaling. "Nope, no problem. My best friend and my roommate? I'm sure you guys would get along great. I just don't know what you would talk about." An aspiring photographer and an econ major? They had nothing in common.

The pretty, delicate shoulders, wrapped in some kind of gauzy gypsy shawl, gave another shrug. "You, probably."

"Sounds awesome," Anna said dryly. "Is that what you've been plotting for this weekend?"

Again the pointed look at the clock.

"Well, the weekend's mostly over. But I was thinking tonight," Carmen said, "we could just watch a movie. Peter and Ian said they got ahold of something really scary this time."

Absentmindedly, Anna tapped a pencil against her book. "I don't know," she said, glancing at her calendar. "Finals are in two weeks..."

"Which is why we should be spending as much time as we can together!" Carmen insisted, sitting up. "We only have two weeks before summer, when we're not going to see each other for three months."

Still Anna hesitated. "But..."

"Please?" Carmen was wheedling now.

"Fine," Anna huffed. "But if I fail, it's your fault."

Carmen rolled her eyes. "You're not going to fail. You always do fine."

As it turned out, Anna did do well on finals, despite her roommate's attempts to prevent her from ever studying. William helped her study for Econ 101, and in return, she acted as a sounding board for his final presentations. All-night study sessions with the history students, fueled by pizza and ramen, and feverish proofreading of papers between the English majors quickly gave way to the quiet panic of taking the actual exams. A girl majoring in chemistry passed out in the middle of the cafeteria, at least one student was suffering from stress-induced nausea in a bathroom stall at any given time, and—

"—And don't forget about Tony," Carmen was eager to add.

"What happened to Tony?"

"He was streaking around campus two nights ago, throwing psych notes everywhere."

So all in all, finals week had been fairly quiet.

### CHAPTER FOUR

And just like that, it was summer. Anna returned home to Georgia, and after applying unsuccessfully for a number of internships and jobs that would provide useful experience, took a position as a cashier in a grocery store. Sure, William had his advisory internship in Houston, but being a cashier wasn't so bad. She was discovering the very limits of her memory, patience, and math skills, and made it a goal to learn something new about human nature every day. It was valuable, she told herself, and applicable to her English literature studies.

So far, she had learned one all-encompassing fact about human nature: that people are horrible. She could feel herself, she told William on one of their calls, already transforming into the crabby old professor that she was sure was her future self.

"Ah, it can't be that bad, Bookworm," he had said with a laugh. "You've gotta smile at someone. Your face does it naturally."

"No, you're right," she sighed. "I'm exaggerating. I did smile at this sweet old lady last week. But that was because my manager was right behind her."

"Close enough."

And William? He said he was doing well, although he moaned about missing the income from their ill-gotten billiard gains. Chelsea, his latest girlfriend, liked going out, and an unpaid internship, while good for the resume, lacked the benefit of a paycheck.

"So take her to the park," Anna had told him. "Bring a Frisbee so she has something to chase."

"She's not a dog."

"No?" Anna said, still teasing. "Charles seemed to think so. Or did he use a different word...?" She certainly wasn't going to repeat the word that Charles used to describe the blonde bimbo now spending an inordinate amount of time in William's apartment, but it didn't take a difficult stretch of imagination to fill in the blank. From all accounts, there were only two big reasons William was even spending time with this girl—and neither of them was her sunny personality.

"The guy thinks he's funny," William said through gritted teeth.

Chelsea really wasn't that bad. Charles was jealous, plain and simple. Sure, his roommate, the journalism major, was better at coming up with the words to express his desires and emotions, but he failed in practice. William, on the other hand, had learned a long time ago that it wasn't so much what he said that mattered, but rather how he said it. So while Charles was busy writing sweet nothings that fell flat, William was off scoring a girl like Chelsea.

Who wasn't that bad.

So she liked to be pampered. What girl didn't? It was only a problem because William couldn't afford to do much pampering at the moment.

If she could just—

His phone rang.

"Prego."

A merry voice answered him. "Hey, Will."

William stretched and a relaxed smile replaced the worried, tense expression he'd had thinking about—

"Done serving the plebs for the day, then?"

She laughed. "If they're plebs, what does that make me? Dirt?"

"There's no shame in clay. People have died for less. Or so you keep telling me."

"Well, Georgian clay is different," Anna said. "But yes, I'm off of work now. What have you done today?"

"I had a very difficult day today," William said. "I put together two whole assessment packets and got to tell a very nice daycare lady that their business is now insolvent."

"Not to one-up you or anything," Anna replied, "but I got to clean up three smashed jars of spaghetti sauce in today."

William chuckled. "You win this time."

The reply was immediate and exultant. "Awesome."

It was the only game they had left, considering the distance between Houston and Atlanta: whose day was worse. In theory, they were keeping score and the ultimate loser would have to buy the other a burger. How many was William behind by now? Five? Seven? He'd lost track.

"Are you on your way home?"

If Anna had just gotten off, which presumably she had—William glanced at the clock: 7:30, right on schedule—she would be pulling into her driveway in no time at all. They talked after enough of her shifts that he knew the exact distance between her store and her house, even though he had never been to Atlanta.

"Yeah. Should be there soon."

And if the post office did its job, there should be something waiting for her when she got there.

"So you haven't checked the mail yet, then, right?" William had to smother a smile.

"No..." Anna replied hesitantly. "Is there a reason that I should have?"

"Ah—no. Niente."

"That was helpful," Anna said. "Thank you."

"Anytime."

There was a beat of silence, filled only by the wind rushing noisily through car windows as Anna drove home.

Then her cheery voice came back. "How's Charles and everyone?"

"Charles is as insufferable as ever," William replied. "I owe him popcorn the next time we go to the movies."

"Why?"

"Oh...I bet him that our last bar tab would be under fifty bucks." He would have won, too, if it had just been the two of them. "And then Chelsea decided to invite herself along."

"Ah." He could hear mirth in Anna's voice. Humor was better than judgment, at least. He didn't want Anna to think poorly of him. "You know, for such an inveterate gambler, you think that you would be better at winning." Silently, William agreed, but he wouldn't grant her the satisfaction of acknowledging that she had a point. "And how is Chesapeake Bay?"

Anna had given William's latest girlfriend the nickname as a joke or an insult, William wasn't quite sure which. He only knew that Charles had chosen to begin using it as well, as had Oliver, and if Chesapeake—Chelsea—if Chelsea heard it, she would pitch a fit.

"Chelsea? She's good." William shrugged, forgetting that Anna was several states over, instead of on the couch beside him. "I don't see her that often. We only go out every other weekend or so."

"Huh." Anna paused. "Not to seem contradictory, but that's pretty frequent. Most people would call that going steady."

As in seriously dating? William thought that seeing a girl once every fourteen days counted as barely even acquainted. During the school year, he and Anna could be found at one of their places at least four nights a week. So by comparison, he was definitely not going steady with Chelsea. Not worth the effort. Or the money that he didn't have.

"We're not serious," he said. "I'm too poor to handle a real girlfriend right now."

"You and me both," Anna teased.

The roaring of the wind quieted, calmed, and then went still. Somewhere off in the distance, there was the crunch of gravel and a car engine shut off.

"Okay, I'm home," she told him. "Do I go check the mail now?"

If it had arrived, he couldn't wait to hear her reaction. Although she hadn't yet said anything—probably afraid it would be rude—William was very aware of what today was. He had timed the mailing to exaction and been waiting all day to hear if it had been delivered.

"If you want," he said, trying to sound offhand.

"What did you do, break your streak of illiteracy and actually write me a letter?" she said.

He could hear the disbelief in her voice, and William didn't blame her for it. They both knew that he was not good with words. She'd proofread enough of his papers that she should understand why he didn't write letters.

Still, he didn't rise to the bait. "You'll see." Maybe.

A door creaked open. She must be inside now.

"Hold on," she said, then he heard her bellow: "Hey Daddy, did anything come for me today?" There was a muffled response, too far off to make words out of, then: "Thank you!" And then she was talking to William again. "It should be on the table..."

"That your dad?"

"Yeah. My mother's pickin' Lee up from baseball practice." Then: "Aha!"

So it had come, after all. William heaved a silent sigh of relief. At least something had worked out in his favor.

Anna's voice came back, jubilant. "I have a package!"

"How interesting," William said.

"Yes, someone has sent me a package. From Houston, no less."

"Oh, really?" He was going to snap from the tension if she took much longer to open the blasted thing. "What's in it?"

"We'll see. I'm fixin' to open it right now. Just need to hunt down a knife..."

William heard some draws slamming, cutlery rattling, and then finally, a box getting torn open.

"Now let's see," Anna said.

He could picture her lifting the lid, uncovering the carefully selected present, lifting it out of the box.

"Why, it's a...box of cupcake mix!" she said. It wasn't difficult to hear the confusion, but there was also pleasure. Her pleasure was all he wanted. "And they're red velvet!"

"The frosting's included," William interjected. He'd had a lot of difficulty finding what he had wanted—because what was the point of cupcakes without frosting? Then it was just a muffin. And who wanted a muffin instead of a cupcake?

"So it is," Anna agreed, still bemused. "And red velvet is my favorite flavor."

He was going to have to explain this. He really thought she would get it—at times it felt like they really could read each other's minds—but it wouldn't be difficult to explain. Maybe he should have included a letter—but then it would have come off looking even dumber. Hi Anna, here's some cupcakes. I hope you like them. Yeah, no.

There was more rustling from her end. "There's something else in here," she was saying. "Let's see...a box of cupcake mix, and...a book!"

Her sudden squeal of excitement was the only confirmation that William needed that he had done well.

"You can't see me right now," Anna said, her voice breathless, "but I'm doing my happy dance."

"You mean your book dance?"

"That's the one!" she said. He could hear the grin in her words.

This summer vacation was no fun. Working for nothing and missing out on Anna's smile made for dull days that blended into dreary weeks.

"Do you have that book already?" William said. He hated to interrupt her excitement, but he'd had such a difficult time finding a book that Anna might not have that he needed to know.

"Oh, let me see," she said, returning to reality. "Love in the Time of Cholera? No, I don't. I don't think I've ever heard of it before."

"Oh." That was good. She didn't have it. And now she did. "It's supposed to be really good. It sounded like something you would like."

"No, it really does."

Already he could hear her flipping through pages. William grinned, amused but not surprised. Anna had never been good at resisting the temptation of a new book.

"So you sent me all this?" she said. "How come?"

"I'm pretty sure you know why, Anna."

"I do?" Was it his imagination, or was her voice suddenly constricted?

"Well, yeah," William said. When she didn't immediately reply, he spelled it out for her: "Happy birthday."

"Oh!" Anna sounded well and truly startled. "I didn't think you would remember," she admitted. "No one at work did."

Of course he had remembered. He also remembered the rueful smile that crossed her face when she'd told him when her birthday was. And the way she had kicked a pebble and muttered quietly, "July birthdays are the worst." No one from school was there to celebrate, but William had wanted to do something to commemorate it all the same.

"Now the mix makes sense," Anna said. "So that I can make my own birthday cupcakes."

William had to defend the present. "Hey, do you know how much it costs to have ready-made cupcakes delivered? Count your blessings, Bookworm." If she was going to start griping about this, then screw it. At least he tried.

"No, no," she replied, laughing. "I like it. It's unique. No one's ever given me a present like this."

"At least it's got that going for it."

"It's fantastic, Will," she insisted. "Truly."

He allowed himself to be mollified. "Got any big plans for tonight?"

"Not really. My mother—"

A knock on the door. Close enough to make William jump. So not on Anna's end, then. William's room was farthest from the front door, and as such, it was more practical for Charles to answer the knock. Besides, William had had a long day, and he didn't feel like budging. Especially in the middle of a conversation with his—not his—bookworm. His friend, the bookworm.

The visitor rapped on the door a second time. Shuffling, reluctant footsteps told William that Charles had finally emerged from his room. He answered the door without a word. There was a pause that almost made William curious enough to ask Anna to hold on a second, and then the door shut. And with the door closing came a strident, high-pitched voice calling his name.

Anna had paused anyway. "That Chesapeake?"

"Yeah," William said gruffly.

"I'll let you go, then," Anna replied airily.

He almost didn't want her to hang up. In fact, he almost wanted Chelsea to go away so that he could stay on the phone with Anna. Just like he almost wanted her to go away when he and Charles were preparing to go shoot a game of pool. The woman didn't have the greatest timing.

And she was getting closer. The click-click of high heels echoed loudly through his apartment. And his head.

William sighed. "Okay. I'll talk to you later, I guess."

"Sure thing."

"Oh, hey—Annabelle," he blurted, hoping she hadn't hung up yet. "Happy birthday. I hope you have a great birthday night. You deserve it."

He knew that nineteen didn't feel like a big deal, but any birthday was worth celebrating. Especially with your favorite cupcakes.

"Thank you, William," she said. "And thanks for my present. I love it."

"Good. Bye." Then he laughed. "Goodbye."

There was an answering laugh waiting for him. "Bye."

"Ciao."

He hung up grinning, in the best mood he'd been all day.

And then his door opened.

"Hi, Billy!" the woman in the doorway practically sang.

Ugh. Billy, again? William felt his grin falter. "Hey, Chelsea."

"So I was thinking..." the blonde started coyly. "What are you doing tonight?"

"I didn't have much planned," William said. "Did you want to hang out?"

Chelsea pouted her plump lips and leaned on one long, long leg. William had to work hard to focus on what she was saying. He knew that she had worn that skirt just to mess with his head. It wasn't making thinking any easier, that was for sure.

"Oh, I thought we could go to that club again. The one—you remember," she purred. "With the jello shots, and we danced for, like, hours?"

Oh, yes. The night of torture. When he'd been forced to stand and dance for three hours in pounding music and darkness, on a floor that was covered in at least an inch of spilled alcohol and don't-want-to-know-what-else. And Chelsea had thought it hilarious to wear a tiny dress and then dance with every guy in the place. Two drinks had ended up costing him almost thirty bucks—and then she'd gotten started on the shots. William had been very annoyed by the end of the night, not that Chelsea had noticed.

"I don't know..." he said. He didn't want to set her off again with a flat-out no. "I'm kinda beat. Can we just watch a movie tonight?"

The pout deepened and with it, William felt his smile disappear completely.

"But Billy..." she said. "You promised!"

Promised what, exactly?

"I just can't tonight, okay, Chels?"

It only went downhill from there. She whined, he griped, she accused him of only being interested in her body, he did not entirely refrain from name-calling, and by the end of it, William found himself alone and angry on a Friday night.

In the wake of the deafening slammed door, William could hear the sound of singing Munchkins coming from Charles' room.

"Are you really watching that odioso movie again?" he hollered through the wall at his roommate.

"Wishful thinking!" Charles called back as the Ding dong, the witch is dead refrain began again.

"You're a riot," William grumbled, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed.

He'd barely finished the sentence before his roommate popped his stupidly smiling head in the doorway.

"Want a beer?"

William thought about snapping at Charles for eavesdropping, but then—

"Yeah, okay."

He had a strict one-fight-a-night policy, and getting into it with his roommate wouldn't help anything.

They ended up in front of the TV, taking hearty swigs from beer bottles and halfheartedly watching an old action flick. This is all William had wanted to do tonight, but now his mood was ruined.

"Allora, I don't need this," he found himself bursting as a ninja charged the scruffy hero on screen. "I have to put up with enough crap at work all day, and then it's like she comes over looking for a fight."

Charles' eyes never left the TV. He nodded, took a drink, nodded some more. "Yup."

"Whatever," William said. "It's not even worth the effort. I'm sick of it, you know?"

Charles nodded again. "Yep."

"I don't need to be worrying about a girlfriend right now anyway. I should be thinking about the future, not some ragazza."

"Yeah," Charles said. "We're graduating in a year. We need to get our act together before we're thrown out with a diploma and nothing else."

Charles wasn't really paying attention to the conversation. He was happy that Chelsea was gone, and would say just about anything to keep it that way. So while William knew that whatever came out of his roommate's mouth was extremely biased, he still appreciated having someone there to back him up vocally.

And to be honest, he wouldn't easily find someone to stand in defense for Chelsea as a suitable girlfriend. He knew that Anna didn't much like her, either. Come to think of it, most of his friends tended to roll their eyes when Chelsea walked into a room. Except for Aiden, who had more of a tendency to drool. William could never decide which was more irritating.

All he said, however, was a vehement, "Yeah," and that was the last word between them on Chelsea.

***

He did have to tell Anna, however, the next time they talked.

She had begun including a courtesy "And how's Chelsea?" when she asked after his health and the internship. It was a nice gesture, but knowing it was coming didn't make it less grating to William's ears.

"She's fine, I guess," he said, trying to figure out how to best word his single-again status. "She won't be coming over anymore, so I'm not sure."

There was a quick pause as Anna deciphered the meaning. "You seem pretty okay with that."

"I am," William said, and it was true. He hadn't really been emotionally invested in the girl. "I'm more irritated with it all than anything."

"That's a shame," Anna said mildly. "I liked her. Nice girl."

William barked a laugh and with it, the tension he'd been carrying since Chelsea stormed out of his apartment finally dispelled. Talking with Anna helped solve a lot of problems. He liked to tell her that she was good for his soul, to which she always replied that if that were true, he would do his homework a lot more often. Which was also probably true.

"So who's next?" Anna asked.

"Who's next for what?"

"For the grand William-dating adventure, doofus."

"Oh." William scratched his head. Considered a glass of wine, discarded the thought. If he had a glass, he would want a meal to go along with it. And he wasn't in the mood to cook. But wine would help him through this discussion. William hadn't thought as far as the next girl yet. He'd been so consumed by being rid of Chelsea that he hadn't bothered to spare a thought for who he might ask out next.

"I don't know," he admitted out loud. "Not anyone for right now. I'm thinking about taking a break from women for a while."

"Yeah, right." Anna was incredulous—and amused. "That'd be like the Pope taking a break from being Catholic."

"You don't believe me?"

William could understand her skepticism. He was in a constant state of being with a girl or planning to be, and calling the game like this wasn't really his style. But he could do it. He was tired of the whole mess right now. Money and drama: that was all women ever cared about, and he was tired of it. Like Charles said, he needed to focus on the future.

"I think you'll find it difficult," Anna said. "You're too used to having a girl ready to jump into your arms. I think you'll go into withdrawal."

She hadn't been paying much attention, then. William had been with far fewer girls this year, especially compared to his first two years in college, and with decreasing regularity. He didn't need them the way he used to. He had Anna and Charles if he ever desired conversation and he was usually too busy to hook up. So what did he need a girl for?

An occasional distraction, sure. As stress relief, women were fine. When the need struck him, an encounter with an enthusiastic female was enjoyable. But he wasn't overly stressed, and needs were fulfilled for the moment.

"I think I'll be fine," he said, throwing himself in bed.

His feet had been killing him all day and lying down brought immediate relief. The sensation of his back slowly relaxing into the mattress and his feet rejoicing at the chance to rest wrung a groan from deep in William's throat. Oh, he'd been waiting for this moment all day, falling into bed after work as he and Anna continued their conversation.

Close in his ear there was Anna's throaty chuckle. Her voice sounded so close, so intimate that it almost felt like she was right next to him. Not that he would know what that felt like, because he'd never had Anna in his bed. Not that he wanted to have Anna in his bed. Except his brain was suddenly forming images of Anna in his bed, and he had to say, his brain had a compelling argument. He knew just about every one of her expressions and reactions—if he had her here, beside him, would he learn some new ones? Would she?

Get that out of your head! What's wrong with you?

This must be the withdrawal that Anna had mentioned. Maybe she was right. It hadn't been more than three days since he and Chelsea had split, and his mind was already fantasizing about the first girl he came into contact with. It was fine to want a girl, William reminded himself. Perfectly natural.

Just not Anna.

Anna was, and always would be, off-limits. You couldn't fantasize about your best friend. Unless you wanted to open up a world of hurt. She'd be creeped out, he'd have problems too, and no one would be happy anymore. So long as he kept his mind and his body focused on other girls, they'd be good. If he needed a girl. Which he'd just told Anna he didn't. But maybe a girl with a smile as bright as the moon and cinnamon curls that could belong wild and free on his pillow...Nope. He didn't need a girl. No girl. Definitely not that girl.

Where had all of this come from, anyway? One day he'd been fine and content, happy hanging out with Anna no matter what she was wearing, and then the next, he was getting totally inappropriate thoughts about her. Something had changed, and he didn't like it. It wasn't Anna, he didn't think. She was as playful and adorable as ever. And it couldn't be William who was different. It had to just be the boredom of summer. There was no school, barely anyone to talk to, and William had no girl at the moment to distract him. That must be all it was. Nothing more.

"So what's new at work?" William asked, desperate to get his head straight. "Anything going on?"

"Um..." Anna thought for a minute. "One of my coworkers asked me out, if that counts?"

William tamped down his reluctance to hear the rest. "I'd say so," he said. "What did you tell him?"

"That I had to think about it. Was that rude?"

"Not rude, but maybe a bad sign. What do you need to think about?"

"I don't know..." she said.

William could hear the reluctance in her voice. If she was already this unwilling to go on a date with the guy, she probably shouldn't go at all. Pointless, really.

"I mean, he's so sweet—bless his heart," she continued.

"Ouch," William laughed. "He's that bad?"

"He's like a little puppy!" Anna told him. "He always gets so excited when we have the same shift, and he's always trying to talk to me and make jokes, but I don't know. He's just not my cup of tea, you know?"

"Sure," William said. He understood the concept, but he'd always had a very simple cup of tea: girl.

"Plus, school starts in a month. It's not like I can date anyone seriously here and then go back to school. Right?"

Anna sure was talking herself out of this quickly. Why did that cheer him up so much?

"That's true," he agreed casually. "Although you haven't really cared about dating seriously before."

"Yeah..."

William could picture her perfectly as she hesitated, probably twirling a strand of hair around and around her fingers, head titled, considering the options.

"But then again," she said, "the guys I went out with last year were clear that it was casual. With Justin, it could just be coffee, but I can't be sure." She sighed. "Plus," she added with renewed energy, "I don't have you here in case something goes wrong. It's always the quiet ones you have to watch out for, right?"

"You do have your brother," William pointed out.

"That's true," she agreed reluctantly. "Although Lee is—"

William laughed. "Look, Anna, it's okay to not want to go out with him. It's okay to tell him no. You don't have to go out with every guy that asks you."

"Well, but I don't want to hurt his feelings," Anna said. "He's so sweet."

"So just tell him the thing about going back to school. He'll understand." And if he didn't, William could be very persuasive.

"Yeah, okay." Anna sighed, but it was fortifying this time. "Somehow, he'll have to survive the disappointment." She sounded better already.

William didn't even bother trying to smother his grin. His girl was a fighter.

Shut up, brain!

Anna was not his. And she never would be. That's not how this worked.

Change the subject now. Before his mind hung onto the thought and took it for a ride.

"So you'll be back in a month, huh?" William said, rubbing the tension from his forehead.

"Yep!" Anna's cheerful reply was free of any of the demons beating at William's head at the moment. Thankfully, she had no idea what he was thinking. Let's keep it that way.

"Should I plan our first billiard hit for that first weekend, or do you need a week to settle back in?" He was so ready to start making money again. And so ready to be with Anna again. Their phone calls were fun, but it wasn't the same.

Anna laughed. "You have a one-track mind. How do you know I haven't branched out on my own?"

On the contrary, he was trying very hard to keep his mind off of the one track it wanted to stick to. Not that he could tell her that.

"I hope that you've waited for me," he said. "I miss hanging out with you."

"Yeah, me too," she sighed. "I can't wait to get back to school. It's always more fun when you're around."

He would take it.

"And getting my fair share of the winnings helps." William really hoped the financial reminder would keep his thoughts firmly in the friendly, moneymaking track. "So hurry back!"

She laughed. "I'll do my best."

***

It went like that for the rest of the month. William was practically counting down the days by the end of the summer. He enjoyed spending time with Charles, always had, but nobody could play pool like Anna. She had a gift. Add to that her Southern sass and spunky smile, and you had a killer combination. William missed being around her.

As the Anna-less days wore on, more unwelcome thoughts continued popping up. He was ready to be rid of those, too. Once he actually saw Anna, was around her, all of that insanity would dissipate. This was just withdrawal symptoms that for some reason had appropriated Anna's face. It had nothing to do with the girl herself. Couldn't be.

That line of reasoning kept William sane until she was back. And then, when she had moved into her new on-campus apartment, and he met her at the campus café, and she ran to greet him, he knew he was in trouble. That he'd been lying to himself for a month.

He couldn't pretend to not notice his lungs needed to work harder when she was around, or the quickening of his pulse at the first flash of her bouncing hair. The exhilaration at seeing her smile once more—smiling at him, all for him—robbed him of any words approaching casual. There was an "er," an "uh," one stuttered "ciao," and most damning of all, the reflexive "so how are you?"

She'd taken it in stride, his forgiving girl, but he couldn't ignore the prick of disappointment that had briefly sparked in her eyes. And it really shouldn't have come as a surprise that she already had a date for that weekend.

It wasn't fair. It really wasn't fair.

William got the message, loud and clear: She isn't for you.

### CHAPTER FIVE

_Year Two_

William's tongue loosened back up quickly around Anna. Soon everything was back to normal, and the silly leap of the heart that had wanted to turn into a crush had been tamped back down. More or less. If it was anything—which it wasn't—it was a passing fancy. Best to ignore it and let it fade on its own. And in the meantime, act like nothing had changed. Because it hadn't, and it wouldn't.

"Charles, get the popcorn!"

The crackling from the microwave was rapidly decreasing in volume and quantity. If their movie snack was burnt, it was Charles' fault. It was the one thing they had dared to put him in charge of.

"Yeah, yeah..." Recalled by William's shout, Charles hustled from his room to bang the microwave open before the tantalizing smell of salty, buttery goodness was replaced by acrid billows of ruined popcorn.

Rustling, shaking, microwave door slammed shut, hundreds of exploded kernels tumbling over themselves, hitting the cold bowl.

"Here." Charles shoved the popcorn under William's nose.

It took a second for the steamy butter haze to clear. A moment of blindly groping for the bowl before his fingers found greedy purchase. A second longer for William to get a clear sight of his roommate.

"And put on a shirt!"

Oblivious Charles shrugged, like he spent much of his time at the apartment half-naked. But while William usually didn't care, he was not in the mood for Charles' bare chest. Not today.

"What?" Charles said. "I just got out of the shower. And it's just Anna here."

Exactly. Anna. Anna was present. William repressed the growl of annoyance that wanted out and glanced across the couch to Anna. Anna, who had a hand up to shield her eyes from seeing Charles' naked chest.

It was Anna. She didn't need to be seeing any guy any kind of naked. Except maybe—not. No guy.

"It's his home," Anna offered, still staring resolutely forward. "He's allowed to be comfortable."

Not around Anna, he wasn't.

"Cover that up," William said, chucking a pillow at his obtuse roommate. "No one wants to see your boobs."

Charles rolled his eyes and threw the pillow back, but thankfully disappeared into his room in search of a top.

"They're not boobs," he muttered on his way out. "They're called pectorals!" issued from the still-open bedroom door.

Maybe a couple of years ago they had been well-defined pecs, but Charles hadn't kept up with the gymnastics that had blessed him with a muscled physique, and his hard-earned chest muscles had gone a little soft.

"If you went to the gym more than once a month, they wouldn't be boobs."

William could see Anna fighting down a tiny smile that counteracted her determined, fixed gaze and cheeks that were beginning to pink. Was—was she blushing? Over Charles? Charles wasn't her type.

Charles laughed, proving the thought with his next words. "Unlike you," he called back, "I don't need to work out every day to keep my muscles. I'm svelte."

Oh, please. If Charles started bragging one more time about being "smooth chocolate" in front of Anna, William might be sick. His roommate postured a little bit too much around the sweet Southern girl. Like she didn't have enough guys flexing and bragging around her. Like she needed a dark-skinned former gymnast added to the ranks.

"So where's your roommate?" Charles asked before William could draw breath to mock his claim to svelteness. He emerged from his room in a tight black V-neck. It was an improvement, at least.

Anna, instinctively turning towards the question, gave a small, involuntary sigh when she saw the shirt. Of relief or disappointment? Not that it mattered to William.

"Carmen's still working on her Byron interpretation," Anna answered, finally pressing play for the movie.

The credits began, along with the introductory voice-over monologue, which was integral to the development of the plot.

" _In a world once ruled by creatures of the night, a new dawn is breaking—one of..."_

The rest was lost as Anna turned back to talk to Charles over the back of the couch. "She actually wanted me to ask if you could look it over once she's finished," she said.

"I'd be happy to," Charles said, folding his six-foot frame into their only armchair, rickety though it was. It allowed him to continue their conversation with ease. With his head bent altogether too close to Anna. Couldn't be comfortable for either of them.

"I've been through Dr. Chance. I remember how tough he is."

Charles made a grab for the popcorn, which William had placed on the broad, empty couch cushion that stood between him and Anna. To please the latest demand for the bowl, she balanced it on her arm of the couch, allowing easy access for Charles and herself.

"You just have to butter him up with...ooh, what did he always say—?" Charles pinched the bridge of his nose to think. "The sacred heart of man?—He'll go along with anything else you say."

William turned the volume up. He couldn't hear anything over their talking.

" _We weren't expecting the robots. They came from..."_

"Are you sure?" Anna appealed to Charles. "I tried suggesting that with Moby-Dick, and he said I was reading too much into it."

Explosions. A scream, superimposed over a shot of the world leaders plotting.

"It works most of the time," Charles assured her. "Carmen doesn't have to worry. I remember her last paper—she has all of the ideas. She just needs to pay better attention to how she expresses them."

William punched the volume button a few more times.

Gunshots rattled louder through the small living room. Oh good, the heroine running away in her tight-fitting white dress. The slow motion was absolutely essential to the storyline.

"Speakin' of roommates," Anna said, shooting William an exasperated look, "where's yours?"

For an answer, Charles pointed at William, who was resolutely staring at the TV. Trying to hear the movie.

Anna's exasperated glare was redirected to Charles. Thankfully, she was impervious to his winning grin.

William knew what Anna was worried about. The last time they had tried to watch a movie at his apartment, Oliver had come storming out of his room to yell at them about noise levels and how other people lived there. At twice the volume as the TV. Anna was probably expecting Oliver's "keep out" sign-littered door to fly open at any moment.

"Oliver's at the library," Charles informed her. "He said he had a huge chem exam on Monday."

"Oh." Anna turned back to the screen briefly, just long enough to toss a few kernels in her mouth, then returned her attention to Charles. "I will never understand—"

"Annabelle," William groaned, reclaiming possession of the popcorn bowl before the other two ate all of it.

And before Charles' hand could complete its descent into the bowl—while Anna's fingers were still buried in it. He was saving them from the awkwardness that would ensue if their hands brushed against each other in the bowl. Because he was such a good friend.

"Just watch the movie, per favore."

"Am I talkin' too much?"

William crammed in a large mouthful of rapidly cooling popcorn, allowed Anna to steal a few from his next handful. "Un po'."

"Sorry 'bout that that," Anna said, completely unrepentant. "I'll be quiet," she promised, facing the movie with single-minded concentration.

Behind her curly head, Charles pointed for the bowl clutched tightly in William's greedy hands. Unwilling to relinquish the snack so soon, William shook his head in refusal.

Bet? Charles mouthed at him.

He wanted to bet for the popcorn? All right, William would play. He nodded once, accepting, requesting the terms.

Charles jerked his chin towards Anna, still watching the movie in focused silence, looked at his watch, and held up three fingers.

He didn't think Anna could be quiet for three minutes? William would take that bet. He had faith in her.

For an answer, the hand he had draped over the back of the couch held up five fingers. Five minutes. He had more faith in her than Charles did, anyway. That should count for something.

The roommates smiled and slapped palms. The bet was laid, the deal was set.

They made it two minutes and 37 seconds.

The supporting male lead had just started to outline his brainwashing theory when Anna turned to William suddenly.

She opened her mouth—William braced himself—and closed it. Faced forward again.

William breathed a silent sigh of relief. He hadn't lost yet. Smirking at his roommate, he chomped down on another big handful of popcorn.

Just 11 more seconds, and—

"Here's what I don't get: If the brainwashing happened ten years ago—"

The possible plot hole was cut short by William's erupting in groans. Startled, Anna watched as Charles broke out in a huge grin and the bowl was passed over in grim defeat. A moment's pause, and then she plowed on again.

"Here's what I don't get..."

No matter how many times she promised to be silent, the movie's dialogue was always broken far too soon by her voice—and more importantly, by her smile. It helped to temper the frustration that itched every time she interrupted the movie anew.

The film jerked to an end with a final revolutionary fireball and Anna finally paused in her debate with Charles over brainwashing vs. conditioning.

"You were right, Will," she said, plunking the long-empty popcorn bowl on the coffee table and turning back to him. "That was a pretty good movie."

"How would you know?" he all but snapped. "You talked through the whole thing."

There was the briefest of pauses before Anna replied. "I still watched it." There was confusion in her words, a question in the answer. "Did I do something'—?"

She looked to Charles, who shrugged. Not going to help his roommate, then. Some friend he was.

She tried again. "What's wrong?"

William rubbed his forehead smooth of the frown. Took a deep breath. "Nothing," he said.

Should he leave it at that? But she did ask. Couldn't have it causing problems for them later. If it were him, he would want to know. Maybe it he just mentioned it—delicately—she wouldn't find it insulting so much as encouragement for improvement.

"It's just—you kinda talk through everything we try to watch," William started. "It can get a little ann—" No wrong word wrong word! Never tell a girl she's being annoying! "Distracting." A better, safer alternative.

"Annoying?"

William wanted to kick himself in the mouth when Anna said quietly, so quietly, the word he had tried to withhold. The word he hadn't meant, not really. Yes, it got on his nerves occasionally, but it wasn't as if—

"You think I'm annoying?"

"No," William said immediately, truthfully—and also because he knew it was the only correct answer. "I never said that."

He looked to Charles for support, who shrugged yet again. No help coming from that quarter. The man was useless.

"I never said that, Annabelle," William repeated, as though reiterating the fact would save him.

Anna uncurled herself from the couch and bent to retrieve her shoes. "You almost did."

"Aw, c'mon, Anna," William groaned. "You know I didn't mean it like that."

"Ever heard of a Freudian slip?" Anna snapped. She stood, went to collect her stats book that lay by the door, where she'd left it upon entering the apartment. The promised study session had been immediately abandoned in favor of watching the movie.

She was leaving? How like Anna, to find a problem and run away from it. So long as she could ignore its existence, she could stay happy.

William felt his own aggravation rising to match her ire. "You know that I don't think you're annoying." If she honestly believed that, then she was an idiot. There was no way William would spend even half the time they shared together if he found her presence grating. "The movie talking bugs me a little is all."

"Whatever."

And just like that, she'd shut him out. Shut down.

"Don't—don't do that!" William was not in the mood for her throwing a hissy fit. He wished he could grab her and rattle her into her senses. "Se pensi—"

He jumped to his feet to meet her, although he now easily towered over her five-foot frame—and remained where he stood by the couch, keeping space between them. Keeping everything between them.

"It drives me crazy when you shut off like that! If you would just let me explain—"

"Oh, every other way that I drive you crazy?" she snapped back, eyes blazing. "No, thank you."

"Per Dio—Stop overreacting!" Probably the absolute worst thing possible to say, but William was too furious to care. He hadn't wanted to fight today. Especially not with Anna. Yet here they were.

She gasped in utter outrage. "Overre—?" she started, then—"You—How—" She was sputtering, incapable of forming words from her fury. Might be a good thing. Words were a powerful weapon, and they'd already done enough damage for one day.

Unable to locate coherence, Anna pressed the heels of her palms into her eyes, groaning in frustration, before quickly dropping her hands with a dismayed, angry cry.

"And now my makeup's ruined!"

She glared at William as though it was his fault that her eyeshadow was now half-gone and mascara smudged. Like he'd made her rub her eyes.

"This is not how I wanted to start getting ready for my date tonight," Anna growled under her breath, snatching up her bag and hiking it to her shoulder.

Wait....Date?

Of course Anna would have a date lined up on a Saturday night. Not a rare occurrence. But the fact that she would be going straight from watching a movie with them to a date with some new loser...well, it was almost insulting.

A throat clearing invaded the heavy, furious breathing that was filling the apartment, giving William a welcome distraction. Better than the direction his thoughts were tempted to turn, towards Anna's date and another boring Saturday night for him, to spend with his roommate.

Who, to William's renewed irritation, still had not budged from his seat in the armchair, even as the afternoon had imploded into an argument in front of him.

William wanted to hit him. He wanted to hit something.

Charles spoke for the first time, interposing himself into the conversation without invitation. "Who's the sod du jour?"

Anna spun to face him, expression livid, and William waited for her to unleash the ugly Hardwick temper on their not-so-innocent bystander. For her to be angry at someone besides just him.

She took a deep breath...

And let it out. Slowly. Again.

Chest heaving, making a conscious effort to relax, not wanting to lash out at Charles. Because he hadn't done anything to upset her. He hadn't been fool enough to hurt a beautiful girl's feelings. No, that had been all William.

"Brady." The name came slowly, almost unwillingly, to Anna's still-white lips. "And it's not every night that I have a date, like—"

Charles interrupted her almost immediately. "Brady who?"

William felt his own anger sharpen. It was more than deflection that Charles was aiming for, more than simply drawing Anna out of the fight. There was...actual interest in his voice, in the question. Charles was invested in the answer. In Anna?

Without thought or will, William's hands curled into fists and his feet almost took the step to Charles. He didn't like the idea that Charles was interested in Anna. Or worse, Anna returning that interest.

Certainly not because William wanted her for himself. He'd never desired a girl less than he did Anna. Face mottled red, flyaway hairs popping out of her now-messy bun, foot almost stomping—it wasn't a pretty sight.

So William definitely didn't want her. As for Charles...well, she and Charles wouldn't be a good fit. They were—Charles was too bland for her. Too similar. And his tendency to make everything into a joke, while amusing at first, would quickly grow to grate on Anna's nerves.

Plus, if Charles started trying to pursue her, it would mess up the dynamics of everything. Even if she encouraged him, relationships end quickly, and that would splinter the friendship they both held with William. For the best interests of everyone involved, Charles should give up now.

His thoughts consumed, William turned away from the room at large, already plotting out how to lay out before Charles the many reasons that pursuing Anna would be a terrible idea. His plans were interrupted by Anna's answer.

"Brady Altan." Her tone carried with it the unspoken of course. What other Brady would there be?

Of course it would be him. Biting his tongue until it ached, William swallowed a curse. Of course his Anna would have attracted the attention of the school's quarterback. The guy had fewer IQ points than he had inches, but he did have eyes. Like that—

"Altan?" Charles' voice, too, had an edge to it now. His roommate, always so easygoing, had sat forward in anxious concern. "How did that happen?" The question, though innocuous enough, was not meant kindly.

Good to see that he and Charles agreed. Anna could do better than Brady Altan. So much better. Even Charles would be an improvement.

Anna chose to ignore the implied censure. "We have Italian together and he's been needin' help with his homework." She almost smiled. Was she that into him? The revulsion practically had William gagging.

"Hardly surprising," Charles said caustically. "The guy has enough trouble with the English language."

Anna's softened expression was immediately replaced by the return of the frown. "That's not very nice."

Charles cracked his knuckles, an audible reminder of the last time William and he had encountered Brady and his concussed teammates. Like William needed help remembering.

"Well, neither is he," Charles retorted.

Brady, too dumb to play billiards properly, had cheated against Charles in the sacred space of the secret pool hall. It had almost caused a twenty-man brawl when Charles contested the legitimacy of Brady's shots.

William remained silent, too angry with Anna, with Charles, and with the whole stupid world to speak. Anna wanted to go out with a cheating imbecile with a temper problem, fine. Charles wanted to dissuade her so that he could woo her for himself—well, he was welcome to it. He was welcome to her.

"He is to me," Anna declared, standing proud and straight in the little apartment, as though she was under attack. "And at least he doesn't think I'm annoying."

She whirled away from Charles and for one mad moment, William thought that she might possibly tumble against his chest, into his arms. He unbent enough to unfold his arms, ready to catch her if she—but no—of course not, she was still angry and that last parting shot was for him, flung his direction like a poisoned dart as she moved past and for the door.

She left nothing behind but a trail of fury-scented perfume as she flitted through the door, giving William no time to muster his final counterattack.

"I don't think you're annoying!" he yelled after her, cut off too soon by the deafening slam of the door.

There was no answer in return, besides the tell-tale sound of heels stomping down the stairs.

Charles heaved a sigh, but for once was wise enough to say nothing.

William, still staring at the closed door, felt nothing but the frustration boiling in his blood. Why did she have to go and ruin a perfectly good afternoon? Why did he?

Now he was going to have to apologize. Or wait until hell froze over for her to.

His hand grabbed at the first object it brushed against, seized, longed to destroy. Made an effort to focus first. A book. Chaucer. Charles'.

He held it out for his roommate's inspection. "Do you care about this?"

Charles glanced, smiled, relinquished control with a shake of his head. "Go nuts."

The words were hardly formed before William moved, throwing the tome through the room with all his might. It sailed past the couch, skidded across the top of the foosball table, knocking off a bowl that someone—Oliver, probably—had left, and smashed into a glass with a halfway-satisfactory crash. Then—nothing. Silence, save for the tinkle of the destroyed pieces of the glass coming to a rest.

"Feel better?"

William paused to take stock. "No, not really." Giving his anger a bit of an outlet hadn't helped at all. And now there was a mess to clean.

Growling, he swept up the shattered glass, then stomped his way into his room, collected notes, textbook, study materials. He needed to clear his head. He needed to get out of here. Studying was the readiest excuse available.

"Going out?" Charles called after him.

If only. William reappeared with his paper-stuffed bag. "I have an exam on Monday."

Understanding—too damn much of it for William's taste—lit in Charles' eyes. "Yeah, it'd be good to get your mind off...some things."

Understatement. Major understatement.

"You and Oliver can be study buddies," Charles suggested, amusement tugging at the corners of his mouth.

Despite his foul mood, William couldn't resist the laugh that burst through. "Yeah! That would work out great."

For all his edicts on maintaining courteous quiet, Charles and William had quickly discovered that their roommate was possibly the worst study companion on campus. Every thirty seconds, as though on a schedule, he would clear his throat—quietly, too quietly at first to be noticeable. So quietly that it slipped and burrowed its way into your eardrums, until one day, without ever consciously knowing when it had started, the throat clearing was all you could hear.

Every. Thirty. Seconds.

And Oliver's apparent need to snack while studying wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for his dependence on cellophane- and foil-wrapped vending machine fare. It was impossible to compose a convincing argument in favor of the Dutch school of economics while all you could hear across the table was crinkle crinkle hem hm crunch rustle rustle munch hem hmcm hem

It was maddening. Definitely not worth the headache. William would do much better to study in silence and try to beat his useless brain into submission. And his thoughts back from Anna.

"If Carmen comes by," he said, slinging his books over his shoulder, "do me a favor and give her back her movie?"

"Sure thing," Charles said. "I'll let her know how much you enjoyed it."

Ah, there it was, the half-smile that reminded William that he was scum. Perfect.

William pulled the movie out of the player and tossed it onto the coffee table, ready for return. He didn't want to see so much as the case again—all he would see would be Anna, all he could hear was her voice, small and hurt: "You think I'm annoying?"

"Just get it out of here."

Charles could have said a million things, ranging from observant to humorous, but thankfully he kept his thoughts to himself and settled with "I'll see you later."

William grunted his assent and pulled the door open. "Ciao."

Off to the library, off with his stupid guilt and still-smoldering embers of anger.

He threw himself into his notes for four hours, until the sun had long since set, until he couldn't stand any more. Until Anna had had ample time to go on that ill-advised date with that mother—with her football player—and get back. Until he had stopped wondering if she was enjoying herself.

Go home or find a willing date of your own, but stop this pathetic not-thinking of not-thoughts, like a song that will not leave your head, though you know not where it came from in the first place.

And so William trudged home, berating himself, as Anna tried to bid her clueless paramour goodbye. Multiple times.

### CHAPTER SIX

The truck pulled to a stop, idled, and shut off. Anna turned with a practiced smile to her date.

"Thank you for a lovely evening, Brady," she said.

"I'm glad you enjoyed yourself," he replied.

Although she hadn't exactly, it was important to stay gracious. He had made the effort to take her out, and she needed to show that she appreciated that. Anna tried to hide her disappointment. She'd been thrilled to pieces when Brady Altan had asked her out (the senior football player was definitely on the short list of "hottest guys here"), but the date itself had turned out to be snooze-worthy.

She had to admit that Brady had been very considerate all evening, opening every door for her, pulling her chair out, periodically paying her sweet compliments, but it just didn't do anything for her. And at dinner, he'd spent half an hour chronicling every single one of his moves in the last football game they'd won—which, if memory served, had been last semester.

The fact that he kept trying to play footsie with her under the table didn't help. And he had tried one too many times to slide his index finger down the inside of her wrist, despite Anna's pulling her hands away each time that it happened.

She didn't even like football. She had always been more into the soccer guys.

So it was pretty obvious that there wasn't going to be a second date. Even though it wasn't very charitable of her and despite the argument of a few hours ago, Anna could not wait to go back to William's apartment, prop her feet up on the couch, and tell him all about this failure of a date. He would laugh—she knew he would—and then say that that's what she got for accepting every offer that came her way. In part, Anna had to admit, he was right. Still, some of the stories she came away with made it all worthwhile. And making William laugh over those tales made up for it all tenfold. She loved making him laugh. It was the happiest sound in the world.

And she wanted to hear it now.

"Right," she said, ready to be with a smiling Italian instead of a pretentious concussion waiting to happen. "Well, thanks again."

She hopped out of the truck with a smile—didn't want him to think her impolite—and made the short walk to her door. She should at least pop her head in and say hi to Carmen before heading for the apartments.

It had been a mistake to wear heels. The infernal shoes made so much noise on the sidewalk that she didn't hear Brady open his own door to follow after her.

She did notice him, however, when she pulled out her keys and felt a presence behind her.

Anna whipped around to find Brady standing far, far too close. Shouldn't he be in his car? Driving away?

This was the closest they'd been all evening, and with Anna's nose almost poking his chest, she finally understood how such a boor had landed a spot on the football team. Brady loomed over her, with shoulders twice as wide as her own and a good foot of a height advantage.

Her stomach clenched, and not in the good, butterflies way.

"What's your hurry?" he said.

Brady still sounded relaxed and cheerful, but it did not succeed in putting Anna at ease. He was not supposed to follow her to the door like this. She hadn't given any indication that she wanted to continue their date. She'd said thank you and goodnight in the car to avoid the dreaded doorway goodbye. And yet, here he was, staring her down, crowding her into her apartment door.

"I'm pretty tired," she said, trying to smile.

"The night's still young," Brady protested. "I feel like we were just getting to talking."

Anna shrugged. "Sorry," she offered. "Maybe we could hang out another time."

Like never. That would be fine with her.

"Aw, that's a shame." It looked like he was finally surrendering. "I had a really good time, anyway."

"That's good," Anna said. Maybe if she just agreed with whatever he said, he would leave soon. "It was a nice date. Thank you."

Still smiling, Brady nodded, then started making the universally recognized move in.

"Brady, I—" Anna started to say, and was silenced.

By a pair of hard, wet lips. Anna went cold. She hadn't been prepared for it and she wasn't enjoying it, but would it be worse if she fought? She could endure an unwelcome kiss for a minute. Then maybe she could escape indoors.

At least that was the plan, but then his hand started skating up her side and—seriously? Tongue?

She jerked her head back with the attempted intrusion of his tongue, but he still didn't take the hint and leave. He didn't even move back after ending the kiss.

"Wow," he murmured, eyes half-shut. Oh, ew. Italian food had been a bad choice. "Is it just me, or was that amazing?"

"It's just you," Anna retorted, voice hard. That was it. That was the last straw. Politeness has its limits, and Brady Altan had succeeded in bashing up against them.

A heavy sigh, heaved directly in her face. Anna fought the urge to gag.

"You know, you don't have to keep that coy act up," Brady said. "It's just you and me here."

"I'm not acting coy," she said. "I'm just not—"

"I get that you want people to think you're shy—"

"Definitely not what's going on here," Anna said. Was he deaf? She'd tried polite and pointed; her only recourse was being coldly direct. "This isn't going to happen."

If anything, Brady moved closer. "Of course it is," he said. "You'll enjoy it."

"Somehow I doubt that," she muttered darkly.

He heard. Brady's eyes, which had been brightened by excitement, quickly clouded over.

"You're not fooling me, Bookworm," he said, suddenly angry. "Girls like you are the worst, you know that?"

"Girls like me," Anna repeated frostily.

"Yeah. You've been teasing me all night, and the second we actually get to your door, you try and pull that hard-to-get crap. It's so stupid." He leaned in even closer. "And I'm tired of it."

"Okay, look, Brady," Anna said, putting a hand on his chest. Mistake. Don't touch him. She withdrew it quickly. "I'm sorry if you're...upset, but it was certainly not my intention to give you that kind of an impression."

He snorted. "Give me a break," he said. "You show up for a date dressed like that, and expect me to believe you aren't doing it on purpose?"

Anna fought to avoid looking down at her outfit—didn't want to draw his eyes anywhere. She did not want him thinking he was welcome to look at her body. But her blouse wasn't even that low-cut. Her cleavage wasn't visible at all, and her skirt was...long enough, she thought. This was a total overreaction on his part. Better to just end the fiasco right now.

"That's exactly what I expect you to believe. Goodnight, Brady."

She tried to brush past him to get her door open, and that's when it all fell apart. He growled and grabbed her, forcing his mouth down on hers again.

No. Anna attempted to shake her head to break the kiss—if it could even be called that—but he held her immobile. There was no backing away. No escape.

This was going to end badly for one of them. Preferably him.

Anna's hands pushed fruitlessly at his shoulders. Yeah, right, like that was going to work. The guy was built like a brick wall. She tried yanking on his hair to pull his head back, but that had an unanticipated result. Brady mistook the hair-pulling for belated passion and continued the assault on her lips with renewed vigor. She would have bitten him, but biting in a kiss...well, that was not the message she wanted to convey. She just wanted him off.

And when she made to punch him in the jaw, the footballer grabbed her wrists and held them tightly together. She didn't have any options left.

Except one.

Pulling off a swift knee to his crotch would be effective, but difficult to accomplish when he was standing this close. But she had to try. She had to get rid of him.

Anna shifted her weight and thrust her right knee straight for Brady's groin.

He blocked it.

And then shoved her against the wall, still holding her wrists in one hand.

"Kennedy said you were a bitch," he said, staring at her with fury. "Now I know I should have listened to him."

Anna felt even sicker than before. Kennedy was behind all of this? What was this, his twisted revenge for his own failed advances?

All else had failed. She either had to play on his heart or be left dealing with something much worse than a boring date. Anna hated begging, but if it meant she could get away, she would spend the rest of her life groveling on her knees.

"Please," she whispered, squeezing her eyelids shut against pricking tears. "Please, just let me go home."

She never heard an answer. Instead, her ears were filled with running footsteps, fabric tearing, and a shout of protest. And the wind was suddenly all around her, filling the space that Brady had just been occupying, cleansing it with emptiness.

Someone had yanked Brady several feet back, effectively freeing Anna. Before she could even think to be grateful for the rescue, however, she caught sight of the mindless fury in familiar eyes.

The terror that froze her in place burned off even the courage to say his name.

"Back off, Forte," Brady spat. "This doesn't concern you."

William didn't move. "It sure as hell doesn't concern her."

While Anna was glad to no longer be the target of the anger of a hormone-driven jock, the alternative wasn't much better. She was still cornered, still terrified. If anything, the situation was worse now that there were two angry, hyped-up men standing here.

Brady, still trying to stare William down, stepped towards Anna again. "If you don't—"

Anna flinched. She didn't mean to—shouldn't be showing weakness right now. It could make things even worse. Couldn't be helped.

A muscle in William's jaw clenched. In one controlled, calm movement, he took hold of Brady's collar and with a quick flick of his arm, had sent the football player almost into the bushes.

Brady cursed but managed to catch himself before he fell over completely. William, still quiet, took one side step, interposing his body between Brady and Anna.

At least now Brady was a safe distance away from her. And at least now she didn't have to look at that dead expression on William's face. Not that his tense back was much more comforting.

Every muscle down William's arms was pulled as tight as a drum, culminating with fists clenched so forcefully that his knuckles shone white.

"Go home, Anna," he said quietly.

"We're not done here yet," Brady said.

"Yes, you are." William wasn't arguing, the way Anna had tried. It wasn't a suggestion, and it did not allow for any continuation of the conversation. "If you ever come near her again, I will end you." The certainty in his voice was so cold that it made Anna shiver.

Anna was staring at a stranger's back. She'd seen William cheery and she'd seen him serious. She'd even seen him angry a few times. But this? She had never seen him like this. He was scary. Ready for blood.

Brady shivered once as well—the slightest tremble, the biggest giveaway.

"Whatever, man," Brady said, trying to play it off casually even as he took a step back, a step away.

He didn't want them to see that he was intimidated? Fine. Anna was afraid enough for all of them, and she wasn't going to bother hiding it.

"It's not like she's worth it."

Oh, he couldn't slap her in the face physically, so he was going for a parting, intangible shot? It was a coward's trick. Anna was insulted, but she'd heard worse.

William, apparently, thought otherwise.

"Che cazzo hai detto, tu stronzetto?" he hissed, gaze swiveling back to pin down Brady where he stood.

William's hands, already balled into fists, prepared to strike as he jerked forward.

If the two came to blows, it would end badly for all of them. Anna forgot about her fear for a moment and grabbed onto William's arm. She held on with all her might, ready to face the furious stranger to bring her friend back.

"Will, don't," she implored him. Don't do this. Calm down. Don't turn an already bad night into a fistfight.

The stranger in William's body paused, looking down at her with those dead eyes. What was he going to do, hit her if she stayed in his way? He was going to have to physically remove her before she would let go of him. There wasn't an alternative. She couldn't let this happen.

"P-please," she stammered. Please don't be like this. Please turn back into my friend.

It was like she wasn't even there. William made a move towards Brady, who flinched. Anna would too, if she were in his place. Heavens, she was flinching anyway.

William laughed as he turned away, a hollow, cold sound. "Go home, Brady."

Amazingly, the boy listened. With a final glare, Brady was slinking off to whatever hole he lived in, and Anna wasn't able to pay attention to him any longer because now William was focused on her, and he didn't look any happier. Shouldn't he be less angry now?

"Get inside," he ordered, his voice quiet and deadly.

If anything, the knots in Anna's stomach grew worse. It took three tries to get her key in the lock and open the door, her fingers were trembling so much. If he noticed, William didn't comment on the difficulty. He just waited, silent and still, until the door swung in and he stepped inside the apartment with her.

Was he doing this to make sure that she was okay? It was sweet of him, but unnecessary. She was unharmed. In fact, Anna was more unnerved by his eerie mood than she had been by Brady's pushiness. The problem had gone away, so why was he still acting so angry?

Anna flicked on the lights in the living room and glanced around the corner. Carmen was still out. At least one of them was having a good date. She turned back and was surprised to find William standing stiff and silent by the door. He'd never had any problem before with making himself at home in her apartment. What was the deal?

"William, why don't—" She started, but she didn't get far.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" he said, the words like quiet thunder.

Anna blinked and felt her jaw drop open. He was mad at her? How was this her fault? She hadn't asked Brady to force that kiss on her, and she certainly hadn't asked William to intervene.

"Excuse me?"

"I warned you that this would happen," he said.

"You warned me?" Anna was flabbergasted. When had he ever warned her that Brady was an assault waiting to happen?

"Yes. I told you that if you keep dressing like—" he waved a vague hand towards her—"like that, then guys would take it as an invitation."

Oh, no he didn't. He was not going to pin this on her wardrobe. Anna could feel her own anger rising to meet his.

"And I thought that I told you," she said, "that that is their fault for being idiots."

"That idea came from somewhere, Anna," he said. "You can't deny that!"

"Seriously? You're going to try and blame me for this?"

He tried to reply, but she cut him off. Anna wasn't just getting angry now. She was there. He wanted to unleash his fury, she would meet him, lash for lash.

"No," she said. "No. You think I asked Brady to act like that? You think I told him I wanted to—" Anna fought to lower her voice. She took a deep breath. "No. I'm not the one who put the idea in his head, so don't you dare accuse me of it."

"Well then, who did? He just came up with it out of nowhere?"

The fact that she had an answer, she suspected, would not make him any happier. "Kennedy."

He had to have. After what Brady had said, Anna was almost sure. So she'd hit him when he'd tried to grope her. A little rude of her, maybe, but it hardly gave him license to spread a rumor about her.

"Before you...got there," Anna said, "Brady said something about Kennedy telling him that I was...not a good person and that he should have listened to him."

At her words, some of the tension gradually left William's body. He even sat down slowly—finally, progress—but his eyes never left Anna's face.

"You don't think that Kennedy..."

"Told Brady to do that?" Anna shrugged. "I don't know. I don't want to know." Her voice broke.

Please don't let William have heard the tears she was fighting to contain. She didn't need to cause him any more stress tonight. And it wasn't that she was that freaked out, because nothing had happened and even if William hadn't rescued her, she would have eventually remembered a few of the tricks that he had taught her. Eventually. Maybe.

She wasn't quite sure what she was feeling right now. If Kennedy really had...well, who would do that? Who could try to hurt someone like that? Her throat was so tight that it hurt and her face burned trying to not let the tears out.

William was staring at the wall facing him. So long as he didn't turn his head and look at her, she could just clear her throat and pretend that it was nothing. That would be best, for them both to pretend.

He didn't seem to be in the mood to keep up the pretense, however.

"Anna," William said. "Annabelle, come here."

Don't start to sniffle. Good grief, you're pathetic.

So instead of sniffling, she swiped once at her persistently runny nose and continued to clear her throat like the plague of frogs had erupted in her esophagus.

She didn't move. This was humiliating enough.

Unfortunately, he did, unfolding himself from the couch and crossing the room in two quick strides. She couldn't exactly hide the tears that kept trying to escape, but Lord help her, she was still going to stubbornly try.

William grabbed her shoulders gently. "Are you okay?" he said.

Finally, he sounded more like himself.

Anna shrugged, made a sound like a sick vacuum cleaner, and put her palms to her cheeks.

"I'm...I think so," she said. "He didn't hurt me, if that's what you're wondering."

"It wasn't."

She couldn't think of any way to respond to that, so Anna focused on pulling herself together.

"I'm fine," she said, and hoped she was telling the truth. That was all she could do, really.

"Are you...Was he...Is there..."

William was really struggling for words, and all Anna could do was think about the way his hands were sliding down her arms slowly, gently, encasing her own hands in his, leaving a trail of warmth in their wake and banishing the trembles that remained in the wake of fear-born adrenaline.

"Are you okay?" she said, just to have something to say. "You looked ready to kill something out there."

His answering laugh was humorless and tried to bring back the chill. "Oh, I'm still ready to kill," he said. "I just know who now."

"So long as it isn't me," Anna tried to joke. She hoped it wasn't her.

"No," William sighed, releasing her hands. "Not you." He rubbed at his eyes, like he was trying to erase a sight. "When I saw that testa di cazzo—"

"It won't do any good to keep thinking about it," Anna said hastily. The last thing she needed was for him to start getting worked up again. "Here, sit a spell."

She guided him back to his spot on the couch and this time took a seat herself, in the chair facing the couch.

"Can I get you anything to drink?" she offered lamely. No matter what had happened in the past hour, she could not ignore requirements of hospitality with someone in her home.

"I—no, I don't think so," William said.

Well, now what were they going to talk about? What a coward Brady was? How funny it was that a football player was afraid of an economics major? Although, looking William over, it wasn't much of a surprise. Their combination of yoga and strength training had given him a fantastic body and he practically radiated power. He being there had really—

But what had William been doing near her apartment? His complex was on an entirely different street. He usually spent Friday nights at his place or out with his other friends. And yet, he had been serendipitously there, just as Brady was getting too aggressive for Anna to handle.

"William—" she started nervously. She was encouraged when his answering look was free of that dead stare. "What are you doing here?" He raised an eyebrow, forcing her to amend her question. "I mean—not here, just—you don't usually walk by my place, but with the date tonight—"

"Are you asking if I was checking up on you? I'm not your father."

"I know you're not," Anna said, cheeks burning. "I'm just wondering." Relieved, but also wondering. He and Charles had both reacted poorly when they heard who she was seeing tonight—not that Anna could blame them now.

William sighed. "I was studying in the science building earlier and was on my way home," he replied. "I have a huge exam on Monday."

His walk back to his apartment had taken him close enough to Anna's that he had seen and recognized Brady's ugly red truck. And if he had been a little concerned at seeing the car there this late and altered his course a tiny bit to actually pass by her place, well, nobody needed to know that much. Especially not her. He had just wanted to make sure that everything was okay. Brady didn't have the best reputation for keeping his temper. In retrospect, William was glad that he had chosen to walk by. Hopefully Anna was as well.

"Don't get me wrong," Anna said. "I'm grateful. If you hadn't been there—"

If he hadn't been there, who knows what Brady would have done? He'd already tried to stick his tongue down her throat. And shoved her. If William hadn't been there—

Her teeth started chattering. Great. Just what she needed. To fall apart in front of William. Again.

He sighed and, grabbing the sweatshirt she'd left on a dining room chair, tossed it at her. Anna snuggled her face into it, needing the warmth.

The shivers did not stop. Would not stop.

"Would you feel better if you changed?"

Changing would be a good idea. As much as Anna liked lace, it didn't do much for heat retention. She gave William a brief nod and escaped into her bedroom.

Okay. Put on something that will keep you warm. Make it easier to keep it together.

Anna grabbed a pile of thick cotton. Sweatpants. Sweatpants were comfortable. And warm. And unfashionable. She started to lower the pants. Nobody was appealing in sweatpants.

So? It wasn't like she was going to be entertaining any visitors tonight. The only person here was William. She didn't care about being appealing to William. Anna never thought twice about wearing sweatpants around Carmen, so how was this any different?

Anna pulled off her skirt and prepared to hop into the pants. And hesitated.

Well, just because she wanted to be comfortable didn't mean that she had to slum it around. You could be comfy and still presentable. That was the definition of class.

Like a tiny tornado, she blew into her closet and started rifling.

No, no, no, maybe—actually, definitely not, umm...no...no, no....And then stood there, hands on hips, flustered and at a loss.

Anna stared at her collection of skirts. William had seen her in most of these already, so couldn't she wear one? But wouldn't it look odd if she came out in another cute outfit when she had come in to change into something warm and comfortable?

Anna yanked open a drawer. Well, there were always yoga pants. Cute, well-fitted, and warm. Except...wasn't this exactly what he had accused her of? If she changed out of a "sexy" outfit into clothes that were still tight, would that make him angry again?

William's voice floated through the door. "What are you doing, sewing a new outfit?"

"Just a minute!" she called back, frantically staring at all the clothes she couldn't wear.

If he knew what she was worried about, he would think she was crazy. Anna was beginning to think she was a little crazy, herself. Since when did she care about how she looked around William? This was William, for heaven's sake.

Stop thinking about what William thinks about your clothes. He's a guy. All he'll be able to tell is that you're more covered and more comfortable.

Stop thinking.

Anna grabbed a black pair of yoga pants and yanked them on. Now she just had to decide on a shirt...

As quickly as she could, she was changed and slipped back into the living room. William was still on the couch. Good. He wouldn't notice. He wouldn't care.

He turned around to smile at her, holding up one of the controllers for Anna's game system. "Hey, Bookworm. I imagine you feel like shooting something right about now."

He wasn't wrong.

Anna had to squeeze past him to get to the couch first. She'd meant to grab the controller that he was holding up as she passed between William and the coffee table, but it fell as she was reaching for it.

What the hell? William's fingers had gone slack and the controller, unnoticed, had tumbled out of his numb hand as the thought crashed into his mind like a blinding thunderbolt.

Anna had gone to change, and comes back in yoga pants? Arguably the best-fitting pair she had? The push-up bra of the pants world, William had affectionately called them in his younger days. When Anna had walked in front of him, inadvertently displaying their many merits, William only had one word left to call them: trouble.

And to make matters worse, Anna was now apologizing.

"Oh, sorry," she said. "I must have bumped you." If she'd bumped him, she sure as hell would know. "Here, let me get it."

Jeez, was she actually going to bend over and—? The answer to that was shockingly, blindingly, yes.

No. William may be losing his mind, but he was not going to encourage further slides into insanity.

"No," he croaked. "No! Here—sit. It was my fault. It's easier for—"

And before she could bend right in front of him and extend the painful, exquisite torture, he had fished for and retrieved the truant controller.

"Here," he said, holding it back up for her.

This time, don't drop it like a bumbling prepubescent.

It was successfully handed off. Anna settled herself on the couch after swathing herself in Carmen's fuzzy brown blanket, controller in hand, ready to unleash destruction on the unsuspecting villains of computer generation.

William had to bite the inside of his cheek to stay silent. With the blanket acting as a giant, furry insulator, Anna must not have noticed just how close they were sitting on the couch. She was practically cuddled against his side. He could feel her knee against his leg. Her knee was right there. The pressure of her leg sent a stream of electricity straight up his body, making William wish for a blanket of his own to hide in.

Stop going crazy. Suddenly it was a cause of anxiety for them to be touching? Oh no, contact! He was acting like a foolish fifteen-year-old girl. They had sat this close a million times before, and it had never been weird. No reason for it to be weird now. At least, no valid reason. He was imagining some tiny hint of attraction towards Anna because sure, she was gorgeous, and he had just rescued her from a stressful situation. And she looked so good with her yoga pants clinging to her in all the right places, the same way any woman would be appealing in tight clothes. It was nothing more. A passing fancy.

The answering thought haunted him: But what if it didn't pass?

He'd been having issues ever since they'd gotten back from the summer and every time she smiled, it sent a kick straight up his midsection. Her dates were getting progressively dumber and more irritating—only slightly less irritating than the stupid temptation to kiss her when her hair was coming down and her expression was opened for him alone. If this didn't stop—but it would.

There was only one solution: suck it up and shut up. Stop imagining things, get past this stupid wannabe crush, and get things back to normal. He just had to outlast the crazy thoughts. They would go away soon. They had to.

The game began.

At first Anna prodded at buttons listlessly, but that made her lose, and Anna hated losing. So she gradually picked up the pace until they were both pounding away furiously at their controllers, wrapped up in the game like nothing had happened an hour ago.

They kept it up until her eyes drooped and buttons on the controller started sliding around, and then somehow, William ended up with Anna's head nestled into his shoulder.

Trying not to disturb her, William shut off the game, the TV, and—now what? Just sit there until morning? Or would it be better to ease off the couch and let her lie down? His neck was already starting to ache from being in such an awkward position.

It only got worse when she snuggled closer, slowly rubbing her cheek into his shoulder. William froze as Anna took two deep breaths, her nose running a gentle caress along his neck.

He should move. Give her some space so she could sleep properly. She must have forgotten he was even there. Probably just thought he was a pillow.

"William?" The whisper was so faint that he barely heard it. "Thank you."

She fell asleep on her sigh, and just like that, William knew he was done for. He didn't care if he never slept again if it meant keeping Anna here, snuggled up against his side.

The girl was trouble, no doubt about it. She was crazy and competitive and really stupid when it came to boys. She had no more math skills than a goldfish. She couldn't even sit through one movie without talking.

And William never wanted to leave her side.

It was a very long night for him.

He sat on that couch and stroked Anna's arm, keeping her warm, keeping her safe. By the time the sun rose, he had come to terms with it.

He was in love with Anna.

He wanted her and needed her in ways that you should never want a friend, especially your best friend. He wanted to watch her come alive in his bed, he wanted to bring her to pleasure and back, and he wanted to make dinner with her every night and bring her breakfast every morning. If it meant he had to protect her from a hundred idiots he would protect her from a hundred idiots. If it meant she never looked at him as anything other than a friend, then he would only ever be a friend to her. It only mattered that she stayed safe and happy.

He loved her. He had no other choice.

***

For her part, Anna didn't do much thinking that night. Her time for thought came with the morning light, when she could no longer avoid the events of the previous night. Slowly, painfully, she forced herself to think about what had happened. Brady had gotten too pushy...and William had protected her.

She'd never seen him like that, the total cold fury. It was a side of William that she had been unprepared for.

But she'd also never seen that gentle, tender side of his before, either. Not only had he protected her, he'd looked after her. He had soothed her nerves, run his warm hands down her arms, brought sensation back into her numb hands. He had also distracted her with the irresistible temptation of beating him in a video game. And she had...land sakes, she had sniffed his neck! She must be the crazy one.

Who does that? What kind of weirdo sniffs their friend's neck? It's not like she was one of his girlfriends and he had put the moves on her. She was his friend. She didn't belong near his neck—or his bare skin—at all. But imagine if...

No. No imagining. Her mind had tried to skip down that trail before, and she would block it off as many times as she had to. She was not going to think about William like that. So she thought her friend was sexy. He wasn't an option.

Of course she thought William was attractive. She wasn't blind. His broad shoulders and toned abs gave unspoken testament to the many hours he spent in the gym, his brown eyes were always laughing, and his dark hair curled roguishly around his ears, begging to be touched.

And of course she cared about him. He was her best friend. They were very close. As a friend, she loved him.

But she couldn't care about him more than that. It just would not do.

A "Good morning" rumbled in her ear, coming from all sides. She was surrounded by it.

Come to think of it, Anna didn't remember lying down anywhere to sleep last night. She sort of nodded off while playing. So where...

She risked a peek up to find William's jaw in front of her eyes. He needed a shave. Focus, Anna! She squinted her eyes, trying to concentrate harder and get her bearings. She was...half-lying on William's chest, enveloped by his cologne and the heat of his body.

Lord have mercy.

She'd gone and fallen asleep on him.

Anna gave a squeak and sat up. "Sorry," she mumbled.

He stretched carefully. Anna, hyper-aware though she was, refused to watch his body move. Or his shirt cling to the cut panes of his abs. She had better things to do than ogle her best friend.

Maybe she peeked a little.

"'S okay," he yawned.

Fortunately, he didn't look upset or annoyed. His expression was pretty neutral, actually. Anna could live with neutral. It meant that she hadn't made things weird.

But when their eyes met, her stomach tried to flip-flop.

Uh-oh.

### CHAPTER SEVEN

Weeks passed, then months. Neither Anna nor William brought up the Brady Altan incident again, unwilling to discuss the events that had frightened Anna so deeply. It was easier for them both to return to schoolwork and pretend the badly tempered athlete had never existed. The tenor of their days settled back into the familiar, the comfortable. Billy and the Bookworm were still an inseparable team. Nothing had changed.

Despite the constant refrain of friends and nothing more, William had given up fighting the depth of his feelings for Anna and instead focused his energies to containment and control. If he could just keep his love hidden, it need never ruin their friendship. The thought kept William sane through the remainder of their second—and last—fall semester together. He passed midterms, then finals, without slipping up. A simple list of rules kept him going: Don't stare at her too long, don't laugh too much at her (truly terrible) jokes, pretend not to care about her dates.

Don't touch her.

It was the most important of his rules, and the most impossible to follow. William was wired for human contact. Even his distaste was communicated through touch, or the lack thereof, and his fists yelled his anger when his tongue was tied. Tenderness and affection came not from his lips, but from his fingertips. It was just as natural for William to hug his mother as it was for him to high-five Charles or shove Aiden. And that was why it was imperative that the one person he wanted, he needed to touch the most, was the one he never could. If he started touching Anna the way that he wanted to, he'd never be able to stop.

Each morning, he made the same vow to himself: I will not touch her. And each day, William found a new excuse to break it. It was always something little. Nothing obvious, nothing that would cross a line. He restrained himself to brotherly touches (or, never having had a sister, what he imagined was brotherly): tousling her hair, a playful shove, or a short, one-armed hug.

It was torture, but he couldn't bring himself to stop.

This year, the winter break was easier to bear. Unrequited love is always better at a distance. Their tradition of phone calls over breaks continued, bridging the gap just enough to keep them satisfied. With each call, bringing to William's lonely ear and aching heart Anna's infectious laugh and warm, peaches-and-honey voice, he could feel himself falling deeper in love with her. He was turning into a sap, and he couldn't seem to mind.

Faster than William could believe, the spring semester was already starting and the torture began anew. Mercifully, the end of January brought with it an intimidating winter storm. It swept south through Texas, making the temperature plummet and carrying on its heels heavy, dark clouds. William found it remarkably difficult to fight his determination to stay away from Anna while they were all shivering into their scarves. She would have been even easier to resist if she didn't look so darn cute when she was huddled in her winter coat, bemoaning the weather.

"Cheer up, Bookworm!" William told her, slapping her on the back. "They're saying it might snow over the weekend."

Her answering groan was half desire, half dread. Anna had never seen snow outside of the one day a year white hit the streets of Atlanta, more ice storm than snowfall. As much as she wanted it to snow, she didn't appreciate the cold that accompanied it.

William, for one, didn't mind that the icy winds kept them indoors, wrapped up in (separate) warm blankets and drinking hot chocolate on each other's couches. They were spending so much time together to avoid the freezing weather that the first thought on William's mind when he woke up early one Saturday morning was hearing Anna's voice. He couldn't wait to see her. A call would have to do.

The phone rang twice, three times, four. In the brief space between a valid call and voicemail, she finally answered.

"What?" she groaned.

"Still not a morning person, then?" It was a risk calling her before noon, William knew, but this time it would be well worth it.

"Not on Saturdays," Anna answered groggily. "I think I've earned that much."

To give the girl credit, 8 a.m. classes every day of the week would break even the most determined of early birds. Reserving the right to sleep in one day of the week wasn't too much to ask.

"Probably. But not today."

Despite her answering growl, William couldn't deny that he was enjoying the conversation. He had been disappointed to discover that being in love with your best friend made encounters with more willing women unsatisfying, and if he was being honest, completely undesirable. So in his new, unfortunately celibate state, driving Anna crazy was the best substitute he had to sex.

"And what is so special about today?" Anna said, still annoyed.

Instead of answering, William had a question ready for her. "Have you checked the weather report lately?"

"Why?" She sounded more alert now, almost excited. Almost awake. "Has the cold finally left?'

"Not exactly," William said, grinning.

She groaned. "When is it going to be livable again?" The girl sure did like being overdramatic.

"Annabelle." William had to get her attention refocused before she went on another tirade against the bitter cold front that had been blasting Houston for the past week. "Look outside."

She sighed, but obeyed. William heard rustling, the squeak of springs as she climbed out of bed—she had been talking to him while in bed?—shuffling to the window, a curtain being pulled aside, then a long, long silence.

"Well, butter my butt and call me a biscuit," she said at last. "It's snowing."

William laughed. "Happy I woke you up now?"

"Carmen!" he heard her hiss. "Carmen, wake up! It's snowing!"

There was a muffled exclamation of surprise, and then she was back on the phone. "When did it start?" she said breathlessly.

"Sometime last night. I was asleep."

"It's so beautiful," Anna said, sounding awestruck.

For William, snow was more of a nuisance than anything, but hearing Anna wonder at the blanket of white gave him new eyes for it. The stuff was still swirling down in silvery flurries, adding more to the already disguised landscape, and the pure roads stretching into oblivion shone with their own internal light. Never had the world been more silent, more peaceful.

The only noise came from the phone pressed to William's ear. He could hear Anna scrambling around, and then the unmistakable noise of a door swinging open.

"Wait, you're not going out there, are you?" he said. He'd never say so, but William had wanted to be there for her first time experiencing snow. He had wanted to see her face as she discovered something new. "Wait for me?"

"I can't promise that," Anna replied. "There aren't even footprints out there. I need to see this up close."

He'd wanted to see her up close in the snow. Things always felt different in the snow-purified world. And being there for her first time with Texas snow—

"How many inches?" she said, her voice hushed.

How many what? Oh, right, the snow. How much had fallen. "I would be very surprised if it was more than two," he said. Just enough to play.

There was a small squeal. "It's cold," Anna exclaimed.

"It's frozen water, Anna! What were you expecting?"

"I don't know," she whined. "For it to be nicer? In Georgia it's always more ice than anything. I'm going back in."

William chuckled. "Next time, put a coat on first."

As he'd expected, the apartment walls couldn't contain Anna's excitement for long. She had soon pulled on boots and a coat and was running off to build a snow fort with her other friends. William had raised his eyebrows when he received her message about their plans—a snow fort out of two inches?—but merely wished her luck. He'd already missed seeing her first experience with the snow, and she hadn't invited him to join in her adventures. Instead, William was left behind, which was probably for the best. He and Charles had to focus on finishing—or in William's case, starting—their final projects.

William had been through enough snow days that he knew to spend them indoors, with the warmth and without the hypothermia. He made a big pot of coffee, tossed a beer to Charles, and resigned himself to spending the day on his thesis project.

His roommate had other plans, however. Charles' suggestion of a movie marathon was too tempting to pass up, and as the sky lightened and then darkened all too soon, they bemoaned deadlines, watched movies, and continued to be surprised that the snow had not yet stopped falling.

"It's been going all day," Charles said. "If this keeps up, we won't have class on Monday."

William smiled in reply. "One can only hope."

The roommates clinked bottles and watched the snowflakes drift gently past the window. They found it much more mesmerizing at the moment than a movie they'd seen five times before.

Charles took a speculative swig. "Think there's enough on the ground for a snowman?"

William shrugged. "Maybe."

His roommate jumped up unexpectedly. "Let's go see," he said, slapping William on the leg. "We've been inside all day."

"What?" William groaned. "Aw, c'mon man, that was the whole point."

Charles started wrapping a scarf around his neck. "Well, now the point is to go out and enjoy the snow before it gets too dark. Besides, it could melt overnight."

"It's too cold out there," William grumbled.

His roommate fixed William with a half-warning glare that he'd perfected through years of bossing around his four younger siblings. William, a younger brother himself, never appreciated Charles using it on him. "It's going to be cold in here, too, if you don't get off your ass."

"What—"

"Don't make me open those windows."

"But—"

"Come on. It'll be fun."

William wasn't the smartest man, but he knew when a battle wasn't worth fighting. He surrendered and grabbed his coat. The sooner Charles got the stupid snowman out of his system, the sooner William could come back home. And not have to go back out hopefully ever.

"Fine," he said, stomping out of the apartment. "Let's go play in the snow." Five minutes in the snow, and then he was coming back in, Charles and snowman be damned.

Of course the snow was only patchy on the ground below. Cars had been driving around and through the apartment complex all day, leaving the ground bare in crisscrossing tracks of wetness. Charles' next idea was to try the grass next to the street—but no, other rompers had already come and gone, leaving a massacre of grass and dirt in the place of pure fallen snow. William's nose was getting colder by the second. Turning a deaf ear to any complaints or threats to return home, Charles was stubborn in his determination for a snowman, and continued to drag William through the freezing wind, only to find no snow and more cold.

"If the snow is still thick enough anywhere, it'll be in the quad," William said, clenching his jaw tightly to keep from shivering.

So the quad it was. And of course he wasn't the only one to have had the same thought. As the snow continued to drift down and the two frozen students trudged up to the lit courtyard, they found it already populated with a smattering of other undergrads. And snow. Just enough snow to have some fun.

Even as Charles stepped into the quad, a shriek splintered the fragile peace of the frozen air. William peered through the flakes, seeking the source.

It wasn't hard to find. Anna was twisting away from another bundled-up figure, squealing as she did so. William tensed, his hands curling into hard fists, ready to deal with whatever she was trying to get away from, but another sound quickly followed on the heels of the scream. She was...laughing?

Well, at least someone was having fun, he thought to himself. Pity it didn't include him.

"No!" she cried, still laughing. "I already made one snowman. You can build this one yourself!"

"But Anna!" William could hear the guy wheedling even as he tried to wind his arms around her figure again. "It's not the same, and you know it! Teamwork makes the dream work!"

Before he knew what he was doing, William had scooped up a good handful of the cold powder and was packing it into a ball. If Anna didn't want to make another snowman with that guy, he could think of plenty of other ways for her to enjoy the snow.

She hadn't even noticed that he was there yet, but William was still determined to protect her. Even as she writhed, trying to evade the handsy underclassman, the moron was continuing to press her. Was the guy that desperate for a date?

"Dude, this is perfect for packing," Charles was saying excitedly. "C'mon!"

"Give me a minute," William said back, eyes on his target. Eyes that only ever saw her.

One well-aimed snowball should be sufficient to shock that idiot back into rational thought. Bonus points if he got snow down the back of the coat.

"Bet you'll miss."

Charles had no faith in him.

"I doubt it," William answered without turning from his goal. "Whataburger?"

"Deal."

The roommates slapped mittened palms, sealing the terms of the bet. William grinned. When his frozen projectile hit the back of the boy's head, it would make up for the last bet that William had lost to his roommate.

William narrowed his eyes, took aim, threw...

And forgot to account for the wind.

His ball of wet ice landed squarely on Anna's laughing, upturned face. William stared in horror as she sputtered, snow dripping away, and searched for her attacker.

There was one way to survive this with ego and image intact: Act like you did it on purpose. Quickly he dove for more snow, forcing a handful into another sphere.

"There's plenty more where that came from, Bookworm," he called out, voice teasing.

He didn't miss the grin that broke out when she spotted him. It was like the sun had come out to shine on him alone. There was no snow, no chilly dusk, no freezing wind. Only Anna. She was happy that it was him, and that was enough. It was enough.

And when she dug into a snowdrift and came up holding her own fistful of flakes, William couldn't repress his own smile. She was a fighter. This was going to be good.

He ducked when she hauled back and pitched the snowball, but he needn't have worried. Anna wasn't a great shot to begin with, and her bulky coat, scarf, and gloves didn't help. Result? Charles ended up with a faceful of snow.

"What—?" Charles coughed and shook the slush away.

William, grinning, pointed at the small figure on the other end of the quad. Anna's hands had come up to cover her mouth when her terrible shot had landed. Was that guilt? What was she going to do, run over and start apologizing?

She took her hands down to yell, "Oops!" So laughter then, not guilt. In fact, now she was doubled over with it. William could almost hear her wheezing for breath through the laughing.

"You'll pay for that, Bookworm!" Charles hollered back at her, bending to pack his own snowball.

The wind carried her jubilant laugh back to them as she fell to feverishly packing snowballs. She called to her friends for help in taking out the seniors, urging them to action. Carmen was the first to run to her side and begin contributing to the snowball effort. The other three soon followed, all eager for battle. It was to be all-out war, then. Excellent, William thought, unable to repress a grin.

"Start packing!" Charles ordered him.

William shook himself. Here he'd been, standing out in the open, mooning after some girl like he was sixteen, when anyone could have pegged him with a frozen missile. Thankfully, he had Charles to call him back to reality.

A quick battle strategy was sketched out, defensive lines were drawn, and there was just not enough time to make enough snowballs.

"Okay, they have a head start on us," Charles said, making sure they were ducked out of sight behind a bench. "They've already got half a fort to hide behind. Defense will be difficult on this side."

"What if we topple the fort?"

"Bring the fight to them?" Charles finished a ball. "It's risky."

"It's our only shot," William said. They didn't stand a chance if the sophomores went on the offensive, and he was not going to lose to a couple of underclassmen trying to get into Anna's parka.

"We can only take as many as we can carry," Charles said, scooping up a pile of fresh projectiles. "We'll have to make the rest as we go."

William held a hand out. "Aim true."

Charles clasped the extended hand firmly, the unswerving handshake of the brothers headed into battle, possibly for the last time.

Charles' firm reply: "Leave no survivors."

And into the fray. The roommates stood together, diving in opposite directions to split the fire and confuse the enemy.

William had prepared himself for the biting wind, the snow obscuring his vision, possibly the confusion of sophomores desperately running to avoid his assault. What he hadn't counted on was the merciless barrage that assailed him the moment he popped out of hiding.

Snowballs struck his chest, his face, even his legs, momentarily stunning him. He checked, unsure what direction to aim first. It wasn't until he heard Charles calling for help that he unfroze and steeled himself to return fire.

"William!" Charles yelled. "Cover me, man!"

William tried, he really did, but he could only throw one at a time and there were three on Charles at once. His friend's progress was halted halfway across the courtyard. He had already spent his last prepared snowball and was frantically packing a new one, but he was fighting a rising tide.

But...while the three students focused their fire on Charles, they had left a glaring gap in their defenses, and William was going to break through. He pegged one kid with a ball, danced out of reach of the returning volley, and dove for their incomplete fort. Success!

When he put a hand to the wall, determined to shove it over, a laughing face peeked through the tiny window that had been left for snipers. Of course. Home defense.

"Now what," Anna said, "do you think you're doin'?"

"Destroying base camp," William replied. "You lose!"

Anna shrieked in laughter. "You can try!"

Her cheeks had been teased to bright pink by the cold and her blue eyes were sparkling with the challenge. Her black knit cap hugged close, leaving the rest of her curls to spill wildly over her shoulders. One mittened hand weighed a snowball, ready to strike.

Not if he struck first. William pitched a ball at her, but the gap in the snow was small and Anna was fast. She easily dodged it and came back up with a returning shot.

"Oh, no you don't," William muttered, dodging around the edge of the defensive wall. There. Now they were on the same side of the fort. Equal playing ground. Except now he had almost a foot and a significantly better aim to his advantage.

Anna sized up the situation just as he had, measured her chances, and knew she'd lose.

"Cheater," she shouted, turning to run. Trying to abandon base?

I don't think so, William thought. He launched himself at the small figure trying to flee from the fort, determined to stop her. There would be no escape. He and Charles left no survivors. Just a few quick steps and he would reach her. She had shorter legs. She couldn't outrun him. Faster, faster!

"Wait for me!" he called, hoping she would slow instinctively to his words.

"Not on your life!" she shouted in return. His girl was smarter than that. Fortunately, she wasn't faster.

His outstretched hand brushed her coat, reached, grasped. Anna felt the tug and fought harder to get away, arms windmilling in a desperate—and now futile—effort to keep moving forward. He wouldn't yank her back, if that's what she was afraid of. William only wanted to slow her down.

And slow down she did, and he had caught up already, and without pausing to think about the propriety or the wisdom of it, he'd tackled her right into a snowdrift.

She tumbled onto her back with a squeak, William inadvertently landing on top of her. The harsh wind stilled, blocked out by the shelter of the fort's wall. Big white flakes continued to fall, mixing in their hair and brushing down Anna's cheeks.

Breathless from laughing, she pinned William with a teasing glare.

"No fair," she accused him.

"You're right," he said. "It was five against two."

Anna huffed in mock indignation, her head lolling to the right, pillowed by the snow. Her cheeks beamed rosily and every time she blinked, the snowflakes caught in her lashes were dragged down to lay themselves gently against her skin. Blue eyes brighter than the sky sparkled up at him as her lips parted slightly to let her breathe more freely.

He'd never wanted a woman more.

Even through unknowable layers, he could feel the warmth of her body as it pressed and molded against his. Their bodies together, practically entwined, were slowly heating, creating a cursed inferno in William's blood and beneath his skin. He could almost feel the bed of snow melting around them.

Did Anna realize that her hand was wrapped around his bicep as he propped himself up, holding his body above hers? That he could feel the warmth of her fingers burning through his coat, bringing to mind what it would be like to have her hands on his skin? To be on top of her in a bed? William was frozen. He couldn't have moved if he wanted to.

And he most certainly did not want to.

Did she want him to move, though? Was she already wondering why he still hadn't gotten up? He risked a peek down.

She didn't look like she wanted him to get off her. In fact, she was still chuckling.

"Good gravy, you're heavy," Anna said, dimpling up at him.

"Oh—sorry—" Here he'd been, imagining his best friend naked, all the while pinning her to the ground like a caveman, and suffocating her to boot. What a piece of work he was.

"No, it's—" But William had already shifted his weight, leveraging his body off of hers entirely and sliding to the side. "—fine," Anna finished belatedly.

That was Anna, polite to a fault. It was nice of her to try and make him feel better, but unnecessary. He got the message. Get off me. You're being weird. I certainly don't want to kiss you.

William had no intention of kissing her. Even if Anna wanted it, which she didn't. That had been pretty obvious. She'd wanted him to get off, not get closer. So the hand he reached out to her was definitely not intended for caressing. He was just going to help her up.

But what came out of his mouth was, "You have snow on your face," and instead of pulling them both off the ground, his gloved fingers were brushing the offending flakes away from her cheeks. Gently. She had such soft skin.

Was that his own heart in his ears, beating like a train, or was it hers? He could feel his blood humming through his veins, hot and fast. Need. So much need. Anna's breath still came in quick little gasps from those perfect, full lips. Lips that looked so soft, so inviting...They drew him down, down, closer, almost...

A snowball whizzed over them, striking a light pole and disappearing in a small explosion of snow. It might as well have been a bucket of cold water over the head.

William jerked upright. Damn it all, he was not supposed to be seducing his best friend!

Even if it looked like she wanted it. Just a little.

Wishful thinking on his part, William told himself bitterly. She was closing her eyes to avoid the snow. Nothing more. If he tried to force something like a kiss, it would ruin their friendship when she rebuffed him. Oh, she'd be nice about it, but the fact of the matter was she saw him as nothing more than a friend. Which was fine. He was just going to have to control himself better in the future.

"I think you're losing," Anna said quietly, now sitting up herself.

What? William glanced back at her, startled. She sounded so much like his own conscience that he'd thought for a second she'd meant...but the corner of her mouth quirked up, and he remembered.

Right. The snowball fight. In which they were outnumbered. Which Anna was thinking about, not the fact that William ached for her touch with every bone, every muscle in his body.

Focus. He jumped up to see over the top of the snow wall, determined to throw himself back into the fray. Determined to throw his mind back where it belonged—away from Anna. He gazed out across the quad...to find it littered with exhausted bodies, all of whom were laughing.

"I think we can call it a tie," Charles was calling as he lay on his back, weakly tossing one final snowball to the sky.

One of the dark figures—Carmen—jumped up. "Ooh, I need my camera!" she cried, running to the edge of the quad.

William left the fort and Anna. It was safer to get away right now, cool his head—and his body. Safer still to return to his roommate and remember what they were doing here. Just playing in the snow.

"Well, that was fun," William said drily, holding out a hand to help Charles to his feet.

His friend took it and jumped up with a quick yank. "Told you it was a good idea to get out."

"Vamos, muchachos," Carmen called, jogging back to the still-prone figures. "I want to preserve some memories here. Get up."

One by one, the still-winded soldiers reluctantly complied and shuffled together to form a cluster that Carmen finally deemed passable. Smile, hold...hold...and....The flash went off, blinding everyone. William stared desperately at the sky, hoping that the bright spots obscuring his vision would fade soon.

Carmen studied the picture. "Hm, someone blinked," she said.

"I wonder why!" one of her models hollered back.

Anna's roommate huffed. "Fine, we'll try one without the flash!" she said. "Wusses," she muttered under her breath.

Under the pretense of retrieving his hat from where it had fallen during the battle, Charles snuck up behind their photographer and hoisted a giant snowball up, threatening the entire huddle. Anna and the other girl shrieked, hunching together for cover, and the sophomore boys immediately dove to hide behind the girls.

"Oh, that's much better," Carmen said warmly, checking the resultant photo. "But I didn't say to..."

She finally turned and took in Charles and the situation at once. She narrowed her eyes at him. "Don't even think about it, pendejo," she snapped. "I'm holding a camera."

Charles shrugged and tossed away his snow boulder. Never one to pass up an opportunity, Carmen quickly snapped his picture. When he turned to glare at her, she shrugged back at him.

"I gotta take the shots when I see them," she said. "William, get over here!" she called, waving him a few feet from the group. "I need a picture of you and Anna together. I don't have any yet."

Reluctantly, William obeyed her command and shuffled over. Anna left the group and met him where Carmen had pointed, offering a sympathetic smile. At least they were enduring this together.

They stood side-by-side awkwardly, William hunching his shoulders against the cold.

"I really don't want to do this," he muttered through stiff lips. It was always a mistake to let Carmen take your picture. Once you gave her control of the camera, she turned into a little tyrant.

"Neither do I, but with Carmen, the sooner you go along with it, the sooner it's over," Anna replied.

Carmen frowned at them. "You look so awkward!" she said. "Try smiling? Act like you like each other."

William bared his teeth at the photographer. "Better?"

"Oh, just...relax!" Carmen said, frustration coloring her voice. "Do something silly. It'll make a good picture."

"Like this?" Anna called back, right before stuffing a handful of snow down the back of William's shirt.

He gasped at the sudden invasion of cold. She...it...she'd betrayed him! He'd trusted that they were done throwing snow at each other, trusted her enough to stand beside her for the pictures! And in return, he got ice down his back.

"You'll pay for that," he warned her.

"Ah'm shakin' in mah boots," she drawled, laughter sparkling in her bright eyes.

"You're going to be shaking a lot more by the time I'm done with you," he promised, his voice growing husky.

Cazzo, had that really come out of his mouth? He hadn't meant it to sound so...provocative. He wouldn't mind making her shake with desire—Lord knows, he was all but trembling for want of her—or had been, up until a minute ago—but to declare it to her face? That was a step too far.

Anna blinked. William still couldn't tell if she'd caught the underlying meaning to his words, but her eyes darkened.

She opened her mouth to speak—

Now was the time. Now, while she was distracted. William whipped off her knit cap, and before she'd had time to react, had slapped a pile of snow on top of her head and then pulled her hat back on over the wet mess.

Anna cried out, a sound of dismay. She yanked the hat off again and flung the slush away, but it was too late. The cold and the wet was already seeping into her hair and her scalp. William knew because the same thing was happening to his pants, thanks to Anna. She was immune to the justice of it, however. She smacked him angrily.

"There," he said, laughing. "Now your head's as cold as the rest of you. And the rest of me."

She jerked her sopping hat back on. Her narrow glare only made him laugh harder. "Actually," she said frostily, "besides my head, I'm not cold."

"Yeah, right, Annabelle." William was tempted to ruffle the top of her hat affectionately, but it was probably the wrong time. Especially since he would only be rubbing in the snow. "You've been playing outside all day. Your hands have got to be freezing."

He knew his were, and he'd been here less than an hour. Already he was starting to look forward to his warm apartment, warm couch, warm Anna...

William forced his thoughts to the present—and real—Anna. None of that.

"Hey, Carmen!" the other girl called, drawing Anna's roommate away. "Can you try and get a picture of this snowflake?"

Carmen dashed off, eager for yet another photo op. Intent on each other, William and Anna didn't notice her leaving.

Anna's brow puckered. "No, they're really not," she said, sounding puzzled. "I mean, yeah, my fingers were cold for the first couple of hours, and it was really bad for a bit, but by now I can't feel them at all, so I'm fine."

William blinked. "...You're kidding, right?" Please let her be joking. Please let her be joking. She couldn't be that dense.

"Nope!" Anna smiled brightly. "I could stay out all night, now that my feet are starting to adjust, too!"

A hard stare down at her feet confirmed William's suspicion that Anna had chosen to forego anything resembling common sense when she got dressed that morning. Her feet were half-buried in the snow, but he could still see the tops of her soaking-wet canvas shoes peeking up at him. Even sneakers would have been better, but instead, Anna was running around in light, summery shoes. No wonder she was relieved that her feet were "adjusting" to the cold.

This was her first snow, William reminded himself. She was new to the whole experience. She didn't know about frostbite. William took a deep breath, trying to control his incredulity.

"Anna," he said, "that's not adjusting. That's called going numb."

She didn't look fazed by it. "Okay," she said, and shrugged. Terminology. That's all she thought he was correcting her over.

Deep breaths. "Your extremities are going numb because you're losing circulation there. Because of the cold. If you stay out here, you could get frostbite."

"Don't be ridiculous," Anna said, smiling. "People don't get frostbitten from playing in a little snow."

"Let me see your hands."

Ignoring her protests, William grabbed one mitten and peeled it off. And stared. How had she even been able to curl her fingers around a snowball? Her hand felt like a tiny, solid block of ice. He chafed her skin, trying to rub some warmth back in, and pinched her cold, cold fingertip.

"Can you feel that?"

"Well—no," she admitted, "but I'm fine. It's fine, William."

"Fine?" He held her hand up so that she could see it. "It's turning blue, Anna."

Anna stared. The fingertips were so white that they had started taking on a light blue tinge. Surely it was just the bad light from the quad's lampposts. Hopefully.

"Come on," William said, without hesitation. "I'm taking you home."

And deaf to her remonstrances, he started pulling her out of the courtyard towards the apartments. Towards his apartment. Towards home.

"Hot chocolate at my place!" William called over his shoulder to the others in the quad. "Any takers?"

Big mistake. A clamor of eager answers rose from the group. They'd been out in the cold long enough, and it was high time for the best part of a snow day: getting out of the snow.

William hadn't meant for all of them to take him up on the offer—Anna was the only one he cared about getting inside—but now they had, and he was just going to have to put up with the extra bodies in the cramped apartment and endure Charles' pointed glares. His annoyance would hopefully be mitigated by the hamburger that William was going to have to buy his roommate after losing their bet.

So long as he got Anna warmed up and her blood circulating again, the rest didn't matter. He could put up with the noise and the crush of energy and even the overeager sophomore boys falling over themselves to get the attention of the girls. He just wanted Anna to get a mug of hot cocoa in her hands and from shivering to sated—comfortable. Get her comfortable. Stop her teeth chattering, for one. And get her smiling again.

William would have marveled at the tenderness he felt for the birdbrain reluctantly following him home if he didn't know better. He'd never known a girl who got herself into more trouble than this one—or one who caused such a rush of instinctive protectiveness.

More importantly, he'd never before known one who matched him so perfectly in all things. Hers was a friendship he treasured above all others, regardless of what his body told him. Their friendship was the most important thing. It must be preserved. Yet again, William swore to quell his useless emotions. They were only causing problems. He could get over Anna. He would have to.

### CHAPTER EIGHT

Five weeks after the snow melted, Anna was getting ready for yet another date—this time, with the same boy she'd been out with the last weekend. Must be serious, William thought with a wry smile. He tried to ignore his roiling resentment as he talked with Carmen on the girls' couch. Carmen proved a viable distraction, as she and William bickered over his accusation that she was trying to take too many pictures of him.

"Play nice, you two," Anna said with one last warning glare at the pair on the couch.

Carmen slung her camera strap around again and grinned. "Not likely."

"William..." Anna warned, a definite bite to her voice by now.

He spread his hands, all guile. "What did I do?"

She only spared his innocence one roll of mascaraed eyes before dashing back into the bedroom.

"Carmen, can I borrow your heels?" she called.

"Which ones?" Carmen shouted back.

"The gold ones?"

"With that dress?" Carmen hopped up to join Anna in the closet.

Their voices, for all that there were two doorways and three walls between the closet and the living room, still drifted out to insistently beat at William's hearing. "Well, it's because I'm wearing my blue earrings..."

A knock at the door. Finally. The signal that William would get some peace and quiet to do this project. Because he was so looking forward to working on astronomy homework. William had put off taking his final science requirement as long as he could, which left him taking the easiest science elective that he could find in his final semester of college. It also meant he was in a class filled primarily with underclassmen. Fortunately, Carmen was taking the same course, which gave them an easy choice when it came to picking a partner for the assigned project. They'd agreed to work on it that night, since they were both free and Anna wouldn't be there to distract them.

"Ladies," he hollered at the bedroom. "Door." He wasn't going to go around answering Anna's door. It wasn't like he lived in the apartment with Carmen and Anna. And even if he did, he wasn't going to be the grade-A chump who acted as butler to her endless parade of dates.

"Oh, it's my gentleman caller," Anna half-whispered, half-sang.

She twirled into the living room, followed by Carmen.

"How do I look?" she asked William, pulling on a cardigan.

He barely glanced up from his notebook. "You look fine."

He'd never been very good at lying. Fine didn't begin to cover how Anna looked at any hour of the day, much less all dolled up for a date. But William just didn't have the words that adequately described how beautiful she was—and if he tried, it would come out stupid.

At least she'd finally taken his advice and started wearing more appropriate clothing for her dates. Where all else had failed, Brady Altan had shaken some sense into her! Not that Brady was, in any way, a good thing. But now her bright blue dress almost reached her knees and did a man the courtesy of not explicitly trying to push her cleavage up to her neck.

She still looked supremely kissable, the kind of girl you would hold doors open for and give your jacket if she even suggested a shiver. The kind you would protect and caress, rather than ravish. And kiss and kiss, sweetly, tenderly.

Fine, so far as descriptors went, would have to suffice.

"Gee, thanks," Anna said sarcastically and turned to her roommate for affirmation. "Carmen?"

"You look beautiful," Carmen assured her, tucking stray curls back into Anna's low bun. "Appropriately second-datey."

A second knock. Nameless loser No. 38 was growing impatient.

"Oh, right," Anna said, remembering. She smoothed down the front of her skirt, checked her earrings, and pulled the door open.

Glancing up with that blasted curiosity that he wanted to repress but couldn't, William only caught a glimpse of adoring, puppy-love-stricken eyes and hair aggressively gelled up into unfashionable spikes before he forced himself to refocus on his notebook. Waves of ill-chosen cologne wafted from the open door to assault William's nostrils, temping him to sneeze. No matter how much body spray Anna's date had used, it wouldn't help the fact that he'd chosen to wear a short-sleeved button down shirt, nor the beet-red color he'd flushed the second he caught sight of Anna.

"Wow," came drawling out of the nervous Texan, whose belt buckle was practically bigger than his head, and certainly larger than his brain. "You—you look prettier'n the Fourth of July!"

Anna laughed—a small courtesy chuckle—and patted her hair down. "Well, ain't you sweet?" The girl never could resist flattery.

"Oh—here—"

Rustling and crinkling came in large quantities. William, who was still making a half-hearted attempt to study his class notes, sighed and threw his notebook back onto the coffee table in disgust. There was no way he could read with all that noise going on. Anna reared back from the large bouquet of red roses that had been shoved under her nose.

"Why, thank you, John," she said, taking the stems with reluctant fingers. "They're very...fragrant."

William covered his snort with a cough the best he could. Anna hated the smell of roses. They'd be even worse tomorrow. Gardenias, honeysuckle, jasmine—that's what she was always sticking her nose in. When the opportunity presented itself, she would sniff wild roses gingerly, and then—"I always hope they'll smell better," with a regretful sigh.

"I saw them and thought of you," John said. "An Anna by any other name would still be as sweet."

"Er..."

By the sound of it, Anna was just as taken aback by the butchered Shakespeare as William was. A quick glance at Carmen, who was hidden by the door, and—yep, she had slapped both hands over her mouth in a last-ditch effort to stifle her giggles.

"Why don't I just put these in some water," Anna suggested, the distaste in her voice subtle, but present.

"Okay, sure," was the reply, a little disappointed. "I was going to have them set them up on our table at the restaurant, but I ran out of time. I guess that will have to wait until next time."

Judging by Anna's face as she turned back into the room, John wasn't getting a next time.

"Carmen, can you get me a vase?" she called, heading into the kitchen.

With a grin, Carmen grabbed one from above the fridge and put it in the sink. She stayed at Anna's side, pretending to help with the flowers as Anna turned the faucet on. They spoke in voices low enough that the running water made it impossible to eavesdrop on their conversation from the living room.

John, now attempting to casually lounge in the doorway, was watching Anna's movements as she moved through the kitchen. When she bent over, his eyes stayed fixated on one curve, when she stood on her toes to grab a towel, a grin appeared on his pimpled face. William fought to control his breathing—she's not yours, she's not yours—rather than think about putting out John's eyes with his own cowboy boot.

With a pointed glare at the prick that had John clearing his throat and redirecting his gaze at the walls, William wandered into the kitchen under the pretext of getting some tea. Anna didn't look happy. William leaned nonchalantly against the counter to drink his tea, and to hear what they were saying at the sink. Neither girl paid him any attention.

"And did you hear that horrible line he tried from Romeo and Juliet?" Anna was saying, keeping her voice low.

Carmen nodded. "I thought I would crack a rib trying not to laugh. Poor thing."

"I really thought he would have loosened up on a second date," Anna said. "But he's even worse this time around. And the roses?"

"I thought him bringing you flowers was a sweet touch," Carmen said, trying to be fair.

Anna snorted. "I hate being given flowers." The vase had long since overflown, but the faucet remained on. "Bring me chocolates. Give me books. Make me cupcakes, I don't even care. But roses? It's the absolute worst." She carefully sheared off the plastic wrapping from the bouquet and threw it away. "I don't want to go," she whispered to Carmen. "I already know I'm not going to have a good time."

"So don't go," Carmen said—quite reasonably, William felt.

"I can't," Anna said, her voice unwilling molasses as she resigned herself. "It wouldn't be gracious, after he's put so much trouble into it. I'll just have to see if we can cut the date short or something."

"If you want, I can come down with food poisoning in 45 minutes," Carmen offered.

That got Anna to perk up a bit. "You're the best. Would you mind?"

"Nah. It's fun." Carmen grinned. "Enjoy yourself."

"Yeah, yeah..." A sigh, a newly straightened back, and the faucet was shut off.

Anna poured out the excess water and plunked the long stems into the vase as her date checked his watch.

"We should get going," he said. "Our reservation is for 7:30."

"Yeah, okay," Anna said. She finally drifted towards the apartment's front door.

"You kids have fun," William said, faintly mocking. He reclaimed his seat on the couch and flipped his notes back open.

Anna was the only one who caught his tone, and she stuck her tongue out at him behind her date's back.

John lifted a hand in farewell. "Seeya, Billy."

No, you won't. Not that he would feel the loss.

"It's William!" dateless William hollered at the now-closed door.

He really hated that stupid nickname. It's not like he even looked like a Billy. Wasn't William concession enough for these people? They were never satisfied until they had succeeded in butchering and bastardizing his name down to the dumbest, most Americanized form possible.

"Some people never learn, do they, Will?" Carmen jumped back into her seat on the couch, notebook finally in hand.

His answering glare had her raising a hand in surrender. "It's William." Anna was the only one who was allowed to call him Will. No one else had earned that kind of familiarity.

"Okay, okay," Carmen said, acquiescing. She slapped her notebook open, newly energized. "We doing this project, or what?"

William groaned. "Do we have to?" It was a Friday night. Who did homework on the weekend?

Unfazed, Carmen shrugged. "If you want to keep putting it off, fine by me. We can just sit here and do nothing."

Sounds like his kind of night. Play video games, zone out for a few hours, give his brain a break. Anna already had the new Assassin. William hadn't gotten a chance to play it yet. Except...as he reached for the game controller, there was motion at the corner of his eye. Carmen. More specifically, Carmen's camera.

Click.

William sighed, rubbing at his temples. "Must you?"

"Oh, very nice," Carmen said approvingly. She studied the picture. "I'm going to call this one Laziness in Action."

"I thought Anna told you to play nice."

The thought of Anna reminded William of the way that her date had behaved, and his hands formed fists at his sides. John hadn't looked like he wanted to play nice. The way he kept staring at her! He had all but drooled. And his opportunistic move for a better view just as Anna was bending over...William's fists clenched tighter still.

"This is me playing nice," Carmen said, oblivious to William's murderous train of thought. "If you like, I can go full-on paparazzi mode."

Click. Click click.

"I'll pass."

If this was Carmen limiting her picture-taking, William didn't want to experience the bad end of the spectrum.

"So since you don't want to work on the project, I don't have that many options for entertainment."

Right. Astronomy. Stop thinking about Anna going on yet another date, and focus on schoolwork. Not the way that creep had looked more down her cleavage than in her eyes. Astronomy. Stars. Supernovas. Black holes.

William cleared his throat. "Fine, then. Let's do this." Anything to get Carmen to put the camera down.

They sat silent for a full minute, both shuffling through their notes to avoid being the first to speak. William was not going to be the first one to break. He'd been forced into enough group projects to know how that ended—with him doing all the work.

Carmen cracked first. Barely. "So...got any ideas?"

Oh, that was helpful. Don't roll your eyes. Maybe she's not expecting you to do everything. Give her a little credit. Be a good teammate. On a stupid astronomy project.

Besides, he did have an idea. The assignment was to work with a partner and give a presentation on any topic from the class, but the project also had to incorporate both partners' majors. The point was to see the class as it related to the students individually, like the artistic or historical side of astronomy, and William thought that he'd come up with a good way of doing that.

William pulled his computer open and started typing as he spoke. "I thought that the easiest way to tie economics and English in with astronomy would be to do a mock-up of a business—like design a website for it? That way, you do all the written stuff for it, and then the business side of it would be me."

Carmen wasn't enthused. "What kind of business deals with astronomy?" she said, wrinkling her nose.

"A business that sells something. Like, maybe, photographs of stars and planets? You could take a couple of artsy shots of stars and we could make a website where people could 'buy'—"

He was interrupted by a snicker.

"Anna just texted me," Carmen said, grinning up at William.

Astronomy immediately fell by the wayside. "What'd she say?"

"I can't believe I wore my real pearls for this," Carmen read from her phone. "He took me to a Los Baños. I hate Mexican food. Oh, the poor thing." Her sympathy for her roommate didn't keep Carmen from laughing. "John is really sweet, but he's just too shy for someone like Anna."

"Is she messaging you right in front of the guy?" William frowned in disapproval. It drove him crazy when he took a girl out and she spent the whole time on her phone. Chelsea used to do it to him out of spite. Loser or not, John didn't deserve that.

Carmen shook her head without looking up from the phone. "No, she's in the bathroom."

Wow, he did not need to know that.

Carmen stifled another giggle. "He said he could really see this going somewhere," she read. "Okay, now she's headed back to the table. She said she'll try to maintain contact."

It was like disaster relief updates: never coming when you badly wanted them to, and then a flood of information all at once. William turned a page, he wanted to know about Anna's dinner. Carmen suggested a particularly starry photo, William was dying to know if John was trying to wax poetic again. Astronomy notes blurred into one big smudge as William wondered why Anna hadn't sent any new messages.

And then Carmen's phone would buzz and there would be a merciful study break in which they could enjoy Anna's humorous misfortune.

"Now he's talking about his parents and how they 'would just love me,'" Carmen relayed. "Send help."

The simple plea, so amusing to Carmen, was anything but for William.

"Does she mean that?" he said, no longer smiling. Did she need help—or rescue? It was about a ten minute drive to the restaurant. If he hit all green lights and kept his foot on the accelerator—

"Oh, she's just overreacting," Carmen said, cutting into his worried planning. "Like a guy bringing her flowers is that big of a deal. I'm sure she's fine."

The camera was coming back up. Moving on from the melodrama of Anna's dating life, Carmen was ready to take more pictures.

William wasn't so easily deflected. "How long has it been?"

Sighing, Carmen set the camera back on the coffee table and checked her watch. "About 40 minutes."

It was a reasonable amount of time. "Should we rescue her?" Carmen had said 45 minutes, after all. Anna was counting on it.

Carmen's smile twinkled. "What, you don't think we should let her suffer a bit more?"

"If she really doesn't want to be out with this guy, I'm not going to abandon her." That's what friends do, after all. Even if it was a minor breach of guy code.

"Fine...Now comes the fun part." For Carmen, apparently, every part of this was the fun part. She raised the phone to her ear. "And we're ringing...we're ringing..."

The rhythmic tone abruptly ended, replaced with Anna's electronically distorted voice. "Hello?"

"Wow, a ring and a half," Carmen said to William. "She must be desperate."

"Hello?"

"Yeah, hi, Anna?"

"Yes?"

"Hey, this is Sara," Carmen said, lying coolly. "I'm with Carmen right now."

"Is everything okay?" Anna seemed to have her lines down pat.

Not the first time they'd used the tactic, then. A well-oiled system for rescuing each other from bad dates. Good idea, but where had it been the night of short-tempered Brady Altan?

"Well..." Carmen drew the word out with relish. "I'm not sure. Carmen started getting really sick. It looks like food poisoning."

"Oh, my goodness. Is she okay? Can I talk to her?"

"Not at the moment." Carmen paused to fight down a grin. "She's...well, to be perfectly frank, it's coming out both ends."

On the other end, there was only a disgusted "Ugh..."

"She hates it when I say that," Carmen whispered to William. And back to the staged call. "Are you around? She's asking for you and I'm afraid we might need to take her to the emergency room."

"Yes, I'll...I'll be there as soon as I can," Anna promised. "Thanks for calling."

"Bye."

With the call ended, Carmen tossed the phone on top of her notes triumphantly. "Works like a charm," she said. "We'll have to scram when they get back, though."

"And what—you'll hide in the bathroom pretending to puke?" William's lip curled. How juvenile.

Carmen didn't even bat an eye. "If I have to. If that's what it takes."

William had to admire the loyalty there. Anna, he knew, would do the same. They did what they had to in order to look out for each other. Just as William would do whatever it took to protect her.

Carmen propped her feet on the table. "If my calculations are correct, he'll have her at the door in under fifteen minutes. Poor guy."

Poor guy never had a chance against these two.

So that left them with fifteen minutes before she arrived. Fifteen minutes to fill with working...or talking.

"Pretty smooth system you have there," William said, nodding towards the now-abandoned phone. Short, sweet, and they played their parts with well-honed precision.

"It has to be," Carmen replied. "It's the best way out of a bad date for everyone involved."

If he kept Carmen talking, they wouldn't have to keep working on the project. It wasn't due for another two weeks. They had time.

"So have you guys always done it?" Much as he hated to admit it, William was curious about the girls' system. Were there code words? Did they have contingency plans? Code names? Was there a whole network of girls involved, like a giant, conspiratorial spider web?

Carmen's normally cheerful expression clouded over. "No, not always," she said. "We'd talked about it before, but never got around to setting up anything definite until her date with Brady."

"She told you about that?" William said, voice tight.

Even the thought of that night was enough to make his blood boil. Seeing his normally confident Anna cringe away, hearing her scared, small voice break on that one word of entreaty—and Brady, lost to the anger, shoving her back against the bricks—William had seen red. He hadn't cared who he hit so long as he got the threat away from Anna, so long as he could make her safe once more.

"She did," Carmen said, mouth twisting into a worried frown. "And I know she says that she would have handled it, and I know she never really thanked you, but I—" She was destroying the strap of her camera with her twisting and pulling. William gently disentangled the abused fabric, leaving Carmen no choice but to focus on the conversation. "Thank you," she said. "Thank you for coming to her rescue."

William shrugged off the gratitude. The words were so old-fashioned, too dashing to apply to William. Rescue? He'd pushed back a guy who was trying to force too much on Anna, that's all. Like he would have ever let any harm come to her.

Carmen cleared her throat, trying to clear the awkwardness from the air. "So after that, we came up with code words, fake emergency calls, the whole deal. It's working pretty well so far, thankfully."

"I see that."

Carmen went back to snapping pictures; William withheld his protest. It was something to do. Something to look at.

"Don't sound so disapproving, Billy," she said. "It's a good thing. It saved me from this—uh...pretty bad situation at a party."

"I am glad to hear that," William acknowledged.

He didn't like imagining Carmen afraid of something outside her control any more than he did Anna. Especially since he couldn't understand anyone wanting to hurt Carmen, with her misleadingly small stature and wide, laughing brown eyes. She tended to attribute her well-disguised strength and "spicy Mexican charm" to keeping danger at bay, but it was more than that. She was such an endearing spark of sunshine that no one around her wanted to see it flicker.

But for all that, she still didn't have license to bastardize his name. "And it's William," he corrected her, yet again.

Carmen shrugged. "Sorry, William," she said, entirely unapologetic. "But you started the nicknames. You gave Anna one she hates, so you have to deal with the consequences."

"I don't see why she puts up such a fuss," William retorted. "It's a compliment. She reads a lot. She's smart. Billy, on the other hand, shows a total disregard for my name and culture."

Carmen opened her mouth to reply, but the key sounded in the lock. "They're back!" she hissed. She jumped off the couch, yanking William to his feet with her. "Hide hide hide!"

Carmen ran into the bathroom but left the door cracked, allowing her to hear what was going on in the living room. The bathroom now taken, Carmen had left William to find his own hiding place.

Feeling like a freshman trying to avoid the girls' dorm RA—unwelcome nostalgia—William ducked into the closet. Should he actively hide, or would it be sufficient to remain out of sight? He considered the rack of dresses. If he really wanted to be invisible, he'd have to wedge himself between their clothes and get suffocated by skirts. Then again, it wasn't like Anna's date was going to be searching the apartment. He could just lurk in the dark and be hidden enough.

Heroically, William resisted the urge to snoop. The lavender scent of Anna's laundry detergent drifted from the hanging dresses, beguiling him. If he buried his nose in the cloth, he would be enveloped by Anna's essence.

The lock disengaged and the front door swung open.

"It's awfully sweet of you to offer," Anna was saying loudly, "but I couldn't ask that of you."

"Well, you don't have to," came John's reply. "Because I'm offering."

"And I do appreciate it," Anna said. Her voice was coming closer. Had John followed her into the apartment? William inched closer to the dresses, ready to hide himself more thoroughly.

Sensing her cue, Carmen coughed loudly, cutting it off with a weak moan.

"Anna?" she groaned. "Is—is that you?" There was a retch.

William almost gagged listening to her. He did not have the stomach for this.

"I think Sara and I can take care of her ourselves," Anna said quietly. "I'm so sorry this came up." She actually did sound regretful. William, straining to eavesdrop, almost believed her himself.

"I understand," John said. "Hope you feel better, Carmen," he called into the room.

From the bathroom came only a sick groan of acknowledgement. For all the disgusting noises, William had to applaud Carmen for her dedication. She had missed her true calling as a plague victim.

The front door clicked shut, Anna sighed, then came footsteps. William tensed. Had the date left? Was he insisting on remaining as moral support?

"He's gone," Anna called. "You guys can come out now."

William poked his head out from the closet; Carmen immediately strode into the living room, the picture of health. Satisfied that the coast was clear, William followed her out.

Anna kicked off her heels and flopped down on the couch with a sigh, ready to put her worn feet in someone's lap.

And if you asked William, that someone could be Carmen. He was not about to give Anna's smelly feet a massage right after she came home from a date with some other guy. If he started acting like that much of a fool—well, he'd be no better than John, the poor sap with no hope of a third date. Anna would see him as nothing more than another puppy to serve her.

Not that he didn't live to serve her, William admitted bleakly to himself, running his fingers through his hair. His heart and whole being were hers for the taking. But not as her slave. Theirs was a relationship based on equality and friendship. That friendship was the whole point. Friends don't let friends be pathetic over a girl. Even if the girl in question is the friend not letting the friend...

So William remained standing over the couch, while Carmen, who was caught in no such mental quandary, lay down on the opposite end and the roommates plopped their feet on each other.

"He actually offered to take us to the emergency room," Anna said, starting the discussion of her date. Her fingers plucked at the edge of her coiled bun as she spoke. "Nice touch with the coughing, by the way." This to Carmen. "I was afraid that he was going to get sick."

"Glad I could help." Her cheerful equanimity restored, Carmen clicked one more photo, this time of Anna. "Nice," she said, checking the result. "I think I'll title it Steel Magnolia in Repose."

Anna rolled her eyes and pushed the lens away with a lazy hand. "Shoo."

"And all because the poor guy brought you flowers," William said, throwing himself into his usual armchair facing the girls.

Anna tried not to glare at the accusation in his words. "It wasn't just the flowers," she said, rising to her own defense. Figuratively. Her back remained firmly planted on the cushions of the couch.

"No?" William smirked. "What, did he recite Austen to you, too?"

Anna looked to the ceiling, biting her lip. Hard. She struggled to take a couple of deep breaths, and swallowed back the irritation that wanted to rise to the surface at his mocking. She didn't want to have yet another bad date ending in a fight with William.

What got under his saddle every time she got pretty and went on a date? He always seemed to show up looking for a fight. Anna almost wished it was jealousy, but she knew better. She knew William better.

Thankfully, Carmen intervened. "Maybe he should have," she said. She poked a finger in William's direction. "Guys these days should take some pointers from Mr. Darcy. He is the epitome of romance."

"Especially when he's played by Colin Firth," Anna agreed with a smile.

Carmen agreed. "Oh, Colin Firth is the best..."

Both girls gave a dreamy sigh.

"Jane Austen could salvage any bad date." Carmen was certain.

"As must as I like Pride and Prejudice," Anna said, "I don't know." She grimaced. "I think if John had started quoting Darcy at me, I would have jumped out the window."

So no quoting of romantic passages, no flowers. William began a mental catalogue. What else? Why not flowers? Did she have a vendetta against chocolates, too? What would it take to win this girl over?

"Because he brought you roses?" William asked.

"It wasn't just the flowers," Anna insisted, throwing up a hand. "It was like..." She searched for the words. "I opened the door, okay? And he's just standing there with this big thing of roses. And before he even says a word, he shoves the flowers at me with this hopeful expression of—" Anna unwound her hair, puzzling how to explain, then assumed big, beseeching eyes. "His face just looked like—'Here—I got you these—and this is really important—because I like you a lot—please like me, too!'"

She dropped the expression immediately when Carmen began laughing. "It was so much riding on a bouquet of flowers, so much pressure."

High standards, this one. The horror of a man showing his intentions! Then again, William reasoned, she'd had a tough couple of years with too many guys putting too much pressure on her. She wasn't wrong to flinch at the first indication of enhanced ardor.

That, and as William knew from his own experience arguing with her, throw too much on Anna at once—whether flowers or a fight—and she shut down. She had to come to terms with things on her own terms. If you forced the issue, you lost her. If, for example, William got down on one knee and professed his love, she would shut him out completely. She would never accept it. She would never accept him.

"Besides, he's from Texas," Anna said now, her levity returning. "It never would have worked between us."

"Especially not with that belt buckle," Carmen said. She shuddered in mock horror. "I've never seen such a garish Texas flag."

Anna giggled suddenly, the sound darting through the room like quicksilver. "And his hair! I was afraid it was going to catch on fire!"

"Either that or break off in chunks," William said, earning an approving laugh from the couch. "I don't think that much gel even comes in a single bottle." Surely Anna preferred thick, soft curls that spoke to an exotic, Mediterranean origin. Maybe someday.

"And I've still got to see him again in Euro Lit on Tuesday morning," Anna groaned, pressing the heels of her palms to her eyes. She must be exhausted. "There's no escape."

"Just two more months left in the semester," Carmen soothed her. "Then you won't have to see him at all."

So soon. William's eyes flew to take stock of Anna's reaction to the reminder. She did not seem comforted by the approaching deadline.

William wasn't, either. He was graduating in two months.

And what then? The financial advisory firm where he'd interned the past summer was very interested in bringing him back as an actual employee, so there was always that option. It would keep him in Houston, and close to Anna.

Still, not being in class or on campus with Anna was going to be difficult. It could change their friendship. Who knew what the future held for the two of them?

Anna's perturbed gaze met William's. The same questions were pecking behind her sapphire eyes. William was about to graduate. Who knew what that meant? Time would not cease its indomitable march forward.

Would she be left behind?

### CHAPTER NINE

His sunglasses were slipping again. Hardly surprising, given the bright sunlight that was determined to make the world break a sweat. William surreptitiously pushed the glasses back up the bridge of his nose. A combination of the stifling sun and the mind-numbing boredom was tempting him to daydream. Was Anna in the audience, watching? Would he and Charles be able to get away from their families and have a beer tonight, like they'd planned? William made an effort to focus. He knew that he should savor the moment. You only graduate from college once.

"Guglielmo Alessandro Forte."

William winced as he walked forward. They'd had the graduates write out the phonetic spelling of their names, and even so, his name had come out sounding like a garbled tangle of consonants.

There were a few localized cheers, half-hearted clapping in general, and already the professor was preparing to read out the next graduate's name. William mounted the steps one at a time, chanting internally don't trip don't trip—at least he didn't have to worry about wearing heels, unlike that poor girl who'd fallen flat on her face—

He made it up to the platform successfully, turned, and faced the dean, who took his hand in a limp handshake.

"Don't forget to smile for the camera," the dean muttered him through clenched teeth.

Obligingly, William smirked towards the photographer, then dropped the dean's hand and reached for his diploma. That in hand, he took the steps down on the opposite side of the platform. When his feet touched the ground, diploma firmly in hand, William let out the breath he hadn't realized that he'd been holding.

He'd made it. He was a college graduate. After four years of struggling with homework and lectures, he had earned his degree and it was over.

For some reason, William had expected it would feel different. More momentous, somehow. Instead, he walked back to his chair and sat back down, feeling the same as he had ten minutes before.

His seat in the sea of black robes reclaimed, William tugged at the neck of the graduation gown. Why black, of all colors, for a ceremony taking place outside on a Texas spring afternoon? College wasn't in the business of forming the minds of tomorrow, or whatever new drivel they were spouting these days. College was in the business of torture.

Still the second half of the alphabet to get through—and why are there always more people with second-half last names?—the final speech (please let us out of here before my mother dies of heat stroke), tassels shift, and the graduating class began cheering (but don't toss your hats!).

Then the sea of black robes exploded like the scattering of the four winds. The ceremony grounds were suddenly a mass of conversation, exclamations, photos snapping, and searching, searching for family members.

William and Charles stuck close together and waited for their families to find them. It was better than everyone running around in circles looking for everyone else.

Anna found him first, and following close at her heels were his mother and brother. His father hadn't been able to make it. William understood. Flights to the States were expensive, an unnecessary expense for such a small occasion. His mother, on the other hand, had been saving up for this ever since William had been a freshman, and a flight from Arizona was much more affordable than a flight from Italy. It was enough for William that his mother had been able to come.

Most important at the moment, however, Anna's smile found him first. The first words out of her mouth, well, he should have seen coming.

"Guglielmo?" she said. "That's the big secret name?"

William ducked his head, ears starting to tinge red. "It's a family name," he said defensively. Heaven knew why he was defending the stupid thing. William hated his name. "Tell her," he appealed to his mother. "It's a family name."

"And a fine one at that," his mother said, beaming. "Mio nonno Guglielmo worked his way from a poor fisherman to owning his own shop. And there was no store finer than his in the walls of Bari."

"Oh, it's a fine name," Anna said. Her eyes were still dancing. "Very...manly."

William's response was hampered by the hug that his mother swooped in for.

"Oh, Mamma," he said, fighting down a smile.

"Don't you 'Mamma' me, Guglielmo," his mother said. She pulled away slightly, grinning up at him. "I am very pleased with you for once."

That better not have been a snort of laughter from Anna. He couldn't help his name, and that was a fact.

"Congrats, Charles," Anna said, giving him a high five.

William's mother, catching sight of Charles and reinvigorated with excitement, seized him and William in another fierce hug.

"Oh, I am so proud of ragazzi miei!" she exclaimed.

Past his mother's shoulder, William could see Anna sticking her hand out to his older brother.

"Well, hai thare!" she said.

William fought back a laugh of his own. Anna's accent hadn't been that thick in ages. The excitement of meeting a new person must bring it out of her.

As though unsure of what to make of the petite Southern spitfire in front of him, Francesco slowly shook her extended hand.

"Ciao."

"Ah'm Anna," she said, still shaking his hand. "You must be William's brother."

"Sì. Francesco."

With a friendly smile, Anna finally let go. "Nice to meetcha."

"Thanks, Ms. Forte," Charles mumbled. Was his windpipe getting crushed by the hug too, or was that just William? "It's good to see you again."

Charles' family lived close enough to Houston that William had spent several holidays with them at times when he had been unable to afford plane fare to be with his mother. The summer that Charles had gotten an internship in Phoenix, Ms. Forte had insisted on hosting Charles to repay his family's hospitality. As a result, Charles had become a de facto member of the Forte family.

Anna smiled at the black robes and tightly clutched diplomas and more tightly clutched graduates. "All y'all look pretty as a picture," she said happily.

"Oh, we need pictures!" William's mother exclaimed, finally releasing the boys. "Pictures are important."

William repressed a sigh. It would make his mother happy to be taking pictures. Trying to ignore the rapidly clicking camera that was now being wielded by his mother, William reached Francesco. The brothers formally shook hands.

"Nice work, little brother," Francesco said. "Cum laude. Non che male."

How he'd miraculously scraped that one out of the barrel, William would never know. Homework existed to be ignored, had always been his philosophy.

William made the most of his half-inch height advantage to look down at his brother. Anything to avoid the prickle of inferiority that haunted a younger sibling. "It's nothing compared to summa cum," he said, shrugging. Francesco had always been the intellectual one of the two brothers, and had graduated summa cum from NYU.

"Hey, Francesco," Charles greeted the older Forte amicably. "How's that book coming?"

It was Francesco's turn to shrug. "Got a few rejections from New York. There's not much of a market for poetry these days." He lifted one leather-clad shoulder carelessly. "Of course, you don't write poetry to sell it."

"Of course," Charles agreed politely. His eyes had begun to scan the slowly-dispersing crowd around them, looking more intently for his own family.

Mama Forte's voice rang out imperiously. "Guglielmo, take those sunglasses off!"

"Sì, Signora." With a laugh, William obeyed and pocketed his precious Wayfarers. He also took the opportunity of freedom from his mother's arms to unzip the sweltering black robe and let the breeze wrap its cooling fingers around his body. Finally, relief.

"Tell me you did not wear those to get your diploma!"

"Aw, come on, Mamma," he called back, smiling. "The sun was right in my eyes. I couldn't have seen anything otherwise!"

"You're going to look like uno zingaro in those pictures!" It was his mother's default warning any time that William was misbehaving: looking like a gypsy—an Italian mother's worst fear.

Suddenly Anna's voice was in his ear. "How like you, Guglielmo," she said teasingly. "You always gotta be so cool."

His answering snort wasn't any kind of cool. "You're just jealous."

"Oh?" Anna didn't look convinced. "I think not. I plan on looking a lot more dignified at my graduation."

"Snob," he teased.

"Not that you'll be around to see it," Anna continued. Her upbeat expression waned briefly.

"Hey," William said, briefly ignoring his mother's directions for photo poses and turning to face Anna fully. He hated it when she stopped smiling. "I'm not going anywhere. I'll be working in Houston, remember? You haven't gotten rid of me yet."

Her beam returned full force. "That's true. And it's not like we're going to stop being friends."

"Of course not," William said. "You're still my best friend, Bookworm."

"Hey," Charles protested mildly.

William sighed. "You, too, Charles."

"Yeah, that's convincing," his roommate griped. "If I get replaced with Anna, Francesco is going to be my new best friend."

Thoroughly bored with the whole process, Francesco didn't even look up from his phone. "Oh, joy," he said, anything but excited.

"Anyway," William said, trying to get the day back on track. He resisted the urge to run his thumb along Anna's cheekbone. "Yes, we're going to celebrate graduation and the end of an era, but after that, nobody's leaving forever, okay?" There were flyaway curls begging to be tucked behind her ear. Her hair always looked so soft. Focus. "We're best friends, and nothing's going to change that."

### CHAPTER TEN

_Year Four_

Contrary to Anna's gloomy expectations, William's words proved true. The next two years as she finished up her degree passed by in a blur for Anna, but her friendship with William remained constant. The time that they spent together was a much-needed comfort during her junior and senior years, especially when her excitement and nervousness about her future beyond college threatened to overwhelm Anna. Even Carmen had her next steps figured out: She was going to move to Baton Rouge after graduation and open up her own photography studio. Anna, however, had no clue what she would do next. Having William nearby helped to calm her fears.

Despite their constant complaints about the reprehensible lack of maintenance and threats to break the lease and move, William and Charles kept their apartment close to campus. Rent was cheap, and Charles, now working for the Houston Press, liked the relatively short commute. William had chosen to accept a job with the financial consultancy firm that he had interned with before. Even though he liked to tell Anna that he was a glorified secretary, he enjoyed the work, and he was able to stay close to home.

Besides, if they moved or he got a different job, William would see even less of Anna, who always sounded like she had a million papers due. By her senior year, he was lucky if he got an hour with her on the weekends to play a game of pool. Or snatched a few hours to go to the gym or watch a movie together. Or was able to cajole Charles and Carmen into joining them for a few video games. Or—come to think of it, William hadn't seen Anna study in weeks. They still did yoga together every week (now on Saturday afternoons, just the two of them), still occasionally hit up the pool dives, but for all her moaning about the giant thesis that she had due in five months...four months...two...where were the papers? The books? The obsessive notecards plastering the wall in a mad spider web of themes and facts?

"I'll get to it," was the only concern that Anna spared for it. "Oscar Wilde will still be there after this game."

How comforting.

Watching her sudden frenzy of imploding deadlines and crazy thesis statements born of strings of all-nighters made William happier than ever that he was done with school. The drudgery of an office job carried with it its own stresses, but at least he didn't have homework or exams to worry about.

As much as he could, as her final semester drew to a close, William kept Anna on task. He acted as her audience when she needed to practice her English thesis defense, nodded along when she wanted to gush about her latest pet author or historical figure, and was in the front row at her thesis presentation. He liked to think that that half-smile she gave before launching into it was particularly for him. And when she concluded, William couldn't restrain his own grin of pride for her.

Somehow, with resources of sheer luck beyond William's understanding, Anna completed her degree requirements and had her own turn to walk across the big scary dais towards a thin piece of paper and an empty future.

And he was there to cheer her on. Charles declined to attend, citing the fact that it was a Sunday afternoon and there was sleep to be had.

His absence meant that when the ceremony was over and William had found Anna in the crowd of recent graduates, he was left to face alone the horde of Hardwicks that descended. Maybe if Charles had been there to diffuse the tension with his well-flowing words, lunch wouldn't have been such a disaster. Maybe then William wouldn't have been dumb enough to let himself get cornered. He wouldn't ever know for sure, but he was absolutely going to blame Charles for it, one way or another. It was easier if there was identifiable fault—besides William's own stupidity.

Not that he'd known any of that going in. He'd been too nervous and eager about finally meeting Anna's relatives.

As much as he'd heard about Anna's mother, William had never pictured her with a pixie cut. It didn't hide her maturity or her wrinkles, but it did offset the severity of her pointed chin. The same pointy chin Anna had frequently bemoaned in her own mirror, citing her grandfather as the unfortunate source. And look—same eyes as Anna as well, shining out from encroaching crow's feet, and that laughing smile, beautiful in its unaffected happiness. There, too, was his Anna.

The rich brown curls came from Mr. Hardwick, who stood proud at 5'6 and had chosen to wear a three-piece suit. In May. In Houston. Despite the aggressive sunshine, he never uttered a word of complaint beyond occasionally mopping his gleaming brow with a precisely folded pocket square. In fact, he said little at all except for intermittent, conventional moans over the suddenness of his young daughter's step into adulthood.

Anna had warned him ahead of time that besides her parents, there would also be a smattering of aunts, complete with uncles in tow, coming to her graduation. They were a tight-knit clan, the Hardwicks. William had been excited to meet her family, but he hadn't been prepared for the noise of them all vying for Anna's attention, the proud parents', even her brother Lee's. Every few seconds there came the imperious caw of "Anna Beth!" from one source or another, so that although she kept William at her side to prevent him from getting lost in the press of relatives, her smile and her conversation were constantly having to turn from one direction to another, never to him, trying to pay due attention to all who had travelled so far for her sake.

"Wait for me tonight," he murmured close to her ear so that she wouldn't miss his words. "I'll buy you a drink to celebrate, just the two of us."

Anna's smile dropped for an instant into an expression of stark gratitude. She grasped his hand in a fervent promise and had to immediately exclaim over Cousin Libby's most recent ballet accomplishments. The crowd of family was going to wear her down quickly, but William would make sure that she recharged tonight. A beer would probably help.

William didn't mind that she hadn't been able to reply. The talking filled his ears and Anna's smile filled his heart, and there was always a new relation shaking his hand.

"Oh, so you're William!"

"Anna Beth never mentioned how tall you are. My word, I all but need a step-stool!" Aunt Karen all but did, with her barely five-foot height (and four-foot girth).

William had always laughed heartily when Anna said that she was the tall one in her family. Now that he'd met them—well, it was still funny, but more because it was true. The few inches past five feet that she'd managed to achieve put her a head above all of her aunts. William felt like a clumsy, out-of-place giant.

"You're coming to lunch with us, ya hear?" This from Mrs. Hardwick. Half invitation, half threat.

"Mr. Dean is jest fine, son," her father said when William called him Mr. Hardwick. "I hear you've been a good friend to my baby girl." His words were almost as intimidating as his wife's. Almost.

And there was always one aunt or another screeching, "Lee! Git yerself over here and give your sister a hug!"

Obligingly, Lee shuffled his way forward and raised his arms, sighing in mock reluctance. Anna simply laughed and grabbed him into a fierce little bear hug.

"I'm so glad you could come!" she said to Lee, whose hazelnut mop of curls so closely matched his older sister's.

While she had five years on him, Anna's little brother was already half a foot taller. If Anna was peaches and cream, Lee's coloring was more suited to strawberries, but as the siblings smiled at each other, matching dimples peeped out on right cheeks, and Anna was there, too, in the small paperback shoved into Lee's back pocket, easily accessible for any reading emergencies.

"You're lucky school let out on time," Lee replied. "Otherwise there would have been no way. I've seen enough of your graduations."

"Oh, like you haven't had a fair few yourself!" Anna retorted. "I remember the second-grade graduation—unparalleled in stupidity only by the fourth-grade graduation, with the fake diploma and—"

"Hush up, you two," their mother admonished. "No fightin'."

"Yes ma'am," the siblings chorused, falling obediently into line like a pair of ducklings.

Not that their good behavior lasted long. Their mother's scorching glare had hardly passed over before Anna was smacking her little brother with the hard-backed diploma case. Lee reciprocated with a shove of the shoulder, which Anna did not appreciate.

William couldn't help smiling as he watched Anna with her brother, enjoying her day and her family.

As her mother watched him. Watching Anna.

Lunch at a barbeque pit was just as loud and chaotic. Everyone wanted to near the woman of the hour, everyone wanted to be heard by her. In the din of putting tables together and bickering over seats, William found himself shunted down three people away from Anna, leaving him at the mercy of her relatives.

As Anna happily chowed down on a rack of ribs and chatted through mouthfuls with her mother, William nervously smiled down the gauntlet of curious eyes. Should he speak first? Break the tension? Or stay silent and respectful, limiting himself to "Yes ma'am," and "No sir"?

"Your hair's too long," Anna's Uncle Sal said, relieving William of the decision—Uncle Sal who was sporting a comb-over comprised of exactly four hairs.

William self-consciously shook his own hair back out of his face. It wasn't too long—barely went past his ears. He'd thought it was presentable enough.

"Are you one of them Frenchie fruitcakes?" Uncle Sal again, providing valuable contributions to the celebratory, lunchtime atmosphere.

"Sal, that ain't polite!" one of the aunts hissed at him. Betty? Vi? William had lost track.

Sal swiped a hand across his mouth, succeeding only in smearing barbeque sauce farther across his face. "What?" he said. "Son, with that hair, you look like one of them—"

"Didn't you hear Anna Beth say he was Roman or some such?"

William took a fortifying gulp of his drink. No beer to be had here, but tonight he and Anna would have their own celebration. Just a few hours more. He held on to the promise of their later with the same fervor with which Anna had gripped his hand. They still had a ways to get through before then, but they would have later.

"Vicky, don't be ridiculous," another of the uncles snapped. "There ain't Romans no more. Where are you from?" this demanded of William, spoken through a mouthful of bright yellow potato salad.

"I grew up in Bari," William said. Before they could ask, he answered. "It's a small town along the southern coast of Italy. Close to Greece."

"Is it pretty there?" This almost whispered by the aunt with her hair in a low bun so much like Anna's. She was smiling timidly at William, the first real friendliness he'd felt at the table, so he spoke to her.

"It can be." He could tell them about the colored stone of the buildings stacked high on either side of the narrow streets, the Basilica of St. Nicholas, and the sunshine that was bright and warm without being punishing. But pretty? A fishing village? No. It was poor and dirty and the smell of the market chased you down every street.

At the moment, however, William even missed the stench of the shore—dead fish and motor oil. Better than facing down this sweet-tea-laced interrogation.

"And who are your parents?" Anna's father had decided to join the conversation.

William paraphrased what would be honest and the simplest to explain. "My father still works in the market in Bari. When I was a teenager, my mother got a job as a high school teacher in Phoenix, and my brother and I moved to the States with her." Best to skip over the whole messy divorce business.

"What does your father do?" Anna's mother called down the table, as though the entire restaurant needed to know.

Still William kept his tone quiet, despite the flames in his ears and neck. "He sells fish, ma'am. In the open-air market."

Mrs. Hardwick wrinkled her nose, like she could smell the fish from here. The expression, so similar to Anna's, would have made William smile if her next words hadn't come pouring out. "He must stink to high heaven!"

"He does what he can to feed his family, ma'am," William said, struggling to keep his voice even. "It is something I have always admired him for."

"That's right," Sal spoke up abruptly. "Get off yore high horse, Susanna. Not everybody's going to be as blessed as our family."

William barely contained his unamused laughter. No, his family had not been as blessed as Anna's. His childhood home had had three rooms and his experiences growing up in the rough side of Bari—well, he couldn't blame his mother for jumping at the chance to move to America.

Hardly up to these people's par. Who was he kidding, trying to eat with her family, act nice, trying to blend in? He didn't belong with them.

"William's doing pretty well for himself," Anna called down the table, shaming her family out of the interrogation. "He works for a company that helps solve organizations' economic crises." She flashed him a grin. "You should ask him about that."

Six pairs of eyes flicked back to William. Anna hadn't rescued him from their scrutiny, but she'd at least redirected the conversation to an area he was comfortable discussing. Better that than his family's socioeconomic status.

"It sounds impressive," he said, affecting a carefree smile, "But I fetch coffee and send memos. I'm a secretary without the pencil skirt."

The tension at the table broke with his and Anna's laugh—and half a beat later, with the rest of the group joining in, if a bit uncertainly. Family members refocused on their food. Anna shot William an apologetic look; he shrugged it off. The Hardwicks were nice, in their own special, Southern way.

The rest of the day probably would have gone smoothly if William had just stayed in his seat and remained immersed in the family time. But no. He had to get up and ruin the whole day. Maybe even the whole week.

This was supposed to be a happy occasion.

It had started innocently enough. After the corn, the meat, the potatoes, the collard greens heavily seasoned with bacon, and everything absolutely smothered in butter and salt, William had reached for his glass to find it empty. Simple enough solution: stand up, get a refill, and sit back down.

But his rising drew everyone's attention and the table's conversation stilled as they paused to stare at him. Again.

His mind went blank. "Uh..." William gripped his cup, jogging the memory. Hold tight to your goal. "I'm going for another drink." He raised his glass a little, as though they needed evidence. "Anyone want anything?"

A blink, a beat, and a scattered shaking of heads. Sal resumed his joke about the old lady with the toothache, Lee stuck his nose back in his book, and Anna's mother looked back to her daughter, prepared to continue their argument about the unpaid internship with a Houston nonprofit that Anna would be starting the next week. Anna, however, had other demands to make.

"Oh, wait!" she called to William just as he stepped away from the table. Not quite free, then. She rattled her own glass at him, now containing only ice.

"What do you want?"

"Coke."

William let her drop her plastic cup on top of his and turned for the drink dispenser, but then swiveled back. He'd had enough girlfriends to know a trap when he heard it.

"What kind?"

Anna beamed at him, well-pleased. He couldn't help but smile in return. "Root beer, please?"

"Certo, Annabelle," William said, forgetting their audience. It wasn't even an audience. Everyone had gone back to their own conversations and lost interest as William stepped away from the table. And forgetting the many pairs of eyes that were still present and ready to resume staring at any misstep, William ruffled her hair as he passed by.

It had been an affectionate gesture, perfectly friendly, just like her reactive squeak and unsuccessful attempt to dodge. And his playful laugh had only been a little flirtatious.

It had been just another mistake of his, one among hundreds.

"Allora," William muttered to himself, filling one glass at the soda fountain. "Che cosa è con questa ragazza—Oh, scusami, Mrs. Hardwick." She had appeared behind him in search of her own drink refill, and he had stepped backwards right into her. "I didn't—"

"It's fine," she said, moving to his side. "You take your sweet time."

He filled the second glass in uneasy silence and made to return to Anna, but—

"Hold on a second," Mrs. Hardwick said, picking up her glass. "I wanted a word with you."

This could not be good.

"Now, Mr. Fort," she began, the foreboding words punctuated by the crashing of ice down the chute into her glass, "from what Anna has told me, you two have known each other since she first started at Rice."

William was too apprehensive to correct her mispronunciation of his oft-distorted name. Now was not the time.

"You know, Anna Beth is my only daughter."

She paused, as though William was supposed to fill in the next words. But with this play, he didn't know his lines.

He tried to supplement it by offering, "And you've done a swell job in raising her."

Swell? Swell? Of all the words he could have chosen to pull out, why that one? He wanted these people to like him.

Mrs. Hardwick, however, didn't seem to notice his moronic word choice. "Sweet of you to say," she said graciously. "She has been a blessing." She watched her daughter with fond eyes. Anna, unaware of the discussion going on across the room, was proudly showing her diploma to her father and maintaining a lively conversation with her brother. The bright blue gaze that Anna had inherited snapped back to William, immediately losing its softness. "I know you care for her."

William knew better than to look back at the subject of their rapidly downward-spiraling conversation. His face would give too much away.

Again the stern woman awaited a response. William swallowed past the dryness in his throat and attempted sidestepping the danger with a carefree smile.

"As Carmen likes to say, to know Anna is to love her."

"Hmm." The lips that immediately pressed into a thin line did not give William much hope that his diversion tactic had worked. The next words that Mrs. Hardwick launched into gave him a distinctly hollow feeling in the pit of his stomach.

"Now, only the good Lord knows what you've gotten in your head for my daughter, but you might as well know that you should give it up right now." She paused, mustering her attack. "Mr. Fort, Anna has never wanted for much. She's not used to any other mode of life, and I'm worried enough as it is that she's risking working at an unpaid internship with no means of income."

William nodded along, folding his arms across his chest. He and Anna had talked about that themselves. They'd talked and talked her last semester of school, weighing options and calculating risks, but she'd made the decision independent of anyone else. "I need to start living my life," she'd told him. "For myself, not for anyone else."

So this was why her mother was riled up? Was she hoping that William would try and talk Anna out of doing the internship? Not likely. William was proud of her taking the chance instead of getting another easy grocery store gig. And it was her decision to make.

"She is young," Mrs. Hardwick continued. "She doesn't know what she wants or needs."

The momentary bubble of hope that the disapproving twist to her mouth was about Anna's internship burst with her next words.

"And what Anna Beth needs and deserves, Mr. Fort, is a good boy from a good family. One who understands where she's from and can continue to provide for her."

Drinks long forgotten, Anna's mother looked William over, taking in everything: his unruly, "too long" hair, the nose that had been broken in a Bari bar fight, hands that would never be free of the taint of fish, and the beat-up leather shoes that had been lovingly worn and lovingly repaired many times.

Should he reply? Should he react at all? William was frozen. In Bari, as an angry fifteen-year-old, he'd fought a trio of his drunk friends with a laugh, but as an adult, facing a disdainful, Southern mother, he was at a loss. Was there any appropriate way to respond to her disapproval? If he agreed, he was doomed. Dare to contradict her, and he might as well start building a coffin. No matter what he said, William was sure that he would be coming away from this confrontation with a lot worse than a broken nose and bloody knuckles.

"I...I don't..." he began helplessly.

"Don't bother," she cut him off. "I imagine that Anna sees you as an adventure. You're foreign, tall, somewhat educated, and she seems to find you amusing."

William almost choked on the word. He was amusing for Anna? A diversion, like a new book? He tried to remind himself that these were her mother's words. Anna valued him more than that. Surely.

"Be that as it may," Mrs. Hardwick said, steel in her voice, "I would rather nail my hand to this bar before I would see my daughter tie herself to the likes of you." She made one all-encompassing gesture with the hand in question. Weighed, measured, and found wanting.

William stood dumbfounded. Mrs. Hardwick, now silent, took a sip of her sweet tea. He'd never been in this kind of situation before, wasn't sure what to say. He was sure, however, that what finally came out of his mouth was wrong.

"That would be painful."

So very, very wrong.

Mrs. Hardwick's eyes flashed with fury. "Are you sassin' me?"

Great job, idiot. Make Anna's mother go from annoyed to angry. With one sentence. He deserved a Darwin award—if he survived this conversation.

"No, signora," he hastened to say. "Not at all!"

And if he did dare to ask for her parents' blessing to pursue Anna, what then? They would laugh in his face. As would Anna, in all likelihood.

But what could he tell this Southern matriarch that would suffice as both truth and assurance?

I am in love with your daughter, but don't worry, she doesn't want me.

Too honest by far.

I will never go near your daughter.

Too curt—and far too bleak a future for William to contemplate.

Anna and I are very close, but I will never treat her in a way that she does not want to be treated.

It was diplomatic, sure, but was it too diplomatic? Wouldn't he just be dodging the question again?

Words chased themselves through William's mind in circles and interwoven patterns, forming and reforming into possible answers that were all immediately discarded as unsatisfactory and other options rushed to take the place of the last.

All the while, Anna's mother was staring him down with a hard, unforgiving glare. As though one might wait for a slow person walking in front to move, move, move faster already.

"I am very fond of Anna," William eventually said. He couldn't deny that without even an imbecile knowing that he was lying.

"Not good enough."

Yes, even without the bald statement falling like lead between them, it was abundantly clear that William was not good enough. He didn't deserve Anna. Even he knew that, even without her mother to helpfully point it out.

"Ch'è vuoi?" He asked her, now desperate. "What is good enough?"

"I want your word," Anna's mother said firmly. "Your word that you will keep your hands off. Anna values your friendship, but I know how you godless Italians treat women."

William spread his hands in surrender and gave Mrs. Hardwick the same vow that he swore to himself every day. "I will not touch her. You have my word."

Unless she asks me. Unbidden, the latter thought always chased the former pledge. And then, like a prison guard regaining control of an escaped inmate, the answer: She won't. It roped the unwelcome hope back under lock and key. He couldn't control his heart, not since Anna had stolen it with a smile, but he would damn well control his thoughts. She isn't for you.

Mrs. Hardwick nodded, finally satisfied, and released them both to go back to the table, to pretend that nothing had happened. Not that her intrusion had changed a thing, he thought as Anna caught sight of them returning and beamed at him.

He and Anna were best friends. Had been for four years. Being the one closest to her heart and their jokes was enough for William.

It was enough as Anna began her internship at the nonprofit and thrived in the organization, and also when she had to start making money and took an administrative position in a nearby high school. Their friendship was all they needed as he teased that for all the lectures that she gave unwitting tardy students, Anna should be on the teaching staff. It was sufficient as William was promoted from fetching coffee and landed his long-sought-after financial consultant position, and even as every Saturday afternoon found them, without fail, continuing their tradition of yoga in Anna's light-filled little apartment.

It should have been enough, over a year later, the day that there was a knock on William's door that fateful Saturday, when everything fell apart. But stupid, foolish William had dared to hope for more.

And lost it all.

### CHAPTER ELEVEN

_Year Five_

William pulled his apartment door open, answering the confident knock that rang out even as he reached for the knob. There was only one person who would bang his door down like that. There was only one person he'd be this pleased to see on his day off. Their faces broke into identical smiles in greeting as he stood aside, letting his best friend enter. She strolled past him, rolled-up mat tucked securely under one arm.

"Nice," Anna said as she took in the furniture pushed up against the wall. "I love what you've done with the place." Shoving aside everything that normally occupied his living room allowed for the requisite space for two bodies, two mats, and enough room left between them for fat Buddha.

William shut the door and followed her back into the room, forcing his eyes to study the mess of his hasty remodeling instead of Anna's newest ensemble. Honestly, why were yoga clothes designed to draw the eye straight to the most tantalizing bits? It effectively ruined the entire point of yoga in the first place—relaxation. And William desperately needed some relaxation.

"I did what I could. You only gave me about twenty minutes warning," he reminded her. He was used to doing their yoga in her little apartment. This wasn't supposed to happen at his place.

Anna pushed her bangs out of her eyes. "Well, how was I supposed to know that dear Auntie Karen would be dropping in to 'checkup' on me? I didn't get any more warning than you did."

William laughed. He always enjoyed a good story about Anna's crazy Aunt Karen, but Anna was less than amused. "It should be good for you to have some company," he said.

He worried about her so much, especially considering how constantly frayed her nerves were these days. The high school was starting to hint that they couldn't afford to keep her on for much longer, so Anna was staring at unemployment again and having to consider going back to school for her Masters. William kept telling her to become a teacher, but she was too busy worrying about her next step to consider it. Maybe a bit of company at home would be just what she needed. There was only so much that Carmen could do from Louisiana, and only so many times that she could visit.

"If you knew how nosy she is, and how long she'll stick around for, you would never say that," Anna retorted with a decisive toss of her ponytail. "She takes puttin' up your feet and sittin' a spell to a whole 'nother level. It just—ugh! No. Yoga." Slowly she unclenched her hands, lowered her arms. "Yoga will be good. Yoga is just what I need right now."

With a practiced flip, she unrolled her yoga mat out on the floor. Giving in, William followed suit, and they were soon absorbed in the routine of steady breathing and fluid movements. They moved in unison, their poses practiced countless times until they had no option but to fall into step with each other, as one heart will match the beat of another.

He knew he shouldn't—no, more than that, knew he couldn't—but William could not stop himself from sneaking glances at his partner—his friend. The way she moved during their yoga sessions always fascinated him, as almost everything about her did. Even in as simple of a pose as the tree—damn, her body looked good in skintight clothes. William hoped that she couldn't hear him swallow so loudly, or see his Adam's apple bob compulsively.

He almost stammered when he spoke again, which would have been ridiculous. "Do you still need help with your camel position?"

"No thanks, I got it finally," came the easy reply.

And she did have it down pretty well, from the suggestive flexibility, to the arched back and thrown back head. If he were helping her maneuver, her head would be just about level with....William was immediately grateful for the looseness of his own sweatpants. He gave up on his own pose halfway through and just stared at her.

Finally, she unbent and they seamlessly moved into the much safer triangle.

"Actually," she said, looking over from behind her outstretched arm, "I could use your help with my wind removing. I still can't get my leg folded right."

"Sure. Why not?" He must be insane. "Wait for me."

She breathed out slowly, and back in, and lay down on her back. Her right leg lay flat, but her left was supposed to fold flush against her torso. Anna had always had trouble when it came to the flexibility of her legs. William almost had to lie on top of her to help her hold the correct position, pressing down on her bent leg. This was exquisite torture, to be leaning against her soft body like this, trying not to inhale her sweet scent, and never able to...

Suddenly, the unthinkable happened: she folded her leg so well that they touched. More than an arm or a leg. All along their bodies, and in that moment, he knew that she could feel his hardness, feel how much he wanted her.

Anna gasped and her body stiffened.

"Cos'è?" William asked guardedly, retreating to his own mat clumsily. What is it? Was she disgusted with him? Did she want to leave? Had he just irrevocably ruined their friendship?

Anna's thoughts were no less chaotic than William's. Far from feeling disgusted, she was deliberating how to answer his question. "I've never been able to get that one right," she said, trying to achieve a casualness that she did not feel. "I'm pretty shocked that I finally got it." Her poorly feigned nonchalance must have convinced him, because William relaxed slightly. Even though she managed to skate over the awkward moment, they finished the session in silence.

Anna couldn't stop thinking about the moment that their bodies had connected. She hadn't meant to react like she had, and it was entirely involuntary, but the little surprised noise had escaped her when she would have much rather been moaning. She had thought it was terrible to feel that way about her best friend, to want him like she did. Was it possible that William felt the same? It seemed that he certainly felt something.

Their controlled breathing was the only noise for the next thirty tortuous minutes.

When they had finished, William stood up abruptly, starling Anna out of her reverie. "I need to take a quick shower," he informed her. "I was working out earlier. You'll be okay on your own?"

Of course she would be okay here. He knew that. They practically lived at each other's apartments. "Sure. I'll just be warming up my scorin' hand." He looked baffled for a moment, as though his mind were miles away. "What do you say, Forte? Up for a resounding defeat in foosball?"

He barked a laugh as he disappeared into his bedroom. "Certo, Bookworm! That'd be the day!"

Anna pulled her hair free of its ponytail and wandered around the living room. The only reading material that William kept out in his living room was a coffee table book that highlighted the best museums in Italy, entirely in Italian. Anna had long since given up trying to read it, and instead amused herself by looking at the picture frames. Her favorite had always been one of a younger William, alone, his face screwed up in a hilarious transition from a scowl to a reluctant laugh.

Right about now, William would be finished disrobing and preparing to step under the stream of water to wash the sweat off of his hard body. Anna had never been so envious of a bar of soap before. She'd been to the gym with William enough times to be well-and-not-well-enough acquainted with his olive skin, the hard width of his shoulders, the cut of his abs, the well-defined V that disappeared into his waistband...Anna lifted the mass of her hair off her neck, heaving a sigh and hoping to chase off the unwelcome warmth. Think about something else. Think of something to relax you, like...like yoga! Yoga was relaxing. Rhythmic breathing, flexible positions, William leaning against her entire body, encasing her in heat, in longing, so hard where she was soft—

Maybe yoga wasn't as relaxing as she'd hoped. As she needed.

She leaned against his kitchen counter, daydreaming and fighting the daydream, and jumped when something moved against her elbows. Whipping around, Anna saw that it was a new picture she hadn't noticed before, of the two of them in the aftermath of a snowball fight. Carmen had taken it. It was one of her fondest memories—the night, years ago, when he had almost kissed her.

At the moment, one of her fondest memories was beginning to slide away from her, towards the other edge of the counter. She grabbed for it, but the tips of her fingers clumsily clutching for it only caused it to skitter backwards and disappear off the edge, followed by a sickening crunch of glass.

"Anna?" It was William, no doubt attracted by the noise. He was standing in the doorway of his bedroom, his hair damp, clad only in pants.

At the sight of his bare chest, Anna could not fight the perfect clarity of the memory of him on top of her, his hard body heating her up. A quick blush scalded her cheekbones. Before she could stop herself, she moaned. She just couldn't help it.

He strode across the room to her, instantly concerned. "Annabelle, are you hurt?" he asked intensely. "Dimmi."

She had to look up into his face now to answer him, he was that close. Damp and curly, his dark locks fell around his face, framing the sharpness of that shadowed jaw. A bead of water slowly formed at the end of one brown strand, just kissing his smooth, perfect shoulder. Shockingly, this didn't help her ability to be coherent. She felt as though she was drowning in his scent, unable to think beyond William.

"The frame. It broke," she said, her thoughts muddled. "I didn't mean to. Honest."

Gingerly, his warm fingers encircled her wrists, as he peered down at her palms. "Did you get cut?" Thank heavens, he didn't look angry about the picture frame.

Anna was awash in a sea of conflicting desires as William turned her hands over, still checking her skin for injuries. Should she move? Break the spell that had suddenly taken her over? Or remain frozen and allow him to care for her? Leave herself at the mercy of his strong hands?

If she followed her heart's clamoring and stayed put, Anna knew for a fact that she would pay for her weakness. She'd paid for it earlier, when William had gotten weirded out and been all uncomfortable and silent during their yoga session. How much worse would it be if she let things drag on more?

But all of her mind's arguments went unheeded as William continued his inspection, now running his hands down her forearms. His touch was gentle, yet it still awoke an irrepressible flame somewhere deep inside Anna. She needed more, more than this feather-light brush of his fingers.

She needed him.

William had already checked every spot of Anna's skin that might have conceivably been in contact with the broken glass. His hands had reached her shoulders by now. His next move, Anna expected, would be to shake her shoulders casually and make a glib comment, the way he always did when he touched her—to make it obvious that it was a friendly touch, that it meant nothing.

Instead, when he moved, it was his right hand sliding down her side, following the flow of her curves until he was holding her waist, drawing Anna closer to him. His other hand moved just as gently in the opposite direction, sweeping up along her neck, his thumb coming to rest on her cheekbone.

Painfully slow, William's eyes dragged up to meet Anna's gaze. She'd been staring up at him in a sort of trance, unable to think past the fluttering of her heart and the fact that William was touching her, he was touching her like she'd always wanted, and she wanted even more.

His eyes bored into hers intently. "You're okay," he said, the words both a reassurance and a sigh of relief.

"Of course I am," Anna said.

One corner of William's mouth quirked up at her response.

Then, because her mental facilities had completely shut down and Anna's fool mouth had run away from her, she heard herself blurt, "I'm with you."

As the words left her mouth, Anna's cheeks flooded red. Of course she was okay, her brain had thought—whenever she was with William, she was safe. She'd totally forgotten about the broken frame behind her, which was all William was asking about. No, the glass didn't cut me, was all she should have said, but instead she had gotten caught up in William's nearness and put her foot firmly between her teeth. Anna knew better, but she had allowed herself to briefly enjoy the feeling of unguarded contentment from being close to him—and had paid for it with unintentional, destructive honesty.

Like she'd just confessed to a shocking secret, William's eyes momentarily widened and his hand quickly withdrew from her waist.

Anna felt the loss of his touch and his warmth immediately. Her chagrined blush spread farther, threatening to cover her entire face as she waited for William to back away from her completely. A thick fog of regret began brewing in her mind. Could he tell how badly she wanted him? Did it disturb him that much? Was he going to ask her to leave?

All of her concerns were wiped away when William's warm fingers came up to her cheek, so that her face was cupped between his rough hands. He was still there. He wasn't making any move to get away. Anna couldn't quite believe it. He still hadn't looked away from her eyes, and the intensity of his dark gaze was making her heart pound.

They were standing so close that she could feel the heat radiating off of his body, filling the small space between them, which was rapidly shrinking. Without knowing exactly when, William had shifted, leaning closer and closer. He moved so slowly, letting her know without speaking that she had ample time to stop him, if she did not want him that close.

His eyes searched hers as he moved, looking—for what? A rejection that she would never give him? Instead, she closed her eyes once more, waiting for the moment...

He kissed her.

As their lips connected, Anna felt an electric current pass through her. She gasped slightly, her mouth parting open to his plundering kiss. Her fingers curled on his chest, wanting something to grab onto, and William's hands slid back some, so that his fingers were entwined in her hair, holding her lips possessively to his. As though he had anything to worry about. Anna's body was glued to his, unable to move away.

Desperate for more, Anna nipped at his bottom lip, moaning quietly. A noise that could only be described as a growl rumbled deep in William's throat as he reclaimed her mouth, burning his way inside. He grabbed her waist and pulled her even more tightly against him, so that she could feel his body all the way down. Including the hard length pressing against her, which seemed to beat with a pulse all its own. Anna ached to feel it better.

He was kissing her so passionately that she could feel each movement sink down into her chest, growing into an acute need for more. With a jerk of her head, Anna tore her lips away. There was flash of uncertainty in his eyes, the worry that he had miscalculated and misstepped, before Anna went up on her toes to run the tip of her tongue along his ear. He tasted like soap and something rougher, something inherently William.

Anna wanted to show him how his kisses made her feel, show him how much pleasure they gave. She wanted to please him, torture him as she was pleased, as she was tortured. Anna bit his neck. Once, twice, more, little nips up and down, soothed every so often by a teasing lick. Then she started sucking, and his hands were knotted in her shirt, and judging by the rapid rise and fall of his chest, he was enjoying it. His breathing almost sounded like gasps—

And then he tilted her head back up and began kissing her in earnest. There was nothing else in the world but William: no sight, no sound, the only sensation his lips. Her hands traced the planes of his muscled back. There was nothing that could ever compare to the sensation of touching his bare skin. As Anna's hands drifted further down, they slid to his sides, resting tentatively on his hips, as though she was uncertain as to what to do next.

William certainly knew. Without breaking the kiss, he swept her up into his arms and began carrying her back towards his bedroom.

Anna tried not to think about her head or feet hitting a doorjamb. William would keep her safe. And if he accidently slammed her into the doorway, he would make it up to her. Driving rational thought away, she simply continued to kiss him, unable to get enough of his lips, his tongue, the way she could feel each kiss deep inside of her body.

When they arrived at the side of his bed, William didn't pause to put her down gently. There was too much need in both of them for that. Instead, Anna found herself being pushed onto the bed with William quickly following, kissing his way along her neck, her shoulder, shoving aside the strap of her shirt to hungrily kiss and bite and suck the curve of her skin. She moaned with desire.

I want you so bad, she thought desperately. At his sharp intake of breath, she froze. Had she accidentally spoken aloud?

"E io te," he groaned in her ear. "I've wanted you for so long, Anna. Spogliati. Adesso, Annabelle." Get undressed now.

His breath in her ear, saying her name was almost too much to bear. Her back arched in surprised pleasure. His deep voice seemed to sink all the way down and only intensified the dull ache, the intense need she had at her center.

Then suddenly her top was ripped off and he was looking down at her body with a ridiculous grin. Immediately self-conscious, she made to cover herself, but he put an end to that by forcing her arms apart again and claiming her nearest nipple with his mouth.

She gasped, her fingers wrapping in his hair. The sensation of him sucking, pulling, biting at her nipple pooled between her thighs. She'd never imagined...

"William," she moaned. "That feels so good..."

His lips moved from her breast and she immediately felt the loss. Anna's noise of protest was silenced by William's kiss, his hand moving to capture her breast. The calluses of his palm scraping against her tightened nipple, combined with his lips connected to hers, filled her with pleasure—and excitement. She whimpered, feeling her nipples harden even more. And deeper, lower...her thighs rubbed themselves together, aching, needing...him.

Fumbling with excitement and nervousness—nervous? With William?—Anna tried to open his pants, but her uncertain fingers were no match for the zipper. William's hands replaced hers and within a matter of seconds he was naked. He didn't even think of hesitating as he peeled off her tight yoga pants, which she twisted out of eagerly.

Once she was free, he ran a hand down her back, trailing along her spine with rough, sure fingers. Anna felt her knees go weak. If she had still been standing, she would have fallen. His hand slid down still further, along her newly revealed curves, and then he grabbed her ass.

Anna surprised both of them by jerking in response—not away, but closer to his body. Well, that was interesting.

The slide of their bodies together, skin against skin, was incredible. Anna had never known anything that had felt this good. His hand moved back up her side and rediscovered her neck, her cheekbones, the delicate shell of her ear. The gentle caress of his fingertips was soon replaced by hunger as William went back to sucking on her bottom lip. He was driven on by burning need, just as she was.

Rather than have him gape at her naked body, which he looked dangerously close to doing, Anna rolled him onto his back and began kissing down his neck to his chest, a kiss for every time she had longed to do this very thing. His body was amazing.

He slipped a finger underneath her chin and tried to tilt her head back to his lips, but she was having none of that. She scooted her body down further and continued her kisses, scattering a trail down his chest.

When her lips had reached his hips, he groaned and weakly tried to bring her head up. "Annabelle, amor, I don't just want—"

She replied with her mouth still pressed against his skin, her lips curving up into a sensual smile. "Will, you have got to learn how to loosen up." She felt a shiver go through him.

Down, down, to where he throbbed for her, long and ready.

Anna paused then, her breath dancing along his skin, drawing from him a tortured groan before she drew closer and gently, slowly kissed his tip. His breath, already unsteady, stopped for that instant, and then picked up in a ragged pace.

Anna had five years' worth of fantasies to make up with this moment of stopped time, and she was going to draw as much from it as she could. She continued to tease him by refusing to suck, despite his body's obvious begging, but rather kissed all the way up and down his length, adding a lick in here and there. By the time she had transitioned all the way to simply licking up and down his shaft, over and over again, everywhere, his hands were knotted roughly in her hair. Smiling, she positioned her wet lips directly over his tip again, but this time she slipped her lips down over it, capturing the head in her soft, wet mouth.

He groaned with utter desire, then gasped as Anna gave in to the pressure of his hands on her head, and dove down to encase his entire cock in her mouth. It was so big, bulging into her throat. She pulled her head back up slowly, letting him drag back out infinitesimally, giving as much suction as she could to the action. She let it pop back out and then bent down for a second time.

Suddenly she felt herself yanked back up and pushed onto her back. William was leaning over her, panting and eyes burning.

"As good as that feels," he told her in between hungry kisses, "I'd much rather be able to see your eyes."

There was a shift, a redistribution of his weight, subtle but unmistakable, and Anna found herself looking up at William as his shoulders rose above her, his legs slid between hers, and heat brushed against the inside of her thigh. He was done teasing.

Anna hesitated for a fraction of a second, pulling back minutely. Was she ready for this? She'd never been this free with anyone before. Could this be a huge mistake?

Although his body was roaring to take what was in his arms and make it his, William dimly felt Anna pause. He stilled and looked at her, afraid he was moving too fast for her.

There was a flash of fear in her eyes. She was afraid...of him? As much as he wanted this, wanted her, William couldn't force this.

Gently, he said, "We don't have to..." while his mind was begging her, please, don't ruin this! Don't make us regret taking our chance!

"I—I know we don't," she murmured, and leaned in to kiss him again, her movements growing more assured.

William poured all the longing, desire, need, and love that had built up for the past five years into that kiss, and hoped she'd understand. She must have somehow, because she wrapped her arms tightly around his neck and deepened their kiss. Their tongues danced, stroking each other into a frenzy. Anna nodded against his lips.

"Please," she gasped. "Oh, please, William."

William felt himself throb with an extra surge of blood. Hearing Anna moaning like that, having it be his name on her lips, was so much sexier than he'd ever imagined. She was a dream, a fantasy. She was temptation incarnate.

Anna's puckered nipples brushed against William's hypersensitive chest as she arched her back, silently begging. Her hips were twitching in circles, communicating her need for him.

William moved closer—so close. His fingers slid through her hair, holding her lips to his, and his cock moved of its own accord, the head rubbing gently along her slit.

He had to fight to not groan aloud. She was soaking wet.

The sporadic contact of skin was proving too much to bear. "Please, Will," she was starting to whimper. "Oh, please."

She sucked in a gasp, feeling him pulse in response. She needed him. She needed to feel William inside of her.

"Please what?" William said, rubbing one perfect, creamy mound. This was exquisite torture, being so close but unconnected, waiting to take the plunge. It was agony, and yet, he could feel Anna getting even wetter.

"P—please," was all Anna could say, feeling like she could cry with the need. If he wanted, she would beg him. She would say whatever it took to have him. "Please take me..."

"Sì, Annabelle," William whispered. He slowly moved forward, claiming his own.

It wasn't fast enough for Anna, the impatient little thing. He was moving at the slowest pace imaginable, and she needed all of him—now.

The discomfort she hadn't planned on, but she could live with it. It was William, it was—it was painful, Lord have mercy that hurt, please get it over with—

"Faster," she pleaded, bucking her hips. This was even worse torture than before.

"We will go faster, amor," William said.

William was loving how tight, how perfect Anna felt, but it meant that they needed to go slowly. He just needed her to adjust to his size first, and then he could make love to her at any speed she desired.

He moved forward another inch, marveling at the sensation of being so close to her, so amazingly—she flinched. In pain. William froze, searching her face. She hid it quickly and well, but she could not mask the resistance of her body.

"Annabelle," he said slowly, unwanted realization though it was, "are you—"

"I'm fine," she said, though her clenched teeth betrayed the lie. "Please, William."

William was so unprepared for this. He'd never—with someone who hadn't—and she was hurting—maybe they should—

"But..." he tried. He didn't know what to say. His body withdrew minutely as he gently rubbed along her delicate cheekbone.

Anna huffed an impatient sigh. She was done waiting. She met William's eyes and held them as she deliberately wrapped her legs around his waist.

"I need you," she said. "Now."

With a groan, William gave into the passion beating at him and drove into her. Anna made a noise halfway between a moan and a cry, pressing her face into the curve of his shoulder. William could feel the tension in every muscle in her body. One hand stroked her hair as the other tenderly ran along her back, easing the tightness from her spine, until Anna gave a shuddering sigh and dropped her head back onto the pillow, smiling up at him. She bit her lip—a familiar gesture, but one that still made him throb—and arched against him.

Her eyes, alight with the same pleasure that was flooding William's body, stroked the fire within him to an inferno.

"Sì, ragazza mia," William gasped out, unable to control himself from going faster. He gave in to the desire that was driving them both on. He needed more of her, all of her, at once.

He needed to see Anna better, see how her lithe little body moved. William rolled onto his back, dragging Anna on top of him without breaking their connection.

"Take it, Annabelle," he whispered, driving up into her over and over again. "Make it your own."

Anna's head was thrown back in ecstasy, her hair tumbling down her back in tangled waves. Her mouth formed incoherencies, and her hands gripped his muscled shoulders as they moved. Her hips rolled sensually as she moved up and down, revealing their joining and then sheathing him tightly, over and over again.

Yes, this view was infinitely preferable.

It wasn't going to take much longer to send William over the edge. Every move Anna made sent licks of fire into William's body, and he could feel the pleasure building into an undeniable crescendo. Anna wasn't far off either, if the increasingly regular whimpering cries she was giving were any indication.

The sight of her breasts bouncing up and down with the rhythm of their thrusts was sending jolts of electric pleasure through William's body. He leaned forward and caught one nipple in his mouth, unwilling to neglect any part of her body as they moved together.

He flicked his tongue against the puckered peak, moaning deep in his throat, and Anna's breathing picked up at an even faster pace. Her hands were tangled in his hair, holding him tightly to her nipple.

"Oh, Annabelle, per favore," he groaned into her breasts. "Vieni, bella. Venga per me." Come for me, he begged, encouraged, ordered her. Come for him, with him.

It was all she needed to hear. The pleasure was spiraling tighter and tighter, and with his command finding its way into her soul, Anna was overtaken by an explosion of ecstasy.

Their bodies shuddered with the release. They gasped together, clinging tightly to each other and the sensations of pure pleasure. Anna unraveled first, slumping boneless against William's chest, a satisfied smile drifting across her face.

William soon followed suit, sprawling back against the pillows. They fell asleep there, naked and sated, until Anna's roving fingers woke William up several hours later. He grinned without opening his eyes. They were not leaving this bed anytime soon.

### CHAPTER TWELVE

William woke up late the next morning to an empty bed. Anna's perfume still lingered in his sheets, but she was gone.

When had she left? And why? He racked his brain for a reason, but couldn't think of where he might have gone wrong. It had happened suddenly, it's true, but they had known each other—and he had wanted her—for five years. Maybe she was turning shy again? Did she regret it? Surely not. It had been too good for her to regret it.

But he had come very close to admitting to her just how long he had wanted this, and just how he felt about her. Had that been it? William groaned and pressed his fists into his eyes. You couldn't just throw something like that out there! You had to work up to it, prepare her for it. He knew Anna. Come on too strong, and she bolted.

A rattle of plates shook him out of his agonized self-berating. He pulled his hands down to find Anna at the foot of his bed. In one of his button-downs. Holding breakfast.

If he had ever seen a sexier woman, William certainly couldn't think of it now. The hunger in his stomach battled for precedence over a deeper, hotter hunger. She was here, and she was his. At the thought, he had to bite down a pleased growl.

Mine.

"What are you smiling about?" Anna said, handing him a plate.

He shook his head as she clambered back into bed with her own share. He would tell her soon. Very soon. He just had to make sure she was ready to hear it. "I'm glad you didn't leave," he said instead, opting for partial truth.

Anna shrugged carelessly, and the shirt slipped down her shoulder. "I was hungry."

"You are amazing," William said fervently as he bit into his omelet.

She smiled back. "You may want to look at the wreck I left your kitchen in before you say that."

They ate quickly, both left ravenous by their activity of the previous night. In the daylight, it was too easy to catch one sneaking glances at the other—sometimes nervous, sometimes appreciative. William's gazes were more of the latter.

As his stomach filled, his appetite began to grow again. Having Anna in his shirt, in his bed...he could get used to it. William had never felt so content with his life. If only he could tell Anna how happy she had made him. The woman had given him the most amazing night of his life—and then made breakfast.

At the moment, all Anna was making was a face as she attempted to comb out her hair with ineffectual fingers. William couldn't fight back his grin at the sight of her struggling against her messy hair.

"It's so tangled..." she was muttering. The snarls were too persistent for her fingers and the secondary attack of flattening the volume and shoving the mass of curls back was met with equal resistance.

"Do you have a brush?" Anna asked, her hands coming to rest with a sigh.

"Leave it." William liked seeing her hair wild like this. It was a nice change from her usual sedate bun. The strands that flared from her scalp like an avenging halo made her look fiery. Gloriously untamed.

William wanted to sink his hands into the warm silk and feel it run along his skin once more. He wanted to sink back into her mouth, reclaim it, reclaim her. His body clamored for her skin, her hair, her lips, her touch.

She was much too far away for what William wanted.

"Come here," he told her, his voice gone to gravel.

Finally abandoning the futile efforts against her hair, Anna took the hand he'd reached for her. She wasn't expecting his powerful tug as soon as he had her within his grip, and she tumbled onto his chest with a startled laugh.

"What are you doin'?" she said, giggling as his fingers trailed up her bare thigh.

William nipped at the pure ivory column of her throat. "Voglio," he murmured against her throat.

Her breath hitched. "What do you want?" Still she teased.

"Ti voglio," came the raspy whisper. "Ho bisogno Annabella mia."

What was meant to be a laugh came out half-moaned. "Not for long," Anna finally said, dimpling down at him. Her fingers came to rest on his wide chest, sending shivers down into his bloodstream with their featherlight caresses. "I need to do the dishes."

"I wouldn't worry about them," William said. His teeth grazed her earlobe and he was rewarded by a shudder that ran through her body. "I have plans for you that involve you being off your feet." Or if she would rather, they could be on their feet. Anything she wanted. However she wanted.

Anna's eyes darkened at his husky promise and William had to fight back a moan. He could watch her on the cusp of seduction for hours.

When she started to move in slow, sensuous little circles, however, torturing and enticing them both with the nearness of their distance, hours shortened to seconds.

William rolled to his side suddenly, bringing Anna around his body and down onto the bed. Right where he needed her.

And with Anna gazing up at him with wide eyes and wider smile, William was lost, adrift in her. The look of her, the feel of her...the love of her.

He needed to kiss her. Again. And another. The connection of their mouths as she met him, brush for brush, stroke for stroke, of their bodies and their minds left William with a blazing fire in his chest. He'd never felt more full, more complete.

He'd never felt more.

A gentle tug on a lock of his hair recalled William to reality. Anna was staring back at him.

"What is it?" she whispered.

Should he tell her?

A memory flashed: Anna grimacing, trying to think of any excuse to back out of a date because she'd been surprised by a dozen roses.

Poor John had never had a chance, but William had a chance and a choice: Ease her into the idea of love, or tell her now—and risk seeing her bolt from his life forever.

William knew Anna. You couldn't dump any big news on the girl. She couldn't handle the pressure. She needed time to adjust to the idea—like graduation. Let it approach gradually, naturally, and she would accept it.

So rather than blurt out whatever fool words had taken up residence in his heart, William settled for the next thought—excuse—for staring at her with such intensity.

"I always knew you would look like this, Annabelle," he murmured, tracing the slope of her jaw, her neck with one hand.

Her eyebrows quirked up. "Like what?"

Wild. Satisfied. Beautiful. Perfect.

He didn't know which to choose, how to put into words what he couldn't even put into thought.

And then the dreaded follow-up question, the one he hadn't thought to forestall: "Always?"

Cazzo.

Always—why did he have to admit to always? The word had slipped past his teeth before he could realize that it should be held back. That it would reveal too much.

He would have to tell her the truth. At least part of it. Not the fact that he'd been fantasizing about this moment forever and been in love with her at least that long.

"Every time you went out on a date and I tried not to imagine the end—" how so many of his own dates had ended, with a warm body in bed and emptiness in his chest. "I would be consumed with jealousy, thinking they got this view..." This perfection. William rubbed a strand of her hair between his fingers, marveling at the softness of it. Not noticing the hard, wary tension that was creeping into her shoulders. "I never thought I would be your first."

Had never dared to hope for that miracle, that perfect moment in which she was his, utterly, she was his, first and only. In which no other man had touched her, and William would die before any other did.

As his quiet words washed over her, Anna felt ice seep into her bones. I never thought I would be your first. He thought so little of her? She'd only ever had eyes for him. Only ever felt alive in the safety of his presence.

"You must have a very low opinion of me," Anna said quietly, trying to keep her emotions in check. "To think I jumped into bed with every guy who asked me out?"

There was an oblivious kiss dropped on her nose, packing more pain into the wound with its impersonality. With its detachment.

"Not every guy," William said with a fast smile.

An empty one. What was he saying?

"But I always figured with the way you—" William bit his tongue just in time to avert disaster. Definitely the wrong thing to say. After the fights they'd had in earlier years over it, now was the absolute worst time to bring up Anna's wardrobe. Besides, he did like how Anna wore her clothes, liked the way her body flowed in them. Maybe not when it tortured him and encouraged every other guy in sight, but when he could touch her—and now he could—oh, it was the sweetest kind of pleasure.

William had always known it would be like this. Always hoped that his patience and agony would be rewarded and the universe would grant him one touch, one kiss with Anna. It had given him all he had ever dared to want and so much more—and then stopped him before he could tangle his words and ruin everything.

But she was still waiting for him to finish his sentence, blinking up at him expectantly.

"I always thought that when it was my turn—"

The instant the word was out, William knew that he had been celebrating prematurely. And that he was screwed.

Anna jerked as though he had slapped her.

"Your...turn?" The words wrenched from her throat.

Funny, but even though the question dropped like a bomb, it wasn't loud to Anna's ears. Then again, it was difficult for her to hear much of anything with that odd rushing in her ears. Any why was the room tilting like that?

Five minutes ago, Anna had been blissfully content. Hopeful, even. Now, with one sentence, it was all crumbling around her.

She'd known William for five years. Had known him in many moods, including scary angry and artlessly happy. She'd never known him to be cruel.

Of course, a small, cold voice whispered back at her, you've never jumped into bed with him before, either.

"What did you mean by that?" Anna had to know. There was no way he could mean it...

But the way that his eyes started to dart around the room, giving proof to his nervousness, told Anna everything that she didn't want but needed to know. William had let slip something he hadn't intended for her to hear.

"Did—did you plan this?"

Anna couldn't breathe. Who knew why she had asked the question. She had heard enough already. But she couldn't leave it alone, the same way a scab demands to be picked at.

His eyebrows raised at the question, as though the answer was obvious. And maybe it was. Just not to Anna.

"Of course I planned for this to happen. I—"

Anna had thought that she couldn't feel worse, going from complete bliss to utter wretchedness, with pain blooming anew in her chest.

She'd been wrong.

Pull away. Now. Get back while you can still move. Don't puke yet. Ignore the roiling of your stomach until you've gotten away from this sick, twisted man you thought you knew. You thought you—don't even think it, don't you dare.

Anna drew back, out of the snake's reach, sat up, and threw her legs over the side of the bed. The cold rush of air that hit her bare skin upon emerging from the warmth of the sheets was nothing compared to the ice she felt creeping over her.

Deep breaths.

Eyes snapped shut, Anna focused on taking one deep breath after another, hoping it would calm her stomach long enough for her to get away. In through the nose, out through the mouth. Or was it the other way around? She couldn't remember ever feeling so sick.

Unbidden, unwanted, he spoke again. "I've wanted this for years." His voice sounded almost unsteady, as though he was nervous. What did he have to be nervous about? He'd gotten what he wanted. Anna had to swallow the revulsion—and the returning taste of eggs—creeping up her throat.

Years? He'd been planning to screw her and screw her over for years?

"Per anni, Annabelle, magari—"

She sensed, rather than saw, his hand reaching out for her.

"Don't call me that," she managed though a jaw locked stiffly against tears or anything else that might come out.

"Per che no?" William genuinely sounded confused—concerned. Clueless. "Va bene, Annabelle? Cos'è male?"

He wanted to know if she was okay? What was wrong? Did he really not understand the effect that his horrifying honesty was wreaking on her? Anna felt betrayed. She felt sick. She felt used.

And you wanted this, the cold voice sneered at her. You begged him for it.

Not this. She'd never wanted this. She had only wanted—what she'd always wanted—William.

Not so for him. He had wanted her, but only because—because he wanted his turn. And now that he'd had it? Now? Now he was innocent, uncomprehending of her pain.

Perhaps his innocence wasn't baseless. Anna was sure that the girls he had slept with in the past had gone into it with the same understanding that he seemed to have. That it meant nothing. That she meant nothing.

He was wrong. This had meant so much more.

Or it was supposed to.

Anna wasn't going to fall apart on William. She wouldn't give him the satisfaction. She couldn't let him see how completely he had succeeded or how deeply he had managed to cut. Anger, the last bastion of the wounded, was her only recourse.

Where were her clothes? Anna was getting out of the room, out of his apartment, and she was getting out immediately.

"Cosa stai—?"

"It's what you do, isn't it?" she forced out through numb lips and clenched teeth. "After a one-night stand? Get up, get out?" So long as she focused on her anger, the pain was ignorable. At least for the time being. Stay angry, and she would stay together.

If William hadn't been firmly in the middle of it, he would have fallen out of bed from the shock.

"What?"

A one-night stand? She only wanted...? Watching Anna retrieve her shirt, her pants, fish around for her shoes, was too much like watching Chelsea go through the same process before dancing out with a breezy "That was fun, Billy. Thanks!" Or Kathryn. Or any number of girls who had entered his bed and then left it immediately after getting what they wanted. Leaving him to the distinct feeling that he was superfluous. He was a means to an end. They wanted all of a man and none of William.

Anna wasn't supposed to be like that. She was supposed to know more of him. He'd hoped that she would want more of him, too.

Maybe she was mad because she was disappointed? Had he been bad? No—that wasn't possible. Anna had enjoyed what they'd done. He'd made sure of that. Or maybe it had hurt more than she'd let on?

He tried a more conciliatory tack. "I know when it's your first time it isn't always—"

"Oh, don't act like that makes a difference," she snapped at him, now ripping his shirt off in favor of her own.

She was getting dressed. To leave. She was leaving him.

"It does," William replied, sitting up in his earnestness. And he was her first. "If I'd known, I would have been more—I shouldn't have—" He floundered for words.

Attacked her like a starving animal? Taken her without thought or care? Taken her virginity?

"It's not something I take lightly," he said seriously. "I never meant—I never would have done that to you."

The words hung in the room empty before slowly dropping, one at a time. Mocking him with their weightlessness. Their falsehood.

Yes, he would have. The instant Anna had asked him, even knowing she was innocent, knowing she was untouched, he would have made love to her without a second thought. Maybe with more care, but he still would have had her.

"Yes, you would." Anna's quiet voice broke into his thoughts like a pickaxe. She wasn't moving anymore, thankfully, but neither was she looking at him. Anna faced the window, one shoe dangling from her hand, still back to the bed. To William. "But then it would have been because poor Anna Hardwick managed to make it to twenty-three with hymen intact. I'd be a pity lay."

"One thing I could never do, Anna," William said evenly, "is pity you." He admired her too much. He loved her too much.

He wouldn't have even slept with her out of pity, it was apparently impossible that he'd done it out of desire or—no, there was exactly one reason that her false friend ever found himself in bed with a woman. Anna hugged her arms tightly across her waist, fighting to find the power to put her second shoe on.

"So instead," she said, voice dripping acid, "I get to be another notch in Guglielmo Forte's bedpost. Lucky me."

"What? You're not—where are you getting that from?" William scrambled out of bed to get to her, but she jerked out of reach, using the space as an excuse to pull on her shoe, allowing her to stand, small and proud and now fully dressed in his room, ready to escape. Unwilling to remain in such a vulnerable state in the cold room, William pulled on a pair of his pants he'd left draped over the back of a chair.

There was something wrong here. A toxicity brewing, pushing them apart as sure as a glacier. Anna was careful to keep the distance between them. For every step that William took, she took two away.

Why the sudden coldness, the abrupt conviction that last night—that she—meant nothing? She was determined to hold on to the pretense, as though that was somehow the better alternative to William admitting he'd wanted her for so long.

That was it, wasn't it? William's stomach clenched. Coming so close to saying that he'd been in love with her for years—Anna couldn't abide the thought and was convincing herself that was the opposite was the case to avoid the terror of too much truth.

William had hoped that she could accept hearing that he wanted—and had for years—to be with her. She had said as much in return last night, and given William hope that he could have lived centuries without if it meant not having it ripped away with first light.

But words whispered in the height of passion and need can be less than meaningless, an insidious voice hissed at William. You'll say anything to get a woman into bed.

That was unfair. He hadn't been like that for years. He hadn't even tried to date anyone since he'd accepted his feelings for Anna.

Who was still backing away from him, her eyes blazing.

"Anna..." He tried reaching out to her again, but she flinched. He had to settle for vocal entreaty. "Allora, just come back to bed, Anna. We can keep talking, or we—we can—" It was all falling to shreds right in front of him, and he couldn't stop it. "I know that it's not your first time anymore, but I can—"

"Why are you so fixated on that?" Anna all but shouted at him. Yelling would force back the tears. Fighting would force back the pain. It had to. "What do you want from me? An apology? Tears? A medal?"

Ah, resorting to anger to avoid her problems. How very Anna. "Stop shutting me out!" he shot back. "I don't want anything!" Except you, all of you. "It's just—well, a girl's first time should be special." William flushed to the roots of his uncombed hair. She should have had flowers, champagne, and sweetness, not an uncultured Italian having at her like a man starved.

"And that wasn't special." Anna's voice had gone calm again—dangerously so. "Of course not." How could she hope that Girl Number 143 would be any more special, any more meaningful, than Girl Number 142?

Anna choked, her control perilously close to crumbling. Calm words gave way to the sensation that something had torn in her throat, fluttering with raw edges, and anger failed her in favor of tears threatening to fill her eyes. She had to leave. Immediately.

To her dismay, William followed her, step by step, room through room, until she reached for the doorknob, and his honeycombed accent almost succeeded in forestalling her.

"Anna, don't go," he said. "Not like this."

"I can't stay here any longer." She wrenched the door open.

"Per favore, Annabelle," he said. "Wait for—"

No. She couldn't hear those words again. Could not stomach the sickness they gave.

"You want to know why I was still a virgin?" Anna said, so abruptly quiet that William had to strain to catch the words. "It's because I never wanted any man but you."

And then she was gone, slamming the door so hard that he heard the windows rattle.

And she was gone.
The next installment in the Untimely Series

Don't miss the conclusion of Anna and William's story in Never the Right Time, Part II...

Available wherever books are sold.

She walked away from the only man she ever loved, and he will never know how much it cost her. Now, years later, Anna has made a decent life for herself in Dallas, teaching her literary favorites.

William has found nothing but success since graduating college. Nothing but success and loneliness, since Anna walked out of his life. When a consulting opportunity opens up at the university that Anna is now teaching at, he leaps at the chance. But nothing could have prepared him for losing her to another man.

William may have grown up, but his charming grin is just as captivating as ever, and Anna is finding it increasingly difficult to ignore him—and to keep him out of her heart—as he rides his motorcycle into the faculty parking lot each morning. She fights her feelings at every turn, and at every turn he's there.
About the Author

**Lizzie Socorro** is from the South, but is currently living in self-imposed exile in the cold North. She has a dog named Bingley and a cat named Collins, and they hate each other. Lizzie divides her time between trying to keep her hair in check, fighting with her lemon of a dishwasher, and volunteering at her local animal shelter. Lizzie especially loves history and the arts, and anything that brings them together, like historical fiction. She also loves to hear from her readers.

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