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“I will,” Krista says, and Allen the Dick charges off, slamming the school entrance door behind him.

  “Sorry about that,” Krista whispers. She turns and pokes her head inside the door to her classroom. “I'll be right in, Corina.”

  “Don't matter,” I say, though it does. It matters that there's a dude who doesn’t see her, sniffing around in her life.

  ʼCause I do. I see all of her.

  “Allen doesn't intend to be like that. He gets all fussy when I don't communicate.”

  I frown. “Communicate what?”

  Krista lifts a shoulder. “What’s going on. But this time…” She laughs a little. “I didn't know the direction my life would take until three days ago. Hell, my parents hardly knew.”

  Her eyes widen, and she covers her mouth. “I'm sorry,” she mumbles behind her hand. “I have a bit of a potty mouth.”

  I grin. Nothing compared to mine.

  “It's okay. See ya tomorrow, Krista.”

  She nods.

  “You did well today, Trainer.”

  I keep walking toward the door her controlling boyfriend just went through.

  “Trainer?”

  I turn, hating to see her one last time—because I want it so badly.

  Our eyes meet, and hers are solemn. “You did well,” she repeats.

  My face gets hot again, and I know I'm fucking blushing. I don't say nothinʼ. I just nod.

  Safer.

  Chapter 7

  Krista

  Allen has me rattled. I can barely enjoy my time with Corina. She reminds me so much of Trainer. They're hugely different, but at the core, they're the same: misunderstood.

  I don't know why, but somehow, the students are always so clear to me. It's like I've got x-ray vision or something.

  I see them.

  I get them.

  They hide because they've had to. Saying I'm a great teacher wouldn't be accurate. I'm great at being intuitive.

  It's my strongest asset… and my greatest fault.

  My gaze goes to Corina, who's saddled with this horrible tick. She's also a non-traditional learner. Her learning was a fail before she ever made first grade.

  Thankfully, I always get the squirmers and people that can't sit still. Her tick doesn't register with me. It's just a part of who she is.

  “Who was that?” Corina whispers. She dips her head, letting the curtain of her dishwater-blond hair hide the eye that jumps around all the time.

  I don't answer the question. “You don't have to do that with me,” I say.

  She looks up, startled. “Do what?” Corina momentarily forgets about her eye, and it twitches. Self-consciously, she puts her hand over her eyeball and stares at me out of a beautifully flecked greenish-brown hazel orb.

  “Hide the tick in your eye. I don't care about that.”

  “Ah-huh,” she replies, clearly unconvinced.

  “I need you to use your finger, so you're going to have to let the eye jump.” I lift my shoulders in a dismissive shrug, telling her it’s no big deal.

  Corina bites her bottom lip almost hard enough to draw blood, but she slowly lowers her hand.

  The eye twitches, and a defeated sigh whispers between us.

  Corina waits for me to do the expected. Look uncomfortable. Laugh. Turn away from noticing. Whatever.

  I don't. I stare at the jumping, twitching, leaking eye.

  “Thank you,” she whispers.

  “For what?” My eyebrows knot.

  “For not caring,” she says instantly.

  I smile, feeling the expression reach my eyes, creasing the corners. “Oh, I care. More than you know.”

  Then I turn away. To my work.

  Our work.

  *

  I can't return to my condo.

  I'm fit to bursting. The day was a-fricking-mazing. All three students did well—especially the socially awkward guy at the end, Dwayne.

  I did well.

  This is my purpose. The reason I was meant to be alive.

  I twirl on the way to my Fiat, like Eliza Doolittle in that old film, My Fair Lady, that my parents used to watch. I spin with happiness.

  I have to tell Sam. She's going to die.

  And someone needs to know how inappropriate my feelings are toward a certain, tall, dark and dangerous.

  Dangerously vulnerable.

  That's what Brett Rife—Trainer—is.

  I grasp the handle on my car and pop in, locking the doors out of habit.

  I wonder how Trainer ended up with that name, then shrug. He seems like he has deep reasons for things in his life. Secrets.

  I'm curious to know them.

  After tapping out a quick text to Sam, I wait for her to ping back.

  She does within seconds.

  Coincidentally, I'm sitting in the parking lot of the school where we first met.

  In kindergarten.

  We’ve lived mirrored lives with boring parents who stay together and affirm their offspring.

  Unheard of.

  Hells yes, come on over, Sam texts back.

  I start my car and travel the five blocks to her house. Her parents were killed in a twenty-car pile-up after we graduated from high school, and Sam inherited their house in Kensington Heights.

  And a set of new parents. Mine.

  I take a deep, cleansing breath.

  *

  Samantha Brunner is a court stenographer.

  She refers to herself as a fly.

  As in, on the wall. We giggle over that.

  “I'm just nosey and want to hear all the juicy tidbits,” she'll say.

  Her honey-colored hair is a mass of dark gold curls that whip around her shoulders as she pulls open the door when I've barely had time to knock.

  Sam's hair is actually quite long, but it's so curly, the length is hidden in springiness.

  Saying Sam has energy is an understatement. She likes to write off her excessive exuberance by saying, “I sit on my ass all day, so I'm rearing to go when I'm outta there!”

  Deep-chocolate eyes with a rim of bright navy blue greet me.

  “Okay, I want all the details of this new ‘job.’” She puts air quotes the last word, and

  I roll my eyes. Like I have a choice?

  “And Allen showed for the first day of this new gig? Holy crow—what a colossal ass.”

  Sort of.

  “I'm fucking grief-stricken I introduced you two.” Sam mock-slaps her forehead in disgust. “Come in here!” She jerks me inside and shuts the door, hitting the locks.

  I follow her inside the dim interior and get a melancholy pang. It's been five years since Sam's parents were killed, but she hasn't altered the interior much.

  The inside of the house has a mild shrine-ish feel.

  Sam doesn't need to work. Both of her parents had healthy life insurance policies. Since she does work, she has the money to refurbish the place. Give it her own personal stamp.

  She hasn't.

  I guess Sam needs more time.

  “Can you believe this shit?” she says, scooping up a pile of mail at the edge of the beige-colored laminate countertop.

  She wags the letters around for a few seconds then slaps them on the counter.

  I pick them up.

  They're addressed to her dead parents.

  Morons, I think, disgusted with the powers that be for not getting their facts straight, five years post-mortem.

  “Don't they know they're dead?” she asks in a thready voice.

  Sam always gets strung out toward the anniversary of their death.

  I know it by heart. It's next week.

  Moving behind her, I wrap my arms around her small body. She's terribly tall but as thin as a whip. Sam always says she wants my ass and boobs.

  I don't think so; grass is always greener.

  Sam looks like a model. Her dad was a mixed-race black man, and her mother was a porcelain doll. They made a beautiful daughter together.

  A sad one.

 
Sam perks up, turning in the circle of my arms and wiping her eyes.

  “Enough of this bullshit!” she whips a finger in the air. “How'd I even get here, anyway?”

  “Assholes sent mail for your dead parents.”

  She scowls, wrinkling her perfect brow. “Yeah, fuckwits,” she mutters.

  We laugh, and the sounds melts away the sadness.

  “Wait, I need coffee for this.”

  I move over to the couch that still faces a humungous room-length fireplace—classic 70s style. Real masonry to the brick foundation, it’s sort of cheesy now. The house was the last one built in the development and faces Clark Lake, which is more pond than lake. But the area behind the house can't be developed, so the house has a pretty view of a permanent greenbelt.

  Trees I don't know the name for fan out where four picture windows rise from floor to ceiling, framing silky fronds tipped with delicate pink blooms.

  Spent blooms from the large ornamental weeping cherry tree at the corner of the small yard litter the ground like pink snow, and a large boulder is beside it like an anchor. A chain-link fence divides Sam's property with the low maintenance park that runs immediately behind it.

  It's peaceful. Unlike Sam's life.

  Sam looks in the same direction my gaze is turned toward, taking a sip of black coffee that she just made with her Keurig.

  “The trees seem like they're talking among themselves,” she comments wistfully.

  I close my eyes, listening to them rustle through the kitchen window that's cracked open a couple of inches. The forest reaches down to the easy shores of the glorified pond, and lots of the trees appear to be nearly a hundred years old.

  “Second mature growth,” I say aloud, guessing the area was clear cut a century ago and these are the babies of yesteryear, all grown up.

  I'm a tiny bit of a tree hugger. Love nature. Love what it provides me. Beauty, peace… hope. I can name the evergreens, though the names for the deciduous trees right in Sam's yard are harder to remember.

  “Huh?” Sam gives me a look. “You're getting all daydreamy. ‘Kay, so before the brain fog rolls in”—she taps the rim of my cup, and I shoot her a dirty look—“tell me how your day went. And I don't want to hear about Asshole Allen first. That text saying he did the asshole-show-up slayed me.”

  I hide my smirk. When Sam introduced me to him, she was only acquainted with him as a lawyer she’d met at work and didn't know him well enough to thoroughly vet his character.

  Allen's fine. He's just… Allen.

  I tell her everything. She stops me a dozen times to ask about Trainer.

  “Did you look at his penis?”

  “No!” I reply emphatically.She replies with raised brows, calling me a liar.

  And she’s right.

  “Was there chemistry?”

  “He's a student,” I reply.

  “So?” Sam says, brows popping. “He's over eighteen. You're not pulling a Mary Kay Letourneau.”

  So creepy.

  “He's definitely over age. It's not that. I want him to trust me, not jump on his bones. Besides…” I shrug.

  “Don't give me one word about Allen. You're not into him anymore, Krista. I mean, when was the last time you slept together?”

  It's been a while—like nearly a half year. I mean, Allen was a nice guy, but he’s gotten kind of possessive lately. He seemed to have a sixth sense that I was pulling away… which made him push harder.

  The fact is, we just have lousy chemistry, and he’s not really on point with what gives me pleasure. He just wants to stick me and get off, but I'm not a human pincushion. I want more. He's only my second boyfriend, and he's the worst at meeting my sexual—and emotional—needs.

  “He's a limp noodle in bed.” Sam's thoughts echo my own.

  I feel like I owe Allen, somehow, and I hate that obligatory feeling.

  “I didn't tell you that, Sam.”

  She rolls her eyes, sitting down on the same couch as me and curling her legs beneath her. “Ya don't have to. There's no fire when you talk about Allen. It's more like distaste.” She wrinkles a pert nose. “Like you tasted a piece of fruit going bad and want to spit it out.”

  A laugh bursts out of me. “That bad?”

  “Uh-huh.” Sam nods vigorously then winks. “Hells yes.”

  I give my head a little shake. “God, you're something.”

  “Yep.” She wraps her fingers around her mug, warming her hand. She shoots a scowl outside. “It's effing cold for June.”

  I glance at her partially open window, tilting my head toward the kitchen, and restate the obvious, “You're letting all the cold air in.”

  “Fresh air,” Sam qualifies with a slight shrug.

  We sit in companionable silence while I drink coffee with enough cream and sugar to qualify the concoction as something other than actual coffee. I only hope I can sleep tonight after the extra caffeine jolt.

  Sam's takes hers black. Like punishment.

  After a minute or so, Sam says, “So Trainer?” Her full lips curve like a Cheshire Cat.

  I can't help the blush that makes my cheeks hot. “He's really rough around the edges,” I try to repeat what I've already said.

  “Bad boy,” she sings then adds, “Not like Allen!” Sam slaps her thigh then spins her index finger in a circle. “Love that whole program.”

  I laugh. “You're no help.”

  “Help for what?” She sets her empty cup on the sofa table behind us.

  “You said he swore at you and stomped around the class.”

  “It's just bravado and self-defense.” I lift a shoulder. “He's never had anyone care or look too deeply at why he's illiterate. Like a lot of dyslexics, others assume they're stupid. When actually, it couldn't be further from the truth.”

  I glance at my half-drank coffee. Cream has made it beige. “His eyes. God, Sam—his eyes.”

  I look up as her brow screws into a delicate frown. “What? You said they're all clear green. Hot.”

  “Wounded,” I correct. “There's pain I saw there before he shut me out.”

  “Listen to me, Krista.”

  My gaze rises to meet hers.

  “You cannot save everyone. You're a teacher, not a shrink.”

  My face turns to the window again. Watching the tree branches caress each other, I hear their whispers. I hear one of the learners I teach even more clearly.

  What do I do about Trainer?

  The one I hear the loudest.

  Chapter 8

  Trainer

  I stare at my cell phone screen for a long time.

  The text I sent Storm is a memorized phrase. One of many that I've saved on my phone so I can pretend better.

  People don't know how lucky they are to see letters and understand what they mean.

  Mama didn't know I couldn't learn. Course, Mama wasn't paying attention to much except whichever Arnie had her on her back.

  I look away from my cell, gazing into the deep woods that surround the club like a battalion of green.

  Something I do a hell of a lot—like thinking about shit alone.

  I release a pent-up exhale, digging my hair out of the tie at my nape and re-doing it.

  Mama loves me. She just don't see me.

  Rubbing my chest, I can't get rid of the tightness there. Never been afraid before. Except when I was too young to be anything but hurt by the Arnies.

  Now I'm afraid.

  So afraid my teeth are numb in my mouth. That teacher—Krista Glass—she fucking sees shit to my toenails.

  Gotta keep my distance. Gotta take the class in case I go to court for the turds whose asses I kicked.

  Remembering that fancy prick who was a jerk to Krista when I was standing right there… makes the distance harder. Want to find out what kind of a prick he is. He might be an Arnie.

  Fancy suits don't put me off none. Anyone can be that kind of man. Seen ʼem in all shapes and sizes.

  In the end, they're the same.
>
  “Hey, bud,” Noose says, plopping down on the wide back concrete step of the club where I’m perched with my uneasy thoughts.

  “Hey,” I say, not turning.

  He claps me on the back. Noose was a taskmaster when I was a prospect, but he was fair. Never talked down to me.

  Never treated me like I was dumb, even though I probably acted the part.

  He bangs out a cig and, stuffing it between his lips, asks a muffled question, “How'd it go?”

  I let the silence drag out. Gives me time to work over a reply.

  Noose waits, which is his way.

  “Embarrassed. Angry,” I say truthfully, staring at my scuffed boots.

  “Fuck it.” Noose springs the lid free from his beer with his tungsten wedding band and rolls the chilled glass bottle across his forehead.

  After a couple of minutes, he says, “Gonna miss this cold snap. Always fucking hot as hell.”

  I smile. True. Us guys run warm-blooded.

  Which makes me think of Krista.

  I take a pull of my own icy beer. Need to figure things out. Not used to having to. I like the club. It keeps things simple. My mind zones, and I can do what I'm told and get loyalty and respect in return. Road Kill MCcompletes me.

  Krista, and my obsessing over her, screws up all that small amount of peace I lucked into carving out for myself.

  “What else?” Noose asks causally.

  Noose isn't casual. He's always rooting around for answers, wanting to know the why or what behind things. It's just him.

  I'm not an actor. Never been good at keeping a straight face. So I don't bother. Besides, Noose has taught me a sort of fragile trust in the last couple of years.

  Could've been the first time he knocked two guysʼ skulls together because they called me dumb.

  Began there, I figure. Me loving him.

  Guys don't love, they say. But when you haven't had any, the emotion sneaks up on a man, tackling him when he's not expecting it.

  I'd go to the ground for my brothers. But I have a soft spot for Noose.

  Even if he did have me clean up after the orgies. Fucker.

  I give a rough exhale. “There's a girl.”

  “Figured with that moon face ya got.” He sips his beer, issuing a quiet snort.

  I frown.