Page 98 of Broken Vows

I’m not sure I could absorb anything new right now. Paul is at the front of the room talking through sample questions, but my mind keeps slipping away from him and back to last night. To Levi and the broken, helpless sounds he made when I pushed him too close to the edge and then pulled him back again. The way his body trembled under my touch.

Heat crawls up my neck. I shift in my seat and force my eyes back to the notes in front of me, but it’s useless. The numbers blur. The words on the page stop meaning anything. Levi has taken up residence in my head, and some frightening part of me likes having him there.

Which is exactly the problem.

I’m too old to be sitting in class replaying last night like a lovestruck teenager. I have a divorce to survive, a pregnant daughter, a lawyer who may or may not know my name, and a math test so bad it should have come with a condolence card.

And yet all I can think about is Levi and the way he made me turn around again last night.

I’d worried I was boring him, so I shifted to turn away. But Levi stopped me almost immediately.

He wanted to see my face. That was the part that undid me.

Then he just looked at me. Dazed. Almost stunned. Not confused, exactly. More like he couldn’t quite believe he was allowed to be there with me.

No one has ever looked at me like that before. Like I was the most wanted thing in the world.

I bite my lip hard, warmth flooding my cheeks even now.

“Carmen.”

My head snaps up. Paul is looking at me from the front of the room, one hand resting on a stack of worksheets. A few students glance in my direction, and I sit a little straighter.

“Yes?”

“About your last test,” he says. “I was marking late, and I think I may have focused too much on the answers rather than the working. I’d like to have another look at it, if that’s alright.”

For a second, I just stare at him. “Oh. I don’t have it with me.”

“That’s fine.” He gives me a polite smile. “Bring it next time and I’ll go through it properly.”

I nod slowly.

He moves on before I can ask anything else.

That’s strange. Very strange. Paul doesn’t seem like the sort of man who suddenly wakes in the night worrying about partial marks. Still, I’m not going to question it. Maybe he really did look too quickly. Maybe some of my working was worth something after all.

Probably not enough to change the result. But something.

My mind drifts straight back to Levi.

This is ridiculous.

Last night was probably it for him. I should prepare myself for that.

Men do that. They chase. They win. They drift.

I’ve survived far worse things than a man losing interest.

Still, my chest aches at the thought. Because I hope he hasn’t. I hope he’s somewhere thinking about me too.

And I hate that I’m waiting for proof. A message. That’s all. Something small. Something simple. Something that tells me I’m still in his head, even a little.

But my phone stays silent.

By the time class ends, I have learned absolutely nothing about quadratic equations and far too much about my own complete lack of emotional composure.

I should go home.