A Heat of the Moment Thing Page 7

  Why, oh why, had I pressed print?

  I opened my door, looked left and right, said a quick prayer and started down the corridor. I held my breath and tried to blend into the wall as I passed Matt’s office, then picked up the pace a little once I got past the danger zone. It was all I could do not to break into a run as I rounded the corner and saw the printer ahead.

  “Morning, Becky.”

  I reared back in horror. My heart lurched into my throat. I halted mid-stride. Gary. The Big Boss. Stationed right beside the printer, dammit. I smiled a tight hello and forced myself forward.

  “How was your weekend?” he asked.

  What did he know? What had he seen? His expression told me nothing so I played it safe. “Fair to middling.”

  He picked up a page as it came off the printer. Horrified, I snatched it out of his hands.

  He blinked in surprise. “Er—”

  “That’s mine,” I said. Scanned the text. ‘Cost Effectiveness Report . . . Tourism & Travel, Gillingas College . . . Executive Summary’.

  My toes curled with embarrassment.

  “Oh.” I thrust the paper back at him. “Sorry. My mistake.”

  He gave me a quizzical look. “That’s okay.”

  He paused, watching the printer do its thing. “I hear you made it to Little Tuscany for Friday drinks.”

  My heart plummeted the length of my body, coming to rest near my ankles. So. Sal had got to him already. This was bad, bad news.

  He picked up another half-dozen pages from the printer then turned back to me. “Did you enjoy yourself?”

  I searched his face and he gave me an easy smile—or was it more shark? I couldn’t tell. I stretched my lips in imitation.

  “Yes, thanks.” I gulped. “Have you seen Sal this morning?”

  “Not yet.”

  Thank God. Now I just needed to find her and convince her to keep her trap shut. Threats? Not my thing. Bribery? Absolutely. Whatever it took.

  Gary glanced over my shoulder.

  “Ah, Matt,” he said, raising his voice. “Just the person.”

  My heart surged all the way back up to my throat again, like some half-dead beast frantic for refuge. I heard his footsteps behind me. Desperation curdled in my belly.

  “Here’s a copy of that report I drafted,” Gary continued. “Could you have a look at it and give me your thoughts?”

  I stepped to one side.

  “Gotta go,” I murmured to Matt’s feet, and scarpered.

  It was only when I was safely back in my office, deep-breathing myself back to normality, that I realised I hadn’t collected my printout.

  * * *

  “Sal? Hi. You’re there. Great. Don’t move. I’ll be down in a second.”

  I hung up and, before I could change my mind, stepped out of my office. I had to speak to her. Now. Get this whole Friday mess cleaned up and persuade her to keep my secrets secret.

  As I headed towards reception her raucous laughter met me halfway up the corridor. In spite of myself I grinned, enjoying the sound. She really was the life-blood of T&T.

  Oh joy. Here came Hank.

  I stepped to one side, making room so he could pass. “Hi.” Be nice, but don’t encourage him.

  He waggled his eyebrows. “Hi yourself,” he said, and winked one of those I’m-too-sexy kind of winks that, on him, was just plain creepy.

  I didn’t stop to chat.

  As I rounded the last corner, there he was. Matt. Right there, at Sal’s desk. Leaning against the counter, laughing with her.

  “Can you believe it?” she spluttered, dabbing at her eyes. “But what could I say? I didn’t want to be the one to ruin her week. Figured I’d leave that to you.”

  I veered sharply away and escaped into the ladies’. Locked myself in a cubicle. Sat down. Stood up. Beat my head against the door a couple of times. Felt the walls closing in. Let myself out and paced back and forth.

  Stop being silly; it hadn’t been about me.

  Ha! It had, and I knew it.

  But it had just been one comment. It could’ve been about anything.

  I’d have to resign.

  “Oh for Pete’s sake!” I said out loud. “Get a grip of yourself.”

  A toilet flushed and I suddenly realised I wasn’t alone. I hastily stepped up to the mirror and patted at my hair. Amanda emerged behind me. She gave me a strange look as she approached the washbasin, but said nothing.

  “Amanda! Hi,” I said, falsely bright. “I just gave myself such a fright. Almost fell flat on my face. These floor-tiles are really slippery.”

  She looked at me, then down at the tiles, then back at me.

  “Oh,” she said, and left without another word.

  I watched the door swing to. Had that gone okay?

  Sure—except she now thought I was a lunatic.

  I waited a few heartbeats and followed. Matt was no longer at Sal’s desk so I took a deep breath and approached.

  “Hi, Sal.”

  She looked up from her typing.

  “Hi.” She leaned forward and stage-whispered, “On a scale of miniscule to colossal, how was your hangover?”

  “Enormous.”

  She laughed. “I’m not surprised. Oh!” She handed me a note. “Phone message for you. He didn’t want to be put through to your voicemail. Charlie someone.”

  My jaw tightened. “Thanks.”

  Was he stalking me or something? Seventeen years on and suddenly I got three messages in one day? Talk about overkill. Either he was up to something, or dying.

  Dog breath.

  I crushed the note in my hand. Let him rot in hell.

  I shoved Charlie’s imminent death out of my mind and focused on the bigger issue: shutting Sal up. “Are you free for lunch?”

  “Sure. But not until I’ve finished this pile.” She patted it. “How about a late one? Two o’clock. Can you wait that long?”

  I didn’t have much choice, so I plastered a smile on my lips. “Sure. See you then.”

  She nodded, her fingers already back at the keyboard.

  Two o’clock! That gave her three-and-a-half hours. Plenty of time to destroy my reputation.

  And there wasn’t a damn thing I could do about it so I might as well put it out of my head. I high-tailed it back to the sanctuary of my office. Stooped to pick up the note somebody had slipped under my door. Wandered in, starting reading.

  The missing printout.

  My stomach flip-flopped. Who’d picked it up? Heat rushed to my face. Not Gary, I hoped.

  I read the scrawled handwriting at the top. Found this at the back of Gary’s report. Figured it was more useful to you than him. PS Have you tried the quiz?

  My whole body crawled with embarrassment as I read the name scrawled at the bottom.

  Matt.

  * * *

  Sal and I met at Julio’s, a bustling café one street over from T&T. By the time she arrived I was already there, table secured, order placed and conversation planned.

  “Hey! She lives!” Sal sat down and placed her order number on the table between us. “How was the rest of your weekend?”

  “Quiet. Very quiet.”

  She laughed. “I bet. Your house-mate was interesting.”

  “Interesting? Pain in the neck, more like.” I stopped as the waitress gave me my muffin and coffee, then turned back to her. “Jim told me he’d met you.”

  She watched as I sliced my muffin into quarters then eighths. “He seemed rather . . . offbeat.”

  I smiled. “He’s okay. Just individualistic.” I picked at my muffin.

  “No kidding.” Her panini and coffee arrived and she attacked them with gusto. “It was the Bart Simpson boxers that gave it away.”

  I snorted. Bart Simpson boxers? I’d remember that the next time he threw insults at me.

  “I mean, hello. My six-year-old nephew wears Bart Simpson boxers.” She chewed and gestured and talked at once. “I didn’t know whether to whip him onto my knee for
a cuddle or call the cops and report him.” She chuckled, took another bite of her panini, then washed it down with coffee.

  “Bart Simpson boxers?” I echoed. “Are you sure?”

  Not that I should be surprised. This was Jim, after all.

  “Absolutely. You don’t remember?”

  I shook my head.

  “Guess you had to be there. Oh!” She waved a hand. “That’s right. You were.”

  She laughed then shovelled down the last of her panini.

  Out and out fear swirled in my gut. With methodical precision I chopped each eighth of my muffin in half. Sixteen bites. How on earth did I broach this whole Friday night secret-sharing session with her?

  I popped bite number one in my mouth. I didn’t give a hoot about Jim and his Bart Simpson boxers, but I needed to know right now exactly what I’d told Sal and how much of it she’d passed on.

  I ate a second piece of muffin. If I couldn’t get her to keep her trap shut about Matt, I needed to work out a plan B. Fast.

  “He’s skinny, isn’t he?” she said.

  “Who? Matt?” Hell, no. Well-built in all the right places.

  She snapped to attention. “No, I meant Jim. But since you’ve brought Matt up . . .” She pointed her fork at me. “You two looked very cosy on Friday night. Fast work, Girlfriend.”

  I shifted in my chair, stuffed two pieces of muffin in my mouth.

  “No cosier than I got with Hank,” I mumbled. Swallowed. The food went down about as well as her words. “Which reminds me, thanks for the warning, Girlfriend.”

  “Touché. You’re right. Sorry. I should’ve said something. Several people have made formal complaints. I think he’s on a cautionary. Don’t take any crap from him.”

  Then she narrowed her eyes. “Ha! Nice deflection. You almost had me, there. Tell me about you and Matt.”

  “What’s to tell? We were just talking.”

  “U-huh. ‘Just talking’.” She drew quotation marks in the air. “You ‘just talked’ for so long I reckon you swapped your whole life histories.”

  She paused. Her face grew sombre. “Just don’t get too hung up on him, okay?”

  The world tilted.

  “Why not? Not that I would,” I hastened to add.

  She shrugged. “What’s to say? Great lecturer. Great sportsman. Great body. Great waste.”

  I held her gaze. Eventually she looked away.

  “Look.” She sighed. “He’s more interested in his mountaineering than anything you have in mind.”

  I blushed uncomfortably. They had been talking about me. I took refuge in my muffin, dabbing butter on the remaining pieces with obsessive intensity.

  Now. I had to do it now, before I lost my nerve.

  I carefully placed my knife on the plate. Adjusted it to a jaunty sailor’s cap angle. Took a deep breath.

  “Sal, about last Friday.” I hesitated, then plunged on. “We talked, you and I, and . . . see, there are things I told you that . . . well, I shouldn’t have said. Things that needed to stay in my head. Stuff about my past.” I paused, and looked directly at her. “And stuff about Matt. Sal, I really need you to forget everything I said.”

  She leaned forward. “Hey, don’t get me wrong, Luv. It’s not as if he’s told me he’s not interested in you or anything. It’s just . . . look, he may be T&T’s most eligible bachelor, but he’s also T&T’s most determined bachelor. Every woman I know is in love with him—the queue’s out the door—but he’s just not a relationships kind of guy.”

  Relief washed through me. I could cope with the heartbreak as long as it wasn’t paired with humiliation.

  “Sal, promise me you won’t breathe a word to anyone. It was the drink talking.”

  “Yeah, drink has a way of bringing out the naked truth in us all.” She gave me an exaggerated wink. “Bet you wouldn’t say no to a bit of Matt’s naked truth.”

  I choked down the rest of my coffee. “I’d better go.”

  “You’re running away.”

  “Yep.” I stood. Gave her a closed-lip smile. “But you’re wrong. I’d definitely say no. He’s my boss, not my lover.” I turned to go and stopped short against a wall of six-foot-plus chest. “Oof!”

  “Who’s not your lover?” Matt asked, smiling as his arm shot out to steady me.

  Heat flooded my cheeks, spilling down my neck and through my limbs, pooling in my toes. I blushed so hard I may as well have been rotating on a spit. Any second now my skin would do a reptilian peel.

  “Oh,” I stammered, taking a quick step back. “Nobody. No one. I don’t have a lover.”

  “She’s working on it,” piped up Sal.

  Oh God. Shut up, Sal. How could I not have sensed him there? How could she not have warned me? I threw her a thinking-of-killing-you glance and, without waiting to hear Matt’s reply, dodged around him and shot out of there like I had Jack The Ripper after me.

  Chapter Nine

  I sorted the mess of papers into rough piles on my desk, working my way through a mental To Do list.

  Background notes—tick. Course outlines—tick. Avoid Matt—tick. Lectures for weeks one through six—tick. Lectures thereafter—work in progress. Avoiding Matt—another work in progress. Assessments—

  Assessments!

  I gnawed at a hapless nail, drawing blood. How could I have overlooked the assessments? I had to have them submitted for printing by—when? I checked T&T’s schedule. Did a double-take. Checked my desktop calendar. Tomorrow? My stomach plummeted. Good grief. I had no chance. I’d been working like a dog as it was, trying to get ahead of all the planning and paperwork. I couldn’t possibly have finished the assessments as well.

  Or could I?

  A little demon in my head mocked me. I’d been time-wasting. I’d been running in circles, achieving nothing. I’d been trying to do a job I had no hope of performing effectively.

  Stop it! I stood and paced the small width of my office. This wasn’t about me being incompetent, or a failure. I simply had too much to do in too little time.

  I stopped pacing and stared out the window. Inhaled deeply and slowly. S-l-o-w-l-y let the breath escape.

  There was nothing for it: I’d have to beg.

  No point putting it off. The sooner I fronted up to the problem the sooner I’d be able to get back to work. I strode down to Gary’s office before I could change my mind, rapped on the door.

  Gary looked up from his work and smiled. “Morning, Becky.”

  “Hi.” I managed a nervous lip-twitch.

  “You’re not wearing a scarf anymore.”

  I blushed. “My hair’s grown back a bit now.”

  He nodded. “That’s good.” Another smile, and he continued hammering his keyboard.

  I waited in silence, unable to bring myself to interrupt him yet, equally, unable to leave. My hands found each other and wrung together.

  Finally he stopped typing long enough to ask, “You’re settling in okay?”

  “Yes.” I sighed. Paused, then, feeling the need to elaborate, added, “I’m really enjoying it.”

  Even I could hear my lack of enthusiasm.

  He chuckled. “I see.” He swivelled away from his computer and gave me his full attention. “Are you going to tell me what the ‘but’ is?”

  I blushed.

  “Well, yes, there is a ‘but’. Nothing major,” I assured him. “At least, I hope not. Well, it’s not for me, but it might be for you, but I hope not”—the words tripped over themselves—“only I didn’t mean for this to happen but it just has and I’m really sorry but you see I’m stuck in a bit of a bind and—”

  “Becky.” He held up a hand. “How about you just tell me the problem and I’ll see what I can do to help.”

  I exhaled. “Sure. Sorry. It’s the first-year Assessments deadline. I don’t think I’m going to be able to meet it.”

  “Is that all? I’m sure we can work a way around that. But it’s not really me you should be speaking to. Matt oversees the cours
e so you’ll need to talk to him.”

  I felt the colour drain from my face. I’d managed to avoid Matt quite well these past couple of weeks. It had almost become manageable. But now . . .

  “Oh. Of course.” I backed towards the door. “Sorry to bother you.”

  “No bother at all. I’m pleased you’re enjoying T&T. And don’t worry, Matt knows you’ve been under pressure. I’m sure he’ll come up with a workable solution.”

  All very well for Gary to say, but he wasn’t seeing it through my eyes. For me, Matt represented problems, not solutions. Even being in the same room as him was a challenge.

  I trudged down to Matt’s office, hoping he wouldn’t be there. No such luck. He looked up and saw me as I raised my hand to knock.

  “Hey, stranger,” he said, then did a double-take. “Wow. You lost the scarf. You look fantastic.”

  Blushing seemed to be a recurring theme today. “Er, thanks.”

  My mind went blank. What was I doing here?

  Matt sat up straighter in his seat. “I haven’t seen you for days. Where have you been hiding?”

  It was too close to the truth. My blush deepened, approached beetroot. “Oh, you know, around. Working hard. Trying to get on top of all the planning.” I shuffled my feet. “That’s why I’m here, actually.”

  “Oh? You need a hand?” He indicated a chair and I sank into it like a fox hiding from the hounds.

  “Not really. Just an extension.”

  He cocked an eyebrow at me. “An extension, eh? That’ll cost you.”

  “Sure, whatever it takes. The printing deadline for assessments is tomorrow and, well”—my eyes darted around the room before returning to him—“there’s no way I’ll be able to meet it. I know deadlines are important,” I added, “and I promise it won’t happen next year, but what with just starting in the job and all—”

  “Ah.” He grinned. “The new-kid-on-the-block excuse.”

  He must’ve heard so many excuses from students over the years, probably far more creative than my own pathetic attempt. I shifted uncomfortably. “I’m really sorry, I know it’s not good enough and I feel terrible, but—”

  “So what’s an extension worth these days?” He leaned back in his chair, rested his feet on the desk.