Chapter 26 Twenty Six
Chapter 26 Twenty Six
Becca
So I watched...
I watched Zara at breakfast the next morning, watched her laugh with her friends, watched her check her phone every few minutes with that secret little smile that makes me want to slap her. I watched Kane at breakfast, watched him drink his coffee and chat with other professors and pretend like he had not spent the night fucking a student half his age. I watched both of them during the morning seminar, watched the way their eyes find each other across
crowded rooms, watched the way they look away quickly when someone seem to notice.
And then, in the afternoon, I saw it again.
I was coming out of a seminar on constitutional law when I spotted Zara heading toward the elevators alone, her phone in her hand. I followed at a distance, staying far enough back that she would not notice me but close enough that I would not lose her. She got on the elevator. I watched the numbers light up until they stopped on the second floor.
The second floor.
Where the faculty lounge is.
I took the stairs two at a time, my heart pounding, and when I reached the second floor hallway I saw Zara knock lightly on a door at the end of the corridor. I saw the door open just enough for her to slip inside and I saw the face of the man inside before it closed again.
Professor Darren Kane.
I stood in the hallway, alone, staring at that closed door, and I felt something close to commiting murder. It was not surprise, not really, because I had already known. This was more of a confirmation, I actually wanted to see this with my own eyes to confirm my fear, but seeing it made me feel sick and angry and jealous all at once.
She is fucking him, I thought, and the words echoed in my head like a curse. That little brat is fucking my professor.
I waited outside the faculty lounge for almost an hour. I pretended to read something on my phone. I pretended to be waiting for someone who never came. When the door finally opened and Zara stepped out, I was ready to confront her.
It was a test, like a fishing expedition, and her reaction told me everything I needed to know. The way her face went stiff and her shoulders tensed. The way she snapped back with attitude instead of just laughing it off like an innocent person would have done. Those were not the reactions of someone with nothing to hide. Those were the reactions of someone who had just been caught and was trying to figure out how to get out of it.
Maybe I will see you around, Zara.
Maybe I will see you sneaking out of his room again tonight.
Maybe I will see you ruin his career and your own life, and maybe I will be the one who makes sure everyone finds out exactly what kind of girl you really are.
Back in my own room, I sat on the edge of my bed and stared at my phone.
I had taken photos of Zara entering the lounge. I had taken photos of Kane inside when the door opened slightly and I had also taken photos of Zara leaving an hour later with her clothes rumpled and her face flushed. The photos are not conclusive on their own, not enough to prove anything definitively, but they are a start. They are evidence.
I could destroy them both with these photos. One email to the dean, one anonymous tip to the university's ethics committee, and Professor Darren Kane would be teaching at a community college somewhere in the middle of nowhere, assuming he is teaching at all. Zara Lennox would be expelled, her academic career over before it had really begun, and she would have to explain to her rich father why she had thrown away everything for a man twice her age.
But...fuck as satisfying as it may be, I do not want to destroy Kane. I want him to look at me the way he looks at Zara. I want him to touch me the way he touches that bratty little undergraduate. I want to be the one slipping out of his room at midnight with my hair a mess and a smile on my face.
And I know exactly how to get what I want.
I will not report them. Not yet. Not until I have a plan. Instead, I will watch and wait and gather more evidence, and when the time is right, I will use what I have to make Kane see me. Not as a threat, but as an ally. Not as someone who wants to destroy him, but as someone who wants to help him. Someone who can keep his secret, if he gives me what I want in return.
Everyone has a price, I think, looking at the photo of Zara leaving the faculty lounge and Professor Kane is about to find out what mine is.
I put my phone down, lay back on my bed, and closed my eyes.
In my mind, I am already rehearsing the conversation I will have with him. The way I will approach him, the words I will use, the look I will give him that will make him understand that I am not like the others, that I am smarter and more patient and more dangerous than any of the giggling girls in his lecture hall.
I am Becca Halloway, and I always get what I want in the end.
And what I want now is Professor Darren Kane.