The last thing I wanted was for someone else to fight my battles for me. Especially not the good professor. Any loan of assistance from him came with an interest rate to put the most unscrupulous of loan sharks to shame.

"Why don't you let her speak for herself?" Liam said.

Dr. Aretino puffed up. As much as watching two men fight over me appealed to me on an animal level, I knew that I needed to put an end to this.

"Yes, why don't you both let me speak for myself?"

Both the men looked at me, sensing the venom in my voice. I hitched the strap of my bag to a more comfortable spot on my shoulder.

"Professor, I'm going to submit a list of extra credit assignment ideas to you by the next lecture... Mr. Montgomery," the flash of hurt on Liam's face cut into me, but I kept going, "As you can see, I am just fine, crazy Italian drivers or not. If you'll both excuse me, I have studying to do."

I slipped by the two of them. Aretino said nothing, though I could sense his appraising and indulgent eyes on my back.

Liam, however, reached out for me. His hand lighted on my shoulder.

"Don't touch me!" I said, jerking away from him so violently that I nearly fell over the armrest of the chair next to me. I'd said it with more venom than I intended, and again I saw the uncomprehending hurt on his face.

This is the right thing, I kept telling myself, forcing my eyes ahead as I marched towards the door.

If it was the right thing, why did it hurt so much? If it was the right thing, why did it seem so much like the wrong thing?

My mood must have spread out around me, because other students scrambled to get out of my way out in the hall. The sun itself seemed to dim when I stepped out. The smile on the face of the normally jovial, flirty bus driver dropped as I hauled myself up the step and flashed my student ID at him.

I sat near the back, the vinyl cover on the seat creaking slightly as I put my weight on it.

I tried not to look back out the window. I really did. Unable to resist the impulse, I let my eyes scan out the window just as the bus huffed and lurched away from the curb.

When I didn't see him, I turned bodily towards the window, pressing my hand to the cool pane. Liam wasn't anywhere to be seen on the bus loop.

I'd been certain—certain—that he'd chase me outside, try to stop me, try to explain himself. That's what a player would do, wasn't it? But he wasn't there.

And then it was my turn to feel hurt. Even though I knew I shouldn't. If he accepted this so easily, it was a good thing. I could get on with my life and he on with his.

"Fine," I said, then again, "Fine," with a bit more venom. My voice didn't hitch there at all. No, it definitely didn't.

***

My flat looked even smaller, somehow. More cramped. The walls pressed in on me. The window seemed more a tiny jail cell porthole peering out onto a world barred from me.

I tossed my messenger bag onto the bed that I noticed was more a cot than anything. Then I yanked my chair out, the screech of the feet across the scratched old floor shivering up my spine.

I supposed I was so angry because of how good things seemed to be. Liam had seemed so genuinely interested in me, and I in him. He'd appeared so perfect, outside and in. A handsome man on the outside and a good one on the inside, such an apparently rare combination.

I'd begun to let myself be happy again, because of him, to let the world in. And now it was all a part of some game or scheme.

Or maybe it was because I wanted so badly to believe that all the evidence that secretary had presented me was wrong, that all the things I'd heard about him were wrong.

Again and again, I returned to that image of him examining that statue of the philosopher king, or the intimate knowledge and appreciation he had of and for the city.

What I knew about him simply didn't reconcile with what the world thought it knew about him. Yet, I also knew that if I brought up any search engine on my laptop there'd be no shortage of pictures of him with his various exploits, no shortage of articles about the trail of broken hearts left in his wake.

Or of the meteoric rise and success of Mass Systems. No company became that successful while also retaining any sense of morality or ethics.

Who knew what Liam Montgomery had done for his success?

No, I had to take away from this only the positives and move on with my life. The pleasant memories, the renewed sense of purpose. None of the heartache or the sense of betrayal.

A task about as easy as herding cats.

However, my mind kept returning to one point, over and over: Why didn't he come after me?

So when he knocked on the door and said, "Emma?" a bizarre triumph and excitement ran through me almost as intense as my anger.

"Just go away!" I said.

"You know that isn't going to happen. Talk to me."

Again, that strain of concern in his voice.

When I didn't reply, he tried the latch. And of course, in my distracted state I'd forgotten to throw the deadbolt into place when I'd come in.

He came in and closed the door behind himself. I faced away from him.

"You know," he said, "How?"

"Not from you." That was satisfying. Especially since he took it like a punch to the gut. Despite my attempt at schadenfreude, it didn't feel as good as I'd expected. In fact, the urge to apologize welled up in me so fast I had trouble stifling it.

"I deserve an answer," Liam said.

"I don't know her name. Your secretary. Your cold and beautiful statue of a secretary. The one you're involved with. If that's all, I'd like to be alone now."

"Abigail? That makes sense. But you have to know that the moment I met you it was over between the two of us. I'm not that kind of man."

"That's rich," I said, punctuating it was a humorless laugh, "The liar isn't a cheater. You should add that to your CV." Even in my angry state, I knew I was being harsh. Except I couldn't help it. There was something cathartic, letting all my feelings spill out in a torrent of vitriol.

"I never lied to you, Emma." Even though I couldn't see him, I knew that he'd set his jaw in a hard line, that he'd balled his hands into fists.

"Then why is it I learned who you really were from your most recent jilted lover instead of you?" And that was really the heart of it, that broken trust, that obscuring of identity.

"If you know who I am, then you also have to realize that I didn't want all of that changing the way you felt about me. I wanted you to like me for me, not for the money. You have no idea what it's like to see the dollar signs pop up in the eyes of every woman you meet."

I wanted to lash out again, if only because it relieved some of that angry pressure inside of me. Yet I couldn't. What he said made sense, even though I wanted so very badly for it not to.

The desire to be loved for who you are is, in my opinion, one of the greatest equalizers on earth. Beggars felt it just as truly as kings and oil barons.

"Judging by the procession of bimbos you've paraded in front of the media, you've never seemed to mind women throwing themselves at you before this." Again I sensed him flinch behind me. But there was more.

"You've never searched for anything so desperately before?" Liam said, his voice clouding with anger, "You've never wanted something so much that you let yourself accept something less than what you truly wanted?"

I squeezed my eyes shut. I won't let him get to me. "Then maybe you should have told me. How do you think it makes me feel to know that you didn't think you could trust me? Especially after I let myself trust you so completely? I guess you're not as good at reading people as you think you are."