Chapter Twelve

Sami

I flopped over onto my back, my sheets twisting around me. My Millennium Falcon alarm clock projected the time on the ceiling, which was usually kinda awesome. All I had to do to see the time was open my eyes. But not so awesome when I hadn’t yet closed my eyes. I watched another five minutes tick by, then finally rolled out of bed. Sleep was out of my reach, so I might as well do something productive. Quinn wanted me to work on my weapons skills. Shooting wasn’t my forte, but honestly? Guns kinda scared me. Which was exactly why I needed to practice. Even if I didn’t end up staying with Class Alpha, it was still a good skill to have. It wouldn’t hurt to get in some target practice at the indoor range before breakfast.

I pulled on a pair of sweatpants and my favorite hedgehog T-shirt—it said I’m cute and stabby, which perfectly fit my mood. The dorm was silent when I left my room. Everyone else was either sound asleep at this early hour or possibly not here at all, since today was our day off. The guys had gone out to The Snaz again, and they probably all found women willing to share their beds. Remy had tried to talk me into going, but what was the point? It always ended up the same way—the guys would all find cozy beds to spend the night in, and I’d wind up coming home alone. I didn’t fit in with the climbers, skiers, and hikers who frequented The Snaz—big surprise there—and wasn’t even a tiny bit interested in anyone at the bars.

There was only one guy who interested me, and I couldn’t go there for so many reasons.

Campus was also dark and quiet. Nobody up at this hour, except…the computer lab was lit up bright, drawing me in like a lighthouse beacon. Or a bug zapper.

Only one person would be in there at this time of night.

My heart stuttered in my chest, and I stopped walking. Should I go in?

I drew in a fortifying breath and pulled open the door to Quentin Hall. The computer lab’s door sat propped open and spilled a square of light onto the floor. I peeked inside and yes, there was Harvard at his desk. His hair was damp from a recent shower, the wetness darkening the color, hiding the bit of auburn I found so charming. He muttered to himself as he worked, and he was well into a bottle of bourbon. He didn’t even have a glass. He just grabbed the bottle and chugged, then turned his attention back to his computer and continued muttering.

I should leave. He very obviously wasn’t in the mood for company.

I backed away, and my shoulder banged into the open door. He spun around, brows cranked down in annoyance until he saw it was me. His features softened.

“Uh, hi.” I gave him a little wave.

Oh my God, waving again? Could I be any more stupid?

“Hey,” he said softly. And judging by the way he slurred it, he was definitely more than halfway plastered.

Since I was caught, I moved into the lab. “What are you doing in here?”

“Someone got into the system. I have to fix it before anyone finds out.” He grabbed the bottle but paused with it halfway to his mouth. “I’m supposed to be the best. I have to be the best. Gabe and Quinn won’t ever trust me if I’m not. But I screwed up somewhere, and someone got in. I gotta fix it.”

Pain sliced through me. What did I say to that? He was beating himself up because of what I’d done.

God.

I propped a hip on the edge of his desk. “You think they don’t trust you now because of the drone thing?”

“I know they don’t. I just wanted to…” He exhaled hard and took another long drink from the bottle. “It doesn’t matter.”

It did matter to me. I yearned to know what he wanted, what he needed, what his goals and dreams were. I was so pathetically thirsty for any scrap of information he’d give me about himself, but I didn’t push him. He’d drawn the line in the sand between us and made it clear our relationship had to stay professional.

It was hard, though, not to touch him when he looked so devastated. Especially since I was the one who’d hurt him.

I glanced away from him and noticed the screen of his laptop. I recognized where he was and what he’d been doing because I’d been there once myself. “You’re in Tucker Quentin’s computer.”

“I wasn’t hacking.” He reached out and slapped the lid closed. “I have full access.”

“To look at personnel files on Quentin’s personal computer?” He scowled, and I raised my hands in surrender. “Hey, if you want me to pretend I didn’t see that, I didn’t see it. I’m the last one to criticize someone for snooping. Glass houses and all that.”

“It’s no big deal,” he muttered and took another long pull from the bottle. “I wasn’t invading anyone’s privacy.”

“Except Quentin’s.”

“It was my personnel file.”

“Why were you hacking into your own file?”

He said nothing in response. Just finished off the bottle and shoved out of his chair. He swayed a bit on his feet and grabbed for the desk to steady himself. Instead, his hand landed on my thigh. He stared down at it for a moment, then lifted his gaze to mine. He was drunk as fuck, and maybe that was why he couldn’t hide the spark of pure lust that turned his irises more amber than brown.

I didn’t move. I held my breath and waited to see what he’d do next. His gaze dropped to my mouth.

He leaned forward, and, for one heart-stopping minute, I thought he was going to kiss me. And maybe he would have, had he not lost his balance. He caught himself on the edge of the desk this time and stepped back, straightening his glasses and swiping his hair back from his face with one hand.

I released the air caught in my lungs. Even drunk, he wouldn’t kiss me. I was an idiot for thinking he would. For wanting him to.

I jumped off the desk and slid an arm around his waist as he tilted sideways. “I think you’ve had enough for tonight. Let’s get you home.”

He looped an arm over my shoulders and leaned into me as I led him from the computer lab. Outside, the early-morning air carried a bite of winter. I shivered.

Harvard scowled and straightened. “It’s cold. You should have a coat.” He patted his T-shirt-clad chest. “I don’t have one for you.”

“It’s okay.” I darted forward as he listed sideways again. “Here. Let me help.”

He grunted as I pulled him upright again. “A gentleman’s s’posed to help a lady.”

God, he was too cute. “Yeah, well, sometimes a gentleman needs help, too. Especially when he’s polished off an entire bottle of Jim Beam by himself.”

“That was stupid of him.”

“Yeah. He’s going to hate himself in the morning.” Or, technically, afternoon, since it was already morning. But whatever.

“He doesn’t really like himself all that much on a regular day.”

That stopped me cold in my tracks. I turned him to face me. “Harvard—”

But he wasn’t looking at me. His head tipped back. “Show me a constellation,” he slurred as if he hadn’t just dropped a huge truth bomb at my feet.

He didn’t like himself? He was wildly smart, funny, and sweet. Everyone liked him, so why didn’t he like himself?

I wouldn’t get the answer from him tonight, though, so I followed his gaze to the sky. With dawn soon approaching, the stars weren’t as bright as the middle of the night, but I could still pick out a few. “What’s your zodiac sign?” I asked.

He scrunched up his face in the most adorable way. “Dunno. My birthday is July twentieth.”

“Cancer.” Of course I already knew that, but I didn’t want him to know I knew. That would be weird. It’d probably also be weird to tell him I was a Scorpio, which was a great pairing for Cancer.

“We can’t see Cancer now, but come spring it will be right…” I pulled him to a stop and scanned the stars again, then lifted our joined hands to trace a spot in the sky. “There. The crab. Hera placed it in the sky after Hercules stepped on it during his battle with the Hydra. It’s the faintest of the zodiac constellations. It contains an orange giant one hundred and eighty light-years away that holds the record for the longest star name—Arkushanangarushashutu. It’s supposedly ancient Babylonian for ‘the southeast star in the crab.’”

He squinted at the sky. “How do you know all this stuff?”

“I studied astronomy in high school.” And astrology. And mythology. Writing, photography, computer graphics. Technology, engineering. Even some zoology. My parents liked to tell people I had “diversified interests” to save face, when they actually thought I was flighty and unfocused.

“Why didn’t you continue?” Harvard asked. “You love it.”

“I do. And for a while, I thought I’d be the first woman on Mars, but…” I trailed off and shrugged. I didn’t want to tell him that my parents had talked me out of it. They always told me I was too impractical. That I had to get my head out of the clouds and my nose out of science fiction books. I’d believed them.

Now that dream seemed as distant as the stars in Harvard’s constellation.

The thought left a hollow pit in my stomach. I needed a subject change. “What did you want to be as a kid?”

“A superhero,” he whispered, a tinge of sadness in his tone that plainly said he still wanted to be a hero.

He lost his balance, and I lost my grip on him. He went down on his butt in the dirt, then just sat there like he couldn’t figure out what had happened.

I sighed and looked across campus to the dirt road that I knew led to his cabin. Not that I’d ever been there before, but I’d run by a bunch of times during PT. All of the HORNET guys stayed in the cluster of cabins at the turn-off from the main road. Some, like Harvard, lived there permanently. Others only stayed when they were in town for a mission or training.

But those cabins were a good half mile away at least. There was no way I’d be able to get him there on my own. I glanced over my shoulder at the dorm. Much closer. I’d just deposit him in my bed to sleep it off, then go to the range like I’d planned.

I tugged on his arm. “C’mon. Up you go.”

It was a struggle, but I managed to pull him to his feet and drag him to the dorm.

At the door to my room, I fumbled and dropped my key. He bent to pick it up, lost his balance, and crashed into me, pinning me against the wall with his body.

A sober Harvard would have mumbled an apology and all but tripped over himself backing away. Not drunk Harvard. He didn’t move back, and every breath I drew rubbed my breasts against his chest. He flattened a hand against the wall on either side of my head, caging me there. It was the first time in my life I wanted to be caged.

He was going to kiss me. I didn’t have a whole lot of experience with the opposite sex, but I knew it the second his gaze flicked down to my lips. God, I wanted it. I’d pretty much wanted it since the first time he gave me his shy smile and flashed that dimple.

But.

Dammit, he was drunk. If he remembered any of this in the morning, he’d regret it.

He leaned in, and I pressed a gentle hand to his chest. He stopped instantly and blinked down at my hand, then up at me. I didn’t expect the hurt that flashed in his eyes before he hid it.

Why the hurt? It was the deep kind, the kind that came from serious emotional baggage. There was so much about this man I didn’t understand. So much I’d never learn as long as he kept his barriers up.

And here he was with every single one of those barriers down. He’d answer any question I asked right now. He’d do anything I asked him. Yet I was the one stopping him, because I wanted him to tell me his story when he was ready, not because alcohol had loosened his tongue.

Pretty sure this was peak adulting for me.

Yay, me.

He’d knocked his glasses askew when he fell into me. I reached out to straighten them, and his scowl slowly morphed into that shy smile that made my knees go to jelly.

I returned his smile with one of my own. “I’m not rejecting you, Harvard. That’s the last thing I want to do. And I’d very much like you to kiss me. Just not tonight, because I’m afraid you’ll regret it when you’ve sobered up.”

Or worse, he’d hate himself for stepping over the line he’d drawn between us and never dare cross it again.

“Sami…” He seemed about to say more, but his face scrunched up, and he rested his forehead on my shoulder. He groaned. “The room’s spinning.”

Okay, this I could handle. I pushed him back enough to retrieve the key from the floor, then slid an arm around his waist. “I’m sure it is. C’mon, you need to lie down.”

I managed to get the door open and shuffled awkwardly over to dump him into my bed. I left him long enough to grab the trash can from my bathroom. Luckily, I’d already emptied it. How embarrassing would it have been to offer him a trash can full of tampon applicators? Ugh.

By the time I returned, he was already out cold, his face buried in my pillow. He was going to break his glasses if he slept like that.

I set the trash can down within easy reach, then knelt beside him and very gently removed the glasses. His eyelids didn’t so much as twitch.

Okay, I didn’t have to worry about waking him.

He was so tall his booted feet hung over the end of the bed. I moved down to unlace the boots and pull them off. Then I not-so-gently tugged the comforter out from under him. Still no movement. The man was a rock. I tucked the comforter around him and straightened, unsure what to do now. Did I stay in case he got sick? No. It’d be creepy of me to just sit there and watch him sleep.

Stick to the original plan. Go to the range and get some shooting in. Quinn said he’d be testing me again in a month, and if I was still here, I wanted to do better than the abysmal failure that was my last range test.

I backed out of the room, still being careful not to make any noise, even though nothing short of a bomb was going to wake Harvard at this point. I retraced my steps across campus toward the range, but once again the glare of lights in the computer lab sidetracked me. We’d left them on. I poked my head through the door, reached for the switch—and stopped.

What exactly had Harvard been doing in here? The glimpse I’d gotten of his screen didn’t sit right with me, and his explanation had been so thin as to be transparent. I couldn’t shake the sudden gnawing curiosity. The black-hat hacker in me rearing her ugly head, desperate to crack into places I didn’t have a right to be and learn information I wasn’t supposed to know.

My fingertips itched to touch a keyboard.

No. No, it was wrong. I was done doing wrong.

I reached for the light again but never managed to flip the switch.

What if Harvard had done something wrong? He’d been extremely wasted, his judgment all kinds of impaired. I could take a quick peek, in and out, just to make sure…

I hesitated and glanced around. Of course there was nobody else here at this early hour on a weekend. No one would know. I could cover my tracks so even Harvard wouldn’t know.

I walked in and sat down behind his computer. For a moment, I just soaked in his space. It smelled like him here, a soothing mix of woods and soap. On his desk, he had a figurine of the Hulk smashing Batman. Mini replicas of the Starship Enterprise and the Millennium Falcon sat side by side. He had a pen holder shaped like a classic Nintendo controller, and one of his pens was the Tenth Doctor’s sonic screwdriver. Another was made from an actual circuit board. Another, a lightsaber. His wireless headphones had the Rebel Alliance emblem on each ear and rested on a stormtrooper helmet. His mousepad looked like a floppy disk.

It was all so…Harvard.

I opened the top drawer of his desk, knowing I was beyond snooping and going straight to invading his privacy but unable to help myself. I found his Harvard degree stuffed inside the drawer, face down. Why wouldn’t he display this as proudly as his figurines?

Weird.

I set it back where I found it and shut the drawer. The action rattled his mouse and woke his computer. Lines of code popped up on the screen.

What the…?

I took hold of the mouse and scrolled through the code. My heart kicked into hyperdrive. Oh, shit. This was bad. This was really bad.

My benefactor hadn’t just given Jean-Luc’s computer a little virus. The system was cannibalizing itself. No wonder Harvard was drinking heavily. He was barely staying ahead of total destruction.

Goddamn it.

I had to stop this.