Kissing Tolstoy (Dear Professor Book 1) Read online

  The sensation of dread spread, cold despair and wretchedness winding its way around my lungs and squeezing.

  “Ugh,” I said before I could catch myself, because none of those options sounded appealing.

  Professor Cartwright waited a beat longer, and then asked, “So, what do you want to do?”

  I quickly debated my options, immediately dismissing her proposal to speak with him and obtain his signoff for the late-withdraw. I didn’t want to do that. I didn’t want to be alone with him or ask him for anything. Plus, clearly, for some bizarre reason only he and his bowties understood, he didn’t want me to drop the course.

  Because he is a passionless and heartless sadist who lives to make me, and probably countless others, wretched.

  The image and associated sensations of him pressing me against the door to his office, touching, and kissing me flashed into memory. Abruptly, I was hot.

  Well . . . maybe not passionless.

  Moving on.

  I dismissed her other idea, that I could try to rejoin the class and hope he’d opt to ignore me, as he’d done before. I refused to be ignored. I deserved better.

  It was my desire for respect, control of my own destiny, and the sensibilities of my tender heart that ultimately made the decision.

  “I guess I’ll take the F.” My voice cracked with misery, because I was a good student. An F wouldn’t decimate my GPA, but it would make an ugly dent.

  My advisor sighed again. “Anna . . . what’s going on? I know you. The lowest grade on your transcript is a B. Are you sure you don’t want to talk to him? Try to work something out?”

  I shook my head before she’d finished speaking. “No. I’ll take the F.”

  “Do you want me to talk to him?”

  “No,” I blurted, then closed my eyes with remorse. Gathering a deep, calming breath, I tempered my tone. “I’m sorry. No. Please don’t. I . . . he’s right. I have no good reason the drop the course. Therefore, I should take the F. I deserve the F.”

  She made a gruff sound of dissatisfaction, but relented. “Okay. Fine. I’ll enter it into the system. But I’ll also make a note on your transcript explaining the situation and my disagreement with the outcome.”

  “You don’t have to do that.”

  “You have one year left, Anna. I hope this debacle isn’t a sign of things to come.”

  “No. Not at all,” I promised. “I swear, I just—I should have taken the summer off. I made a mistake. I shouldn’t have enrolled in the course.”

  I shouldn’t have enrolled in the course . . .

  Truer words had never been spoken.

  Luca sent me an email.

  I stumbled across it after two nights of (mostly) restless sleep. Finding an email on my phone from Luca Kroft at 6:14 a.m.—before coffee, before a shower, before moving more than the ten steps required to carry me to where my laptop sat on my desk—was an incredibly effective way to become fully awake.

  Tingly, spiky flares of self-consciousness erupted all over my body. I straightened. My breath came short. Heat spread both upward—circling my throat, over my cheeks—and downward to the pit of my stomach.

  It sat unread in my inbox, black and bold, with the subject line Russian Lit

  I felt caught. Found out. Discovered.

  Which was ridiculous, since I was alone in my apartment and he had no power over me. I’d effectively taken his power away when I accepted the F.

  I stared at the subject line. Then I stared at it some more. Then I closed my laptop, crossed to the kitchen, made coffee, and took a shower. Dressing quickly, I selected a travel mug, and filled it. I grabbed my keys, phone, and earbuds, and left my apartment.

  It may sound silly (all right, it was silly) but I didn’t want to open his email in my apartment. It felt like inviting him in, providing the specter of him space to hover. I didn’t want Luca—or his sexy ghost—invading my safe place.

  A full hundred yards beyond the entrance to the weaving jogging and nature trail around my apartment complex, I claimed a bench, took a large swig of coffee, and opened my email.

  Russian Lit

  He’d sent it late last night, after midnight. For some reason, this discovery filled me with renewed tingly and spiky self-consciousness—which felt less unwieldy now I was outside. Even so, I folded one arm over my middle, crossed my legs, and gritted my teeth in preparation.

  Gathering a bracing breath and ignoring the galloping of my heart, I opened the email.

  Dear Anna,

  Cartwright stated that you’ve opted to take an F in Classical Russian Literature. This is a mistake. You held the highest grade prior to your withdrawal. Reconsider. You’ll be provided notes for the last two weeks and you may take the skipped weekly assessments. Contact the class TA and she’ll administer them at a time of your choosing.

  -LK

  I read it and reread it. And then read it again a few more times, picking apart every word, word choice, word placement.

  What struck me the most was what he’d omitted.

  He’d omitted himself.

  I’d read a research article in my Intro to Psychology class during my freshman year, discussing the power dynamics of emails. The use of I, me, and my were associated with a weaker position—usually an employee writing to his or her boss. Whereas, the lack of these pronouns within an email was associated with the individual in power, control.

  Luca had omitted all personal and possessive pronouns referring to himself: I, me, my. Furthermore, at the end of the message, he’d given me only his initials.

  This realization pissed me off. Like . . . SERIOUSLY PISSED ME OFF.

  Even now, he was giving me nothing of himself, holding me beyond arms-length, and pushing me into a box labeled ignore.

  Been there. Done that. Not going back for the T-shirt.

  Floating high on my fog of irrational anger, I typed a quick response:

  Professor Kroft,

  No, thank you.

  -AIH

  Using the middle finger of my right hand, I flicked off the screen of my phone—and therefore, the impervious Luca Kroft in his superior and sexy bowties and luscious leather pants, wherever he sat high and mighty, perfect and brilliant and untouchable—and hit send. Feeling the rightness of my hasty and haughty response, I decided to use the adrenaline flowing through my veins to fuel a long walk.

  As a means of distraction, I listened to my angry music playlist and power-walked like a boss for over an hour. In a fit of insanity, I sprinted for the last five minutes, wanting my pulse to quicken for some purpose other than the thought or sight of Luca Kroft.

  Satisfied and spent, I climbed the stairs two at a time to my apartment and rinsed off in the shower before dressing for the day. Work had me scheduled for an evening shift, but I had until 4:00 p.m. all to myself.

  And this was a good thing, because I wanted to crack the spines of my fall semester textbooks and browse the first few chapters before the start of the school year.

  Absentmindedly, I flipped open my laptop, intent on messaging Emily to see if she had time to study, and that’s when I saw it.

  Luca had responded. He’d responded just ten minutes after I’d sent my reply.

  Except he hadn’t hit reply. He’d sent a new message, with a new subject line: We need to talk.

  I didn’t open the email. I didn’t need to. The email preview showed me the entirety of his message, which other than a phone number—presumably his—was blank.

  An albatross.

  That’s what he was.

  Or rather, the thought of him was an albatross, hanging around my neck. I couldn’t see past the feathers and bulk of Luca Kroft, clouding my vision and making concentration impossible.

  I stumbled, tripping over my feet, on my way to hand over the check to my last table of the evening. I didn’t fall, but the almost falling was enough to have me biting back a curse.

  Obviously, I hadn’t called Luca. I wasn’t going to call him. I was going to i
gnore his imperative. But the fact that he’d made it at all unsettled me.

  What could he possibly want to talk about? He ignored me for weeks, I’d made a fool of myself over a B on a paper, we’d kissed, he told me to leave, I dropped the course—end of story.

  Leaving the check with the table and assurances that they didn’t need to hurry, I left the main dining room and traversed the galley to the break room. It was mostly empty as the night was still relatively young for a Friday. As I’d taken the first evening shift, beginning at four and ending at nine, I would be one of the first to leave once I finished rolling my silverware quota.

  I’d just untied my apron when my boss found me. “Ah! Anna, there you are.”

  I looked up from the stack of black cloth napkins. The big man was hovering in the entranceway, a weird look on his face.

  “What’s up? What’s wrong?”

  “You have a new table, number forty-four.”

  I wrinkled my nose at this news. “What? Now? It’s almost nine.”

  “Yeah, the guy asked for you specifically. You know usually I’d just tell him you’re not here, but it’s one of the museum’s patron families.” His frown intensified with an unspoken apology. “How about if you take this table, I’ll have someone else finish up your silverware?”

  I reached for my apron to re-tie it. “It’s fine. I don’t mind.”

  I brushed past him on the way out and hurriedly glanced at the table where I’d left the check. They’d already left, so I took a moment to gather their payment, then navigated the still-busy restaurant. Table forty-four was a booth with high seatbacks at the edge of the restaurant, hidden away and typically reserved for romantic twosomes wanting quiet and privacy.

  Therefore, I didn’t see him until I drew even with the table. But when I did, when I saw it was him and that he was alone, I stopped.

  Luca.

  I stopped and I stared, unconsciously holding my breath. To breathe was to admit I could not pause and rewind my reality, I could not undo the seeing of him.

  He said nothing, instead opting to openly study me in his steady way.

  When I could take no more of his detached perusal, I blurted, “What are you doing here?”

  “Eating. Hopefully.” His icy irises felt like hooks, digging into some unseen part of myself and holding me hostage.

  “You can’t—” I needed to swallow before I could continue. “You can’t come here, just show up. This is where I work.”

  “Why not? You showed up where I work.” He sounded so entirely reasonable, but with an edge of something else. Something I couldn’t place, but had the fine hairs on the back of my neck raising in warning.

  “Because I was your student,” I seethed through clenched teeth.

  “And now I’m your customer.”

  “Luca.”

  “Anna.”

  My lashes fluttered, as though he’d blown dust into my eyes. Magical, heart-wrenching, alluring man-dust. I both hated and adored the way he said my name: softly, reverently, beseechingly. It made me breathless and warm, flustered and absorbed. Absorbed in him. By him. Only him.

  We stared at each other and the albatross around my neck grew heavier, but in the wrong direction. Instead of weighing me down, it tugged me forward, toward Luca. I stumbled a step closer, my thighs touching the edge of the table.

  “Fine. What do you want?” I wanted to sound cold, aloof, but instead the words arrived as a shaky whisper. I couldn’t stop staring at his lips.

  I’ve kissed those.

  The thought inspired a wave of longing, a spike of regret, a twist of desire—each sharper and more disorienting than the last.

  He didn’t respond, waiting until I returned my gaze to his. What I saw, the force and focus of his stare, made me swallow and stiffen.

  Instinctively, I edged away.

  Luca reached out and grabbed my wrist, circling it with his large hand. The unexpected contact halted my backward momentum.

  “Anna,” he said, arresting me, tugging me back to the table. “When are you finished tonight? When can you leave?”

  I thought about lying, but I couldn’t. Not when he was gazing at me, his thumb rubbing a slow circle on the inside of my wrist, and his voice echoing the tenderness of his touch.

  I had to clear my throat before I could form words. “You’re my only table. When you leave, I can leave.”

  His stare turned searching. Actually, probing was more accurate. I watched him, transfixed as his eyes narrowed slightly, the side of his jaw and temple ticked belying his frustration, or resolve, or both. Eventually, he nodded once, releasing my wrist.

  “Order a bottle of Louis Roederer Cristal Brut.” Luca reached into his pocket and withdrew his wallet, finding several bills. “Meet me in the patron parking lot. We’ll ride together.”

  “I’m not . . .” I began but stalled, frowning at the five one-hundred dollar bills he’d pressed into my palm, but unable to make sense of them. “There’s nothing to say,” I finally managed, shaking my head at the wad of cash. “I have nothing to say to you.”

  “Then you’ll listen.”

  “But—”

  “Anna.” My name a caress, he effectively killed the objection on the tip of my tongue. Nothing about him was soft except how he said my name.

  Why does this man make me so weak? Why?

  . . . because he’s brilliant and fascinating and—against all odds and laws of nature—looks amazing in leather pants.

  Obviously.

  Not waiting for me to respond, he stood from the booth, once more reaching for my wrist and tugging me closer. Again, before I could comprehend what was happening, Luca bent and brushed a gentle kiss over my mouth. I sucked in a shocked breath, too stiff and hot with surprise to move.

  He lingered, nipping my bottom lip and tasting it with his tongue at the last minute, like it was compulsory, like he couldn’t help himself.

  I swayed forward as he released me. He turned before I could inspect his eyes, striding unhurriedly to the exit.

  Part 10

  ** ANNA **

  I met Luca in the parking lot, but didn’t know how to feel about . . . anything.

  Logicaling (of note, logicaling is not a real word, kids) my way through things was completely out of the question. Though I didn’t know how to feel, I also felt too much.

  I held myself back, stopping six feet from where he sat on his motorcycle, watching me silently as I approached holding his bottle of champagne.

  Luca studied me with outward dispassion for a long moment, and then offered me a helmet. “Put it on.”

  I lifted an eyebrow at the helmet, then at him. “No, thank you. I’ll drive my car. Where do you want me to put this?” I held up the bottle.

  “Keep it.” Luca nodded once, apparently unfazed, and secured the helmet to the back of his motorcycle. “Follow me.”

  I wanted to ask, Follow you where? but I said nothing. This was likely because I was muddled, flustered by the sight of him and the unexpected kiss in the restaurant. My blood was still pumping hot and thick through my veins at the memory of him nipping and tasting my bottom lip.

  If I boldly walked over to him, wrapped my arms around his neck, and bit his lip in a similar fashion . . . what would he do?

  Before I could take any action, he revved his motorcycle to life. I jumped inelegantly, squeaking at the unexpected sound—only unexpected because my brain had been distracted with thoughts of boldly kissing him.

  He glanced at me questioningly, as though to ask, Changed your mind? about the motorcycle ride.

  I shook my head quickly and turned, jogging to my car two lanes over and arriving out of breath. After fumbling and fighting with my keys and discarding the champagne to my back seat, I was soon out of the employee lot.

  I followed him off the museum grounds to the main thoroughfare, on the highway, off the downtown exit, left on Park Street, and into a parking garage for one of the high-rises overlooking the park and adja
cent to the river.

  I drove on autopilot, following without focusing too much on where we were going, where he was leading me. I was preoccupied.

  We’ve kissed. Two times now. And I enjoyed it, a lot. I am no longer his student. He is no longer my professor. And he gave you an F for dropping his class. Do we like him? . . . I don’t know. But we’ve kissed.

  Unfortunately, I’d made it no further than these sentiments. They were a continuous loop in my brain even as Luca motioned for me to take a parking spot by the elevator—which I did—while he parked his bike behind a Mercedes adjacent to my car.

  Luca opened my door just as I unbuckled my seatbelt, reaching in and holding my hand with his gloved fingers to help me stand. Saying nothing, he tugged me forward, shutting the door, and lead me to the elevator.

  I swallowed tightly, glancing at his large hand holding mine, his encased in black leather.

  What was happening? I wanted to ask. What were we doing?

  Instead, I managed, “Do you live here?”

  His eyes flickered to me, holding mine just briefly before moving back to the elevator. “My family has a place in the building. It’s not mine.”

  I nodded, trying to project an outward air of nonchalance to disguise my inner turmoil.

  In unison, we stepped onto the elevator. He released my hand, pressed a button for the forty-seventh floor, and scanned a card at the panel.

  On instinct, I yawned as the pressure built in my ears.

  “The pressure,” I murmured.

  “Pardon?” I felt his gaze move back to me, studying my profile.

  I motioned to my head, explaining, “The pressure, from the rapid ascent. I’m not tired, even though I’m yawning.”

  His eyebrows inched upward, but he said nothing. Just looked at me. He looked at me like I was the weird one in this elevator. This banal looking made my neck itch beneath the starched collar of my work shirt.