As usual, Peter pulls up a block before the school, so I can get out unnoticed. "I'll see you in the lecture hall," Jacob says before I get out of the car. I nod meekly and shut the door, and instead of going along the main road, I curve off to the right where the car can follow me. I text Spencer to meet me on the quad so that we can walk to class together. He responds with an extensive array of emojis and I cant help but try and deduct what each of them mean in context. But the time I reach the quad we only have a few minutes to get the the lecture hall.
"So you're boyfriends practically you're teacher today."
"Eww. Please never say that ever again." I cringe. "No, he's a guest spokesperson. Its going to be so awkward."
"Girl, you have me. Plus we can sit towards the back so people don't aware, and if he says anything that pisses you off you guys can have make-up sex later."
"Please," I retort, "I'm no the one who's been having make-up sex. I saw you bitch with you're sweaty little body and half boner. There's not fooling me." We both laugh, and he hangs his arm around my shoulder.
"Whatever," he mumbles when we walking into the hall. Jacobs already out the front, engaging in a conversation with the professor, and as he looks to the right and his gaze meets mine, I'm quick to look away, knowing that self control at his moment would be extremely difficult.
"Class!" The professor yells, and the room falls into a hush. Spencer and I take our seats in the back row and immediately starts making comments that have me wetting myself with laughter. "We welcome back Mr Reynolds to our class, and I suggest that you use these two hors wisely to gather as much information and ask as many questions possible to execute your'e paper's to the best of you're abilities."
Despite the fact that I should be intently listening, Spencer captures my attention for most of the lecture as we exchange funny anecdotes back and fourth. That is until the questions take a weird turn. One of my fellow students asks, "You're new Cassio you're building in partnership with Ava Bronson is supposed to be one of the biggest technological advancements in New York. What differentiates you're technology from other buildings?"
"Did you know he was working with his Ex?" Spencer whispers to me.
"No. I didn't." I tell him as my mouth forms a hard line.
Jacob meets my eyes and I know he know's he fucked up, "Um," he says slightly perpetuated and perplexed, "Primarily security. Most casino's focus hard on the security in the vaults, an while we intend to still maintain optimal security there, we also strive for better security on the floor. Scouting for card counters ad thieves. Other than that the structural design almost defies gravity; a lot physics involved I believe."
Spencer shoot's his hand up and I already know he's going to shoot himself in the foot. Jacob points to him, and all eyes shift to us int the back row, "What was the logic in going into business with a bitch like Ava?" I slap my forehead and shrink into my seat.
"Ava's a really polite and caring person who many judge to quickly. Secondly, I don't see how her personality has nothing to do with my choice in a business partner." Jacob says angrily. I stare at him pissed. He knows what she said to me, and he defends her like that?!
Another person asks a question, "Is it true you're sister and you're girlfriend go here?"
He looks at me and people start to snicker around the room, "My private life is none of you're concern," he says loud and forcefully and the laughter quickly drains from the room.
Another person, speaks up to ask a question, "if you're in a relationship from someone in this room, how come you were seen going out to dinner with Ava and taking her back to you're place, and photo's showing she didn't leave until 5 am the next morning?"
That's it. He's a dead man. There have been to many scandals involving the two of them for me not to dump his ass. "The media twists things and I don't understand how this has anything to do with you're papers." He says, once again commanding complete respect throughout the entire room. For the rest of the lecture, all I wanted to do was storm out of there, but I knew doing so would only create a bigger scene then ending things privately and on good terms. Becuase despite us not going to be in a relationship anymore, I'll still have to see him when we have Christmas and on the holidays with our family's.
I place my hand up fiercely into the air, and stair at him with brutal spite, "What makes a young...single man such as himself decide to invest what I assume would be billions into a casino that would be run by an inexperienced CEO such as Ava Bronson?"
I watch as his jaw clench at the word single, and the class snickers and snaps photo's which makes me sink back into my seat. "Trust." He says with double entendre inflicted in his voice, "Trust is vital when working with someone, becuase without trust you're left with insecurities, and ultimately failure."
"Never underestimate the power of having blind faith in somebody," I say through clenched teeth. "It can manifest in ways that bend the laws of physics, or break them entirely."
40 minutes later, the professor re-enters the roo, thanks Jacob and dismisses the class. I grab Spencers hand and we bolt out the door. I don't know where to go where Jacob can't follow, or even have his goons follow.
Unfortunately I lock eyes with Peter who's in the visible parking lot waiting outside the door, and by the way he begins to walk over, I know Jacobs already told him. Giving Spencer my laptop I say, "Take my stuff, I'll see you later," and I run in the opposite direction of Peter. Thank god I chose to where runners, or this would have gone completely different. I'm running along 116th Street as full speed, until I look behind me and notice that nobody's following me anymore and I slow down. Just my luck when I turn back around I walk straight into a man. Holding my hand up to the section of my head that I hit I apologise excessively.
"I know you, you're in them papers with that rich boy ey'"
I pull out my phone to call Becky, "Um maybe," I respond darting my eyes to the man, "I'm so sorry I wasn't watching where I was going."
"Maybe?" Responds forcefully, making me take a step back. "It's really a yes or no question." His voice was rough, probably scared from years and years of smoking. Considering his age potentially around 50 or 60, he sounds like he would smoke a pack or two a day, and he certainly spelt like it as well.
"Again, I'm sorry I bumped into you," I say my voice growing small.
"Are you tryna' mess with me or somen'?"
"No sir-"
"You think that you can be all knocking folks over not giving a shit? Huh?" When he grabs my wrist, I yank it out of his hand and I can fell my heart in my throat.
"Don't touch me." I take a single step away, diverting my attention back to my phone this time to calll the person I feel most safe with. Jacob.
"Get off you phone. You young people can't ever solve a single issue." He grabs my phone and this time I leave it, too scared to engage with this man any longer. I stay on the street, which had very few people.
I go up to the first women I see and ask, "Can I please use you're phone." I can tell by the way she looked at me that she knew who I was, but she also could sense my panic.
"Sure."
I dial Becky's number and ask her to text this phone Jacobs number, she didn't know what was going on my she did it anyway and I called Jacob. Like most calls that don't have my contact number he answered the phone gruffly until I squeaked, "I'm on 116th street please come and get me."
The second he answered I broke out into tears, and he relayed the message to Peter and responded, "Baby, I'm on my way. Just stay on the phone with me please."
"Please hurry."
Though it's distant I hear him yell at Peter, "I don't give a shit, run the light if you have to." Then he speaks into the phone, "We're 30 seconds away. Okay?" I don't run the energy in me to speak so I just sob, but then I see the car pull around the corner, hang up the phone and pass it back to the lady thanking her. The car didn't even come to a complete stop before Jacob got out running to me. I walk lazily into his large embrace, and bury my sobbing face into the crook of his neck. Shielding my face from the few camera's that had now begun to capture this moment, he took us back into the car and instructed for Peter to drive. I crawl onto his lap and wrap myself around him. "Baby what happened?"
"A man tri-tried t-to tou-touch me."
"Who did!"
"I'm not sure, some guy on the st-street. He didn't touch me...there but he grabbed my arm...and he has my phone. I'm sorry I lost my phone."
Pulling my head back onto his shoulder he says, "Emma don't apologise. I don't care that you lost you're phone, we can get you a new one. I care that this happened to you." Addressing peter he says, "Find out who this guy is and make sure he gets the message never to do that again." Peter didn't respond, but he also didn't need to, becuase we both knew what Jacob meant. For the rest of the ride Jacob hushed me, although I did notice him place a seatbelt around me, and his agitation every time the car jerked. I appreciated that he placed his personal anxiety's aside in the pursuit of comforting me. Once the car parked in the garage, Jacob and I just sat in silence for a while, me still on top of him and him rubbing my back. I'd stopped crying now, and began to feel my other emotion towards Jacob which was anger, only leaving me conflicted and confused. I climbed off of his lap and opened the door, fixing my appearance as I clambered out. Then I started for the exit of the garage. "Babe, the appartments this way," he said confused.
"Yeah well my rooms back at Columbia, so," I mumbled.
"Hey, Hey, Hey, why are you going?"
"Don't think that I've forgotten about what went down in class today."
"Can't you please just let me explain-"
"No. No more explaining, becuase when you do, I do too much forgiving."
"Ava and I did have dinner...what the camera's conveniently didn't catch was that both of our lawyers were there as we discussed business. Then they also conveniently failed to catch was Ava AND her lawyer coming back to mine to finalise things."
"I'm on you're legal team you idiot! How come I wasn't there then?"
"When was the last time you checked you'r work email? Becuase not only were you supposed to come, but you didn't show up. People probably assumed it would be strange that since we're dating to do dinner like that. This all happened when you were pissed at me, so I assumed you didn't come, well...becuase you were pissed at me."
"First how come Ava left at 5 am in the morning."
"Ava, and EVERYONE else left at 5 am becuase after contracts were signed we all we're drinking."
"Second," I quiet my voice, "I didn't know that I had a work email."
"How about we go upstairs, you use my laptop and if everything checks out you consider forgiving me."
I start to walk towards the private elevator, "You better hope everything checks out."
--
After making contact with Felix, he tells me how to log in and it turns out that I had 38 unread emails in my work account. I scroll down and realise that Jacob was right and I shouldn't have doubted him in the first place. Then I also realise the most recent is Mr Sommer's asking me if i will be attending tonight's client dinner with Mr Reynolds. I respond, and honestly I feel so grown up sending my first email, but when I send it, I realise that it sent with Jacob's signature. So Mr Sommers would know I sent this, essentially from his bosses computer. Luckily I can undo it and I re compose the email, this time without the signature. Jacob's sitting on the kitchen stool, looking at me, which I've noticed he's done since he picked me up. I walked over to him dragging my feat, "I'm sorry, you were right and I should've just believed you that you wouldn't cheat on me." He doesn't gloat. Or even provide a cocky return, and rather kisses my forehead. "Guess what,"
"What?"
"I got a job at the Starbucks near my school." In a sarcastic tone I say, "What was odd was that when I went in for the interview, they asked for my name and then practically begged me to take the job. They must have been impressed with my complete lack of credentials." He laughed at my sinister humour and I continued, "or maybe it was the fact I was you're girlfriend, but I think it was the credentials one."
"Me too." He concedes.
"Unfortunately that means I'm going to have to see you even less."
"Noooooo," he whines and pouts.
"Please just let me loan you some money and you can pay me back."
"I don't have a job to pay you back with though silly."
"Well you won't have to pay me back when we get married-" he instantly stops and swallows his words.
I freeze and just pretend like I didn't hear him, "Speaking of work I'm coming to the dinner tonight with you Mr Sommer's, Felix, Ava, and her legal team."
"Oh great. Do you want to come back here after?" I'm glad we're ignoring what he just said.
"We'll just see how the night plays out. Yeah?"
"So you'll come back here?"
"That's not what I said," I giggle.
"You said 'how the night plays out.' And the night IS about me, so I will get everyone back here if need be."
"You're impossible," I huff.
"I can't be impossible. I exist. So I think you mean I'm improbable. So does this mean you forgive me?"
"There was nothing to forgive?" I rub my nose into his neck and breath him in. "I have to get ready for dinner."
He looks at his watch and astonishes, "We still have 2 and a half hours!"
"I know, and I haven't even decided what to wear."
"I think you only need two hours to get changed," he smirks and tips me over his shoulder. "Plus I got you an appointment with my doctor to see what birth control you'll go on."
Going rigid, I say, "Are you serious." he notices the warning in my tone and places me down on the bed. "I don't have health insurance yet. I can't pay for doctors visits like that."
"That's fine. We agreed you would let me pay for the birth control. Which includes other medical bills and by extension medical insurance."
"By extension nothing. I hadn't even considered medical insurance and paying for the re-fill pill-," I begin to spill out all my worries and concerns like word-vomit, but Jacob calms me.
"Hey, it's okay. Calm down, deep breaths. I promise you it's fine and-" Without letting him continue I wrap my arms around his neck and pull him down to my mouth to stop him from talking and my mind from racing.
"I guess you're right. I do only need 2 hours to get ready," I keep kissing him hard, but he pulls away reluctantly.
"Emma you're hurting right now, and fucking me isn't going to make the pain go away."
"Please," I whimper, biting his lip with mine. But he only strokes my hair, lies on the bed, and lifts me so that I'm on top of him.
"Just let me hold you." He whispers into my hair.
When Jacob falls asleep, I carefully remove myself off of him and go back to his iPad. I still makes me squirm with joy that his password is my name. I check the my emails for the roster the Starbucks manager Casey sent over for me. As per the interview, I told her that as many shifts as possible on certain days where I didn't have class or my internship, and she was more than happy to oblige. It did make me feel dirty the way I used my obvious connection to Jacob just to allow myself to work when I could rather then when I was specifically told to. I looked over the roster and noticed that true to her word, Casey gave me more shifts then most of the employee's and under my name was the name Bianca who would fill in for the slots I was unavailable for. All of a sudden I hear shouting coming from the bedroom, and I'm so startled I drop the tablet on the floor. "Jacob!?" I run the bedroom and as I get closer the sounds become much more distinct.
"We have to back for him!"..."He was still breathing when we left him!"..."Shut up!"..."Shut up!"
"Jacob!" I yell, shaking his shoulder, his hand lunges for my face but I stumble back, hitting my head on the wall and scream. He jerks out of his sleep panting, reaching for breaths and looks over to me.
"D-did I hurt you?!"
"No," I touch my head and feel for blood, but all I feel is a potential lump forming. "No you didn't hurt me baby." I get off the floor and walk over to him, his body is covered in sweat, so I pull his hand so that he walks into the bathroom. He's clearly still in some sort of shock as his face is completely glazed over by an emotionless robot. As if all the colour and cheerfulness had drained from him. I begin to remove his layers of clothing and direct him to the shower. In the process I end up getting wet but I don't care. As I run my hands up and down his body, water falling on us heavily, he lazily starts to fiddle with the strings on my top. One pull and the top would fall off of me, yet in true male fashion he hadn't yet figured that out. While we have had sex before as a way of emotional stability and reassurance, something about being completely out, open and vulnerable in the shower made me feel a certain way.
It was times like this where I still felt like the inexperienced girl who would retreat in cowardice at the fist sign of intimacy.