Pushing them back up into position, I revealed, “Because I can’t complete even one of my passes. I’m letting the team and fans down. My parents won’t back the f**k off over Shelly—you just witnessed my daddy’s insistence on that issue. She’s being a bigger leech than normal and I’m constantly fighting her off. My head is all over the place, I can’t sleep or get focused, and thinking about a certain English girl keeps me up every night. Every f**king night. She’s plaguing my dreams.”

Needing to feel her touch, I laid her hand against my cheek, the contact calming me right down.

“Yeah, I know what that’s like.” Her answer was breathy, telling.

It was time I told her some home truths. “I thought about our last meeting nonstop while I was away.”

“Yeah. Me too. It’s been… different to have my head filled with a certain Bama hottie and not Dante, Descartes, or Kant.” I wanted to laugh at her cute as hell accent and thank the Lord that she’d been thinking about me too.

“You think I’m a hottie?” I asked jokingly, nudging her arm.

“You’re all right.” Her nose crinkled as she smiled and that blush crept up her cheeks. I’d gone from hating the world to feeling on top of it.

“Where were you going at this time of morning when you saw this hottie getting a beatdown?” I needed to move from this tree, and I sure as f**k wasn’t going to class. I wanted to be wherever she was, and I pretty much always did what I wanted.

“Rome—” She went to say something, but I cut her off.

“Answer the damn question, Shakespeare.”

“The library. I have notes I need to write up for Professor Ross. She has an office there where I can work undisturbed. I saw… what happened with you and your daddy and thought you needed me more than the exciting world of academia does right now.”

Standing, dragging her with me, I announced, “Let’s go.”

“Where to?” She frowned in confusion.

“The library. I’m going to help you. We can’t let the world of academia down now, can we?” I lifted her bag off the floor and placed it on her shoulder.

“Romeo… are you sure you don’t want to go home or do something else? We could talk more if you’d like. Whatever you need.”

Jesus, talking about my home life was so not what I wanted. Hell, what I really wanted was to take Molly back to my room and not bother surfacing until I’d had my fill, but I wasn’t sure that suggestion would go down well.

Pulling on her hand, I said, “No. We’re going to go to the library and I’m going to help you with your paper.”

“You’re going to help me with philosophy?” I should have been insulted by her disbelief, but that air of arrogance she always had when it came to her studies just made me want to prove her wrong.

Turning her around and wrapping my arms around her shoulders, I whispered, “Hey, just because I’m a jock don’t mean I’m stupid. For your information, I’m acing that class. I may be able to show you a thing or two.”

I let her go and quoted, “For example, Immanuel Kant was a real piss-ant who was very rarely stable.”

Letting out an excited giggle, she sang, “Heidegger, Heidegger was a boozy beggar who could think you under the table.”

“Aristotle, Aristotle was a bugger for the bottle, and Hobbes was fond of his dram.” I gestured for her to finish.

“And Rene Descartes was a drunken fart. I drink, therefore I am.’”

She was British after all. Wasn’t watching Monty Python like a rite of passage or some shit? Her huge grin told me I’d just racked me up some points in her book.

“So you’re a Monty Python fan?” she asked excitedly.

“Well, you can’t study philosophy and not be familiar with ‘Bruces’ Philosophers Song.’” Truth was, one of my first philosophy professors in sophomore year used to play it all the damn time. After that, I watched every film they’d made.

“I agree, but I never pegged you for a British comedy nut.”

“It’s Python,” I said simply. I held out my hand. “So let’s go. I surprised you once with my philosophy knowledge. I’m pretty sure I can do it again.”

“Whatever, you’re twenty-one. I’m still only twenty and I’m already on my master’s. I doubt there’s anything you can show me, superstar. It’s my area of expertise.”

There she went with that mouth again. Grabbing her hand, I pulled her to my chest, gripping her tight, and leaned in to whisper, “Maybe not in philosophy, but I can sure as hell show you other things, Mol—in my area of expertise.”

“And what’s that?” she asked, and I smiled, feeling her heart beating like crazy in her chest.

I ran my lips down the skin of her neck, kissing her pulse and teasing, “Much more… pleasurable things than work.”

I caught her pause in breath, and, satisfied that I’d rattled her nerves, dragged her with me. “Come on, megabrain, let’s go research and get your dirty mind outta the gutter.”

That’d teach her to try me.

We worked in the library for hours. Not once did she push me to talk about my father, or about anything else; her mind was completely focused on her task. She kind of reminded me of Rain Man when she worked, totally immersed in her own little world.

“Come on, Shakespeare, I’ll walk you home,” I finally said when Molly yawned for the fifth time in the space of ten minutes and my ass had begun to ache from sitting in one spot too long.