Chapter 19

The moment I step into his office after his terse email, I know it's over. He knows.

He motions for me to sit across from him, his brows furrowed, his face serious.

"Millie," he murmurs and slides my exam over to me.

My breath lodges in my throat and cold sweat breaks out over my skin. Jocelyn ended up fake coughing and nudging me during the exam, desperation in her eyes. The test was harder than expected and there were questions we didn't cover the night before.

In the end, I couldn't do it. I couldn't ignore the little girl trying not to disappoint her dying mom. And so, I leaned back in my chair, nausea churning in my gut, and let her look at my answers before we turned in the exam.

"Yes, Professor?"

He slides Jocelyn's test next to mine, and he has circled in red phrases and answers that are identical on the two packets. Damning evidence of our deceit. A chill sweeps through me, and I want to throw up. Damn it, Joss. You couldn't have varied your answers just a little bit?

"I'm concerned your friend has cheated off of you on the exam."

His words draw my attention to him. There's a hesitation in his words, a thin thread of hope, like he's holding his breath.

"Did Jocelyn cheat off of you? You seemed troubled in class. Is there anything I need to know about?"

My lips tremble and I open my mouth to speak, but no words come out. I twist my fingers on my lap. I try again.

"P-Professor, what are you going to do to her?"

Ryland's eyes narrow, the concern in his slate irises shifting into something colder. His nostrils flare. I can feel the temperature of the room dropping by ten degrees.

"If she cheated, I'll report her and she may get expelled."

"No! Please don't do that." I look down at my lap. "I-It's not what you think it is. W-We have reasons."

The silence in the room is heavy and suffocating. I pull at my fingers, afraid to look up at the man before me. I can't let Jocelyn take the fall for everything. I can't let him report her. She'll be so devastated. And her mom?

After a few seconds, I gather my courage and look up and my heart plummets to the floor.

The harshness in the slate eyes, as sharp as a steel blade. The twitching muscles in his jaw. His perfect lips curled up in a hard sneer.

The absolute hatred pouring out from the man standing behind his desk, every inch of him straining against his perfectly tailored black suit, every inch the powerful billionaire the press has mentioned in the papers.

My pulse skitters and grows thready. Acid churns in my gut.

"You were in on it, weren't you? You're a fucking cheater too. You thought I wouldn't find out." His voice is a low, guttural whisper, lethal in its quality.

"You thought I was stupid, didn't you, Ms. Callahan?" Ms. Callahan. A sharp ache slices across my chest. "You thought you could wind me around your pretty little fingers, bat those lovely eyelashes on your face, and maybe shed some tears and I'd just let you go?"

"R-Ryland." His name slips out automatically and he flinches, his eyes flaring at my usage of his first name, something I've done a thousand times in the privacy of my thoughts but never aloud.

"It's Professor Anderson to you, you cheating, deceitful little girl."

"P-Professor, I…I—"

"You what? Trying to buy yourself some time to spin more lies? You thought you could take advantage of my feelings toward you, didn't you? Treat me like a fool?" His face is chilly, his eyes flashing—the fiercest lightning in the dark skies.

Tears spring into my eyes as I hear him acknowledge out loud for the first time this invisible yearning between us. "Your feelings?" I whisper.

"Stop!" His command is terse, his anger so palpable, the betrayal clearly cutting deep inside him.

Going into the exam, I knew if I got caught, it'd be over, because he hates cheaters. Everyone in the school knew it. I saw the way he berated Fanny and Gregory in front of the classroom. Rumor was, they were expelled.

Ryland has never told me the reason he hates cheaters so much, but I know it to be true from the venom in his voice when he's said the sentiment in the past. But I never expected his hatred to stab me in the core, leaving me a bleeding mess before him.

I never expected it to hurt like this.

But I didn't have another choice, did I? I'd walked in Jocelyn's shoes before. Intimately. Felt the sadness and helplessness of not being able to do anything as everything fell apart when Mom passed away. I experienced anger and depression in the years after.

I know personally how exhausting it is to pretend everything is fine for the sake of uplifting everyone around me.

How could I deny Jocelyn? How could I let her disappoint her mom in what looks to be the remaining few months they'd have together?

There wasn't any other choice.

My vision blurs as I stare at Ryland towering before me, every inch the livid, vengeful god about to exact revenge or punishment on the mere mortal. The disappointment and anger radiating from him are knives to my heart.

My tongue is furry and thick. I pull and twist my fingers. "I…I had a reason for it."

His silence is foreboding.

"Jocelyn's mom is dying of breast cancer and she hasn't been able to devote more time to class and studying. She was going to be put on academic probation if she failed your class. I helped her study. We pulled an all-nighter trying to get her caught up on the material, but there was simply too much for her to absorb in such a short time. And so when she nudged me to glance at my test…I let her."

I look up at him, my fingers twitching with the need to take his hands, the hands currently knotted to his sides, white knuckles, and all. "P-Please understand. I went through what she did. I had to help her. Please don't punish her. If you need to punish anyone, punish me. Report me instead."

My cheeks are wet with tears as I let go of the dreams I had—the honors program, graduating at the top of class, honoring my memories of Mom and Mr. Roberts. The repercussions for cheating are severe: a big black mark on my transcript and I might get expelled. But I couldn't do this to Jocelyn.

I couldn't do this to the little seven-year-old girl crying on top of her dying mom deep inside me.

Ryland is still silent, his chest heaving large breaths, loud in the chilly room, which used to be so warm, so heated because of him, but now feels as frigid as the arctic.

I whisper, "It's the right thing to do."

He flinches, his eyes widening, darkening, his glare even sharper and slicing at my words. His lips twitch and sneer, the whites of his teeth flashing.

"Excuses," he angrily spits out, "Excuses, all of it. I've heard everything I need to hear. Now get out of my office!"

His command shatters the rest of my heart and pulverizes the fragments to pieces. I'm gone from his eyes, his soulful, cold eyes. Instead of the intense passion I usually see in those swirling charcoal pools, I now only see revulsion reflected in them.

I swallow the lump in my throat and choke on my sadness. My face and nose are a mess of tears, but I don't care. It doesn't matter anymore.

"I'm sorry, Professor," I whisper. "I'm so, so sorry."

I leave the room, feeling his wrath singeing my back, and know that life will never, ever be the same again.

He left without notice.

Johnny, the TA, announced to class this morning he'd be taking over the lectures for the last month of the calendar year with the dean of the business school supervising. Apparently, Professor Anderson had to take care of urgent business back in New York.

"Thank you so much, Millie," Jocelyn whispers as she pulls me into a hug after a home-cooked meal. She said it was the least she could do to thank me for doing something she knew violated my morals for her.

"I'm going to be fine because of you. Even though I did well on the exam, I was still a little shy of passing the class. However, Professor Anderson sent me an email with extra credit before he left. It was a simple exercise, something anyone could do. Between that and the grade on the test, I'll skate by…just barely. It wouldn't have happened without you, Millie!"

She hugs me tightly before traipsing back to the kitchen and turning on the faucet. I hear her humming happily under her breath and the dishes clinking in the sink.

Ryland didn't end up reporting me or Jocelyn, much to my surprise. I don't know whether to laugh or cry at that. My dreams are still intact and I can still graduate. But of course, this means I'm not getting the recommendation from him and will need to get one from my other professors.

I stare at her, the shadow of the little girl inside me, the ghost of the woman who's still in hiding today, and my heart twists inside my chest.

A bittersweet pain.

I did the right thing. It's unethical, but the right thing, nonetheless.

But we're over. Irrevocably so. But then again, we never started, did we?

It was a tragedy written in the storm to begin with. An anomaly. And now, it's gone.

There's a new chasm in my chest, one I'm not sure I'll ever fill.

Later that night, I sit in front of my desk and take out a piece of paper. With a heavy heart, I write another letter to Mom, the woman I know would love me unconditionally, the woman who'd wrap me in her arms right now and comfort me if she were still here.

I sniffle, moisture misting my eyes, and begin.

Dear Mom,

The thing you never told me and I never realized until now is…whirlwinds, by definition, aren't permanent. And when they leave, they leave a sea of debris and devastation in their wake.

He left, Mom. I betrayed him. It was for the greater good, but it was still considered cheating. It was something he hated, and I did it anyway.

Is it possible to truly fall in love and be in a relationship without the other person acknowledging it? Why does this feel like a breakup when nothing has ever happened between us? Why does my heart hurt so much, the pain waking me up in the middle of the night?

I wish you were here with me. You'd tell me what to do.

If the stars align and one day my path crosses with his again, I hope I'll get another chance to prove myself to him, to be deserving of his love. I hope our story hasn't ended yet because, despite the pain gutting me to the core right now, the whirlwind was so beautiful, Mom. Utterly breathtaking. And I'm not ready to leave its madness yet.

Love, Millie