Groupthink: A Dark Reverse Harem Romance by Lauren League

Author:Lauren League [League, Lauren]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Night Thoughts Media, LLC
Published: 2024-04-03T00:00:00+00:00

15

Sam

Too much? Too much.

Grace looked down, then pointed her eyes straight ahead. “I… I don’t know what to say…”

“You don’t have to say anything,” I said, returning my eyes to the road. “I don’t even care if we’re on the same page. I’m just letting you know what page I’m on. And you can turn to it, if you want.”

“What if I’m not ready?”

I shrugged and pressed the gas pedal gently, and the car and the world started moving again. “I don’t expect you to be ready. What, do you think I’m some tool that would take advantage of you when you’re distressed and vulnerable like this? Why do you think I didn’t kiss you in your classroom when your eyes were all like, ‘kiss me, Sam’?”

She didn’t say anything, then turned to stare out the window. Then she said, “Things are complicated.”

“Then let’s un-complicate them,” I said. “Tell me everything you’ve got locked in that noggin. But put on some music first.”

“Oh, right,” she said, glancing down at my phone for seemingly the thirtieth fucking time.

If I didn’t get some sound in here soon, there would be nothing to stop my mental chatter from pouring out and annoying her to death. Rhymes and jokes and puns and disses…

The ‘negging.’

“Trying to figure out who you are via Taylor Swift is a little heavy for right now,” I said. “How about you play The Dear Hunter? Act Five: Hymns with the Devil in Confessional.”

She relaxed, freed from the weight of the decision. “Why, you feel like you’re the devil and I’m in confessional?”

I smiled.

I liked the sound of that.

“Not quite the devil, but maybe the little one on your shoulder telling you to indulge.”

She giggled, and the gentle wind chime sound of her laugh dispelled all the tension in the air.

It soothed me, and then it got even better when the gentle harp chords of the first song on the album, Regress, came through the speakers.

The words flickering on the edges of my vision and crowding my mind pulled back a bit. I could breathe easy.

Finally.

Finally, I could think clearly.

“So,” I began. “That guy in the hallway. Tom Sawyer or whatever—”

“Sawyer’s his first name.”

“It’s a dumb name. Doesn’t matter if it’s first or last.”

She grinned.

I smiled. “That’s the guy—your boss. The one you kissed.”

She sank down in the seat a few centimeters. “Yeah…”

My instinct told me to be quiet, now. To give her the space to fill things in if she wanted to.

“I don’t know why I did it.”

“Maybe you wanted to take a risk. Feel alive.”

“That feels like part of it,” she admitted.

“Do you like being a teacher?” I asked.

She snapped to attention. “What?”

“Your job. Do you even like it?”

“Of course I like my job.”

“Well, yeah, we’re all trained to say that. But really; do you wake up every day full of energy, can’t wait to go to work?”

Grace scrunched up her face. “No, who does?”

“Me,” I said. “Sorry, don’t mean to brag, but actually I do. I love what I do.

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