Page 19 of Almost Ravaged (Men of Evercrisp Orchard #1)

Chapter seventeen

Mercer

H ints of buttery caramel and apple spice flood my senses as Sawyer Davvies sails past me and out of my office. Once she’s rounded the corner that leads to the elevator, I slam the door and press my head to the cool surface.

Jesus H. Damn it all to hell.

Eyes closed, I inhale deeply through my nose, then let the breath out slowly.

How the fuck did I wind up with a graduate assistant who doesn’t know the first thing about marketing, and who also looks like that ?

From the second she walked forward in that lecture hall, I was fucked. Her every curve, her every damn freckle, was designed to the exact specifications of my ideal woman.

Thick, wavy hair, the same color as the leaves in late September. Soft brown eyes framed by thick lashes and smoky makeup. Pouty, lush lips. Freckles sprinkled all over her face, arms, and chest.

That fucking chest. A man could bury himself in that chest, and he’d gladly use his final breath to thank the heavens before suffocating in the perfect pillows.

Don’t get me started on her attire .

The straining slit of her pencil skirt was diabolical enough. When she slipped out of her cardigan, exposing the pale crests of her breasts straining against the low-cut tank top, I nearly blacked out.

This is what I get for taking a sabbatical. Either the universe is punishing me for my absence or the department secretary is playing a cruel joke by selecting this woman out of all the eligible candidates.

God dammit.

I drive my fist into the closed door, then shove off the wood and stalk back to my desk.

Sawyer Davvies should not be my biggest concern today. Right now, my attention needs to be focused on catching up with my colleagues and reacclimating to the day-to-day drivel of academia.

After a full year off, I’m completely out of the loop. Though the time off was necessary and I’d do it again in a heartbeat, playing catch-up on the first day of class is less than ideal.

Technically my contract started on August first.

In an ideal world, I would have spent the last few weeks attending faculty meetings and boring HR seminars. But given the unique nature of my time off, Dean Stalworth offered me the opportunity to complete the necessary start-of-school trainings remotely.

Nevertheless, today should not have been my first day back on campus. I thoroughly fucked up.

It was my intention to ease back into a routine. I told myself I’d come back to the office on occasion to check in and touch base, and I was certain I’d spend time here over the summer, updating my lessons.

But then fall turned to winter, and winter gave way to spring.

All the while, I stayed away. Then summer hit, and business picked up at the orchard, providing purpose and more work than Noah and I could keep up with.

By the end of each night, I was so exhausted that all I wanted was to sit around the fire and share a joint with my best friend.

So that’s what I did.

I worked and smoked and sat around the fire pit nursing a beer every night for the last several months, allowing my sole focus to be on the place I was needed most and the person who needed me .

My plans to come to campus last week were thwarted by the lack of parking enforcement during orientation. I couldn’t have found a parking spot if I tried, and honestly, I didn’t try very hard.

I considered reintegrating over the weekend.

Considered it, but in the end, I chose to enjoy the last of the time off I’d earned, staying where I was, free from the sense of foreboding that the new semester brings.

Plus I told Noah I wasn’t allowed back on campus until the first day of fall semester. It was a blatant lie. It was also the only way I could ensure he wouldn’t worry.

Up until now, I’ve regretted nothing. But I certainly am paying for my choices today.

Settling in, I power on my desktop, which I realize now is an updated version of my old machine.

By some miracle, my username and password work on the first try.

While I wait for the system to update, I scan the memos Cherrie, the department secretary, haughtily handed me when I arrived this morning.

The first one still boggles my mind. Harry Swinehart from the university’s communications team has been named the new head of the department of marketing and entrepreneurship.

It’s absurd.

Harry is only still employed by the university because he’s an institution himself.

He was old two decades ago when I was an undergrad.

He knows everyone in town and here at Holt, and he’s held various administrative positions over the years, often acting as a liaison between the town and the university.

He knows nothing of academia or the pedagogy of this field. I don’t even know if the man has a master’s degree.

Head of the department.

How the hell did that happen?

It won’t be an easy transition for Sybil.

She’s been department chair for two years and had just finalized the massive restructuring of the concentrations within the major when I went on leave.

I’ve been very much looking forward to where she’ll take us next as a department.

She’s an excellent leader. She’s shrewd but fair and not overly concerned about administrative hierarchy the way many department heads are.

Students first, Sybil always says. It’s refreshing to have someone so high up feel so in touch with the student population.

My next class isn’t until this afternoon, and it’s an upperclassmen capstone seminar that will require minimal bandwidth today, so I have time to do some housekeeping. My first order of business will be to ask Sybil to lunch so I can get to the bottom of what the hell is going on around here.

I open my email application so I can shoot her a quick invite, but when my inbox loads and I’m met with thousands of unread messages, along with a warning that I’m nearly out of storage, I hesitate.

With a sigh, I consider deleting them all and starting fresh.

I’ve gone as far as to click the delete all icon when the name of a sender near the top catches my eye.

Sawyer Davvies.

The email below it is also from her. And another three lines down.

I search her name, discovering a total of seven messages from Ms. Sawyer Davvies, proving what my fucked-up subconscious didn’t want to believe.

She made a concerted effort to connect prior to the start of classes.

Yet I berated her in front of thirty undergrads for not being prepared.

Projection, much? My therapist is going to have a field day when I share this story.

If.

If I share it.

Because though I may be a staunch advocate for therapy and tending to one’s mental health, I’m not prepared to divulge to Naveen how unreasonably attracted I am to my new graduate assistant.

Nor am I ready to admit that, had I been involved in any capacity with the hiring process, she would have been cut from the list immediately.

She’s too hot and she doesn’t know the first thing about this field.

I miss my former GA. Curtis wasn’t particularly dedicated to the role.

Nor was he all that sharp. But he knew how I liked things done, and at least he was studying marketing.

Was being the operative word. Until he changed career paths and transferred to a school in North Carolina to study athletic training.

Goodbye, Curtis. You would not believe how sorely you are missed.

I save all Sawyer’s emails in a folder, then type out a message to Sybil.

Once the whooshing sound confirms it’s been sent, I select all 81,769 emails in my inbox and delete them .

There.

The new semester has officially begun. Time to make the most of this fresh start.