Lauren's POV
"That's her. That's her!" Ally shouted, slumping down in the passenger seat. I eased up, peering out of the glass, watching a tall brunette walk out of the small diner that sat on the corner of the street.
She stopped at the end of the large window, leaning against the brick wall. Immediately she reached into the pocket of her apron, fumbling for a second before coming back with a single cigarette and a lighter. She placed it between her lips, then against the blackness of the night, a small flame appeared followed by a puff of smoke.
"Seriously?" I asked, my warm breath fogging up the glass.
"Yeah," she responded quickly.
I sighed, studying the stranger's every move. At my expression, Ally asked, "What?"
"Nothing," I shrugged my shoulders. "That's just not what I expected." I watched her long fingers wedge the cigarette between themselves and hang by her waist, while she freed her phone from her pocket with the other hand.
The illumination from the screen lit up her face revealing distinct features that made her look far older than twenty-one.
"She just doesn't look like Camila's type," I thought to myself. Or at least I thought I had but clearly it was said aloud because Ally responded.
"What exactly is Camila's type?" I felt my cheeks heat up and I glanced over quickly at her. She smiled still peering over my shoulder studying Dinah just as I had been doing.
"I don't know," I admitted. "She looks so-"
"Evil? Bitchy? Terrify-"
I shook my head. "No. Normal." I expelled a heavy breath. "She doesn't look like she's capable of terrorizing anyone."
Ally groaned next to me. "Don't let her fool you," she whispered. "Just because you can't see the horns doesn't mean they're not there."
I softly laughed.
"Now focus Lauren. C'mon. This is a mission and you're getting distracting."
"I'm sorry," I apologized playfully.
"Now are you ready to do this or not?"
"I am," I said quietly, and as I did, it felt like my heart dropped to my feet.
There was a sweeping of numbness that covered my body just thinking that I'd have to actually exit my car and approach her.
It was one thing to plan it secretly in the kitchen at 1am but to be here, hand on the door, not even twenty feet from Dinah. I could feel fear coursing through my veins.
"Don't lose nerve now," Ally whispered, clearly seeing that I was starting to panic. "We went through all of the trouble of sneaking out of the apartment, we can't just go home now. You have to do this Lauren," she said and I nodded my head nervously.
"I know," my voice shook.
"Now remember," Ally coached. "All you're going to do is walk by and see if she notices you. That's it. Don't talk. Don't stop. Just walk by. Okay?"
Ally had planned to stay behind in the car. First to go unnoticed by Camila's ex, but also to watch her reaction in seeing me.
Fingers were crossed, that I'd walk by, Dinah would look up, acknowledging me, but she'd have no reaction. She wouldn't call out my name. Her expression wouldn't change. Nothing would happen.
Because if that's how things played out then Ally's theory would be proven right.
She seems to think that Dinah only knows my name.
"There's a list in the lobby of every building that has the professor's offices on it. She could have followed Camila, saw that she got off on that floor and narrowed her search down to four names."
Me and three other male professors.
"Clearly we know that Camila's not too concerned with her classes to be visiting that often, so it'd seem obvious that she was there for the only female professor on the list." Troy and Camila seemed unimpressed by Ally's theory but I was hanging onto her every word so she spoke directly to me. "So if she only knows your name but doesn't recognize you then there's no way in hell she could have proof that you two are together."
So that's when she devised this plan to be in the same area as Dinah to see if she notices me.
It seemed like a good way to test the theory but I don't think I was prepared for how terrifying it'd be to actually carry it through when I had agreed.
"Okay?" Ally asked again. "Just walk by. Don't stop."
"Okay." I wrapped my fingers around the door handle.
"Lauren," Ally called out just before I pulled it open.
"Yeah?" I asked turning around.
"You can do this," she said giving me the final boost of confidence that I needed.
I nodded my head, taking a deep inhale before tugging against the handle, opening the door.
Once I was out of the SUV. My feet firmly planted to the cement, I narrowed in my focus, allowing myself to only think of the conversation that I had with Camila moments before she fell asleep tonight. And thinking of her was enough to calm the erratic pounding inside of my chest.
Her words were what carried me forward in the direction of where Dinah was standing.
***
"Be honest with me Lauren," Camila said as she settled against me in bed. The heat from her skin clashed with mine, and the only thing separating our bare bodies was a thin layer of sweat.
"Are you worried about Dinah?"
She asked it so innocently that I wanted to keep up the act I was putting on to spare her. The act I had decided on portraying the moment she came to my office and told me that her ex knew that we were dating. I wanted to seem nonchalant. Seem at ease with the entire thing. I even went as far as making her promise that she wouldn't let the fear of being found out, distance us like before.
But we were in such a vulnerable position at the moment, I knew she'd recognize the lie if I tried to tell it again.
So I admitted the truth.
For the first time since earlier today, when she revealed the news, I told her how I really felt. "Of course I am," I said, wrapping my arms tighter around her waist. Her bare back was pressed against my chest, her head leaning on my shoulder and my face was buried in her neck.
Immediately I felt her steady breathing change, and her heart beat sped up against my lips that were on her skin.
It was sad that I could feel how nervous she was without having to hear her say it. But it was beautiful that just a month in, I already felt that close to her to notice the change.
And the thought that Dinah was out there threatening to take that from me, was sickening.
"Why didn't you tell me before?" she asked.
"I didn't want it to worry me," I said kissing her neck. "I thought if I said that it didn't enough, it'd go away."
"You know that never works," she softly laughed, and I nodded my head.
"I know. It's just that I don't want to be scared to be with you because I think that we're finally in a good place."
"But you are?" she drew the corner of her lip between her teeth and expelled a single heavy, breath. "You are scared?"
"Of course I am. I don't like to think that I could lose you," I whispered and my warm breath against her skin caused a wave of chills to appear beneath my fingertips that were on her stomach.
She sighed.
"You won't though," she leaned to the side in order to see me better. Her lips were still red and swollen and the marks I had left behind in my office on her skin this morning, were now coated with a fresh shade of pink. "No one can force us to not be together," she said, her voice shaking. "You won't lose me."
"Says the girl who doesn't make promises." I leaned forward kissing her mouth and I could still taste myself on her lips. "How do you know that I won't lose you if you can't say what will happen in the future?"
She shook her head, pulling her mouth away from mine. I clinched my jaw in anticipation. I didn't like to bring up the idea of promises because only hours ago she asked for us to never argue about them.
But before I could apologize, she said, "I don't know what will happen. But I do know enough to say that I won't run and I sure as hell won't panic. Dinah is trying to scare us into not being together but it won't work. I'm in this, Lauren," she whispered. "I love you and that I can-"
"You can what Camila?" I asked when she hesitated. I could see her tongue dancing against her lips as she tried to force herself to say the word. One that she hadn't even uttered in five months.
She shook her head, not finding the nerve. So I spoke before she could feel guilty that she couldn't say it.
I leaned my forehead against hers, "I love you too Camila. And you're right, we can control what happens to our relationship. It just feels bigger than us, you know?" I inhaled. "I could lose my job, you could get into trouble. Your education could be compromised. My career could be compromised. Our lives could-"
"Stop," she cried out. "Will you please just stop. You promised me to not run. In your office, remember?"
I nodded my head slowly, knowing clearly what I had said.
"Well, I'm asking you to do the same thing." She turned completely in my arms, until we were chest to chest, her open palms on my flushed cheeks. "Promise me you won't let this take you away from me."
And I promised because I could easily do it when it came to her.
"I'm not running," I said to make it clear that I was still very much here. "You just asked if I was worried, well I am. We have a lot to lose, and for me, the only thing that Dinah is threatening to take away, that I can't live without, is you." I shrugged my shoulders. "I don't need to teach. But I do need the way holding you feels safe and familiar. I can lose my job but I can't lose you."
"You won't lose me," she said softly and feeling a spark of nerve, I asked again.
"How do you know that Camila?" I wanted validation and it might have been naive of me but hearing that word would give me that.
"I don't know for sure," she admitted. "But I can- I can pr-"
I let her have a moment to collect herself, and finally she said it.
"I can't promise you that you won't lose me. But I can promise you that I'm going to do everything I can to make sure that you don't."
And the hurricane going on inside of me stopped dead in it's tracks. She rolled her eyes at my reaction. A smile involuntarily forced it's way to my face.
"Say it again," I smiled into the kiss that came after closing the distance between our mouths and she softly laughed with flushed cheeks.
"I promise I'll fight for you Lauren."
***
I smiled at the thought of her words that had completely changed everything between us. Remembering the girl that was so appalled by promises a month ago, to the one who had finally made them exactly when I needed her to.
That was the reason it was in the middle of the night, and I was intentionally walking down the street toward her ex. Because she was worth the fight.
Camila had always been worth the fight.
So there was no need to be nervous because walking past Dinah would give me answers that would help me keep the girl that I've fallen in love with.
Knowing I was close, I put my head down, shoved my shaking hands in the pockets of my leather jacket and steadied my pace into a slow walk.
I watched as her boots become closer and closer and when they were not even five feet away, I took took one last deep breath, in preparation for the moment of truth.
I passed by where Dinah was standing feeling confident that she hadn't stopped me yet.
And then a few feet away, before I ever had a chance to exhale, the breath was ripped from my lungs when she spoke so evenly that I immediately was made aware of why Ally had warned me.
In a crass tone, she said, "You know Ms. Jauregui. It's not polite to stalk people." I could physically hear her take another inhale from her cigarette and let the smoke be released from her mouth.
And in that moment, everything in me said to follow Ally's advice. Keep walking. Don't stop. Don't say a word to her. But I remembered why I was there. Camila. And that was enough to still my feet. It was enough to turn me around. And the thought of my girlfriend, who was sound asleep in her bed, none the wiser that I had left, was enough to force words from the back of my throat, across my shaking lips.
Words that I will never be able to unsay.
Words that started a war.
In a raspy tone, I said through clinched teeth, "Who the fuck do you think you are?"
She smirked and it sent a wave of regret across my body.
"I'm the girl that's going to make your life a living hell."
A/N: Oops. So this chapter went in a different direction than I had originally planned. But here it is. Don't hate me.