Page 1 of Forever Only Once

Chapter 1

Hazel

I couldn’t affordto be late today. I had promised that I would be there on time because everybody else had meetings and other appointments after our coffee break, and I couldn’t be the one to hold them back. It didn’t help that I had hit every single red light on the way here, and a student had come in to ask a question just as I was about to head to my car. I’d stayed later than I wanted to, mostly because I would never leave a student hanging. He’d had legit questions, and even though my office hours had run an extra thirty minutes past my scheduled time, I felt like I had helped him solve a few problems so he could work on the rest on his own. Thankfully, that student was also one who asked pointed questions, which got him thinking.

That didn’t always happen with some of my students at UB.

Even though I truly loved them and was glad to help, doing so meant I was now running late.

I hated being late.

I crossed the street, moving away from the public parking lot, annoyed that I hadn’t been able to find a spot in front of Dakota’s café, the Boulder Bean.

I loved living in Boulder, the college-town feel with the central university taking up most of downtown, and my smaller university residing in a little corner. Boulder was weird, at least that’s what everybody said. I kind of agreed. But after trying to find a place that called to me, I had needed weird, needed a little bit of home.

I didn’t have any family left. Didn’t have a place to call home outside of this. Boulder was it.

I loved my new city, though it wasn’t entirely new anymore, seeing as I’d been here for long enough. I’d made friends, ones that I truly liked. An inner circle that was waiting for me because I couldn’t find a fricking place to park.Parking was nearly always a nightmare.

Boulder had boomed over time, and it was getting a little ridiculous now. I found it harder to find my little piece of privacy and peace.

Tourism was getting more substantial thanks to the fact that I lived in one of the most beautiful places in the world. The mountains were right behind me, the foothills gorgeous and looking as if they were painted on the horizon.

I tried to take pictures, but it just didn’t work out. A photo could never capture the true beauty.

I loved Boulder. I loved the home that I had been forced to make for myself. I did not enjoy the fact that everybody and their mother was moving to Boulder. I might technically be a transplant, but I liked to think of this as my new home. If I had my way, everyone else would just stay away for a minute so I could enjoy it. I knew I was part of the problem—I hadn’t been born here, after all—but I wasn’t going to think too hard on that.

I took another turn and ran straight into a massive chest.

I held back a curse, mostly because I hadn’t been watching where I was going, just like he clearly hadn’t. He gripped my elbows, clutching them ever so slightly. My heart raced at the unwanted and unexpected contact, and I froze, every single lesson I had learned in my self-defense classes seeping out of my mind as I tried to catch my breath. I grabbed onto my purse strap, as if that could protect me. Then I looked up—and up—at the man in front of me.

He was clean-shaven, wearing a perfect suit, his thin tie finished with an elegantly crafted knot at the neck. He smiled down at me, his eyes full of warmth…and something else I didn’t want to name.

I had gotten skilled at deducing what a man thought when he looked at me.

I didn’t like what I saw with this stranger.

“Hello there,” he said, his voice deep, a little accented. Irish, maybe? That didn’t sound right, though. No, it sounded as if he had been watching a little too much British TV and decided to add an accent to his voice.

With his hands still on me, seemingly not willing to let go, my heart raced, and flashes of other hands came at me, shaking me to my core. But these weren’t those hands. This was not him. I needed to remember that.

“Sorry,” I said, annoyed with myself for even apologizing since we’d both been in the wrong and moving too quickly. But I had run into this stranger just like he had run into me, so perhaps I’d needed to apologize anyway.

“No need to be. It’s good to have...run into you.”

I attempted to move away, but he kept his hands on me as if he were trying to keep me steady.

I tried not to let the bile make its way up my throat.

“Excuse me. I need to go.”

“I just want to make sure I didn’t hurt you. After all, we did hit kind of hard. This will be a funny story we can tell our children one day. Don’t you think?” He winked, and I just blinked at him.

Was that supposed to be a line? One where he still wouldn’t let go of me?

I took a deep breath and twisted in his arms so he had to move his wrist or risk it getting broken.

He took a step back and frowned at me.