“You will use your hands and fingers according to this diagram.” The professor laser-pointed to the screen. “Which you will find on the class website. You will use the altitude of Polaris above the horizon to determine your own location on this planet.”

He killed the overhead. “If you have questions, see your TA. Good day, see you Monday.”

Gavin headed straight for me, glaring at the guy in the next chair. He picked up my backpack from the floor. “Ready?”

“Just a minute,” I said. “I need to pack that. Give it here.”

My neighbor walked away and Gavin settled into his seat. “Maybe I can get the TA to move me next to you.”

I ignored him and shoved my iPad in my bag. “You want to do this Polaris lab together this weekend?”

“Definitely. We should drive out of town a bit Saturday night and find a good place.”

“Sure.”

“You think you’ll be ready for the bike? You’ll love it, I promise.”

I slung my backpack on my shoulder. “Okay.”

“Perfect.” He held out his elbow. “To your chariot?”

I slid my hand through his arm. “Lead the way.”

“You two are just too cute,” Jenny said, falling in beside us. “Set a date yet?”

I nudged her. “Don’t be snarky.”

“It’s an honest question. I expect to be maid of honor. And Lumberjack can be my escort, since he was the one who got you both at the same star party.” She dropped behind us as we headed for the stairwell. “When are we going to double date?”

“Whenever you want,” I said.

“Oooh, I know!” Jenny said. “We should do the star thing together. He’s the TA. We’ll obviously get it right.”

“Corabelle and I already have plans for that.” Gavin held the door open for us.

“Party poopers,” Jenny said. “Well, maybe something Sunday? We have to stay away from campus. Robert isn’t supposed to fraternize with his students.”

Gavin coughed. “I’m guessing there is a bit more than fraternizing going on.”

Jenny laughed, a tinkling sound. “You bet there is. Ta-ta, you totes adorbs two.” She dashed ahead of us. “I have to meet my lumberjack at an undisclosed location!”

“Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do!” I called after her.

She turned back. “I have a feeling that doesn’t leave much out.” Her pink hair streamed behind her as she raced out of the building.

I turned to Gavin. “So, your scowl could have peeled paint off the walls earlier,” I said. “You’re not seriously going to be upset every time I talk to some other guy.”

Gavin’s jaw started working and I squeezed his hand. “We’ve got this, right?”

He nodded.

“Shoot, I just remembered something.” I stopped walking. “I have to pick up a book on reserve for my lit class. Do we have a minute?”

Gavin checked his watch. “Sure. Even if it takes a bit, I can call Bud.”

We doubled back toward the center of campus and the looming Geisel Library. I had only been inside once, taking a cursory look at the Dr. Seuss memorabilia. Gavin walked along the clear cases of drawings and war posters as I collected my book. “Have you been on the top floor?” he asked when I came up beside him.

“Nope. Are there stacks up there?”

“Not many. I think they use it for storage. It’s a mess. You want to see?”

I glanced at the clock. We still had a half-hour before we really needed to head to work. “Okay.”

When we stepped out of the elevator, I saw what Gavin meant. Most of the library shelves were empty. Shrink-wrapped crates blocked some of the aisles. But the view through to the windows was unobstructed, and I wandered in a daze over to the giant panes of glass. “It’s beautiful,” I breathed.

“You can get a full panoramic of campus,” Gavin said.

Students worked at small tables facing the windows. A sign above their heads read “Silent study area.”

This would be an incredible place to write papers. The side facing the ocean was inspirational all on its own, even if partially blocked by other buildings, including the dorm where we had our star parties. Between the towering buildings, the vast white-blue of the Pacific expanded out forever like an empty canvas. Craggy bluffs bordered the shore, leading to houses, and eventually back to campus.

“This is interesting,” Gavin said.

I turned around. He’d discovered a cache of huge crates among the empty stacks. These were upended to rest on their sides, forming a circle almost as tall as he was. I turned my head to read the black numbers spray-painted on the wood. Dewey decimal numbers, maybe. Between two of the crates was a gap filled in with the heavy-duty plastic that had been cut away.

He pushed aside the plastic and ducked in among the crates. At first I could see the top of his head, but then he disappeared.

“Gavin!” I whispered. “What are you doing?”

His hand snaked out from the opening. When I grasped it, he pulled me through.

“It was a trap,” he said, his voice raspy and low. He pushed the plastic over the gap, obscuring the opening.

The crates surrounded us, but the empty space in the middle was plenty large enough to stand in. “What are we doing?” I asked.

He slid his hand beneath my shirt and moved up to cup a breast. “This.” He lowered his head to kiss me.

My heart pounded, but I relaxed into his mouth. His free hand tugged the backpack off my shoulder to rest on the carpet. “Are you sure this is a good idea?” I asked.

“This is always a good idea.” He unsnapped my jeans. “We’ll see if you can control yourself enough to be quiet.”

His hand slipped inside my panties and searched out the spot he was looking for. My mouth opened, but he closed his lips over mine before I could cry out. “Easy, girl,” he said against me, his fingers spreading me so he could get better access. “How’s this for a new challenge?”

I gripped his shoulders, breathing into his ear.

“That’s it,” he whispered. He grew frustrated trying to work inside the jeans, so he jerked them down past my hips. I leaned forward to bite his shoulder as sensations splintered through me.

He worked me carefully, using all the new knowledge he’d gained in the last few days. When I was writhing against him pretty hard, he withdrew, silencing my protest with a kiss.

His hands on my waist guided me in a circle to face away from him. He pushed on a crate to make sure it was heavy and steady. It tilted a little, but braced against one of the stacks. He moved my hands to grasp the corners of the box, and I heard the jingle of his belt.

Heat flashed through me. We were going to do this, here, in the library, with students a few yards away. Gavin steadied me with one hand on my hip and pushed me down a little with a firm press on the back. “Just a little more.”

I bent over and felt him seeking me, getting the angle right, then he was in, and I clutched the crate, still worried we could tip all the empty stacks in a domino crash worthy of a sitcom. He held both my hips, rocking into me, and just the idea that we were here, doing this, made everything so much more intense.

He reached around, finding his favorite spot again, and even though I couldn’t spread my legs in the jeans, he was close enough. I was soaring, up, the fluttering building into a cascade. He felt me start to go and thrust faster, harder, so that I totally forgot where we were. I pressed backward, taking him in deeper, and everything tightened at once, letting go in a shuddering release that set him off immediately, emptying into me with a force I’d never felt in him.

He exhaled against my hair, and I shifted my weight so that I wasn’t leaning on the crate, which had mercifully held. The image of it falling, and all the startled students seeing us, our jeans around our ankles, struck me as so hilarious that I started giggling.

“Uh-oh,” Gavin said, pulling out and yanking up his jeans. “This isn’t going to be one of those epic never-ending Corabelle giggle fits, is it?”

I had forgotten they existed. I couldn’t even remember the last one. Before I got pregnant? Had I exploded into one at any point with Finn? I bent to pull up my pants but everything was so funny. Me, my butt in the air, holding on to a crate of books. Gavin, plowing into me, rustling the plastic. I held my belly, trying to stay silent, my laughter so intense that my ab muscles were starting to hurt.

Gavin bent and jerked up my pants, because I was doubling over, the giggles coming so fast now that there was no stopping them. I managed to grab my waistband and snap it closed, but still, images of us surrounded by downed crates, the loose plastic floating down in the aftermath, was just…so funny.

“How did I used to get you to stop?” Gavin asked, although he was on the cusp of cracking up himself.

I shook my head. “I…don’t…remember…” I gasped for air. My stomach was aching. I tried to think of serious things like librarians and their stern expressions. The astronomy professor, leaning on his podium — no, that was even funnier. I burst into a fresh batch of giggles.

“Is somebody in there?” A voice outside the ring of crates made me clap my hand over my mouth.

“Now we’ve done it,” Gavin whispered, but he was already laughing.

The plastic began rustling. “You should come out now.”

Gavin put his finger over his lips.

I was heaving with effort and trying to stop, sucking air in. I should have been appalled, worried, but no, I couldn’t bring it down.

A head peeked through the gap, a guy not much older than us with square black glasses. “I knew it!”

Gavin held up his hands. “We’re busted.”

The face disappeared and resumed as just a voice. “I’m the TA in charge of the graduate study area up here. This is a silent study floor.”