“Well, Jane,” he said, walking into the break room in that salmon pullover I hated. “What do you believe?”
“My name is not Jane and what do I believe about what?”
He cocked his head, almost smile tugging his lips. I hated that look; it made something inside me burn. He had a thing, a thing I didn’t understand, an I-can’t-stand-this-thing-but-I-don’t-even-know-what-it-is-thing. Yeah, that’s what he had.
Seemingly totally unconcerned with my glare, he moved to pour himself a cup of coffee. Moved is actually a thousand miles from what he did. He stalked. He prowled. He glided. And all the time, watching me from the corner of his eye, laughing.
I wanted to throw up my hands and have a fit. I hated how he always got to me! How the hell did he always get to me?
“Well,” I said slowly. He never let me get away without answering. “I believe you are an arrogant son of a bitch with no morals and no scruples and no…. concern for anybody else.”
He laughed, leaning back against the counter, long legs crossed at the ankles, body fit into his clothes as if they had been made on him. Off the rack, my ass.
“Morals and scruples,” he mused, watching me over the rim of his mug. “And no concern. Pretty ugly.”
“As are you. And let me add, arrogant,”
“You said that one…”
“…a sexist pig, a prig, a conceited, egotistical bastard…and….”
“Keep on, Jane,” he goaded. “Don’t hold back.”
His words had the opposite affect; they shut me up. I felt like crying but I didn’t know why.
He looked at me for a long moment, something unfamiliar in his eyes, and then he set down his mug. “Thanks for the chat, Jane. We’ll never speak of it again.”
Turning, he walked out the door.
Why did I want to cry? Why did I want to pick up his mug and just hold it because it had touched some part of him?
The dullness was like a razor across his skin. He’d promised to make her hate him and he had. She hated him. And now, she was safe.
A Writer's Life 
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