Twist of Fate : Chasser University Book 1 Read online

  Twist of Fate

  (Chasser University Book One)

  C.J. HELM

  Copyright © 2021 C.J. Helm

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN: 9798751624217

  DEDICATION

  To my husband,

  Our love story is much better than this one.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I may have put pen to paper and written this book, but authors would be nothing without their readers. You are such a great group of people. Supportive, insightful, passionate, and encouraging. I love you all.

  To all who read this book:

  I hope this love story captures your imagination and touches your heart. Thank you for giving my characters a place on your shelf.

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23

  CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25

  CHAPTER 26

  CHAPTER 27

  CHAPTER 28

  CHAPTER 29

  CHAPTER 30

  CHAPTER 31

  CHAPTER 32

  CHAPTER 33

  CHAPTER 34

  CHAPTER 35

  CHAPTER 36

  CHAPTER 37

  CHAPTER 38

  CHAPTER 39

  CHAPTER 40

  CHAPTER 41

  CHAPTER 42

  CHAPTER 1

  Amy

  I was late to class and if there was one thing I hated, it was arriving late to anything, let alone a class I was already struggling in.

  Today, at least I could blame the library’s printer. Slow, old, and creaky, it had taken way too long to spit out the paper that was due in class - I checked the time on my phone screen - in exactly ten minutes. I was going to take the printer’s reluctance to give me my work as a bad sign.

  An English major who hates the advanced creative fiction writing class as much as she hates math classes? Yep, definitely a bad sign.

  I could analyze the heck out of literature all day long. Give me a story and I’d break it down to the smallest details. After all, I wasn’t minoring in literature for nothing. That style of writing, technical and analytical, I loved.

  It was the pressure and uncertainty of putting together a fiction of my own that I dreaded. The ups and downs of writing fiction didn’t fit my very organized personality. I needed predictability and I needed order.

  Somehow, I’d made it three and a half years at Chasser University without taking a creative writing class. Unfortunately, my student advisor had stumbled across the omission last year as we were working out my course schedule for my last and final year as an undergrad.

  “Is there any way we can skip it and pretend I already took it?” I’d asked her, joking, but also not joking.

  She’d eyed me over her reading glasses. “It seems like an easy class for you, Amy.”

  I’d stayed quiet and didn’t tell her I’d deliberately avoided it while she scrolled through the next year’s schedule to see where she could fit it in. It turned out I should have taken it anytime over the last three years because the university wasn’t offering the beginner creative writing class at all the upcoming year. That left me with the advanced class as my only option. Which meant weekly creative writing assignments and a final that took all of the previous assignments and compiled them into a complete and publication-worthy work of creative fiction.

  At least that was what the class description said in the course calendar. As I stared down at the next year of my life, my advisor tried to console me.

  “You have so much experience in writing that I’m sure this one will be cake for you.”

  She had lied.

  Now that I was finally in my last semester as an undergrad, I dreaded the class every week. It wasn’t just that I felt like a fish out of water with the writing assignments, but Professor Milner was a dud. The man was the most boring educator I’d ever been forced to endure. He had to be approaching sixty, balding, with a paunch that spoke of too much beer and fried food. And his assignments confused the hell out of me. So far, they all sounded like he’d pulled the prompts straight from a Pinterest writer’s inspiration board. A month in and I had confirmed why I’d avoided the class all along.

  Now I was late. And I refused to be late to anything. I sprinted out of the library and across the greens, attempting to shuffle the stack of papers in my hands into some sort of order. My black and white sneakers smacked when I hit the sidewalk again. The Literature and Humanities building was just ahead. I slammed into the double doors with a bang, shoving one open enough with my shoulder to let me through.

  From the emptiness of the halls in front of me, it looked like I would have a clear shot to Professor Milner’s classroom. There were only about three dozen of us in class, so they’d crammed us all into one of the smaller classrooms at the back of the building.

  I was used to larger class sizes. That was another thing I didn’t like about this class. I preferred to get lost in the shuffle of an auditorium size crowd. My career goals may have included teaching in my own high school classroom one day, but that didn’t mean I wanted to speak aloud in a room full of adults.

  Glancing down, I checked my watch and saw that miraculously, I still had five minutes to spare. Just as the satisfaction of arriving on time washed over me, another feeling hit. This one was stronger, more urgent, and radiated in my lower regions.

  I had to pee. And the urge had decided to hit me with the force of a freight train. There was no way I’d be able to hold it until after class.

  “Shoot,” I yelled, my voice echoing down the empty hallway. Frantically, my brain tried to remember the layout of this building. I ran around the corner, hoping to be greeted by the familiar decal on the door.

  “Yes!” I dove into the restroom and tossed my backpack down on the counter. Carefully, I laid the assignment I’d just printed on the top of my backpack. Hopefully, no one walked in and splashed water all over the freshly printed pages.

  I was in and out of the stall in an impressive amount of time. Rushing, I washed my hands and wiped them as dry as possible. The clock ticked down in my head. I probably had three minutes to spare, but my class was just at the other end of the hall. I could still make it on time.

  I grabbed my backpack with one hand and the pages I’d printed with the other. The backpack was still halfway unzipped from my frantic search for a presentation folder in the library, but I couldn’t spare the time to zip it up again. Instead, I hoisted it up and held it together as best I could. Hopefully my friend, Mariah, would have an extra folder I could borrow to use today for class.

  I made a beeline for the door, proud of myself for getting to class on time. But the contents of my backpack jostled haphazardly as I speed walked. I realized that losing my wallet and keys was an imminent possibility if I didn’t close the bag.

  I bolted out of the bathroom, head down, fiddling with the stubborn zipper, trying to get it to slide up a little farther. Just as the zipper finally gave way and I lifted my head, smack. The side of my face erupted in pain. It felt like I’d just run into the face of a brick wall.

  Had I literally run into the wall?

  “What the…”

  Reflexively, my fingers opened as I put my hands up to protect my face from whatever had just tried to attack it. Everything I was carrying flew out of my hands. Backpack? Thump on the worn tiled floor. Freshly printed assignment that I was supposed to turn in in two minutes? It was now fluttering to the ground in a flurry of white and black pages.

  Shit.

  For a moment, my head spun. I blinked the haze away, trying to make sense of the fact that I’d run into a wall that hadn’t even been there before I entered the restroom.

  But then, as the mist cleared from my eyes, I realized that what I’d run into wasn’t a wall at all.

  Like a head-butting billy goat, I’d just run into the apparently very hard chest of a very big, very broad-shouldered man. He towered above me. But his size didn’t stop my temper from flaring up in a hot flash. I was instantly fuming.

  Now I was going to be late to class for sure.

  “What the hell, dude,” I exclaimed. “Don’t you watch where you’re going?”

  Suddenly, I connected to the feeling of my limbs again and I became aware of a warm, insistent pressure on both of my forearms.

  My body erupted in a flood of tingles as I looked up into a pair of the warmest brown eyes that I’d ever seen. Bold, black eyebrows topped those eyes. I took note that the smooth salt-and-pepper hair on his head wasn’t doing him any harm in the looks department. In fact, my whole body seemed to suddenly be tingling with the awareness that this was the hottest man I had ever seen in my life.

  And he was touching me, his fingertips singing my skin as he held onto my forearms with a gentle, but firm pressure. He’d pulled me close to his chest, as if he was afraid that I’d fall backwards if he let go.

/>   Wow, he’s hot. I closed my mouth, since it had seemed to have fallen open with shock, and just took him in. His thumbs smoothed themselves over my skin and I felt that touch everywhere on my body. Everywhere. Including between my thighs and my now very alert nipples. Every cell in my body seemed to be pulling me closer to him, like he was surrounded by a magnetic field I couldn’t resist.

  The stranger stared back at me, those chocolate eyes looking me over. An expression that seemed to be a mixture of concern and amusement was on his face. My stomach lurched.

  “Did you hurt yourself?” A deep, smooth voice tickled my ears. “You should really watch where you are going.”

  Those strong fingers, the pads a little rough and calloused, rubbed my skin again.

  “What?” I murmured, ignoring his sarcastic tone and staring now at his gorgeous mouth. I’d never realized how hot lips could be. His were tucked behind a short beard and were twitching with a suppressed urge to laugh. I felt a tickle of irritation that his amusement seemed to be directed at me. But his beard looked so soft and smooth that I wanted to reach out and pet it.

  Unexpectedly, a wave of dizziness washed over me. Clinging to the stranger’s forearms to keep my balance, I tried to remember why I was so upset a few seconds ago. My mouth curved into a smile as I peered up at him. My brain felt loopy and washed out, like I’d just spent all afternoon swimming in a lake and I was now lounging on the shore, absorbing the hot rays of the sun.

  I felt myself sway.

  “It’s ok. I’ve got you,” he murmured in my ear.

  The stranger pulled me closer, steadying me against his thick torso. I felt him back me up until I bumped softly into the wall. His muscular thighs pressed into mine, holding me up. I was trapped between this mountain of a man and the wall behind me. Trying to collect myself, I leaned my head against his chest.

  The wave of dizziness passed and I lifted my head to look at him again. A wild moment of wondering what his moustache would feel like feathering over my skin shot through me like a lightning bolt before I came to my senses and realized how ridiculous I must look.

  “Do I need to call the nurse to come look at you?” He was speaking to me again, his brow drawn together in a frown.

  “Nnn..no,” I stuttered out. The stranger seemed to realize that he still had me pinned against the wall because he took a slight step back and dropped his hands. Immediately I noticed the absence of his touch.

  “You smacked your forehead pretty hard.” Suddenly his hand came up again and touched my hair. Gently, he felt along my hairline. The way he worked his fingers through my hair sent shivers down my spine. I loved having my scalp touched. “You might have a concussion.”

  “Mmmm,” I heard the sound come out of my mouth. My eyes flew open and I realized in horror that I had pressed myself against him. I was arched up into him like a cat, nothing between us but our clothing and a firm bulge at the center of his hips. Instinctively, I arched up into it. The pressure of his hard body against mine was doing things to my brain. And my body.

  I jerked away. The stranger’s hands dropped and he stepped back immediately. His expression shuttered, those chocolate eyes going from warm to cold in an instant.

  What the hell was I doing?

  “I’m fine,” I snapped. Quickly, I squatted and started snatching at the contents of my backpack, which had scattered all across the floor. To my dismay, so had my assignment, the white sheets scattered randomly down the hall. Every page was going to be out of order.

  He bent down as well, his long fingers lifting pencils and lip gloss and paper and gum wrappers off of the floor.

  “Were you trying out for a speed walking championship?” I heard him mutter.

  My head snapped up. “Excuse me?”

  The man may have been a literal swoon-fest, but I was really ticked off right now. “This situation is amusing to you?” I fumed. “I was walking to my creative writing class to hand in the assignment that is now all over the floor. How was I to know someone was waiting to attack me with their hard ass chest when I walked into the hall?”

  I gestured wildly to the sheets of paper. “And now you’ve made me late.” My palm smacked the floor in frustration.

  “Oh, I made you late?” his deep voice rumbled and he snapped from serious to amused like a light switch. “Well I wasn’t the one running like a hellion out of the bathroom with her head down, was I?”

  I decided I didn’t like his tone. It was offensive. He handed me a pile of junk from my backpack and our fingers brushed. Despite my irritation with him, electricity shot up my arm. My whole body flushed.

  He was handsome. If a rude, burly lumberjack tried to dress up. His well-worn jeans fit snugly around broad hips. A dark blue t-shirt was stretched across a muscular chest and his shoulders were too big for the camel-colored sports coat he wore. The outfit was completed with steel toed work boots that looked like they were meant to be worn while chopping wood.

  The stranger’s hair was styled short on the sides, but longer on top. It swooped over in a surprisingly trendy style. By the salt-and-pepper scattered through his hair and beard and the lines etched around his eyes, I would have guessed his age to be close to forty. He was probably another student’s father. I just hoped that if I knew his kid, that he or she had better people skills.

  Despite his annoying attitude, his age didn’t do anything to lessen my instant attraction to him. I hadn’t dated much through college. Sex was less interesting than grades and goals. Men could come later. After grad school.

  I now found myself now at the age of twenty-two without the slightest clue on how to be romantic. But there was something that I had always found irresistibly seductive about an older man. Not just any older man. The right older man. One who looked as hot as this stranger. All that experience...

  I snapped out of it. “Whatever. Sorry for running into you then. Thanks for the help.” I motioned to the messy stack of paper in my hand.

  The edges of his eyes crinkled as he smirked at me. “Good luck with your paper. I’m sure your professor will be lenient if you explain what happened.”

  I barely registered what he said. My anxiety was already spiking out of control at the realization that I was now undeniably late to class. The prospect of walking in with everyone’s eyes on me made my stomach lurch. I hurried down the hall without another glance back at the handsome stranger.

  CHAPTER 2

  Amy

  To my surprise, class hadn’t even started yet. A few groups of students stood in various corners of the room, heads together, voices murmuring. Although I was surprised not to see Mariah talking in one of the groups, I was glad to have her friendly face to make a beeline for as I walked across the room toward our usual spot.

  Since there were only a few dozen of us who had signed up for this class, seats were arranged in two circular rows. I had managed to get used to the arrangement, but I didn't like it. It was much harder to get lost in the back of the class with this in-your-face setup.

  “Hi,” Mariah said. She looked up from her phone and moved her backpack off the seat next to her. We always saved each other a seat. I plopped into the chair, suddenly glad this was my last class of the weekend. Swiftly, I rearranged the sheets of my assignment, trying to get it back into some semblance of order.

  “You’re late,” Mariah observed, handing me a presentation folder. I gratefully accepted.

  “I know,” I grimaced. “You’ll never guess what happened out in the hall just now. But where is Professor Milner? I expected class to be in full swing by now.”

  Mariah shifted to look at me. She propped one leg underneath her. Her face sparkled with anticipation.

  “Didn’t you hear what happened?”

  “Uh, no,” I replied. “I was in the library studying for a test. I haven’t really talked to anyone today.”

  Nor did I really talk to anyone most other days. I was lucky to have Mariah and Lacey as my closest friends on this campus or I’d be really lonely.

  “Professor Milner was in a car accident this morning,” Mariah’s eyes lit up. She grinned at my shocked expression. “Oh he’s pretty much ok. Just a broken leg and pelvis which sucks, but it will heal. They’ve had to call in another professor from a local college to sub until he gets back.”