I didn't knock with an excuse. I had nothing prepared. Nothing to hide behind. No version of a reason that wasn't the real one. I just knocked once and pushed the door open. Stepped inside and let it fall shut behind me.
He was at his desk. Papers in front of him, pen in hand, sleeves rolled the way they always were. He looked up.
Something moved through his expression. Brief. Gone.
Then he was just looking at me with that same steady, unrevealing attention he gave everything, like I was a student who had come in with a question and he was deciding whether it was worth his time.
I stood and held his gaze and said nothing for a moment. I needed a second to decide what I was actually going to do with the anger that had been sitting in my chest…since I’d watched his eyes move over me in t
