"Hello? Building D? Got it." she shoved her phone back into her coat pocket.

"Who was it?"

Jess raised an eyebrow at the way Noah asked her a question. She clicked her tongue on him seeing his straight face. 'Where does this jerk gets the nerve,' she wondered.

"A friend and it is none of your business. The same thing with following me around." she narrowed her eyes on him. "And to answer your question on how long has I been working on the project, that professor Boa oversees was since the beginning," she told him while licking the wooden ice cream spoon with much gusto.

"And if you will ask another why,... the answer is simple. Because it is MY project." she wiped the ice cream on the left corner of her mouth with her thumb, she was about to lick the smudge of ice cream on her thumb when she remembered that she was inside the jerk's car.

She saw a box of tissue in between the passenger and the driver seat, without asking for his permission she pulled a piece and wiped her hands clean of the stickiness of the ice cream.

"Listen to whatever the other members of the team are saying that you should do about me, and we will not have a problem Mr. Tiefenbacher." she handed him back the ice cream cup and unlocked the passenger door.

"Do you even care of what they are saying behind your back?" he asked out of curiosity.

"I don't," she answered curtly. "You got your ice cream back. Bye, Mr. Tiefenbacher."

"Noah, call me Noah," he said in the passenger door that was slammed on his face. Jess was already walking away to meet her friend which is according to her, none of his business. He chuckled softly.

He wasn't able to say anything during the time she was in the passenger seat of his car simply because he was mesmerized when she licked the back of the wooden ice cream spoon. And he almost, lost himself when she put her thumb in between her lips about to lick them, only to change her mind.

He found himself disappointed. He shook his head with how pathetic his reaction was with how Jess ate a freaking ice cream. Speaking of ice cream he looked at the cup that she shoved back in his hand before she got out of his car, and found the cup empty!

His laughter echoed inside the silence of his car. He was laughing so hard he slapped the steering wheel. "Miss Zimmerman, what am I going to do with you?" he scoffed in amusement.

Meanwhile, Jess briskly walked to Building D where Luke was waiting for her. She shuddered with her fake bravado in front of Noah. Truth to be told her knees were shaking all the while she was being a wise-ass with him.

"Who wouldn't?" she blurted out along the empty corridor. Those deep set blue eyes of him will be the death of her sooner than later.

Noah Tiefenbacher - is one hell of a man. His eyes reminded her of summer back home, but when they were in bed, those eyes of him when clouded with desires were like a burst of rain in the middle of summer.

It extinguishes the gnawing emptiness of her heart. The way his hands roamed all over her skin, filled all the cracks in her being she doesn't know ever existed.

The hallway blurred so suddenly, that Jess leaned on the corridor wall to steady herself. She didn't notice how badly her legs were shaking until her back was supported by the cold cement wall. She was surprised to find her cheeks wet with tears.

"Pathetic," she scolded herself. "The guy didn't put a gun over your head, get over it!" she told herself rather loudly, that if someone happened to hear her, there would be another story about her all over the College of Microbiology.

According to Luke, she has such a laughable reputation all over the university that if he didn't know they were talking about her, he would think they were talking about a bunch of different girls and not just her.

What she said to Noah was true. She didn't care about people murmuring behind her back. She grew up being the talk of the whole town,- later on the whole country.

People threw her a strange look and whispered words that a young girl should never hear. But what can she do, her father is a man-slut. 'Why the word slut is only given to a girl,' she asked herself as she forcefully wipes the tears from her face.

She blew a deep breath steadying her heart that was momentarily shaken with the memory she shared with Noah. The one he didn't remember. She smiled bitterly. 'The bastard should have just died already.' She clicked her tongue in annoyance but more on herself than with him.

--

"Finally, the princess has arrived! Clang the bells, let the angels sing." he shoved the burritos on her hands as soon as she reached the hidden garden at Building D.

"Hunger really looks ugly on you," she smirked at Luke while unwrapping her share of burritos.

"Let me guess, you had an encounter with that virginity thief," he said, not even hiding the mockery in his voice.

"Thank you for your gallant observation, my lord." she mocked him back. The burritos had already gone cold. No wonder Luke was being sarcastic.

"Did you cry?" he asked in a gentle tone.

Jess almost choke on the lump in her throat hearing the gentleness of his voice. Luke is bitchy most of the time, but he has the most loving heart she has ever known. Her college life would be so boring without him.

But- she would die first before she would ever tell it to his face. He doesn't have to know because his ego was already big enough.

"Don't ask me anymore. I want to enjoy my burrito in peace," she mumbled an answer with her mouth full.

"Do you think Noah has a twin?"