Heartbitten (A New Adult Vampire Romance Novel) Read Online Free PDF Page B

could she get? She wanted to go and hug him, comfort him, but instead she ducked her head back and let out a breath. Stepping backward, she accidentally knocked into a stack of books. Her hands stretched out but they fell through her fingers, the whole stack topping over in a loud crash of paper and dust. Ancient dust.
    "What are you doing here?"
    Liz looked up to see the man standing over her, frowning. He wasn't so cute now that he was angry. His eyes were dark, so black that the pupils were swallowed whole.
    "I—I—"
    "You knocked over the Browning collection," the man said.
    "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to interrupt." Liz continued to pick up the books that she'd knocked over. He didn't make a move to help her at all. Instead, he leaned against the bookshelf, glaring. She could see the moist smear on his cheek from where he'd wiped away his tears, but the sorrow in his eyes had disappeared for good.
    "Nobody is supposed to be in here," he said. His voice was irritated and smug, and any kind of attraction she'd had to him quickly evaporated.
    "Then what are you doing here?" she asked, putting the last book back.
    "Did you see the name on the plaque outside the door?" he asked.
    "No."
    "No ?"
    "No. Who reads plaques?" Liz shrugged.
    Robb sighed and rolled his eyes. "What's the use of donating a ton of money? Nobody ever reads plaques."
    Ah, a trust fund student. Sure, she'd knocked over some books. So what?
    "The door was open. I was just curious."
    "That's a dangerous thing." He stepped forward, and she got her first good look at him. He was wearing suit pants and a tie over a crisply pressed white shirt. His dry cleaning bill was probably half of her rent for the month. His cologne had a strange smell to it, something familiar that she couldn't put her finger on. And yes, he was handsome. Very handsome. Unfortunately, he was also very much an asshole.
    "It's dangerous to be curious?" she asked.
    "You heard what happened to the cat," he said, a slight sneer on his face.
    "Poetry. Truly the most dangerous volumes of all the history of literature." The snarkiness slipped out of her before she could stuff it back in. Oh well.
    "Some of these volumes are thousands of years old, you know," he said. "They're important . Unlike your curiosity."
    Such an asshole. Liz decided right then and there that she didn't care how snarky she was to a rich, stuck-up grad school kid. She was in grad school here too, and she had just as much right to be in the library as he did. She put one hand on her hip.
    "Well, I'm so glad your family donated them. It must make your thesis a little easier to defend with so many excellent primary sources right here for nobody to use except you."
    "They're here for safekeeping, not so some clumsy girl can knock them on the floor."
    "I said I was sorry!" Liz said, fuming. "I didn't mean to knock them over."
    "Whatever. I don't have time for this." The man pulled out a key from his pocket and tossed the book he'd been reading back on the shelf. "I'm leaving now, which means you're leaving now."
    "Fine," Liz said. " I don't have time for assholes ." She stormed out of the room, not bothering to read the plaque on the wall outside. She had to get back to the lab. Why
    did cute guys always have to be such jerks?

 
    CHAPTER THREE
    Robb rested his arm on the shelf. The encounter with the girl had shaken him, and he didn't know why. The fiery way she'd shot insults at him, her bright green eyes, her American accent. Despite her clumsy mistake, he could tell that her beautiful face hid an intelligence behind them. He'd been taken aback by her sudden appearance, and he'd snapped at her before even thinking.
    He regretted it immediately—as soon as he'd seen the hurt in her eyes. And just as immediately, the hurt he'd seen had been covered up by a hard shell of sarcasm, and she'd snapped right back at him. If it was any other girl, he would have forgotten her the second she left the room, if not before.