He grins at me. “See? We have so much in common. This is already the best coffee date of my life.”
I have no idea what to say to that, but I’m saved from figuring it out when a waitress comes over to take our order. After we both order cinnamon rolls and drinks—coffee for him and Diet Pepsi for me—Elliot smiles at the waitress. “Can you bring my girl here her Diet Pepsi in a mug instead of a glass?”
She glances at me for confirmation of the strange request and I just nod, my stomach doing weird things at themy girland the way he remembers the cup I like to drink from. Shit.
“I’m not your girl,” I say when the waitress walks away.
Elliot just smiles again. “Not yet.”
“What happened to talking about you being my advisor and you not hitting on me while we have coffee?”
He reaches over and runs a single finger over my hand. I shiver and yank my hand away. He grins. “I definitely didn’t agree to the second one, but we can talk all you want about the first. Why me?”
“Because I want to study app design and you’re the best. I want the best.”
“I appreciate that, but I’m nowhere near the best.”
I shake my head. “I disagree. Not only are you the youngest tenured professor in MassTech history, but you have also written and lectured more than anyone else on socially responsible app development, the social impact of technology, and the intersection of UI and UX design in app development. I want to know what you know.”
He studies me with what I can only describe as professor eyes, which, it turns out, are just as appealing as when he looks at me with attraction in his gaze. “Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why do you want to know what I know? Why a PhD when there are other ways to learn what you need to know that would be easier, and they’d get you to where you want to be much faster than this one?”
I bristle. Elliot doesn’t know it, but his question hits right at the heart of me, poking at every single insecurity I’ve ever had.
Are you as smart as your brother is?
You’re only here because your last name is Sullivan.
Must be nice, having a billionaire for a brother.
Why do you bother working so hard, when you obviously don’t have to?
Every single nasty, uninformed statement that’s been hurled my way races through my brain in a split second, and suddenly I’m incandescent with rage.
“Are you implying that you don’t think I can hack it,Professor Wyles? Because if you are, let me explain to you all the reasons you’re dead ass wrong. I graduated first in my class from UC Berkeley with a combined bachelor’s and master’s degree in computer science; a program that takes most people five years took me four, and I managed a minor in genetics too. I spent four years as a software engineer at one of the most famous tech companies in the world, one of them while I was still in college, and two of them as head of the department, being lectured atbecause of my last name by men I could code circles around, and I raised productivity in my department by sixty percent year after year despite said inferior men and their rampant, outright misogyny. Being a woman in STEM is a full contact sport, so I assure you I am fully capable of handling whatever it is you believe makes this program so rigorous you think you need to warn me away from it.”
Elliot’s face lights up as I finish my little rant. “Fuck, yes. Consider yourself advised, Mystery Girl.”
“Huh?” I ask, completely lost.
Elliot pauses when the waitress sets a mug in front of each of us. He dumps milk and a bunch of sugar into his coffee and takes a sip. “The computer science PhD program is filled to the brim with tech bros who are so sure they’re about to take Silicon Valley by storm and make billions of dollars. Almost none of them will, and at least half of them will flame out of here in the first year because none of them are as smart as they think they are. You are exactly as smart as you think you are, and there’s no chance you’ll flame out. Women in STEM are so badass.Youare so badass. This program needs you, and I’ll be damned if anyone else gets to be your advisor. It’s me or no one, Mystery Girl.”
“I’m so confused,” I mumble, taking a sip of my Diet Pepsi. It’s perfect, and it’s in my favorite kind of mug. Big but not heavy, with a handle long enough to slip all my fingers through. I glance around, wondering idly whether they sell them.
Elliot takes another sip of his coffee. “What about that confused you?”
I lean forward, resting my elbows on the table. “All of it. One second you’re calling me your girl, and the next second you’re telling me you have to be my advisor or I get no advisor. And, I mean, you’re not the boss of me. But also, you know I can’t be your girl if you’re my advisor, right? Like, there is no hitting on me whatsoever. No standing ridiculously close to me or pinningme against desks or calling me Mystery Girl or treating me differently than anyone else you advise.”
He looks at me thoughtfully.
“What’s your last name?”
I feel the color drain from my face at his question which is, I admit, an outsized reaction to someone asking about my last name, but old habits die hard. I take a sip of my soda to delay answering. “Why do you want to know?”
“You said you spent four years being lectured at because of your last name. I’m just wondering what your last name is.”
