First Love, Once Removed Ep. 4

By Laci Maskell

Livia has been in love with exactly two men in her lifetime.
Jean-Luc was her first. He was the passionate, whirl-wind romance she never quite got over.
Lucas is her second. He is her rock, her safe place, her forever. At least she thinks.
Until Jean-Luc re-enters her life and splits her heart in two.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Laci Maskell
• Release date: Apr 21, 2021
• ISBN: 9781005135904

Laci Maskell

I was born and raised in Nebraska. I fell in love with reading when I discovered Harry Potter. I began writing in the sixth grade. The four loves of my life are reading, writing, watching movies, and listening to music.

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First Love, Once Removed

Laci Maskell

Published by Laci Maskell at Smashwords

Copyright © Laci Maskell 2021

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Dedication

To all of you who stuck by me through the hard times.

Other books by the author

Still Life Moving

So . . . That Happened

The Phoenix Trilogy

Phoenix Born

Phoenix Burn

Phoenix Rising

First Love, Once Removed

Episode One

Episode Two

Episode Three

Chapter One

Sara

I’m so tired of everyone being so madly in love with Livia.

I mean, what’s so good about her anyway?

Alright fine, she’s my best friend and I totally love her, but dammit if I’m not utterly pissed off with her right now. Alright, not exactly pissed, but she’s really mucked things up lately and I’m not too happy about it. Alright fine, maybe it’s not her fault, but I still feel like blaming her.

I can’t believe her lost first love returned to her life only days ago. It seems like it’s been weeks. Maybe it’s because I’ve never gone this long without talking to her, never been mad at her for this long. I know I don’t have a right to be mad at her, but I’m mad at her nonetheless. She’s got Lucas, I wanted Jean-Luc. She took him from me. Sure, Oscar isn’t too bad to look at. And sure Alex would be fine in bed in a pinch. But I wanted Jean-Luc. Maybe he will get bored of her, give up when he decides she won’t leave Lucas, and I will be his shoulder to cry on. Or, something like that.

I’d like to think Jean-Luc will get bored of the chase, but I’m not so sure. We haven’t spent all that much time together and yet I’ve seen the way he looks at her. The way he hangs on her every word. The way he smiles when she comes into the room. I saw the way he kissed her.

Maybe one day I’ll affect someone like that. Maybe someone will look at me like that. Maybe someone will kiss me like that.

And maybe I never even got a chance with my someone.

It’s something I’ve thought about for a while, especially the past few days.

It’s something I think about as Lucas, Livia, and I walk to the supper for the first day of classes for the group. We had the welcome to America party for the foreign exchange students but Mr. Kline likes to have a supper with the students to see how their first few days in the country are going as well as their first day of class. It’s a way to find out if they are having issues and fix them right away. Whether that be issues with the country, issues with the program, issues with classes, etc. We’ve only ever had one foreign exchange student go home after the first few days, but that was somewhat of a special circumstance.

Generally the program runs smoothly. The students enjoy their time here. They learn a lot. They make new friends. They get out of the program exactly what they wanted. Sometimes there are students who go home at the end of the semester not having the best semester of their lives but they generally aren’t mad about it.

I’ve certainly had my fair share of fun with a lot of the students over the years. It’s a delicate game I play with them. You need to time it right. If you sleep with them too early and things go sideways it can make the rest of the semester difficult. I made that mistake early on and had one of the students think he’d fallen in love with me. The fact that they go home at the end of the year is helpful in that sort of situation. You need to lay the groundwork and not just spring it on them. Not that some of them wouldn’t enjoy it. You certainly don’t want to sleep with more than one of them in a semester unless you are all on the same page. Some guys can get jealous. Even if you’re just having fun with them. Even if they will go home in a few months. I have a few other rules or guidelines, whichever you want to call them. Some of a little less importance, some of a little more importance. It also depends on the guys.

I can generally tell right away who the guy will be every semester. I am not always too picky, but I know my type. Hot is the top of the priority list. But I like a guy to be interesting, a little hard to get, good smile, funny, nice body, thick hair I can grab hold of and run my fingers through. Okay so maybe I’m a little pickier than I’d like to admit.

This year I was wishy washy. Aziz is cute but I can’t understand a lot of what he says, which I guess could be