Dear Professor

by Blaire Drake

  He was fucking kidding me. He had to be. He had gone down on me and then he’d just walked out and demanded I got my shit together?

  Who the fuck did he think he was? I hadn’t signed up to be treated like a common whore. If I’d wanted that, I would have joined a brothel instead of a cam girl website. Or I’d have been on a street corner somewhere. Seriously!

  I hadn’t realized how mad I was until I woke up this morning. It hit me then, as I rolled out of bed, how badly I wanted to take a blender to his ballsac or something. I wanted to throw a ton of bricks at him for the crap behavior.

  Was that how it would be? Was I destined to be treated like shit for the next few weeks whenever he decided?

  Because that wasn’t what I’d signed up for. I hadn’t signed up to be treated like dirt. Was it really worth it, all of this? If I was just going to be treated like crap?

  I wanted my future. Of course I did. I’d worked so goddamn hard for it, but that didn’t mean I wanted to be treated like a doormat for it.

  I grabbed my planner and checked my schedule. Today marked a lesson with Professor Keaton. I took a deep breath, grabbed my phone, and called the school. I put on my best sleepy voice and added a cough for good measure as I called in sick. I was offered best wishes and ensured that work would either be provided to me by Jake Haas or e-mailed by my professors.

  I hid my phone beneath my pillow and curled up beneath my duvet, only to be interrupted by three loud bangs at my door.

  “Whaaaat?” I groaned, peeking out over the top of the covers.

  My bedroom door opened, and Bella’s head pokes around the door. Instantly, her face scrunches up when her eyes hit me.

  “Eww. What’s wrong with you?”

  “Sick,” I muttered.

  “Like, Ebola sick or can’t-be-fucked sick?”

  “Fuck-you-before-I-vomit-on-you sick.”

  “Yeah, ’kay, byeeeee.”

  The door slammed, and I pulled the covers over my head.

  Such a fucking drama queen.

  At least she wasn’t a wimp, I supposed. Like me. That’s totally what I was doing at that point—being a giant wimp. I might as well have just quit school, paid for a plane ticket, and gone home. That would, of course, be totally ridiculous. But still totally logical.

  It would solve all the problems. I’d just re-enroll in another school for my final year. I could do that, right? Even if I had to start again. Would that have been easier? It would have been better for me because I wouldn’t have been treated like crap.

  I pulled the covers down and sat up. What the hell was I doing, lying in bed, lamenting his asshole-ish treatment of me? Why was I not storming into his office and ripping him a new one?

  I wouldn’t have taken that shit treatment from anyone else, so why was I from him? Because I was scared of him? Of what he could do? Of what he had on me?

  Okay, I wasn’t scared. Not of him. I didn’t believe he would hurt me. I didn’t actually know what I believed at that point. It didn’t make any sense, but hey. He wouldn’t have hurt me. That wouldn’t have benefitted him in any way. I was scared of what he’d do with the information he had about me, sure. But not of the man himself.

  Then it hit me—like a giant smack in the face, the thought came to me.

  I needed to level the playing field. Right now, he had a silent army of a thousand, while I lay in bed wondering how to battle against it. If there was one thing I’d learned since becoming a cam girl, it was that everyone had a past, and not everyone’s was a good one. Skeletons were skeletons for a reason.

  It stood to reason that, somewhere in his thirty-one years, Professor Jordan Keaton would have a skeleton or two. One that would benefit me if I could uncover it.

  Yep... There had to be one somewhere. And I was determined to find it.

  Campus was always quiet at the end of the day, when only the teachers and a few straggling students remained. I was hoping to find Professor Keaton in his office, mostly to tell him that his attitude last night hadn’t been okay.

  My generic Google search hadn’t dug up much about him. Just his degree and where he taught. Nothing personal at all, and it was then that I’d realized I had a little time, that the best way to catch him was by taking it slow.

  That was exactly how I’d ended up where I was, with the hope that he’d still be there. Rumor had it that he preferred to grade in his office as opposed to taking his work home. I hoped that it would be one of those nights.

  His office was in one of the quietest parts of campus—not that it really stood for anything. As I walked down the long hall of the history department toward his personal space, the quietness of the hall was eerie. I was used to there being several different groups of students speeding through to their next class, because for the most part, that’s what this hall was used for: a shortcut.

  I reached his office at the end of the hall and let out a small breath when I saw the faint, yellow glow through the blind covering the window. I knocked three times.

  “Come in.”

  With a shaking hand, I grasped the door handle and pushed it down. The door opened with the tiniest squeak, and I took two steps into the room. He was sitting behind his desk, wearing his glasses, and he was entirely focused on the two stacks of papers in front of him. The one to the right was significantly higher than the one on the left, and I took that to assume I’d caught him in time.

  But he wasn’t alone. Professor Banks, my literature professor, was sitting in a chair opposite his desk. She turned when I stilled.

  “Darcy! I thought you were sick.” Her dark eyes combed over me.

  “It was a twenty-four-hour thing,” I lied smoothly. “I’m feeling better now.”

  “Oh, good, good. What are you doing here?” She looked between me and Jordan.

  “I asked Jake Haas to contact Miss Hamilton and have her come and see me regarding her last assignment if she was feeling up to it,” he answered, lying just as easily as I had. “Clearly, she is, although I can’t say I appreciate the late hour.”

  “I’m sorry, sir. I didn’t want to risk coming earlier and vomiting all over you.”

  His eyes cut to mine, a warning sparking in them. “Thank you for your consideration, but perhaps an e-mail rescheduling for tomorrow would have been more appropriate.”

  “Probably.” I put my hands in the back pockets of my jeans and shrugged. I even offered a little smile for good measure.

  His grip on his pen tightened. He really did hate my attitude, didn’t he?

  “Thank you for stopping by, Carly,” he said to Professor Banks. “But, since Miss Hamilton is here, I’d like to get to the bottom of the issue with her.”

  That sounded…threatening.

  Professor Banks paused for a second, and I’d swear she pouted. I wondered if she had a crush on him. That wouldn’t have been ridiculous. Half the campus did, after all. And they weren’t all female.

  “Of course,” she said. “Let’s discuss again tomorrow.”

  “I’ll check my schedule.” Jordan’s gaze dropped back down to the paper he was grading, and Professor Banks stood.

  She came to me and, with a scrutinizing eye, said, “I hope I’ll see you in class tomorrow, Darcy. I take it Mr. Haas also passed on the assignment.”

  “Yes, ma’am. He sent right after class. I already turned it in online.”

  Shock flashed through her eyes. “Of course you did. See you tomorrow, Darcy. Jordan.”

  I lifted my hand in a wave, but Jordan ignored her completely. She didn’t look too put out about it, but she left the door wide open as she walked down the hall.

  “Take a seat, Miss Hamilton,” Jordan demanded. “I’ll be with you in a moment.”

  Wordlessly, I took the seat Professor Banks had just vacated. Minutes ticked by as he finished marking down on the paper with a blood-red pen. Incessantly, he scrawled messages in the margins and circled and underlined.

  Whoever that belonged to was going to get a ri
ght ass-kicking. I bet it was Jake’s. It’s what his always looked like. It amazed me how my best friend never dropped a mark in law, but he could barely remember what happened last year in history.

  I took a deep breath as even more time passed. Jordan didn’t seem to notice though. I wondered if this was how he was every night, even if there were interruptions. Another few minutes went by and I rested my hand on the desk.

  Then I tapped my nails against it.

  He didn’t bat an eyelid.

  What the hell?

  I kept it up until his jaw ticked and he slammed his pen down. He hit me with his electrifying gaze. That one look made me stop the tapping.

  With his eyes firmly on me, he took the paper and put it on the stack to his right. He got up and walked around his desk, toward the door. My mouth went dry with every step he took, especially when he turned the lock. The click seemed to echo through the small room, but I refused to let him see that it affected me.

  “Miraculous recovery, even from a twenty-four-hour thing.” His words drawled through the air between us.

  I fought my smile. “I’m a fighter. What can I say?”

  “I know for a fact that I didn’t send Mr. Haas to get you. So, why are you here?”

  “I wanted to talk about last night.” I met his eyes and held his gaze.

  He didn’t say anything for a moment. He tilted his head to one side and slowly removed his glasses. Our stares stayed connected as he folded the arms of the glasses then gently set them down on the desk. Leaning forward, he grasped the corners of the piece of furniture, and his lips pulled to one side.

  “Talk away.”

  “I…” I swallowed, but with a deep breath, I centered myself once more. “I don’t appreciate the way you treated me.”

  “You didn’t seem to be complaining at the time.”

  “My attention was compromised.”

  His lips curved up even farther. “It most certainly was.”

  I stood up and set my hands on my hips. “If you’re going to make a joke out my feelings and your clear lack of respect for me, go ahead and tell everyone what I do. I don’t care. I won’t be so openly treated like a piece of shit by you, Jordan.”

  He stilled, and something I couldn’t make out flashed in his eyes. “Then maybe you should get to the point slightly quicker, Darcy.”

  Anger swirled inside me. I could feel the red-hot rage as it pumped around my body in my bloodstream.

  “Or maybe you should keep your asinine comments to yourself and let a girl finish talking.”

  His jaw tightened in response, and I saw his arms do the same thing, as though he were gripping the desk with a force that could splinter the wood. His white shirt stretched across his broad shoulders, confirming what I thought.

  “Then, by all means, continue.”

  Wow. That had actually worked.

  Go me.

  “I don’t appreciate the way you treated me yesterday. You bundled me into your vehicle, drove me to your house, had a partially reasonable conversation, gave me an orgasm, and then left.”

  One of his eyebrows rose.

  Okay. So it didn’t sound that bad when I put it like that, but still.

  “I don’t like the way you spoke to me. I know that, for all intents and purposes, I’m practically your personal whore, but you’d probably treat one from the street corner far better than you treated me.” I let out a huffing breath as I got it out. “I’m not asking for a lot. If this agreement continues, you will talk to me as though I’m a person and not a toy you can put away when you’re done. If you can’t respect me as a human being with feelings, then you can take your contract and you can fold it into an origami swan inside your asshole for all I care of it.”

  He stilled. Totally. And then, out of nowhere, he laughed.

  I’d never heard him laugh. Not once.

  I hated it.

  Hated the way the deep, rich sound filled the room. Hated the way each smooth chuckle glided over my skin and made the hairs stand on end. Hated the way I liked it.

  “Fold it into an origami swan inside my asshole,” he chuckled. “That’s one I’ve never heard before.”

  I didn’t know what to say, so I reached up and pushed my bangs from my eyes.

  Jordan pushed off the desk, and after adjusting one of his sleeves above his elbow, he pulled his tie off. Leaving the satin, black strip to fall onto his desk, he undid the top two buttons of his shirt then focused on me.

  “You’re right. I apologize for the way I treated you yesterday. It won’t happen again.”

  I waited, but he didn’t say anything else.

  That was it? Just that?

  “That’s the most fucking halfhearted apology I’ve ever heard in my life.”

  “You want me to try again, sweet thing? Because you might not like my new apology.” His tone screamed of a warning, but I never did listen to those.

  “Damn right I want a better apology than that. You sounded like an automatic message.”

  I’d pushed him. And I saw the exact moment he hit the edge.

  It was the flaring of his nostrils. The darkening of his eyes. The snap of his shoes against the linoleum floor as he closed the distance between us in five brisk steps and grabbed hold of me.

  He tugged me toward him ferociously. His fingers burned into me through the thin material of my shirt, but it felt like ice compared to the heat of his mouth as it descended onto mine.

  I guessed this was the apology I was after.

  I guessed I needed to know that yesterday’s burst of desire hadn’t been a one-off.

  It hadn’t.

  I could feel his want in the sweep of his tongue against mine and in the slight pain as his fingertips dug into my sides.

  My hands slid up his chest, and my arms would around his neck. His hard body was right against mine, and I could feel his cock pushing against my stomach as the kiss deepened.

  This was so wrong. So, so wrong.

  My pussy ached. I could feel myself getting wet as my own want sparked at every single one of my nerve endings. It was like he knew, because he held me tighter, spun us, and pulled me back and down. The kiss broke as I gasped at the quick movement, but the break lasted all of a second as I found myself sitting on top of him.

  He was in the chair I’d just been in, and now, instead of his fingertips digging into my sides, one of his hands was cupping the back of my neck and one was teasing the bare skin at my lower back. My legs were on either side of him, and his cock was pushing against my pussy.

  His grip was so strong that I couldn’t move. But I didn’t want to. The shock mixed with the desire that had me feeling hot. I wanted to stay right there where he was kissing me. Where my lips were tingling from the way he nipped the lower one every now and then. Where my hair was tangled in his fingers at the base of my neck. Where my body was reacting to him, making my hips buck so I was grinding against him.

  Bolts of pleasure shot through me as my clit pressed against the seam of my pants.

  God. I wanted him.

  The thought made me pull back with a gasp. I released my grip on his collar and covered my mouth with my hand. I didn’t get off him though. I wasn’t that strong.

  His eyes opened, and the second our gazes collided, it felt as though every nerve ending in my body tingled with desire once again.

  “Good enough apology, sweet thing?” he rasped, sitting up straight, keeping one arm locked around my waist.

  My face was almost level with his as his nose brushed mine.

  “Is that enough for you, Darcy? Enough fucking sorry in that for you?”

  I couldn’t speak, so I nodded. Just a little bit.

  “Contrary to what you believe, I’m not an asshole. I’m acting like this for your own good. It helps me resist you.”

  “Why would you make me sign a contract only to resist me?”

  “Because I’ve watched you for so long. I’ve wanted you for so long that I would fuck you so har
d I would terrify you.”

  I hit him with a level stare and dropped my hand. “I’m not afraid.”

  His jaw ticked again. Something, it seemed, that happened a lot when he was irritated. “Because you don’t know what I could do to you.”

  I swept my hair around my neck so it hung over one shoulder then leaned in. My mouth rested by his ear, and I whispered, “So tell me.”

  His fight was almost tangible. I sensed the battle he was fighting as he decided whether or not to tell me. I also sensed the exact moment he decided to do just that.

  He wound my hair around his hand, making a fist, and tugged on it so hard that tears stung the backs of my eyes. I gasped as my head jerked back. His breath coated the exposed skin of my neck, and he let out a long, shuddery breath.

  “Still want to know, Darcy?”

  “Yes.”

  “You feel this?” He gave a small jerk on my hair.

  “Yes.”

  “That’s nothing compared to what I’d do. I’m not a gentle lover. I’m rough. Bruising. I’d bite your lip so hard it’d bleed before I’d kiss it better.” His lips peppered tiny kisses down my neck, the sensation in direct contradiction with his words. “If I fucked you right now, I’d toe the line of hurting you—even if you’d like it. And you would. But I’m not comfortable with taking the risk right now.”

  My heart thundered against my ribs. I could barely breathe, and all I wanted to do was rub myself against his erection, but I could feel my heart. “I’m still not scared,” I forced out breathlessly.

  “Then you’re a fool.” He let me go, grasped my waist, then pushed me back to standing.

  I staggered back a couple of steps before I righted myself. My body was still going crazy, but although I still didn’t understand what he was doing, I didn’t push it. I took it for what it was and ran my fingers through my hair.

  He walked around the desk and glanced out the window. It’d started raining at some point in the last several minutes. It wasn’t particularly heavy, but the windows were covered in rain droplets that were racing down the glass surface.

  “Did you walk? I can give you a ride.”

  How was that for a dismissal? A softer one than last night, but still one.