And of course, we’d been caught.

Caught at the exact moment Olin put her hand on mine and our eyes locked while we sat against the brick wall. My mouth watered. My heart galloped. My stomach churned for the taste of her lips.

We’d been so close.

So fucking close to our first kiss.

But then the gruff command from the deputy ripped us apart.

I’d been furious.

But in an awful way, I was grateful.

Furious to have the perfect almost-kiss ruined, but thankful that I didn’t lose control and ravage her.

If I touched her.

When I touched her.

She deserved to be pampered and adored. To be given sweet and softness. Not devoured and mauled like I was desperate to do.

I’d thought keeping my distance physically would be easier as time went on, knowing we could be with each other when I was sure she loved me and could never take that back.

But...it only grew harder.

So damn hard it was a physical ache every second of every damn day. I couldn’t breathe some days. I woke up at night with an unbearable pain to run over to her house and climb through her window.

To crawl into her bed, to kiss her as hard as I could, to take everything she offered me.

And that sort of desperation terrified me.

I’d have nightmares about making her scream like the whores inside my home.

I’d wake in full sweats at the thought of making her cry with my inherited savagery.

As the weeks went on, more and more fear layered my fraying self-control.

I was afraid to kiss her more than ever now.

Afraid I’d hurt her with the naked violence coursing in my blood.

Olin shrugged helplessly.

I shook my head, commanding her to stay quiet. I’d deal with Ms Tallup after class.

She gave me a grateful smile, blew me a kiss, then returned to her test with tense shoulders.

For the remaining twenty minutes, I scribbled answers as best I could while my brain focused on more important things. The deputy obviously told Ms Tallup he’d caught us. Therefore, she’d done this to punish me.

But why?

What the hell does she want from me?

The bell rang, signalling chairs to squeal away from desks and papers to be gathered in a fast rustle. The mass exodus of students was good because it meant I could speak to Ms Tallup and get far away before my temper exploded.

Olin stood, slinging her messenger bag over her shoulder. She caught my fingers as I walked past, but I pointed at the corridor. “Go.”

She bit her lip. After a second, she obeyed, disappearing with the throng of other teenagers.

The second she’d gone, I looked at Ms Tallup.

She stood at the front with her arms crossed and a sick smirk upon her lips. “Mr. Clark. Not rushing off to spend time with your girlfriend today?” She cocked her head. “Does this mean the allure has finally worn off? Are you going to focus on your studies instead of your...” Her gaze dropped down my front, locking on my crotch.

She licked her lips.

Thick disgust rippled down my back.

I knew that look.

It was the look of grotesque hunger when a man looked at a whore he’d bought for the night.

I wasn’t a whore.

Yet my teacher looked at me as if I was one.

Thick fear filled me, whispering answers to why Ms Tallup picked on me. Why she watched me more than any other student. Why I felt so on edge around her.

She wanted something from me.

Something sickening.

Something she would never fucking get.

I marched toward her and punched my test onto her desk. “Olin doesn’t deserve detention. Tell her it was a mistake.”

Her face darkened; she laughed coldly. “A student telling a teacher what to do?” She shook her head, clucking her tongue. “Now, that will never do.”

My nostrils flared, doing my best to control my rage. “I’ll do it. I’ll serve the detention.”

“You weren’t the one talking.”

“Don’t care. Olin wasn’t either.”

“Punishment is given to those who deserve it.”

I shivered. Her words were a little too close to the thoughts in my own head. I got it rough at home, but maybe...I deserved it.

Maybe I wasn’t as good as I strived to be. Maybe my dad knew something about me that I didn’t, and his beatings were part of a punishment I did deserve.

I shook those thoughts away. If that was the case, I would weather the storm. But I wouldn’t let Olin be hurt. She’d never done anything wrong in her life.

Removing my fist from her desk, I backed up a step and lowered my voice. “Why do you hate me so much?”

Her eyes widened. “Hate you? Why on earth do you think I hate you?”

“Oh, I dunno. A few reasons.”

“None that are real.” She waved her hand, her gaze once again landing on my body. “Now, run along.”

“I’m not a child. I don’t ‘run along’.”

She smiled coyly. “Oh, believe me. I know you’re not a child, Gilbert Clark.”

I crossed my arms against the sudden chill. “I should be done with school if it wasn’t for you. I think the least I deserve is the truth. You don’t like me. I get it. I’m fine with it. But don’t take it out on Olin. She’s one of your best students.”

“She was.” She sniffed. “Until she started hanging out with you.”

“Her grades are still excellent.”

Ms Tallup leaned over the table, casting a subtle glance at the door and empty corridor. “It’s not her grades I’m bothered about.”

I swallowed hard as her eyes once again skated down my front, lingered on my jeans, then snaked their way back to my face. “I’m worried what you’re doing to her. She’s underage. You could be arrested.”

“Arrested?” I backed up. “For what?”

“For sleeping with your innocent little girlfriend.”

I swallowed hard. I didn’t like this conversation at all.

The dynamics were off. The subjects all wrong. No way should a teacher discuss a student’s love life. No way should the power she held be used to condemn and control me.

Terror slicked down my spine. “Why do you care what Olin and I do outside of school hours?”

She stilled. Her eyes flashed as she made a show of fluffing papers into a neat pile. “I don’t. But you should.”

“Why?” Goosebumps dotted my arms as her face sharpened, dropping the pretence she’d held for years.

With a short, tight chuckle, she whispered, “You’re a smart boy. You’ll figure it out.”

She left me standing wordless and disgusted as she swept from the classroom with her hips swaying and a sly smile on her lips.

OceanofPDF.com

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter Twenty

______________________________

Olin

-The Present-

“WHAT DID YOU mean we both have to pay?”

My question hung in the air as I stepped into Gil’s warehouse. He’d driven us here in a small hatchback that’d seen better days with chipped white paint and ripped upholstery. It didn’t smell like him nor had any sign of regular use.

I’d held my tongue the entire journey.

He hadn’t let me grab any clothes or asked if I needed to check on my apartment. He’d just bundled me into his run-down vehicle and squirreled me away in the same place he’d kicked me out of two days prior.

I tried to be rational.

I tried to be patient.

But I’m running out of restraint.

Gil didn’t answer my question, moving through the cavernous space with stormy steps. He looked angry. Angry at having me back in his space.

Well, that makes two of us.

The poise that’d been drilled into me by my dance master fissured a little. My composure that ensured no one ever knew just how lonely I was, frayed.

Gil wanted me.

That was undeniable.

Gil would protect me.

That was tried and tested.