Chapter 12
TWELVE
Asher Montgomery
While Beckett and I didn’t hate each other the way we used to, we still didn’t talk outside of filming. The cameras turned off, and so did we.
We hadn’t spoken since Saturday, even though we’d sat through class together on Monday, close enough that our elbows nearly touched. Tonight, though, he was coming over to upload the video and hang out with Theo.
According to Theo, Beckett had finally received his debit card and was suddenly determined to learn everything about basic finance, as if it were a foreign language he could cram before finals.
By the end of the week, he’d have to set up a payment plan, if he hadn’t already, which made everything feel more permanent than I liked.
Structured. Official. Like our future videos weren’t just a side project anymore.
Beckett needed me, needed us, if he wanted to afford school.
It wasn’t as if Theo wouldn’t have given him the money outright. He had offered.
Surprisingly, Beckett turned him down. I hated admitting how much I respected that.
If Theo offered to pay for my tuition, which I would never ask for, and thankfully didn’t need thanks to scholarships softening the blow, I wouldn’t refuse.
Pride was expensive. Survival was practical.
This wasn’t some glossy romance novel where the struggling guy nobly rejects his billionaire boyfriend’s help on principle alone.
Though, if I’m being honest, I would have found a way to earn it back.
Repay it. Something cinematic and morally balanced, like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman. Not that Beckett was my boyfriend.
My phone vibrated in my pocket as I walked to class, the sudden buzz slicing through my thoughts. Hardly anyone texted me besides Theo, so I checked it without hesitation. But it wasn’t Theo.
A message from an unknown number sat in my inbox. No words. Just a photo.
It was me and Beckett outside the classroom building.
We were standing close, angled toward each other like we were mid-conversation.
I was almost certain we’d been arguing. I remembered tension, sharp words, the way my jaw had ached from clenching it.
But in the picture, it didn’t look like that at all.
It looked softer. Intimate, even. Like something else entirely.
Don’t fuck this up.
I didn’t have to wonder who sent the text or what it meant. The message didn’t need a caption. I exhaled slowly and slipped my phone back into my pocket, as if ignoring it could make it disappear.
Moments later, I walked into the classroom.
Beckett was already there.
His eyes found mine almost instantly, and something in them flickered. Fear, maybe. Or panic. I couldn’t tell what about me unsettled him so much lately. Was it me standing there, or the feelings he was trying so hard to outrun?
Things had shifted over the past couple of weeks.
Movie nights that ran too late. Filming sessions that felt less like arguments and more like something dangerously close to chemistry.
We might have hated each other a little less now.
For someone who had been very confidently straight two weeks ago, developing complicated feelings for his rival probably wasn’t an easy adjustment.
I wondered just how uncomfortable I could make him.
How red would his cheeks turn if I leaned in and whispered something filthy in his ear while the professor droned on about theory? How far could I push before he broke?
I walked toward him with deliberate confidence and slid into the seat beside him. We were at the end of the row, tucked toward the back, half-shielded by the long desk in front of us. Just enough cover to make bad decisions tempting.
I rested my hand on his knee.
He went rigid. His eyes widened, round and startled, as if I’d just pulled a fire alarm.
“What are you doing?” he whispered, his voice barely steady. His breath hitched when I let my hand drift a fraction higher.
The reaction sent a pulse of heat through me. Power tasted sharp. I never would have imagined doing something like this in class, not in a room full of people taking notes and pretending to care about lecture slides. But Beckett pulled something reckless out of me.
Or maybe I was responding to the threat in that photo. Proving I wasn’t the one being cornered.
“Teasing you,” I murmured. “In class. Shh. You’ve got work to do.”
I tilted my head toward his notebook. “Just ignore me while you take notes today.” Notes I would absolutely need to copy later, assuming he could still form coherent sentences.
The professor swept into the room, dropping her bag onto the desk with a thud. “Today we’re going to talk about psychoanalytic theory. For Friday, you’ll write a one-page analysis of a movie from that perspective.”
“You have to stop,” Beckett muttered under his breath, careful not to draw attention.
But the tension radiating off him told a completely different story.
“Relax, Beck,” I murmured. “I’m not going to do anything except keep my hand right here and whisper filthy things in your ear. If you lose focus and embarrass yourself, that’s on you.” I let my breath ghost along the side of his neck. “Now get to work. Take notes for us.”
His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed. His eyes dropped to the page, and his pen finally started moving, though his handwriting looked tighter than usual, each letter pressed into the paper as if it had something to prove.
“You’re already doing so well with taking orders,” I whispered, leaning just close enough that our shoulders brushed. My voice stayed low, contained in the small pocket of space between us.
“Jesus Christ,” he muttered, grip loosening on the pen before it slipped from his fingers and clattered softly against the desk. “You’re not playing fair, Montgomery.”
“I never claimed to.” I leaned back slightly, just enough to study him. “I play to win.”
Win what, exactly, I wasn’t sure. The argument? The power? Him? The prize seemed to shift every time he looked at me like that, caught somewhere between defiance and surrender.
“Pick the pen back up,” I said quietly. “Take notes for us. I’d hate to have to drag you to the bathroom and discipline you for slacking.”
His breath hitched, and a low, involuntary sound slipped from him before he could stop it.
There it was. New data. Useful data.
I hadn’t expected to care about the specifics of Beckett’s desires, but suddenly I did.
Maybe because this tension felt inevitable, like something we were circling whether we admitted it or not.
If we were heading toward sleeping together eventually, understanding what made him unravel seemed practical. Efficient.
Or maybe that was just the excuse I was giving myself.
“You… you need to stop,” he said again, weaker this time. “It’s not right. We’re in class.”
I might have believed him if his hips hadn’t subtly followed the warmth of my hand the second I pulled it away.
I smirked.
I leaned in close enough to feel his breath hitch.
“Don’t worry. Your secret is safe with me, Becks.
No one here needs to know that you’re a good submissive who loves to please others and gets off on dirty talk.
That’s just for me.” My fingers traced lazy circles on his thigh, just shy of where he wanted them.
His pupils dilated as I whispered against his ear, “No one here needs to know how your breath catches when I tell you what to do.” His eyelids fluttered shut.
I pulled back just enough to watch a bead of sweat form at his temple.
My hand stilled on his thigh, and he unconsciously shifted toward it, seeking more contact.
I smiled and withdrew completely, savoring the small, involuntary sound that escaped his throat.
The thought of him ruining his pants and facing that walk of shame tempted me, but there was something even sweeter in denial. In watching hunger build behind his eyes with no satisfaction in sight.
“Do you want me to rub you until you come in your pants? Make you walk out of here a mess, knowing I did that to you?” I taunted him with the question, knowing full well the war between his pride and desire.
“N—no. Of course not,” he stuttered. “I don’t even want you to touch me.”
I pulled my hand away from his thigh, leaving a ghost of warmth that lingered between us.
My fingers found the cool leather of my bag, extracted a notebook with deliberate slowness.
The scratch of my pen against paper filled our silence as I kept my eyes down, though every nerve ending tracked his gaze burning into my profile.
His breath came in small, staccato hitches—almost inaudible, but betraying everything his pride wouldn’t let him say.
“Please, Asher. Please make me come. I don’t care if I have to leave this place wearing my mess.”
I pretended to give in to his demands. This time, instead of gripping his thigh, I slid my palm over the rigid outline beneath his jeans, feeling the heat radiating through the fabric.
Each deliberate stroke drew sweet, quiet groans from his throat—sounds that existed in a frequency meant only for my ears.
I could tell when he was getting close from the way his jaw clenched, the slight tremble in his thighs.
His focus on the lecture notes before him had entirely ceased, his pen slipping from his grip.
Instead of giving him what he wanted, I withdrew my hand and folded it primly in my lap.
His thighs tensed beneath his jeans. A flush crept up his neck to stain his cheeks, and his fingers curled into fists against the desk.
When he turned to me, his pupils had swallowed the blue of his irises, and a muscle twitched in his jaw as he exhaled through flared nostrils.
“Sorry, Harrington. You don’t get to make demands. It’s about time someone told you no.”
His gaze darkened, something sharp and heated settling behind his eyes. I could feel it on me, that look, like a physical weight pressing between my shoulder blades. It would have been easy to meet it, to let whatever silent challenge simmered there ignite into something reckless.
Instead, I forced myself to stay focused on my notebook.
I kept writing, even though I knew I’d missed a solid portion of the lecture.
My notes were fragmented at best, half-finished sentences about repression and subconscious desire that felt almost ironic given the circumstances.
The professor’s voice blurred into background noise, rising and falling without meaning.
Every shift of Beckett’s posture beside me registered louder than anything she said.
Still, I didn’t look at him.
I didn’t trust what I might see if I did.
When the professor finally dismissed us, chairs scraped against the floor in a chaotic chorus. I packed up quickly, shoving my notebook into my bag with more force than necessary. The second I stood, I felt his presence turn fully toward me.
I didn’t give him the chance to speak.
I bolted from the room like my ass was on fire, like the air inside had grown too thick to breathe. The hallway felt cooler, safer, even as my pulse refused to slow.
I’d have to see him again in a few hours.
And judging by the look in his eyes, whatever reaction I’d sparked in him was far from over.
The anticipation of it lingered, electric and dangerous, and I had a feeling it would be worth every reckless second.