Chapter 25
Cormac
Ienter the lecture hall several minutes before class starts. I like to get there early so I can stand at the podium and read through my notes before she walks in.
Control the field. Control myself.
After last night, I need it.
I set the stack of quizzes on the desk. No reason for me to look at her at all, but I notice her seat is empty. I wonder if last night exhausted her. Is she sleeping in today? She arrives just as I move to shut the door.
Scarlett Ford waltzes into class wearing a low-cut shirt and a short skirt, and I lose all hope of another day not wanting her. Her hair is in a high ponytail, and her lips are drenched with gloss that I want to see smeared on my cock when I fuck that fresh mouth.
All I’m thinking is how soon I can make that happen. It feels helpless to fight it. It’s only a matter of time.
Her eyes find mine, and it’s like she knows what I feel. What I’m trying to hide.
I force my gaze down and return to the podium, adjusting the quizzes, and wait for my pulse to settle.
Through my lashes, I watch her take a seat.
Not her usual. She’s in the center, a row higher, one she knows is the perfect angle to give me a full view of her legs.
As she shifts, I get a glimpse between her thighs.
My jaw locks in painful tension while my fingers curl around the podium’s edge.
Blood turning thick and hot, I know right here, right now that this girl is going to destroy me.
With the class filled, I clear my throat and walk through the aisle, handing out the exams mechanically, student by student. When I get to Scarlett, she lifts her gaze at the exact moment I lower the paper.
Our stares collide as her fingers brush mine. A current shoots up my arm like I grabbed a live wire.
“Morning, professor,” she says softly, but that voice of hers is a fist around my heart.
“Ford,” I manage, flat, impersonal, and professional. And totally pathetic, even to my own ears.
I drop the quiz onto her desk and move on before I do something unforgivable.
I catch her predatory smile before I move away. Like she’s enjoying the challenge of trying to get a rise out of me. Not realizing how well she’s already done.
Lost in mental chaos, I finish handing out the quizzes, ignoring other stares and attempts at my attention. Only one person matters.
Scarlett.
When I reach the front again, I speak to the class without taking my eyes off the clock at the back of the room. If I look at that woman, I’m done.
“You have thirty minutes. No talking. Phones away.” I pull at my collar. “And good luck, you are going to need it.”
Pens click, and pages rustle, and I think I’m in the clear.
I make the mistake of dragging my eyes from the clock, then stopping at the fourth row. Fuck, Scarlett is looking right at me with a smirk on her face and a pen in her mouth that she’s pushing in and out. A blush colors her cheeks, and her pupils are dilated.
My throat tightens, and my heartbeat stutters hard enough that I have to grip the podium to hide the tremor.
She’s doing this on purpose. She doesn’t understand how dangerous what she’s asking for is.
Something happened to her last night. I sensed a shift.
Ava wasn’t near death, but she’d successfully called Griffin’s wife’s condition, set her up for care.
Even located the second heartbeat. Knowing you have that knowledge and power brings on a rush like no other.
I bet the experience is marching through Scarlett’s veins like wildfire. I’ve been there, I know the feeling.
She tilts her head the slightest degree. My throat vibrates as one of her hands slips below the desk and onto her lap. Her legs part open a little more.
Her knees are dead ahead, straight in my view. Her skirt rides up an inch. Then another. Just enough for me to notice.
She crosses her legs and then…uncrosses them.
Too fucking slowly.
And holy mother of God. She is not wearing underwear.
Just like she fucking promised.
Heat floods my spine, but I breathe out through my nose, fighting for control.
Her eyes drop to my hands gripping the podium, and the smile on her lips is a shot to the heart. She’s fucking won, I’m hooked and glued.
Unglued is more like it.
I glance around, see that all the heads in the class are bowed over their tests, before I look back at Scarlett. Her bare, glistening pussy is on display to me. She slips her finger between her legs, dragging it up and down the slit. I literally watch it get soaked as my cock throbs in my pants.
I feel the vibration in my teeth, and there’s a fire in my gut that can burn down this whole campus.
She’s not flirting with me to get a rise out of me, giggle, and walk away like other women in this class. Scarlett is handing me an open invitation to break a very sacred rule.
I’ve fucking broken them all. I swore I wouldn’t break this one.
O’Rourke bloodlust is a drug, an iron chain to bad deeds. The only other time I give in to it is on a kill. This thing I feel watching Scarlett fingerfuck herself is mixing with that violent, ancient, and hungry O’Rourke desire.
My sanity snaps like a weak thread. My voice comes out rough and low. “Eyes on your test, Ford.”
She smiles and finally lifts the pen but keeps stroking herself.
Now, I mouth.
Minutes drag by. I watch the clock, not the room. But even then, I feel Scarlett’s eyes flick to me. I somehow manage the other twenty-eight minutes, but it’s mental torture.
When the timer hits thirty, I practically bark, “Time.”
Pens drop. Papers shuffle. Students stand to drop off their hard work. Proof that they deserve to be a doctor, while I deserve to be back in Dunbar for what I’m about to do.
It’s not the end of this test. It’s the beginning of a mistake I’m going to regret. But I can’t stop myself.
Scarlett takes her time getting to her feet and is the very last student to come down from the seats. I should push all the tests off the surface and take her on the fucking desk. In front of people to show them what tempting me looks like.
She makes the mistake of getting too close. Invades my space and steals my breath.
Her voice comes low, soft enough that only I can hear. “That was…hard.”
That smile suggests she likes having this control over me. But she won’t like me in a few minutes.
My pulse slams into my throat. “You have no fucking idea what you’re playing with.”
She flinches at the jolt of my tone, allowing me to have the upper hand for a second. She didn’t expect the acid on my tongue. She thought she’d come pick up a whimpering puppy.
Her pupils blown, her breathing shallow, she says, “Oh? Then, show me.” Her body hums with energy that matches my own.
I pluck the quiz from her fingers, toss it onto the desk without looking at it, and lean in just enough that she knows her game is over.
“Get your bare ass in my office, right fucking now,” I say, my control fracturing clean down the center.
I don’t bark, but it’s not a request. It’s a quiet command edged with something feral.
She inhales sharply like the words hit somewhere deep. “But—”
“Now.” I let the word settle, dark and absolute. “Before I lose my patience and bend you over this desk and use my belt on you in front of the next class.”
Her eyes widen with a touch of fear that I’m capable of far worse than she ever imagined. I see every pulse point hammering under her skin. She is electric and about to explode. But she’s going to explode with me.
She swallows once, then nods.
“Good girl.” I lean in. “I’m going to show you what you unleashed. That fuck I gave you in the hotel room? I was being polite.”
Stunned, she turns and walks out of the lecture hall, and I watch the sway of her hips until she’s gone.
When the door shuts behind her, my hands shake as I grab the quizzes and shove them into my leather briefcase. Professor Pencil Skirt passes me on the way, and her perfume is like a wrecking ball. I’m so raw.
I don’t even make eye contact, just push past her to make my biggest mistake. My restraint unravels with each step. I reach my office door, and Scarlett is already standing beside it, waiting for the ride, ticket in hand.
Waiting for me. Waiting to be ruined by me. So breathless and lit from within that her skin is glowing.
I unlock the door and push it open. “Get in.”
She walks past me, and my restraint fucking evaporates. I slam the door shut, done pretending either of us can stop this.