Chapter 11
Eleven
Sadie
I ’m sprinting across campus. My notebook and pen are still sitting on the table in the classroom, but there’s no way I’m going back. Not today.
Tears sting behind my eyes, and I feel like I’m crawling out of my skin. I don’t know if I want to cry or scream or hit something or fuck someone.
What just happened back there?
I wanted that—and I’m not just saying that. I really did want it. I craved it, needed it, and practically begged him to do it. I wanted Lucas Goode to release his aggression on me as much as he wanted to.
So why am I so upset?
It’s like all my emotions bubbled to the top, and now they’re begging to spring free.
I manage to make it to my car, locking myself inside before slamming my hands against the steering wheel and letting out a scream. It doesn’t help. My body is still buzzing. My skin prickles, feeling every tiny sensation from the friction of my cotton panties against my sore ass to the heat of my car, causing sweat to build in my pores. I can feel every single one.
My breathing intensifies, and before I give myself time to think or stop, I shove my hand down the front of my leggings. My body is screaming with need as I smother my hand over my clit, trying to quiet this ache.
But I can’t. Touching myself only makes it worse.
So I press my fingers over it in tight circles, rubbing myself as I replay the needy sounds he made as he spanked me. The way he unleashed something primal inside himself. The way the pain awakened my arousal and my emotions.
Throwing my head back, I whimper in the quiet, steamy confines of my car. My legs tense, and my back arches as my relentless fingers force my body into a hasty orgasm that feels like both a burden and a relief.
Crying out, I ride out the waves of pleasure, cursing Dr. Goode’s name in my head. My free hand squeezes the steering wheel, and when the climax eventually crests the peak, my head starts to spin, and dots appear in my vision.
Quickly, I pull my hand out of my pants and start my car, cranking the AC to full power. It takes a moment for the air to turn cold, but when it does, I rest my forehead against the steering wheel and breathe it in. My head is soaked with sweat, and my legs are still trembling from the intensity of my quick orgasm.
It takes me a moment to realize I’m not upset anymore. It turns out masturbating really did relieve the intensity.
However, my ass still hurts, and I’m still mad.
Instead of going back to Luke’s house—which, I guess, technically is my house now—I drive to the one person who will listen to me vent about this without judgment. When I pull up to Sage’s apartment, I park in an empty spot across the street and dash into the laundromat.
She’s not down here like I can sometimes find her, but the owner, Gladys, is. She’s sweeping the floor and pauses to stare at me in shock .
“What the hell happened to you?” she asks.
Saying that I just got spanked by my professor and masturbated in my car probably isn’t the right response, so I just shrug and reply jovially, “This heat!”
She chuckles to herself as I jog up the stairs to Sage’s apartment. God, I sure hope Adam isn’t home, and I don’t walk in on something I don’t want to see. When I tap on her door, her dog Roscoe starts yipping inside, and I hear her immediately try to shush him.
When she opens the door, she’s obviously surprised to see me, judging by the expression on her face. “What’s up? Are you okay?”
“Something weird just happened, and I need to talk about it.”
“Come in.” Quickly opening the door, she ushers me inside and meets me on the couch. “Want something to drink? I’ve got sweet tea.”
“No thanks,” I reply, tucking my sweaty red curls behind my ear.
Planting her hands in what’s left of her lap, she waits for me to speak. “What happened?”
“First of all, you have to promise to keep this between you and me.”
“Always,” she replies without hesitation. “Adam is with his mom, so we’re good. Tell me everything.”
I drag in a breath before starting. “Luke…spanked me.”
Sage’s face is frozen in disbelief. “Spanked you?”
“Yes. After class.”
Her expression tightens. “Did he hurt you?”
“No,” I answer quickly. “I mean…not any more than I wanted him to.”
“So…you wanted him to…” she says with the tone of a question.
“Yes…” I reply uneasily.
Sage shakes her head. “Okay, start over.”
That’s when I tell her everything, from the argument in class to the fight afterward, even last night’s discussion about the terms of our new living arrangement and how things should be. She doesn’t look less confused at any point in the story, which is a bad sign.
“Wow…”
“Yeah,” I reply.
“You guys have some intense sexual chemistry.”
My spine straightens. “What? No. That’s not…no. We don’t…”
With that, Sage begins to laugh. “Do you hear yourself?”
“Sage, Luke and I do not have sexual anything . He’s a pompous control freak and not my type at all . We’re just living together until he hopefully leaves for England. I can rent his place on my own. Maybe even date a normal guy and settle down.”
She rubs her belly as her eyes narrow. “He just spanked you, and you rubbed one out minutes later. I’d call that pretty sexual.”
“Ugh,” I groan, putting my face in my hands.
“Maybe you two need to just do it and get it out of your systems,” she says with a shrug.
“Absolutely not,” I say, shaking my head.
“Okay, fine. But you have to admit that you’re sort of falling into kinky roles with each other. It sounds to me like you want him to be your Dom, and he wants that, too.”
Biting my bottom lip, I don’t even bother trying to argue with that. She’s right. I do want that in some weird way. I’ve even made it somewhat clear to him. But was I putting too much pressure on him today? Did I coerce him into something he didn’t want?
Sage’s soft hand touches my knee. “You need to talk to him. That’s step one. Figure out exactly what you both want out of this situation. And hey, you can always have a Dom/sub dynamic without the sex. People do it all the time.”
I roll my eyes. “No, they don’t. Sex always becomes part of the equation. Trying to separate kink from sex is like trying to separate sex from feelings. ”
Sage shakes her head, clearly disagreeing with me but not bothering to argue.
“Listen,” she says after a moment. “Take my advice. Talk to him because if you don’t, and you just continue to get on his nerves to get a reaction out of him, I guarantee it will end with sex. So if that’s not what you want…talk it out.”
“Fine,” I mumble under my breath.
After leaving Sage’s, I head back to the house. Luke’s not there, so I use that time to do homework and a bit of reading. I need to make a doctor’s appointment to get this whole pregnancy situation checked out, but I’m dreading that, so it keeps getting shoved down the to-do list.
Halfway through my statistics homework, I stretch out on the couch and fall asleep with my book and calculator on my chest. But when I wake up, they’re both stacked on the coffee table, along with the pen and notebook I left in class. I hear movement in the kitchen, but I pretend to be asleep for a while to avoid the awkward conversation I don’t want to have.
I still don’t know what I want to say. I’m a grown-ass woman who was spanked like a child—and I liked it. I can’t ask for that. Not from someone I’m not even in a relationship with. If Luke and I were dating, it would be different.
When it becomes unavoidable, I eventually sit up from the couch and turn to face the man sitting at the dining room table.
“Hi,” I stammer uncomfortably.
I can see his jaw clench from here before he awkwardly replies, “Hey.”
“How did your interview go?” I ask to keep the conversation light.
“It was postponed.” His mood is melancholy, and now I know why.
I climb onto my knees to face him. “Oh no. I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay,” he says with a shrug. “They needed to reschedule for next month.”
I don’t know anything about this internship he’s trying to get into, but I know enough from his mood and the way he talks about it that it’s important to him.
When there’s nothing to say for a moment, we sit in tense silence. He’s the first one to broach the subject.
“Listen, Sadie…”
Just hearing him say my name, not Miss Green, sets my nerves on edge. It’s too real and serious. I hate it.
So I quickly interrupt him before he can say anything else.
“Don’t,” I blurt out. “You don’t need to apologize or say anything. I’m fine.”
“Yes, I do,” he argues. “I lost my temper.”
“No, you didn’t.”
“It was wrong of me to put my hands on you,” he continues, clearly not listening to me.
“Luke, I wanted you to.”
“Still, I didn’t know that at the time, and it was wrong of me.”
God, this is so uncomfortable, but I can still feel his gaze on my face, so I decide to just come out with it.
“I liked it.”
He pauses. “You did?”
Without looking into his eyes, I quickly nod.
Then, after clearing his throat, he mutters raspily, “Me too.”
We’re both quiet for a moment, soaking in this new tension between us. Finally, I’m the one to fill the silence. “I think we just found our form of punishment.”
“Yeah…” he stammers. “I think we did.”
More awkward silence.
“So…” he starts. “If you act up or don’t listen to me, you want me to…”
“Yep,” I reply.
“We should probably have a word or something, right?” He scratches the back of his neck and it’s clear just how new all of this is to him.
“A safe word, yeah. I think stop or no will suffice for now,” I say.
He shuffles his feet as he nods. “Perfect.”
For the first time since the start of this awkward conversation, our eyes meet and something pure flashes between us. An almost friendly familiarity. And for the first time since we met, I feel a trust blooming between us. I can’t remember the last man I really trusted, so this is nice.
“Now that we’ve established that,” he says, “are you going to tell me why you were late this morning?” he asks.
There’s something so satisfying about hearing that infuriatingly stern tone of his again. It feels so normal already.
“Well, if you must know. It’s because I spent the morning throwing up.”
He winces in disgust. “Is that normal? To be so sick all the time?”
“How the hell should I know? This is my first time doing this.”
“Have you seen your doctor yet?”
I deflate into the couch. “No.”
“Why not?” he asks in a scolding tone.
“Because I’m putting it off. If I make the appointment, then it becomes real, and I’m not ready for it to be real.”
With a huff, he stares at the ceiling. “These things rarely wait until you’re ready, Miss Green.”
Oh, thank God. No more Sadie .
“I know that. I’m not an idiot,” I argue.
“Then pick up the phone. And call them. Now.”
Glaring at him obstinately, I grab my phone from the table. As I glance down at the device, scrolling for my doctor’s number, I realize that I’m doing this because he’s making me. Hypothetically. Not literally. But something about that makes it easier. Less overwhelming. More manageable.
When I find the number, I stare at it for a moment. Making this call is huge. I’ll have to say those words out loud again. The words that my mouth seems to fumble. I’m pregnant .
“I think I need to…be alone for this.” My voice sounds so small, but Luke doesn’t argue or question it.
He just stands from the dining room table and says, “I’m going for a run.” Then as he passes the couch, he lays a hand on my shoulder. It’s so oddly comforting. The same hand that spanked me this morning. “You can do this,” he says, and I swallow those words like medicine.
I can do this.
With that he leaves, and I hit the button.