25. DEBAUCHERY
ariella
Finally, my break is over.
Today, I stepped back into my university life after over a month away—weeks spent healing from the bike accident that split my term clean in half and forced me to restart—a reset I never asked for, yet one I’ve no choice but to endure.
And, almost cruelly, my first class happens to be with Professor Hertley.
It feels like stepping into a loop where the universe has dragged me back to the exact beginning. Only this time, I’m not the same girl who first walked into Oxford University.
Too much has happened in the space between then and now. Too much has changed in the meantime.
A quiet unease settles low in my chest when I take my seat.
Am I still his student assistant?
The thought strikes sharper than I expect. A flicker of something ugly about being replaced presses against my ribs at the possibility.
Someone more qualified. More capable. Someone who could do the job without hiding behind technicalities. Someone… official.
My fingers curl slightly against the desk, grounding myself before the feeling can dig too deep.
Just like my first day, Alistair Hertley walks in right on time, carrying nothing but his iPad. With that, the hollow ache dissolves the moment I see him.
Everything else fades away, leaving only last night flooding back into my mind. Not just last night—every night of the past few days.
All the memories linger in the way my pulse stutters, in the way my body feels too aware of itself beneath my clothes.
He, however, is entirely unaffected, as if everything he experienced was nothing more than a hyperactive imagination.
This time, he doesn’t ask for names. No slow assessment of the room, no careful cataloguing of identities. Just a brief introduction of himself, followed by a concise overview of the course.
Meanwhile, I keep drifting.
My attention fractures every few minutes, pulled away from the board and dragged back to him. Every glance in his direction triggers the same memory, one that’s impossible to ignore.
Just when I thought I could get used to his place—comfortable enough to sneak something from his refrigerator—he catches me red-handed.
“Eager to be caught, little kitty?”
The raspiness of his sleepy voice echoes through my body, finally resolving into my throbbing core, which is again begging for his attention.
I flinch, not just at the sound of his voice, but at the way he gave me a pet name. It feels so intimately possessive in a dangerous kind of way.
Little kitty.
“I’d rather suggest you focus this time so you don’t need to repeat this course, Miss Keinston.”
The shift hits instantly. From little kitty to Miss Keinston.
The contrast is jarring enough to leave me momentarily disoriented.
Around me, I can feel the weight of eyes turning—curious, judgmental, invasive. They look at me like I’m something rare yet misplaced.
They don’t know the story behind the name.
To them, Keinston isn’t just a surname but a brand. And now, apparently, I’m the failed version of it.
The irony almost makes me laugh.
But I don’t drop the bowl of chocolate-mint ice cream.
Instead, I set it aside with deliberate calmness, pulling my mask up to cover the lower half of my face before turning to face him fully. He’s not wearing his glasses.
His gaze lands on me and sweeps over my leather-covered body.
It travels unhurriedly, starting from my face down to the rest of me, as if he has all the time in the world to take me apart piece by piece. The movement is subtle, like being touched without contact.
Heat prickles along my skin in the wake of his attention, goosebumps rising in a slow, traitorous wave. Every inch of me heightens from sensation under that silent inspection, leaving my body reacting before my mind can catch up.
It’s an undressing that never quite crosses the line—yet leaves you feeling far more exposed than if you were fully dressed and covered.
And I don’t look away.
I stand there, fully aware, fully covered, and still feeling like he can see right through me.
“With due respect, Sir, I’d say you should be the last person talking about focus when you’re the one who keeps creating distractions.”
A collective silent gasp ripples through the room. My own heartbeat stutters, caught somewhere between shock and something far more reckless.
But I don’t take it back.
I can’t stand the way he speaks to me like I’m just another student in this room, as if he didn’t control the narrative down to the last lie—my accident, my absence, my return to waking up under his roof, under his rules, under his authority.
If he gets to pretend, then so do I.
Nonetheless, I return the favor.
My gaze drifts—deliberate this time, unhurried in a way that mirrors his own.
His upper body is still bare. The overhead light spills across him, catching on the defined planes of muscle, highlighting the kiss mark I left on the upper left side of his chest.
My gaze drags lower.
The sharp cut of his V-line disappears beneath the waistband of his sweatpants, hanging just low enough to make the view indecent without crossing into exposure.
My breath hitches, barely noticeable, as I follow the line further. I see the subtle rise beneath the fabric—the evidence of him coming in my mouth, and I happen to spill some on his clothes again. The unmistakable tension.
My pulse spikes. No matter how much I see of him, it’s never enough. Every glance feeds me greed. And every time, I want more than the last.
He says something, but I don’t register a single word. My mind is too loud, my anger still simmering beneath the surface, and my body betraying me in ways I refuse to acknowledge.
At this point, I just blankly stare at him.
His jaw tightens almost imperceptibly before he clears his throat. “I was hoping for an answer, Miss Keinston.”
My eyes widen barely a fraction at the implication—he’s trying to communicate in code words in the middle of the class about me joining his so-called research team.
“I heard you,” I reply evenly, letting my voice settle into something deceptively calm. “I just didn’t find it worth answering.”
“Are you incapable of following simple instructions, or are you choosing not to?” he asks, tone smooth but edged now.
My lips press together—the movement deliberate enough to answer without giving him what he actually wants. Words.
Around us, the room has gone completely still. Every eye is on us.
He clears his throat again to reset himself, though the tension lingers all the same.
“I asked you a question.”
I still don’t answer.
Instead, I tilt my head slightly, letting my expression soften into something almost innocent.
It’s almost amusing.
He’s still expecting compliance in the form he prefers. So I give him something new. I move.
The air feels thicker with every inch I close between us, charged with tension that has nothing to do with academics and everything to do with the way his gaze tracks me.
I stop right in front of him.
Close enough to feel the warmth of his body. Close enough to catch the faint shift in his breathing. Close enough to look directly into those ocean-blue eyes without obstruction.
It’s the first time we’re seeing each other like this—fully, clearly, without shadows or distance to blur the edges.
He has no idea who I am, and I thrive in that feeling of having the upper hand.
“You do know I have a wife.”
Out of everything, that’s what he chose to remind me of. My jaw tightens instantly, a sharp clench I can’t quite suppress.
I can’t give him my voice. So I give him a clipped nod, pretending the information is irrelevant rather than something that’s always been clawing under my skin.
“Careful, Alistair Hertley,” his full name rolls off my tongue with deliberate clarity. “You’re starting to sound self-convincing.”
His nostrils flare.
“Go to my office, Miss Keinston,” his timbre is now stripped of any trace of leniency. “You’ll wait for me there until this lecture concludes. You’re dismissed for today.”
My brows frown slightly, disbelief threading through my tone. “You can’t be serious.”
It’s bruising my ego, my last name—Keinston.
“I’m afraid I am,” he replies unhesitantly. “Remove yourself from this room immediately.”
The finality in his voice leaves no place for argument.
Before the moment can stretch any further, I’m shoving my things into my bag with impatient movements.
The tension follows me, starting from getting out of my seat, all the way to the door.
I push it open harder than necessary and slam it shut with such force that it echoes down the corridor.
“Yet you still come back. Every. Single. Night.”
So he was aware of my presence all this time…
Unbothered, a silent chuckle builds in my chest, restrained but no less potent, although I try not to react.
Because you can’t help but want me more than you want her, Alistair.
“What do you want from me, little kitty?”
Does he still not know?
I step closer, drawn in by something I’ve long since stopped pretending to resist. My index finger presses lightly against his bare chest, right over the steady thrum of his heartbeat. It’s beating too hard, giving away how much I’m affecting his body.
My finger drags slowly across his skin, as nails grazing to leave a faint trail—careful not to touch the lipstick mark I left on his chest.
I trace my answer instead of speaking it—him. I want him.
His brows pull together, the shift in his expression small but telling—something caught between disbelief and pure surprise.
“Me?” he repeats.
I nod once—yes, you. Always been you. Ever since I laid my eyes on you four years ago.
Alistair scoffs in dismissal. “You don’t even know what you’re asking for.”
I give him a small nod that says “I do” and watch him clench his jaw.
I always knew. I want to be yours only. However, it is.
“Next time, I’ll have my way with you, little kitty.”
Some questionable part of me loves that promising threat. In fact. I’m almost getting turned on from the anticipation of what he might do to me.
His wife’s voice calls from upstairs, cutting through whatever was building between us. “Everything alright downstairs, honey?”
The spell snaps. The moment fractures.
“Yeah, just some stray cat,” he answers casually,, his eyes never leaving mine. “I’ll be right back.”
I move instantly, slipping out of sight and ducking beneath the kitchen counter.
My breath held as I watch him look in my direction, but answering his wife. “Yeah, just some stray cat,” he obviously connected it to little kitty like some inside joke.
“I’ll be right back,” he turns away, pulled back into the life he insists on reminding me of.
The second he’s gone, I don’t hesitate to slip out through the nearest window, leaving nothing behind but the lingering tension he won’t be able to ignore.