Chapter 5
Camila
Living with Cameron Vance was like living in a very expensive, very sexy museum where you weren't allowed to touch the exhibits. And the most forbidden exhibit of all was the six-foot-five goalie currently frowning at a spreadsheet on his iPad like it had personally offended his ancestors.
It had been four days.
Four days of "The Deal."
Four days of sleeping in the guest room (which still smelled like cedar and emptiness).
Four days of him cooking terrifyingly healthy meals—grilled chicken, steamed broccoli, brown rice—and watching me eat them to ensure I was "fueled for cognitive function.
" Four days of pretending to be his girlfriend in public, which mostly involved him putting a heavy hand on the small of my back and steering me away from frat boys while I smiled like a Stepford Wife.
And four days of this: The Study Session.
"You're drifting," Cameron’s voice cut through my daydream. He didn't even look up from his screen. "Focus, Sterling."
I groaned, letting my head thunk onto the cold marble of the kitchen island.
"My brain is full, Cameron. It’s leaking out of my ears.
I can physically feel the endowment yield calculations replacing my childhood memories.
I just forgot the name of my first pony.
Her name was Sparkles, and now she’s gone. Replaced by a pivot table."
"Sparkles was a liability," Cameron said dryly. "Pivot tables are assets."
He finally looked at me. He was wearing his "at home" uniform: grey sweatpants that hung low on his hips—showcasing that maddening V-cut muscle—and a black t-shirt that stretched tight across his chest. He had glasses on.
Glasses.
Thick, black-rimmed reading glasses that made him look like Clark Kent if Clark Kent was a grumpy, sexually repressed athlete with a control kink.
It was unfair. It was actually a hate crime against my libido.
"We've been at this for two hours," I whined, twisting a lock of hair around my finger. "I need a break. I need stimulation. I need... chocolate. Or wine. Or a lobotomy."
"You need to pass the midterm on Tuesday," he countered, tapping his stylus against the iPad. "And currently, your retention rate is hovering at a dismal sixty percent. If you fail, the deal is off. You’re out on the street."
"You wouldn't," I challenged, lifting my head to glare at him.
"Try me."
He stared at me. I stared back.
This was our new dynamic. I pushed; he held firm. I poked; he blocked. It was exhausting, infuriating, and... weirdly addictive.
For the last seventy-two hours, we had fallen into a bizarre rhythm.
By day, we were the Campus Power Couple.
We ate lunch together in the quad, where he would peel an orange for me with surgical precision while half the student body whispered about how "The Wall" had finally been breached.
He held my hand walking to class, his grip firm and possessive, playing the part of the protective boyfriend so well I sometimes forgot it was a lie.
But by night? By night, he turned into Sergeant Vance of the Academic Boot Camp.
"I'm bored, Cameron," I sighed, sliding off the stool. I started pacing the length of the kitchen, my bare feet slapping against the concrete floor. "I can't just sit there and absorb numbers. I'm a kinetic learner. I need movement. I need drama."
"You are a child," he muttered, taking off his glasses and rubbing the bridge of his nose. "Sit down."
"Make me," I said.
The words slipped out before I could check them.
The air in the kitchen instantly changed. The hum of the refrigerator seemed to vanish. The silence stretched, tight and rubber-band thin.
Cameron lowered his hand. He put his glasses back on. He turned slowly on his stool to face me.
"What did you say?"
His voice was low. Quiet. It was the voice he used when someone crowded his crease.
A smarter woman would have backed down. A smarter woman would have sat her ass on the stool and opened the textbook to page 45.
But I wasn't a smart woman. I was Camila Sterling. And I had been feeling a low-level hum of anxiety and arousal since the moment I moved in. I needed to break something.
"I said, make me," I repeated, planting my hands on my hips. I tilted my chin up. "You're so bossy, Vance. 'Sit down.' 'Eat your vegetables.' 'Don't touch the thermostat.' Do you ever get tired of hearing your own voice?"
He watched me. He didn't blink. His eyes tracked the rise and fall of my chest.
"You're acting out," he diagnosed clinically. "You're frustrated because the material is hard, so you're trying to pick a fight to avoid doing the work. It's a defense mechanism."
"Stop analyzing me!" I stomped my foot. "I'm not a hockey play. I'm a human being who is bored to death!"
I marched over to him, invading his personal space. I stood between his spread knees, looking up at him. It was a dangerous place to be, but the adrenaline was singing in my veins.
"You think you can just order me around because I signed your little contract," I sneered, poking him in the chest. His pectoral muscle was hard as rock under the cotton. "But you're not my boss, Cameron. You're just my landlord."
He looked down at my finger poking his chest. Then he looked up at my face.
"Is that right?"
"Yes," I insisted, though my voice wavered slightly. "You're boring. You're a robot. I bet you even schedule your—"
He moved.
It was a blur of motion. One second I was standing, the next I was airborne.
He grabbed me by the waist and lifted me effortless, spinning me around and slamming me down onto the marble island.
My breath left my body in a whoosh.
Before I could scramble away, he was there. He stepped between my dangling legs, his thighs pinning mine against the cabinets. He placed his hands on the counter on either side of my hips, trapping me.
He leaned down, his face inches from mine. His eyes were no longer cold. They were burning with a dark, blue fire.
"Say that again," he whispered. "Call me boring again."
My heart was hammering against my ribs like a trapped bird. My brain was screaming DANGER, but my body... my body was singing FINALLY.
"You..." I swallowed hard, my throat dry. "You're..."
"I'm what?" He leaned closer. His nose brushed against mine. I could smell the coffee on his breath, mixed with mint. "Am I boring now, Mila?"
"No," I whispered.
"Good."
He didn't back off. He stayed right there, looming over me. The heat radiating from his body was overwhelming.
"You want stimulation?" he murmured, his gaze dropping to my mouth. "You want to learn kinetically?"
"I..." I couldn't form a sentence. My entire system had rebooted.
"Answer me," he commanded.
"Yes," I breathed.
"Fine."
He grabbed the Art History textbook from the counter.
"Lesson one," he said, his voice rough. "Renaissance art. The focal point."
He slammed the book open next to my hip.
"Read the first paragraph," he ordered.
I stared at him. "What?"
"Read it," he said. His hand moved. He placed his large, warm palm on my thigh, just above my knee. His thumb rubbed a slow circle against the bare skin exposed by my shorts.
"Read it out loud," he said. "And if you get a word wrong... we stop."
My brain was short-circuiting. His hand was heavy, hot, and terrifyingly close to the center of me.
"The... the High Renaissance," I stammered, looking at the text. "Was marked by a... a renewed emphasis on... on classical..."
His hand moved up an inch. Just one inch. But my breath hitched.
"Classical what?" he prompted, his voice a dark purr against my ear.
"Antiquity," I squeaked.
"Good girl."
The praise hit me like a drug. My toes curled.
"Keep reading," he murmured. His thumb pressed into the soft flesh of my inner thigh.
"Artists such as... as Leonardo and... and Michelangelo..." I was panting now. It was impossible to focus. "Sought to capture... the ideal... human form."
"The ideal human form," Cameron repeated slowly.
His hand slid higher.
He wasn't touching anything vital yet. He was just resting his hand on my upper thigh, his fingers splayed wide. But the implication was there. The threat. The promise.
"Do you know what the ideal form is, Mila?" he whispered.
I shook my head, unable to speak.
"It's submission," he said softly. "It's giving up control."
He leaned in and kissed the sensitive spot just below my ear.
I gasped, my head falling back. "Cameron..."
"Read," he growled against my neck. "Don't stop reading."
"The... the use of... linear perspective..." I was gasping the words out now. He was sucking on the pulse point of my neck, his teeth grazing the skin.
His hand moved again. His fingers brushed against the lace of my panties.
I bucked my hips involuntarily.
"Ah," he warned, pulling back slightly to look me in the eye. "Did I say you could move?"
"No," I whimpered.
"Stay still."
He moved his hand back to my thigh, but he didn't stop the torture. He kept his palm hot and heavy, grounding me, while he leaned in to kiss my jawline, my chin, the corner of my mouth.
It was agonizing. He was everywhere and nowhere.
"Why are you doing this?" I whispered, tears of frustration pricking my eyes.
"Because you asked for it," he said against my lips. "You said you were bored. Are you bored now?"
"No," I sobbed. "Please."
"Please what?"
"Kiss me," I begged. "Just kiss me."
He pulled back an inch. He looked at my lips, swollen and wet. He looked at my eyes, dilated and pleading.
"Not until you finish the paragraph," he said.
"You're a monster," I hissed.
"I'm a tutor," he corrected. "Read."
I took a shaky breath. I looked at the book. The words were swimming.
"This approach... created a sense of... of harmony and... balance."
"Balance," he echoed.
Suddenly, he moved. His hand slipped beneath the hem of my shorts. His fingers slid under the elastic of my panties.
He didn't penetrate. He just cupped me. His palm was hot against my center. He held me there, feeling the wetness soaking the lace.
"You're wet," he noted, his voice sounding wrecked. "For art history?"