Chapter 25 What Rules? #2
Panting, we continued to hold each other close, even as I released my legs from his hips and my feet dropped back to the ground.
His skin was flushed and damp with a thin sheen of sweat.
His hair was sticking out at odd angles where my hands had pulled.
His shirt was endlessly rumpled, and his pants and boxers hung loose around his muscular thighs.
I didn’t doubt that I looked just as debauched as he did. At the moment, I didn’t care.
He pulled up his pants then helped smooth my skirt back down over my hips, before wrapping his arms around my waist, enveloping me in his heat. I rested my cheek on his shoulder, and he rested his on the top of my head.
We stood like that for a long time, holding each other up and breathing each other’s air. I could have stayed like that forever, basking in the post-coital haze.
Finally, I pulled back and looked up at him. His dark chocolate eyes found mine, turning my insides gooey.
“Well, that was—” he said.
“Impulsive?” I offered.
“Yes,” he agreed with a decisive nod. “Though, I was going to say spectacular.”
“Mmm,” I agreed, a smirk spreading over my lips.
He mirrored it with his own grin. “I really just came here to talk to you.”
“We talked,” I said, though that was being generous. Words were spoken, but nothing was resolved. All I really knew was that my plan to respect his boundaries was shattered like a glass beaker dropped on the floor.
He raised an eyebrow. “Hardly.”
“Okay, we didn’t,” I conceded. “But what is there to say? We both know the situation we’re in. There’s a pretty undeniable chemistry between us.” I paused, and he nodded. “We’re both adults. Both consenting. I think we can keep our personal and professional lives separate.”
“I agree. Though we really can’t make it a habit of doing… this… in the classroom. This is blurring the lines between Work and… Not Work… a little too much.”
I laughed and tried to smooth out the creases lining my skirt. They didn’t go anywhere.
“Yes, what we just did was definitely Not Work. I can feel all the Not Evidence of the Not Work dripping down my thigh as we speak.”
“Oh shit! I’m sorry.” Jack sprang into action, grabbing a few paper towels from the roll by the sink and handing them to me. “Here.”
I accepted them with a coy smile. As I began to pull the skirt back up so I could remove my ruined panties and clean myself, he turned away abruptly.
“Do you want some privacy?”
“Are you blushing?” I teased. “You made the mess, but you’re shy now that it’s time to clean up?”
He whirled around to face me. “Well, no, I—”
I threw my panties at him, and he caught them just before they hit his surprised face.
“Would you mind rinsing those out in the sink?”
He stood frozen, staring at the scraps of blue lace as if they held the secrets of string theory. “No,” he said slowly. “I don’t think so.” Then, he slid them into the pocket of his pants.
I threw away the paper towels and fisted my hands on my hips. “You are not seriously stealing my panties.”
“You mean my panties,” he corrected. “You gave them to me.”
My jaw dropped as I regarded his self-satisfied grin. “Are you seventeen years old?”
“I’m sure my seventeen-year-old self never dreamed he would get his hands on Melanie Burke’s panties. I owe it to him to keep these.” He was smiling broadly, unapologetic. He looked younger, relaxed, and completely endearing.
I shook my head, bemused. “You thought about my panties when you were seventeen?”
“And eighteen and nineteen and twenty.” His hands were in his pockets, and he rocked back on his heels as he grinned at me. “And twenty-one and twenty-two…”
“Oh, stop. You did not,” I laughed.
“You were captivating. Brilliant and so beautiful that it hurt to look at you almost as much as it hurt not to.” He tucked a lock of hair behind my ear, and I found myself holding my breath. “I couldn’t help but I...like you.”
Realization crashed over me like a bombshell. This situation went so much deeper for him than it did for me. He had harbored feelings—intense feelings—for me for well over a decade.
Suddenly, his reaction when we first met in August took on a new light. He had been shocked and excited to see me. And that had quickly devolved into mortified when I hadn’t recognized him and devastated when he found out I was his competition.
I had hurt him, deeply, without even realizing it.
And now, we were taking a step together that could leave either of us in tatters if we weren’t careful.
That just wouldn’t do with the end of the semester looming. I needed to take a page out of Jack’s book and get some new rules in place. ASAP.
“Okay, so how will this work?” I asked. “We should probably make the classroom—and the equipment closet—off limits. Anyone could have walked in here just now. We didn’t even think to lock the door.”
“In my defense,” he said, “I would have locked the door if I had been expecting anything. I didn’t think you would throw yourself at me.”
I scoffed and stepped toward him, poking my pointer finger into his chest. “I believe it was you who kissed me, if I’m not mistaken.”
His hands moved to my hips again, and I was suddenly very aware of the fact that I wasn’t wearing underwear.
“True, but you kissed me back.”
Silly Jack was so damn cute. When he leaned down and brushed his lips across my forehead, my brain went fuzzy for a minute. Fuckity fuck, I was in trouble. Not that I had any intention of putting an end to any of this. That could be a Future Melanie problem.
“As I was saying,” I squeaked, clinging to the last scraps of my dignity, “the classroom and the closet are off limits.”
“Agreed.”
“In fact, we should probably try to behave in all of the common campus spaces and limit the naughtiness to our apartments.”
“Agreed. Though that one might be a little harder,” he said, sending my eyebrows shooting up to my hairline.
“Do you really want a repeat of the wrestling room?” I demanded.
His eyes twinkled with mischief, and I hit him on the chest with the flat of my palm.
“That’s not what I meant!” I said. “Who are you and what have you done with Jackson Cooper?”
I was pretty good at sex, but I couldn’t have managed to rewire his brain in the last fifteen minutes. I was eighty-seven percent sure. Though maybe the effect was cumulative? I would have to test that hypothesis later.
“I know what you meant,” he said, taking a more serious tone. “And yes, we were lucky it was only Alan. Things could have gone very differently if someone else had walked in. I’m sure we can combine our considerable brain power and exercise self-control during school hours.”
I smiled brightly and pecked him on the jaw. “That’s all I ask.”
He reciprocated, capturing my lips in a steamy kiss that had my toes curling and my body tingling all over again. I was breathless when he pulled away.
“We literally just agreed—” I scolded.
“Last one. I promise I’ll behave now.” He brushed a loose wave off my cheek and tucked it behind my ear.
“Good,” I said matter-of-factly. Then, I bit my lip as I reconsidered. “Actually, please don’t behave too well.”
Jack smirked as he pulled my lip from my teeth with the pad of his thumb.