I’m sure there’s a point to be made, but it’s hard to focus on it when he’s hovering over my breast like this, pensive and unhurried. I thread my fingers through his hair and arch against his mouth, eliciting a ragged laugh.
He brushes his lips against my nipple, saying, “The thing I got you was free, though.”
“It was?”
He cuts his eyes to the bedside table, nodding. “Top drawer. Check it out.”
When I reach over to open it, he moves his mouth to the center of my chest, kissing the scars as I rummage through. I raise an eyebrow, holding up a box of condoms. “Did you keep the receipt?” Because there might have been a time I wanted them, but I can’t even remember it. Now the thought of them being inside me without leaving a trace of themselves behind is actively off-putting.
“Those are old,” he says, grabbing the box and flinging it across the room. “The paper, on top.”
I find it, pulling it from the drawer and giving it a long look over. It’s a paper on Soviet dystopias, written by D. Rathbone, and features a simple rubric, written in red cursive:
Analysis - B, Grammar - D, Evidence - A.
In a big circle below it is the letter ‘C’。
I bolt upright, ignoring his groan of protest. “Oh my god, you got this on your own?”
He flops back, looking put out as I cover my chest with the paper. “Not really. I’m kind of seeing someone—for extra help.”
“A tutor?” For some reason, the thought of him sitting with someone else—another girl—and working through his reading issues makes my chest ignite in a hot, possessive fury.
He doesn’t make me suffer long, reaching out to twirl a lock of my hair around his finger. “The music director set me up with this guy. A literacy coach.” The corners of his eyes tighten at the admission. “I had to give up my studio space on Tuesdays and Thursdays to work with him, but it’s free, and he’s not a dick about it.”
“Holy shit. A real literacy coach?” I say, gaping at him. Not just some tutor, or some student who’d bend at his every whim. An actual professional who understands his limitations, but also understands his potential.
I tackle him with a kiss that’s too full of my own smile to reach the proper ambition.
As much as I don’t mind helping Dimitri, I know that actually asking someone for help, with zero strings attached, is huge. Revealing his vulnerabilities to me was easier because he had the power. I’ve never been prouder of this man.
“If I’d known you’d be this excited about a ‘C’ maybe I would have tried harder a while back.” His hands slip to my hips and I rock against him. Building warmth rises between us but before my lips can meet his again, a loud banging on the door jolts us apart.
He picks up his phone and checks the time. “He said three hours. On the dot.”
I expect him to ignore it, but he doesn’t. A different sort of energy sparks through him. “Come on,” he says, rolling me off. “Let’s go see what Santa brought us.”
17
Killian
“Killian…”
I watch as Story sighs my name; the camera moving from her supple tits to her sleeping face. Her lips are slightly parted, cheeks flushed a soft pink. Once again, I reach down to adjust my boner, listening to Tristian ask her if she misses waking up to my cock.
The hallway feels too hot, even though it’s December and drafty, and if I had a little less respect for myself, I’d just whip my dick out right here and get off like an animal. But I don’t. In the time it takes Story and Rath to wake the fuck up, I’ve replayed the video Tristian sent me a time or two. Or five.
Or… twenty eight.
I wait until precisely nine to pound on the door, tired of pacing out here with that video playing on a loop, both on my phone and inside my head. It’s getting real fucking old. She wants it. She wants me in her bed. She wants to wake up to me. That little frown on her face while Tristian was whispering in her ear was pure disappointment.
So what the hell does a guy have to do?
Rath’s the one to yank the door open, looking surly and tense. From the tent in his boxers, I can guess why. “You’re the worst goddamn cockblock, you know that?”
I look over his shoulder just in time to catch a flash of Story’s bare chest as she closes her shirt. My dick throbs. “You can’t hole up in here all fucking day. Let’s get on with it.”
With that, I leave them, fully intending to march my horny ass back up there in ten minutes if they don’t show. I look for Ms. Crane next, but she’s a lot easier. I find her in the garden, back hunched against the cold as she aggressively puffs at a cigarette. This isn’t generally an unusual state to find her in. For being such a curmudgeonly bitch, she follows the rules about not smoking in the house.