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“Yes.” She panted through the powerplay. “That’s all we ever do.”

The minutes ticked by.

Frustration coursed through her as she scuffled beneath me, every breath more labored, each push and tug and block losing its edge as emotion derailed instinct and knowledge.

We twisted, circled, wrestled.

Every inch of our bodies were stuck together, tied in a knot.

She released a hiss into my ear when I caged her legs in with mine. “Damn you,” she cursed, on the verge of giving up. “Let me go.”

“Make me,” I taunted.

“I’m done. I quit.”

“Not a fucking chance,” I gritted out. “C’mon, Halley, harness your anger. Stay mad. Use it against me?—”

“I am mad,” she spit back, voice muffled by my shoulder. “I’m mad at you.”

“You were thanking me earlier. Cooking for me, hugging me. You didn’t seem mad.”

“I’m both,” she countered hotly. “You’re mixing me all up inside. I don’t know whether to hug you, strangle you, or kiss you.”

A shot of heat swam through me. “Yeah?”

“Yes.” She grunted, her legs linking around me again as she used her hips to try and swing me onto my back. “I hate the way you look at me like I’m a burden.”

“You are.” I was dousing her rekindled flame in lighter fluid because she was stronger when she was pissed off and throwing fury in my face. “You’ve been nothing but a burden since I laid eyes on you.”

Another growl.

Another failed attempt to gain control.

“The way you talk to me.” She fisted my hair with white-knuckled fingers. “Like you can boss me around, bark orders at me.”

“You like it when I do.”

“No,” she seethed, breathing hellfire.

Sweat dripped off our skin as she raked her nails up the planes of my slick back, leaving claw marks behind.

Now she was fighting dirty.

And I cursed the goddamn stirring in my pants as my dick hardened, my hips involuntarily grinding against her spread thighs.

Her furious grunt died out to a whimper for the span of a second before she regrouped and battled harder. “I hate you,” she snarled, thrusting upward against my erection, a contradiction to the way her arms tried in vain to shove me away. “I hate the way you spar with me like I’m your equal when you’ll only ever see me as your student.” She wheezed, struggled, her words hardly coherent as she fought for breaths and leverage. “A prodigy you can whip into shape so you can place me on your mantel and appreciate me from afar.”

“That’s where you belong.” I squeezed the globes of her ass until her legs loosened on a cracked moan and I tossed her flat on her back, towering over her, my hands flying out to catch her by the wrists. I held tight, relentless, my sweat-soaked chest heaving against hers. Leaning in close, I ground out, “Far. Away. From me.”

The anger fizzled out as her eyes flashed, an inch below mine, a smirk curling on her pretty, pouty lips. “You wish. But you can’t stay away from me.”

Grinding my pelvis against hers, I felt her damp underwear flush with my erection and swallowed my moan with more lies. “You’ll never be anything to me. Nothing more than my daughter’s friend. A lost little girl I met at a party, who tried to lie her way into my bed.”

She squirmed against my rock-hard cock and delighted in the way I shuddered. “It kills you, doesn’t it?” She lifted her chin. “That you want to fuck your daughter’s best friend? A teenager, half your age.”

My grip tightened to bruising, my veins popping in my arms and hands. She was trying to strip me down, defeat me with words, and it was working.

Halley’s gaze dropped to my mouth as she whispered, “Tell me your plans for us that night.”

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