Page 29 of Teaching His Babygirl

Colt

It’s beenover a week since Leon and his family saw us at the restaurant and nothing has come of it. Thank God. I’ll admit that sneaking around the school stealing kisses is hot as hell, but I don’t want Darlene to use it as an excuse to run from what is growing between us. The bell rings, shaking me out of my musings. A look at the clock tells me it’s Darlene’s free period. The temptation to see her is too great to ignore.

I tell Judy I’m going for a little walk around the halls and I’ll be back—something I’m doing more and more frequently. I’m fairly sure she’s suspicious as to my newfound love for strolling around the halls of Thurston Academy. I’m almost to Darlene’s classroom when I hear the sound of her voice. A smile spreads across my face until I hear the words she’s saying.

“This is inappropriate, Mr. Zimmerman…”

“That’s okay, baby… we won’t tell anyone,” a male voice responds.

“No…”

“You can spread those pretty thighs for the principal but not me?”

There’s a slapping sound and a low growl, and I’m running the rest of the way down the hall and skidding into her classroom. The scene in front of me has my blood fucking boiling. Leon fucking Zimmerman has Darlene backed against the wall. Darlene has her hands up, one covering her mouth the other one out as if expecting a blow.

“Bitch, you’re going to regret that,” he growls, reaching for her.

I’m on him in a second. I have him yanked away and on the ground with my knee in his back within a heartbeat.

“Oh my God, Colt!” she cries out, looking at me with tearful eyes. “Don’t hurt him!”

“Don’t. Hurt. Him,” I snarl. “Do you know what could have happened?”

I kneel into Leon’s back a little harder, making him gasp. Good. The fucker deserves a hell of a lot more than being subdued. If he weren’t a student… I shake my head at the thought of what I would be willing to do in the name of Darlene. The amount of rage I have coursing through my veins tells me plenty.

“She assaulted me!” he shouts from below me.

The knee in his back is definitely not enough punishment. The asshole deserves a beat down. I pull out my phone and dial Coop. “Need you in the art room, bring the on-duty school officer,” I bark into the phone as soon as he answers. I hang up before he can respond.

I look over to where Darlene is still standing against the wall. Her arms are wrapped around her torso, tears are falling down her cheeks in a torrent as she shakes. “S-sorry. This is all my fault.”

“This is not your fault.”

What the fuck is she getting at? Her fault. Not even close. My mind goes back to what could have happened if I hadn’t been so obsessed with her that I couldn’t resist coming to her classroom. Leon is a starting linebacker on the school’s football team. He’s easily half a foot taller than her and has at least seventy-five pounds of muscle on her. He could easily overpower her… he was going to…

“She hit me!” Leon yells, trying to buck me off of him.

I laugh darkly at that. He may be bigger and badder than my Darlene, but I’m bigger and madder than him. No, not mad. I’m livid. Murderous even. Fucking shithead touched my babygirl. Darlene is mine. I let out a low, feral growl, digging my knee even harder into his back, just barely holding back my need to pummel him.

Coop and Jasper, the school police officer, show up just before I can lose my head and beat him half to death.

“What the fuck is going on here?” Coop asks, looking between where I have Leon pinned to the floor and where Darlene is crying against the wall.

“Leon attacked Dar-Miss Larson,” I correct myself, trying to preserve the promise I made her, though right now I could give a fuck about keeping our relationship secret.

“Bullshit!” Leon yells. “She hit me!”

Jasper looks at Darlene. “Is that true?”

She whimpers and nods. I’m instantly up off of Leon, letting Coop handle him. It takes me a scant second to cross the gap between Darlene and me. Unable to help myself, I cup her cheek and look into her eyes, willing her to hear my next words. “You didn’t do anything wrong. You defended yourself.”

“I hit a student,” she cries. “He was… I just…”

She can’t make a coherent sentence through her tears. She’s shaking so hard that her teeth chatter. She’s pale and looks about ready to collapse. I wrap my arms around her and hold her to me. I explain what I walked in on to Jasper and he calls in for backup. Darlene pushes out of my arms, she seems to be all cried out, but she’s definitely not okay.

Jasper asks her a few questions and she can barely answer. She’s standing there staring where Leon was on the ground just minutes before, holding her hand like it’s a live snake about to strike.

“Do you want to press charges?” Jasper asks her for the second time.

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