Page 9 of Taming His Teacher

“That Shepherd kid isn’t half bad, is he?”

He’s turned his eyes to Shep’s drawings and I stifle the words in my throat.He’s wonderful.“He’s pretty good.”

Will takes a few steps and lays a hand at the small of my back possessively. A small pulse of pleasure radiates from where his fingers lay. “Maybe next Sunday I can take you to the MFA. Or the ICA. Show you some real art.”

“How do you know we both have Sunday off?”

“I checked the schedule.”

It’s not hard to do, it’s online, but you have to go out of your way to find out someone’s schedule other than your own. Will checked my schedule. It might not make anyone else swoon, but I’m flattered. “Oh. Um, okay.”

“Good.”

He snakes his hand around my waist and he pulls me to him so we’re standing face-to-face, no room between our bodies. The muffled voices of boys cleaning up are bouncing around the awkward corners of the building. I put my hands on his chest and apply pressure.

“The boys are still here. We shouldn’t.”

“Why are you always pushing me away, Erin? Don’t you like me?”

“I do like you, I—”

“Because I like you. I think about you all the time.” He does? “I want to be with you. Here. Now.”

I shake my head and flush. “Not now.”

Instead of his expression darkening, his sculpted brows go up. “But here?”

I squeak and squirm in his grasp but he doesn’t let go. “Will!”

“Here?”

Suddenly it doesn’t sound like such a bad idea. I’m tired of playing by the rules, of being a good girl. I’ve achieved my one goal in life; I should be allowed to let loose. Maybe I should try being adventurous, daring. Live on the edge for once. Maybe being a tad promiscuous will make me feel like a real grown-up, and will smother the wholly inappropriate feelings I’m starting to develop for Zach Shepherd.

“Okay. Here.”

He smiles that über-charming grin. I’m happy to have pleased him, especially when he kisses me, his hands curling around my hips and his fingers digging into me in a possessive and rough way that makes my breath go short. But I have to hiss, “Will, stop. Wait ’til they’re gone.”

An hour later, I’m wishing we would’ve waited longer. There’s a reason I don’t do this. But it’s been so long I forgot how dirty and abandoned it makes me feel. Like a pair of used socks that get tossed on the floor. Not even into the laundry basket. Oh, no. He didn’t put me in the laundry basket. This is a one-time thing and now that he’s had me he won’t want me again. I’d had one tutor who, though she was sleeping with my father, had felt it appropriate to lecture me about how I should keep my legs closed.

“No man wants to marry a girl who gives it up easy. Especially a girl like you.”

I knew what she’d meant; she hadn’t had to explain it. Pretty but not so pretty they’d keep me around for my looks. My dad had money, but not so much I’d be worth marrying for that. And this woman hadn’t thought I was all that bright. What the heck did she know? She’d made the same mistake she’d warned me against, and it wasn’t so long before Natalia wasn’t my tutor anymore.

But for all her hypocrisy, maybe Natalia wasn’t so far off base. I’ll be just another campus conquest for Will. How many fellows has he slept with? God, am I foolish. It hadn’t even been that good. Fumbling, awkward vanilla sex that happens between the drunk and/or in a hurry who don’t know each other’s hot buttons. I’d tried to figure out what he wanted but Will is not an attentive lover. At least we’d used a condom, hastily dug out of his wallet.

So I made a mistake. Everyone makes mistakes. I’m allowed to make a few mistakes, right? Except my dad convinced me from an early age that I’mnotallowed. That whatever the consequences would be for other people, mine would be a hundred times worse. I’d be the kid who OD’d the first time I did drugs. I’d be the one who got salmonella from eating raw cookie dough. I’d be the one who got run over by a bus because I jaywalked.

These are the thoughts my father instilled in my head. I am not allowed to take chances. I am not allowed to take risks. I’ve been built to suffer and I shouldn’t invite more heartache into my life than I’ll already have. I figured out later it was his way of trying to make sure I didn’t leave him like my mom had, but the damage went too deep. He thought he was carving it in stone, but I’m a piece of soap. It’s not something I particularly like about myself, but I’ve always been soft, malleable. I don’t mind so much being blown along like a feather in the breeze even if I sometimes feel lost, like I’d rather be plucked from a gust of wind and stuck in someone’s cap.

Will left a few minutes ago, told me we shouldn’t walk across campus together lest people figure out what went down, and I’d agreed. But now I’m alone, staring at the clock waiting for the ten minutes we’d agreed on to pass and I’m sorry. I’m sorry about it all.

“Screw it,” I mutter, and head out when there are three minutes left on the clock.

Chapter 3

Erin

Thanksgiving break is coming to an end. The boys will be filtering in in a few hours with hair just cut and suitcases of freshly washed clothes, maybe with a new video game or some gadget I won’t understand the point of. For now, the dorm my tiny attic apartment is in is empty and I intend to enjoy.

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