Page 13 of Kept

My face, heavy-lidded and open-mouthed, as Rhett plowed into me on the table. My head lolling over the back of the chair while he knelt between my legs, my hand tangled in his hair.

Coldness seeped through my limbs. He was so carefully positioned in the photographs, it would be easy to argue that any dark-haired, broad-shouldered man was the one, but there was only one me.

A single word echoed through my mind as Professor Thayer raised an eyebrow, juxtaposed against Rhett smiling down at me, telling me no one saw.

Liar.

Chapter Five

“Damning, aren’t they?”

I couldn’t breathe, my lungs frozen and shriveled behind my ribs. It was all over. Less than a day, and I’d fucked up my only chance at the life I wanted.

At least I could go out with whatever shreds of dignity I had left. I wasn’t going to be the idiot that protestedno, it’s not me!when it was clearly me shoving Rhett’s head between my legs.

Perversely, my skin warmed just from the sight of the photos.

“Very,” I said, my voice coming out in a rasp. I didn’t seem to be able to speak higher than a squeak. That was me as usual. Mouse.

Caught in the mousetrap this time.

Professor Thayer just looked at me. I’d never stripped naked in front of him, but he’d still seen all I was made of. Like Rhett’s hunger, there was something dark and savage under his skin, a beast that’d caught the scent of weak prey and was waiting to run it down.

“There are clauses to your scholarship, Miss Fawkes.” He tapped a stack of papers I hadn’t seen, not with my eyes glued to the photos. “Stipulations written out in very clear language in the contract.”

I sank into the chair, my knees watery and boneless. He pushed the contract towards me. “Read it.”

I’d already read it. I knew the exact paragraph he was talking about, and the words jumped off the page at me.

Code of morality.

Unseemly conduct.

Inappropriate relations.

Impropriety reflecting a poor image on the values of Bourdillon University.

I silently placed the contract back on his desk.

“Impropriety,” he said softly, his eyes never moving from my face. “Unseemly conduct. If I’d known how unseemly you could be, Miss Fawkes, I might’ve had you pay me back yesterday.” A hot blush rose to my cheeks as he spoke. “On your knees.”

A hint of anger rose under the shame. “You can’t speak to me like that,” I retorted, but it came out weak, barely a whisper. Another ineffectual squeak.Grow a fucking spine, Plain Jane.

“I can speak to you however I damn well please.” And he could. Fuck it all, but he could, because mine was the only visible face in those photos, and I couldn’t afford the defense lawyer Rhett could, and even if I could… how much of a hell would they make my life?

“Is this it, then? Are you kicking me out?”

The question hung between us like a dark cloud. Thayer rubbed his lower lip with one scarred knuckle, his gaze on my mouth now.

My mouth was still swollen and red from kissing Rhett.

“That’s entirely up to you.” He picked up a photo from the pile, examining it intently. I cringed when he flipped it to face me. My back was arched off the table, fingers curled over the edge of the table. “You have two choices, Miss Fawkes. One: Your scholarship contract is null and void. You go home. You don’t come back.”

He didn’t need to give me further details. It would be The End. No finishing college, just a lifetime of waiting tables ahead of me, always several steps behind the hospital payments.

I had a terrible feeling I knew what option two was, but I wanted to see his full lips form the words. Maybe it was a little bit of a masochistic streak I had, but I wanted the words out between us, ready to punch right through my chest.

He rubbed his salt-and-pepper beard with one large hand, dark gaze boring through me. “Option two. You remain under a strict code of silence. You never touch another man attending this university besides the ones we’ve given you permission to touch.”

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