Page 12 of Kept

“Jane Fawkes, stay behind, if you please.” Rhett watched the other students filter out, like he didn’t notice me at all.

Rachelle winked at me jokingly and my heart dropped somewhere near my knees. The hope for a smooth year I’d felt earlier was cold and dead now.

When the room was empty, Rhett shut the door. “Enjoying your classes?”

I pulled my beat-up messenger bag over my shoulder, hoping he had a real reason for this. If anyone ever found out… “It’s been great so far. I love this place.”

That was the truth, at least. If I hadn’t screwed myself over already, I’d be as happy as a piglet in muck right now.

A breath later, Rhett’s hands were on the wall on each side of my head, caging me in.

“What did you dream about last night?” he breathed in my ear. Goosebumps rose over my neck and rolled downwards.

What I’d dreamed: Rhett pounding into me, his face flickering between Gabriel Spears cool, hard gaze and Thayer’s warmer, but crueler, one.

What I told him: “The usual, you know. Showing up to class and realizing I’d forgotten to get dressed.”

His tongue flicked my earlobe, the smell of mint gum mixing with his tobacco cologne, and everything in me responded to that scent on a visceral level. My body and its primitive drive had gotten the memo loud and clear: this was the guy it wanted to fuck, in every position and on every surface.

My brain was only half-logical: he was nowmyprofessor. But he smelled like pure sex. He was authority. But I knew what he felt like and I wanted more.

My voice broke before I could even begin speaking. “I dreamed of you,” I whispered.

It was like they were the magic words and he was just waiting for them. Rhett caught my mouth in a harsh kiss. My lower lip ground against my teeth, and he tilted his head to force my mouth open, tongue sliding over mine.

My hips ground against him when he pressed in, the full height of him covering me, and I was already picturing round two of forbidden activities when his cell rang.

Rhett released me, eyes boring a hole right through my skull for a long moment before he strode back to his desk and answered.

I remained against the wall, letting it hold me up. My legs were unreliable.

“Harlow,” he said, and paused. Blue eyes flicked my way.Fuck. “She’s here.”

Time to pull myself together.

My stomach did a slow roll as Rhett listened. He finally murmured an assent and hung up, sliding his cell in his pocket. “You’re to report to the Dean’s office before you head to the library,” he said. He looked me over, and there was something so primal and hungry in his gaze that I almost missed the importance of his words.

“Don’t worry,” he said when I paled. He pushed me back against the wall, kissing me softer this time. Being caught between lust and fear was a little like the world’s worst rollercoaster ride. “He has some ground rules to discuss with you. We take our role as mentors seriously, Jane.”

God help me and my bad fucking life choices, but I kissed him back. “Did anyone know you were there?”

Rhett’s lips moved over my cheek to my neck. “No.”

I breathed a little sigh of relief and he pulled his full weight off my body. “You’re free to go. Thayer is a punctual bastard.”

I swallowed my completely-unwarranted disappointment and offered Rhett a small smile. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow.” He wound a lock of blonde hair around his finger, smiling back at me.

That was the last image I carried in my mind as I found the small, dark corridor where the Dean of Students kept his office. I knocked on the door, and a gruff voice said, “Enter.”

Feeling a little like I was walking into the belly of the beast, I pushed the door open. Professor Thayer’s office was old-money, the furniture made of ebony wood, a red Oriental carpet spread across the floor, and first-edition books covered a massive bookshelf behind him. I’d kill a man with my bare hands to touch some of those books, but he’d never let me. Not after I’d destroyed a first edition with coffee.

He gestured to the empty seat across the broad desk. “Close the door behind you.”

I complied and stepped forward to take my seat, then saw what was spread across that desk. It didn’t gel with Rhett’s sunny smile, his reassurances, his promise that no one else saw us.

The desktop was covered with a slew of glossy photographs, and I was intimately familiar with both of the subjects depicted, even though only one face was clearly showing.

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