Page 141 of Teacher's Pet

The knife clatters to the floor, but I don’t dare move.

Can’t breathe.

Can’t think.

"Noah-"

“No,” he snaps, his voice sharp, wrecked. “Shut the fuck up.”

He’s wasted.

Completely, utterly wasted.

I reach for him, trying to push him away, trying to snap him out of whatever spiral he’s in.

“Noah, I’m not doing this with you-”

His lips latch onto my skin.

Gasping, my body locks up as he shamelessly kisses the soft skin above my waistline, his mouth hot and needy against my stomach.

His tongue flicks, drags, tastes—taking his time, savoring every inch of me like I’m something he’s been starving for.

I can feel him unraveling against me.

Can feel myself unraveling right with him.

The fire I tried so desperately to kill, it roars back to life, flooding through me in a violent surge, soaking through my underwear in a matter of seconds.

Fuck, I can’t-

“Noah,” I whisper, hands shaking.

His grip on me tightens.

"Fucking Anastasia Burns," he breathes against my skin, his lips curving in something dark, something broken. “Fuck,” he murmurs, pressing one more kiss, teeth grazing just barely. "Nothing beats reality."

My entire body shudders.

I’m seconds away from letting this consume me.

Seconds away from making a mistake I’ll never come back from.

So I do the one thing I know will make him stop.

His scars.

“Noah-” I hiss, grabbing the back of his neck.

He goes rigid.

His breath hitches.

His body locks.

My fingers press into raised ridges of skin.

Not the faint injuries I once grazed over, the ones I traced in the dark like a secret.

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