Page 22 of Wicked Ends
“My, my, birthday girl, you pop up in the most interesting places,” he said quietly.
My heart leapt into my mouth. I gripped onto the edge of my desk and raised my chin, trying my best not to let him see how unsettled I was.
“I-I don’t know what to say in my defense, except that behind the bar, you looked a hell of a lot older. I’m sorry—so sorry… If you want to tell the dean, I understand. If you want to change classes, I understand,” I rambled. The words had been swirling around my head the entire class, and now, they dumped out on the floor all around us.
Marcus pushed off the door and walked toward me. His eyes narrowed as he assessed my jumbled words.
“Sorry?” he repeated, closing in on me. He strode right up to me, closer than I’d expected him to. I had nowhere to go as he rounded my desk and crowded me back against the lectern.
“What are you apologizing for, just so we’re on the same page?” he said.
“For…” I took a deep breath, “taking advantage of you. You’re young?—”
“I’m twenty. I’ll be twenty-one in a few weeks,” he interrupted.
I opened my mouth to ask how he was so old, seeing as it was a freshman class, and he seemed to read my mind.
“When your dad goes to prison and you become a ward of the state for a while before your brother can get you out, it sets your academic timelines off a little.”
I had no response for that. I stared at him. He was even more beautiful in the morning light flooding through the windows.
Beautiful?Fuck.What was I thinking?
“Regardless. The power dynamic, it’s not right. I would never have—I should never have,” I spluttered in an attempt to articulate the awful, guilty recriminations swirling in my head.
“What? Turned off that you fucked some lowlife with a dad inside? Regretting lowering your standards for the night? Is that why you ran away in the cold light of day?”
I gaped at him, shocked by his tight words. There was so much to unpack under his clipped, guarded tone.
“No. I’d never think anything like that. I shouldn’t have?—”
“Shouldn’t have what? Fucked me? Let me eat your pussy? Gripped my fingers so damn tight with your cunt you could have snapped them off?” he asked, totally unfazed by the filth coming from his mouth.
I’d never heard dirty talk like that in real life, and this guy could say it utterly shamelessly.
He raised a dark eyebrow at me. “Try it, and I won’t accept it. I’m not a fucking kid, and you didn’t take advantage of anyone. You weren’t leaving that bar without my cum leaking from your cunt. That was my decision, got it? You think you have power over me? You think I’m intimidated by your authority?”
It was laughable when he put it like that. Heat filled my cheeks. I couldn’t stand it. I dropped his gaze and looked away. His fingers landed on my chin, and he tugged my face back up, so I was forced to meet his eyes.
“But you can apologize to me for something,” he said.
“What?”
“Apologize for sneaking out of my bed, while I was still asleep, without leaving me so much as your number or your real fucking name.” He broke off on an incredulous chuckle. “You’ll be the first, and last woman to do that.”
“Right, because you’ve never had a one-night stand leave before morning?”
“Leave, sure, because I’ve made them. I didn’t tell you to leave. I didn’tallowyou to leave, so you should have been there when I woke up.”
The balls on this guy were something else. I pulled my face from his grip and pushed him back. He barely swayed.
“Look, Mr. Bailey, I’m your teacher, I’m older than you?—”
“Barely,” he added.
“Older is more than birthdays,” I told him harshly. “I’m older than you in terms of life experience.”
He laughed. The fucker laughed. He was so ridiculously hot, standing there and laughing at me, I wanted to slap him. I wanted to stomp on his far-too-big feet. I wanted him to realize the gravity of what had happened.
