“You’re one hell of a good liar, Professor May,” he said softly.
Ah Christ. This was ridiculous. Of course she knew what he wanted from her. She’d known it the moment his gaze met hers. And she was too old for teenage, flirty games. Actually, shit, what did that have to do with age? Even when she’d been younger she hadn’t had the patience for it. Whatever she’d done to deserve his attention, one thing was clear. It had to stop.
Slowly she closed her laptop bag then straightened and turned to face him. He stared back at her, his beautifully cut mouth unsmiling. The uncompromising look on his face, hard and stern, made something hot clench inside her. Something she wasn’t prepared to acknowledge.
This is how it started with Piers…
Forcing away the thought, she said bluntly, “I’m thirty-eight.”
His straight, black brows arrowed down. “So?”
“How old are you?”
“Twenty-five. But what’s that got to do with anything?”
Twenty-five. Christ. Older than the average student, but still. “I think thirteen years’ age difference speaks for itself, doesn’t it?”
“Does your age bother you?”
“No.”
“Good. Because it doesn’t bother me either.”
“Well it should.” She twisted to pick up her laptop bag and briefcase. And when she turned back he was standing right in front of her. Not too close but enough that the sexual awareness she’d been telling herself for days she didn’t feel gathered tighter inside her.
“I don’t give a shit about your age,” he said. “So if you’re trying to warn me away you need to think of something else.”
She took a slow breath. “Ah, so we’re going to have this conversation, are we?”
“What conversation?”
“The one where you tell me you’re attracted to me and I tell you that this kind of conversation is inappropriate. That I’m your professor and liaisons between staff and students are prohibited.”
He didn’t say anything for a moment, standing there with his hands in his pockets, motionless. “You sound like you’ve had it before,” he said eventually.
“More than once.” With a couple of younger guys looking for a mother figure and settling on her. Those occasions had been easy ones to nip in the bud, the kids embarrassed and easily deflected once she’d spoken to them.
And you didn’t want them.
She didn’t want Lucien either. No. Definitely not. She pasted on her usual smile, ignoring the unease that sat in her gut. “So? Are we going to have that conversation or not?”
“I think you’re under a misapprehension about what I want, Professor.”
Her fingers curled hard on her briefcase handle. Oh fuck. Had she read him entirely wrong then? It was possible. It had been a long time since anyone had shown any interest in her. “Am I? You’d better tell me then, hadn’t you?”
“Are you sure you want to know?”
“Stop playing games with me, Mr. North. I don’t have either the time or the patience.”
He didn’t move, but it felt as if the room were suddenly too small to contain both of them and oxygen as well. “Okay then, so no more games. I’m not going to tell you I’m attracted to you, Professor, no. What I’d like to do is take you home and fuck you senseless.”
The words hung in the silence of the lecture theatre like profanities in a church.
She’d thought she’d long gotten past the stage of being shocked. She was wrong. And what made it even worse was the way those provocative words struck home, flaming arrows that set a part of her alight. And other parts dry mouthed with fear…
“Hmmm. I can see we might have to have a little chat with the dean about that.” Her voice was perfectly calm, perfectly level. Masking her shock so he wouldn’t see. So he wouldn’t know. “In fact, even saying those words could get you suspended.”
“I realize that. But you asked me what I wanted. So I told you.”
She could get him suspended if she wanted to, she knew that. But she also knew she wasn’t going to. He hadn’t done anything, after all, only been inappropriate. Besides, going straight to the dean would only prove that she couldn’t handle this on her own and she damn well could. He was only a student and she’d dealt with inappropriate students before.
Eleanor forced herself to hold her briefcase by her side instead of in front her like a shield. Relaxed her fingers on the handle. “So, you want to fuck me,” she said easily. “Well, honey, I have to say, you wouldn’t be the first and you probably won’t be the last. But I don’t screw students. I never have and I’m not about to start with you, understand? Besides, I prefer men to boys. Now…” she met his gaze, ice cool, “…is there anything else I can help you with?”