His reluctance lasted only a moment before the arm around my back tightened, securing me more firmly against him. My entire body hummed, atoms coming alive at his touch.

We moved away from the bathroom, toward the dance floor, arms and legs entwined and hips aligned. Nathan’s eyes didn’t stray from mine, holding me in place. The music roared, the speakers bouncing the bass all the way to our space on the middle of the dance floor. The song was a slower one, with a resounding beat. A song that exuded sex, a song that demanded we get so close that we tangled with one another.

My face brushed against the stubble on his jawline a couple times, leaving a tingle across my cheeks. Images of his face between my legs, that hair scraping against my thighs, came vividly to the surface, making me ache. I wrapped one hand around his neck, lightly dug my nails into his skin, taking in his warm, spicy cologne. It was subtle, but enough to drive me mad. With my other hand, I explored: fingers along his jaw, hand in his hair, along the muscles of his shoulder.

“What are we doing, Add?” He’d narrowed his eyes, and the lights danced across his face as we swayed from song to song, keeping our bodies close.

“Dancing.” As another slower song came on, I turned around, bringing my back to his chest, my ass aligned with his crotch. I shivered, feeling his arousal hard against the thin fabric of my leggings. One of his arms came around my stomach, pulling me closer. My breath seized for a second, my own arousal a lightning jolt in between my legs.

With his other hand, he moved my hair over one shoulder and brought his mouth down to my exposed neck. But he didn’t touch, just breathed there, warm air traveling up and down the column of my throat. My eyelids closed and my head fell back into him. I brought one arm up behind me, clasping his neck, while my other came around my stomach, linking my fingers with his.

It was the most sexual dance I’d ever engaged in. I was bold, but so was he. With our fingers clasped together, his hand roamed up my stomach, coming to rest right under the curve of my breasts.

Holy mother fuck.

It was almost as stimulating as if his hands had actually covered my breasts. And with that image, I felt my pussy clench down.

Turning my head to him, I whispered loudly over the music, “Wanna get out of here?”

He didn’t answer, simply turned me around and clasped my hand, pulling me through the crowd. I gave a thumbs-up to Leo as I passed him, the blonde curled up on his lap.

When we hit the sidewalk and the clouds of cigarette smoke, Nathan pulled me down the street, the businesses long closed. The lack of light kept the sidewalks in a shroud of darkness.

“Where are—”

Before I could finish asking, he pushed me up against the brick wall and I saw a flash of heat in his eyes before his lips crashed on mine. He tasted warm, minty, like sin and heaven in one bite.

I couldn’t help it; I groaned, long and deep. His lips nipped at mine and I parted them, allowing him access. Teeth and tongues clashed, his hands pinning mine above my head. I wasn’t a submissive type of girl but damn did his control turn me on. I wriggled my arms and when he let go of me, my hands dug into his hair as I leaned into him, licking along his lower lip before sucking it between my teeth. He pushed into me, his hips rubbing against me.

“Fuck,” I groaned, dry humping him like a horny teenager. His hands gripped my hips and yanked my lower body against his as I leaned my upper back against the brick. My hands slid from his hair down his chest, inside his open jacket. Using my thumbnails, I drew a line down each side of his chest, biting through the fabric enough to bring him to a frenzy. Warm hands glided under my tank, over my stomach, up my ribcage. When they met the line of my bra, his fingers dug in just enough to bury themselves between my skin and my underwire. So close but not close enough.

“Let’s go somewhere,” I whispered against his mouth, the hard length of his cock digging into my stomach. “My place is only two blocks away.”

He seemed to war with himself on whether he wanted to pull away and lose this connection even if only momentarily, or if he wanted to try his luck right here, against the wall, hoping we didn’t get arrested for indecency.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” He pulled back, too far for my liking.

My breasts heaved as I caught my breath and I pinned him with a stare. Gripping onto the lapels of his leather jacket, I stepped closer to him, decreasing the distance he’d put between us. “Fuck. Yes.”

“My two favorite words,” he said, before kissing me once more. “Lead the way.”

Chapter Three

Monday morning, class. I arrived early to guarantee a good seat. Front row, dead center, a pair of Maybach glasses hanging from the center of my shirt.

Students piled in, some still reeking of their weekend festivities: booze, sweat and smoke—of the legal and illegal variety. A classmate slid into the seat to my left, bringing with him a cloud of marijuana. He smiled at me, but I paid no attention, tapping the eraser side of my pencil on the blank paper in front of me. My eyes moved to the clock and back toward the door, waiting for Nathan to enter the room. I took in his clean white board, desk free of clutter, chair set perfectly center behind it.

My phone pinged and I pulled it from my pocket.

Celeste: Are you coming home for Dad’s birthday this weekend?

I pursed my lips. Celeste, my sister and Dad’s favorite. She was sixteen years my senior, and about ten steps ahead of me in caring one iota about my absentee father.

Me: Unlikely.

I waited for her response, expecting her to be her usual bitchy self when it came to the matter of our dear father, a man who abandoned his youngest child, a daughter born sixteen years after his last one.

Celeste: Don’t be so selfish, Adele.

Me: Tell that to dear old Dad on his birthday, won’t you?

I powered off my phone, feeling my blood bubbling just underneath the skin. It was no use; a powered-off phone wouldn’t stop Celeste’s barrage of messages. But it did turn off the echo of everything I’d done to disappoint her.

The guy next to me coughed, a wet sound, and I barely contained the distasteful curl of my lips as I leaned away. The seat on my right was quickly filled by a female student who, unlike her fellow peers, had actually given a shit about her appearance today. Her hair was smooth, shiny, reflecting the fluorescents like a mirror. Her makeup carefully applied, her clothing form fitting.

It was no surprise that Professor Easton had fans. After all, I was one. A big one. It was a running joke among the students that the shorter the skirt, the more likely for Dr. Easton to ignore you. He was known for being kind of a hard ass, expecting a lot from his students, not only in their classwork but in how they conducted themselves as well.

I pulled out the copy of On Writing by Stephen King that had been listed in the course syllabus as required text just before the door opened and the noise in the room silenced.

I didn’t lift my head, but I wanted to. I wanted to see if he recognized me. I was wearing jeans and a crisp white button-up blouse—both a departure from my outfit Friday night. But over the blouse I wore the leather jacket and capping my feet were fuck-me red heels. My hair was piled up in a bun. I looked like the Adele from class last week, nondescript apart from the leather, shoes and eyeglasses that cost more than my first car.