Beautifully Broken

sp; I practically choke when I hear his voice. Shit! Did he overhear our conversation?

“Why, Teach? Have I been naughty?”

Dylan smirks at my smartass comment while Bree’s jaw hangs open.

Gavin narrows his eyes at me. “Because you skipped my class this morning. Unless you’d like to talk in detention after school, you’ll come with me now.”

“Fine,” I huff. I gather my things since lunch is almost over anyway. “I’ll see you later, guys.”

“Good luck, Kitty,” Dylan calls.

Grudgingly, I follow Gavin down the hall into his classroom. When we step inside, he closes the door and turns the lock. I’m fuming by this point so I take the privacy as my license to get everything off my chest.

“What’s wrong, Teach?”

“Why’d you skip class, Kat?”

“Why’d you lock the door, Gavin? Are you looking for another lap dance?”

He glances at the door nervously as I begin lifting my shirt. He charges forward and pulls it back down.

“Stop it!” he growls.

“Why?” I ask coyly. “You don’t want to see me naked?”

“I always want to see you naked!” He pulls the ends of his hair. “Damn it! I didn’t mean to say that. Forget I said that.”

I place my hand on my hip. “Something like that is kind of hard to forget, Teach.”

“Stop calling me that.”

“Why? You’re my teacher, are you not?”

“I won’t always be your teacher. In just over six months, you won’t even be a student here anymore.”

“What does that mean?”

He shrugs. “It’s a factual statement. There’s no hidden meaning.”

My head spins as I try reading between the lines. Is he saying that he wants to pursue something after graduation? Is he asking me to wait for him?

“Stop playing games with me. What are you trying to say?”

“I’m not playing games,” he insists. “I can’t say anything. I’m trying to do the right thing here, Kat. Can’t you respect that?”

“I’d respect you a lot more if you’d cut the shit and just tell me the truth. I’m a big girl, Gavin. Whatever it is, I can handle it.”

Unless he tells me that he doesn’t want me. I don’t think I could handle that.

His eyes fill with fire. “Fine! You want the truth? The other night…when I saw you taking your clothes off in front of all those men? I wanted to fucking kill them for seeing you like that! I wanted to throw you over my shoulder and haul your ass out of there. When we were alone in that room…I wanted to claim your body so badly that it would erase every memory of those assholes leering at you on that stage. I spent the entire holiday weekend drinking myself into oblivion trying to forget the look on those fuckers’ faces. Trying to forget how much I want you. How much I miss talking to you. Seeing you laugh. Being the one responsible on the rare occasion when your face does light up. The truth is that I want to be in your orbit every second of every day. I want to find some way to make this work. And right now, in this very moment, I want nothing more than to throw you over my desk and fuck you until you’re screaming for mercy.”

He’s breathing hard by the time he finishes his rant. So am I. My body is screaming for his. I’m soaking wet, pliant.

“So do it,” I whisper.

He doesn’t give me a chance to change my mind. Not that I would. He grabs me behind the neck and pulls me into a punishing kiss. He picks me up and lays me down on the desk, our mouths never leaving one another’s. Miscellaneous items are digging into my back but I ignore the pain because the pleasure I’m feeling is much more intense. We’re so lost in each other that we don’t hear the bell ring. Or the knocking.

“Mr. Cooper, are you in there?” a voice calls.