Hiding my true intentions was the most important facet of the personality I showed to the world. If people knew what I truly was, I’d be a pariah. Instead, I was the CEO of a vast forestry company that had been in my family for three generations.
She shot an unsure glance to Link, who gave her a nod of approval. She seemed to stand straighter and moved forward into my arms. The touch of her silky dress beneath my fingers, the slide of her warm palm into mine—I was greedy for all of it. I kept a look of disinterest on my face, the most-used mask in my repertoire, even though every gear and cog inside me turned and clanked as if I were a machine waking up after a long, dark sleep. Her energy was like gasoline in my veins, powering me up for some mysterious purpose.
We moved to the slow song, melding into the other dancers. She tightened in my arms, no longer at ease the way she was with him. She needed to be comfortable with me, to open up so I could see all her inner workings. Her eyes hid from mine as she looked everywhere but at me. I wanted to force her to tell me every thought that flitted through her mind. But that wouldn’t work. My father had worked on my finesse, as he called it, for years, to the point that I was the puppet of perfect manners, a marionette on a genteel string. Pull here, I smiled. Pull there, I offered condolences. No string led to a kidnapping option. But I still had a few tricks of my own.
The song switched to another slow dance, the singer crooning an old Smoky Robinson tune. Though she was in my arms, her silence kept a wide expanse between us, one I intended to cross. I performed a brief calculus, trying to decide what a normal man would say in this situation, which string to pull. It was an equation I’d learned from my earliest days—figuring out what people expected so that no one would notice there was something wrong with me.
She’d mentioned her job and seemed to enjoy it. I started there. “How many students do you have?”
Her eyebrows arched, and she finally met my gaze. “Each class is about ten students, and I have five classes a day.”
“Seems like a small class size?” I didn’t know since I’d been home schooled after the first grade. Apparently, the incident where I’d informed another first grader that I intended to disembowel him the next time he tripped me on my way to class was frowned upon by my parents and my private school.
“It is. Trenton has an entire department devoted to fundraising to keep the educational standards top notch. We have a lot of legacies whose parents are one percenters living in the city. I sit on the financial aid board and make sure that we offer scholarships to children from underachieving areas, even if some of our alumni disagree.”
“So you’re a teacher and a social justice crusader?”
She stiffened. I didn’t like it.
“I just care about every child getting a great education.” Her defensive tone told me I’d made a misstep.
“I didn’t mean any offense.” I tried to solve her puzzle and choose the correct response to keep her talking. “I’m impressed, actually.”
“Oh.” She blushed that delicious shade of pink. “Sorry. I guess I’m just used to blowback from parents on the need-based scholarships.”
“Don’t be sorry.” I leaned closer, pretending I had to speak into her ear to be heard over the music. “What’s your favorite thing about teaching?” Inhaling her scent, citrus and floral, ignited an even stronger buzz inside me. Like bees building a hive in my brain, each of them humming for me to take my queen.
“The students. Some of them are…let’s just say entitled. But there are quite a few who love learning as much as I do, which is saying something. And there are a few who I think could be first-rate scientists one day, or at least real movers and shakers in the STEM professions. They make me proud.” The tension in her body eased a bit more, and she smiled up at me. “What’s your favorite part of your job?”
Her smile worked to unravel the black wire that wrapped around my heart. The sensation of falling and soaring melded into one. How could the slight upturn of her mouth create so much chaos? I wanted more.
“Control.” I tightened my hand at her waist, feeling her move beneath the fabric. Her skin would be even softer, my fingers leaving red marks along the pale flesh. My teeth would bruise her, my marks lasting for days until I made fresh ones. But I was jumping ahead, which was unlike me. And I was thinking about bedding a woman, also unlike me. I’d been with women, taking my pleasure and then moving on, but I’d never sought one out. They always came to me, and if I was interested, I’d let them have a few hours of my time.