Lessons in Corruption (The Fallen Men 1)

“Club,” I croaked out at the same time that Zeus corrected him too.

We shared a weird little smile.

“That’s exactly what I’m saying. So, if you’re ‘bout done here, you can let Cressida go back to work and you can go back to whatever cage you came from and keep livin’ your narrow fuckin’ life,” Zeus ordered.

William stared at him.

I stared at him.

Zeus moved.

He used the arm around my shoulders to swing me into his front and then he tilted his head towards me so all William (and the nosey folks in the office) could see was his riot of crumpled, shoulder length brown waves. It probably looked exactly like he was giving me a big kiss. Instead, he pressed his lips close to my ear and said, “Just claimed ya, teach. Hope to fuck my son knows what he’s doin’.”

“I, I don’t know what, I mean…” I tried to say but King lifted a hand and pressed it gently over my mouth.

“Don’t lie to me, teach. Wouldn’ta helped you if I didn’t think you were a good woman. Now, I want you to step back when I let you go, look at me with stars in those beautiful brown eyes and then hightail it back into your classroom. Yeah?”

His eyes were so close to me I could see the loops of different blues and grays that made up his irises. Unlike King’s who’s were perforated and so pale a blue they glowed just like Arctic ice, Zeus’s were ringed like the trunk of an old tree. They were wise eyes despite their brutality and before I could overthink it, I nodded my acquiescence to his demands.

We broke apart, I looked up at him dazedly (not really an act as I was seriously bemused) and then with one last sidelong look at a ruffled William, I hightailed it to my classroom. Only when I was at the doors to the Humanities building did I look back to see Zeus leaning against his massive Harley with his arms crossed over his chest, watching as William’s car peeled out of the lot.

“What’s wrong?”

I jolted out of my thoughts at the rumbling, annoyed sound of King’s voice. He stood in front of my table in the library office. It was surrounded on two sides by glass walls so I could see the students working quietly at their tables. Now, King was the only one left in the lull between class time and after-school study sessions. It wasn’t lost on me that our lovely librarian, Harry Reynard, had left me the office in peace when he’d realized I needed a little alone time.

It had been a long twenty-four hours, the longest of my life, so I didn’t hate myself too much for assigning a last minute in-class essay on Paradise Lost in my last period English class just so I could have fifty minutes to figure out what had happened in the parking lot between my estranged husband, the President of The Fallen MC and little ole’ me.

Even after the class ended, I hadn’t figured it out.

The silver lining of this was that I didn’t feel awkward around King even though I should have been blushing and fidgeting like a shy schoolgirl after what I’d let him do to me this time yesterday afternoon.

Still, I thrill of anxiety and the delicious echo of pleasure pulsed through me and tightened my nipples at being in the same room alone with him. King’s eyes ducked down to the sight but, surprisingly, his frown remained.

“What are you talking about? I dismissed class, you can take a walk or something before detention starts in ten minutes,” I said, because I didn’t know what else to say.

Well, King, William showed up at school to make a scene but don’t worry, your crazy hot, insanely scary dad stepped in and, I think, claimed me like a piece of property so that my ex wouldn’t fuck with me anymore. That’s what’s wrong.

King’s eyebrows locked together, casting deep shadows over his glacial eyes. “Don’t give me that bullshit. Something’s been up your ass all day and I wanna know what it is.”

“How is that any of your business?”

A sneer twisted his beautiful mouth as he leaned forward on my desk, cornering me like a predator would his prey. “‘Cause if you tell me, I’ll take care of it for you.”

Gosh freaking darn it, I did not have the strength to deal with his strangely endearing brand of biker sweetness today. “King not only is it not your job as a student to take care of anything for me except your homework, I am also incredibly uncomfortable with the idea of you ‘taking care of’ anyone.”

Hurt flickered across his features, brief but stunning and wrong like a midnight eclipse.

“Just ‘cause I’m the son of The Fallen doesn’t mean I take care of every problem with my fists.”