And that’s what we do, until the sun goes down.
At nighttime, I roll my sleeping bag under the couch and stare at the ceiling, wondering at what point in time I voluntarily gave my balls to a seventeen-year-old, and when, if ever, I am going to get them back.
Telling myself that I’m staying here to protect her from whatever bullshit is lurking in the shadows of her life is a poor excuse I don’t allow myself the luxury of believing. After all, I didn’t shove my tongue into her mouth trying to protect her. I didn’t grind against the damp fabric of her jeans to make sure that she was okay. I didn’t bite down on her soft flesh like she was my favorite meal to save her.
I want her.
I want more of her.
And it’s either caving in or handing my resignation letter tomorrow morning, first thing on a Monday, and get the hell out of there.
I could do it. Resign. I can do it in a heartbeat, if I were so inclined. Before I decided to help the youth of America with my brilliant educational skills, I was an intern at Rosenthal, Belmont, and Marks in Los Angeles. I have the résumé to do whatever I want. I don’t even have to be a teacher if I don’t want to.
I roll to my side and prop my head on my forearm, staring at her through the small light the moon provides. She is beautiful, but that’s not it. A lot of girls at West Point are. And that’s just what they are. Girls. Remi Stringer is not a girl. If she were, she wouldn’t have snorted in my face when my dick was firmly clasped between her thighs and told me I don’t have the capability of ruining her. Not like this, anyway.
I roll the last two days in my head in slow motion, and before I notice, the sun comes up. At six, I get up and make her breakfast. At six thirty, I shove lunch money into her backpack. At six forty-five, I wake her up.
“Time to go to school, Remington.” I try to sound firm, but it’s gone now. That shield is no longer there. And it’s always there when I talk to my students.
She stretches on the couch like a lazy cat under the sun, a smile on her luscious lips, and my dick jerks inside my pants.
“Mmmm, but I don’t want the weekend to end.”
“Too bad, it’s already ended.”
“Sunday felt really short.”
“That’s the thing about weekends. They’re short,” I snap, even though my weekends used to feel very long before the last one I spent with her.
“And weekdays are long and hard. Just like—” She reaches out to palm my cock over my pants.
“Remington,” I cut her off, throwing a pile of clothes—her school uniform, which she brought over with her—at her face just so she won’t see the raging hard-on I’m sporting. Her nipples are erect, and her body is the smoothest, ripest thing I’ve ever seen. How can she only be in high school? “Five minutes or I’m driving without you.”
“That actually sounds like a plan to me.” She giggles into her arm.
“Don’t sass.”
“Or?”
“Or I’ll take the role of responsible adult in your life, and then you’ll really be in trouble.”
“I kind of like getting into trouble when it’s with you,” she says, righting herself on the couch and clutching into the new clothes I threw her way.
“Then I’m happy to report that we’re both royally and completely fucked.”
Her hip connects with my waist as she swaggers her way to the bathroom to change. What she doesn’t know is that if she got naked here and now, this time I wouldn’t stop her. “Good,” she whispers.
And that’s that.
Everything is a production when it comes to Pierce James.
First, we had to stop by his house before we drove to school because he had to pick up his dress clothes and whatever the hell he needs for his class. I stayed in his SUV, examining his house from the window. Pierce lives in one of those new developments on the outskirts of Vegas, the plush, rich ones. This one is called El-Porto, and all the houses are cookie-cutter, ranch-style homes with perfectly manicured lawns. One is decorated with a giant “It’s a Boy!” sign that stretches across the lawn, along with a blue stork that has the baby’s name, birthday, and weight. Jesus Christ. Might as well give out your social security number while you’re at it. It feels like we live on two different planets.
I feel strangely breathless. Like this is monumental in a way, though I don’t know how it could be. It’s just a house. A really gorgeous house, but still just a house. And yet, there’s another piece of him that now belongs to me. That only I have, out of all the girls in school. Pierce gets into his house—not even bothering to shut the door—and appears twenty seconds later clasping his brown leather bag. When he fastens his seatbelt, he says, “You should probably erase this place from your memory.”
“Jesus, Pierce.” I shake my head, peppering the gesture with an eye roll. In reality, I’m pretty pissed, and I might not show it, but the sting in my eyeballs suggests I want to cry, too. It’s getting old. This whole I-don’t-want-you-in-my-life act. I clutch my backpack tighter into my chest and look out the window. He sighs beside me, throwing the vehicle into drive.
“That’s not how I meant it.”