The Secret (Winslow Brothers 3)

And when you don’t ask? The chance of a yes is always zero.

For the next half hour, students trickle down out of their seats to turn in their exams on my desk, and it’s almost scary how perfect the arc of confidence is. Now that class is getting close to ending, we’re in a violent downward swing into sheer panic. Hands scribble furiously, and Rachel can barely keep up with how many people she has to hop around to see.

I’m making a diligent effort not to take my eyes off her, but she’s making it a little difficult by darting around the room at the speed of a rocket.

I pull out my phone and type one more innuendo-laden message.

Me: Save some energy for me.

She glances my direction and rolls her eyes, and I fight the urge to laugh.

I look up at the clock as the timer on my desk chimes. “Two-minute warning,” I call out, my voice sticking in my throat just slightly after not using it for the entire hour.

Rachel’s gaze jerks to mine as though I’ve done it on purpose. Ah, that must be the gritty voice she referred to.

I continue to try to watch her hips and ass sashay around my room and grow more turned on by the second. Normally, by now, I’d be over the idea of fucking the same woman. I’d be bored. She’d be clingy. And I’d move on to my next blink of a relationship.

But I’m still hungry for Rachel in that can’t-eat, can’t-sleep kind of way that’s usually only there for a first encounter.

Maybe it’s because she’s so hard to read? Or because she likes to keep me on my toes? I’m not sure I understand the reason at all, but for now, with the idea of fucking her on the top of my desk within the next fifteen minutes playing the lead role on my priority list, I don’t give one single shit.

My tongue runs over my lips as I watch her bend over slightly to help a student in the front row, and when another kid comes to turn in their test, I lean around them to keep my line of sight.

He follows it and then gives me the thumbs-up like only an eighteen-year-old, hormone-riddled dude can.

I shake my head at him and purse my eyebrows into a frown deep enough that my forehead wrinkles, and he just chuckles.

I shoo him out the door with a wave of my hand, but he looks back a time or two to check out the same thing I am.

Forcing myself to focus on the test stack is a challenge, but as the tide of students finally committing to their fate turns into a line in front of my desk, it gets a little easier.

The timer on my desk goes off with a buzz, and I call out into the largely emptied classroom for all the stragglers who are left. “Time’s up. Pencils down. Come on up here and turn them in on the stack, please.”

A few grumbles resonate in the echoey space, particularly from the last student that Rachel attempted to help, but slowly and surely, they get their asses out of their chairs and head in my direction.

A smile in place, I try to comfort them both as poignantly and as quickly as I can. I want my students to succeed—and chances are, ninety-five percent of the ones who care this much have—but I also want to see Rachel’s legs up in the air and back on this desk more than I want my last breath.

Rachel lingers at the door, patting kids on the shoulders as they leave and gifting them with a genuine smile. When the last one exits, though, I look up to see her shutting the door and locking it, and a smile so sinister spreads across my face, I’m surprised I haven’t already been cast as the villain in the next major superhero movie.

“I forgot that door even locked.” The truth is, I’ve never had a reason to consider using it until now.

Rachel’s answering smile is sexy and confident. “I scoped it out fifteen minutes ago.”

“Fifteen minutes ago? Had I even texted you about desk sex by then? Or are you telepathic?”

“Telepathic, probably,” she teases, her slow walk toward me feeling almost agonizing. “Or maybe I was just thinking about it first.”

Sweet fuck, that’s so hot.

“That’s okay with me,” I concede immediately. “I don’t need to win. In fact, I might even prefer this.”

She smiles, coming to a heart-throbbing stop in front of me, and the only thing I can see clearly are her bright green eyes through the flutter of her lashes. “Take off my clothes, Ty.”

“Yes, ma’am,” I drawl immediately, suddenly being overtaken by a Southern gentleman. Which isn’t all that big of a surprise. If my metaphorical tail wags any harder, I’m going to turn into a puppy next.