CHAPTER NINE

HARPER

Grading—endless, vexatious grading and it’s only the start of the semester. It doesn’t help I’ve got a constant peep show going on inside my head starring one particular student and his ‘sex me, beautiful’ smile. If this was Sex Studies, he’d be getting an Insta-A.

But it’s not now, is it?

I press my thighs tightly together to ward off the growing tension and heat there, all that sensation waiting to be stirred and summoned.

I place the paper I’m grading down and lean back, attempting to breathe and clear my head. Mindy’s big on meditation, but the only universe-altering discovery I’ve made while attempting it is how freakin’ hungry I get sitting on my ass doing nothing.

There’s no chocolate around here save for the horrifically overpriced vending machine in the hall that basically requires a bank loan, and my emergency drawer rations are depleted, so coffee it is.

I stand and walk down to the break room. I’m about to enter when I hear James’s voice.

“Honestly, I think we have to be a bit more careful who we take on here,” he says, slurring away like he’s Sherlock Holmes here to solve the many mysteries of the world.

There’s muted agreement from the others in the room, all male from what I can gather.

I remain out of sight.

“She’s simply not up to the task,” James continues, that casual, nonchalant tone I fell for in full swing, that façade of greater academia. “She’s far too young and, frankly, a little naïve. The cultural studies deserve someone who has seen actual culture.”

I bring my hand to my chest. Holy shit, I realize. He’s talking about me.

I shove the anger down, box it away so I can hear him.

“I heard a rumor you were seeing her, casually,” says an unidentifiable voice.

“Yes, well,” James chortles, “shall I say her performance out of the lecture hall is just as lackluster.”

The laughter that follows makes my blood boil, yet I can’t force myself in the room, to confront this asshole and discuss how ‘lacking’ his own ‘performance’ was. I’m sure his high and mighty chums here would love to know how useless his frankfurter of a dick was at providing even a sliver of pleasure between the sheets.

I should confront him. I should bust in there like Lara Croft and save the day, or at least face, but I cannot do it. I can’t move.

His next words are lost thanks to the drumming in my ears, the sheer rage pulsing through my veins. I don’t do anything. I simply turn around and walk calmly back to my office. I sit at my desk with my hands together and stew.

Coward.

Maybe I am, but what would confronting him have achieved? He always had the upper hand in a war of words, especially in front of an audience of peers. He thrived on that stuff, on the ego boost being a tenured professor at even this poor excuse for an educational institution provided. I hate letting him walk all over me like this, but he has the upper hand, the ability to bring me down.

I let him steal away enough of my life already. He’s not going to take away my career too.

A knock on the door startles me out of my stupor.

I look up. “Colton?”

He enters, placing his coat in the corner, the navy V-neck he’s wearing all too tight, and all too right given the way it clings to his pecs. He’s holds up a textbook. “I’m sorry. We agreed on four PM, right?”

I check my watch, pushing together papers and trying to tidy the desk if only to give my hands something other to do than flap around like exotic birds. “I did, yes, sure, come in.”

He closes the door behind himself, smiling. He places the textbook on the desk and seats himself, gaze narrowing at me. “What’s wrong?”

I brush my hair over the back of my ear, acting casual. “Who said anything was wrong?”

He leans back, James Dean come to life. “It’s all over your face, in the way you’re sitting there like you’ve got a set of Ben Wa balls rolling around.”

“Ben what?”

He waves it off. “It doesn’t matter. Tell me what’s wrong. Maybe I can… help?” He lifts an eyebrow, a dark question mark.

Be still my beating love bud. “It’s my ex, James.”

“Okay,” nods Colton, “tell me where he lives. I’ll fuck him up Tony Soprano style. Does he need his legs?”

“No, no, no. Not a good idea,” I rush out.

“Why the hell not? He hurts you. I hurt him. That’s classic cause and effect.”

“He could ruin my reputation, or worse.”

“Why? Did he say something?”

“Only that I’m useless, both professionally and personally.”

Colton places his hands on his knees, leaning forward. “Oh, now I’m really going to fuck him up.”

“It’s not a great situation, I admit, but let’s just concentrate on class, shall we? I believe we’re looking at cultural production and consumption and productivist theories of power.”

Colton stands, moving around my desk and forcing me to slide my chair back.

“What, what are you doing?” I’m crowing like a cornered animal.

He kneels between the desk and the chair smiling, his heavy hands falling on my bare knees. Slowly, he spreads my legs apart. “Using my power productively.”

“Colton, this is in—” But my words catch as he reaches underneath my skirt and takes hold of my panties, gently tugging them under my ass and down my thighs, continuing until he can loop them off my ankle.

He slides them, warm, into his jeans’ pocket. “You don’t need those.”

I should stop this. I should tell him to get the hell out before this goes wrong in any one of a million ways, but as his thumb runs along the milky white of my inner thigh, all I can do is sit there, my hands gripping the arms of the chair until my knuckles are bone white.

“The door,” I tell him. “It’s unlocked.”

He kisses the top of my leg, bunching up my skirt with his free hand to allow himself greater access. “I know.”

My breathing is hard and labored. This is beyond dangerous. I don’t do this kind of thing. I’m quiet and shy. I’m not freakin’ Anastasia Steele.

Colton’s mouth presses against the soft flesh of my inner thigh. He moans, small vibrations running across my skin, running right into my heated center that’s growing slick and wet before him.

“Relax,” he whispers.

I close my eyes and breathe out, powerless to stop him, the small kisses that shift closer and closer to my sex.

Not once did James go down on me. He thought it was beneath him, disgusting, but Colton has no such qualms. Without warning he buries his entire face into my pussy, his tongue probing deep into my hole while his fingers hold me apart, softly stroking my labia.

I wanted the bad boy in high school, but I was awkward and clumsy. He was the Sun and I was Pluto—all but a speck in the sky. I didn’t care he was in and out of the Principal’s office, that he smoked or blazed it up behind the gym. I only wanted a taste, the experience, and now I’ve got the real deal it’s like I’ve been transported back to those heady days and everything I missed out on.

My mouth strains wide, my thighs clamping around Colton’s head. He pushes them apart, allowing his tongue to run further inside my wetness, to draw out and lash at my clit in long, languid strokes.

It’s incredible. I had no idea it would feel this… good. A new world is opening up inside me, filling itself with hot sensation and possibility, because Colton isn’t just pressing his mouth against my most private space, tongue deep inside me; he’s worshipping me.

He moans in the act, the now familiar pull tightening around my core as he lifts his head to suck gently on my sensitive clit. It pulses against his lips, my heart pounding its way out of my chest, my cheeks and skin flushed and patchy.

I can’t stifle my arousal any longer, letting out a pained groan when he runs two joined fingers inside me, hooking them upwards so they press against the corrugated roof of my sex.

I’m a wet mess below, my arousal warm and slick around Colton’s fingers, his tongue continuing to work above in figure-eights, each an electric shock of sensation that drags me closer and closer towards oblivion.

He presses his fingers deeper, pushing them up against what I imagine is my g-spot, his tongue flicking back and forth like a wet brush over my clit.

Tentatively, I reach down and run my fingers through his hair, my feet off the ground, my spine bent off the back of the chair.

My god, I realize. He’s going to make me come, right here, in my office.

The thought threatens to tip me over, to finally release me, but a knock on the door soon slams me back to reality.

I straighten up, frantically pushing Colton into the space under my desk and brushing down my skirt.

The door opens. Dean Mayson herself stands there smiling.

“Dean Mayson,” I choke, the pulsing between my legs refusing to relent.

Colton’s squashed between my legs and the back wall of the desk, mercifully hidden away.

But for how long?

The Dean’s face turns to confusion and I’m positive this is the end. I’m sweating swimming pools. “Oh, I’m sorry, Harper. I was looking for Martha’s office.”

I swallow hard and plaster on that winning smile, right as Colton begins to spread my legs below, the pad of his thumb pressing against the bud of my clit and forcing me to jolt in my chair. “Ah,” I stammer, swallowing, “end of the hall, on the right.”

Relief floods through me as the Dean goes to leave, but pauses, opening the door again. “Is everything okay? You look a little… flushed.”

Colton applies more pressure to my clit. I crush his hand with my thighs, curse him silently. “Everything’s swell.” I beam, no idea why I suddenly sound someone out of a ’50s diner.

Thank the good Lord it’s enough to appease the Dean. “Well,” she says, smiling back, “good day.”

“And to you, a day that is good,” I reply, the door closing and my mortification lifted.

I let my thighs fall open and drag Colton’s head forward under the desk, clawing at his scalp, caring about nothing except that sweet release. I lever myself against his face, holding him in position, bucking there in desperation.

Colton runs two scooped digits into my heat, lapping at my clit until I’m panting hard, my heart galloping against my ribcage.

He knows precisely how to tease out my pleasure, building up a steady rhythm until I cannot take a single second more, every part of me coiled and tight before my orgasm smashes into me with all the force of an atomic bomb, pleasure wrecking me from the inside out, my pussy convulsing around his fingers, his lips, his tongue… all of it too much to process.

He flicks my clit one last time and I force my chair back breathing hard, bringing my forehead against the edge of the desk.

He climbs out of his hidey hole, running a finger into his mouth, and I swear to god it’s so damn naughty and hot I almost come again.

“Lock the door,” I tell him.

“Why?”

I get down onto my knees. “Because I want to return the favor.”

That does it. He’s over to that door like lightning, returning just as quickly. With shaking hands I undo his belt and drag his zipper down, fishing inside his pants for his cock. I pull it free.

Holy schnitzel. It’s twice the size of James’ at least—thick and long and hailstone hard. And it’s beautiful.

I lower my head over him, guiding his cock into the warm depths of my mouth. My lips close around his root and I take him deep as I can.

Now he stirs, moaning and mewling. His eyes remain closed, but his hips begin to lift up against me, driving more of his member inside. “Fuck, Harper…”

That tower of Cosmos Mindy was referring to were passed down to me from my mother and have since become indicative of my quest to find the Holy Grail. I’ve read every article only about the female orgasm, tried every toy and method—the tantric arts, ASMR, belly button stimulation. Heck, everything short of childbirth (No, thank you, very much). I thought I was doomed to wander the earth forever in search of the Big O. I never expected to find it in a ripped, tattooed, live-my-life-one-mile-at-a-time poster boy Colton Beckett.

He’s provided me pleasure. I want to provide it back. Like he said, its simple economics, and I’m enjoying it, having this bad boy turn into putty in my hands… and mouth.

I’m exhausted but suck with all the enthusiasm I can muster. I draw him out, keeping the head of his cock inside and swirling my tongue around it, feeling its folds and lines, getting to know every intimate detail of this mighty appendage.

“That’s it, baby,” he groans. “Take it all.”

I suck on Colton’s cock avidly, jaw stretched wide to accommodate his length. He begins to swing his hips into my face, the brushy stubble of his pubic hair pressing against my nose. He doesn’t ask permission or suddenly become a gentleman. He lets go of my wrists and holds my hair in a fistful, using it to lever himself against me quicker and quicker, his balls slapping against my chin and his cock filling every inch of my mouth. He strokes deeper into my throat, just enough to prevent me gagging, but more than I’ve ever taken before. I run my tongue over the silky underside of his member, press it against his glans as he whimpers and groans in satisfaction above.

You’re doing it. You’re going to make him come.

It doesn’t take him long. His grip tightens in my hair, his body tensing. “Fuck, I’m going to co—”

I let his cock pop free wet and glistening from my mouth, continuing to jerk him off with my hand.

He grunts, his first ejaculation firing over my shoulder. The next I direct to the floor, enjoying the way his cock twitches in my grip, the power I have over him in this moment.

It seems endless, his orgasm.

Spent, my hand sticky, I stand and kiss him, the tart taste of my own arousal still on his lips.

He sits on the edge of the desk. “Sorry, I don’t usually come so fast.”

I use tissues to clean myself, handing him one. “Is that a good thing or a bad thing?”

He laughs. “Oh, that was a very good thing, trust me.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t,” I open my mouth, “you know…”

“Take it in your mouth? Swallow?”

“Yeah…”

He takes me around the waist, pulling me into another kiss before whispering against the coral shell of my ear. “There’s always next time.”

I pull back in mock offence. “Who said anything about a next time?”

He takes hold of his cock. “Your mouth’s one thing, but you’ve still got two holes I need to fill.”

“I’m not a highway.”

The look of satisfaction on his face is even more enjoyable than the pleasure he provided. “And I’m not wearing an orange vest or carrying a shovel.”

I raise an eyebrow. “Not… quite, and you can call me Ms. Dunham, thank you.”

He smiles at that. “Don’t expect me to bring an apple to class.”

I glance down to his crotch. “Maybe a bucket of ice?”

He stands, tucking away his still-hard cock and drawing his zipper back up while I do my best to compose myself. I’ve barely moved yet I feel like I’ve run to the top of the Empire State and back. All my energy’s been drained out of my vagina by the sexy vampire in front of me.

For all his talk, though, I imagine he’ll pull the same move, feign indifference and head off, but he sits on the other side of the desk and opens his textbook like the last ten minutes never happened. “Now…” he points at a page. “I’m struggling with this, right here—indicators of growth. I was hoping you could shed some light on it for me?”

I almost snigger like a schoolgirl. Indicators of growth indeed.

But something else is intriguing me, because if I was shocked before, I’m pretty close to breaking out the defibrillator at the idea he actually wants to study after all.