“Excuse me? I’m the teacher,” I teased, happy to have him alone.
“And I’m the pissed-off guy who needs to put you in your place every now and again. Here.” He patted his desktop and plopped back in this chair. I glanced at the closed door and back at him.
“Vicious could come back,” I argued.
“Vicious would keep his mouth shut even if he walked in on me fucking Mr. Pattinson while the PTA president licks my asshole. I can do anything with anyone as long as it’s not Millie. We’re goddamned near blood-brothers.”
Millie, huh? Maybe the bastard did have a beating heart after all.
I took slow steps to him and sat at the edge of his desk. He grabbed me by the waist and pulled me into his groin so that I straddled him, my legs curling around his waist.
“What did you do to them?” I whispered again, my hands buried in his golden hair as my arms circled his neck. Despite everything, I cared about those kids.
“Baby…” He brushed his knuckles against my lips, his eyes focused solely on them.
“Well?” I deliberately widened my eyes, questioning him.
He laughed like he thought my expression was cute. “Nothing yet. But we got a name. Toby Rowland.”
“And?” Rowland was a junior, another douche who I taught. He was also Coach Rowland’s son.
Jaime shrugged. “Dude’s always hiding behind his daddy in practice. It’ll be hard to pin him down, but neither one’s getting away with what they did to Trent. Fuckers killed his ticket out.”
Trent Rexroth, All Saints’ stand-out football star, had slipped in the locker room before a big game this fall, breaking his ankle and ending his path to college and pro-football glory.
I opened my mouth, intending to convince him to give up the retaliation, but he grabbed me by my ass and pulled me into his aching erection, sucking hard on one of my breasts through the fabric of my blouse and finishing on a teasing bite.
“Shit…” I muttered.
“How was your weekend?” He placed his lips on my neck and licked his way to my cleavage. I shivered into his body. “Did you miss me?”
“It was good.” My hands ghosted over his broad chest greedily. “And no,” I lied. “I thought we agreed this was just harmless fun.”
“It is.” He tipped his head back, staring at me seriously. “And it’s fun being with you.”
“I bet it’s just as fun being with high school girls.” My mouth went dry when I said it.
It was stupid and insecure, but it felt good to finally say what I’d been thinking about for weeks. Where Jaime went, girls followed. Bronze-skinned, shiny-haired cheerleaders with wide smiles and legs for miles. They caught up with his long steps in the hallways, leaned against his SUV after school, and laughed at everything he said…even when he didn’t make jokes.
Jaime smirked, his right hand tracing my inner thigh, traveling upward and disappearing under my pencil skirt. “I beg to differ. High school girls are high maintenance. They’re full of drama. They talk about fucking hair straighteners and parties for hours. The hot ones make you go to Jennifer Love Hewitt movies. No. There’s nothing fun about high school girls. You, on the other hand…”
His fingers found my soaking undies, and as usual, he cocked his head, smirking, letting me know that he was onto me. My body sang a tune only Jaime knew the words to and my heart drummed so fast and loud that I felt the pulse in my toes. Doing this was almost like begging to get caught.
A part of me was desperate to be seen.
“You talk back,” he said. “You’re cold and stubborn. Sad and snarky. I like your brand of weird. The whole package.” He drew an imaginary circle with his finger around my face, leaning into me. “But most of all…” he breathed, placing a gentle kiss on the corner of my lips. “I like the chase. You make me sweat somewhere besides a football field. Turns out…that’s the exercise I’ve been looking for.”
Just as he said that, the door flung open and Vicious pushed his way inside. Lucky for me, he was staring down at a piece of paper he held in one hand and the ripped-open envelope he had in the other. “Can’t believe she says shit like this,” he muttered.
That allowed me a minute to jump off Jaime’s boner and rearrange my skirt, leaning back down and pretending to flip through one of the books he had on his table. “Here’s the paragraph you were looking for.” I cleared my throat and straightened.
Vicious finally looked up, but it wasn’t at me. “Trent just texted me. Coach called a team meeting. Toby’s been named as captain for next year.”
“Whatever.” Jaime’s jaw ticked. The atmosphere in the room changed. No words were spoken, but plans were being made, right in front of my eyes.
Toby Rowland was in so much trouble, it physically hurt me to think what they’d do to him once they got him alone.
“Whatever sounds right,” Vicious echoed, his voice flat. “Thanks a fucking ton for detention, Ms. G. Hope you know what you’re doing.” He shook his head with a sadistic smile. A threat.
“Vicious,” Jaime gnashed. A warning.
Vicious strode to his chair and flopped down, waving his hand. “She’s lucky you have a soft spot for her. Otherwise I’d have reduced her to ashes at Liberty Park.”
A hard spot, baby, I thought as I made my way back to my desk. And you have no idea.
THAT DAY CHANGED EVERYTHING, BECAUSE that day Jaime and I started texting. It made it so much easier to plan things. More hot dates at my partially-packed apartment. More fucking in insane positions. More stealing kisses at school, getting off on the thrill of being caught.
At the end of the week, Jaime sent me a picture of himself flexing his guns in front of the mirror in their locker room. I almost didn’t open the text message, fearing I’d see something horrific like someone else’s junk, but then I remembered it was Jaime I was talking about. He was oddly responsible for someone his age and with his status. Out of the four of them, he was the quietest. The one with the working moral compass. If Vicious was the evil one, and Dean was the stoner one, and Trent was the lost, beautiful soul searching for its mate, Jaime was the cement that glued them together. He was the guy you could always count on. And I was starting to count on him too.
Jaime:
It’s scientifically proven. You’re riding the best stud in town. These guns could kill.
Me:
Jaime, you’re an eighteen-year-old. Perspective, please.
Jaime:
This from someone who goes to sleep with my dick clutched in her hand. Pizza tonight?
Me:
That happened once. By accident.
Me:
And yes. But no onions.
I leaned back against a box filled with books and giggled, hugging my cell phone like an idiot. A disaster, I thought to myself. What the fuck are you doing? Dating him now?
Jaime:
No onion? No condom then. I’m clean. Your on the pill.
Me:
YOU’RE. YOU-apostrophe-RE.
Me:
And deal.
Jaime:
Nice doing business with you. x
Dear God, I needed to stop this. Stop this before I was going to get hurt. Already, the way my heart squeezed every time I noticed him for the first time in class felt a little too hard. The pleasure of sleeping with him freckled with a dash of pain. He still filled me. Filled me with joy and laughter and amazing sex. But now he was sucking from me, too.
Emotions, thoughts, logic.
That evening, Jaime got to my apartment and tackled me to the sofa, peppering my whole face with kisses. I laughed, throwing my fists at his sculpted abs. We rolled around, half making out, half fighting and laughing, before we both stopped to take a breath, examining each other’s faces for the first time since he walked in. He was atop of me, his eyes roaming my face, searching for answers to questions we were both too scared to ask aloud.
“How did you know I’m on the pill?” The silence rang so loud, I felt the urge to break it.
br /> “Saw them on your bathroom counter. Duh.”
“Well, let’s get nekkid and do some dirty stuff then. I know it’s Friday, and you probably want to hang out with your friends later.” I grabbed the hem of my shirt and started getting undressed.
He stopped me, his palm on my hand. “Take it easy, missy. No rush. Let’s watch a crappy nineties movie together while we wait for the pizza. I’m going to sleep here tonight.”
I frowned. Vicious threw balls-out parties every weekend, and the HotHoles were always in full attendance. It was mandatory or some shit. I happened to know this because at All Saints getting invited to these things meant that you were one of the cool kids. I also happened to know there was a party tonight because yesterday the hallways were filled with hushed convos about which guys were going to be challenged to a fight in Defy and which girls were going to get inside Vicious’s private media room where the HotHoles hung out.
“What about Vicious’s party?” I asked. The last few weeks, the mere idea of having Jaime sitting there in the secluded room with young, willing women offering themselves to him made me lose my mind. I hated those parties, and despised Vicious even more for throwing them.
“I’m planning an even bigger party between your legs tonight.” He wiggled his brows at me.
I rolled my eyes but couldn’t help but smile. “I think I like you,” I muttered, pressing my face to his muscled torso in a hug. I felt his heartbeat under my ear.
“I think I like you back.”
My heart nearly exploded, and I found myself clutching the anchor on my necklace for dear life, knowing that this time, it couldn’t save me from falling deeper into whatever the hell that was we were creating.
Actually, I knew exactly what it was.
Magic.
It’s been psychologically proven. People lie to themselves in order to protect themselves from the things they do. From what they think and feel. I was in denial when it came to Jaime Followhill. In my head, I downplayed the whole thing. Reduced it to nothing but some fun. But the truth was, I was never so intrigued by a man.
Defy.
That’s what I wondered about most. Why did he fight? He didn’t look like the type who needed a violent outlet to unwind. Vicious, sure. But Jaime? No. He seemed like a laid-back guy.
So after the movie and pizza (no onions. He remembered), I asked him.
I prepped him beforehand. Knew that Jaime was not going to open up about things that had to do with his friends so easily. I got down on my knees and took him—all of him—deep in my mouth, covering most of his shaft, my fist doing the rest. He groaned and yanked my head back and forth, my hair in his fist.
“I’m going to come in your mouth,” he announced. He stood, one foot lazily propped back against my fridge, in all his naked six foot three inch glory.
I moaned into his hot flesh, lolling my head from side to side. I liked it. To feel admired and desired by a younger man. He was driving me crazy…but I was driving him wild.
My moan encouraged him, and he emptied himself inside my mouth. The warm, salty liquid shot straight into my throat, and I swallowed it instantly, desperate for every drop of him.
After his release, he glided down the front of my fridge, sinking into a sit-down position, his knees bent, as he slowly let go of my hair. We both grinned, the kind of private smile only we knew how to decode. I doubted I could give that smile to someone else, even if I’d tried.
“What’s up?” He grabbed my hand, offhand and confident, and jerked me to sit between his legs. I did, purring into his mouth as we shared a slow, seductive kiss. “Look at my Little Ballerina, learning how to give head like it’s the eighties.”
“What happened in the eighties?” I asked, feeling ridiculously stupid. You’d think I know more about the decade than he did. He shrugged.
“Nothing. People liked giving head, I guess.”
I shook my head on a laugh. He was so ridiculous sometimes, but that’s exactly what made it so easy to unwind with this guy. I flattened my palm against his chest. “I need to ask you something.”
“Uh-oh. Am I in trouble, Ms. Greene? Have I been a bad boy? Do I need a spanking?” He wiggled his brows and laughed.
God, he was sexy. And God, it was creepy.
I shook my head, closing my eyes so I wouldn’t see his reaction to my blush. “Tell me about Defy,” I said.
None of the teachers knew much about Defy, other than the injuries we spotted on Monday mornings. Students got into bloody fights at Vicious’s parties, and there was nothing we could do about it.
Jaime frowned. “What do you want to know?”
“I want to know everything.” I cleared my throat. “Where, why, how, and most of all…why are you doing it?”
His eyes darkened, and he pulled his blond hair into a high bun. I watched him silently, swallowing hard while he examined me under his lashes. I was stepping deeper into a territory that wasn’t mine. We both were. This was intimate and secretive, two lines we promised we wouldn’t cross outside the bedroom.
Are we breaking the rules?
It occurred to me that I was the first one to step over the line that I was so quick to paint in our relationship. But it also occurred to me that there wasn’t one line. It was more like an abstract painting full of lines, circles and triangles. It was a mess, and trying to maneuver your moves in this thing between us was hopeless.
“This doesn’t leave this room,” Jaime warned, dipping his chin down, his nose touching mine.
“Of course,” I said as if this was obvious. We were still on the floor, my legs knotted with his. I wanted to toss aside my teacher hat at that moment. To burn it to ashes, more like. “This is between you and me. I’m just curious.”
“Well…” He pulled me deeper between his legs, opening them wider to accommodate me. His eyes honed on an invisible spot on the wall. This was hard for him. Giving up a secret that wasn’t wholly his. “Where? At Vicious’s place. Every weekend. Guys know better than to come to his parties if they don’t feel like fighting. And still…everyone does. Let’s admit it. This town is fucking boring. We’re all rich, privileged, and desperate to fill in the void.”
“What void?”
“That void. Whether it’s sex or pressure or money. We fight on the tennis court. His father and stepmother never use it, so they never notice the blood stains, which their handyman takes care of during the week.”
That void was familiar. I didn’t want to tell him that I had it, too. The hole in my soul. And that I, too, found a way to fill it. With him.
Suddenly, he snaked one hand behind my back and lowered me along with him to the floor, doing it slowly so I wouldn’t hit my head.
A wicked grin curved his lips. “Why? Because it’s fun. Because men have become so fucking emasculated by society, we sometimes feel like having our balls back. Why do dudes love Fight Club so much? It’s because behind every A&F boxers-wearing guy who smells like citrus aftershave and knows who Versace is and takes you out on a date to an Italian dinner and a foreign film, there’s a savage who just wants to grab you by the hair and drag you to his cave.”
His other hand moved between us, sliding down my belly, finding my soaking panties. I was wearing a knee-length dress, but it was flipped up and Jaime didn’t look like he was bothered by it too much. He rubbed my entrance through my panties furiously.
“How? Someone steps out to the pool with his sleeves rolled up. That’s an invitation to fight. You can’t challenge a specific guy. The other guy has to volunteer. Chicks dig it, even when you lose, so guys do it, because pussy is nice, even when you have a bleeding lip. We use our fists. Kicks. Basic MMA shit. But we fight clean, mostly. And if things get out of hand, which they usually don’t unless Vicious’s involved…” He bit my lip, tugging my underwear down roughly and pushing in two fingers. “Then one of the HotHoles breaks it off before shit goes to the ER.”
I whimpered, tightening around him. He was rougher than usual, and
I doubted it was a coincidence. He wanted to show me that he was a man, not a kid.
And he succeeded. In and out, in and out, he fingered me while I writhed on my kitchen floor underneath him.
So this was it. This was Defy. I had more questions I couldn’t exactly articulate at that moment, but one thing was clear—Jaime wasn’t afraid of getting hurt. Not physically, anyway.
But what about emotionally?
And what about me? Would I be able to take the hit when things between us went south?
All I knew was that my south liked him. So much so, that I came on his fingers before he even had the chance to touch my clit.
“You feel pretty manly to me,” I breathed out, all jelly-legged with half-mast eyes.
“And you feel like a woman worthy of a fight, Ms. Greene.”
SIX HEAVENLY WEEKS TICKED BY before Jaime claimed not only my body, but my heart. Unsurprisingly, it was the day I got my period (AKA the time when my hormones were wreaking havoc with my body). It was also the day that I moved.
I’d found a place in a small beach town on the outskirts of Todos Santos, and I’d arranged for a substitute teacher to cover my classes that day. That didn’t stop Principal Followhill from grunting that I had some nerve taking time off when my position was on the line and my classes were behind schedule on the required syllabus. She was back to her old ways now that she’d paid me off for Jaime’s car accident.
Since I didn’t want to spend much money on movers, I’d decided to do some of the heavy lifting myself. I spent my morning running from my old apartment to the new one, moving boxes up and down the stairs. I was sweaty and smelly, with my messy ponytail, PINK black sweatpants, and a yellow tank top that showed off my toned midriff. If there was a potential husband waiting for me in the dingy complex I was moving into, he was going to think that I was hot. And possibly homeless.
On my third run back to my old apartment, I saw Jaime waiting at my door. He was wearing a white sleeveless tank and khaki shorts. The kind that hugged his ass as if to say, You better believe I’m touching this all day, bitch.