Eden blinked at me. She opened her mouth to speak and her stomach rumbled, causing her to flush and me to chuckle. God, she was so pure and innocent – even though she had been sucking my cock like a pro not twenty minutes ago, she had already reverted to her sweet, naïve self that I loved so much.
Loved? I thought.
It was the first word that had come to my mind.
I wouldn’t think about that now, not while Eden was still here. She followed me into the kitchen and perched at my table while I made us a late-night snack. Even though I’d eaten that man-sized dinner of steak and potato earlier, fucking Eden raw and senseless had worked up an appetite. I fried some onions and potatoes, then tossed in some diced peppers and mushrooms.
Eden’s eyes widened slightly when I put the plate in front of her.
“What,” I teased. “You think that because I’m a bachelor I can’t cook?”
Eden flushed. “Well, sort of,” she admitted. She took her fork and then ate a small bite, chewing and nodding. “It’s good.”
“You don’t have to sound so surprised,” I teased again.
Eden’s cheeks turned from soft pink to bright red. “Sorry,” she said. “It’s just, I’m not really used to cooking, or eating stuff like this.”
“Well, yeah,” I replied. “I can’t imagine the dining hall is any good.”
“Oh, no, I mean, they’re terrible, yeah. But I have an apartment, remember?” Eden asked. She giggled briefly. “I just don’t really cook. My roommate and I can make coffee and those drop cookies in the package – that’s about it.”
I nodded. I should teach you to cook, I thought as I watched Eden devour forkful after forkful. That could be fun. Instantly, my mind was filled with an image of Eden, nude save for a skimpy little apron, with flour on her round cheeks and sensual laughter in her eyes.
It wasn’t just that I wanted to teach her to cook.
It was that I wanted to do everything with her, experience everything with her. I knew that I was falling for her, and I deeply regretted the fact that we hadn’t met in undergrad, that we weren’t both the same age, dealing with the same things at once.
But no – maybe that wouldn’t have worked very well, either. I remembered my TA, Peter, talking about how it was a relief to have broken up with his girlfriend from undergrad and the strain that grad school put on adult relationships.
It seemed like no promising compromise could ever be reached. Either Eden and I would continue this sexual dance until something changed between us, or until we were found out and forced apart by the Oakbrook College gods.
Just enjoy this, I told myself firmly as I dragged my attention away from Eden’s poochy little lips chewing and smacking. Just enjoy the time with her, right now.
We ate in companionable silence. My muscles felt warm and relaxed from the thorough workout that I’d just had and the food filled my stomach and made me feel comforted, almost as comforted as having Eden’s presence right next to me. When we were done, Eden hopped up from the table and washed both plates and forks, then the plate and tools I’d used.
“You didn’t have to do that,” I told her.
“I wanted to,” she said simply, and I realized that we were talking about so much more than just dishes.
Eden wanted to be with me – that much was clear. And even with my skeptical and suspicious nature, I no longer thought she was just pushing me or testing my boundaries. She wasn’t just seeing how much she could get away with – and it wasn’t like she was slacking off in class, either.
No.
She wanted me.
It won’t last, I told myself immediately, tearing my eyes away from the sight of her ass shaking from side to side as she swayed and hopped around while drying the dishes. There was clearly a song in her head that was putting a bounce in her step, and while I didn’t want to crush her happiness, I had a hard time believe that things between us would last.
By the time we’d eaten and cleaned up, it was almost ten. The sky was inky black, and Eden shivered as she looked out the window. She seemed to be taking forever to zip up her puffer coat, and she turned to me with pleading eyes.
“I can’t stay over, can I?”
I shook my head. I wanted her to, so desperately that it almost frightened me. I wanted her to curl up in my bed and let me hold her and fuck her and breathe in the sweaty, floral scent of her hair all night long.
But how would that look, a student emerging from my house in the harsh light of the morning?
“It’s better if you don’t,” I said finally. The urge to add “Sorry” was almost overwhelming, but thankfully I kept it to myself.
“That’s okay,” Eden said reluctantly, as if to soften the blow to herself as well as me. “I should do some studying before the next day.”
As she was halfway out the door, I reached for her sleeve.
“Wait,” I said. “Hold on a second.”
“What is it?” Eden asked.
“I ... I shouldn’t be doing this, but here,” I said as I pressed a business card into her hand.
“What’s this?” Eden blinked down at it. She turned her face up to me and grinned. “I already have your email,” she added.
“That number,” I said. “It’s my cell.”
Eden blinked at me in surprise.
“Oh,” she said softly. “Um, are you sure?”
No, I thought. Not at all – this is probably one of the stupidest things that I’ve ever done. But I want you to have it, because I want you to call me.
Because I want you.
“Yeah,” I lied hoarsely. “I’m sure.”
She left, and I went to bed, my head swimming with thoughts of Eden Cooper and the blossoming partnership between us.
Monday morning, I couldn’t stop myself from replaying the memory of last night, over and over. The memory was crystal clear and perfect. Eden, flushed and naked, sprawled and wanton, begging me to fuck her from behind. I woke up with my cock hard and throbbing and had no choice but to rub a quick one out in the shower. I tried to keep it physical and focus on the touch of my hand on my cock, but Eden’s curvy body kept sneaking into my mind. By the time I was coming, I was picturing her body in my hands, quivering and shaking with pleasure too intense to bear.
Goddamnit, I thought. If I don’t stop soon, I’m going to make myself hard again.
The only good thing about the day was that it was Monday – an Eden-less day, at least in my classes, and I hoped that I’d be able to focus on everything at hand.
Naturally, I wasn’t. I couldn’t stop all thoughts of Eden, and I knew that I was walking around with a stupid grin on my face as I suffered through my morning seminars and classes.
She lingered on my mind all day – through a meeting with Peter, through a small meeting with the rest of the English faculty, even when I’d left campus and gone to the grocery store. Eden was everywhere: lurking in the candy section at the store, gigging behind a tree on campus, even waiting for me at home.
She wasn’t, of course.
But with the way I couldn’t shake the thoughts of her, she may as well have been. It seemed all too perfect when I checked phone after hearing a buzz.
Eden had sent me a text.
Missed you today. Can’t wait to see you tomorrow, she’d written, as formally as she would have written a paper and submitted it, hoping for an ‘A’.
A grin spread across my face.
Missed you, too, I texted her. It’s going to be insanely difficult not to kiss you senseless tomorrow.
I watched as the three dots appeared and vanished on the screen of my phone, indicating that Eden was making me a reply. It seemed to last forever, and I wondered if she was writing me a novel via text.
When it came, my grin grew even wider. Eden hadn’t written anything, just sent me a couple of emoji – a couple kissing, followed by a huge red heart.
What we were doing was wrong.
But if this was wrong, I was starting to think
that I could never be right.
21
Eden – Tuesday
“Wow,” Petra said.
I whirled around from where I stood, in front of the tiny washer and dryer set that lived in a closet across from the bathroom.
“What?” I asked awkwardly. “What is it?”
Petra shook her head. “Nothing,” she said. “You’re just ... well, you’re bouncing,” she added, stifling a laugh. “Someone’s in a good mood this morning! Not to mention, for all the cleaning you do, I can’t remember the last time I saw you do laundry!”
Well, that’s the thing, I thought as a hot flush spread across my cheeks. I’m down one pair of panties, and I didn’t exactly have a Victoria Secret display hiding in my dresser.
“You’re blushing,” Petra commented.
“It’s hot in here,” I lied. “I mean, cleaning always makes me sweaty. I guess I should probably really try to get in shape, huh?”
The skeptical look on her face told me that Petra wasn’t buying it. She stepped closer.
“You okay?” Petra asked. “Sorry about the other night.” Now it was her turn to flush. “I hope that Evan and I weren’t too loud.”
It was hard not to smile right back to let Petra know that she wasn’t the only resident of this apartment getting laid. I bit the inside of my mouth to keep from grinning and I shook my head.
“You were fine,” I told her. “I heard nothing.”
Petra grinned. “You’re a doll,” she said. “And I’m buying you a white-noise machine for your birthday.”
I smiled weakly. My birthday wasn’t for several months – I’d be twenty-two, a number that had once seemed practically ancient – but thinking about it filled me with anxiety. The semester would be over, so there was that – but how would I be celebrating?
And would Will be by my side?
I knew, realistically, that I shouldn’t be thinking like this. I was getting ahead of myself, which was dangerous: for all I knew, as soon as the semester was over, Will would break things off with me.
Or maybe he’d decide he wanted a job in another state, like Wyoming, and I’d have to decide between going with him or staying on the east coast.
Stop it, I told myself firmly. I looked up and realized that Petra was giving me a weird look.
“I feel like such a nag for bringing this up again and again, but if there was something going on, you’d tell me, right?” Petra asked. There was hesitation in her voice and she stepped closer.
God, how I wish I could, I thought. While historically I had always been a pretty introverted person, closed off to most of the world, I was so desperate to talk about Will and our developing relationship and my feelings that I would have confided in anyone.
“Because if there is, no matter what it is, I won’t judge you,” Petra continued. “And like, please don’t feel weird about the fact that I have a boyfriend now. I’ll try to make sure that he doesn’t spend too many nights here.” She scrunched up her face. “I mean, no more than like one or two a week is fine, right?”
I nodded. How could I tell her that I, too, now had a boyfriend?
I couldn’t, and it was killing me.
For the last few years, I’d trusted Petra with so much. She had kept all of my secrets, at least as far as I knew. She knew about the time I got my period in math lecture and had to sneak out of the auditorium, where I didn’t go back in because the seat had been covered in blood. She knew about the time I’d thrown up at a party, outside of someone’s window, and that it had landed all over a rich kid’s bike. She’d been loyal and lied for me.
At the time, both of those incidents had seemed like huge, mortifying events. They were small fries compared to my current secret – and how would I trust Petra to tell the difference? She was so carefree, so laid-back, that for all I knew, she’d just laugh and say something like, happens all the time!
But maybe she wouldn’t. Maybe she would be worried about me. Maybe she’d go to the dean and say that Professor Marks was a predator, and that he should be fired immediately and sent to prison for the rest of his life.
A cold chill ran down my spine. I knew then that as much as I wanted to tell Petra the truth about what was really going on, I couldn’t.
At least, not now.
“Really,” I lied, hating myself for it. “It’s nothing. This semester is just kind of stressful, you know?”
Petra nodded, and I felt a rush of relief knowing that I’d gotten away with my lie. Besides, it hadn’t be a total lie. This semester was killing me – and that was just the stress of hiding such a dangerous secret. When I factored in that I hadn’t even decided what I wanted to write my senior paper on and my struggles in the basic tech seminar, I was really in trouble.
I was conflicted. Part of me wanted the semester over as soon as possible while the other part wanted it to last for the rest of my life. Logically, I knew that things would eventually calm down, that I wouldn’t always feel like a stoned, lusty mess at the mere mention of Professor Marks.
It was hard to swallow that and internalize it, though. And besides, I thought as Petra finally walked away from the laundry closet. What if that never happens?
What if the sight of Professor Marks – Will! – makes my heart go crazy for the rest of my life?
Then what am I going to do?
The morning was bright and sunny, almost warm, and I unzipped my jacket by the time I made it to campus. I went into Will’s classroom and stopped, puzzled.
When he saw my face, he grinned. We weren’t alone – there were already three other students there – and I blushed hotly, sensing the sparks that flew between Will and myself.
“You look confused, Eden,” Will said. For a horrible moment, I thought the chair arrangement meant there was some kind of test or oral that I’d forgotten all about. But I saw that the other students were looking much the same way.
“Sorry,” Will said with a chuckle. “I thought it would be fun to do a little group project today.”
I raised an eyebrow at him. Group project? I thought. The idea of it made my heart sink. I’d always hated doing group work in schools, if only because I was the kind of student who would do everyone’s work herself, just to make sure that she got a good grade. I was a total control freak and everyone hated working with me even though it meant that they weren’t really responsible for anything.
Worst of all, it was my time that I should have been sharing with Will, listening to his wisdom and insight about the great authors of the past.
And now, he expected me to pair up with other students and completely ignore him? When he’d made that joke about kissing me senseless?
I had the strangest feeling that I was being tested, and the worst thing was, I had no idea what to do about it. Doubt began to creep in and I swallowed hard and nodded.
“Sure,” I said weakly. “Sounds great.”
22
Will – Friday
The week was turning out to be one of the longest of my life. I was barely sleeping – thoughts of Eden and her luscious curves and her ripe little mouth crept in every time I closed my eyes – and I’d even forgot to plan my classes for my senior seminar and the group of freshmen. I happily turned the freshmen over to my TA, Peter, but there wasn’t much I could do for Eden’s class, save sticking the kids into groups and having them work on a project that I thought of in the spur of the moment.
She’d looked at me like she’d known, too. But then class had been over and two students had hustled over to me and started lobbing useless questions about the end-of-term project, wanting to know if I’d figured out the requirements (I hadn’t) and was there anything they could do to raise their grades in the meantime (there wasn’t). Eden had lingered in the doorway and our eyes had met over the other students’ heads, and god, I’d wanted her so much in that moment that I could have just burst. Outside, the weather was getting warmer but the ancient English building was still blasting the heat at full. Eden, like m
y other students, had removed her jacket. She’d been wearing a jersey dress that had crept up her round thighs every time she shifted in her chair or leaned down to scratch an invisible mark on her ankle.
It had been driving me crazy. At one point, I had cursed the outdoor weather – despite my intense dislike of winter, at least puffer coats in the classroom meant that I could stay focused.
How the fuck was I ever going to concentrate on teaching when it got truly hot and Eden would start showing up in Daisy Dukes and tight little tops, her massive tits bursting out of them?
It was a dumb male fantasy – especially because I knew Eden, knew she’d never wear anything that slutty. No, for someone like her who was clearly uncomfortable with her size, she probably spent summers in oversized T-shirts and baggy shorts.
Well, I suppose a man could dream. I’d jacked off every single night that week, something I hadn’t done since my early twenties. My cock should have been raw and chafed, but if anything the constant stimulation was just making it harder for myself.
Now, days later, I was nearly at the point of bursting. I desperately wanted her – wanted to kiss her, wanted to hold her tightly in my arms, wanted to run my hands down that curved back of hers and squeeze her ass until she moaned like the little slut I had made her into. The day before, I’d seen her outside of the dining hall and sauntered over with a package, wrapped safely in an interdepartmental mail envelope with the red strings tied and secured.
“For your eyes only,” I’d informed her in a low voice, then walked away and left her breathlessly explaining to a friend that she was being tasked with delivering mail to the Communications department.
Of course, the package hadn’t contained mail of any sort. I’d driven out of town, to a women’s clothing store, and purchased a new pair of panties for Eden to replace the ones I’d ruined. It was a red silk thong, sheer and barely there, and that little scrap of fabric had cost almost fifty fucking dollars.
Forbidden First Times: A Contemporary Romance Collection Page 115
