And if it weren’t for the feminine voice at the other end of the bookcase calling out “Ms. Richards, you okay?” I would’ve been lost to subspace once again.
But I’m not. Instead of floating above my body in blissful near-unconsciousness, I’m staring down the now lit tunnel of books into the face of my biggest nightmare.
Because me and my student, my lover, have been caught.
Chapter 19
Nate
My eyes are closed as I pour my heart and soul into the words I whisper against Evie’s ear while I thrust in and out of her tight, wet heat. The excitement, the adrenaline of playing this lovers’ game she initiated was the key that unlocked all the feelings and things I’ve kept inside, everything that’s built up over the months I taunted her, and then the last several weeks in which we both gave in to our every desire. With every night she’s slept in my arms, with every time we’ve made love, with every study hour we’ve spent having to keep our true feelings hidden, with every stolen kiss between these very bookcases, with every session we’ve spent in Doc’s office, and with the hours upon hours of staying up late at night, talking on the phone, texting, even FaceTiming, we’ve grown closer than I ever imagined two people could be. Close enough that I know what I feel for Evelyn Richards is love. Undeniable, untouchable love.
And I’m confessing everything, telling her all the things I feel for her, my eyes squeezed tight as Evelyn’s pussy clamps around me as she comes, yanking me along to base jump right off the cliff with her.
So I don’t see the moment the lights overhead flip on. I only hear the voice mere seconds after I fill Evie with every drop of cum I have.
“Ms. Richards, you okay?”
I know that voice, and right now, I’ve never hated anyone more in my entire life, because I know she’s not going to let this go. The girl can’t keep a secret to save her life.
Without turning around, I lower Evie until her feet touch the floor, and I tuck myself back into my underwear, pulling my pants back up my legs, a part of me recognizing I hadn’t even thought to bother with my undressing ritual, and grateful I had wanted Evie so desperately that I didn’t undress all the way. Because it makes this a fraction less humiliating. I’m able to keep Evelyn hidden with my big body, because unlike mine, her pants and shoes are on the floor a foot away. Her panties are ripped and lying at our feet. I spin around, keeping Evelyn’s nudity concealed as I face the intruder, the person who just ruined the greatest, most epic moment of my entire life.
Lindy lifts her brows in surprise then crosses her arms over her cheerleading-uniform-covered chest as she pops her hip.
“Really, Nate?” Her voice is acidic, eating through this perfect bubble Evie and I have been wrapped in for the last three and half weeks. “Is that the reason you keep telling me no? Didn’t want me again, because you’re slumming it with a teacher?”
I take a step forward, but Evie grabs my arm, keeping me in place, and it reminds me I need to keep her blocked from Lindy’s ugly sneer. The woman I love doesn’t need to see the look this bitch is trying to give her.
But the look I give Lindy makes that expression slide right off her face, and she drops her arms, taking a step back. And when a deep, dark, almost terrifying growl rumbles throughout the bookshelves, Lindy takes off out of sight and down the staircase before I even realize the sound was coming from me.
I turn back around, picking up Evie’s pants and holding them open for her to step into when I see she’s trembling so badly she can’t even move.
“Oh God,” she says on an exhale, and her knees buckle just as I’m buttoning her slacks. I catch her against me, sliding us both to the floor so I can put her shoes on her feet, snatching up her torn panties and shoving them in my pocket before I stand up with her in my arms.
“It’s going to be fine, baby,” I promise her, carrying her down the stairs, and she bursts into tears.
“This is all my fault,” she wails, and her wracking sobs break my heart.
I shake my head. “It’s not—”
“It is!” she cries. “You didn’t do this. You’ve been so careful, so aware, even warning me when you thought I was acting in a way someone might get suspicious. And what did I do? I lured you into the library at school to have sex!” She can’t catch her breath after that. And I move faster once I realize she’s starting to have a panic attack, knowing I have to snap her out of it.
I set her on the circulation desk and force her to look into my eyes. The fear and misery in hers gut me, but I know I have to be strong for her. “Evelyn,” I say, my tone deep, commanding, “this is not your fault. And as my sub, I demand you trust that I will take care of this.”
She whimpers, shaking her head frantically as she tries to take a deep breath, the tears streaming down her cheeks.
“Do you truly believe I’d let anything happen to you? Do you really think I’ll allow anyone to ruin your life, to ruin what we have together?” I prompt rhetorically, asking the questions as a reminder that I told her before I’d hurt anyone who tried to come between us, who tried to hurt Evie in any way.
Just when my words finally cut through her panic, before I can say anything else to dissipate her overwhelming worry, the doors of the library burst open, and Lindy walks in… along with the assistant principal, Mr. Moran.
“See?” Lindy gestures toward us dramatically, as if the man didn’t immediately spot me holding Evie to my chest while she sat on the desk, me between her legs. But I don’t give a shit. My woman comes above everything and everyone else. It’s my job to take care of her, and I don’t give a fuck who sees it.
Mr. Moran clears his throat. “Uh… thank you, Lindy. Please, drive home safe,” he says, dismissing her, clearly uncomfortable seeing Evie and me in this position.
She gives a theatrically bratty huff as she stomps her foot, and then she marches out the door.
Mr. Moran reaches up to rub his bald head for a second, looking everywhere but at me while I continue to hold Evie, rubbing circles along her back as I focus on the assistant principal’s eyes. He never meets mine, but he says with a sigh, “Well… come with me, you two. Gotta call your parents, kid.”
Evelyn jerks, and my arms tighten around her. “It’ll be okay, baby,” I tell her once more, and I slide her off the desk and set her on her feet, wrapping an arm around her to keep her steady as we walk to the office.
Chapter 20
Evie
It’s my worst nightmare come to life. How could I have been so stupid? How had I let my lust and desire overrule my mind and ruin my own freaking life? In the beginning of all this, I had been so worried Nathaniel would blackmail me, tell everyone about my private life, how I was a member of a BDSM club. And then later, I was worried his flirtations would make it obvious there was something going on between us. But no. It was me, it was my own stupid self who couldn’t just wait two more freaking days to make love with Nate, to wait until Friday when we could be in the privacy of my sanctuary, my home, without worry of being caught. Just two more days, and we could’ve had another weekend spending every moment together, wrapped up in each other, where the rest of the world disappeared and all that was left was us.
No. It was me who got him to chase me into the library, me who made it perfectly clear I wanted him to fuck me right then and there.
“I… I thought we were the only ones here,” I tell Nate as we trail behind Mr. Moran, and he tightens his grip around my shoulders.
“Cheerleaders practice late during football season, baby,” he replies, and I feel like an idiot. Of course they do. If I paid any sort of attention to my students’ extracurriculars, if I cared even the slightest to support all the school’s sports and our athletes, I would’ve remembered that. But no, I’m a horrible teacher. All I care about on Friday nights is getting home as fast as I can so I can get ready to go to my BDSM club, not giving one shit about the kids’ football games and other things that are important to them during their high school caree
r.
We follow Mr. Moran into the main office and then through the reception area to enter his. He gestures toward the chairs across from him as he rounds the desk, sitting down and pulling his phone close to him.
And then I lose time. I’m vaguely aware of the two males speaking back and forth. I even manage to acknowledge it when Nathaniel asks if I’m all right. But I’m fairly certain I skip right past my panic attack and just black out, even though I somehow stay upright in my seat.
It’s not until I hear other people enter the office from behind me—Nate’s parents, I assume—that I snap back to the here and now, and without thinking, I shoot out of my seat, spin around, and back away from them. I don’t know if it’s because I think his mother might launch at me and choke the life out of me for sleeping with her precious only son, or if it’s something else that sets off my fight-or-flight, but while the instinct needle had flipped to the fight side earlier, when Nathaniel had caught me in the library, it most certainly was pointing all the way in the red, alarms going off inside my head for me to fucking fly.
But there’s nowhere to run. And so I don’t look like a complete freaking moron, I gesture to my now empty seat, saying to the beautiful woman with chestnut hair and big doe eyes the same color as her son’s, “Please, sit.” It’s then I realize I’ve backed myself into a corner, and I don’t know whether I feel trapped, or if I feel safer since nothing can come at me from the back.
“Oh, thank you, sweetheart,” she replies and sits, and her voice is so sweet, so pleasant-sounding, and it breaks my heart to think that it’s going to sound so very different when she hears why she’s here. This woman, who Nate painted such a wonderful image of in my mind, the best mom, the Pinterest mom, the woman his dad married for true love. I’d fantasized about meeting her in the future, about what it’d be like to have a close relationship with her, since I no longer have a mother of my own. She had been as much of a dream as Nate was, and now I’m going to lose it all.
Nate stands as well and offers his dad the chair, and his dad glances at me, asking silently if I want to take the now open seat—a gentleman, like his son.
“No thank you,” I reply, my voice trembling, and Mrs. Black’s face falls a little when she hears it.
Nathaniel comes to stand next to me, and as if he isn’t aware that his parents are right here, staring at us, as if we are on stage and in a spotlight, he wraps his arms around me and pulls me to his chest. I stiffen, my eyes going wide, and I start to struggle away, but he just tightens his grip, bending down to press a kiss to the top of my head and whispering a “Shhh” against my hair. “Trust me.”
Mr. Moran clears his throat yet again, and all I can do is watch this train wreck happen, unable to look away with Nate trapping me in my front row seat. “Mr. and Mrs. Black, let me start by saying this is incredibly awkward for me. Obviously, seeing as this academy is your family’s legacy, and I am an employee of yours. Also, because Nathaniel is a star student. He’s never had to be disciplined in any way, always the epitome of what a pupil should be.”
I can’t help but snort at that, knowing damn well I tried to turn him in for basically harassing me and was shut down before the words could even leave my mouth. And then I yelp when Nate reaches down and pinches my ass, horrified when everyone turns my way in confusion at what probably looks on the outside like I have Tourette’s. Thankfully, Mr. Moran just continues.
“I must inform you that a student came upon your son and Ms. Richards in a… compromising position in the library.”
Mrs. Black eyes widen, and her mouth drops open just a little, her cheeks turning bright pink. Mr. Black reaches over and takes her hand, but his expression doesn’t change except to lift a brow at his son.
“As your son is eighteen, he is a consenting adult. In our state, there is no statutory rape case here. But… there are ethical considerations to be made. There is a policy in place at our school to punish faculty to protect students, since their parents have entrusted their children with them. You may choose to press charges against Ms. Richards that will take away her teaching certification,” he tells them, and I sink against Nate, Mr. Moran’s words taking the life right out of me.
Nate’s arm comes up to pull my head against his chest, and I shut my eyes, forcing myself to absorb the sound of his strong but steady heartbeat against my ear. How can he be so calm at a time like this? How can his pulse be so smooth when mine feels like I’m having a full-on heart attack? It almost makes me mad, him being so cool and collected. I mean, it’s not his life that hangs in the balance. But I thought he’d at least be worried for mine, especially after all the things he said to me in the library not forty-five minutes ago.
And then I flinch back at the sound of Mrs. Black’s gentle voice that is so close to me, so close she could attack me for corrupting her “perfect” son. But when I register her words, recognize she’s not speaking to me but to Nate in a tone I fully didn’t expect, I crack one eye open.
“So this is your little mouse, my boy?” she asks him, no smile on her lips but her eyes are twinkling, and my brow furrows in confusion.
“It is,” he replies, his voice proud, and her eyes look down from his towering height over both of us until she’s looking straight ahead into mine. For some reason, my body relaxes when she stays there, seeming to read me, seeming to tell me something with her beautiful doe eyes, and Nate unfurls his hand from the back of my head so I can stand up straighter, still in his arms. A moment later, Mrs. Black gives me the smallest smile, and she turns back to the assistant principal.
“That won’t be necessary, Mr. Moran. I’ll sign whatever waiver I need in order to give my consent to this relationship,” she tells him, and I gasp, looking from her, to her husband—who has a little smirk on his lips as he looks at his son that looks oh-so familiar—then up to Nate, who is, in fact, giving me that same damn look as he stares down at me.
A thousand whirling thoughts overwhelm my mind, but only one thing comes out of my mouth when I see that expression. “You told your parents about me?” I squeak.
He lets out a cocky laugh. “Didn’t I tell you not to worry, that you should trust me?”
I open and close my mouth like a fish, not knowing how to answer that. There’s activity inside the assistant principal’s office, shuffling of papers, things being signed, and hands being shaken. I vaguely hear Mr. Moran assuring Nathaniel’s schedule wouldn’t have to be altered since I’m not technically one of his teachers in a graded class, and then I’m moving as Nate leads me toward the door.
“Evelyn, dear. Would you do us the honor of coming for dinner tonight? I know you commute quite far, but I’ve already got it in the oven, so you’ll still be able to head home at a decent hour,” Mrs. Black invites, and I’m startled that she already knows that much about me.
My lips reply before my head even catches up. “I’d love to.”
“You’ve been through a lot, baby. You’ll ride with me and I’ll bring you back to your car once you’re good and full and your nerves aren’t as frazzled,” Nate informs me, and I close my eyes, grateful to have finally found my Dominant half and he’s chosen this moment to assert it.
“That sounds perfect,” I tell him, and even though his mom is right there watching us, I can’t help but tip my head up to give him an appreciative smile, to which he leans down, just like I knew he would, and places a sweet kiss to my lips.
My cheeks flame, even though I know I instigated it, and I shyly meet his mother’s eyes. But all I see there is the twinkle of happiness, not the look of a woman luring me back to her home to kill me slowly for defiling her precious only child.
“Let’s go grab your things, little mouse,” Nate tells me, and we turn to make our way down the hallway as his dad calls out.
“Takes eight minutes and thirteen seconds to get to our house, son. Better see you there in fifteen.”
And my hand slaps over my mouth as I let out a giggle—one, because his dad was clearl
y stating there was to be no more shenanigans in the library, and two, because it sounded so very like something Nate would say.
Chapter 21
Evie
On the ride to his house, Nate seems to sense I need a minute to process everything that just happened, so he holds my hand and turns up his music, giving me the time to get my thoughts in order. And just like his dad said, with a glance at the clock in Nathaniel’s fancy dashboard, I see it only took eight minutes to get here. I look out the windshield at the sprawling… I can’t even call it a house. It’s a freaking mansion if I’ve ever seen one, and Nate laughs at the first thing that comes out of my mouth.
“You said your mom does everything herself? She must clean from sunup to sundown.”
“Nah, we have housekeepers, but Mom cooks and does all the decorating and stuff herself. She’s a homemaker minus the maidly duties,” he explains, and I nod, my eyes never leaving the freaking castle before me.
“She’s living the good life,” I murmur, and he chuckles.
“Let’s go in before my dad has an aneurism because I’m late.”
I scoff. “You mean before you have an aneurism for being late.”
“Tomatoes, to-mah-toes.” He gets out and comes around the hood, opening my door and leaning across me to unbuckle my seatbelt as always. Something I’ve never questioned, since it makes me feel so taken care of. I place my hand in his and he helps me down from his truck, and then he leads me up the steps to the giant front doors, my eyes trying to take everything in at once.
The door opens just as he reaches for the knob, startling me a bit, especially when I see his mom standing there with an expression I can’t quite decipher. But I take it as excitement when suddenly she grips me by the shoulders and hauls me over the threshold and into a tight hug. It all happens so fast I stand there stiffly for a second, but then Nathaniel’s “Mooom, stop suffocating my girl” echoes throughout the huge foyer, and I relax against her, bringing my arms up to lay my palms flat against the middle of her back. She’s shaped a lot like me, petite and thin, but her hips are a little wider and she’s got about an inch of height on me. Her scent is a pleasant floral.
A Lesson in Blackmail: Black Mountain Academy / a Club Alias Novel Page 15
