I, on the other hand, am about three seconds from exploding. I may appear calm, but I’ve done nothing but pummel him in my mind since I got the call.
“Food good?” I ask, gesturing toward her half-eaten burger.
“So good,” she moans, leaning her head on the headrest. She drops her head to the side to look over at me. “You take me to the nicest places.”
“Brat.” I know she’s teasing, but it gets me wondering what it would be like if I wasn’t her teacher, and I could take her on real dates. How we still have the whole school year ahead of us, and we’re already in so deep. It would be selfish of me to let this continue. But I’m a selfish man when it comes to Remington Stringer.
“Have you heard anything about Christian?” I ask in attempt to distract myself from my current train of thought. I pull up to the gate and punch in the code.
“No. I tried to go to the hospital after school, but he didn’t answer his texts to tell me where he was. Then when I called, his parents picked up and told me they didn’t want any visitors.” She clenches a fist on her lap, and I have to hold back a smirk. My girl is a little spitfire.
“He’ll be okay,” I assure her.
“I know.” She nods. “God, I could punch Benton. All of this over a secret.”
Remington hasn’t explained their situation, but from what I overheard after the fight, I can fill in the blanks. When I pull into my driveway, she doesn’t make a move to get out.
“Secrets ruin lives, Pierce.” And I know she’s not talking about Christian anymore. I don’t have a response for that. I won’t lie to her and tell her everything will work out, or that we’ll both come out of this unscathed. Because one of us is bound to get burned. We both know that.
Finally, she unbuckles her seatbelt and hops out of the car. When we walk into my house, it’s dark, tranquil, and deafeningly quiet. The complete opposite of the chaos that is Remington’s life. She looks around, taking in her surroundings like it’s the first time she’s really seeing my house. I guess it kind of is, seeing as how the only other time she was here, I had her flat on her back in two seconds flat.
She heads straight for the stairs, tracing the bannister with one finger as she makes her way to my room. She looks back at me, her chin resting on her shoulder, her hair a tangled mess that spills down her back. The look in her eye is a stark contrast to the hardened one that usually resides there. She’s dropping the shield, letting me see her vulnerable side, and begging me not to make her regret it.
“I need you. I don’t want to think about Ryan or Kaela or my dad or any of them. In here—in your house—I feel like none of that can touch us. I want you to fuck me, Mr. James. Are you coming?” she asks simply, softly.
“Hopefully more than once.”
I storm up the steps after her, and she giggles—fucking giggles—and runs for my room. I tackle her on my bed, her back to my front. Her ass to my cock. I grip both of her wrists above her head in one hand and smooth her hair out of her face with my other one. I grind myself into her backside, and she moans softly. I lick the shell of her ear before fisting her hair.
“I can’t promise you forever, Remi girl. I can’t even promise that one of us won’t get hurt. But I can promise a few things,” I whisper roughly into her ear. She arches back into me. “I promise to take care of you, even when you won’t let me. I promise that while I’m with you, I won’t so much as think of another woman, and I promise to fuck you good, and to love every minute of it.” She wiggles against me again, her breathing turning ragged. I reach down and flip up her skirt. I palm her ass and squeeze before giving it a sharp slap, which earns me a yelp.
“Is that enough for you?”
“Yes,” she whispers.
“Good. Because I’d like to fuck you now.” I tug at her panties, sliding them down just far enough. I unzip my slacks and pull myself out. I slide the head of my cock through her slit, making sure she’s wet enough—of course, she is; she’s always ready for me—before shoving inside her in one hard thrust.
“Shit!” she yells on a gasp, lurching forward. I pull her back by her hips and hold her in place.
“Don’t run from my dick, baby. Keep your ass up.” She nods frantically, her face smothered in my sheets. I pull out at a leisurely pace before I dive back in. She moans, low and keening. I nudge her legs with mine until her knees are tucked up under her chest. Bracing my hands behind me on the bed, I lean back and watch myself slide in and out. She’s on display for me, her uniform skirt bunched up around her hips. Fuck. The sight alone is enough to make me come. When she pushes herself up on her forearms and starts to fuck me back, I snap. I reach forward and fist her skirt, using it as leverage to fuck her harder.
“So good,” she mumbles into the sheets.
“Everything is with you.” She pulls away from me and my dick pops up, smacking into my stomach. Before I can ask what she’s doing, she turns around, crawling back to me. She dips her head down and takes one long lick of my cock.
“I’ve been dying to taste you,” she says before swirling her tongue around my tip, never breaking eye contact.
Jesus Christ.
When I think nothing can possibly be any better than Remington’s tongue, she takes me into her mouth and closes her lips around me. My hips pump forward on their own accord, and she gags a little. I pull back slightly, running my hands through her hair.
“Suck me,” I growl. And she does, with the perfect amount of pressure.
“Do you taste yourself on me?” She hums her answer and wraps one hand around my base, working my shaft while she sucks on my crown. I guide her movements, going a little deeper each time. When I hit the back of her throat, tears spring to her eyes, and it only makes me harder. She holds my hips and looks up at me, wide green eyes, black mascara running down her cheeks. So damn beautiful.
I lie on my back, pulling her on top of me in one swift movement.
“Condom,” I say, gripping her thighs. I can’t believe I nearly forgot. She leans forward and grabs one out of my side table before holding it out for me. I don’t take it.
“Put it on me.” She bites her lip and does as I say, tearing it open and then rolling it onto my cock that’s still glistening from her mouth.
“Now, put me inside you,” I instruct. There’s no hesitation. She leans forward and reaches behind her, placing me at her entrance. She brings her hands on either side of my head before lowering herself onto me.
“Oh my God.” She closes her eyes and throws her head back, circling her hips while I’m buried inside her. I unbutton her shirt, leaving it hanging off her, and pull her heavy breasts out of her black bra. I see a glimpse of her tattoo that I nearly forgot about before I lean forward, taking her nipple into my mouth and sucking. Hard. Her slow circles turn into rocking, and then she’s riding me rough and fast. She isn’t putting on a show. She isn’t screaming like a porn star. Her movements are uncoordinated and frantic, but she couldn’t care less. She’s taking her pleasure, and it’s the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen in my life. She sits up, and the new angle has us both groaning.
“I feel so full. It’s so deep.”
“Lean back,” I tell her gruffly. She does, ripping off her shirt and bra before resting her hands on my knees. I reach forward to rub on her clit with my thumb, trying desperately to resist the urge to come.
“Please don’t stop,” she begs, her eyes pinched shut. She grabs my wrist and holds the heel of my palm where she needs it.
“Come, baby. Come all over me,” I grind out. I lift my hips, forcing myself impossibly deep, and I feel her pussy contract around me. She ceases her movements, so I sit up, wrap my arm around her lower back, and fuck her hard through her orgasm.
“I feel you coming, Remi. You’re squeezing me so tight.”
“Don’t stop, don’t stop, don’t stop,” she chants like a prayer. And I don’t want to ever stop. I’ll never get enough. Her mouth drops open in a silent scream, and I snake my tongue insi
de. The kiss is sloppy and desperate, and when she sucks on my tongue, I can’t hold back. I grip her waist hard, holding her in place while I shove myself as deep as I can, coming like a geyser.
Remington drops her forehead to my shoulder, lazily rocking her hips as we both come down. I kiss her temple, tracing my fingertips up and down her spine.
“How’d I do, Mr. James?” she mumbles into my neck, and I chuckle.
“A+. Your best work to date, Miss Stringer.” I lift her off me and lay her down before covering her with my comforter.
“Good to know.” She yawns. “I should go to sleep. I have school in the morning, and my teacher is kind of a dick.”
I laugh as I walk to the master bathroom to take care of the condom and clean myself up. By the time I’m out, Remington is curled up on her side, one hand under her cheek, and her lips parted ever so slightly. Quietly, I pad over to her and graze her flushed cheek with my knuckle. “What are you doing to me?” I muse aloud. I try to make sense of the overwhelming and foreign feelings that slam into me, but they all hit me at once, making it hard to grasp on to anything, save for one thing. Mine.
I take one last look at her before throwing my slacks back on and grabbing my keys. I know what I have to do.
When I was in law school, my lecturer showed up at my doorstep inside the dorms one day, unannounced. I remember clasping the door as he stood on the threshold, a seventy-something-year-old man with wafer-thin white hair and too many wrinkles to distinguish his facial features, and said, “You need to change courses.”
“What?” I asked, laughing. I come from a family of lawyers, and this was the point where I still wanted to make my father proud. Or at least, the thought of disappointing my parents made me feel slightly uncomfortable. “Why would you say that?”
“You can’t be a lawyer.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re no better than a thug.”
“What makes you say that?”
“I see you, Mr. James. I watch you all the time, and when you don’t like something, you snap. You don’t have the self-control to become a lawyer. You’re a hothead. You don’t have the patience for it either. You’d make a horrible chess player.”
“Thank you,” I said, shutting the door in his face. I graduated with honors, but he was right.
I am hotheaded.
I can be ruthless.
Especially when something of mine is in danger.
Ryan is about to learn that we have something in common the hard way.
The minute after Remi fell asleep, I drove to her old house. I knew Ryan would be here. I didn’t expect the big silver truck with the slogan, “National Pipes: We Create Careers, Not Jobs,” to be parked right outside the house. Her dad is here, too. The slogan against this rotting, out-of-shape neighborhood is enough to make me chuckle. That is, if I still thought there was something to laugh about in this whole twisted situation.
I’m wearing my work clothes. Dress pants, crisp black dress shirt, and my brown Oxfords. I walk over to the door and knock once, twice, knowing they are here. The Harley Davidson is parked in its designated yellow-grassed spot, too.
The shuffling sound and indistinct chatter stir something in me. Not because I am worried about these two idiots, but because it kills me that this is the soundtrack of Remi’s life.
Ryan opens the screen door, fiddling with the rusty lock. Everything rattles. I wait, still and composed, but mentally gearing up for a fight, wondering when the hell this asshole is going to look up and see that I’m not one of his drug-dealer friends.
“Yo, what’s…” The door flings open, and he stands there in a dirty wifebeater, a six-day stubble, and that dazed look of a man who isn’t sure what day or time it is. “What the fuck?” He blinks.
“The fuck is that you and I are going to have a long conversation tonight, whether you like it or not.” I grab him by the throat and walk him back into the house. Ryan Anderson doesn’t put up a fight. Not yet, anyway. My grip on his neck isn’t as tight as I want it to be and I am taller and bigger. More menacing. Then there is my tone. My voice. I sound like a man you don’t want to mess around with. Because I’m not.
I stop when he is next to his dining table and let go of his throat, throwing him into one of the eaten wooden chairs. Everything in the place reeks, him included. Ryan lolls his head from side to side and laughs manically.
“You’re him,” he says. My blood freezes in my veins. For a second there, I think he recognizes me from his time with Gwen. From the black hole that seems to have sucked me deeper into depression until Remington Stringer strode into my life with her long legs and pouty lips and gave me some of her light. “You’re the motherfucking teacher, dude.”
He’s high. Wasted. Completely fucked up. He looks jaded, his eyes bloodshot, purple rings adorning his eye sockets. His skin is clammy all over. His arms and the sliver of flesh that peeks from his wifebeater. His chest. I grab a chair, spinning it around and plopping down, my arms embracing the back of it.
“Where’s your deadbeat dad?”
“You mean Remi’s dad?” He sniffs loudly and rolls his eyes, shaking his head. “Not giving you shit, man. Why would I even talk to you? Unless I get money out of it, of course.”
“It’s simple, Anderson. You will talk to me, because I’m the only person who can prevent you from being thrown into jail for a long time.”
“You’re full of shit,” he spits to the floor. I stare at him like he is dirt.
“Dealing weapons and drugs? You’re looking at fifteen years if you’re lucky. But you aren’t that lucky, are you? If you were, you’d be out of this shithole by now. So, let’s try again. Where’s Daddy Stringer?”
“He’s fucking the neighbor next door. Her husband works with him at the same company, and he’s gone on a long drive for the night. Want to go there and congratulate him on his pity fuck?”
Jesus, this guy is all class. I smile politely. “Guess it’s just you and me then, pal. Do you know why I’m here, Ryan?”
He sits back and lights a cigarette, exhaling loudly. “Because you’re a fucking pedo and you’re looking for another piece of young ass from a neighborhood where girls don’t have enough money to sue your fancy ass?”
“That’s a lot of big words from a very simple man.” I lean forward and tap his nose like he is adorable, and he swats my hand away and growls.
“It’s a good thing you came here, Teach. I have a bone to pick with you, too.”
“You do? How nice. We should do it more often,” I say, but my heart is picking up speed, fast. My stomach lurches. Maybe he is bullshitting, but I doubt it. Very much so.
“Yeah. I mean, I have pictures of you hanging out with my sister.” Ryan tousles his blond hair with the same hand that holds his cigarette, slouching backwards and staring at nothing in particular, looking deep in thought. “Why would you fucking take her on your boat and out to eat? You’re supposed to educate her, you feelin’ me? Just give her tools for her future. You’re giving her your tool, all right. But I don’t think it’s what they had in mind.” He bursts out laughing.
I shake my head. “I don’t think you understand. I have hard evidence against you, Anderson.”
“You have a hard-on for teenage girls. That’s what you have.”
“I have photos of you running around and giving teenage kids Glocks wrapped around a towel. Selling a pregnant lady fucking coke.”
“Who the fuck are you to lecture me!” Ryan flings his arms in the air, spitting as he yells, “Look at you and your own mess. You’re fucking a teenage girl, for fuck’s sake.”
“I can put you in jail for a long time.” I feel my voice rising along with the level of panic in my body.
“So can I.”
“She’s eighteen.” What am I saying? What in the world am I admitting to?
“You’re fucking done,” Ryan spits.
“You killed my sister,” I snap loudly. More clearly, as Ryan’s face twists i
n confusion before recognition settles on it. “You killed Gwen. My sister. She’s gone.”
There is a beat of silence in which both of us take deep, huge breaths, and then before we know it, we are on the floor. I am punching him in the face, feeling his bones crack under my fist. He flails. I throw him across the room and launch at him again. This time he grabs my arm, ready for me, and twists it hard. I feel the pain but can’t bring myself to care. The things that go through my head… They are more important than what I am feeling physically.
Gwen.
Remington.
The past.
The future.
My present. My present is a secret, but not for long, I decide. She craves normalcy. She needs stability. We’d never be normal, but the best things never are. I will be her constant. Her safety net. Someone she will learn to trust and not be afraid to depend on.
Ryan and I are a pile of limbs and blood before I hear my phone buzzing. It is the middle of the night, and there is only one person who could call me at this time.
I right myself, standing up and pushing my foot over his face, standing over him, stepping over his cheek.
“Hello?” I ask, breathing hard. “Remi? Hello? Are you there?”
I hear papers shuffling, the little sucks of air she takes in between. Then the phone goes dead.
Shit.
Even before I open my eyes, I know that I’m alone.
It’s a feeling I’ve grown accustomed to in recent years. The chill of the sheets wrapping around me. I’m not even sure what wakes me up, but once my eyes blink open, I send a hand to the nightstand, feeling around for my phone, but coming up empty-handed.
I look to Pierce’s alarm clock and check the time. Half past two a.m. The Jack and Jill bathroom light is off, the rest of the house dark and quiet. I wait for a while, willing myself to fall back asleep to no avail.
Misbehaved Page 18
