Christ, what a loser.
I sigh in frustration and lean back in my seat.
“Forget it, I’ll be okay,” I say. I have to regroup. Maybe we can arrange a second meeting. And I can show up wearing, I don’t know, lingerie.
Dr. Conlon frowns at me, “Are you sure?”
Yeah, this isn’t going to happen today. I nod, “Very sure.”
“Let me write Patrice’s number down for you anyway,” he says.
He pulls a pen out of the penholder on his desk (who has a freaking pen holder?), but accidentally knocks the holder onto the floor, spilling pens all over the place. I sigh again and get up to help him clean the mess. God, what a clueless klutz. Just my luck.
I bend down on my knees, picking up what appears to be an endless supply of pens. Why the hell does he have so many goddamn pens? Dr. Conlon is bent over in his chair, picking up pens with his left hand as I crouch next to him on the floor.
When I have half a dozen pens in my hand, I feel his grasp on my wrist, “It’s okay, Rachel. I can handle it.”
I look up at his bright blue eyes. That’s when I notice it: his gaze flitting down my neckline, to my very visible breasts. It’s just a second, he was super quick, but I saw it. And he knew that I saw it. I see his face turn a bit red and I know this is my chance. I put my fingers behind his neck and pull his head down towards mine.
I knew I’d be the one making the first move.
“Rachel?” There’s surprise and confusion on his face.
I press my lips onto his. At first he seems frozen and absolutely stunned, but then I feel his arms drawing me closer to him.
God, men are so easy to predict.
Not to be conceited or anything, but I’m a really good kisser. I have to be. Most of the professors aren’t good kissers. Most of them suck at it. Usually, they give me too much tongue—of course, when you don’t like a guy, any amount of tongue is too much tongue. And usually too much saliva. When you kiss a girl, you don’t want her to feel like you’re spitting in her mouth, trust me.
Okay, I’ll be honest: Dr. Conlon isn’t a bad kisser. He’s actually… kind of good at it. That part surprises me. And I don’t get surprised too often.
But good kisser or not, I can tell it’s been a while for him. I can’t say why exactly. Maybe it’s his eagerness. I can tell how badly he wants me by the way he touches me.
I unbutton my blouse, slide off my own skirt, as he watches with his jaw hanging open. As I begin to unbutton his shirt, he looks up at me and grins crookedly, “I never thought my day would end up like this.”
I return his smile, “Are you glad?”
“You have no idea,” he murmurs.
And then I get my second surprise: Dr. Conlon actually has a nice chest. Maybe I should have given him the benefit of the doubt, considering he’s at least ten years younger than the youngest professor I’ve been with. Still, I didn’t expect muscles. And no beer belly, that’s for sure. I run my hands over his pecs, and I’m practically shaking.
Get a grip, Rachel!
“What?” he asks, looking concerned. “Anything wrong?”
“No,” I reply quickly.
This is crazy. I can’t start actually liking this guy. If that happens, then he’s the one in control. And that would be a huge mistake. So I close my eyes and think of the one thing that never fails to disgust me: Mr. Pritchett. Pritchett’s disgusting, hairy body. His sagging jowls. His sweaty skin.
But somehow, it isn’t working. Dr. Conlon keeps kissing me and as his mouth works its way down my neck, I can’t think about Mr. Pritchett anymore. I can only focus on him and what’s about to happen and how good it feels…
_____
When it’s over, Dr. Conlon slumps down in his chair. He shakes his head and rubs his face.
“Wow, Rachel. Jesus Christ…”
I’m still straddling him and I know I need to get up, but I can’t quite move. It has never been like that before. Never. I’ve never lost control that way before.
I don’t get it. Dr. Conlon is a clueless dork who hobbles around with a cane. How is it possible that he was so good at that? Maybe he’s younger than the others, but that shouldn’t matter. The guy has no social life, no dates, nothing. This makes no sense.
“I should probably go, Dr. Conlon,” I mumble.
He grins at me, “You can call me Matt. At least, in here you can.”
Okay, this isn’t a disaster. Yes, we just had some incredible sex. My first incredible sex. But he doesn’t know that. He’s just excited he got to score with a twenty-two year old. Plus, I can tell from the way he’s looking at me that he’s totally smitten.
Nothing has changed. The game is still on.
I usually don’t drop the bombshell on them until the second time. Some of them seem to see it coming, although less of them than I would have guessed. I was surprised how many of those bald old men thought that I was genuinely interested in them. For a lot of them, it was a huge blow to their egos. And I usually took pleasure in delivering it. They were mostly a bunch of assholes.
But Dr. Conlon isn’t an asshole. He’s a nice guy and he really cares about his students.
Oh well. I can’t afford to fail anatomy. This is just the way it has to be.
Chapter 43
I’m in such a good mood the next day that it doesn’t even bother me when I hear Heather loudly singing Taylor Swift in the shower. And then a Justin Bieber song, for Christ’s sake. Anyway, it’s a relief to know that everything worked out with Dr. Conlon just the way I planned. Okay, not entirely the way I planned, but close enough.
When I arrive at lecture the next morning, I notice that Dr. Conlon seems to be in a pretty good mood too. He’s joking around with the class more than usual, and even though he’s generally an animated teacher, I’m impressed by the enthusiasm he’d managed to whip up for the muscles of mastication. Apparently, he really needed to get laid.
Truthfully, Dr. Conlon is a good teacher. Actually, he’s a great teacher. He’s patient and good at explaining tricky concepts, but most importantly, he so obviously loves teaching. This job is his life. And that’s why this is so perfect. As much as it will hurt his pride, I know that when he figures out what I’m after, he’ll cave immediately. He won’t do anything to jeopardize his career.
After lecture is over, I give the professor a five-minute head start to get to his office before heading over there myself. I’m pleased to see the way his eyes light up when I enter the room. I could probably get the keys to his car and all his credit card numbers if I wanted.
“Rachel,” he says, beaming, “I was hoping you’d come by…”
I close the door behind me and lock it. I smile. “How are you doing, Dr. Conlon?”
“Matt,” he corrects me.
In about five minutes, he’s going to hate my guts.
I cross the room to his desk. He pushes his chair back from the desk to allow me room to sit down on his lap. I settle down on his legs and wrap my arms around his neck. I bring my face close to his.
“Are you busy?” I ask him.
He shakes his head, “Nah, just some paperwork.”
This is the moment to drop the bombshell. But I see the way he’s looking at me and… somehow I just choke. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. It’s not like Matt Conlon is the first professor to become smitten with me.
“What?” He’s looking at me, dark eyebrows raised. “Is something wrong?”
“Nothing,” I say, forcing a smile.
He starts to kiss my neck, and my body melts against him. His fingers slide into my dark hair and it feels so nice. Maybe I don’t have to tell him right now. Maybe we can go one more time…
Oh my God, what’s wrong with me?
I have to do this now. Right now.
I pull away from him resolutely, trying to ignore the confusion on his face as I take a deep breath.
“Actually, there is something that’s sort of been on my mind…”
He frowns in concern. “What?”
“I just… I feel like I can’t stop thinking about my grade on that exam,” I sigh. “It’s really… distracting me.”
At this point, at least half of the professors would immediately say something along the lines of: Don’t you worry yourself about that grade. We’ll fix that right now. It saves both of us face if they volunteer to change my grade without having to be threatened.
But Conlon clearly isn’t going for it. Damn. He actually has a lot of integrity. He’s not going to change my grade. He’s going to need to be persuaded.
This is going to get ugly.
“I’m sure you’ll do better on the next exam,” he assures me. His face brightens. “I’d be happy to tutor you myself, Rachel. I do that all the time for students who are having trouble. It’s important to me that you do well.”
“Yes, but…” I run my hand over the inside of his thigh. “It’s going to be hard to pass with such a low grade on the first exam.”
“Rachel, honey,” he says, placing his fingers around my wrist, “I appreciate what you’re doing, but don’t you have some studying to do?”
Our eyes meet. And that’s when I realize it:
He knows.
He knows exactly what I want. And he’s not planning to make this easy for me.
Too bad he has no idea whom he’s dealing with.
“Matt,” I say thoughtfully, “how do you think the dean feels about professors who have sex with their students?”
I watch him carefully for his reaction, expecting his face to drain of color. But it doesn’t. He looks completely calm and collected.
“They probably don’t like it too much,” Dr. Conlon says with a shrug. “I’ve actually heard of professors getting fired for that.”
“Really?” I say in mock surprise.
He nods. “Yeah, sure. And some of them end up wrecking their marriages too. I heard about a professor recently from another university whose wife left him after he slept with one of his students.” He smiles at me, “Actually, I believe he taught at your former university. Maybe you knew him? Dr. Michael Hirsch?”
Oh no. No, no, no…
He can’t know about that. It’s not possible.
Mike Hirsch was a middle-aged guy who was just as overweight and balding as Mr. Pritchett had been, and he also happened to teach my biology class in college. He’d actually believed I really liked him, and had thrown a fit when I suggested he alter my grades. I’d been forced to place an unfortunate phone call to his wife. The call to the wife always came first, because a call to the university would have been much more of a scandal. Of course, as soon as I called his wife, Mike realized I meant business.
But how the hell does Dr. Conlon know about that? Nobody knows. Except, of course, for Mike Hirsch, Mrs. Hirsch and me.
“He’s pretty pissed off at that student who wrecked his marriage,” Dr. Conlon continues. “Would you believe he was angry enough to call some of the professors here to personally warn us about that student? As if any of us would be dumb enough to get taken in by something like that.”
Oh, Christ.
I climb off Dr. Conlon’s lap and back away, staring at him. He’s not smiling anymore, that’s for sure.
“Personally,” he says, “I wouldn’t worry anyway. I’m not married, and I’m the only disabled member on the entire faculty and have been for quite a while. I can pretty much get away with whatever I want. I mean, it’s not like they’re going to think that I seduced my student, right?”
“You knew all along,” I breathe, shaking my head.
“Well, it was nice of Dr. Hirsch to give me that heads up,” he says. “But when you came in here yesterday wearing that short skirt… come on, do you think I’m stupid, Rachel?”
I can’t believe this. Of all the professors I’ve been with, I can’t believe Dr. Conlon is the one who finally caught on to me. The entire time we were having sex yesterday, when he was acting so grateful and amazed, he knew exactly what I was up to. It was all an act. I’m furious.
“Congratulations,” I say. “You figured me out.”
I storm off in the direction of the door, but before I get there, I hear his voice.
“Hold on, Rachel. Where do you think you’re going?”
I turn and see him playing with the handle of his cane.
“What?” I say irritably.
“You’re still failing anatomy,” he reminds me. “What do you expect to do about that?”
I hate him. I really truly hate him.
“I don’t know,” I say. “Jump off the roof of the hospital maybe.”
Dr. Conlon’s face darkens. He doesn’t seem to appreciate my joke, probably because there was a student who really did that. But honestly I’m not entirely sure I am joking.
“I’m holding special tutoring sessions,” he says. “For the students who did really abysmally on the exam. I’ll email you the times—I suggest you show up.”
“I guess I don’t have much of a choice now, do I?” I snap at him.
“Nope,” he says. He pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “Good luck, Rachel.”
Yeah, I’m going to need it.
Chapter 44
Remedial anatomy is like the most humiliating experience of all time.
It’s me, Wendy Adams, and Marissa Dunne. We are apparently the dumbest three people in the whole class—all female, of course. Dr. Conlon instructed us to arrive at the anatomy lab at four p.m., so here we are, standing in front of a dead body, waiting for him to show up.
I don’t care for Wendy or Marissa. Wendy is a real girly girl. She has these long, long eyelashes and wears so much mascara on them that I’m a little worried her eyelashes might smack me in the face. She’s also wearing high heels in lab, which is just ridiculous. Marissa, on the other hand, is a huge flirt. She’s got the blonde cheerleader thing going and I’m pretty sure half the class is in love with her. (The male half. Plus maybe the lesbian bit.)
I really wish I weren’t here.
“I didn’t know you were failing anatomy, Rachel,” Wendy says when I walk in.
“Yeah,” I mumble, not wanting to get into a conversation with her.
“I know,” Marissa agrees. “I totally thought you were really smart.”
Where the hell is Dr. Conlon?
He shows up a few minutes later, dressed in blue scrubs, clutching his cane in his left hand. I can’t help but notice that his blue scrubs make his eyes look so blue. I shift slightly in my sneakers—I really need to stop thinking about him being attractive. Especially since I hate him.
“All right, girls,” he says, gently tugging the plastic off the body in front of us. “Let’s get started, okay?”
Wendy and Marissa nod eagerly. I just stand there and glare at him.
Dr. Conlon starts tugging a glove onto his left hand while he says, “For starters, can you guys tell me the five major branches of the facial nerve?”
Crickets chirp.
“You don’t have to know all five of them,” he adds quickly. “Just one. Can you tell me one branch?”
“Ophthalmic?” Wendy guesses.
Dr. Conlon pauses in his attempt to pull on the glove.
“Uh, well, no. The eye movement is controlled by three other cranial nerves. Do you know which ones those are?”
More crickets.
“Cranial nerves three, four, and six,” he says as we stare at him blankly. Well, he’s got his work cut out for him. Good luck, Dr. Conlon.
“I knew that,” Marissa says.
“Oh, okay,” Dr. Conlon says, not sounding like he believes her. “Anyway, the branches of the facial nerve are the temporal, zygomatic, buccal, mandibular, and cervical. There’s a mnemonic: To Zanzibar By Motor Car.”
At least this time the mnemonic doesn’t involve sex.
Wendy crinkles her nose. “Where’s Zanzibar?”
“I think it’s in Australia,” Marissa says.
“Actuall
y, it’s in Africa,” Dr. Conlon says patiently.
“Who’s heard of Zanzibar?” Wendy says. “Zurich would be better. That’s in Switzerland. I went to Zurich in college with my boyfriend.”
“Um, fine,” Dr. Conlon says. “You’re welcome to use ‘To Zurich By Motor Car.’”
“And what’s a motor car, anyway?” Wendy adds. “Isn’t that just the same as a car?”
Okay, I can’t take another minute of this.
“God, Wendy, who the hell cares?” I snap. “This is the dumbest conversation I’ve ever heard in my entire life!”
All three of them stare at me. Long enough that I feel my cheeks turn red.
“Sorry,” I finally say.
I sneak a look at Dr. Conlon, and I could swear there’s a tiny smile playing on his lips.
“All right, girls,” he says. “Let’s get back to work.”
_____
Yes, this session is humiliating. But at the same time, wow, I learn a lot of anatomy. As much as I hate Dr. Conlon right now, I have to admire how patiently he explains everything to us. Wendy and Marissa have plenty more stupid questions in the queue, but he fields each of them expertly and doesn’t even make them feel like they said something really dumb.
When the hour is up, Dr. Conlon dismisses Wendy and Marissa.
“Why don’t you clean up here, Rachel,” he says.
“Why me?” I shoot back at him as the other girls hightail it out the heavy lab door.
He regards me for a minute. “We’ll take turns.”
“Wonderful,” I say.
He pulls the glove off his left hand. “I’m glad you came today, Rachel.”
“I didn’t have a choice, did I?”
“You always have a choice,” he says. “It’s just that this time, you made the right choice.”
I guess he’s implying that I made the wrong choice when I slept with him. Then again, I didn’t hear any complaints at the time. So I wish he’d drop the holier than thou attitude.
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