I had to give Luke credit. I don’t know how he stayed so relaxed. I wasn’t up there. I wasn’t naked. And still, under Léo’s hot and mocking gaze, my nipples tightened to tingling and moisture pooled into my panties.
“Fifteen minutes. Shapes. Then form.” The instructions were clear and then Léo disappeared behind us to his desk while we awkwardly went to work.
“Thank you, Troy… thank you,” Kev said cryptically through teeth clenched into a smile.
A nervous laugh escaped me.
For the next few minutes, we sat in relative silence, our hands moving in swift strokes, capturing his simple stance in a series of boxes and circles, adjoined by rough lines, darkened to give the appearance of a human instead of a stack of shapes. It was an outline of the form. As instructed, I didn’t get caught up in the details—including the dick details, leaving that area obnoxiously blank.
“Stop.”
I dropped my pencil on the ground at the rough command, a new rush of heat flooding between my thighs that I wasn’t able to cross because the easel sat between them, the irony of the naked man on the paper between them not lost on me.
My heart thudded out of my chest as Léo began walking behind us, looking at what we’d done. It was annoying. Like Miss Clicker. Beat, beat, beat. I wanted to rip it apart so it would stop. It was so loud, I didn’t even hear what he said to Kevin before I felt him behind me. So close I thought if I just leaned back a hair I could rest against his legs.
“The next fifteen minutes, go back over each sketch and add more details. We work in layers. Slowly adding… slowly applying the layers of life to the image,” he said from behind me and for a second, I thought he was going to ignore me—my work—completely. Unremarkable, came to mind. “Details, Miss Milanovic. That means the next time I look at your work, I should be able to tell he is a man. Unless you are too uncomfortable drawing his penis, in which case you should reconsider this class.”
Oh God.
My vision blurred. Was it possible to pass out while sitting down?
My face was burning red as I felt everyone’s—including Luke’s—gaze on me. Mortified. There was a man standing naked in front of a bunch of college kids and yet I was the one who managed to be mortified by this situation.
I hated him.
I stared at him like I should shoot daggers out of my eyes as Léo walked back to his desk, leaving me to face his mortifying statement alone.
Kev laughed next to me. “Seriously, Troy?” he teased while everyone else moved on.
“He. Said. Outline,” I bit out through clenched teeth.
“Yeah well, when the thing is like a third limb, you outline it.” I couldn’t tell if he was being serious or if he was trying to take some of the heat off of me by being opening appreciative of the task assigned to us. “I’d be happy to help you if you want.”
“I’m good,” I bit out.
With the kind of determination that can only be borne from the burning need to prove someone wrong, I threw myself into the assignment. The rest of the class passed in the same manner—fifteen-minute cycles of adding more detail until the first hour was over. Then, Léo had Luke switch poses and we began again.
Time flew. Not because I was working, but because I was waiting. I was waiting for those few moments when he’d come and stand—too close—behind me. I was waiting to hear his critiques so that I could do better the next time. The battle had become like a game. He cut me down and I kept finding better ways to get back up, forcing him to work harder to break me. And I did do better. I did better until he finally had nothing left to say about my sketch.
“That is all for tonight.” I let out the breath I didn’t realize that I’d been holding, a cease-fire being called for the present.
“Wait until I tell Jake about class tonight,” Kev said with a grin.
I stared at him, wondering how and where he still had this energy from. My body felt like it had been fighting for its life for the past three hours and while it still hummed with adrenaline, I knew that as soon as that fled my system, I would collapse.
“I’m sure you’ll tell me all about it,” I said wryly as I shoved my stuff into my art bag, slicing my finger on the newsprint because I wasn’t paying attention; I was too busy watching Léo up on the platform, chatting with Luke.
“You’re taking forever, Troy, c’mon, I’m going to be late.” He tapped his foot on the floor for emphasis.
“So go ahead! You don’t have to wait for me. I… I need to talk to Professor Baudin anyway.” He raised an eyebrow and I rolled my eyes. “I just want to thank him for last weekend.”
I hadn’t told Kev everything, but I mentioned that Wes had cornered me and how Léo stepped in and put him in his place.
“Okay…” he drawled out with a wondering gaze before he gave me a ‘see ya later’ and practically skipped to the door.
When I looked back, the room was clear except for Léo and me.
He cleared his throat and began to walk toward the desk when my voice shot out before he got too far.
“Professor Baudin,” I said even as his name cracked coming out of my mouth.
He didn’t bother to hide the groan of frustration when he turned back to me.
“I… I just wanted to thank you for the other night. At Rhymes,” I stammered, my hands picking up my bag and slinging it onto my shoulder.
There it was again—the subtle tick of his jaw—poised for attack.
“Don’t thank me, Miss Milanovic,” he said curtly, each word stealing a little more of my courage. “I mistook the room for the men’s room. I’m not here to protect you. I’m not your father.”
I froze, gaping, as he spun and left the room.
I’m not your father.
Shame washed over me. And not just because the first part of what he said was a lie—he didn’t mistake the room and he did protect me; we both knew it. Soul-crushing shame came from the other thing that we both knew—my father wouldn’t have been there to protect me. And to insinuate that he would was like a stab in the heart.
Hot angry tears marched down my face. I didn’t know how he knew, but he’d heard my story. Probably from my goddamn mouthy mother. I hated her in that moment, too, but not as much as I hated him.
Rage was better than alcohol for lowering inhibitions in my opinion. Rage didn’t just suggest that you act, it made action imperative. So, with my body boiling, I stormed out of the studio, my head flicking through the now only half-lit halls in search of the office with the sign ‘Professor Baudin’ hanging on the door like his own scarlet letter.
I threw open the door to his office and he didn’t even flinch, the paper he was holding in his hands tipping down slightly.
“How. Dare. You.” My words were laced with loathing as I slammed it shut behind me, not caring if there was anyone else on the floor to hear; I had a feeling there wasn’t. “What is the matter with you? I was thanking you. Do you know what that means? Do you understand the English or should I have said merci for you to get it through your thick skull?”
He set the papers down gently on the desk. I think it was the first time I’d ever seen him do something gently—and that’s how I knew I was in trouble. He stood slowly, the lion locking in on his prey, and rounded the desk. The air, the scent, everything about the moment oozed the calm before the kill.
The world shifted violently underneath me, the door against my back was the only stable thing that I could cling to, and even that was beginning to slip from my consciousness. His gaze could have ended a war—or started one—depending on how you looked at it. Cold and sharp, it would have cut a stronger person to nothing. He may know about my dad, but he didn’t know that I wasn’t afraid of being cut; he didn’t know that when it came to it, I would cut myself in order to become stronger.
No, that stare was meant to make men fall underneath it.
Too bad I wasn’t afraid of the fall.
He crowded me against the door, like the proximity of
his hard body could force me back through the door.
“Mon Dieu, I did what was necessary,” he growled, stopping too close in front of me. Raw, bitter agony flicked across his face like the sun peeking from behind clouds—bright and blinding for a split second before the clouds of frustration crossed over his features again. “I don’t need your thanks. Don’t want it.” His head dipped even closer to mine and my breath crawled inside my lungs and clung to the walls, begging not to be let go. “Now get out of my office, little girl.”
“Who told you?” I demanded, my lip quivering as the last of my tears tumbled down my cheek. “Who told you about my dad?”
His smirk was hard and fast. Careless. Like a hit and run, it left me shaking. My nipples poked against the fabric of my t-shirt, the stupid flower one I had on the other week. My hips pressed back against the door, a reflex so that they didn’t press against him. My thighs locked together, trying to stop his words from tapping more moisture from between them.
“No one had to tell me,” he ground out, staring intently at my lips that interrogated him. “It’s written all over your face that you’re searching for someone to fill Daddy’s shoes. Poor little girl searching for someone to give her attention and tell her that she’s pretty and perfect and smart.” Each word was spat out like it was a curse, one that made my stomach boil.
I hated him.
I hated him with every molecule of oxygen in every breath I took and every beat of my heart.
I hated him with the burning of a thousand suns.
“And what about you?” I shot back. “Aren’t you just searching for a quick screw to try and make you forget how miserable you are?”
“That person is not me, petite,” he ended flatly, barely managing to pull the mask over the enraged lust in his eyes. “Now, this is the last time I will repeat myself and save you. Do not find yourself in a locked room with a strange man again.”
He reached for the doorknob behind me, bringing him less than an inch away from my entire body. He hovered over me, cornered and caged; I was his prey and at his mercy. When he went to pull the knob and open the door, I pushed all my weight against it, fighting for captivity.
I hated him. I hated him for making me hate myself because he was right. I could practically taste his loathing for me in his words. But it wasn’t enough. It wasn’t fair. I wanted to make him hate himself, too.
He planted his palms on either side of my face, his eyes piercing into mine, daring me to disobey.
That’s what we did—he and I—we hated with a force that was never enough until it was self-inflicted. I knew what would make him do that. I knew what he wanted and what he hated himself for wanting.
Me.
As surely as I felt the lust that clawed at my body, I choked on the desire that was strangling his.
“You’re right,” I said with a low voice. “You’re not my dad.” I gave him a beat to think that I was bowing out in defeat. He’d learn that I’d destroy myself it meant that he would be taken down, too. “Because as much as I hate the both of you, I would never kiss him.”
My hands dug into his already rumpled shirt as I pulled myself up and crushed my lips to his. It was fast, but it wasn’t fast enough where he didn’t have time to stop me if he wanted. And he didn’t.
I felt the fullness of his lips that I’d studied for weeks now hot and firm beneath mine. They were firmer than I expected, but maybe that was because he wasn’t kissing me back. Even still, my body arced with the contact. It wasn’t enough, this kiss. I needed more.
I dragged in a frustrated breath, noticing how even the scent of him was disheveled, the rich spice rolled off in potent waves followed by empty lulls; instead of a steady abuse to my senses, I sucked in hard and fast breaths searching for stronger waves, not worrying that they might drown me.
With a frustrated moan, I pressed against him for another second before I pulled my face away. He might not have kissed me back, but he was panting just the same.
Oh, God. What had I done?
What did you do now, Troy?
You kissed your professor.
You. Kissed. Your. Professor.
His gaze made my skin crawl with need. Like a snake, it slithered nefariously over every limb before it began to squeeze. Tighter and tighter. Hotter and hotter. I felt everything tingle as desire choked out circulation.
“Is that your attempt to get my attention, ma petite?” he mocked me with a voice that rasped with sex.
My chin ticked up a notch. Defiant. Always defiant. Even if I was going to fall, it would be with my head held high. I looked at him determined to not let him see the fear that bubbled—that insisted I apologize.
“Did it work?” I hated the breathy whisper I spoke with, but at least I spoke.
Every edge in his face hardened and those deep blue pools turned black, reflecting stark and violent need. “You’re going to have to try much harder, ma petite, if you want my attention.”
My heart fell into my stomach and my eyes broke from his, dropping to his full, parted lips—lips that were still wet from my kiss and still cruel from his words.
I didn’t hear so much as saw what he said next. I watched his perfectly proportioned mouth move and shift as he said, “I’m waiting.”
Did he…
Was he…
Like when the gates open at a horse race, my heart leaped into a gallop. He looked at me like he was starving, needing to devour the thing that would destroy him.
In the things we loathe become the things we love.
This time when I crushed my lips to his, I didn’t kiss a wall, I provoked a lion.
Every inch of me was smashed between the door and his taut body as his mouth ravaged me. Even that wasn’t the right word. What we did wasn’t kissing. It was cruel and demanding and controlling. We fought to conquer and claim lips that only spoke loathing until they touched and confessed to something more. I hadn’t kissed a lot of boys, but that didn’t matter. Nothing would have prepared me for this.
They always talk about French kissing. I always imagined long, languorous kisses that slowly stoked and stirred heat from deep inside your belly. Yeah, this wasn’t that. This was brutal, the way he sucked my tongue and bit at my lips—especially the lower one, like it had wronged him.
Lights, sounds, scents… the world exploded around me. Hate and lust together had sparked a chain reaction that couldn’t be stopped.
We were crazy.
We were mad.
We were mutually. Assured. Destruction.
His hands clasped my face, holding me steady for the assault. In the split seconds when I could focus on the rest of my body without losing the battle my mouth was fighting, I felt all of him—so hot pressed against me. The wide planes of his chest crushed my breasts and lower…
God… lower…
He had to be bigger than Luke. Luke hadn’t been aroused but he was the only naked man I’d ever seen, and it was an inadequate preparation for this. Léo’s erection pressed into my stomach and it felt like it stretched up the entire length of my tummy, the hard ridge digging into me… threatening to impale me.
I whimpered and arched my hips as best I could against him, trapped as I was to the door. With a rabid growl, his thigh jammed between my legs and I clung to it like it was a fucking life raft on a sinking ship. My thighs clamped down and without even thinking, I began to roll my sex against the hard muscle of his leg, needing the pressure and friction.
I was so wet. I felt my panties slip around my swollen sex as I rocked against him. A few more frantic rubs had my dark leggings jammed up and rubbing against my needy clit.
My lips pulled from his with a pop as I gasped, the first sparks of pure, white-hot lightning shooting through my body as I felt my climax building.
“Is this the kind of attention you want?” he growled into my neck, biting angrily at the tender skin, each time making me rock more violently against him.
I cried out, some sort of incoheren
t version of admission, and he laughed. I felt the rush of air against my neck.
“I feel how bad…” He kept talking as I fell farther and farther. “How hungry your pussy is for my attention. She’s slobbering all over my leg begging to be fed, ma petite, isn’t she?”
My head jerked with a nod and my reward was the grinding of his muscled thigh against my throbbing pussy. Gasping, I chased the friction, sliding up and down on his leg. As I moved, I felt the angry, pulsing jerk of his cock against my stomach. It was maddening, knowing I brought him to this. Me. Unremarkable me.
Being taunted on the verge of orgasm is the cruelest torture. I couldn’t listen to his words, but I needed his kiss. My fingers pulled on his hair forcing those vicious lips back to mine. He shoved his tongue into the deepest recesses as I rocked against him, and imagined it was his tongue shoving inside my slippery channel.
His kiss, his touch, his words—like sharp teeth they ripped my body to pieces, and I kept coming back for more. I moaned over and over again into his mouth and he swallowed each one like they fed the darkness inside of him. It was coming. The lightning that had been shooting white heat from the wet friction against my clit was about to be followed by the thunder of my orgasm.
I fought for it. I begged for it. I needed it.
Just like I needed the cuts on my arms and legs, I needed this climax because there was no possible way my body could contain all this desire.
“Give her what she wants, ma chère,” he rasped into my mouth, pressing his leg tighter against my groin. “Let her come on me.”
It was the first time there was ever a softness to his voice, and it was going to make me come all over his leg. Frantic and desperate, I ground against him, humping his leg. Up and down. Up and down. The material of my leggings caught on my clit one last time before the thunder of my orgasm cracked over my body.
The Fall of Troy Page 12
