Total pages in book: 12
Estimated words: 11178 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 56(@200wpm)___ 45(@250wpm)___ 37(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 11178 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 56(@200wpm)___ 45(@250wpm)___ 37(@300wpm)
I took a deep breath and opened the door.
When my brain inadvertently put Professor Henry’s face on the poor stranger from Heart2Heart, I blinked rapidly to try and clear it away.
It didn’t work.
“Mr. Wilde,” he said in his familiar deep voice. The voice that reached down into my belly and made me want to crawl.
I couldn’t breathe. This wasn’t right. This couldn’t be happening. I blinked several times more, silently begging my brain to fix this horrifying malfunction.
When I tried sucking in a breath, I made a wheezing sound and knew without a shadow of a doubt I was suffocating.
“Sorry,” I gasped, letting go of the door to move back into the room. Air. I needed air. I wasn’t getting any air. Maybe the window…
“What’s…? Fuck… Jack? Jack!” His firm grip around my elbow startled me and caused my toe to catch on the carpet. I pitched sideways, but Professor Henry’s arms came around me to keep me from falling face-first onto the bed.
I couldn’t catch my breath, and the fear I was actually going to suffocate made it exponentially worse. Still, part of me still felt like this had to be a dream because I couldn’t conceive of a world where Professor Henry called me by my first name.
“Can’t… br… br…”
He moved me to the foot of the bed and sat me down before squatting down between my knees and taking my face in his big, warm hands. “Look at me.”
I blinked again. Please let this be a horrible mistake. Please tell me this isn’t happening. Just when I thought I’d reached the lowest possible level of mortification, I learned I had further to fall.
“Jack,” he barked. “Listen to me right now, and do as I say. You are okay. It’s okay. Look right here at the space between my eyes. See this? There’s a little freckly spot right there. My sister says it’s the shape of a tennis racquet.”
I couldn’t help but do what he asked. His voice had always been deep and in charge. When he spoke, people listened, and it was no different with me.
I focused on the tennis racquet.
“Breathe slowly,” he said, lowering his voice and slowing it down. My eyes widened in surprise at the gentle tone, but I was too panicked to say anything.
His thumbs brushed over my cheekbones. “Shhh. Slow it down… that’s it… in… out… You’re okay. You’re okay.”
I felt hot tears of embarrassment fill my eyes and spill over before I could blink them away. “S-s-sorry,” I whispered, still trying to breathe. “Y-you d-don’t h-have…”
“Shhh. Don’t try to talk. I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.” He hesitated for a minute before flashing me an easy smile, something I’d never, ever seen on his face before. It was like the sun coming out from behind a dark rain cloud.
The damned thing lit up the entire room and made my heart throw itself against my ribs.
“Besides,” he continued. “If I’m not mistaken, you owe me a hug.”
I squeezed my eyes closed in mortification and felt more tears spill out. This was the absolute worst moment of my life.
And it was happening in front of Professor Henry.
How would I ever recover from this?
FOUR
RIVER
When the door opened, revealing Jack Wilde on the other side, my heart had done a funny little dance of confusion. First, I couldn’t help but think how incredibly inappropriate it would be for me to engage in any physical touch with a student, but then I’d reminded myself he was no longer my student.
I’d already turned in all of my grades for graduate students. The only remaining grades outstanding were for a few students in a low-level undergraduate course.
After I’d successfully reminded myself the fraternization rule didn’t apply here, I felt indescribably giddy.
I was going to get to hold Jack Wilde in my arms all night long.
If he would let me.
This was too good to be true. I’d had an inappropriate crush on this particular grad student since three days before the semester started when I’d seen him jogging on a treadmill at the gym while trying to hold back a bad case of the giggles at something on his phone.
He hadn’t succeeded.
I’d watched him nearly stumble off the equipment while snorting with laughter. Every time he’d tried to get control of himself, he’d look back at the phone and start laughing again.
He was magnetic. I couldn’t keep my eyes off him. Even now, I wanted to drink in every facet of his beautiful face.
But he was panicking. And I couldn’t blame him.
I’d spent the entire semester terrified of stepping out of line, of being caught staring, or worse, getting hard in front of the damned class because he was just that sexy.
His eyes were bright blue green, and his sandy-brown hair was slightly overgrown and always looked messy, like he’d rolled out of bed after being well fucked all night. He was quick to smile and even quicker to make a new friend and put others at ease.