Page 44 of Beautiful Trauma
I ran my hand through his hair. “I break all my rules for you, Henry. Maybe you can give me just this one victory.”
“You’ve been keeping score?” Henry asked disbelievingly. “I think I should be insulted. Shouldn’t I?”
His confusion made me laugh. “Nope.”
“I might be insulted,” Henry said, nodding. “Yeah, I think you need to do some smooth talking here.”
I laughed harder. “Just let me have this victory, and I promise to share it with you.”
“When did you start keeping tally?” Henry asked, attempting to wiggle out from under me until I gripped his ass and thrust my erection against his. “Oh.” His breathless gasp puffed against my smiling lips.
“The confrontation in the bathroom was the first time I realized you had the upper hand in our relationship, and I was seemingly powerless to stop you.”
“Me? Upper hand?”
“Henry, you must know by now how completely you unravel me. I want things with you I haven’t wanted with another person in a very long time.”
He studied my face for several seconds, and a dark cloud briefly passed over his expression, eclipsing his joy. What was it? Disbelief or had I read our growing relationship all wrong? “How would I know that? I mean, it’s evident how much you physically desire me, and I can tell you care about me as a person too. But…” Henry’s words trailed off, and he swallowed hard.
“Go on.”
Henry shook his head. “I don’t want to ruin our night.”
“You won’t,” I assured him, knowing this conversation was long overdue because Henry deserved more than I was giving him. “Something is bothering you, and I want you to tell me.”
Henry closed his eyes, and I wasn’t sure if he was looking for courage or maybe searching for the right words to say. I’d noticed that Henry’s boldness typically resulted from a situation that angered or aroused him. This conversation appeared to do neither. He took a deep breath and met my gaze once more. “I’m not asking you for promises or assurances, Ezra, but I would like to know if you see a time where you and I will date openly? Is that something you even want?”
I had to weigh what I wanted with what I could give him. How cruel would it be for me to tell Henry that I wanted to show him off to the world in one breath then tell him it wasn’t possible in the very next? Yes, I wanted to date him openly, but to do so could result in consequences I wasn’t ready to face. Even if I hadn’t broken code of conduct rules, I’d be a laughingstock among the faculty.There goes another horny professor who can’t keep his dick in his pants.I’d never wanted to be that guy, but I was on the verge of risking the reputation just so I could have my Henry.
“Forget I said anything,” Henry said, mistaking my quiet for impending rejection.
“Henry,” I said softly. “I’m not ashamed of you if that’s what you’re asking.”
“That isn’t what I asked, but maybe it follows the same vein. If I weren’t a student at your college, would you want to date me for real?”
The answer was unequivocally yes, and I was ashamed he didn’t know it. “Henry, I—” Whatever I was about to say was cut off when my door opened and my parents’ voices echoed in the foyer. “What the fuck?” I whispered, scrambling to wrap the blanket tighter around us.
“Ezra!” Mom called out.
Henry’s beautiful eyes nearly bugged out of his head with panic, and his mouth fell open in alarm.
“You left your cell phone on the table at the restaurant,” Dad said, his voice growing louder as they came farther into the condo. “It’s a good thing the manager knows us so well and called to let us know. You took off out of there like a scalded cat. What was so pressing that you left so fast and didn’t realize you left it behind?”
I popped up and looked at them from over the back of the couch. “Um, hi. You might not want to come any closer.”
Startled, my parents jerked to a stop. Mom gasped and brought her hand up to her chest while Dad grinned like a loon. Both of them took in my blanket-draped shoulders and flushed face and knew exactly why I’d left the restaurant so quickly and what they’d interrupted.
“Now, I get it,” Dad said, wearing an attaboy grin.
“Um, we’ll just set your phone down on the table in the foyer and head on out,” Mom said, backing up.
“Why don’t you leave the spare key I gave you too,” I suggested. “I can’t have you popping in here and killing the mood whenever I have my boyfriend over.”Boyfriend.The word came out of nowhere, but I liked the way it sounded. I guess Henry had my answer after all. Myboyfriendstiffened, and I turned my head to look down at him. Tears gathered in his eyes, and I wanted to lean down and reassure him, but it needed to wait until we were alone again so I could do it properly. I winked to reassure him, and the smile he gave me in response nearly blinded me with its brilliance. I turned my attention back to my parents, who stood there wearing identical dopey grins on their faces. “Do you mind?”
“Not at all,” my mother said. She looked at the television and noticed the movie playing. “Oh my goodness. I haven’t seenMy Cousin Vinnyin years. I tried to get you to watch this with me, but you never would. It seems like your boyfriend has great taste in movies.”
Dad nodded. “Classic movie about ‘two yutes,’” he said in an exaggerated New York accent.What the fuck?
“The two what? ‘Did you say yutes?’” Mom asked in an equally embellished Southern drawl.