Page 38 of Dark Notes

“Your heart and stomach. Where else? Describe the feeling in your nipples.”

A flash of heat sweeps across my neck, through my chest, and builds between my legs. I squeeze my thighs together, humiliated by the reaction, confused by the flush of weird emotions, but I latch onto the feeling I understand. “This is wrong.”

“Not wrong. It’s inappropriate. But we went way past inappropriate the first day. Tell me how your nipples feel. I won’t criticize your answer as long as it’s the truth.”

I suck in a shaky breath and give him what he wants. “Itchy and tight.”

“Good girl.”

The tingle between my legs grows stronger, heavier, more demanding.

He pushes his hips against mine to stop my squirming, and the hardest part of him, the part I hate most, jabs against my stomach. “Now put a name to all those feelings.”

“I don’t know.” I can’t breathe. I can’t think. “I can’t.”

“Dig deep, Ivory.”

My throat closes up.

“What do you feel when you haven’t eaten.”

“Hungry.”

His hard eyes are too close, too unsafe. “How about when you see a beautiful piano?”

“Want.”

“And when I gave you praise after your performance of Islamey?”

“Desire for more.”

“Hunger. Want. Desire. Is that what you’re feeling as I hold you against the wall?”

Is it? The aching hunger for something between my legs, my out-of-control heartbeat, and the burning need to express it, talk about it? My head is too mixed-up. Yes, he’s a beautiful man, and I hear all the girls talk about wanting to do him. And yes, I crave his appreciation for my talent and his good-girls and his warm hand on my face, but this? The length of his body against mine? Holding me immobile?

He’s just holding me. Not grabbing my boobs or thrusting between my legs. He’s giving me attention. Asking me about my feelings. Without taking.

Jesus, I do want this, from someone I can trust, from my teacher, and I shouldn’t. “I think it’s desire. And shame.” Humiliation.

He presses his lips against my forehead. “Mmm. There’s my girl.”

“I don’t want to be gagged and tied and—”

His finger falls across my mouth then returns to my back. “Not now. But you’ll think about it. The idea will consume you. Then we’ll talk about it again.”

“But you’re my teacher!”

“I said we’ll talk about it.” He leans back and rests his hands on my hips. “Where will you get the money to pay me back?”

The subject change gives me whiplash. “I’ll have it by Monday, I promise.”

“That’s not what I asked.”

I close my eyes, blocking out his perceptive gaze. He knows my mom is unemployed. I’m here till seven every night and practicing at Stogie’s till eleven, so he knows I can’t work. There’s no way I can tell him I’m doing Prescott’s homework and essentially whoring myself out to pay the bills. And I don’t know why, but lying to him scares me more than him discovering the truth.

Opening my eyes, I do the only thing I can. I shake my head.

His expression hardens, and his scowl overtakes my entire world. “Let’s talk about the punishment for throwing shit at your teacher.”

He’s only inches from my face, with a frightening glare and a body twice my size. Isn’t that punishment enough?

“You have a choice. Tell me where you get your money. Or bare your ass for a spanking.”

All the blood drains from my face to my feet. There is no choice.

I flex my hands against Ivory’s waist, my entire body strumming with the thought of reddening her tight ass. But my brain screams for her to make the other choice, to tell me her secrets and steer me away from this dangerous temptation.

With the wall at her back and her gorgeous tits rising and falling against my chest, she lifts her brown eyes and whispers, “The spanking.”

Her breathy response hits me in the gut and tunnels to my groin, wrenching a guttural sound from my throat and propelling my hips into a hungry grind against hers. She gasps when she feels me. Fuck, how could she not feel me? I’ve never been this hard in my life.

This is a mistake. It’s Shreveport and Joanne and a goddamn slippery slope to ruination all over again.

I hold my body stock-still against hers, my fingers digging into her waist.

She’s not Joanne. This isn’t love or attachment. It’s not even sex. I’m in control, and her punishment is due.

Releasing her, I step back and calm my breaths.

I gave her the choice, and I’m a man of my word. “Turn around. Hands on the wall.”

Her face is a sheet of white as she pivots slowly and follows my order. The slim brown skirt cuts an erotic outline around her pert ass—much better than the black tarp thing she wore a few days ago. The swells of her cheeks are neither too big nor too small, proportioned with her narrow waist and perfect for my hands.