Page 16 of The Naughty Professor

Chapter Fourteen

Thorne

“I’m not Dr. Sterling right now.” Jax’s grin flashed like a sin I was about to commit twice. “He’s a loser. I’m Jax.”

Then his hand was in my hair and his mouth was on mine again—hot, sure, and unafraid.

The crowd detonated around us, a roar of catcalls, applause, and wild, delighted chaos.

Someone shouted, “Get it, gurl!” Even so, all I could hear was the rush of blood in my ears and the impossible fact that I was kissing him back.

I should have pulled away. Should have remembered where I was, what this looked like—what it meant. But none of it mattered when his tongue brushed mine and the world fell out from under me.

He broke the kiss before I could embarrass myself completely. His forehead rested against mine for one dizzy heartbeat, and he smiled like he knew exactly what he’d done to me. “Meet me outside the dressing room after the show,” he murmured.

Then he stood, fluid as a cat, every muscle gleaming under the lights. The crowd howled as he strutted back toward the stage, hips rolling to the rhythm. I stayed where I was, staring, breathless and probably gaping like some dazed fool.

He moved differently now—looser, wilder. Confidence poured out of him in waves, and the audience drank it in like communion wine. Every spin, every snap of his hips, drew another scream from the crowd. The DJ shouted something I didn’t catch over the music, but the men went feral for him.

Jax played to them, but his eyes kept flicking toward me. Just quick glances—tiny sparks that hit their mark every time. A wink here, a smirk there, the kind of wordless teasing that made my pulse race.

My brain couldn’t process it. Felix Sterling, the shy adjunct who never made eye contact in the faculty lounge, was Jax—the glitter-drenched performer now crawling backward across the stage like temptation personified.

The music thumped through my chest, a heavy, steady pulse that felt too close to my heartbeat. I tried to breathe normally, but all I could think about was the taste of him still on my lips. The way his voice had dropped when he said, “I’m Jax.”

It was absurd. Reckless. Inappropriate in more ways than I could count. And yet—I’d never felt more alive.

The lights strobed blue, then red, washing his skin in waves of color. He flipped his hair back, sweat and glitter catching in the light, and the entire bar screamed his name.

Jax. Jax. Jax.

He grinned, soaking in the noise like he was born for it, and for one raw, electric second I believed it—this version of him, fearless and shining, was who he’d been hiding all along.

I ran a hand over my face, trying to collect myself, but it was useless. The smell of sweat and cologne, the bass trembling through the floor, the image of him moving with that unstudied grace—it was all too much.

The crowd surged closer to the stage as he dropped to his knees, one hand reaching out toward the audience. His gaze swept past them, found me again, and locked. A tiny, secret smile curved his mouth, and my mouth went dry.

Then he resumed dancing, spinning, strutting, alive in a way that made everything else in the room fade away.

I sank back into my chair, heartbeat hammering against my ribs. My mind kept repeating the same question, over and over, like a mantra that had lost its meaning.

How did this even happen?

* * *

The show ended in a riot of noise—cheers, applause, dollar bills fluttering through the air.

The lights dimmed, the DJ shouted something about tipping your bartender, and the crowd surged toward the bar.

I stayed rooted in place, still trying to catch my breath.

My mind was a kaleidoscope of disbelief.

Before I could stand, two figures appeared through the dispersing throng—Lorna and Joan. They were opposites even in the way they approached: Lorna bounced on her heels, bracelets jangling like victory bells, while Joan looked like she’d just swallowed a lemon whole.

“Well, well, Professor Carr!” Lorna practically sang it. “You sly dog! You’ve been holding out on us.” I opened my mouth, but she barreled on. “Lord have mercy, if you don’t get lucky tonight, I’m filing a complaint with the universe. Damn that was hot!”

“Lorna,” I started, “please—”

“Please what? Don’t ‘please’ me.” She fanned herself with one jeweled hand, laughing loud enough to turn heads. “Honey, if that man doesn’t put glitter on your pillow by sunrise, I’m gonna be pissed off. At least one of us should get to try him out.”

Beside her, Joan stood stiff as a lamppost, every muscle in her face fighting to maintain dignity and failing spectacularly. Her lipstick was smudged at the corner, her hair askew from the earlier chaos, and her eyes—God help me—looked ready to ignite.

She let out a brittle laugh that belonged in a drawing room, not a gay bar. “Well, I must say,” she began, voice quivering under the weight of suppressed hysteria, “that was… educational. I didn’t know our esteemed faculty were so, ah, well-rounded.”

Lorna cackled. “Oh, honey, that boy’s got more than a degree—he’s got tenure in temptation.”

Joan shot her a glare sharp enough to cut glass. “Some of us still have standards, Lorna.”

“Standards?” Lorna’s grin turned wicked. “Sweetheart, Professor Carr just got kissed senseless by an Adonis in body glitter. Standards don’t apply.”

Joan’s mouth opened, closed, opened again. Then she made a strangled sound somewhere between a scoff and a whimper.

Lorna hooked an arm through hers before she could spiral further. “Come on, Joan. Let’s get you a drink before you explode.”

“I’m not exploding!” Joan snapped, even as Lorna dragged her away toward the bar. “I’m perfectly composed! Perfectly—”

The rest was swallowed by the music restarting.

I exhaled, pressing a hand to my temple. My pulse hadn’t settled. The world felt slightly off-kilter, colors too sharp, sounds too close.

Sean appeared then, grinning like a devil who’d just won a bet. “You,” he said, clapping a hand on my shoulder, “are the luckiest bastard in this club. Did you see his face when he looked at you? Jesus, Thorne, I thought he was gonna melt right into your lap.”

I gave a vague nod, though I barely heard him. My thoughts were spinning in their own orbit, louder than the music.

“I—uh—need a minute,” I said.

Sean raised an eyebrow. “Sure you do. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t—wait, forget that. Do everything I would.” He winked and disappeared into the crowd.

I moved toward the back hallway, where the music dulled to a distant pulse. The air was cooler there, tinged with the faint smell of sweat and cologne. A red EXIT sign buzzed overhead. I leaned against the brick wall outside the dressing room door, folding my arms to keep them from shaking.

The noise of the club faded behind me.

And then it was just me—and my thoughts.

The first kiss since the divorce. Four years of carefully built walls, undone in a heartbeat. Years of silence pretending I was content grading papers alone in a too-quiet apartment. Four long years of looking at the world like a philosopher examining a theory instead of a man living a life.

And then there was him.

Felix Sterling. Dr. Sterling. The shy, bumbling chemistry professor who’d once apologized for existing too loudly in a faculty meeting. I’d spent entire semesters forgetting the man existed.

But damn, he most definitely was real.

Because apparently, beneath the cardigans and stammered small talk, Felix Sterling had a secret life—a stage name, a glittering persona, and the kind of confidence that could stop time itself.

Jax.

And he’d kissed me like he’d been waiting years to do it.

I pressed the back of my head against the wall, closed my eyes, and exhaled.

What was I doing? This was madness. Sterling was a colleague. And now, my department head, Joan, hated me for reasons that multiplied hourly. Dating anyone at VCU was out of the question.

But damn it, I hadn’t felt this alive in so long I barely remembered what it felt like.

The dressing room door creaked open.

Jax stepped out, transformed again—tight jeans, black boots, a gauzy black shirt clinging to his skin, glitter still winking faintly along his throat. His hair was damp, eyes dark and bright all at once. He moved with a lazy confidence that sent my pulse racing.

He saw me and smiled, slow and knowing. “Hey, Professor.”

“Felix—” I started, then stopped. “Jax.”

“Mm-hmm.” He crossed the distance between us in two strides. Then his hands were on my chest, pressing me gently but firmly back against the wall. The world narrowed to the space between our breaths.

Before I could speak, he kissed me.

If the first kiss had been shocking, this one was surrender. It wasn’t frantic; it was thorough. Intentional. My knees nearly buckled.

When he pulled back, his lips hovered just over mine. His voice dropped to a velvet whisper.

“Professor Carr,” he said, “are you ready for some private tutoring?”

* * *

The drive to my building was a test of endurance.

Jax lounged in the passenger seat, his jeans a second skin, that black shirt unbuttoned low enough to taunt the part of me that still believed in restraint. The remnants of glitter on his collarbones caught the streetlights like tiny stars, each one daring me to look closer.

I’d warned him—twice—to keep his hands to himself. He’d nodded solemnly, lips twitching with the faintest hint of mischief. Then the first stoplight turned red, and his hand found my thigh.

“Hands to yourself,” I said, though the words came out softer than I meant.

“Sure thing, Professor.” The title rolled off his tongue like a caress.

The light turned green. I exhaled. And then, at the next red light, his fingers wandered again—slow, deliberate circles working their way up my thigh.

By the time I pulled into the underground garage, my knuckles had gone white around the steering wheel.

Every nerve in my body was alive, sparking against the tight coil of self-control I’d wrapped around myself for years.

When we got out of the car, I nearly ran to the elevator on the other side of the garage, while Jax casually strolled up behind me, softly whistling.

“We have all night, Professor,” Jax murmured while we waited for the elevator. The damn thing took forever. I turned to him, and my knees nearly buckled when I saw him licking his lips. “There’s no rush.”

Finally, the doors slid open, and we stepped inside. It was all I could do not to attack him. But the security camera on the ceiling kept my hands firmly at my sides.

The elevator doors slid shut, and we stood inches apart, the hum of the motor vibrating faintly through the floor. I could see him in the reflection behind me—his gaze traveling over me like a touch he hadn’t yet dared to make.

“Seven floors,” I said, mostly to fill the silence.

Jax smiled, slow and predatory. “That’s six too many.”

The elevator crept past the fourth floor. Then—click. The sudden stop made my breath hitch. The red emergency button glowed beneath his fingers.

“Jax,” I warned, though even I could hear the fracture in my voice. “There’s, um, a camera.”

He turned toward me, the mischief in his smile sharpening into hunger. “Couldn’t wait.”

Then he closed the distance.

The first brush of his mouth was a spark; the second was a storm. My back hit the mirrored wall as his hand slid into my hair, tilting my head just so. His kiss was deep and certain, unhurried but merciless. The world narrowed to the taste of him—warm, insistent, and electric.

I caught his arms, meaning to push him away. Instead, I pulled him closer. The mirror was cool at my back; while he was all heat and motion in front.

Jax kissed like he danced—commanding, fluid, unrelenting. His fingers traced the line of my jaw, the side of my throat, down to the edge of my collar where the fabric met my skin.

“God, you make this too easy,” he murmured against my mouth.

“Easy?” I managed, breath catching. “I’m wondering if I’m gonna survive tonight.”

He chuckled, low and rough. “You’ll survive, trust me.”

Some fragments of reason surfaced long enough for me to find the emergency button again. I hit it, and the elevator jolted back to life.

He smiled against my lips. “Daddy, I want you so bad.”

I forced a breath. “Not another word.”

When the doors opened, we stepped into the dim hallway, our shadows stretching long beneath the low lights. My hands shook as I reached for my keys. They slipped from my fingers, and I knelt to retrieve them—then froze.

The denim of his jeans strained with the outline of his very large hard cock.

“Jesus,” I breathed, and as soon as I leaned forward to mouth it, a door opened somewhere down the hallway. I stood too fast, fumbling the key into the lock. The door swung open, and we stumbled inside.

Jax’s hands were on me again, his body pressing mine backward until the couch caught the back of my knees. I fell into it, and he followed, straddling me.

“We shouldn’t,” I whispered, even as my hands found the hem of his shirt, fingers slipping beneath to trace the lean muscles of his back. “We work together, and...”

“Says who?” Jax’s voice was a low growl that seemed to resonate in the very core of me. He dipped his head, pressing a searing kiss just below my ear. “Says the professor who’s had enough of rules?”

I groaned, tilting my head to give him better access. “You’re going to be the death of me, Jax.”

He pulled back just enough to meet my eyes, the intensity in his stare sending a jolt of electricity straight through me. “Or maybe,” he said, his lips curving into a wicked smile, “I’m going to bring you back to life.”

With that, he claimed my mouth again, and all my doubts, all my hesitations, dissolved in the heat of his kiss.

Jax’s fingers deftly worked the buttons of my shirt, each one undone a surrender, a step further into the abyss.

He broke the kiss, then his mouth followed the trail of exposed skin, tongue darting out to taste, to tease.

I was moaning and gasping like I’d never been touched before.

“Tell me what you want, Professor,” Jax murmured, his breath hot against my chest.

I wanted to say something sexy, something that would keep me ahead, in control. But the words that tumbled out were raw and honest. “You. Just you.”

“You’ve got me,” Jax breathed. “Now take me to bed.”