The literature classroom smells of chalk dust and the lavender water Mrs. Halloway uses to combat the boys' sweat.
I sit at my desk with Petra settled on my lap, her weight familiar and deliberately positioned. She shifts—hips rolling slightly as if finding comfort—and I know the motion is calculated.
"You're tense," she murmurs against my ear, fingers walking up my chest. "Still thinking about earlier?"
We've already fucked once today, up against the lockers in the boys' bathroom, her mouth covered by my hand to muffle the sounds she makes.
"Thinking about how you bit my shoulder when you came," I whisper, thumb tracing circles on her hip. "Thinking about making you do it again."
And I do intend to fuck her again this evening. More than once. At my place, in my bedroom, with the door deliberately ajar so the sound carries down the hallway to where Skye will be trying to read or sleep or pretend she doesn't hear.
Petra is many things, but silent isn't one of them.
I feel myself hardening against her thigh and see the satisfaction bloom across her face—dark eyes softening, lips parting in that way she thinks is seductive.
"There he is," she whispers, rolling her hips once. "Miss me already?"
She believes this reaction belongs to her, to the memory of her nails digging into my shoulders hours ago.
She doesn't know I'm imagining Skye's face instead: the flush that climbed her throat yesterday when we argued, the way her composure cracked for one unguarded second before she rebuilt it.
I picture that same flush spreading as she lies in bed listening to Petra scream my name, and my arousal sharpens into something almost violent.
Petra traces patterns on my collarbone and I let her, cataloging the way she looks at me when she thinks I won't notice. The softness around her mouth. The hope she tries to hide beneath practiced casualness.
"You're distracted," Petra murmurs against my jaw, her fingers tracing patterns on my collarbone. "Still thinking about that paper you owe for Halloway's class?"
"Among other things." I press my palm against her lower back. "When am I not thinking about a dozen things at once?"
"You could try being present for once." Her voice carries that edge of petulance that surfaces whenever she feels ignored. "I'm right here, you know. Physically and otherwise. Most men would consider that a gift."
"Most men don't have my attention span." I let my thumb trace idle circles against her hip through her skirt. "Or my stamina."
She's in love with me—has been for years, probably—and I don't give a flying fuck. This is precisely why I choose older women, women who have learned what "no strings attached" actually means.
Petra is twenty-two, finishing her graduate studies, old enough to know better and young enough to have forgotten. I use this knowledge without guilt. Love is a weakness people advertise; I simply read the signs and adjust accordingly.
Tommy Dixon's laugh drags me back to the present—too loud, deliberately crude.
"—bet she's a screamer," Tommy is saying, and Ean Casey leans forward with that hungry look he gets when discussing anything female. "Something about the quiet ones, you know? All that repression has to go somewhere."
"The new literature tutor," Ean clarifies, catching my attention. "Have you seen her? Fraser, I think her last name is. Showed up last week. Legs for days and this whole stern librarian thing that's doing it for me."
I go still beneath Petra's shifting weight.
Tommy's linebacker shoulders strain against his blazer, and the crooked bridge of his nose still carries the story of sophomore year when he took an elbow during practice and refused to leave the field.
Ean has those sharp cheekbones that photograph well for team portraits, the quicker hands that made him invaluable as our starting midfielder.
We became friends through shared violence on the lacrosse field—through the kind of bone-deep understanding that develops between men who know how to hurt each other and choose not to.
"Stern is an understatement," Tommy says, cracking his knuckles. "She looked at me in the hallway yesterday like I'd personally offended her ancestors. Didn't even smile back when I said hello."
"That's because your version of hello involves staring at a woman's tits," Ean retorts. "Try making eye contact first. Revolutionary concept, I know."
"Since when do you care about eye contact?" Tommy punches Ean's shoulder. "You're the one who spent all of junior year working through the cheerleading squad without learning a single name."
"That's different. Those were cheerleaders. This one's faculty." Ean's voice drops into calculation. "Faculty requires finesse and patience. You have to make them think it's their idea."
"And you think you've got what it takes to crack that ice queen?" Tommy laughs. "She probably hasn't been touched since the Clinton administration."
"Maybe that's exactly why she needs someone to remind her what she's missing." Ean grins. "I give it two weeks before she's eating out of my hand."
Tommy would approach Skye with blunt force—compliments like hammer blows. Ean would be subtler, would study her first, would probably succeed where Tommy failed.
Both would be disasters. Both would ruin her in ways that do not interest me—or rather, interest me too much.
I wonder what their faces would do if they discovered she is my stepsister. If they knew she lives in my house, sleeps next door, wears those shirts with nothing underneath.
"Kai." Petra's voice cuts through my surveillance. "Are you even listening to me? I asked you twice about this weekend."
"What about this weekend?"
"My roommate is visiting her parents, so I'll have the place to myself." The hope in her voice grates against my nerves. "I thought maybe you could come over and we could actually spend some time together."
"This weekend doesn't work for me." I watch the light dim in her eyes before she masks it. "Family obligations."
"Right. Of course." She forces a smile that reaches nowhere near her eyes. "Family comes first. Heaven forbid we actually make plans that don't involve your father's schedule."
"Petra." I let warning bleed into my tone.
"No, it's fine. Forget I mentioned it." She shifts on my lap, and I know the movement is deliberately provocative. "I'm used to being your afterthought by now."
Mrs. Halloway enters in a rustle of tweed and disapproval, her reading glasses perched on her nose. The classroom noise dims into something approaching respect.
Petra slides from my lap, but not before pressing her palm against my thigh. I catch her wrist before she can pull away entirely, leaning close enough to feel her breath hitch.
"Busy after classes," I murmur against her ear. "But I'll be waiting for you. My place at seven."
Her eyes widen. We've never used my bedroom before.
"Your place?" Her voice comes out higher than usual. "As in, your actual room? Where you sleep?"
"That's generally what my place means, yes."
"But we've never—you've never invited me there before." She searches my face for meaning she will never find. "Why now? What changed?"
"Does it matter?" I release her wrist. "Unless you're not interested."
"No, I—of course I'm interested." The eagerness in her voice would be pathetic if it were not so useful. "Seven o'clock. I'll be there. Should I bring anything? Wine? Something to eat?"
"Just yourself." I settle back in my chair. "I have everything else covered."
She nods, flushed with anticipation, constructing a future from a single invitation to a room that will never belong to her.
I am almost sorry for the hope rekindled on Petra's face.
Almost.
But then I picture Skye in the dark, her hands fisted in her sheets, and any remaining sympathy evaporates into anticipation.
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