I love secrets, Mr. Ellis.
Theodore Ellis
CHAPTER XVI
I love secrets, Mr. Ellis.
“Fuck,” I groan, sliding my hands through my freshly washed hair. I was hoping a shower was going to cool my feverish skin and make me see reason. That it would make me forget how her body felt in my hands and the cherry flavor of her lips on my tongue.
None of it helped. I was counting on my wife coming home from her girls' night early. Maybe the hard liquor would make her want me enough to fuck me. But she texted me not too long ago, saying she was staying at her friends, which is code for she’s sleeping at another man’s house. I wondered who it could be for a couple of minutes before I found that I really didn’t care.
So, I did something stupid and accessed Scarlett’s file again, but this time I stole her number and couldn’t stop myself from letting her know that I was still savoring her taste. Now I’m alone in my home with a hard-on for my new eighteen-year-old student, and I don’t know what to fucking do!
I should stop texting her. That would be the appropriate thing to do for a man in my position. I should end whatever this is now, as I should have done back in my class earlier this evening.
I should do a lot of things.
But I decide against every. Single. One.
Call me Theodore.
Somehow, that sentence feels more damning than anything we’ve done. She’s had my touch, but now she has my name. Not many do.
“Fuck… what am I doing?” I question for the hundredth time. I’ve never been so reckless in my life, never stepped one foot out of line; not in my personal life, and sure as fuck not in my professional one. Yet here I am, doing both with someone who is barely legal. I could blame it on my wife and her inability to love me or the strain our marriage puts on my shoulders. Or shit, maybe it's work! The load of being a high school teacher in a terrible economy is finally making me lose my morals…
It could be a million reasons, and I’ll accept any one of them. Just not the one that proves I’m attracted to my student.
The brightening of my phone catches my eye. As her message sits unopened, I sigh, running through my options again.
End this before it gets out of hand, or put everything I’ve ever worked for on the line.
Is she really worth my life? Because that’s what Beth will destroy if she finds out about this.
As I war with my conscience, one thought remains.
No one will ever know.
“No one will ever know.” And just like that, my principles are a thing of the past. I may regret this decision later, but in the dim lighting of my bathroom with nothing but her memory and an awaiting message, I can’t find it in me to care.
Consequences be damned…
Tell me a secret.
Scarlett
I can do better than that.
“I’ll be right back,” I mumble, jumping from the floor as quietly as possible so I don’t disrupt the movie. If they care, they don’t make it known, letting me walk away without so much as a word. That’s more than fine by me. I need them not to care.
Bounding up the stairs with a mission in mind, I fight the voice in the back of my mind, cautioning me that what I’m about to do is a bad idea. But Mr-Theodoreisn’t a boy. He’s a man.
The rules are different.
Once in my room, I close the door softly and examine every corner, but nothing looks as good as the bed.
I’ve done this a few times, but this one is different. It needs to be special. He needs to know thathe’sspecial.
After a couple of adjustments, I finally get my phone propped just right. It captures every angle without exposing too much. Carefully, I scoot back on my knees, trying to prevent my phone from tilting forward on the sheets.
