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When class is over, I finally look at her again. She makes a point of standing from her chair and turning her head away from me. As she leaves class, I can’t help myself. I study her hips, swaying from side to side, her round, perfect ass. I examine her thick legs in her black pants. I want her to stop, look over her shoulder, and show me those wide, beautiful eyes.
I try to remind myself she believed I’d hit a woman. She believed that shit. It doesn’t make me want her any less. She saw Kelly, assumed something, and lashed out. Like I’d ever be attracted to my best friend’s daughter. The only woman I ever want or can even think about wanting won’t even look at me.
“What the fuck are you doing here?” I growl the second I push my office door open.
Jane unfolds her legs and sits up. She was resting them on my desk. She’s wearing a bright red one-piece suit. She’s just the sort of person who’d be proud if their outfit caused a car crash. She rests her elbows on my desk.
“You’ve done very well for yourself, Professor.”
I intentionally keep the door open, then stand in front of my desk.
“What’s the matter?” She grins up at me. “Don’t think you’ll be able to resist me?”
I shake my head. “I never should’ve left you at the altar, Jane. That was a terrible thing to do, but, with respect, fuck off.”
“I forgot you prefer them younger.”
“I don’t prefer anything. I…” I quickly stop myself. I was about to start talking about how unique Ellie is, about how she’s the only person, regardless of age, who’s ever made me feel this way. But that would mean giving Jane ammunition. “Why are you here?”
“I tried to convince Vee to drag Piggy out of class.”
I step forward, fist clenched, a reflex at hearing that evil nickname.
Jane grins. That was a victory for her. She wanted to see if I cared. “I’m sorry. That’s how I refer to her sometimes. She said I could. It was a term her bullies used, as she’s clearly told you. You’re close, obviously, but with me, it’s just a joke.”
“Sure it is.”
“Vee won’t pull Ellie out of class,” Jane says, “so I wanted to make sure you weren’t going to do anything foolish.”
“Like tell her the truth,” I say.
“The truth.” She waves a hand. “What is the truth? Maybe I lied to you back then. Maybe I’m telling the truth now. How can you know?”
“Were you lying back then?” I snap.
She laughs. “Listen, I don’t want you upsetting my niece more than you already have. She told her mother about that little slut you had in your house. It’s obviously a pattern of behavior for you.”
I’m not biting. Sarcastically, I say, “You know me, Jane. I fuck twenty students a night before beating them all up.”
She frowns. It’s not the response she wanted. She feeds on emotion, but I’m not some immature young man anymore. I’ve got silver in my hair now. I’ve lived too long to fall for her crap.
“I can pay you,” Jane goes on. “I know you don’t need cash, but I can pay you, Max. All men have sick, twisted fantasies, right? All men have things they wish they could do to a woman but know they can’t because it would be too much, too violent, right?”
She leans over my desk, attempting to show me her cleavage. I turn away.
“I’m only joking.” She laughs shakily. “As if I’d do that.”
“Ellie and I have silently agreed to return to being professor and student,” I say. “It’s more than you deserve.”
“She’s doing it for her mom, not for me. I don’t think she likes me very much.”
“That’s because she’s smart and perceptive.”
“Ooh, you sound like you love her.”
“Jane.” I look at her again, right in the eye. “The truth is, I was raised in a cold, cold way. I had nobody who ever loved me. I thought I was emotionally dead for many parts of my life. The ink, Jane, and this is important. The ink was the only thing I felt for a long time, and then I met you.”
“Yes?” she whispers with a sick grin.
“And I still felt nothing,” I continue, knowing it’s callous but not giving a damn. She said I hit her, for fuck’s sake. “I tried to fake it. I figured, well, maybe that’s just how I’m built. I don’t have feelings like other people. Then you got pregnant, and I knew I had to do the right thing. I’d go my entire life never feeling what other people felt.”
But then I met Ellie, I almost say, but I hold that part back.
“After the baby, leaving wasn’t difficult. The only hard part was choosing how to leave. I wanted to hurt and embarrass you as much as possible because that shit you said to me, the way you laughed… It was inhuman.”
