We've finally made to the last week stretch and I'm about bursting to share. Since I'd get a ferocious spanking if I posted the whole book the way I want to, I'll just have to follow the rules and offer a teasing taste here and there.
Hope about a little sneak peek at the first few pages?
“That’s all for today, class.” Professor Derek Jacobson leaned over his desk, braced on tanned arms heavily roped with muscles as he checked the last of his notes and then jotted an idea or two for the following lecture. His strict routine never varied. Katrina Keats sucked in her breath as his sandy blond hair fell across his brow—daring to skim the tops of his deceivingly bookish glasses, worn over piercing blue eyes. God, he was sexy. She slid her hand under her notebook, flipped it closed, stacked her books and pulled them into her chest. Her eyes never left him.
Stepping out of her first-row seat, she approached his desk. “Professor Jacobson, I have the papers you asked me to evaluate.”
“I didn’t need them until next week, but why am I not surprised to see you have them done already?” he said with a sly grin that sent liquid lust soaking her panties. “Class is over, call me Derek.”
It wasn’t the first time he’d asked her to refer to him more casually. This was her sixth course with him and she’d been part of his research team for two years. Regardless of the fact that she was now his teaching assistant, somehow she still felt uncomfortable taking that last step to call him by his first name within the anthropology department halls. It gave her too many ideas that didn’t gel with academia. Although, truth be told, the ideas ran rampant no matter how she referred to him. She couldn’t stop them, didn’t even try anymore.
She’d been in love with her professor since she was a sophomore at the university, when she’d fallen from some scaffolding, straight into his strong arms and under his spell. For years she’d done everything possible to excise him from her mind—everything but drop his classes or refuse positions on his research team or decline to go out socially with the class and stay until it was only the two of them left, talking into the night. There were hints of mutual attraction. Instances of the professor giving way to the man. But to this point, the professor had unilaterally won out.
Taking the papers, Derek stuffed them into a collapsible folder and jammed it into a worn leather briefcase. His eyes sought hers out and, catching, held her stare with an intensity that had Katrina holding her breath. He was excited.
“Kat, they accepted our paper. They’re publishing in three months’ time.”
A wide smile spread across her face. “So soon? That’s fantastic!”
“I know, I know. I have an appointment with the grant committee in about fifteen minutes, so I’m going to have to rush out of here, but I wanted to let you know that you are, here and forever, bound to me.”
She blinked twice, not sure what he meant.
He reached across the desk and gripped her shoulder, guiding her around to stand before him. “I published the findings with both of our names.”
She couldn’t believe it. “But…I didn’t think, I never dreamed—”
“You did so much of the work. Pushed me further than I wanted to go. You were the one to identify the discrepancy in our native-language assumptions.” He offered her a mock scowl, continuing on, “There were plenty of times I wanted to turn you over my knee and spank you for challenging every blessed point, but it was because of that damn defiant streak of yours that we did it. Hell yes, your name is on the paper.”
“Derek,” she choked out, her heart racing as much from the idea of being turned over any part of his anatomy as from the news of being published. “Thank you.”
“Ahh, my name,” he said, rewarding her with a slow smile. “Was it so very difficult to give in to my request?”
Her mouth went dry as warm pleasure surged through her system. She wanted to throw down her books, crawl onto the desk and beg him to take her right there. “No,” she managed quietly, forcing herself to respond. “I suppose not.”
They were alone in the classroom now and with rows of empty desks as their only audience stood staring in screaming silence at each other. His gaze moved from her eyes down to her mouth, the simmering intensity between them threatening to boil over at any second. She pressed her lips together, felt her nipples pebble and was grateful for the cloak of her heavy fall sweater.
His thumb moved against her shoulder where he gripped her. The subtle pressure of his touch spiraled through her body, ending with a searing lash of wet heat between her legs. It was intimate contact. Not like the chaste handshakes she received en masse with the other TAs at the end of a semester, not professional politeness, not innocent. It was quietly demanding, and she would give anything he asked.
She pushed out her breath, and with it came his name in a soft plea. “Derek.” She had wanted him for so long. Yearned for the moment to be realized. But he was so strict, so restrained, so controlled. They both were. Until now.
The hold on her shoulder tightened and then released with a jolt that set her back an inch. “Well…congratulations to us.” A smile had never been more stiff. A message never more clear. No.
She blushed, embarrassed in the awkward aftermath of quiet rejection. He’d been close. She’d seen it in his eyes, felt it in his touch. What was stopping him?
He had to know she wanted him, didn’t he? Maybe she hadn’t been clear enough, hadn’t…
Her confidence in tatters, she straightened before him, painfully aware of his eyes narrowing on her. She braced for the sting of humiliation and pressed on, knowing she’d never forgive herself if she didn’t try. “Do you have plans for tonight, Derek? I could make you dinner and—” she swallowed past the knot in her throat, praying it would level the telling tremor in voice, “—we could celebrate…together.”
Struggling not to squirm under the heat of his hard stare, she awaited his response. He glanced away, again pushing the errant bangs from his view, and plucked the glasses off his perfect straight nose. First polishing them with his tie, he replaced them before answering. No doubt a ploy to give himself an added second or two to compose himself. “I’m sorry, Katrina. I’ll have to decline.”
No! Maybe it was only a matter of timing. “We could—”
The curt shake of his head cut off her desperate suggestion.
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