Voyeur (A student/teacher romance) (Voyeur Series)

CALLUM

I waited all of Friday for her to show up. I canceled meetings, put off phone calls, declined a lunch invitation. Until I finally got up the nerve to ask Donna if she’d seen Oaklyn.

“Miss Derringer called in this morning to let me know she wouldn’t be in.”

“Oh.” I nodded “Okay.”

“Sorry, I didn’t tell you sooner, the Post-it note I wrote it on got lost under all this craziness. Do you need me to find you another student aide for something?”

“No, no. Thank you.”

I’d returned to my office and tried to focus on anything but Oaklyn. Once the clock struck four o’clock and people started going home, I still sat there. Rationalizing that if she thought I went home and wasn’t there, that she may show up for something. It didn’t happen.

The sun had lowered over two hours ago and I needed to admit defeat. I closed down my computer and tossed my glasses to the side carelessly. Oaklyn flooded my mind as I wiped my hands down my face. How had I gotten here? An adult lurking in his own office waiting for his student to possibly show up. I should’ve been home, but my desires were urging me to do all I could to see her.

I stared at the black frames haphazardly laying in the middle of papers, having knocked the stack out of alignment. Immediately, I re-situated the papers until the edges evened up, grabbed the glasses and folded the arms in before resting the eyewear at the top center of my desk.

Shaking my head at my inability to just toss something on a desk, I stood from my desk and packed up my bag.

I had just stepped off the elevator on the bottom floor when I heard my name.

“Callum?”

Taking a deep breath, I closed my eyes and forced a smile on my face when I turned. “Hey, Shannon. What are you doing here so late?”

“Ugh.” She dropped her head back with an eye-roll.

“Staff meeting. It didn’t start until almost six, so we’re just getting done.”

“That’s disappointing for a Friday.”

“Tell me about it.” A bright smile stretched across her lips as she stood a little taller. “Good news is that I got to run into you.”

“I’m not sure I’m good enough to make a late staff meeting worth it,” I said, laughing and looking away.

She bit her lip as her heavy eyes looked up to mine. She wasn’t done with me yet. “I think you are. Hey, you want to get a drink?”

Taking her in, I considered it. I considered saying yes and finding a distraction in Shannon’s company. She was beautiful, my age, and more importantly, not my student.

She checked a lot of boxes, but it wouldn’t have worked out, no matter how much I should have wanted to try, and I didn’t want to lead her on.

“Thank you for the offer, but it’s been a hell of a day, and I’m just going to head home for an early night.”

“Okay,” she said, disappointed. I hated that I did that, but I would have hated myself more if I’d gone when I knew it wasn’t where I wanted to be. “Maybe some other time.”

Evading an answer, I nodded once, letting her take from that what she wanted. “Well, I’m parked over here. You have a good night.”

“Thanks, Cal,” she said to my back. I’d already turned toward my car.

By the time I got into the driver’s seat, I was at a new low. Feeling like I was never going to find a relationship, that maybe I didn’t deserve one. Didn’t deserve intimacy like a normal twenty-nine-year-old man. I hated these waves of emotions that hit me. Fifteen fucking years and I still let my demons rule me. Would they forever keep me from a future with a companion? There was a beautiful woman—sweet, kind—standing in front of me, and I’d turned her down. Why? Because all I could remember was a racing heart and sweating when she touched me?

I sat in my car, gripping my keys too tightly waiting to hear the crack of the plastic fob.

Maybe I could go to Voyeur. It always calmed me when I was down about my bleak future. Maybe Oaklyn would be there. And what? Maybe I could pin her to the bed again and feel her squeeze around my fingers? Maybe so I could feel her soft skin on mine?

So she could calm my mind?

Fuck, when was the last time I’d been around a woman intimately and not had my mind racing, preparing for the panic to set in? The last time I came with someone so close and didn’t end up shaking with old nightmares consuming me?

She was an enigma. I couldn’t even think of what it was about her that was different. It made no sense. If it had, then I would have happily tried to recreate that magic with almost anyone who wasn’t off-limits.

Yesterday had been hell. Watching Oaklyn sit there and try not to look at me as much as I was trying to not look at her. When our eyes had collided, she’d touched her shoulder and I knew she was remembering the way I’d bit

into the soft flesh. Was there a mark to remind her of me?

My dick twitched at the thought even now. I’d had to stand behind the lectern for a solid five minutes to get myself under control as I lectured.

As they’d packed up, I’d scrambled for a reason to get her to talk to me after class, making it appear anything other than my need to reassure myself and her that the night at Voyeur hadn’t been just a figment of my imagination. Ask her what it meant?

Instead, she’d brushed me off and bolted.

Now, as I backed out of my spot, my body urged me go, go, go.

I pulled up to the stop sign to leave the school campus and my hands gripped the wheel, pulsing tight around the leather.

Right to Voyeur?

Left to home?

Right?

Or left?

Taking a deep breath, I began to turn the wheel to the right, when my phone rang. No one was behind me, so I waited at the sign and answered.

“Hello?”

“Callum,” Reed greeted me. “What are you doing?”

“I’m just leaving work, man.”

“Work? At seven-thirty on a Friday? Damn, your life is boring.”

“You have a point or just calling to criticize?”

“I do love to give you shit, but no. Come over for dinner, and we can watch the game. We ordered way too much food and Karen has her sister over. I need some help to balance out the testosterone.”

I didn’t even hesitate. “Yeah, man. I’m on my way.”

I turned the wheel left and headed to Reed’s house.

“SO,” Reed started, which should have been my first warning. “How’s the student? You cave and fuck her yet?”

I choked on the beer I’d just tried to swallow. Cupping my hand beneath my chin, trying to catch any liquid before it spilled on their couch. Karen would kill me if she walked in and saw me making a mess on her new couch. We’d had dinner and then Karen and her sister sat at the table drinking wine, while Reed and I had gone to the bonus room to watch the game. At that moment, sipping wine and talking shoes sounded preferable to answering Reed.

Had I fucked her? Not really.

“No. Jesus.” I settled on complete denial. “Things are fine, why would you say that?”

“I think thou doth protest too much.” Reed knew me too well.

“Everything is . . . fine.”

“So, you’re thinking about fucking her,” he said with a smirk, trying to rile me up.

“Fuck you.”

“What? If she’s interested, why not?” he responded with a shrug.

“I’m her teacher. She’s nineteen. She’s my student. She works in the department.” I held my fingers up as I listed off each reason.

“Will you have her again in class?”

“No, she’s a different major.”

“Is she underage?”

“No. Where are you going with this?”

“Is she hot? Interested? Willing?”

“Reed,” I growled. He’d obviously had too much to drink. I didn’t need him listing off reasons why I should rather than reasons why it wouldn’t be insane.

“Come on, man. Live a little.”

“She’s a child.”

He tossed his head back and laughed out loud. I looked toward the door, waiting for Karen to pop in to see what was so funny. That was all I needed, Reed telling his wife about my predicament. God, the look she’d give me would probably wither my balls, and I wouldn’t have to worry about sex ever again.

“She’s an adult,” Reed said once he’d recovered enough.

“And even hearing you say she’s a child, I know you don’t believe it.” He stared at me with knowing eyes. “I haven’t seen you this riled up about a woman in a long time. It’s good to see, man. Even if there is the issue of her being your student. She won’t be forever.” Another pause. “Tell me about her.”

I finished off my bottle of beer, wondering if it was a good idea to talk to my friend about my student, whom I liked and had already been sexual with.

Fuck it.

“Oaklyn is . . . ” Closing my eyes, I pictured her laughing on the other side of my desk. Of her smiling and calling me Clark Kent. “She’s smart. Determined. Beautiful. She’s kind and god, the way she looks when she laughs.” Nothing could stop the smile stretching across my lips. She did that.

Just the thought of her.

“She sounds hot.” Reed broke the moment, and I gave him an irritated side-eye. He only bobbed his eyebrows and took another pull of beer.

“You’re a pig. Karen deserves better.”

“You’re damn right I do,” Karen said from the doorway.

My heart thudded hard, and I wondered how much she’d overheard. If she heard anything, she didn’t let on. “But I love him anyway,” she said, walking over to perch on the arm of the couch. She leaned down to kiss Reed. “Aubrey left and it’s late, so I’m heading to bed.”

“Okay. You feeling okay?” Reed asked Karen and a look passed between them.

“I’m fine, babe.”

“Should we tell him?”

“Tell me what?” I asked, trying to keep up with the conversation.

“I’m sure you’re dying to gossip with your boyfriend.”

“I really am,” Reed agreed before turning to me. “Well, friend. It’s happened. Hell has frozen over, and fate has decided I’m fit to be a father. We’re pregnant.”

The first feeling hit me in the chest like a sledgehammer.

All the more intense because I wasn’t expecting it. I should have been happy and elated for my friend. Instead, my heart closed in on itself with jealousy.

My mouth moved somehow, trying to force something out. “Congratulations, you guys,” I finally managed. “That’s amazing. Karen, if he ever gets out of line, I’ll whip him into shape. I’m serious. Ice cream any time of the night. If he doesn’t deliver, I’ll make sure he pays.”

She laughed as I’d intended. “Thanks, Callum.” She was too entranced with her husband, the father of her future child, to see the pain I was sure marred my face.

“All right. I’m off to bed,” Karen said pulling me out of my revelry. “You two girls don’t stay up too late gabbing.”

“Okay, honey. I’ll kick him out soon,” Reed agreed, winking my way to let me know he was joking.

“Good. You know I hate sleeping alone.” She leaned down with a smile before gently kissing him, his hand on her still-flat stomach. I felt more like a voyeur now than I ever had at the club.

I wanted what was in front of me. I wanted a wife. A family. A woman to carry my child. My chest ached with a strong desire for those things; my limbs were heavy from wanting to reach out and take them for my own. I just didn’t know how to get to them, waiting on the other side of the dark cloud holding me back. But I wanted them. And when I looked closely and imagined what I wanted, the

faceless woman who set me at ease in my future began to take shape.

And all I could see was Oaklyn smiling up at me.

The image knocked the wind out of me. As Reed stared after his wife, I took a moment to collect myself. What the hell was I doing? Oaklyn was avoiding me, and I couldn’t stop imagining her in my future.

What was I doing?

I wanted to pull out my hair, distract myself from the flood of emotions she brought out in me. Pleasure, desire, want, happiness, panic, stress, hope. All of them at war within me. And the more they fought each other, the less control I felt.

I’d just finished my third deep breath as Reed turned back around. We didn’t talk much the rest of the night, just finished watching the game. Him with a contented smile on his face, and me staring blankly at the screen trying to come up with a plan to screw a tight lid back on my emotions.

By the time I pulled into my driveway, I knew what I had to do. I didn’t want to, but indifference was a safe emotion.

At least it had to be better than everything Oaklyn sparked inside of me.