Please Harder, Professor

Chapter 41

Cassian's POV

I head toward my bathroom, already mentally preparing for the hot bath that will hopefully wash away the tension from my first week as Professor Lewis's replacement.

The irony isn't lost on me—occupying his office, teaching his classes, living the life that should have been mine years ago if not for Adrian's manipulative charm with the hiring committee.

"Finally," I mutter to myself, rolling my shoulders to work out the knots from hunching over student papers all evening. "Week one survived."

It's been a good week, all things considered.

The students seem to like my teaching style, my office hours have been busy with actual academic questions rather than poorly disguised flirtation attempts, and I haven't set anything on fire or caused any major incidents.

Well, except for the coffee collision with Sophie, but that's turned out to be more of a blessing than a disaster.

I'm reaching for the faucet when movement in the window across the courtyard catches my eye, and I freeze with my hand halfway to the tap.

Sophie sits curled in her window seat, book propped against her drawn-up knees, completely absorbed in whatever she's reading.

The soft lamplight behind her creates a halo effect around her dark hair, making her look like something out of a Renaissance painting.

Look away, my conscience demands. Give her privacy. You're already her professor, don't make it worse by being a voyeur too.

But I can't seem to move. She's beautiful in the lamplight, lost in her reading with the kind of focused intensity that suggests whatever book has captured her attention is completely consuming her thoughts.

And then I notice what she's wearing—or more accurately, what she's not wearing.

A thin cotton camisole, obviously braless, the fabric clinging to curves I have absolutely no business noticing. Her nipples are clearly outlined against the material, peaked from the evening chill or perhaps from whatever's happening in her book.

Christ, she's hot.

The thought hits me like a physical blow, sending heat straight to my groin despite every rational part of my brain screaming that this is inappropriate on approximately seventeen different levels.

She's your student, I remind myself desperately. She's young, she's vulnerable, she's probably still dealing with her own personal life drama. The last thing she needs is a professor who can't keep his thoughts professional.

But my feet remain rooted to the bathroom tiles, and I find myself memorizing the way the lamplight catches in her hair, the elegant curve of her neck as she turns a page, the way she unconsciously bites her lower lip when she's concentrating.

I force myself to turn on the bath, the sound of rushing water hopefully loud enough to drown out the increasingly inappropriate direction of my thoughts.

Steam begins to fog the mirror as I strip off my clothes with mechanical efficiency, but I can't shake the image of Sophie in that window, so close I could probably call out and get her attention.

Don't even think about it, I warn myself as I sink into water that's almost too hot. You're already walking a professional tightrope here. Don't make it worse.

But the heat only makes the blood flow more insistent, and my cock is already half-hard from glimpsing her in that state of undress. I close my eyes, trying to think of anything else—lesson plans, faculty meetings, the grocery list I keep forgetting to write.

Milk, bread, eggs, I recite mentally. Coffee filters. Laundry detergent. Boring, practical, unsexy domestic responsibilities.

But my mind keeps wandering back to that ridiculous paper she'd accidentally given me.

Was that the kind of thing she read? I wonder. The kind of fantasy that lived in her head? Stories about dominant men and willing submission, about surrendering control to someone stronger?

My hand finds my cock without conscious decision, fingers wrapping around the thick length as heat spreads through my body. The rational part of my brain is still protesting, but it's getting drowned out by more primitive impulses.

What would it be like to be the mysterious stranger in one of her stories? The fantasy builds before I can stop it. To have those warm brown eyes looking up at me with desire instead of mortification, to hear my name fall from her lips in breathless gasps instead of panicked apologies.

My hand moves with slow, deliberate strokes as I imagine Sophie not as the flustered student who'd soaked me in coffee, but as the confident woman who'd written about surrendering to dominant hands.

In my mind, I'm peeling that camisole off her body, discovering if her skin is as soft as it looks in the lamplight, if she'd arch into my touch the way the heroines in her stories always did.

Would she respond to gentle commands? The thought makes my grip tighten. Would she trust me enough to let me take control, to show her what real pleasure feels like?

My rhythm quickens as the bathwater sloshes gently around me, Sophie's face clear in my mind as I bring myself closer to release. In my imagination, she's not reading about some fictional man's control—she's experiencing mine.

Her hands gripping my shoulders, her body moving beneath me, her voice calling out my name as I make her forget every other man who's ever touched her.

The orgasm hits with surprising intensity, my back arching as I spill into the bath water with a groan that's probably loud enough to carry through the thin walls.

For a moment, there's nothing but the sensation of release and the sound of my own ragged breathing echoing off the bathroom tiles.

Shit.

Chest heaving, I open my eyes and stare at the ceiling, reality crashing back over me like cold water.

I just masturbated to fantasies about my student. My twenty-two-year-old student which I must treat as a ward and mold into a tolerable specialist.

The guilt hits immediately, sharp and acidic. This is exactly the kind of behavior that destroys careers, that hurts innocent people, that turns academic relationships into power games.

But she's not innocent, the traitorous part of my brain whispers. She wrote that story, she chose to submit that paper, she looked at you today like she was imagining what you'd look like with your shirt off.

That's not the point, I argue with myself. She deserves better than a creepy professor who can't keep his fantasies separate from reality.

But as I drain the bath and towel off with rough, efficient movements, I already know that teaching Sophie Hale is going to be far more complicated than I'd anticipated.

Because whether it's appropriate or not, whether it's smart or not, whether it's fair to either of us or not, I want her.

And judging by the way she'd looked at me during our office visit, the feeling might just be mutual.

This is going to be a problem, I realize, catching sight of my reflection in the now-clear mirror. A very big problem.