“Yeah, that’s their problem, then. They’ve got little innuendos?” Ranger says, shaking his head. “My innuendos are real fucking big, so I’m sure as hell not slipping them anywhere. If I want my innuendos to fit, I’ve got to ram them in.”
I bite the inside of my cheek, pursing my lips and narrowing my eyes in my best ‘prim and disapproving teacher’ look. “I’m not laughing at that,” I tell him as soon as I can.
“Yeah, you are. You like my big innuendos.”
I really do. And I like how much he’s talking today…though I suspect it’s just because we’re both putting off the goodbye part. “So what kind of big innuendos have you got for them today?”
“For your students? None. Just the birds and bees. Mostly the bees.”
That probably explains why he’s standing in a field of wildflowers. “Telling them about colony collapse disorder and how we’re all going to starve if western honey bees go extinct?”
“Yup. That species doesn’t live here, but they don’t need to know that. I’ll scare the shit out of them. And if fear of cannibalizing their own families doesn’t keep their attention, I’ll fight a grizzly for a pot of honey.”
“That sounds so educational. ‘How to Die in Alaska 101.’”
“Nah, this grizzly is real friendly. Lazy, too. He’ll roll over after the first punch.” Despite his joking, Ranger’s expression slowly hardens, his gaze like a dark, magnetic force through the screen. “Those kids I’m hearing…are they in your classroom or are you alone?”
Kids? I glance up. A pair of students are halfway down the hall, chatting as they open up their lockers. “They’re out in the corridor.”
“Good.” The soot in his voice deepens. “Now you go close your classroom door, Miss Simmons. I don’t want to get you into trouble with what I’m about to say to you.”
My heart hammers. What could get me into trouble? “Why? Are you going to whip out a really big innuendo?”
A growl rips from him. “Shut the door, Alicia.”
An answering growl begins in my chest, and that sends me running away from my desk faster than his command could. Because that wasn’t me responding. That was the…thing inside me.
The monster. The beast.
Usually it’s quiet. Not sleeping, exactly. Just…dormant. It usually stays that way, as long as I feed it. That’s the best way to fight it—except during the full moon, when it’s useless to fight.
And except when I talk to Ranger. Because the monster wants him as much as I do. It wants me on my hands and knees while he mounts me from behind, each thrust ruthless and hard and deep. It wants me to ride his thick cock until I feel the hot pulse of his cum flooding my cunt. It wants me filled and fucked and screaming for him.
And the monster dreams of Ranger with me. I wake up growling his name with my pussy hot and slick and my bedsheets torn to shreds.
It’s terrifying, this ravenous need inside me. I’m only glad that need is directed solely at Ranger—and that my craving for him isn’t like the hunger in my stomach, sated by anything I stuff into my mouth. Otherwise I might have fucked my way through half the town the past six months. But the monster is like me. It doesn’t want sex.
It wants Ranger. Only Ranger.
But he’s safely away. So it’ll be okay.
Shutting the classroom door, I whisper that reassurance to myself. That it’ll be okay. Whatever he says, whatever happens. I’ll get through it.
I’ve got this. I can deal with this. I can.
I can. Because aside from that growl, the beast doesn’t control my mouth. So even as it howls for Ranger to mount me, fuck me—I face him again, my inner muscles aching for release, my panties drenched with arousal, my blood pulsing hot and thick. But Ranger can’t see any of that through the screen. So he can’t see the monster inside me.
I’ll never let him see it. “Door closed,” I tell him. “So what kind of trouble are we talking about?”
“The kind that’s me, if you want it,” he replies gruffly and my heart stills in my chest. “Because I’m going to be in your neck of the woods next weekend.”
I barely stop my body from moving as everything inside me lurches toward the screen. Toward him. As if he’s already here. So close. The effort of keeping still makes my hands shake beneath the desk, makes my thighs ache from clenching so hard.
Yes, I want it. I want you. Yes yes yes.
Only gritted teeth prevent me from growling my answer—but it isn’t only the beast responding. It’s me. Needing. So much.
Desperately I struggle for control, my heart swooping through my chest and the beast roaring as I finally manage a soft, “Oh? For a conference or something?”
Slowly he nods, his gaze locked on mine through the laptop’s screen. “Something like that. I’ve got a few meetings lined up toward the end of the following week. A whole lotta empty hours in between. And you’re completely done with school next Friday?”