Lust

“No-no, I still have to go. I just felt like getting a little dressed up today, that’s all.”

“Good choice,” he told her, then was quick to add, “Not that you don’t always look beautiful, of course.”

“Nice save,” she said, laughing. “Flattery will get you everywhere.”

She leaned in to give him another kiss, a soft, deep kiss, then nibbled on his lip for a moment and pulled back, giving him a long, appraising look.

“In fact,” she continued, her hand tracing its way down the curve of his back and pausing just below the waistband of his jeans, “I wish we could just skip lunch, cut out of here, and I could take you home right now.”

It sounded like a good idea to Adam, but he knew better than to suggest it-Beth had never cut a day of school in her life. Even if her hand was continuing its investigations and her other hand had begun twirling its way through his unruly hair, lightly tickling the nape of his neck. It was maddening. Maybe this was the right moment to suggest…

“Speaking of-you know,” he waggled his eyebrows and gave her an exaggeratedly lascivious leer, “turns out my mothers going out of town next week. So I’ll have the place all to myself, and I figured…”

His arms still around her, he could feel Beth tense up.

“You figured what?” she asked coolly.

“Well, I know you’ve got issues with, you know, you’re always afraid that we’re going to get, you know, interrupted-and I thought maybe if we had some alone time, that we could-that you would-”

“That I would what?” she hissed, glancing around at the crowd of students still milling around them. “That I would forget all about my stupid ‘issues’ and just give you what you want?” She pushed him away.

“Hey, I just thought-”

“I’m sure you did. I’m sure it’s all you ever think about-but why don’t you think about what I want, for once?”

“That’s not fair, Beth,” Adam protested. How had the conversation gotten away from him so quickly? “I’m always thinking about what you want. Why are you getting so uptight about this?” He lowered his voice. “If that’s all I wanted, it’s not like I couldn’t find it somewhere else.”

Oops.

He knew as soon as the words were out of his mouth that it had been the wrong thing to say. The absolute worst possible choice. But if he hadn’t, the blood rising to Beth’s face, the thin, angry line her lips made pressed together, and the haste with which she was backing away from him would all have been a pretty decent tip- off.

“If that’s how you feel-”

“I’m sorry!” he pleaded hastily. “Come on, please, can we talk about this? Can we just have lunch and talk about this?”

“I’m not hungry anymore. But don’t worry, I’m sure you can find someone else. Someone less uptight.” She spit out the words and stalked away.

“I don’t want someone else-I want you,” Adam said plaintively.

But there was no one left to hear him.

By the end of the day Beth had pretty much calmed down-though every time she thought of Adam, her muscles tensed and her breath quickened, the anger surging through her once again. She couldn’t decide-was she angrier at him or at herself? Either way, she was doing her best to keep her mind on something else.

Like, say, Mr. Powell.

Jack.

Okay, so it wasn’t a total coincidence that she’d labored for an hour over her hair (silky, straight, and hanging free, with two thin braids pulled around from the front and tied together with a light blue ribbon), experimented with some new makeup, and donned her cutest miniskirt on the day of her one-on-one meeting with the newspaper adviser.

“Deep in thought already?” Mr. Powell asked, stepping into the tiny newspaper office. “Hope I haven’t missed any strokes of genius.”

Beth laughed and blushed.

“No, Mr. Powell.” He gave her a stern look. “I mean, Jack, don’t worry, the genius is waiting for you.”

“Well, then, wait no longer. Your inspiration has arrived! Let’s get to work.” He sat down next to her and began talking animatedly about his-no, their-plans.

They were supposed to be putting together a new layout for the paper, figuring out which fonts and photo borders they wanted to use, where to stick the comic strips and the lunch menus. They were supposed to be debating how large the headlines should be and whether the column “A Day in the Life of a Cheerleader” really belonged in the sports section. Supposed to be, but Beth wasn’t having too much luck with the whole concentration thing. She sat in front of the computer, an old Mac from the nineties that she had persuaded the school to donate to the floundering newspaper, even though it could barely run the design program they used for the layout. Mr. Powell stood behind her, close enough that she could smell his cologne-something mysterious and European-close enough that she could feel his presence without having to turn around. And then there were the moments when she needed him to look closely at something on the screen, and he would lean down, sometimes placing his hands on her shoulders for balance, and peer over her shoulder, his stubbly cheek only inches from hers. He would stare at the screen, and she, out of the corner of her eye, would stare at his angular profile, wishing the moment would never end.

Beth knew she was being silly, that despite all the joking around, despite the whole first-name-basis thing, despite the fact that last time they had ended up talking together for hours, not just about the newspaper or French class, but about politics, movies, life-despite all that, he was a teacher and she was a student. He was an adult-worldly, cosmopolitan, brilliant, handsome-and she was just a kid. Nothing would ever actually happen. Of course not. So there was no reason whatsoever to feel guilty about having a little crush-or occasionally wishing that her boyfriend would be a little more like Mr. Powell and a little less like, well, Adam.

Besides, it’s not like she was some pathetic twelve-year-old drawing hearts around his name in her notebook or dreaming about how good their names sounded together (although “Beth Powell” did have a nice ring to it…).

Okay, so she was being ridiculous. Utterly ridiculous. She should forget about the whole stupid thing, focus on her work, on the newspaper, on her real relationship. She should stop wasting so much mental real estate on juvenile fantasies.

But still, she thought, crossing one leg over the other in what she admittedly hoped was a seductive shift in position, she was glad she’d worn the miniskirt today.

After all, it never hurt to look your best…

Chapter 6

There must have been something in the air.

Harper stared down at her French quiz, the letters swimming on the page, as she struggled to focus on the subjonctif tense instead of on Adam.

She’d been having just a little problem with that all day long.

She’d seen him the night before, shooting hoops in his driveway.

No shirt on.

God, she wanted him.

She had been about to go to sleep when she heard the rhythmic pounding of the ball on the cement pavement-and when she looked out the window, there he was, barely visible in the dim light of the full moon.

Racing back and forth across the driveway, his muscles straining with the effort, his hair wild, his movements fluid, one sculpted pose melting into the next.

So lean and taut, so graceful. His large, warm hands, his supple fingers massaging the ball.

She liked to imagine those fingers grazing her body, climbing through her tangles of hair, stroking her legs. Too