Chapter Eight

Ursin Miller

It was one of those things a person with obsessive-compulsive disorder couldn't control. My level of obsession went beyond the norm. The urges couldn't be pushed down. The desires seduced and consumed me to insanity. Anya was my fixation. And when I saw her, I wanted to act on the very thing I told myself I wouldn't.

But now that I knew she was the daughter of the man who killed my father, I wanted to make her pay.

"Mr. Miller," she said, breathy, her throat completely exposed.

"How did you know I was here?" The thought thrilled me. There was no doubt we had some desire-hate thing between us. I wanted to hurt her as much as I wanted to pleasure her. How fucked up was that? There was no rationality to whatever was between us. All my logic with her went out the window.

"How did you know I was here?" she retorted, pulled herself out of my hold, and turned to face me.

She was right. How did I know it was her? She looked like someone else, like a sex kitten on the prowl for a daddy. And she was so fucking gorgeous. Anya was a knockout. If I wasn't so fucked up in the head and heart, I'd want her as a normal man would want a normal woman. But we weren't normal, were we? Nothing in this lifetime would make us normal. Only death, because everyone died.

"You don't fool anyone with that outfit, Anya." My comment offended her, and I got much satisfaction from it.

"And you? You think you're fooling anyone with that get-up?" She crossed her thin arms over the low-cut bodice of her tiny dress. "You look like a drug dealer."

Her eyes dropped. I didn't miss the emotion flicker over her face. She knew exactly who I was. I had no doubt. Yet, she still stood there? She was still in my class?

My intrigue tempered my need for vengeance.

"I'm the opposite of a drug dealer, Miss Sanchez. But I can be just as cruel."

Our gazes met in the dark, hazy, loud space of the club I'd been to many times. I was VIP, and on the way upstairs when I spotted her. Her dark soulful, sad eyes gave her away.

"I know," she said, though I barely heard her over the music. The feistiness of moments ago went MIA. She was timid, holding back when she should have been coming at me for putting her in a submission hold. She shouldn't have let me get away with the abuse.

"I can't be seen with a student at a club, Miss Sanchez." I prepared to go upstairs and leave this incident behind. I needed to regroup. Thinking and acting were very different. But I was all irrational when it came to her. I felt like a wild beast.

She reached out her hand and pulled my bare forearm. I paused and pinned my gaze on her petite fingers curled around my flesh. And I got hard, thinking of her hand wrapped around something else.

Holy fucking hell.

"Where can you be with a student?"

The question reverberated in my brain, skipping around like a pinball. What was she asking, really? And it was the way she asked it. Innocent. Audacious. Seductive.

"My office hours." My jaw clenched. I wanted to give a different answer. But she was my student. Not a regular student, though. Not in the least. We had a history of sorts, a connection that could never compare to any other student-teacher relationship. This was complicated beyond measure.

She knew it too. Hence her boldness and her demand of my attention when I didn't want to give it. I owed her. But she owed me too. This was a tit for tat that inadvertently began years ago.

"You don't keep your hours, Mr. Miller." She stepped closer to me. "And I want to talk about the grade you gave me."

"Did you not get my email? I explicitly said no." I lifted my brow, taking in the frustration coloring her face, creasing her forehead.

"I saw your no, but I don't accept it." Anya stepped closer again, and now the tip of her sexy-as-hell heels touched the tip of my Gucci loafers. "So, tell me what you need to turn that no into a yes."

Anger fluctuated through me, waving and concentrating in my stomach, on my face. I was irritated because she knew what she was doing. She was playing, but she didn't get to play with me. I would be the one to play, and when I did, she would not see it coming.

I grabbed her wrist and pulled her hard into me. "Are you bribing me again, Anya?" I growled.

She yelped, her eyes growing wide. She was scared. Good. Fucking good. She had no idea who I could be. And she didn't want to fuck around and find out.

But she was, wasn't she?

Just like her goddamn father.

Anya shook her head, but she didn't struggle against me. She leaned into my hold as if she wanted me to scare her. Just like when I pulled her ponytail, she let me hold her in submission. This was a game. This was her game.

I let her go, and she nearly fell back from the abrupt release.

"The C minus stands." I turned away from her, every nerve ending firing at full throttle.

For two hours, I was upstairs at my usual table, watching the crowd let loose, acting like fools. Disgusting. Liquor didn't affect me as it had most people. I was immune to the effects. Three scotch on the rocks deep since I arrived at the club and I felt nothing.

Lie. I did feel something, but not from the alcohol. Her. Anya turned me on in a way that rocked me. Conflicted me to my core.

I stood from the maroon velvet settee and walked to the railing to overlook the first-floor sloppy dancing drunks. Anya was down there, fighting off advances, no doubt. To think of some below-par boy harassing Anya annoyed me. And though I didn't understand why, I wanted to protect her from such men—boys. The urge, the compulsion rose up in my chest.

With my sickness motivating me, I descended the stairs again to the first floor and walked the loop. She was gone. And I was relieved. A little. The disturbed part of me wanted her to be there, waiting for me.

Better she wasn't.

I glanced down at my watch. It was after midnight. The rage I'd felt earlier, the reason I went to the club in the first place, was tamed back in the box deep inside where I kept all my grievances.

I walked toward the side exit, where my car was parked. The long narrow hall was dark and empty. Not much traffic there, for which I was grateful. I didn't want to speak to anyone. I just wanted to be in my bed. Alone.

But just as I took another step, a forceful shove took me off balance, and my back turned to slam into the wall. Shocked at first, I was liable to swing at whoever pushed me.

What the fuck?

"I know who you are, and I know what you want," Anya hissed, her tiny hands balled into my shirt.

I was stunned, silent for the flash of a moment. I had to open my eyes wider to prove this was really happening. Anya had assaulted me in the hall, where no one was. It was just her and I, and the heavy breathing, and my erection that, for fuck's sake, was almost cutting through my jeans.

But this wasn't how it would go down. No. She should not have my back against the wall. But one thing was for certain. We were now on the same playing field. She was as debased as I was.

I moved fast, lifting her up off her heels, and pushed her back against the wall. She cried out, heavy breath bellowing in and out of her.

"And I know who you are and what you want." I forced my knee between her legs, parting them. "Am I wrong?"

She bit her lip, her eyes heavy and drunk. The heat between us intensified, and the urge I wanted to control said fuck you. No more control, only giving in to our impulses. In a flash, our lips met, crashing against each other in a wild, sloppy kiss that went on far too long.

But I craved it, and she gave to me everything I asked for. I explored her mouth, every crease with my tongue, and she gave back every bit to me. The relief of finally kissing her should have come. And should have quelled whatever the fuck I needed, what we needed from each other. It didn't. I wanted more. Much more.

I slid my hand under her dress. "This is what you want. Right?"

She moaned.

"Say it, Anya. Tell me you want to come."

"I want to come, Mr. Miller."

I brushed the rigid lace of her panties. She was soaked. I groaned. What would it be like to burrow inside her? I could only imagine how good she felt. The taboo of wanting her made it more delicious. I wanted what I shouldn't want.

Anya writhed against my hand, urging me on. And I was so close to slipping my hand inside her panties and finding her wet heat, and taking her to the precipice of pleasure with just my finger, because, yes, I was that fucking good. But she didn't get to decide when I would make her come. She didn't get to dictate how I would do it either. If I would.

I pulled my hand back, feeling so many things. Regret. Lust. Hate. My revenge would come in a hurricane. In a storm of confusion and pleasure and so much devastation.

When I could delve into enough self-loathing to do it, I had no idea.

I leaned in, nearly an inch from her frowning, confused face. "You'll get the grade you want when you stop lying to yourself about who you fucking are. Not a moment before."

Now she was angry, with red and raging eyes and a grimacing mouth. "I'll stop when you stop."

I paused a moment. I'd never been more turned on by a woman in my life. Not a single woman had my full attention as Anya had since the moment we met.

"The difference between me and you is I don't have to stop anything. But you … you have no choice."

She stepped back, all the emotions that plagued her visage now gone. Only the sadness I've seen and known was apparent on her face. Nothing else.

"May I please have a meeting to discuss my grade, Mr. Miller?"

I stepped back, and waited a long time. Long enough to see a bead of a tear well up and fall down her cheek.

"Monday after the lecture, meet me in my office. I will be there. You have my word."