3. Secrets and Lies

"Earth to Titania. Is the fairy queen distracted?"

Hearing her full name on Dr. Pappas's lips was like sandpaper over exposed nerve endings.

Ignoring the titters of her classmates, she kept her expression placid and imagined stabbing her pencil into her instructor's left eyeball. Mercy, she'd die a happy woman if she never had to listen to another of his vapid Midsummer Night's Dream references.

With his chunky, black glasses, white short-sleeved shirts, and bowties, he looked like the definition of a nerd. The thinning comb-over didn't help. He wasn't even that old. If she had to guess, Tania would have said he was in his mid-thirties.

He was certainly younger than the two men she shouldn't have been fantasizing about.

"No, sir. I was considering my answer to your question."

Thankfully, she managed to stop thinking about the Club BDE auction for a hot minute and quickly gave her least favorite instructor the answer he wanted. Also, thankfully, the alarm on his phone signaled the end of class.

Before she could escape, he said, "Miss Andersen, a moment of your time, please."

"Bet he's gonna ask to see your wings," Jason, one of her classmates said, looking her up and down.

She flipped Jason off and gathered her things. It was the life of a female engineering student. After her first semester, she learned to walk like the Winter Soldier on his way to kill something, so at least she didn't get pushed around in the corridors anymore, but barely a day went by that someone didn't say something stupid.

She reminded herself that Dr. Gabrielle Knox, the founder of Knox Software, and the source of Tania's scholarship largesse, would frown upon a felony conviction. Then again, she'd heard rumors about how Dr. Knox treated misogynistic douchebags, so maybe not.

Two hundred and thirty-six point two days until graduation.

And just a few scant hours before the auction for her virginity opened for bids.

After taking a deep breath in an attempt to keep her cool, she trudged to the lectern at the front of the room. "Yes, sir?"

"Come sit, my dear," Dr. Pappas murmured, gesturing to a pair of chairs. After sitting across from her, he laid his hand on her knee. "I'm having a small gathering at my house tomorrow night. I'd like to discuss our future."

"I'm afraid I don't understand," she lied. Tania understood him perfectly but was willing to let him dig his own hole.

Heck, she'd already gone to Dr. Ng, her department head, three times. Despite the university policy prohibiting fraternization between students and instructors, he'd made it clear she would be committing academic suicide if she complained publicly about sexual harassment against a tenured professor. At almost halfway through her senior year, she was too close to the finish line to risk it.

Then again, Pappas was actually touching her this time. Unfortunately, there wasn't anyone around she'd trust to back up her story. It was also clear he'd pulled the same shit with other female students, but she'd make sure the university heard all about his antics once she had her degree in her hand.

"Well…" He tightened his hand on her knee, and she resisted the urge to kick him in the balls. "I'm sure you're on the hunt for an advisor for your graduate program."

"My scholarship doesn't cover postgraduate work. I can't afford it and it's too late to apply for a grant, so I'll be taking a job right after graduation. If my employer wants me to have a master's degree, they'll pay for it."

"Are you sure? We'd work very well together." He leaned closer, letting her catch a whiff of peppermint from a breath mint. "Imagine what we could publish if we embarked on a mutually satisfying relationship."

Translation: I'll stick you with an exorbitant tuition bill and make you do all the work, then put my name on the publications. If you sleep with me, I might add you to the credits.

When his hand moved up her thigh, Tania lost what was left of her patience, and very nearly her lunch. Before she could tell him off, her phone chimed with Mandy's ringtone. "I'm sorry. I have to take this. It's my stepmother."

A flicker of annoyance crossed his face, but he hid it with a smile. "Of course. I'll email you the party details."

"Thanks, but I'm honestly not interested."

Before he could reply, she grabbed her backpack and strode from the classroom, then accepted the call. "Hey, Mandy. Is everything okay?"

"We're great, but I have a favor to ask."

"Okay. I just got out of my last class for the day, but I'm headed to a study session to work on my project. Can it wait until next weekend?"

Tania still felt awful about lying to Mandy but stifled the guilt. Mandy needed time to recognize Victor wasn't coming home instead of getting horizontal with some stranger before she was ready.

"Oh, it's something easy. I'm going to text a picture to you. Could you tell me what it is?"

When her phone buzzed with the incoming text, she opened the image and gasped, but managed to control her reaction before Mandy heard it.

"Where did you get this?" she asked, gazing at the photo of the tattoo on her inner wrist with a flash of sheer black fabric in the background. The barely healed ink was just over a week old, and Mandy hadn't seen it. Thankfully, the image showed just the tattoo and not the rest of her.

She tried to tell herself the body art wasn't hers, but honestly, who else would have a tattoo of that particular equation in the exact same spot? The odds were ludicrously small. Hell, it was in her own handwriting. Tania had drawn it herself, so unless the artist copied it, it was impossible for the ink to be anyone else's.

The thought of Mandy seeing her in that transparent negligee… Tania winced, wishing she'd been a little more circumspect with the photos she'd uploaded to the auction site, but it had been hard to stop posing once she got started. Since she'd planned to obscure her face, she hadn't bothered with makeup or hair, but the silky nightgown and decadent lingerie made her feel beautiful for the first time in her life.

Add a little sexy Motown and some fantasies of Mr. Desmond and Mr. Bastian, and she went from engineer to ingenue in no time flat.

"Damian Elliott sent it to me, so I could ask you."

Oh, god. Where was a hole to crawl into when she needed one? Was Mr. Damian going to bid on her? She hurried to a bench under a live oak and sat, trying to control her panic.

"Um…I think I remember him," Tania finally said. "He's Mr. Desmond's twin brother, right?"

"Right. I figured you'd remember Desmond and Bastian from their housewarming party a few years ago," Mandy replied. "They were friends with your father."

"Do you know where the photo came from?"

"Damian didn't say. The tattoo is cute though. I could see you getting something like that."

"Tell him…" She swallowed hard and tried to control her breathing before she passed out. "Tell him it's the formula to calculate lift."

She'd gotten the tattoo on impulse and wasn't entirely sure what made her decide on the design. It fit her though. All she had to do was look at it to remind herself of how high she'd soar once she was out of college.

"We figured you'd know what it was. Thanks, sweetie."

"No problem. Give Bee a kiss for me."

Tania ended the call and stared blankly at a pair of squirrels chasing each other across the tree branches. Did she dare go through with the auction, knowing there was a chance Mr. Damian would be the one to take her virginity?

She shook her head, trying to dispel the thought. Unfortunately, Tania couldn't explain how he'd gotten the photo in the first place. If he had it, it probably meant he'd been looking. Feeling a little sick to her stomach, she wondered if she should cancel the auction.

No. There was too much at stake. Even if it was Mr. Damian, she had to go through with it.

Please, let me be wrong.

Mr. Damian's hair was darker, without so much gray, but aside from that, he and Mr. Desmond were physically identical. Although she could try to convince herself Mr. Damian was Mr. Desmond if she closed her eyes, her body knew the difference. She didn't want Mr. Damian at all.

And she didn't want Mr. Desmond unless she could have Mr. Bastian too.

God, she couldn't even bring herself to call any of them by name without adding mister to it. Fuck's sake, was she twelve? It didn't even make sense. She'd called her father by his first name for years—not that he was ever around to hear her.

Tania's wants weren't important—especially since she was wishing for the impossible. She had to focus on the big picture and achieve financial security for Mandy and Bee. Pushing down her trepidation, she opened the auction website on her phone and added an item to her list of hard limits.

Masks required for all parties.

She didn't have that many limits anyway. Without experience, she had no idea what she liked or didn't, but could say for certain she wouldn't do anything involving blood or human waste. Hopefully, the new addition to her list wouldn't drop her payout too much.

After taking a deep breath, she strode toward the library and tried not to picture herself being fucked by someone who wasn't one of the men she wanted.

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