Learning the Ropes (7 page)

He had turned to the whiteboard and the notes she had written there for her classes. One-half of the board was for notes that they all got and the other half was erased every period so she could draw new diagrams and explain any concepts that they weren’t getting. Rory really tried to keep her classes on the same schedule so they could study with friends in different periods.

He turned back and smiled at her, nodding over his shoulder at the board. “I always wondered how teachers keep their handwriting so straight. If I try to write on even a piece of paper with no lines my handwriting slants straight up.”

“They teach us that in college.”

“Really?”

“No.” Rory smiled back at him and tried to focus on conversation as he took two chairs down from the front table and gestured for her to come closer. “I’m here, as blackmailed. What did you want to talk about, Noah?”

“Oh, you know, the usual. How your day was, how my day was, why you have a naughty sex quiz taped to your refrigerator and how on earth you failed it so miserably. Why? What do other people talk about?” he asked innocently.

“Pretty much all of that plus the weather, I guess.” Rory watched carefully as he started unpacking his grocery bag. Out came a box of Swiss cake rolls and two little bottles of chocolate milk. She raised her eyebrows at him and he lifted his hands in a shrug.

“After-school snack. Best part of going to school I say. Well, that and the hot teachers.” He made a point of leering at her legs beneath her perfectly appropriate skirt as she walked closer and took a seat next to him.

He handed her a roll and then shook up her chocolate milk before uncapping it and handing it to her. She struggled hard not to be charmed by him and to remember what he was here for. Right. To get the scoop on her failed quiz. And she didn’t want to talk about it because then she would be embarrassed and turn bright red and he’d tease her about it in front of everyone the next time they were all together. So it was better just to avoid it and try to change the subject. “So what kind of job do you have that you can take off in the middle of the day to interrogate a friend?”

“
Visit
a friend.” He corrected mildly. “Are we friends now?”

“Well, you did bring me snack cakes. I can call a temporary ceasefire for that at least.” She took a healthy bite and he grinned at her.

“I’m a marketing consultant.”

“So you don’t really have a job at all.”

“Ha, ha. Very funny.” Noah began unbuttoning his cuffs and rolling them up to his elbow, exposing forearms sprinkled with dark blond hair. Rory stopped chewing and just watched him as he droned on about being a marketing consultant. Something about bringing attention to good products and services that people needed. When he lifted his hand to his tie and unbuttoned the collar, she realized that he was very good at his job. He was bringing to light exactly what good services she needed. When he loosened his tie, Rory bit her lip and started to chug her chocolate milk.

Noah lifted an eyebrow. “I guess you were hungry.”

Rory nodded and crossed to grab a few tissues, blotting her mouth and handing the rest to him. “I missed lunch today.” Just that quickly she was knotted up with tension again.

“Not on a diet are you?”

Rory scoffed, “After the way I just downed that cake and milk? I don’t think so.”

“Good. You’re perfect.” Noah lifted his own chocolate milk and took a few swigs. The silence seemed loud between them. He thought she was perfect. Or he had a line that was proving to be very effective on her. Either way, it wasn’t good. “So why did you skip lunch today?” he asked.

“I had a meeting at lunch. It took the whole period.” Rory moved to clean up their mess, crushing the milk containers with a little more force than was necessary.

“Not a good meeting, I take it.” He stood and put the chairs they had vacated back up on the tables, moving around the room to pick up the chore where she had left off.

“I don’t really want to talk about it.”

“Great. Then let’s talk about the quiz,” he said.

Rory remained silent for a few moments while he finished up. “You’re not going to let this go, are you?”

He shook his head and moved closer to her, leaning on the side of her desk and crossing his arms. “I promise not to laugh.”

She jerked her head to meet his eyes. She hadn’t said it, but yes, of course, that’s what she was afraid of. When he was being sweet with her like this, she had no defense against him. Between the snack and the tie, she was afraid that he would get all of her secrets. They weren’t very good secrets, granted, but they were hers.

“The quiz and the lunch meeting are kind of linked.”

Noah just stayed quiet and waited for her to continue. Finding it easier to talk when she wasn’t looking at him, she paced back and forth. “The quiz was something out of a magazine that the students were passing around last week. Mac confiscated it from a student and brought it to our girls’ night dinner, where we all took it. And I failed it.”

Rory paused for the inevitable comment from him, but it never came. He just watched her intently, not interrupting or smiling at all. “Apparently I’m not the only one who did. The vice-principal came across a stack of these quizzes and a bunch of the students failed the most rudimentary questions. Couple this with the rash of girls at the high school across town that have gotten pregnant and the administration is worried that the kids aren’t getting any sex education at all. So they want all of the biology teachers to work it into their curriculum.”

Noah raised an eyebrow at that. “They want the teachers to work
that
quiz into the curriculum? Can I enroll as a student here?”

Rory rolled her eyes but found a smile despite herself. “Not the quiz, moron. Sex education. With a distinct emphasis on abstinence and birth control.”

“When I was at school we had an actual sex education class.”

“Welcome to schooling after the recession. Budget cuts a long time ago got rid of sex ed. And arts clubs. And pretty soon, the band. The only reason we still have athletics other than football and basketball here is because of teachers like Brianna who have stepped up to coach for free.”

“So now you’re the new sex ed teacher. Why is that a problem, Rory? I know you know the material.”

“Look at that quiz! I took it and I failed it!” Rory cried.

“Yeah, but not the parts about biology. You knew stuff that I never would have guessed in a hundred years. You’re not going to be teaching these kids positions; you’re going to be teaching them mechanics and how the reproductive system works,” Noah said in a calm and even voice. She appreciated him pointing out the obvious but she was too worked-up to listen to reason.

“Plus it’s uncomfortable to lecture about this stuff. It’s so important that I stay in control of my classroom. Usually my age isn’t an issue at all, but when it comes to stuff like this it’s so obvious that I’m only a few years older than them.” Rory buried her face in her hands and tried the deep breathing thing again.

“You’re ten years older than they are, Rory. At least. And yes, they are going to heckle you. That doesn’t have anything to do with your age. I distinctly remember some unsavory jokes being made around this subject in Mr. Anderson’s class and he was old and balding. Not young and beautiful like you. It’s just the nature of the teenage beast that they can’t be adult about stuff like this.”

Rory kept her face in her hands and considered what he had said. Especially the young and beautiful part. She breathed deep. “What if they have a question and I can’t answer it? What if I can’t get through the lecture because I’m too embarrassed and they miss something important?”

She heard Noah’s steps and then saw the tips of his loafers when he stopped in front of her. His hands settled on her shoulders and he pulled her towards his chest. “That’s what makes you such a great teacher, honey. The fact that you care at all if they’re not getting what they need from your class. But you can’t stress out this much over it. They are going to be just as flustered as you. They aren’t going to ask you anything really dirty. And even if one of the boys gets up the nerve to do it, just ignore him and continue on with the lecture.”

He rubbed his thumb down the side of her cheek as he spoke and she relaxed into his chest. He still smelled nice. She wanted to bury her nose in his chest without the shirt between them. They stood like that for long moments before he moved his hand to her back and began to stroke slowly.

“Now, if you want someone to practice your lectures on, I volunteer. And if you need someone to help you get some hands-on practice on this particular subject, I’ll
happily
volunteer,” he whispered in her ear.

Rory giggled and slammed her fist playfully into his stomach, which was a wealth of muscles if her guess were correct. “You’re such a pervert.”

“And you’re so violent. First you slap me, now you’re punching me. Get control of your baser instincts, woman.”

If only he knew how hard she was working to do just that. Her instincts were screaming at her to kiss him, maul him, whatever she had to do to see that lovely bunch of muscles she had just assaulted. Her conscience was screaming at her, too, though. “I’m sorry about that. Slapping you the other night I mean. You didn’t deserve it.”

Noah shrugged. “Maybe not at that specific moment, but I’m sure I’d said something to you at some point that warranted a slap. Don’t worry about it again. Unless you’re feeling guilty and you want to make up for it.” He grinned down at her and he was so handsome and so close and his hands felt so big rubbing over her back that she was tempted. And he had made her forget all of her nervousness and angst over the sex ed thing. For that alone he deserved thanks.

“How exactly do you think I should make up for it?” she peered up at him through her eyelashes, a move she had never employed before but that she had seen Celeste use to great effect. Noah’s arms tightened around her and drew her closer. Apparently it was a move that needed to be included in her small arsenal of sexual tactics.

“I thought you had some pretty good ideas the other night.” He leaned closer and Rory struggled to keep her eyes open. Struggled to come up with a response. Easier said than done when all she wanted to do was bury her face in the space between his shoulder and neck and lick him. In fact that idea sounded heavenly and her beleaguered brain couldn’t come up with a reason not to do it.

She went up on tiptoe and leaned to the side, grasping his earlobe between her teeth and flicking at it with her tongue. He let out a harsh breath and grasped her even closer, her pelvis aligning with his and finding some very convincing evidence that he did in fact find her as beautiful as he said. His hands moved to trace her ribs as they drifted up her sides. His thumbs lightly strummed her nipples.

Rory turned her head and pressed her lips to his. Her tongue came out to run along the seam between his lips. She smiled as he gave a rough growl and brought a hand up to hold her head steady. He’d clearly had enough of her teasing. Noah reversed their positions and picked her up to set her on top of the nearest desk. He moved to stand in-between her thighs and thrust his hand through her hair to hold her still.

Her heart was racing at a mile a minute and she could only struggle to press closer to him. She’d tried to forget how good it had been with him the one time they’d fooled around, but she hadn’t been very successful. If anything, time had dimmed the memory of the sparks between them. She’d never responded to another man the way that she did to his touch.

Every stroke of his tongue pushed his taste further into her mouth. Every circle of his thumb around her nipple sent sensation like lightening through her. And every slow thrust of his hips made her wetter. With her body alive with lust, she couldn’t remember why she’d thought this was such a bad idea.

Until she very faintly heard voices from down the hall. Young voices. Breathing heavily, she frantically pushed him off her. His eyes were glazed and he quickly moved back to try to take her mouth again. “Noah, stop!” she hissed.

He froze where he was standing and let her push him a few steps away. “Why?” His voice was hoarse and much lower than usual. It sent a thrill up her spine.

“Students are coming this way.” Rory hopped off the desk and was surprised to find her legs wobbly. She tried to fix her hair as best she could, but there was probably no fix for what was surely a ‘just got laid’ look on her face.

“Right.” Noah nodded and turned his back on her to gather control of himself. Rory moved to her desk and began to pack up her papers and laptop for the evening. “Sorry about that. I guess I kind of lost control there.”

She looked up as she finished securing her bag. “Just forget it. It was both of us. Let’s just call it temporary insanity brought on by a highly sexualized topic.”

Noah frowned at her. “I’m willing to call it crazy, but not to forget it. Making out with a teacher in her classroom is a pretty big fantasy come true for me. Even if it is a few years later than I hoped it would be.”

Rory rolled her eyes and laughed. “Please don’t even try to tell me that this is the first classroom you’ve made out in.”

“I’m not saying that at all. Although I think it may be the first classroom
you’ve
made out in.”

“Of course it is!”

Noah strolled closer and tugged on a loose tendril of hair. “I don’t mean as a teacher. I mean as a student. You ever engage in a little detention hall hanky-panky, Rory?”

“I would have had to have been assigned detention for that now, wouldn’t I? I don’t think so.”

Noah nodded. “You were a good girl. I bet you kept your make-out sessions firmly in cars at some sort of lover’s lane. Possibly the back of a movie theater.”

Rory pulled away from his light grasp and picked up his jacket to hand back to him. “You’re right—I was a good girl in high school. I didn’t do any making out in
any
locations until I was in college.”

“No way. I bet you were beating the guys off with a stick.”

Rory laughed but there wasn’t a lot of mirth in it. “Not exactly. Most guys didn’t look twice at me. I was shy and awkward and into my studies.”