When their eyes met, he smiled with a knowing glint in his eye. Then he rolled her over on the couch until her body was pressed underneath. He pulled her pants down her legs so she was lying before him in just her underwear, and then started grinding against her.
Her legs came up immediately to wrap around his waist as he thrust forward against the thin material of her thong. She was soaking through from her earlier orgasm and all she could think about at this point was the way his dick was rubbing up against her.
“Hayden,” she moaned, her eyes closing as the material shifted and he slid against bare skin. Oh God! She could not contain how badly she wanted him in that moment, and she didn’t want to. Her fingers brushed at the side of her underwear. He seemed to understand her meaning. He yanked them to the floor, found a condom, and rolled it on.
She brought her hips back up to meet him, so ready to feel him. Her body was shaking with the anticipation.
He moved his cock down before her opening and she whimpered. Four months. She had waited four months. An interminable period of time. She wanted him to take her. She wanted to be his, mind, body, and soul.
His eyes met her for approval and she lifted her hips to meet him in response. Then he slid easily deep into her.
Hayden felt amazing. Perfect. Just as she had always expected him to. And the moment was right. Perfect. Just as she had always wanted it to be with him.
He started up a slow rhythm, feeling her walls expand to let him fill her and then pulling back out. Then he thrust back into her over and over and over again. She could feel her body crumbling, falling apart, giving in to Hayden’s every movement. Her breathing was uneven and her mind blissfully empty, save for the passion and energy radiating from her and the need she felt for this man.
Liz met him for each stroke, but both of them were already so close. She could feel her body tightening around him each time, aching to let loose. She opened her mouth to tell him how close she was and then she exploded around him, her lower half pulsing around his cock. Hayden’s entire body shuddered and then he came deep inside of her.
He dropped forward and rested his head on her shoulder. Neither one could even begin to try for coherent speech. All Liz could think about was how incredible that had felt.
She knew this changed everything.
But she was glad for the change. Finally glad for the change.
Chapter 9
Q & A
A month after the snow day, Liz sat in front of a crowded auditorium for the first-ever colloquium on political journalism at UNC. Today was the big day that she and Professor Mires had been working toward all year. A year of work culminated in one day of activity, and all Liz could think about was the fact that she had to give a speech. Her palms were sweating, her throat felt as if she had swallowed a bottle of cotton balls¸ and her wavy blond hair was sticking to the back of her neck. She hated public speaking. Hated it. She always had.
That was part of the reason she wanted to be a reporter. She was fantastic one-on-one or even in a crowd of reporters, and even better on paper. But she hadn’t signed up to speak in front of a large group of people and have them all stare at her. She had purposely avoided broadcast journalism, because she would rather be behind the camera than in front of it. How did people become so comfortable doing this?
She was about to present her research with Professor Mires to a roomful of distinguished professors in their fields, some prominent reporters for big newspapers, and who knew who else could be in attendance. She thought she might be sick.
Sure, she knew the education policy material like no other, and she had worked her ass off to make everything perfect, but she still felt like a really small fish here. It was a feeling that she didn’t like.
“Okay. Let’s get started,” Professor Mires said, quieting the room. “Ladies and gentlemen, thank you so much for attending this panel in undergraduate research. I would like to start off this session with one of my own students, Miss Liz Dougherty. She will be presenting her paper, ‘Education Policy and New Media in Political Journalism,’ to you today. Take the floor, Liz.”
“Thank you, Dr. Mires,” Liz said. She stood demurely and smoothed out her knee-length cream pencil dress, which belted around the middle with a black buckle. She had taken off her matching black blazer, because the room was warm enough without her freaking out. Her black heels clicked across the hardwood floor as she took the stage. Her eyes roamed the room, but she took it all in in a haze.
Somehow she started speaking. The words tumbled out of her mouth in coherent sentences that made the people sitting in the room nod their heads along with her. A few older gentlemen in the middle stared stonily up at her and she quickly averted her gaze. She hoped they always looked pissed off and weren’t angry about her presentation.
She had a fifteen-minute time slot, and when she reached the halfway point, Dr. Mires gave her a reassuring smile. It eased more of the tension off of her shoulders and she barreled forward. She could do this. She didn’t want to do it every day or anything, but she was doing all right so far.
The door at the back of the room opened and Liz’s eyes flicked up to the interruption in her speech.
Brady Maxwell walked into the room.
Her tongue tied, her face flushed, and she stood in front of everyone like a blubbering idiot. He closed the door quietly and stood in the back of the auditorium, his arms crossed, leaning against the back wall.
She couldn’t believe he had come to her panel. She knew that he was going to be at the colloquium for a politicians’ roundtable this afternoon, but she had expected him to attend his event and then be gone.
But no. Brady was currently in the room for her presentation.
Fuck.
Her memory did not do justice to the man. Even at this distance she could see the contours of his face, the sleek three-piece suit, the confident attitude, those dark brown eyes. Okay . . . maybe she couldn’t see those, but her imagination sure filled in the details.
What the hell had she been talking about before this?
Education policy. Right.
Liz broke eye contact with Brady across the room and looked down at the paper she was clutching in her hands with a death grip. She took a moment to collect herself. She knew Brady was watching her. She could feel his eyes all over her, and she felt vulnerable and exposed. How long in her dark times after walking away had she imagined him coming to find her and begging for her to come back? How many times had she thought about that beautiful face, reconstructing it in her mind? How many times had she wanted those eyes on her, assessing her, judging her, loving her?
No. Christ, she couldn’t go there today. She couldn’t love Brady today. She couldn’t love him ever again. She had buried those feelings, buried them in that dark, dank place that she would never be able to access. A drum beat a fast rhythm in her chest as she tried to regain her bearings.
She just had to get through this presentation. Then she could freak out. She could hold it together until then.
Liz cleared her throat and looked back up at her audience. “As I was saying, our education policy as it stands needs to be revamped. Students are skimming by, learning only to take a test, not to think for themselves. Several studies have shown that previous generations performed better in college when the emphasis was on forward thinking and not test taking.”
She went through the next few slides, detailing the work of political scientists and journalists who had looked at education policy more closely. Then she outlined her own findings and conclusions about the role of social media and how journalism could improve and refocus the political agenda.