Thanks for the love :-*
NOT BETAED!
7. From desire and liars
Christian and Ellie waited for me at the door while I went to pick up my stuff from the staffs room, where Leila was chitchatting with Jose. I looked at him in surprise, I had thought he had left with the others.
"Did you call Mr. Grey?" Leila asked me, stopping midway of raising her cup of coffee to her lips. Internally, I freaked out when I looked into her eyes, the thought of her seeing me leave with my student and her good-looking father frightened me. I didn't want to think about what she could think about me after that.
"Uh, yes. Yes, I did. He picked her up." I nodded furiously, quickly getting my purse and my jacket out of my small, rectangle locker. The green metal door made a loud sound as I closed it too fast, my plan to escape without attracting attention failing miserably.
"Ana, you heading out? I have to read some paperwork with Leila, but if you wait for me, maybe I will buy you one of the hamburgers you like so much." Jose said with a smile. Usually, I would have accepted his offer, since I loved our Burger Special's at Ernie's, a local diner. But I had something else planned for tonight, something they didn't need to know about.
"I'm not feeling well, J. I will just go home. Rain check, okay?" I said apologetically, slipping into my jacket. I had no idea that I could lie like this, but I guess, the possibility of having dinner with a certain Mr. Grey was inspiration enough.
"See you guys." I said and rushed out of the staffs room, walking with fast steps toward the entrance where Ellie and her father were waiting for me.
"I'm ready to go." I smiled at them, the look he gave me made my blood stir, but I ignored it as much as I could. There was something about his eyes, that made my skin tingle and put my senses on fire, clouding my mind, alluring my whole being. I couldn't allow him to affect me like that, maybe going to dinner with them was a wrong idea after all. Mood killer.
"Daddy promised me, I could have chicken nuggets. Do you like chicken nuggets, Miss Steele? I love them with fries and ketchyo." Ellie excitedly told me as she reached for my hand. Meanwhile, Christian hold the door open for us, I thanked him with a smile and a blush.
"Ketchyo?" I asked them with a questioning look, making Christian roll his eyes with a smile.
"Ketchup and mayonnaise put together. She calls it ketchyo." He explained to me as we walked toward the parking spot, where our cars were parked. We stopped by his truck, where he helped Ellie in her seat and fastened her seat belt.
"I fear, we will have to go somewhere that serves chicken nuggets." He said after he closed her door, look apologetically at me. The sun was going down in the sky, in this light, he looked even better.
"It's no problem. I will just follow you with my car." Being the awkward person that I was, I waved quickly at him before walking to my own car, my face red as a beet, my heart thumbing wildly. Fuck. Talk about embarrassing myself.
I waved at him.
I waved.
In my car, I felt the immense need to bang my head against the steering wheel repeatedly, maybe it would help me stop waving awkwardly or make my head explode, so I could be free from this embarrassing torture. God. Why couldn't I behave like a normal human being around him? Dutifully, I followed him with my car through Seattle as he lead me to small Mom and Pop Burger place with a green door and red neon lights. With a last quick prayer to the guy above, I left my car when we parked side by side, hanging my purse over my shoulder, my jacket loosely in my hand. I watched him help Ellie out of her seat, his ass perfectly in front of my eyes as he leaned down, his jeans giving me a great view.
A gunshot wound would have hurt me less than the buzzing feeling that went through my treacherous body, my kitty – thanks to Andrea I couldn't even call it something else now – aching for him. I supposed it wanted to roar, but since it was a part of me, it only could meow pathetically.
Desire. That was what I was feeling. I should probably call it by its name, denial wasn't going to work, that was sure. Christian was a good-looking man, he was muscular, but not beefy, he was tall, he had a pretty face and to top it all, he was cute with his kid. Of course, my ovaries found him attractive, he was everything a woman could want. But that didn't change the fact, that I shouldn't want him, not while his kid was in my class, not while I had a job to lose. Crap. I really shouldn't have come here, I thought, but it was too late now. If I just went home now, it would be even more awkward than my catastrophic wave. That was enough humiliation for one day.
"Thanks for the invitation, Mr. Grey." I said crossing my arms at my chest, trying to sound more polite than nervous. I licked my lips in a nervous gesture, as Ellie jumped to her feet, her dad closing the car's door after her. He turned to me with a frown.
"I thought, we had agreed on 'Christian'." He said, sounding a little bit reproachful. I feel small under his stare, his gray eyes shrinking my confidence.
"Yes, thanks for the invitation, Christian." I corrected myself, making him smile cheerfully.
"It's my pleasure, Miss Steele." He says, now it was my time to frown.
"I don't think it's necessary to call me 'Miss Steele'. Call me Ana." I offered, thinking that it was only fair since I was allowed to use his first name. He wholeheartedly accepted my offer, making Ellie ask me if she could call me Ana, too.
"That wouldn't be appropriate since I am your teacher." I explained to her, leaning down toward her with my hands on my knees. She looked at me with a concentrated face, before she answered.
"But we aren't at school right now." She said with a smug grin. Her father scolded her immediately.
"Ellie, you can only call people by their first name when they allow it." He looked at her sternly, making her apologize to me.
"How about you call me Ana when you graduate?" I proposed, trying to cheer her up since I saw how she started pouting. It worked.
"Yes, thank you, Miss Steele." She said with a gleeful voice, before frowning again. "When will I gra-dua-te?"
I tried not to laugh at the way she misspoke the last word.
"At the end of this summer. That's not far from now." I said encouragingly. She nodded, pleased with herself, now reaching for her father's hand. I stood upright, as she told her father that she was hungry and if she could have some pop soda, too, but he wasn't looking at her. I doubted that he was even listening to her, because his eyes were focused on something else. He was bluntly starring at my chest, his cheeks red, his eyes dark. I followed his stare to my chest and blushed even worse than him, I didn't think that I had blushed this hard before, to be honest.
Underneath my purple long sleeved shirt, my nipples were saluting, the cold wind once again playing its wicked game with them. Holy fuck.
As if my life depended on it, I quickly put on my jacket, zipping it up, my fingers shaking. I had thought I had already hit my limit of humiliation for today, but apparently, I was wrong, my treacherous body wanted to play, too. And it certainly wanted to be played by Christian Grey. Said man was as red as me and was now talking nervously to his daughter, I didn't listen to what they were saying as we walked into the oil and beef smelling diner. A waitress, who couldn't keep her eyes off of Christian, brought a few pillows from the booths so she could sit higher on her chair. It was a small diner type restaurant with square, white tables and wooden chairs, the floor tiled in black and white, the walls a lush dark blue color. Thank God, it was anything but romantic. I didn't want to imagine what being in a candle lit, fancy restaurant with him would be like.
With closed lips, we looked at our laminated menus, only Ellie chatted bubbly, telling her father about her day excitedly. Our eyes met, the nipple incident had left its scars, so we blushed heavily, both looking down at out menus. Okay, Ana, I thought to myself, you better eat your food fast and get lost before you show him more of yourself. With my crazy luck, I wouldn't be surprised if I managed to show him my cotton briefs at the end of the night.
Oh God.
The thought about situations where he could see me in my underwear – or even without it - felt like a punch to my guts. A mix of desire and lust crawled upon my skin, my nipples now hard for another reason, buzzing excitement tiptoed inside me, all connecting in a dot between my legs, the one place that was trying to persuade me into giving him another peep show. From the looks of it, it was time to put my kitty in chains. Maybe I needed to buy myself a chastity belt, I was turning into a horny mess, all thanks to the good-looking – who am I kidding? He looked more than good, he looked spectacular – man sitting across from me. Normally, I would try to flirt pathetically with him, I would give up soon enough, though. But since he was the father of Ellie, the father of one of my students, he was a no-go, taboo, not meant to be mine.
"Miss Steele, do you want chicken nuggets, too? They have dinosaur shaped ones. I love dinosaurs. I wish, Santa would bring me one." Ellie interrupted my thoughts about her father, as she tried to take a peek of her father's laminated menu. Even though she couldn't read yet, she loved to pretend doing it.
I smiled at her, shaking my head.
"I think, I will go with a cheeseburger and some fries." I told her, thinking about Jose's offer to eat burgers tonight.
"Daddy, Miss Steele is having a cheeseburger, too. Just like you." She said with an innocent grin on her face, turning to her father.
"Well, Miss Steele has a great taste." He answered her, but his eyes on me. A flirty smile curled his lips, apparently, his embarrassment about my nipple show forgotten. It was enviable how easy he was over that moment. I still blushed underneath his stare, biting my lip as I kept my eyes on my menu. The waitress, who still only had eyes for the man across from me, took our orders, smiling sweetly at Ellie before she went away. Christian had agreed to let Ellie drink a little bit of pop soda, just because he was sorry for being late today. His daughter looked more than pleased.
"I'm sorry for being late today. I can't apologize enough to make me feel less guilty." Christian said to me after our waitress, who introduced herself as Lily, brought our drinks – yellow pop soda for Ellie, beer for him and me.
"I thought, this dinner was your way of apologizing? It's not necessary to keep apologizing, Mr.. - Christian." I said, nearly calling him 'Mr. Grey' again. I didn't think that he would be happy about it.
"Well, I just hope that Ellie behaved herself." He said, looking at his daughter out of the corner of his eye. Lily had been nice enough to bring a few pencils and a notepad for her to draw on, so Ellie's was focused on her task and not listening to our conversation.
"She always does." I smiled proudly, it was no secret that Ellie was starting to become one of my favorite students. He snorted at my words, shaking his head.
"Yes, she always does, until she doesn't. Don't let her fool you." Christian said with a grin. "Ask my mother. She spends a great deal of time with her, whenever I am working."
"Daddy is a car doctor." Ellie blurted out excitedly, making me frown.
"Car doctor?" I asked, looking from her to Christian. He gave his daughter a loving look, before he answered me.
"I'm a car mechanic. She calls me a car doctor because I heal cars." He answered me by imitating quotation marks with his hands.
"Oh. Car doctor makes sense then." I giggled. Christian told me about his nice and helpful parents who were always eager to babysit Ellie whenever he needed them to. I listened to him with interest, as he talked about his former attorney father, who now spent most of his free time reading criminal books and watching Law & Order, or how his mother was a proud hobby gardener.
"Nana has all kind of flowers in her garden." Ellie told me with a dreamy expression. "Even red roses like in Beauty and the Beast. But I am not allowed to touch them, since she protects them like her children."
"Well, flowers die when you pluck them. Your Nana doesn't want that." Christian said to her with a lecturing look.
"How about you draw pictures of the flowers you want? That way, you get to keep them." I proposed, making her beam at me.
"That's a great idea, Miss Steele. Thank you."
She went back to drawing on the notepad in front of her, her little tongue squeezed between her lips as she started drawing a flower, with a focused expression on her pretty face. She was really adorable.
"You saved my mother's flowers. Now I owe you even more." Christian said to me with a smile. I smiled back, brushing it off.
"I just did my duty as a part of our ecology."
When our food came, I watched Ellie mix ketchup and mayonnaise on her plate with the precision of a five-star chef. She happily munched on her dinosaur shaped nuggets, humming with a pleased expression. I reached for the ketchup bottle in the middle of the table, just like Christian, so our hands brushed. Even though our touch only lasted like two seconds, goosebumps spread on my whole body immediately.
"Ladies first." He said charmingly, I thanked him with a smile, fearing that any word out of my mouth now would be embarrassingly high.
"This tastes good." I finally mumbled between chews, nodding toward my plate where my burger as big as a big fist was placed. He wiped away some ketchup from his mouth with a napkin, before he answered.
"It's our favorite spot. We usually are here when we are not at my parents' for dinner. I'm not the best cook." He told me with a shy smile. "In fact, I would call myself a danger in the kitchen."
I bet he is a danger in the bedroom, too.
Goddammit, Ana! Stop thinking about him like that, I scolded myself internally.
"Mummy doesn't cook either." Ellie said with a frown. "I hope, Nana will teach me."
Christian laughed nervously, before telling her that she would have to ask her grandmother for private lessons. I supposed that the mention of his ex wife made him nervous, why though, I couldn't tell.
"Your mother works too much, she has no time to cook." He said to her and I didn't miss the bitter tone in his voice. Andrea had told me that they broke up because she had cheated on him. It was logical that he was angry at her.
"I love to cook." I blurted out to change the awkward topic.
"Really?" He looked at me, his smile thankful, he was welcoming the topic change.
"Yes, my parents weren't really good at it, so I had to learn myself. Otherwise, I would have been doomed to eat what my mum thought of cooking." I shrugged, munching on my fries.
"Did you grow up in Seattle?" He asked me with interest and soon enough, I was telling him the boring story of Anastasia Steele. If he found it boring, I wouldn't know since he listened with curiosity and asked me questions here and there, about my parents, where they lived now, if I missed them, where I went to college, and so on. Patiently, I answered his questions, although noting that he didn't give me the chance to ask my own. When our drinks were empty, he ordered new ones. When I told him that he didn't need to, he only said that he was enjoying our conversation and beer with me. His words made me blush, just like his intense stares.
After nearly two hours, Ellie got too tired and nagged that she wanted to go home. Surprisingly, I didn't want to go home, even though I had doubted my decision to have dinner with them. I had my fun, I couldn't remember having this much fun in a really long time.
"You didn't have to pay for my food." I muttered as we walked out, he was carrying his nearly asleep daughter.
"I invited you, after all." He brushed it off with a smile.
"Still, now I owe you." I said sulkily as I helped him to get his daughter inside his car. I opened the door for him, as he placed a sleepy Ellie on her seat, fastening her seat belt.
"Maybe you can cook me something." He winked at me when he closed the car door, now facing me. His sudden cheeky flirt surprised me.
"Um.." I stuttered, stepping back, so that I was pressed against my own car. He was standing really close to me, though he had to lean down a little since he was taller. His closeness and his yummy smell bewitched my senses, making another coherent thought impossible. Then, he went for the overkill.
"Or maybe next time we can have dinner just the two of us. You know, without a chatty child and somewhere that doesn't smell of burgers and grease." He whispered with burning eyes staring at me, his tone sensual, full of promises. I felt the cold door of my car against my back, while my front facing him was burning with fever. My cheeks heated up, I probably had reached new shades of red today all thanks to him. While his proposition sounded all too alluring, something I could do a cheery dance for, it still made me remember why it was wrong on so many levels.
"I don't think that would be appropriate." I whispered back, unlike him, my whisper wasn't meant to be sexy. It was more my instinct trying to protect myself, as if speaking out loud would make everyone, including Leila, hear that I was being asked out on a date by Christian Grey.
He frowned at me for a second, before his expression turned into something curious.
"Why not?" Christian asked, still standing too close to me, although I had rejected him. I feared that he wasn't going to give up easily. His question made me stutter, it might also be because how his breath brushed over my skin.
"Well, um… you are the father of one of my students. It.. it would be.. mo-moral turpitude-de."
He tilted his head to one side, looking at me in thoughts.
"So, there is a rule saying that you can't go out with me?" He probed with pursed lips, waiting for my answer.
"Not exactly, but it's still would be.. wrong." I shrugged my shoulders, trying to sound as convincing as possible. He stared at me for a couple of seconds, licking his lips once, the sight of his tongue making me bite my lip. Dear God. His lips, his freaking lips. Christian's eyes darken as he stared at my lips, I immediately stopped biting them.
"What would Miss Williams say if we went out together?" He asked me after he shook his head, probably trying to concentrate on something else than my lips.
"Hopefully not 'you are fired'." I said with a nervous laugh.
"Answer me this, Ana. Do you want to go out with me?" He asked, ignoring my silly joke. He was a man on a mission, he didn't concentrate on anything else.
"I just told you that I can't go out with you since it would be morally wrong." I said out of breath, playing with zipper of my jacket, a nervous gesture. Christian rolled his eyes at me with a sigh.
"I'm not asking you if you can go out with me. I'm asking you if you want to go out with me. There is difference." He said with a wink. His goddamn winks were going to be the death of me. I gulped hardly, feeling investigated.
"That doesn't make a difference. In the end, we can't go out."
"But you said that there was no rule. Are your morals holding you back, Miss Steele?" He asked challengingly, infuriating me in the process. I didn't like how he pestered me, I had a right to reject him after all. With a frown, I narrowed my eyes at him.
"Nothing is holding me back, Mr. Grey." I stressed his name. "I just don't want to go out with you, okay?"
He laughed at my words, shaking his head.
"You are a terrible liar, Miss Steele." He teased me, again winking. Goddammit! Do you have something in your eye? That fucker obviously knew what his winks and words were doing to my body, he wasn't blind, he must knew how much my body ached for him.
"And you are rudely unrelenting. You should take my 'no' and stop talking me into something I don't want to." I was a liar, a liar who was going to have to do lots of explaining to God. Lying and lusting? I had a VIP seat in hell, I was sure.
Suddenly, Christian stepped forward, making me press myself against my car's side. He put both of his hands onto the roof, sandwiching me between his arms, his head bowed down toward me. Oh god. No, please don't kiss me.
He didn't kiss me, though.
"You don't want this?" He whispered, his lips so close to mine. I blinked rapidly, trying not to lean forward and press my lips on his.
"N-no." I said, shaking my head, which was a mistake since it made our nose tips brush each other. Fuck. Even that was hot with him. A smile curled his lips, his eyes glistening with mischief.
"You are a terrible liar, Ana." He only said, before softly putting his lips on mine.
Daddy C's ass belongs to Lisanomoreaguest for this chapter ;)
Cliffies are the source of all evil, just like me :D
I feed on your frustration, remember that.
xoxo
Melii
