Filed to story: Shhh Professor! Please Don’t Tell! Novel Free
Hi Ellie,
Please consider making the time to come talk to me. I’m off campus today, but I would like to talk with you as soon as possible.
Professor Spaulding
I tucked my phone in my pocket with a sigh of relief. I wouldn’t respond today. I would make him wait. Later that afternoon, after catching up on my homework in the library, I met Jackson at the corner of Hawthorn and Rosewood.
“Hi,” he said, kissing my lips warmly as soon as I sat down. “How was your day?”
I closed my eyes for a moment, savoring the feeling of him. Was I dreaming? Was I really going home with him for the second day in a row?
“It was pretty good,” I said. I’d been worried about Annie. “How was yours?”
“Good,” he said. “I didn’t get fired yet.”
I winced.
“I’m sorry,” he said soothingly, stroking my knee. “I didn’t mean to upset you. At least I can joke about it, right?”
I gave him a feeble smile. He laughed softly and squeezed my knee.
We drove back to his mansion. Again, the feeling of safety swept over me as we got farther and farther away from Flynn. As if we were escaping, retreating to a place where we were safe. A fortress.
We made love again as soon as we got there. We went upstairs and undressed and had sex together in the jacuzzi. The warmth of the water merged with the warmth of Jackson’s body, and I was breathless with desire and pleasure.
Unlike Egypt, I could scream here all I wanted to.
Afterwards we dried each other off and got dressed again. This time I’d brought a small suitcase full of my own clothes, and I unpacked them into one of Jackson’s dresser drawers.
After dinner, we sat in the library and cuddled on the couch. My eyes roamed around the room, wondering if I would spend the rest of my life living here.
My eyes landed on Jackson’s diploma, hung on the wall between two of the windows.
Jackson had gone to Flynn. He would have been there eighteen years ago, right around the time when Annie’s mom had gotten pregnant. Maybe he’d known her. Maybe he’d known what guys she hung around with, and would be able to give us another lead.
“Jackson?”
“Yes, dearest?”
I smiled. “I have a question.”
“What is it?”
“It’s kind of a weird question, and to ask it, I’ll have to tell you something personal about Annie, but I feel pretty sure that she wouldn’t mind me telling you.”
“What is it?” Jackson asked again, his nose nuzzling my hair.
“She doesn’t know who her dad is,” I said. “Her mom went to Flynn about eighteen years ago and got pregnant with her, Annie has been trying to find her dad. She thought it was somebody named Logan Green, but they just took a paternity test and it isn’t him after all. She’s really upset.”
Jackson’s nose had stopped nuzzling my hair. He sat up straight.
“I knew Logan Green,” he said. He looked alert. His eyes were a little wide. “What was Annie’s mom’s name?”
“Back them it was Samantha Tully,” I said.
Jackson swallowed.
I looked up at him, and the expressions that were shifting across his face made my heart turn inside out.
I did not want this to be happening.
Samantha Tully.
It suddenly hit me how similar Annie looked to her. The tall, skinny girl with dark hair. Those piercing brown eyes. The quick, impish smile.
I hadn’t been in love with her, but we’d made love a few times. She’d been dating Logan Green, and when they broke up she asked me out for coffee. I think I was a rebound maybe even a little bit of a revenge relationship. We’d only slept together a few times, and then I’d ended things and she’d gone back to Logan. Then I’d graduated, and never heard from her again.
I’d had no idea she’d become pregnant. And now I was sitting here with my arms around the woman I loved, wondering if her best friend was my daughter.
I’d thought I was done feeling like a creepy old man.
Ellie knew. I could feel her energy shift. She’d become perfectly still, her breathing tight and silent.
“It may not be me,” I said, my voice almost a whisper. “I know Samantha dated a lot of people that year.”
Ellie nodded, but her face looked pale. I couldn’t imagine how this made her feel. I swallowed.
And then, I had an emotion I was not expecting.
I might have a daughter.
A warmth rose up in my core. I liked Annie, I’d always liked her a lot. She was bright and funny. We’d gotten to know each other fairly well on the Egypt trip. She had a quick, blunt sense of humor that I enjoyed. I thought she was a brave, intelligent young woman.
And she might be my daughter.
I tried to picture her face. Some of her features might be a reflection of mine. It was more than possible.
I felt a surge of something like excitement. I think it might have been joy.
“Ellie,” I said. “I want to do a paternity test.”