Professor’s Rule 01 - Giving an Inch (3 page)

Jesus, Carson. No. He’s just trying to do his job.

James took the pile of slacks and hung them on the bar fastened to one of the cubicle’s walls. Four altogether. James immediately passed over the first pair. Wool, yuck. Just what he needed: to be doing a massively important presentation with itchy balls.

Oh, very well then, although I can’t recall that ever stopping you before.

Flashes of being shoved up against the grimy surface of a handicapped stall with a busboy rutting between his legs while the Professor looked on. Or taking a guy to the seedy backroom of some club while the Professor calmly sipped his drink at the table after giving James his marching orders:
Go fuck that guy and report back when you’re done
.

No big deal.

Correction. Never stopped YOU
, James replied, but damn the fucking man because a very insistent erection was now poking out of his open fly.

Let’s see your other trouser options.

Oh, that asshole. That prick. That dickbag.

I can’t,
he texted back, wondering if Carson could read the way his teeth were gritted in the words.

Whyever not?
He could hear the smoothly arched eyebrow, envision the disingenuous expression.

You know why.

Let me see that, then.

James reached down, taking his cock in hand, literally weighing his options. If he did this, there’d be no going back.

God, he wanted to do this. Carson—striving to please Carson—was like a fucking drug. Carson might take and take and take, but James in turn gave and gave and gave, and got off on it just as much.

If he took that picture, he was going to do anything else Carson demanded of him. And it would be hot. No, not hot. Fucking incendiary. And for an hour or a day or however long, he would once again have that feeling that he could do anything, be anything. Anything wicked, anything superlative. Anything he wanted.

Anything
Carson
wanted.

But the crash after. Oh, God. That was the rub, in Hamlet’s words. Because if James was an addict and pleasing Carson a drug, well, the shame that came after, the terror of how far it would go—how far James would let it go—that was the hangover.

And the withdrawals didn’t bear thinking of.

Carson waited with what James knew was infinite patience. He wouldn’t text again. That was the thing about him: as much as James liked to tell himself that Carson was demanding and pushy and a Bad Influence, he always waited for James to come to
him
. Right from that very first encounter, when things had been an ethical nightmare (what with James being in Carson’s class and all), it had been James who’d made the first move.

Of course, back then it had been about trying to fuck his way to a better grade, but the Professor sure had set him straight on that one. Be careful what you wish for, and all that. In the end, he’d
worked
for that grade. And not on his knees.

The kneeling had come after the grade had been earned. A reward for a job well done. By that point, after weeks of study, James had been literally drooling for it. In fact, his mouth was a little wet now, thinking about it. The salt, the sweat, the weight of the Professor’s cock on his tongue, the pressure of it slamming down his throat.

He looked himself in the mirror, focused the camera on the jutting shape of his cock tenting his boxers, and snapped the picture.

My. That looks like it needs attention. Certainly enjoying your cage-free existence, aren’t you?

Yep.

And yet, he missed that cage, as much as he’d hated it at the time. Contradictions. He was drowning in them.

Surely such a dire emergency justifies a call for assistance.

No.
He wasn’t going to cross that line. He wasn’t Carson’s plaything anymore, he was his own man, and playing by his own rules. James took guys like Satish out for coffee and cheesecake before they fucked, and when they did fuck, it was somewhere private. Like James’s dorm, or the other guy’s apartment, or a hotel room, or the back of a car . . .

Not
in a fucking dressing room, watching themselves in the floor-length mirror, trying to muffle their sounds . . .

Fuck.

Carson’s reply was terse:
Well then, Mr. Determined-To-Defy-Me
,
can you take your head out of your arse long enough to show me that pretty cock of yours, or are you going to say no to that without good reason, too?
And fuck James for responding to its tone not with anger, but with, well, wide-eyed eagerness.

He stroked himself through the fabric of his boxers, just his first finger and thumb, hissing at the familiar slide of his foreskin over his shaft. So hard, and yes, he wanted to show Carson, wanted to hear Carson’s praise. Missed his praise, all the little compliments he showered James with, and the naughty requests that had flowed from them. He could make James feel sublime and beautiful one second and follow it up with something that made him feel abjectly whorish the next.
My pretty boy, how obedient, I love the look of you hairless, what a lovely cock you have, can you lift your ass for me?

He was going to come in his shorts before he ever had a chance to comply if he didn’t get a grip. Drawing a deep breath, he pulled off the trousers before he jabbed himself with a pin, and then drew his boxers down, tucked them under his cock and balls. Carson had always loved his balls. Loved how tight his sac was, loved the pink seam that bisected his perineum. Just thinking of how much he pleased the man gave James a head rush.

He sent the picture just before another soft knock sounded at the door.

“How’s it going in there?”

James jumped, hands flying guiltily from his cock. “Uh, fine! Totally fine! Yeah, just give me a few minutes?”

Which was, of course, the moment Carson replied. Almost in unison, he and Satish asked,
Sure you don’t need any help?

Satish’s voice was soft. Inviting. Subtly entreating James to let him in.

No damn it! No! Just because he’d been weak enough to show Carson his dick didn’t mean he had to jump right back where their failed relationship had left off.

Failed. That was the operative word. F-A-I-L-E-D.

“No thanks, just in here snapping some pictures.” There was no keeping the abject misery out of his voice. If only Satish knew what those pictures were
of
. Not trousers, that was for damn sure.

Satish’s voice was a little more distant, a little more proper. Withdrawn. “Oh. Right. Okay. Sorry. I’ll leave you to that, then. Call if you need anything.”

Fuck. And now Satish thought he’d done something wrong, or that James wasn’t interested anymore. Maybe even worried that he’d misread his customer and that his flirting was about to bite him in the ass.

James’s phone buzzed, interrupting that particularly depressing train of thought.

Kneel with your back to the mirror. Hand not holding the phone on the back of your neck. You know the proper position.

Yes, James knew, all right, and oh it was so easy to do as he was told, so much easier than the tangled uncertainty Satish represented.

Yes, Professor
, he replied, and obeyed. The elastic waistband of his underwear hobbled his thighs. Thank God the changeroom had a door that reached the floor. It would be awkward having to explain to a passerby who could see the bottom six inches of the room, why he was on his knees with his underwear slipping down his legs.

He turned his back to the mirror and took a deep breath. Switched his phone’s camera to the front view so he could see his reflection on the screen when he held it up over his shoulder. For a skinny guy, he had a fat little ass, perky, and looking at the curve of his back cinched in the vest Satish had chosen for him made him remember the heat of Satish’s hand at the base of his spine. Had Satish been resting his hand there dreaming of cupping James’s full ass instead?

Snap
went the phone’s artificial shutter.

Carson’s reply was near instantaneous.
Even lovelier than I remember, my sweet. You’re never more gorgeous than when you’re on your knees. But so pale. You need somebody to redden you up a bit. How long since you were last spanked?

Not as long as you hope,
James typed back, trying to ignore his cock bobbing between his legs, his shirttails brushing the head, as he remembered the sensation.

Really spanked, James, not little love taps while you’re fucking.

Oh. James’s face was probably as red as Carson wanted his ass to be, just then.

There had been a time he’d sworn he hated those spankings. And the whippings they’d evolved into. The canings, especially. So well-suited to an old-school academic like Carson, and a disobedient pupil like James had been.

So when had his cock begun to ache and drip at the thought of them?

Since you
, he replied. He’d tried the whole BDSM domination thing with other men, but it had never worked out, never even gotten past second base. Nobody compared. That old gay-for-you chestnut came to mind, except in James’s case, it was sub-for-you.

Or maybe he could have been submissive to other men, once upon a time, but Carson had ruined him for anybody else.

Poor boy. Would you like me to rectify that?

No question. No hesitation.
Oh yes, please, Professor.

Easy. So, so very easy to fall off the wagon. Fuck “fall.” Take a gleeful nosedive from the wagon, shouting “So long, suckers!” and “Geronimo!” as he plummeted.

Well, I’m sure that in the past years without my guidance, you’ve racked up plenty of infractions in need of punishment.

A smile twitched at the corner of James’s mouth.
Well, if nothing else, I’ve been masturbating like crazy.

Oh, yes. At first he’d done it for the sake of defiance, once he’d broken his tether, because the Professor’s no-touching-yourself-without-permission rule had been a particularly devious form of torture for a man in his early twenties.

Of course, once the initial anger and rebellion had faded, then he’d done it in yearning, longing for things he hadn’t dared admit he missed.

He could practically hear Carson’s tutting.
Oh, sweetness, that is a grave offense indeed. You know that pretty cock isn’t yours to play with.

That statement should have pissed him right the fuck off. Half an hour ago, it would have. He wanted that defiance back, but he wanted the pain and the pleasure more. So much more. He was trembling for it; the next picture he took, of his hand wedged between his ass cheeks, one finger rubbing his hole, was blurry and out of focus thanks to the fact that he couldn’t keep the fucking camera still.

Too bad you couldn’t have accidentally texted me in a grocery store
, Carson texted in reply, but didn’t elaborate. Not that he needed to; the implication was perfectly clear. And yeah, James was jonesing for him bad enough that he probably would have put a zucchini or cucumber or banana up his ass, if that was what the Professor had commanded.

But obviously that wasn’t an option. Carson’s next text read,
Lean forward now, face on the floor, ass up. Spread yourself for me. I miss your tight, lovely hole almost as much as you miss my cane.

James didn’t want to do that. Didn’t want to take such a humiliating position, especially in a public place. And public place or no, he’d never really liked showing off his asshole. Oh, he liked the pleasure it gave him, sure, had no qualms about being penetrated or even penetrating himself, but that didn’t mean he found it attractive, or understood how any other man could, either.

But he did it anyway. Because it was the Professor and the rewards of obeying were almost always worth the mortification.

It took a couple tries to get the picture right, get himself in the frame properly. Looking at the pictures, out-of-focus and cut off as they were, filled him with shame so burning he almost wanted to puke. Bad enough to take the picture, even worse to have to do it over and over again, scrutinizing the results. On the fourth try, though, he managed to get an acceptable shot. His hand, first and second fingers stretched in opposite directions and prying his ass open, and his hole nestled in the V.

So beautiful, my sweet. I know how hard it was for you to do that. Thank you.

And with those words, the shame was almost gone, washed away with pride and delight. He’d pleased the Professor. It never got old. It never faded. Not even when he wished and prayed it would.

When he didn’t reply immediately, Carson texted him again.

You don’t believe it’s beautiful, but it is. It’s beautiful for the pleasures it offers me. It’s beautiful because it’s mine to claim and use and admire.

James was still on his knees, still hunched forward, wrists on the floor as he held his phone in front of his face.
Whenever and wherever you like, Professor.

Greedy thing, aren’t you?
the Professor chided.
I think more is required to earn that reward, don’t you?

Anything
, he almost texted back, but he managed to salvage at least that much dignity.

Like what?
he asked instead.

I think you know what I want from you today, James. I won’t ask again. If the answer is still no, I will find a suitable alternative, but you know my first choice. So what will it be?

He’d known. He’d known it would come to this. He’d known Carson wouldn’t just let it go. That was why he had been so certain that once he started down this road, he would have to follow it all the way to the end. Because sooner or later, Carson always made him so desperate that he
would
do anything. Even the things he swore he didn’t want to do.

He could refuse. Carson wouldn’t even be so petty as to end the game entirely if he did. James knew that now, even if he hadn’t known it two years ago.