The Professor Next Door (Cider Bar Sisters Book 3) Read online

  Other thoughts were floating around in his brain, but it was hard to grasp them. He wasn’t usually awake at one in the morning, nor was he usually in bed with a gorgeous woman.

  But one thought did manage to take hold.

  “Nicole,” he said, “we didn’t finish the chocolate mousse, did we?”

  She immediately sat up. “No, we didn’t. We’d better finish it now. Letting that go to waste would be a travesty.”

  Yes, she made him smile.

  Chapter 15

  When Nicole woke up on Sunday, someone was stirring beside her.

  Grinning, she wrapped an arm around David, who was lying on his side and looking at her alarm clock.

  “Good morning,” she murmured, kissing his cheek. “You have anywhere to be?”

  “I usually go swimming on Sunday morning.”

  Ah. He must have been coming back from the pool the morning she first saw him, when he was carrying a duffel bag.

  She hid her disappointment. If he wanted to go to the pool, she wouldn’t stop him.

  He rolled over. “But I can skip it today.”

  “Mmm, I’d like that,” she said, moving on top of him.

  They were both still naked, and she moaned as she felt his skin against hers, his hardening length against her thigh.

  He smiled up at her. “I have a request.”

  “Yes?”

  “No handcuffs this time. I want to touch you.”

  He slid his hands up her chest, brushing a thumb over her nipple. Then he brushed her lower lip, continuing to smile at her.

  She could feel herself slowly returning his smile, and the next thing she knew, she was on her back and he was above her.

  She laughed and sank into the mattress as he kissed and licked her all over.

  Nicole may have eaten expensive oysters and cheese last night, but this...this was luxury. Waking up with a beautiful naked man who was intent on pleasuring her. She always tried to get as much pleasure as she could in life—from sex, food, travel—while still being responsible. She didn’t hold herself back.

  This time, they didn’t speak much as he trailed kisses along her collarbone, her breasts, and her shoulders. When she started to squirm, he didn’t make her wait; his hand was immediately between her legs, and when her lips parted, he smiled at her reaction.

  She was very wet for him.

  He watched her face as he stroked her. When his thumb circled her clit, she let out a jerky gasp, and that seemed to please him, too.

  She hadn’t expected the variety in their sexual activities, hadn’t anticipated quite how much she’d enjoy being with him. And there was an unfamiliar comfort in being naked with David. Not that she was usually self-conscious, but it wasn’t quite as comfortable as this.

  Her back bowed off the bed. She was very, very close...

  He withdrew.

  “Bastard,” she muttered.

  “Shh.” He placed a finger—one that was coated in her moisture—to her lips before reaching for a condom. He rolled it on and slid inside her, touching her clit again as he did so, and she immediately cried out.

  “If you were on the other side of the wall,” she said, “you would have heard that.”

  “Yes. But then I wouldn’t be inside you.”

  He kissed her as he thrust in and out, and it wasn’t long before he came, pulling her over the edge, too.

  “David,” she said afterward, when she was lying with her head on his chest. “Can I ask you a personal question?”

  “Go ahead,” he said.

  “When I met you, I thought you were the kind of guy who looked like a husband. Why aren’t you married? You have nice hair and you’re good in bed.” She tried to make her voice light, but when he didn’t immediately reply, she said, “You don’t have to say anything, if you don’t want.”

  “I’m divorced.”

  Somehow, that possibility hadn’t occurred to her.

  “How long ago was that?” she asked.

  “Four years. We were together for nine years, married for five. We met in grad school.”

  They were quiet for a moment.

  Had his ex hurt him terribly?

  David chuckled. “I know you want to pry. I can see the questions on your face.”

  “That doesn’t mean you need to answer them.”

  “I know, but...” He ran a hand through his hair. “I’m the one who ended it, when I realized she’d never truly stand up to her family for me. She would always pick them, in the end. She’s white, and her parents are racist assholes. I could tell myself it wasn’t a big deal when we lived on the other side of the country, but when I got a job in Toronto and we came here, not far from them...” He shook his head. “The worst was the thought of what they’d say to our children.”

  “I can imagine,” Nicole said.

  “And because I know you want to ask, no, I don’t still love her.”

  She hadn’t considered asking that question, but yes, she’d wanted to know, and she felt relieved. Not because Nicole wanted David to fall in love with her, but because she didn’t want him to hurt too much.

  “I cut out the racist people in my family,” she said.

  “You told me.”

  “Right. When Aunt Eliza got my number. She’s one of those Asian ladies who would have only ever married a white man, and she thinks that makes her superior to her cousins, which... Sorry.”

  He reached out and squeezed her arm.

  “It’s different with my parents, I think,” Nicole said. “My mom just happened to fall in love with a white guy, but she doesn’t expect me or Cam to do the same. My aunt is toxic in so many ways. She doesn’t approve of my appearance because I’m not dainty and petite, and she thinks I look slutty no matter what I wear, because my breasts are large. Since I’m not super pale, she also thinks I’m too dark, and... Anyway. My mom, for all the issues I had with her, was pretty good at shutting that shit down, but my parents didn’t completely stop speaking to Eliza until...” Nicole didn’t feel like talking about what had happened with Cam, and David wasn’t one to push.

  “You’re incredibly beautiful,” he said.

  “Trust me, I fucking know.” She thought of how hot she looked in the pin-up painting in her closet. “You don’t need to reassure me.”

  “I know you know, but I want to tell you anyway.”

  She snuggled up against him. “This is the perfect arrangement. Being friends, living next door to each other, and having sex. It’s very convenient.”

  “Convenient,” he repeated faintly. “Yes.”

  “I love sex, but I don’t want everything to be a one-night stand. I used to be fine with that, but then I got old and cranky and tired of flirting. Whenever I found a guy to fuck regularly, he always fell for someone else shortly afterward. Super annoying.” Something occurred to her, and she lifted her head to look at him. “That’s cool with you, right? Friends with benefits?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “Sounds good.”

  But though he’d agreed with her, she couldn’t help feeling slightly disappointed. Perhaps she’d seen too many rom-coms over the years—not that she particularly liked them, but Cam and her mother did—and that part of her had expected him to say that no, he was in love with her, he’d known from the moment she’d handcuffed him to the bed and fed him chocolate mousse.

  A ridiculous thought. It wasn’t like she wanted that to happen.

  As she’d told him, they had the perfect arrangement.

  “Have you ever been married?” he asked.

  She snorted. “Me? Ha! Marriage would destroy me.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “I lived with a guy once. We were together for two years. Calvin was your age when we started dating, and I was twenty-two.”

  “That’s a big age difference.”

  “Yeah, I should have seen it as a warning sign, but I was desperate to be loved.” She laughed ruefully. “Especially because my mom and I weren’t getting alo
ng at the time. I’d moved home for grad school at U of T, but after my mom and I had a big fight, I moved in with Calvin.”

  Calvin had always talked about how rough it was for Asian men...and he had a point. But really, he just wanted to get away with all the shit that privileged white men could. He hadn’t treated her well.

  “I felt like that relationship consumed my life,” Nicole told David. “Like I lost my identity when I was with him, but I didn’t fully realize it until we broke up. Though who am I, anyway? In undergrad, I wasn’t the same person as in high school, when I was the nerdy kid who got high marks and didn’t have many friends. I certainly didn’t kiss anyone back in high school.”

  Back then, Mom had complained that Nicole wasn’t social enough, that she rarely went out with friends and sometimes ate lunch alone. Mom said Nicole needed to work on her people skills...but high school was a tough time for many people. Not everyone felt like they belonged, and Nicole was made to feel like there was something wrong with her, but there wasn’t.

  “I was the nerdy kid in high school, too,” David said.

  She smiled. “I would have expected nothing less.”

  David, she figured, hadn’t gone through the sorts of phases that she had. He’d probably been more constant in who he was.

  “You want to hear how I broke up with Calvin?” she asked. “It’s a good story.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “He decided we should open up our relationship, even though I’d never expressed any interest in that. There was another woman he wanted to fuck, you see. So, it was either we break up or I let him sleep with other people.”

  “That asshole,” David muttered, and she smiled again at his vehemence. It seemed out of character for him, and she couldn’t help being thrilled that he was angry on her behalf.

  “I reluctantly agreed. I’m sure he never expected me to take advantage of it, but I did. I got some cute outfits, went out, met guys... I wasn’t very sexually experienced before Calvin, and when I started fucking other men, I realized just how great sex could be. Anyway, he was all pouty about the action I was getting, and the woman he wanted wouldn’t sleep with him. We broke up, and I loved being single. I’ve been single ever since. It’s great having my own space, and I like not answering to anyone. Not having to plan my life around someone else’s or worry about his reactions to every little thing.”

  It was hard to breathe for few seconds because in the past year, Nicole had started to feel lonely. Her life wasn’t quite as amazingly awesome as she pretended.

  But she did have David now, right next door, and their Friday dinners were nice. She didn’t feel as alone now as she had a few months ago.

  “Well, I’m glad you dumped him,” David said.

  “Me, too.”

  He picked up the framed picture on her night table. It was a photo of her and Cam on holiday last year. “Is this your—”

  “Sibling,” Nicole said. “Their name is Cam.”

  “Ah. You look alike. Very much like siblings.”

  “We do.”

  “Are they older or younger?” he asked.

  “Two years younger.”

  “Like me and my sister.”

  “Is your sister in Toronto?”

  “No.” David set the photo back down. “She’s out in Vancouver, where we grew up. She’s married, got a couple of kids.” There was something wistful in his voice.

  “Do you want kids?”

  “Yeah, one or two. But I’m already forty, and I don’t want to be a super old father. If it doesn’t happen in the next five years, well, that’s life.”

  She was about to ask if he’d dated since his divorce. If he was bitter—he didn’t seem to be, though.

  But then she decided she didn’t really want to know.

  And it wasn’t relevant. It wasn’t like he wanted to date her, and he seemed to have no problem with their arrangement. That was all that mattered.

  He absently stroked her back for a minute, and then her phone vibrated. She pulled it off the bedside table and read the text.

  I was really drunk last night, wasn’t I? Rose said. Ahhh, I never get that drunk. Did I make a fool of myself?

  Nicole was about to send a quick reply, but the phone rang in her hands, catching her off guard. She answered.

  “Hello?”

  “Nicole, I’m soooo sorry,” said a familiar voice. Kelsey? “Po Po stole my phone while I was sleeping and wouldn’t give it back until I drove her here.”

  “Buzz us in!” Po Po shouted. “Oh, it’s okay, a nice man is holding the door open for me.”

  The call ended.

  “Shit,” Nicole said. “Shit, shit. My grandma and cousin are here.” She looked down at her naked body and David’s, then jumped up and started pulling on clothes. Underwear, bra, yoga pants, sweater. That should be good enough.

  “You’ve got sex hair.” David came up behind her and ran his fingers through her hair. “Do you want me to hide in the closet? Attempt make it next door before they arrive?”

  She sighed. “I’m not sure if there’s time. You might run into them in the hallway, and they’ve already met you. You can stay, just put on some clothes.”

  He had to leave the bedroom to find the clothes she’d torn off last night.

  “You have mouthwash?” he asked.

  “Yep, under the bathroom sink.”

  “Uh, Nicole?” he said as he stepped into the bathroom. “There’s a dildo on the counter.”

  Chapter 16

  David laughed as Nicole ran into the washroom and grabbed the candy cane dildo to return it to its proper place.

  “Oh my God,” she said. “That could have been a disaster. Though perhaps my grandmother wouldn’t have realized what it was. She just would have asked why I had a Christmas ornament out in March.” Nicole started laughing, sounding slightly hysterical.

  Now dressed and free of morning breath, David came into the bedroom and rubbed her shoulders.

  “Hey, it’s okay,” he said. “We found it, you put it away. Anything else?”

  Just then, there was some vigorous knocking on the front door, and David followed Nicole out of the bedroom.

  She opened the door to reveal Po Po and Kelsey.

  “Are you surprised?” Po Po asked.

  “Yes, very surprised,” Nicole said, and David tried not to laugh at her tone.

  “Ah, David, you are here, too. Nice to see you again. You are her boyfriend now?”

  “No, he’s not. We’re friends.”

  “It is just very suspicious. I surprise you with visits twice, and both times he is here.”

  “Indeed,” Kelsey said.

  Nicole gave her a dark look. “To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?”

  “You are grumpy,” Po Po said. “I must have interrupted sex.”

  This appeared to render Nicole speechless, and David couldn’t help feeling amused. After all, this was the woman who’d confidently handcuffed him to her bed last night.

  “No, no,” he said, since she was incapable of forming words. “I’m just stopping by because we’re going to H-Mart. We’ll catch an Uber back together to save money.” He hoped that sounded believable.

  Kelsey twisted her lips, but Po Po said, “Yes, this is smart.”

  He congratulated himself on the “saving money” part.

  “We talked about getting bungeoppang on the way, too,” he said, really getting into this domestic fantasy and hoping it would distract Kelsey from any suspicions she had.

  “What’s bungeoppang?” Kelsey asked.

  “It’s like taiyaki,” he said. “There’s a little place on the walk to H-Mart.”

  “What is taiyaki?” Po Po asked Kelsey. “I’ve never had it.” She pushed her granddaughter’s shoulder to get her attention.

  “It’s a pastry in the shape of a fish with sweet red bean paste.”

  “That sounds like a good breakfast to me,” Nicole said.

  He imagined buying
her one, hot off the grill, and the orgasmic sounds she’d make as she bit into it.

  Kelsey frowned. “Why would you take an Uber back from H-Mart? Isn’t it really close?”

  “Yeah, it’s not too far,” he said, “but it’s annoying to carry all the bags back.”

  Po Po stabbed his bicep with her finger. “Wah, are you not strong enough? Nicole, tell him to build bigger muscles!”

  He didn’t mind her light-hearted teasing. Nicole’s family was infinitely preferrable to Steph’s. Not that he and Nicole were together, but somehow, he’d manage to meet her grandmother. Twice.

  “Po Po, stop it,” Nicole said.

  “You know what we should do? We have a car. We will all go to H-Mart together and drive you home! And you will show me where to get these fish pastries. A fun family trip.”

  “It’s really not—”

  “I insist! Why waste money on Uber when you have Kelsey to drive you around?”

  “That’s me,” Kelsey said in a world-weary voice. “The chauffeur.”

  “Aiyah,” Po Po said, “why do you sound so blue? You are living rent free.”

  “You woke me up at eight in the morning on a Sunday, stole my phone, and demanded I drive you halfway across the city.”

  “Once we get home, do not worry, I will leave you alone for the rest of the day.”

  “Sure, Jan.” Kelsey rolled her eyes.

  “Who is Jan?”

  “So, uh,” Nicole said, “why are you here early on a Sunday morning?”

  “It’s not early,” Po Po protested.

  “It’s nine thirty. It’s early for a Sunday.”

  “She wanted to bring you bok choy.” Kelsey lifted up the plastic bag she was holding. “There was a deal at the store yesterday. And there’s a new video she wanted to show you, too.”

  “Yes!” Po Po said. “Kelsey posted it last night.”

  “She also wanted to sneak in questions about David or knock on his door, but she told me not to tell you that.”

  Nicole opened her mouth, but no words came out.

  David rather enjoyed seeing her riled up, but he put a calming hand on her shoulder. Though maybe this wasn’t the best way to convince Nicole’s family that the two of them weren’t together.