Kissing Tolstoy (Dear Professor Book 1) Read online

  “Anna?”

  I stiffened, feeling a little caught by his wakefulness. I’d been having a private moment of reflection and wasn’t quite ready to leave my languid ponderings.

  Although, as good feelings about Luca were the source of my languid ponderings, I soon got over the interruption. Especially since Luca’s voice reminded me of charcoal first thing in the morning, smoky and deep, dark and uninhibited.

  I’d learned over the last two months that he was most susceptible to seduction in the morning. I assumed this was why we’d only spent the night together four times. His hands seemed to roam freer and were more likely to breech clothing, to caress bare skin—as he was doing now.

  “How long have you been awake?” His hand smoothed from my waist to my hip, and on the return pass his fingers slipped beneath my night shirt, trailing along my stomach to my ribs.

  “Not long.” The words were breathless and I held perfectly still, not wanting to move and draw attention to his instinctive ministrations. I suspected he didn’t realize what he was doing, or he hadn’t quite cleared his brain of the dream-fog yet.

  When he did, when he realized his hand was under my shirt, he would draw away and sit on the edge of the bed, taking a few deep breaths before making some excuse to leave the room—or so that had been the pattern thus far.

  For now, I held my breath as the backs of his fingers brushed lightly against the underside of my breast, and I couldn’t stop the automatic urge to arch my back, press my bottom against him. But I did successfully bite back the moan that threatened to tumble from my lips when I found his body ready—so ready—for mine.

  Luca’s breathing grew ragged and he pressed forward, rocking against my backside as his hand became bolder, sliding to fully cup my breast, massage it, sending a shot of pleasure and pain low to my abdomen, and lower still.

  “Anna,” he breathed against my neck, biting my shoulder like he wanted to consume me. “We should stop.”

  Sensing his gathering control and intention to draw away, I grabbed his hand and pressed it more firmly against me, forcing it lower, down my stomach, beneath my underwear, to the thrilling ache between my legs. All the while meeting the indolent rhythm of his hips with my bottom.

  “Touch me, Luca,” I moaned.

  What is this life?

  Was this me? Had I become this kind of nice? This bold, demanding, aching kind of nice? I hoped so. I felt like this kind of nice would probably get me laid more often, and with more intense satisfaction.

  Luca made a sound like a growl, deep in the back of his throat and rumbling in his chest, but didn’t pull away. Instead, he indulged my request, and in doing so, he pushed me to the precipice, where longing and mindlessness, and pain and pleasure all dance on the edge of oblivion.

  Oh God, I was so close. So close. But then he moved away after a few strokes, shifting to one side and placing me on my back until I lay next to him while he lounged on his side. His hand now stroked me lightly over my underwear.

  Ugh.

  Torture.

  PURE TORTURE.

  Sweet, succulent, delicious torture.

  But it didn’t matter. I was so hyped, I was likely going to come anyway. I felt the first tell-tale signs as a surge of heat rushed over my neck to my cheeks, and my hips moved to music I couldn’t hear.

  He bent to my ear, hot breath and whispered words falling over the sensitive skin of my neck, “You infect me, body and soul, with primitive thoughts of claiming and conquering. I do not know who I am when I touch you. I am no longer civilized, I am blood and heat and lust. I barely recognize myself.”

  Paying no attention to any potential nuance within his meaning, I focused solely on the key words: claiming, blood, heat, and lust.

  All good words. I liked those words.

  But then he moved as though to withdraw fully. Unthinkingly, I grabbed his wrist and opened my eyes to meet his.

  He glared at me. Actually, we glared at each other. An unspoken challenge hung heavy between us. Or that heaviness might have been his erection against my hip.

  Seconds ticked by, maybe a full minute, and I sighed the intense sigh of sexual frustration, covering my face with my hands. I felt him hesitate beside me, his weight still on the bed, as I concocted a plan to finish up business while he took a shower, or maybe after he left, or whatever.

  “Anna.”

  “What?” I pulled my hands away and looked at him.

  His jaw ticked, his eyes—hot and covetous—moved over my face, and his lips were parted as though he was about to speak; whatever it was, it seemed to be something of great importance.

  Finally, he said, “I’ll make breakfast.”

  I nodded, only half paying attention, because my body was still humming. In fact, I was trailing my fingers back and forth over my exposed stomach, enjoying the feel of my soft skin.

  His attention snagged on the movement of my hand, his jaw ticking once more as he seemed to grind his teeth.

  “Anna. . .” This time my name was a tight whisper, and sounded suspiciously like a plea.

  I didn’t know what he wanted, what he was asking me for. But I knew what I wanted. So I hooked my thumbs in my shorts and underwear, that movement also drew his attention. Slowly, I pushed the clothes down my legs and studied his shocked expression with satisfaction as his chest expanded with a bracing breath.

  And still, he didn’t move. His hand now rested on my upper thigh, his palm hot against my leg, and he watched—a scarcely subdued thunderstorm—as I hitched my shirt upward, revealing my breasts, then trailed my hand along my stomach, over the ache in my abdomen, and spread my legs.

  He flinched when my fingers made contact with my body, and his breath returned, labored as he watched me touch myself.

  What am I doing? What is this life?

  Goosebumps erupted over the whole of my exposed skin and I felt every nerve ending spark and fire where his eyes moved, devoured, claimed and conquered in a way he wouldn’t yet allow himself to do.

  As though unable to help himself, he bent and sucked my breast into his hot, wet mouth, his fingertips trailing a tickling, restless path along my inner thigh, to my knee as his tongue tangled with and lapped at my nipple.

  I felt something stir within him and he shifted, a break or a decision to act.

  But it was too late.

  I arched, throwing my head back, caring only about the high of sensation. And I soared.

  “But the underlying passion behind Eugene’s discontent is what drives Tatyana at the first. She knows as soon as she sees him.”

  Luca shook his head, glaring at me. The covetous heat from earlier this morning hadn’t quite left his eyes; rather, it simmered, and had begun turning the clear blue of his irises a rather particular shade of gray. I decided the color should be called ‘the gray of my discontent.’

  “No. You are missing the entire point.” Luca stood, grabbing his plate and mine and stomping to the sink. “Eugene is passionless. He’s a miserable person. He was miserable without Tatyana. He would have been miserable with her, because his existence has no purpose.”

  “Tatyana didn’t think so.” I watched his profile as he did the dishes.

  “It’s an allegory of the time,” he shook his head, clearly frustrated, “of the privileged class and their ennui, while the proletariat suffers. There is no cure for ennui, just like there is no cure for starvation save death.”

  “That’s not true.” I reached for my coffee cup and stood, crossing to where he was finishing up the last plate. “The cure for starvation is nourishment. Don’t you think it’s possible that Tatyana could have been the nourishment that he needed? You say he had no purpose, but couldn’t Tatyana—and her passion and love for him—couldn’t that have become his purpose?”

  “But how healthy is that?” he gave me a face, turning off the water and drying his hands, “How healthy is making another person your purpose?”

  “Who cares?” I said louder than necessa
ry, grinning at him. “Who cares how heathy it is? When you’re talking about the reality of starvation and death, what’s a little co-dependence?”

  Luca stared at me for several seconds, and then—abruptly—he laughed, heartily, shaking his head. “You are completely mad.”

  I grinned, an acute sense of triumph making me stand taller as the discontented gray of his eyes had warmed, now bluer, less cloudy.

  My heart skipped as I continued. “Seriously, who cares? Something I think we forget, living in the time we do, is that generations before us didn’t have the luxury of healthy relationships. They had survival.”

  “And passion,” he added, his eyes dropping to my lips as his smile waned.

  “And high infant mortality. And cholera.”

  “And love.”

  Whoa.

  An involuntary flurry of something fantastic hit me like an electric shock, originating in my chest and radiating outward.

  But then I noticed the smile had leached from his face, leaving his jaw set in a mournful line and his eyes that melancholy grey once more. “But only those who were free to do so.”

  “Free to do what?” I tilted my head to the side as I took a step closer such that mere inches separated us, accidentally bumping his leg with mine.

  “Free to love.” Luca shook his head as though frustrated.

  I bumped his leg again, this time on purpose, forcing his eyes back to mine. “I guess it’s a good thing we live now.”

  His smile grim, he wrapped his hand around the back of my head and brought my forehead to his lips for a kiss. His arms slid around me and I set my coffee cup on the counter so I could return his embrace.

  “I’ll see you for dinner?”

  I nodded against his chest, giving him a squeeze. “I’ll meet you after my last class.” We were in the second week of the fall semester and were already falling into a routine. After my classes, I’d go to his office and study while he worked. Then we’d have dinner together, usually at my place as I didn’t like driving home past midnight, which was when we usually said our goodbyes.

  “Do you work tomorrow?” He leaned away, gazing down at me.

  I lifted my chin. “Yes, but it’s my last week, so I don’t think they’ll make me wrap silverware or anything. I should be off no later than nine.”

  “Excellent.” He punctuated this word with another kiss to my forehead then released me. “I’ll pick you up.”

  “Sounds good.” I let him go and picked up my coffee, sighing the sigh of the woman who already misses her guy, even before he’s walked out the door.

  Too soon, he was gone.

  Our time together always felt too short. And the time apart always felt too long.

  Clearly, I’d become ridiculous.

  Getting ready for the day, I laughed at this strange, new version of myself. And then I laughed at his frustration this morning, though it echoed mine in many ways. Anticipation was all well and good; torture could be sweet, for sure.

  Until it wasn’t.

  Until that simmering thunderstorm he carried around erupted into a hurricane. Or multiple tornadoes touching down all at once. Or a sharknado of destruction, annihilating the trailer park of my heart!

  I made a face, frowning at my reflection in the bathroom mirror.

  My heart wasn’t a trailer park. It was more like a national park, but with a sculpture garden of nerdy statues doing the robot. And a library.

  Whatever.

  The point was, did I want to deal with a Luca Kroft severe weather warning? I knew why I hadn’t complained about the progression of our sexy times, but why hadn’t he? Why was he waiting? Why was he so rigid about it? Or what was he waiting for?

  Perhaps he worried about me? About my experience level maybe? Not that he needed to be worried. And he would know if he’d just ask me. My kind of nice might’ve been the goofy kind, but being goofy-nice didn’t mean my past was lacking in sexperience.

  Contrary to depictions on TV, nerds do it. A lot. With other humans.

  I picked up the book I’d been reading yesterday before Luca had come over, Fledgling, by Octavia Butler and decided to marinate in this problem while I read. The novel was about a seemingly young woman with amnesia who discovers she is not what (or who) she believes herself to be.

  It’s an awesome book. I knew this to be true because I’d already read it several times. I especially liked how Butler illuminated self-bias, how the image we see in the mirror can lead us to believe we are one thing, when we are really another thing entirely, and—

  Wait a darn minute, Dostoyevsky.

  Another thing entirely!

  I shot up in my seat, my index finger raised in front of me, suddenly gripped by a thought, or a suspicion, or an idea. Or rather, something like all three.

  A thopicea. That’s what it was, thought + suspicion + idea = thopicea, the most badass made up word of all time.

  So I took my gripping thopicea and I ran to my closet, grinning at both my genius and my leather pants.

  ** Luca **

  A rare opportunity, a call for abstracts issued by the State Department, on the topic of mutual understanding and cultural context between the United States and Russia, had been sent to me some eleven months ago by an acquaintance of mine at Princeton. He’d stumbled across the RFA while searching the Department of Defense website.

  I’d applied for the grant, which had a yearly estimated budget of two million dollars for five years. I’d worked on it tirelessly for three months, fully expecting nothing to come of it other than improved understanding of grantsmanship.

  Now, seated in my office, after leaving Anna—her razor wit, thought-provoking conversation, warm bed, and exquisite body—I lost my ability to draw breath for the second time that day.

  The award email, wherein the grants manager at the State Department congratulated me and my team, and spelled out next steps—a meeting in Washington, DC, a conference call with our grants administration department, documents needed for the transfer of funds—appeared in my inbox with no fanfare, prosaic in its initial uniformity to any other email.

  Yet nothing about this email, or award, or grant, was prosaic. My first thought was to call Anna.

  I wanted, more than anything, to share this moment with her. This moment of triumph. This moment of freedom.

  But then fear wrestled alongside hope. I struggled to accept the reality and ramifications of this news. Years of living as Sergey Kroft’s son meant I had to ask: did my father have connections at the State Department? And could this be one of his maneuverings?

  He was powerful to be sure, but I’d never known him to be capable of this level of corruption. Purchasing and funding an endowed chair at a prestigious university was lightyears from rigging the federal grants system.

  Even so, I reached for my cell and hurriedly found Dominika’s number, counting the rings before she answered.

  “Luca?”

  “Did he make this happen?”

  A pause, and then, “What are we talking about?”

  “Dad.”

  “Did he make what happen?”

  “You know what.”

  Another pause, and then, “Are we talking about the gala? Because that’s not set in stone, and you would only have to show up for an hour or two.”

  I wasn’t aware of any gala, nor would I refuse to attend an event if it were important to my family. “Not the gala, Dominika. The grant.”

  “The grant?”

  “Yes. The State Department grant.” My heart beating out of my chest, I waited for her answer, the sense that my very life, my entire future hung in the balance did not feel like an overly dramatic estimation.

  “Holy crap, are you saying you got the grant?”

  “Did he do it?”

  “What? No! No, why would he? Oh my God, you got it?”

  A gush of air left my lungs and I sunk further into my chair, not prepared to entirely trust my good fortune. “Are you sure?”

  �
��Yes. Yes, I’m sure. There’s no way.” She lowered her voice to just above a whisper, “There’s no way he’d be responsible, even partially. He’s anxious for you to leave teaching, take more responsibility and interest in the family business. A grant like this will cement your career and give you the freedom to go anywhere. He’d never do this. You know he’s just waiting for you to—”

  “Move past my rebellious phase,” I finished for her, truth finally penetrating doubt.

  “Congratulations, little brother.” Dominika was smiling, I heard it in her voice. “I’m proud of you.”

  Her words of praise hit me square in the chest, my throat constricting, but I managed, “Thank you.”

  “What are you going to do? Will you stay there? Or take the grant and run?”

  I sought out my computer screen, skimming the words of the email again. Reading it this time and in no doubt of its veracity, I had no idea whether I would stay or leave my position.

  But I did know exactly how—and with whom—I would spend my evening.

  No more waiting, no more restraint. No more cause for caution. The shackles had fallen off, the burden of uncertainty had been lifted. My life was now my own and I was free to give it, and share it, and live it with whomever I chose.

  I hadn’t yet determined how best to answer my sister’s inquiry when the sound someone opening my office door fractured my attention.

  I glanced up from the email and found her hovering in the doorway.

  Anna.

  “So, how are you?” The cadence of her voice was smooth, deeper than usual, and the way she said the words made them sound rehearsed.

  I immediately hung up on my sister, tapping the red end call button. She wouldn’t like that, and I’d need to apologize later. But for now, I took the extra precaution of turning my cell completely off. I wanted no interruptions, the moment was too momentous.

  “Anna.” I stood, intent on gathering her to me and indulging in the perfect feel of her.

  But the mischievous glint in her eye and slant to her smile halted my would-be progress. She gripped a large raincoat closed at her chest. The rest of her, the black lining her eyes and the red paint of her lips, the high heels she wore, gradually materialized for me as she shut the door.