Art teacher Stone Larrabee dreads parent/teacher conferences. One following Christmas break becomes especially awkward, when a man with whom he shared a hot anonymous hookup and a nasty argument afterward walks in. Edison Watts.<br><br>The moment they’re reunited, sexual sparks reignite. Too many conflicts force Stone to decree there can never be anything between them but the one night, though, even as fate keeps throwing them together throughout the school year, and developing feelings become hard to ignore.<br><br>Some problems are easily solved while others, including the reason for Edison’s initial attraction to Stone and the chip on Edison’s shoulder bigger than the high school’s football field, prove more difficult. Stone can teach, but he decides must also be willing to learn and grow. When Edison promises to do the same, can they find a way to make one and one equal two?

Substitute Teacher

“Sure.” Edison seemed ambivalent, too. “Your place. Why not?”


With such a lack of enthusiasm, Stone was expecting Edison to back out. Twenty minutes later, however, they were at Stone’s apartment.


“This is my living room.” The top floor of three in a two-hundred-year-old converted house, the place had started off as plain as the Dirty Motel, all carpenter’s beige. Now, every vertical surface featured a framed work of art, from the childish to the sophisticated, and the lightwood floors were scattered with colorful rag rugs. “The place isn’t much. I have a friend who handmakes all the rugs.”


Chapter 13