12. Chapter 12

Rey scrambles to her feet, and she and Professor Solo stare at each other.

There is a clock on the wall. Each tick reverberates like a clap of thunder in the charged silence, over the blood that pounds in her ears in slow, fluid beats. Over every ragged breath that he takes, his wide chest heaving.

The fury in his dark eyes cuts her to the quick.

"I— I'm sorry," Rey stammers. "The note you confiscated from Finn— there was a hidden message and it could've gotten him and Rose into trouble—"

"Get. Out. Of my office." The words are shaky at the edges, uttered through Solo's clenched teeth.

Rey should heed the command. She should run away and never speak of this to anyone. But she can't move, something sharp and stubborn lodging in the pit of her very soul, blooming through her veins until it is all she is made of.

She can't let this be taken away from her. The sight of Ben Solo unraveled.

Her gaze drifts lower, drawn like a magnet to the telltale bulge in his hastily zipped-up trousers.

A quite considerable bulge.

She swallows.

"Perhaps you didn't hear me." His tone is virulent, but it isn't cold— in fact, it's easy to discern how rattled he is behind the virulence. He's not wearing his mask. "I said get out. Now."

"But you're still— still—"

Although Rey clams up, physically unable to finish that sentence, it's pretty obvious what she's referring to. Her eyes are glued to his erection, outlined in expensive charcoal fabric.

Solo turns his back to her. He doesn't move fast enough; she catches the look of pure humiliation on his face.

It breaks her heart.

Don't be ashamed, she wants to tell him. I feel it, too.

"Miss Niima," he tries again, says it to the empty air in front of him, "please leave."

The desolate anguish in his tone is palpable. She thinks about the Forbidden Forest. About the plethora of spells he uses to stay away from her. She thinks about every fantasy she's ever had of him. About how lonely he always seems, about how much she herself yearns.

And she makes up her mind.

"Professor Solo." Rey approaches cautiously, watching the lines of his broad shoulders tense as he realizes she's drawing near instead of heading to the door. "I can—"

What can she do? She literally has no idea. Or, rather, she has tons of ideas, but not a single clue how to even begin shaping them into language.

"I can help," she finally says, fighting back a cringe at her awkwardness.

He whirls to face her, knuckles of one hand clenched around the delicate gossamer material of the invisibility cloak. The rage has drained from his features; now he looks as though she'd slapped him, his jaw slack, his eyes wild and desperate and so, so dark in the gloomy light of his office, with the curtains drawn against the afternoon sun.

"You don't know what you're saying," he tells her flatly.

"Of course I do— I said it, didn't I?" she retorts, her cheeks heating up. "Look, I— I think about you, too, when I— you know," she rushes to add, and he makes a noise like a dying animal, low and stifled in the back of his throat. "Most nights I can't sleep, remembering what happened on Halloween. I know we agreed that we should pretend it never happened, but I'm graduating this summer and I'll probably never see you again after that and I want— I want to know what it's like, to be with you, so—" She forces herself to stop, to take a deep breath before she drowns him in word vomit. In her self-imposed silence she sees that he's studying her face intently, in a way that makes her think of hunger and fire and shadow-spun enchantments.

"I'm tired of pretending." Rey hates how plaintive she sounds. "Just— just be with me. Please."

More seconds tick by with no discernible reaction from him. Her bravado slowly trickles away until all that is left is a girl who wore her heart on her sleeve and has nothing to show for it.

Sanity returns. Comes slashing back in like a knife.

Merlin. She'd just propositioned her teacher.

For the second time this month.

Rey suddenly can't get out of that room fast enough.

She turns to make a beeline for the exit, already wondering if Mon Mothma will allow her to drop Defense Against the Dark Arts. So much for being an Auror— maybe she can take up accounting or something—

Large, callused fingers close around her wrist. She's barely registered such a touch before Solo tugs her back toward him, sending her crashing into the massive brick wall that is his chest. The invisibility cloak flutters gently to the floor at the periphery of her vision, and then—

— and then Solo, with his burning eyes, with his messy hair, with his frustrated snarl—

— is all she sees, until his mouth slants over hers and her eyes drift shut.

It had always bewildered Rey, why people close their eyes when they kiss. And now she understands.

It's the fireworks going off inside your head. It's the feel of warm, silky soft lips sliding against your own. It's the woodsy, spice-tinged scent of a man that you breathe in like air. It's the giddiness, the rush, the tangle of emotions too immense for your heart to hold.

All of these beg to be savored.

Rey gasps into Solo's mouth when his hands clamp around her waist and he lifts her off her feet. He does so with no effort. She's as light as a feather when she's with him, she's such a small thing. Her thighs instinctively lock around his waist and he carries her to his desk without once breaking their kiss, his left hand cupping her bottom so he can boost her up higher and, oh, it's criminal, how that one hand of his practically spans both her cheeks. A dark thrill rushes through her at this. Her skirt has ridden up so that half of his palm meets bare skin, and she knows that she will feel the burning imprint of his hand on her ass long after this is over.

She's trembling with anticipation when he sets her down on the edge of his desk. He leans forward, hands flat on the glossy wooden surface on either side of her as he licks into her mouth, as she lets him, as she clutches at the front of his shirt for support. As she had in the Forbidden Forest, she copies his technique studiously, stroke for stroke, their tongues sliding together, each caress stoking the fire building in her core until she's emboldened enough to nibble on his bottom lip. Biting down gently the way he did, beneath the yew tree.

Solo smiles against her lips. "Quick learner, aren't you," he breathes, and Rey's not prepared for how her cunt throbs at the compliment. Neither is she prepared for how he deepens the kiss, her spine dipping even lower over the desk, and her hands are graceless things, tugging at his collar, running down his chest, scrabbling at his bicep, desperate to explore the firmly muscled expanse of him.

To sear the way he feels into her memory.

Solo kisses her again and again and again. Her toes curl at all the things he's doing to her mouth. Inside it. She can barely keep track of what's going on, so it's with some surprise that she realizes his hands have wedged between their bodies to loosen her Gryffindor tie and to fiddle with the buttons of her school-issued white blouse. He pulls away once her tie has drifted to the floor and the last button has come undone and then he eagerly parts her blouse, those chocolate-and-olive eyes of his raking over her exposed torso.

It's only then that Rey remembers she's wearing one of her oldest, homeliest bras. A pale blue color, faded and frayed from so many washings. It's got an army of little pink Fanged Puffskeins stitched onto the cups.

And the pattern must be what Solo's staring at, because Lord knows Rey doesn't have much in the way of cleavage that would be considered particularly stare-worthy.

She starts to cross her arms over her chest. It's almost an instinct, she's so conscious of her small breasts and her ugly bra, but he stops her.

Not by grabbing her wrists or anything like that— instead, he leans in again and kisses her hard on the mouth. So hard that she sees stars as her arms fall away from her chest, her fingers digging into the sleeves of his blazer.

"Cute bra," he huffs against the corner of her lips.

"Oi, you don't have to make fun," Rey snaps, breaking away to glare at him. "It was a three-for-one sale in Diagon Alley—"

But the rest of what she's about to say dissolves into an undignified squeak when his large hand slides up to boldly palm her right breast. His expression suddenly stern.

"I was not—" He tweaks her nipple through the thin, worn padding, and a whimper escapes from her throat— "making fun of you, Miss Niima."

Oh, fuck...

To be called Miss Niima while she's half-dressed and squirming on his desk...

To be spoken to so firmly while she's being touched like this...

Rey's grateful she's already sitting down. She would have fallen over otherwise.

She'd had no idea it could be this way.

Solo holds her gaze, nigh unblinking, as he continues playing idly with her breast. "I was not making fun of you," he repeats in no-nonsense tones. "I am, as a matter of fact, very turned on by you. As you must have witnessed for yourself earlier, when you caught me." With one deft gesture, he tugs down the cups of her bra, exposing her breasts to air that carries a hint of late autumn chill, and he doesn't miss a beat in rolling her bare nipple between thumb and forefinger as it pebbles at his touch.

The pleasure is so sharply intense that it almost hurts. Rey's mind is spinning. She makes a stab at coherence— "What, ah, what were you thinking about? Earlier?"

He doesn't answer right away. Had it been a stupid thing to ask? She's just curious about the specifics, that's all...

She watches a not-so-nice smirk bloom on his pale face.

"Wouldn't you like to know," he murmurs.

Rey narrows her eyes at Solo, reflecting that she might actually dislike him a little— even if she is currently letting him feel her up in his office. Before she can say anything, though, he bows his head, as quick as a flash, and he's sealing his mouth over her other nipple, and he—

— sucks—

All rational thought vanishes. She cries out— well, actually, she yelps, and it's far from the sexiest sound in the world but he doesn't seem to mind one bit, his tongue flicking and swirling in tandem with the fingers that are gently strumming at her other breast and, shit, Rey's going up in flames, pulling him closer, as close as possible, burying her hand in the lush waves of his dark hair.

"Sir," she whispers hoarsely, and calling him that, too, is instinct. He's her teacher. She's his student. And it's a school day and he's standing between her legs and making a mess of her with his hot mouth. His clever fingers. Her mind has blanked and at the same time retreated into a very specific kind of headspace that she doesn't want to examine too closely just yet, because it would speak volumes about the kind of person she is. A certain wildness. "Professor Solo, please, I..."

"What do you want?" His words are muffled against her skin. "You have to tell me what you want."

She hesitates, oddly shy even though the animal inside her is howling at the walls. He is maddeningly content to wait, taking his sweet time covering her sensitive breasts in wet kisses and deliciously sharp pinches until she can't bear it anymore, bursting out, "Your fingers— put them in me— please, I need—"

Rey stops again, embarrassed by the comical whine in her tone and the clumsy way she'd phrased her request. She must sound so bloody ridiculous.

But Solo pauses, a shudder rippling through his powerful frame. When he lifts his head to peer at her, it's with a half-smile that is self-deprecating and yet tinged with a hint of the dark flames that are threatening to swallow her whole.

"If you only knew," he says thickly, "how long I've dreamed about you asking me to do that."

She's never been one to let things go. "Is that what you were thinking about earlier?"

He, in turn, has never been one to offer her the easy way out. "Maybe. Maybe not."

And he bends down again, this time to press nibbling little kisses along her neck. His hand creeps up her thigh, so slowly that it's torturous, so slowly that, when it finally disappears underneath her pleated skirt, she's all flushed and panting, clawing at his blazer.

Her impatience startles a chuckle out of him— a rich firewhiskey sound that vibrates against the delicate skin of her neck. That she feels all the way to the tips of her toes. "Feral little thing, aren't you?" he quips, his palm warm and heavy on the inside of her thigh.

"I'm tall for my age," Rey says primly. "You're just a sequoia."

"And if I were to make the wood-related joke that your comment practically demands?"

"I'd kick you off of me, sir," she declares with mock seriousness. "Swear to Merlin."

"Brat." He nips at her collarbone. A fresh wave of arousal surges through her, dizzying in its fierceness. There's a part of her that still can't believe this is happening, it's like they're both under some sort of spell. One that blocks out the rest of the world and its repercussions.

But she's not complaining in the slightest. And she's especially not complaining when Solo's wandering fingertips graze the outline of her sex through her drenched knickers.

It's something akin to an electric shock, the sensation. She jolts in his arms, her heart leaping in its cage, and suddenly his mouth has captured hers again and their tongues are tangling together as he strokes her between her legs. He keeps it light and teasing, never giving her the pressure she craves. Never making direct contact with the flushed wetness that's aching for more. Even when she cants her hips toward him, he pulls his hand back slightly, never affording her more than these skimming, ghostly, barely-there touches.

Rey's being driven out of her mind. "You're a bad, bad man," she mumbles against his lips, no longer caring what she's saying.

He laughs. Bastard.

She's not at all inclined to forgive him, but then he's coaxing her to lay back on the desk, propped up on her elbows, and he's leaning over her with one hand cupping the small of her back while the other continues its ministrations under her skirt. They're still kissing when his fingers finally, finally slip into her underwear.

"Fuck," he hisses through clenched teeth, "you're soaked."

Rey can't do anything but moan in agreement, turning to hide her furiously blushing face in the crook where Solo's neck meets his shoulder. It seems to her that his fingers are trembling as he glides them along her entrance, coating them in her wetness. It seems to her that she's going to die from pleasure before this is over.

And then he pushes one finger inside and—

— and it hurts—

Not in a nice way, either. He'd gone in with his middle finger and it's nearly twice the size of hers. It's a sting that's almost close to burning. She'd known there would be pain, but she winces, anyway, and his hand immediately retreats.

"Miss Niima." Solo appears to be at a loss, even as he murmurs the words softly into her hair. "Are— are you a virgin?"

"Yes," Rey sniffs into his shirtfront.

There is a long, drawn-out silence.

When she finally dares to take a peek, he's staring down at her like he can't believe she's real. Devoid of his usual mask, his face is a wonder to behold— fascination is written all over it, as well as a trace of guilt because of the fascination, the emotions flickering like sun-dappled currents amidst which are anchored the beauty marks that dot his pale complexion.

She begins to suspect that he is a little like her, and the guilt is starting to feel like a bonus. An added thrill to a situation that is already so, so wrong.

"Jesus Christ." The swear is yet another reminder that he's half-blood. "I really am going to hell."

The next kiss that he presses to her lips is gentle, as is the manner with which he resumes playing with her exposed breasts. And it's— it's so different from what Rey had been expecting. To hear the other girls talk about it, the first few times getting fingered always bring some discomfort. Boys go straight for the kill, clumsy and fumbling, and it's something to be endured until it starts to feel good.

"Oh, what I'd give for a bloke who'll play my lady bits like a violin," Tallie had sighed in the dorms one night, while Jess had nodded in sympathy and Rey and Jannah had just furtively rolled their eyes as they did their homework.

But after that first quickly nixed attempt, Solo isn't going straight for the kill.

Then again, he isn't a schoolboy.

He builds Rey up again with sweet kisses and lingering caresses, waiting until she's squirming on top of his desk and gasping into his mouth before his hand retreats under her skirt once more.

"Want to try again?" he ventures, and she nods, and he transfers his lips to her left breast, sucking tenderly as his finger is gradually eased into her with slow rocking motions.

She whimpers.

This time, it's not from pain.

His hot tongue swirls over her flushed little nipple. His thick finger delves inside her, going deeper and deeper with each second that passes.

He plays her like a violin.

"Do you think you can take another, Miss Niima?" he asks, lifting his head from her chest to study her face.

"Y—yes, sir," she pants. She wants to try. Wants to be good for him.

Another not-so-nice smile crosses his face. She's not so naive that she can't tell it does something to him, being called that in the middle of— this. She'd been right when she told him he was a bad, bad man.

As he switches the attentions of his mouth to her right breast, the second digit is carefully worked into her to join the first. She's so wet now that there's only mild discomfort despite how big his fingers are, stretching her out as they slide along her inner walls. It's not long before her hips have a mind of their own, shamelessly meeting his thrusts.

It's not long before Solo pulls off of her nipple with a slick pop, the lewd sound of which makes her blush even harder— but not as hard as when he draws back to simply stare at her, his pupils blown wide with arousal as she grinds against his hand.

"God, look at you." His tone is feverish. As is the glint his eyes. These as well as his next words are her only indication that he's no longer in control of himself. "Taking my fingers in that tight, hot cunt—"

"Professor," Rey groans. It's partly in protest, because she hadn't been prepared for the way her vision flashed white at the edges to hear him say that. And it's partly a plea for him to keep going.

He says nothing, lifting a brow at her in challenge instead. Right. She has to tell him what she wants.

"Don't— don't stop," she chokes out. Bother, her face is probably as red as a tomato.

It's all the permission Solo needs. He leans in close, his lips grazing the edge of her cheekbone as his wrist quickens its pace. "Look at you," he repeats in a low growl speaking more freely now that it's understood that she'll let him, "your tits hanging out of that cute little bra, wet with my spit, bouncing as you fuck my hand—"

Rey's head lolls back, her eyes fluttering shut. Who knew that language could heighten sensation like this— who knew that a man's deep voice rasping filth in her ear could make her feel so weightless—

Merlin, she's close. She just needs a little more...

"Do you want to know what I was thinking about earlier?" he asks. "When I had my hand on my cock as I said your name?"

His cock. Shit. She nods again, pathetically eager.

"I was thinking about you on your knees, sucking me off in my classroom after lecture." Solo crooks his fingers inside her and she cries out. "I was thinking about that smart little mouth of yours wrapped around my cock, taking all of it so prettily." She keens, writhing from the combined onslaught of physical sensation and mental images. "I was thinking," he concludes, sounding almost furious as his thumb hones in on her clit, "about you letting me fuck your face like a good girl—"

And Rey's orgasm hits her with all the force of a tidal wave. Her spine arches and a pleasure that's nigh unbearable rolls through her system, she falls apart on a sob as she feels herself gush all over Solo's hand, all over her knickers. With how wet she is, it's possible that some of it even gets on his desk.

The same desk that she collapses on as he eases his fingers out of her. She barely hears him pull down his zipper over the ringing in her ears.

When she looks down her body, Solo is a man unmade through the haze of her afterglow. He's palming her thigh as he stands between her spread legs, his other hand fisted around his erection. She's not been rendered so insensible by her climax that her eyes don't practically bug out of her head at the sheer size of him.

He's not as big as she imagined.

He's bigger.

So much bigger.

Just the thought of him cramming that thing into her elicits a fresh trickle of arousal from her aching cunt. She props herself up on her elbows again to get a better view.

Solo's jaw is slack, his kiss-bruised lips parted slightly as his breathing emerges all tattered and rough like he's running a marathon. "Rey," he grits out, "can— may I come on you?"

The conscientious grammatical correction— in mid-sentence, in the middle of this— almost makes her laugh. It's so him. But she doesn't feel like laughing. He looks as though he'll die if she says no.

She's never had this kind of power over anyone before.

"Yes," she whispers, mesmerized by the sight of him tugging on his cock, which is long and thick and flushed an angry red, a bead of clear fluid leaking from the tip. "Come on me." A rush of daring makes her add, "Cover me with it, sir."

"Fuck." His eyes squeeze shut, teeth bared in a snarl. "You impertinent little witch—"

His back bowing, one large hand slamming into the table surface beside her waist, Solo comes, painting Rey's bare abdomen in thick splatters of white, causing her breath to hitch in her throat at how surprisingly warm it is. She wonders what she must look like, laid out on her teacher's desk with her blouse unbuttoned and her breasts exposed and his come pooling on her stomach. She must look like such a wild thing.

Solo remains hunched above her, although he's gone still and some of the tension has drained from his shoulders. He'd needed this, Rey thinks, watching the lines of his face soften.

And then his eyes meet hers and she swallows, knowing that they've just done the unthinkable. The forbidden. They've taken each other past the point of no return and, from this moment on, things are never going to be the same.