Beautiful Obsession Read online

  Beautiful Obsession

  Juniper Bell

  Jack Cartwright has put his wild sexual side firmly in the past so he can focus on his graduate studies. All he wants is to finish his thesis. But the appearance of three mysterious students in a neighboring suite throws his careful plans into chaos. Especially when he catches the three of them together…in bed.

  Clare, Luc and Rob have a highly unusual relationship. Friends since childhood, the two boys rescued Clare from unimaginable horrors. They’ve been her protectors ever since, and something more. But Clare can’t stop thinking about the sexy, smoldering resident advisor down the hall, and what fierce urges might be hiding behind his controlled exterior.

  Now Jack’s dark sexual needs threaten to derail his career as the irresistible threesome lures him into their secret erotic world. But when obsession takes hold, rules don’t stand a chance.

  Ellora’s Cave Publishing

  www.ellorascave.com

  Beautiful Obsession

  ISBN 9781419937934

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  Beautiful Obsession Copyright © 2012 Juniper Bell

  Edited by Jillian Bell

  Photography and cover design by Syneca

  Models: Kevin, Shannon & Brooks

  Electronic book publication April 2012

  The terms Romantica® and Quickies® are registered trademarks of Ellora’s Cave Publishing.

  With the exception of quotes used in reviews, this book may not be reproduced or used in whole or in part by any means existing without written permission from the publisher, Ellora’s Cave Publishing, Inc.® 1056 Home Avenue, Akron OH 44310-3502.

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  This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events or locales is purely coincidental. The characters are productions of the author’s imagination and used fictitiously.

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  Beautiful Obsession

  Juniper Bell

  Chapter One

  First glimpse

  Adams House Dining Hall—Earlton University

  A flash of clear gray shone in a sea of jeans and many shades of black—like the first wink of a star in a familiar night sky. Eyes. Gorgeous, mysterious eyes that sent a shaft of shocking lust straight to Jack’s groin. Squinting, he searched for those remarkable eyes again but the students had shifted position and that compelling moonbeam glance was gone.

  Jack shook it off as a silly hallucination and joined the cafeteria line. He tuned out the din of “What’s your major? What’d you do over the summer?” chatter. Delving back into the question of Spartan law that had come up during a stubborn chapter of his thesis, he barely noticed what food the server handed him. It wasn’t until he scanned the crowded tables to find a seat that he saw her again. Her face came into sudden, stunning focus, like a camera snap-zooming on the most interesting image in the room.

  Those eyes. Secretive, misty gray, one slightly more tilted than the other, as if an artist had deliberately included a flaw to distract from her oval-faced, Madonna-like perfection. Her hair was a dark spill down her back, with a careless pin holding it away from her face. She wore a white sleeveless blouse that revealed arms that were slim to the point of thinness. Her pale skin stood out among the students sunburned from their summer breaks. Her lips were far too full for her mouth, almost embarrassingly generous and erotic. One corner of her mouth curled inward, as if it had a scar. She sat close to the guy beside her and looked nervously around the dining hall with its arched windows and wall sconces. Her friend was big, brawny, walnut haired, silent. His fork looked as if it might break in his hand.

  They must be new to Adams House. Sophomores or transfers from another house. Boyfriend and girlfriend, no doubt.

  His cock surged. He fiddled with his tray as he ruthlessly willed away his erection. He’d gotten used to burying his sexual needs under research and grades and thesis chapters. His life was about graduate school now, not sex.

  He forced himself to look away, spotted another graduate student waving him over, and brushed past the girl’s table. Damn if he was going to let a sexy student get to him. He knew better than that.

  The Inane Scrawlings of Clare Gaston, AKA My Diary—September 15

  Today Jack Cartwright walked past our table in the dining hall. I couldn’t take my eyes off his hands. I actually wanted to be the cafeteria tray. Ridiculous but true! His hands would be on me, then maybe on my hips, maybe on my thighs. I wouldn’t mind if he carried me naked through the dining hall and ate off my body. I’d want him to. That’s how crazy this is making me, has been since I first laid eyes on him.

  J has the best hands I’ve ever seen. The palms themselves are broad and strong as a stonemason’s—that tray looked like a postage stamp, I swear. But the fingers look sensitive. I bet he knows just what he’s doing. I want to know what he knows. I want to feel what he knows on my body. Through osmosis. Which rhymes with neurosis. And diagnosis.

  My epic saga class is paying off. I’m getting good at thinking up rhymes.

  Diagnosis: obsession.

  First meeting

  Adams House, C-Entry.

  Two days later, Jack ran into the brawny boyfriend. As a resident advisor, Jack was charged with negotiating disputes, offering advice, providing a semiadult presence to young students away from home for the first time. He’d been assigned a large suite in the dark, almost brooding Victorian-era building. His floor contained five other suites.

  One of them contained the girl’s boyfriend.

  Jack stuck out his hand as they passed. “Jack Cartwright, resident advisor.”

  “Rob Belton,” said the kid in a strong, deep voice.

  As soon as he spoke, Jack realized he was slightly older than the typical sophomore.

  “Wrestler.”

  “Ah,” said Jack, forcing a jocular smile. “I’ll have to watch my back around you.”

  Rob gave him an odd frown—as if wondering what Jack could possibly do that would require defending himself from Rob. Jack noticed his dour, wary look, as if he were a bodyguard alert to all threats.

  Rob was a big guy, but Jack was even bigger. Jack’s linebacker skills had gotten him into college. He was a physical man, although he didn’t like to focus on that. He was at Earlton to build his intellect, not his biceps.

  Just then the girl rounded the corner. She wasn’t alone. Another man’s arm was slung over her shoulder. Friendly? Possessive? Sexual? Hard to say. Next to her companion, the girl looked like the moon next to the sun—he was golden-haired, loose-limbed, jangly, twinkle-eyed. Jack knew the sort. Trouble.

  “Making friends already, Rob?” the blond boy teased. “That’s so unlike you.”

  Jack noticed the drawl—from the South somewhere. Both boys had the same accent. “I’m Jack Cartwright. Resident advisor in Classics.”

  “Our neighbor the
n.” With a shocking amount of self-assurance, the kid offered a loose-armed handshake. “A pleasure and an honor. I’m Luc Saint Giles.”

  Louisiana, perhaps? Jack could imagine him lounging with his feet on the porch railing of a plantation house or racing a sports car down empty back roads dripping with Spanish moss.

  “You two are roommates?”

  “Yes sir,” drawled Luc. “We promise to keep our parties to ourselves.”

  Rob tilted his head, unsmiling, as if Luc had made a bad joke. Jack didn’t really get it. He forced himself to look at the girl, even though he was afraid he’d make a fool of himself by staring too much.

  She met his eyes levelly, and once again the sexual shock traveled down his body, settling in his groin. Those were no ordinary eyes. They were witch eyes, siren eyes, created to lure a man to certain doom. But she didn’t seem to realize it. She gave him a tentative smile and he noticed one corner of her mouth didn’t move when she smiled, creating an odd swirl effect. A tiny quirk.

  She said nothing. The boys didn’t introduce her. Instead they gave him cordial nods and headed to their room. The door thudded shut behind them.

  The hallway thrummed with the questions they’d left behind. What was the girl’s name? Which boy was she dating? Why did those three seem so unusual?

  As he stood in the hallway for a long, paralyzed moment, he reconstructed every detail of her appearance, everything his brain had taken in while he’d been riveted by her eyes. She’d worn a long skirt, tight, with two slits that went up to her knees. It was a royal purple color with a line of white down the side, ending at the slit. On her feet were simple leather sandals with a thong between her toes. The skirt was too long for him to see much of her legs, but what he saw was pale, luminous and thin. A filmy white Indian cotton top with a gathered neckline revealed the exquisite molding of her collarbones. Not particularly tall, on the thin side, quiet… Nevertheless, the hallway still hummed with her presence. She seemed to change the chemistry of the air simply by inhabiting it. He shook his head to clear it.

  Unacceptable. Fucking unacceptable.

  Inane Scrawlings, September 30

  I’ve sworn never to lie to my diary, or to L and R. So yesterday I told them I couldn’t stop imagining J touching me, fucking me. We had a big fight about it. R’s afraid of getting expelled if we rock the boat. L just likes a quarrel. He’s never serious about it but he enjoys it while it lasts. But they usually come around in the end. They know I have good instincts. Instinct brought me to them. Instinct made me reach for L’s cock that first time, then R’s. My instinct told me we should come to Earlton.

  And now my instinct is telling me J’s the one. The one I’ve been looking for. The one I’ve been craving. Which rhymes with raving. And braving. And depraving.

  J, I want to deprave you. But something tells me you could teach me a thing or two about depraving.

  First mention

  Adams House—Friday afternoon Dean’s Tea

  “I’m curious about the kids from Petit Bayou. Anyone talk to them yet?”

  “Cartwright, the boys are on your turf, right? Met them yet?”

  Jack stood with a small cluster of advisors as they poured themselves coffee, trying like hell not to spill any on the ivory linen tablecloths. “Luc and Rob? Sure. Briefly. Seem nice enough. No trouble so far.”

  “Don’t they seem… I don’t know, strange?”

  “I hadn’t noticed.” Jack couldn’t admit how he’d begun leaving his door open a crack, waiting for footsteps. Couldn’t admit how he peeked out to see if it was them—or her. She was almost always with them. With one or the other. Or both.

  Barnes, math genius and resident advisor of H-Entry, peered curiously over his aviator glasses. He always spoke in quick, nervous little spurts. “They’re here now. They’re always together. Don’t you think it’s strange? Mills says they grew up together. Now they’re rooming together.”

  “They’re far from home. Makes sense.”

  “And they’re always with Clare.”

  “Who?” By now Jack knew her name. But he wanted to hear more. He waited with a kind of sick fascination.

  “Clare Gaston. Also from Petit Bayou. Do you know the odds of three students from one microscopic town in Louisiana all ending up at the same Ivy League university? Very rare.”

  “Hm. I guess they’re all smart. Or exceptionally studious.”

  “If I were you, I’d keep my eye on them. And which one is she dating, anyway?”

  A question Jack very much wanted answered. “I have no idea. Maybe they’re all just friends.”

  “Doubt that.” Barnes lowered his voice. “I heard Riddick caught Clare and Luc together in the tunnels. Fucking.”

  “Yeah, right.” Jack hated hearing that, hated the punch in the gut it gave him.

  “Close enough. His hand was up her shirt.”

  That wasn’t any better. Jack felt as if he were suffocating.

  “And Mills said Rob and Clare—”

  “Do you really think we should be gossiping about the students like this? It seems inappropriate.”

  For the first time, the other advisor with them, Sally Bellingham, spoke up. “You okay, Jack? You seem a little off.”

  Jack glanced at her. Dirty-blond hair, headband, crinkled forehead. “Thesis trouble.” A lie. He hadn’t thought much about his thesis lately.

  “You should come by and let me make you some chamomile tea.”

  Barnes snorted. Jack and he both knew about Sally’s “tea”. She enjoyed an occasional session of no-strings sex and everyone knew it.

  “I’m good. But thanks.” He’d never turned down an invite to Sally’s suite before. But he’d just caught a glimpse of Clare. She wore a simple black dress that swirled around her body when she moved. What was it about the way she moved? It was like quiet music. She made everyone else look too jerky, too sudden, too thoughtless.

  He wondered how she would move during sex. Would she straddle his hips with her long legs? Put her hands to her own breasts, cup them toward him so he could tongue her nipples? Would she take his cock between her thighs, surround him with her soft flesh?

  Good Lord Almighty. This had to stop. Now.

  He poured himself more wine.

  First conversation

  Adams House mailboxes.

  “Mr. Cartwright?”

  Jack’s head jerked up from his pile of mail. Clare stood a few feet from him. Her voice was soft and breathy, like a wooden flute being played in a forest. He smelled her—he’d come to recognize her scent even when she’d already left the room. It had an undertone of green apples with a whiff of chlorine. By now he’d learned that she swam. The thought of Clare in a swimming pool was almost too much for him. He’d spent agonizing minutes wondering whether she wore a bikini or a one-piece. Imagining her in the locker room…

  “Yes? Clare?”

  Her name felt intrusive on his tongue, too intimate. Embarrassing. As if she’d guess his perverted thoughts from the way he said her name.

  “Mr. Barnes told me you grew up in this area.” She spoke with that same faint Louisiana accent and very carefully, as if afraid to get a word wrong.

  “Yes, I grew up in South Boston.” A different world, but she probably knew that.

  “Can you recommend a good watchmaker?”’

  “A what?” He stared at her mouth as that little smile curled one corner.

  “I need my watch repaired.” She opened her hand to reveal an old pocket watch, its silver patina chipped. The chain spilled through her fingers like water. He wanted to lick them.

  “That’s beautiful.”

  “It belonged to my grandfather. It deserves proper care.”

  He loved the way she spoke, so precisely, carefully selecting each word. He’d heard she was studying poetry. “I agree. I don’t know of any repair shops offhand, but I can ask around.”

  “I’d appreciate that very much.” She gave him the friendliest smile she’d
shared thus far, along with a graceful nod. She turned as if to go, and suddenly he couldn’t stand to see that happen.

  “Where are your friends?”

  “My friends? Oh, Rob and Luc?” The corner of her lip quivered ironically. Fascinated, he realized he could read her moods in that one tiny portion of her anatomy. “They’re pretending to try out for crew. But really they just wanted to see what all the fuss is about. I suppose…”

  “Yes?”

  “I suppose you think we’re always together.”

  “Frequently, at any rate. Students are usually advised to branch out, to get to know as many other students as possible.”

  “Well.” She considered, tilting her head carefully. “I don’t care much for other students.” Her clear gray gaze slid toward his, catching for an electrifying instant of significance. Then she was gone.

  She didn’t care for other students. Did that mean she cared for nonstudents? Did that mean she only cared for her two friends?

  Jack went over every word in that conversation a hundred times before their next encounter.

  Inane Scrawlings—September 28

  My instincts tell me J’s fucked men before and would do it again. Sex practically oozes out the man’s pores. Does he have any idea what he does to me? The first time I ever spoke to him, at the mailboxes, I ran back to my room to masturbate. Except I didn’t even make it to my room. This sounds insane, but I ran into the laundry room and locked the door. I sat on a washing machine with my legs spread open. I still had my pocket watch, the one I’d pretended was broken. I wrapped the chain around my hand and drove it down my pants like a madwoman. With the chain pressed against my cunt and the washing machine vibrating under me, I thought about J—his big, hulking shoulders—black shadow on his jaw. The way his midnight-black eyes strip the clothes right off me—the swelling in his jeans—oh God. The chain bit into my clit—I needed that, the harshness, the pressure. I came so hard I bit my arm to keep from making too much noise.