His Naughty Lessons
Chapter 118: Why Don’t You Do Them?

Chapter 118: Why Don’t You Do Them?

** Eli **

For a moment, Eli wondered if he should consider drowning himself in the pool. In a spur of blind and brutal honesty, he had just admitted to the girl in front of him all those shameful thoughts that he never intended to tell another soul. And now, the girl was staring back at him with huge eyes as if his words had just shocked the life out of her.

She must be seeing him as a complete creep now, even worse than that coworker of hers.

This was it, then ... At least he got to be completely truthful with her before she fled for good. If his chest wasn’t feeling so heavy to the point that he almost couldn’t breathe, he would’ve laughed at the irony. Turning away to save himself the pain of watching those familiar, beautiful eyes slowly fill up with revulsion, he started propping his weight up the pool’s edge.

"Why didn’t you do them?" A voice so soft that it was almost a whisper sounded behind him.

Eli paused, flipping himself back around. "Do what?"

"The things you said you wanted to do to me ... Why didn’t you do them?"

It was his turn to gape this time as if the words had just shocked the life out of him.

Harper was smiling. When he finally met her eyes, he saw that they were twinkling, though not with the sly sparks that he had grown used to over the past weeks. There was something more to the light within them now, something new.

But ... What the hell did she just say?

"I mean ... It should go without saying that I’m ... not experienced enough to tell that you had those thoughts," she added when neither of them spoke for a long while. "I ... wish I knew. Why did you assume that I’d be opposed to it?"

Surely he must’ve heard it wrong, even though she had just said it twice and elaborated it unmistakingly. "You can’t be serious?" Eli asked, disbelieving. "We’ve set boundaries, Harper. There were clear rules from the very beginning—"

"Rules that aren’t set in stone," she corrected him. "Did it ever occur to you to check that I might’ve changed my mind as much as you? That I might want the same thing you do?"

"..."

In that instant, Eli could swear that his heart stopped beating. Did she realize what kind of wild images her words could awaken in his mind? All those dirty thoughts he tried to bury, all those fantasies that he kept hidden within the limits of his dreams. Did she know how much control it took to hold those cravings back, and how close her words brought that control to the brink of snapping?

"You ... don’t actually mean that, Harper." Despite being almost submerged in water, he felt his mouth turning dry. This conversation was going badly, and it seemed like a miracle that he was still able to figure out what to say to stay on track. "We obviously don’t want the same thing. If you were the fling type of girl, you wouldn’t have needed any help for your web novel in the first place."

She tilted her head, considering. A gleam fleeted across her eyes. "Then maybe that’s another new territory for me to explore," she offered. "Or maybe ... It’s time that you try something new for a change, too. Who said this has to turn out to be a fling?"

"..."

Eli had a moment of déjà vu, where the scene in front of him coincided perfectly with that first day in her apartment when she asked him so boldly for his "help". This girl could really be ballsy, when she knew what she wanted and was determined to get it.

Only this time, he couldn’t take the wrong step and make the same mistake again. He shook his head. "Have you not heard what I said earlier? I don’t do commitments. There is no other way for this to turn out."

He took the chance to prop himself up out of the water then, sitting down over the rim of the pool. The bite of cool air on his dripping body helped a little to set his mind straight. He believed what he said, but it still felt like a lie when it left his tongue. He knew himself well enough to understand that whatever it was he felt for her, it was much more than just the fleeting lust of a fling. He wanted to hold her, to kiss her gently and breathe sweet whispers into her ears to make her blush. He wanted to wake up every morning with her in his arms, to get out of bed together and make her breakfast when she brewed her coffee. He wanted to enjoy this vacation island with her alone, like it was a honeymoon trip planned only for the two of them ...

But he also knew himself well enough to understand that none of it would ever come true. He would fuck it up royally, the same way he had done countless times already. And when the inevitable happens, she would be the one to pay the price of a heartbreak.

He sucked in a deep breath, strengthening his resolve to convince Harper that this was a horrible, horrible choice. But before he could begin, she followed him to climb out of the pool, perching down next to him. "Are you trying to tell me this is all physical?" she asked and placed her hand on top of his.

The right thing to do then was to pull away. Eli knew it, and he intended to do it. But as her palm slid over the back of his knuckles, the warmth of her skin grazing his, he caught her reflexively, lacing their fingers together and curling his own around her soft hand.

It felt so familiar. So right.

Harper looked down at their clasped hands. "Are you really sure we don’t want the same thing?" she whispered with a smile.