Page 3 of Hot for Teacher
“Chase!” Spencer greeted with more enthusiasm than the moment warranted, waving the frying pan in the air. “Tell Noah he should make us eggs. It’s the first day of the semester. We have to eat breakfast together.”
“You don’t have to make them,” Chase told Noah, ignoring Spence’s squawk of outrage.
He had to have known Chase wasn’t going to join in on the peer pressure party.
Noah’s scowl dropped in an instant, and he sighed, taking the pan from Spencer. “I’ll do it.” He bumped shoulders with the other alpha. “Sorry, man. Woke up on the wrong side of the bed.”
Pathologically incapable of holding a grudge, Spencer just shrugged, coming over to Chase and throwing an arm around his shoulder, casually scent marking him as he did.
Spencer was always doing that—scent marking them—something to do with never getting enough of it from his family growing up. Neither Noah nor Chase minded. Noah probably because he came from a big-ass family and missed getting scentmarked by his siblings. And Chase because he understood the urge—and where it came from—all too well. Better than he’d ever told either of his roommates, that was for sure.
So Chase just tilted his head, giving Spencer better access to his scent glands as Noah took out eggs from their communal fridge.
“Chase, you want toast?” Noah asked. They both knew Spencer wouldn’t—he kept himself on a strict regimen to keep his physique exactly the way he wanted it. More hang-ups from a scrawny, underfed childhood, and neither of them pushed him on it.
“If you’re having some.”
Noah nodded, tossing some slices of bread into the toaster. He wasn’t scowling anymore, but he didn’t exactly look happy either. Which was a shame because Noah had the kind of wide, face-changing smile that could cut through anyone’s defenses. When the three of them had met during freshmen orientation, almost three years ago now, Chase had harbored a little bit of a crush on him. He was pretty sure Spencer had too. It was hard not to with Noah. He was confident, kind, and gorgeous.
They’d both gotten over it a long time ago though. It was just a rite of passage everyone had to go through, having an unrequited crush on Noah Teller.
And the one he’s finally fallen for won’t even text him. Figures.
Chase could only hope Spencer wouldn’t poke the bear any more than he already had this morning. Chase wasn’t, like, superstitious or anything, but he figured it didn’t hurt to start the new semester on the right foot. Make sure things started off calm and cool and with everyone happy with everybody else.
But that was just the way he was, liking things even-keeled. Of the three of them, Noah was effortlessly charming, Spencer was alluring almost in spite of himself, and Chase …
Chase wasn’t sure what he offered, actually. A little bit of quiet,maybe. A willingness to hang in the middle and not pick sides. He’d used to blame his more subdued nature on being busy with sports, but he’d quit lacrosse last year and he wasn’t any rowdier now.
Chase wasn’t insecure about it or anything—he knew their friendship was legit. But he wasn’t loud and out there like his friends could be. He was aware he was decent-looking, but he didn’t catch the eye in an instant the way Noah or Spencer did. He didn’t make as much sense in their trio, at least on a surface level.
It worked, though, the three of them. The other two seemed to like that Chase was chill. They didn’t ignore him just because he wasn’t always the life of the party. Hell, Spencer could barely leave either Chase or Noah alone on a good day.
At least, having gotten his scrambled-egg wish, Spencer seemed to have mellowed now. He’d given up taunting Noah and was just resting his head on Chase’s shoulder, watching Noah comply with his request.
Chase gave him a pat and then shrugged out of his friend’s hold, heading to the fridge and pouring out two glasses of orange juice for him and Noah and a glass of milk for Spencer, which Spencer immediately started adding a hideous amount of protein powder to.
It wasn’t long before Noah started dishing out eggs. Spencer dragged Chase to the table, yelling out, “Extra cheese on mine!”
Chase had no idea why Spencer could have cheese but not bread, but Noah didn’t bat an eye, tossing some more shredded cheese on Spencer’s plate of eggs, his initial reluctance to make them breakfast clearly long gone.
This was what the three of them did, ever since they’d started living together last year. Ever since they’d met, really. They took care of each other in little ways. It was nice, kind of pack-like in a way that was soothing to their instincts. Initial crush aside, Chaseloved these two like brothers now. He was grateful to have met them.
So after cheersing their drinks, Chase dug into his eggs with gusto, ignoring that little nagging feeling that asked,Then why doesn’t it feel like enough?
An hour later,Chase and Noah had said goodbye to Spencer (or their version of it, wherein Spencer had pinched Chase’s cheek like he was a little baby and Chase had unsuccessfully attempted to punch him for it) and were on their way to Omega Studies.
It was a fucking gorgeous morning, sunny and mild in the way only Arizona could be in the beginning of January. The winter weather almost made up for the summer heat. Not that Chase would know the full scope of that—he’d been going to his parents’ lake house in Minnesota every summer since he was a baby. But apparently he was about to have his knowledge of Phoenix in the summer drastically expanded, as his parents had informed him over Christmas that they’d be traveling this year, and he was expected to stay where he was.
“We can’t be paying for a fully staffed house just so you can run around underfoot and get in their way all summer,” his mother had told him. “You understand, hm?”
So, anyway, Chase supposed he’d find out the extent of his heat tolerance real quick. Luckily, Noah and Spencer were sticking around this year too. They could suffer together, and they had a whole glorious semester to anticipate the pain.
As they walked across the quad toward their lecture hall, Chase caught Noah looking at his phone for the hundredth time. “Still no text?” Chase asked.
“Maybe—maybe I wasn’t any good,” Noah mumbled, morose as shit.
His night with the mysterious omega had been Noah’s first time. Crushes on him may have abounded, but he’d never reciprocated—not until now. Still, Chase highly fucking doubted that bad sex was the issue. Lack of skill was one thing, but truly bad sex usually required either malice or obliviousness, and Noah didn’t have much of either.
