Chapter Nine
Blood in the Water
Dinah had been
adamant
that she was never going near Reston again. The sole exception, of course, being when it was finally time to pound the bastard's face in. Barbara, as the understanding and compassionate leader of the team, respected her friend's wishes. While it was certainly a shame to let such a hot lead go cold, Barbara wasn't going to push the issue. To force a woman to do something against her will was a gross betrayal of everything the Birds of Prey stood for.
Luckily, Barbara had another avenue of opportunity. And he was sitting right in the front row of her English class.
Andrew Westfield.
She'd witnessed the lad getting cozy with not one but
two
of his female teachers. With how common that sort of situation was on the Kingston Campus, Barbara had a feeling the Brotherhood types seemed to have a particular fetish.
In a way, it made perfect sense. The hormonal teen boys bending the female authority figures to their will, making older women sexually submit to them. If Barbara were the power-hungry, controlling type - and she
wasn't
- that'd be the kind of thing she'd do.
So today, Barbara Morgan was in the business of inspiration.
Feminine
inspiration. She was going to be the woman that Andrew Westfield couldn't ignore. The woman he just
had
to chase. She certainly dressed the part: long skirt, black turtleneck, chic glasses with big circle lenses - the kind that made her blue eyes seem that much bigger and brighter. Barbara Morgan wasn't the bombshell that Dinah Blake was in her gym bunny garb. No, she was the hot-cute teacher. Mousy enough to be approachable,
attainable
, but hot enough to wiggle her way into many a man's dreams. The turtleneck wasn't tight, just
tight enough
.
The bell rang, a clear, electronic note blaring through the speakers. End of the period. End of the school day.
Showtime, Barbara.
"That's it for today, kids." Barbara rose from her desk, smoothing out her beige midi skirt. She gave a small wave towards the students making their way towards the door. "There'll be a quiz over the material sometime next week, so please remember to do the reading assignments. Mr. Westfield, would you stay a moment?"
Westfield didn't exactly perk up at the mention of his name. Glancing towards his friends who were already filing through the classroom door, he slung his backpack over one shoulder and made his way to Barbara's desk.
She could see a bit of wariness in his eyes. Surely, he was mulling over the possibilities in his head: Was he in trouble? Did he do poorly on the homework? Barbara forced a warm smile at the young man, welcome to anything that kept Westfield off balance. That just made her job easier. Though she did note that those same wary eyes of his were taking not-so-subtle glances at the curious fashion in which her turtleneck fit snugly about her chest.
As bait, Barbara felt she was doing a
damn fine
job.
"What's up, Ms. Morgan?" Inquired the jock. Even wary as he was, it was difficult for a guy like Westfield to appear timid. Tall - a head taller than Barbara - with those wide shoulders and big arms that were the norm on football players, he was cut from a similar cloth as Matthew Reston. Westfield was young, handsome, athletic, born into wealth...
And willing to use magic to enslave helpless women.
"Oh, nothing." Barbara put a soft cadence into her voice, just a little higher pitched than normal. Somewhere in the back of his twisted mind, Westfield would pick up on it and lower his voice accordingly. He wouldn't think to do it, of course. It would be a reaction to
her
, as natural as breathing. She wasn't Barbara Morgan, the teacher. She was Barbara Morgan, the woman. The very
obvious
woman with the tight sweater and the soft, lovely voice. And Westfield would need to be just as obvious as a man. "I just needed some help carrying these boxes back to my room. I figured it would be easy for you, being a big football player and all."
Said boxes were filled with nothing but stacks and stacks of blank notebook paper. But Westfield didn't need to know that. All that mattered was that his cute redhead teacher was too
small
and too
delicate
to carry the boxes herself. A lady should
never
be doing something as silly as carrying heavy boxes. She needed a
man
for the job and she had chosen him specifically. What with how big and strong he was.
Barbara wasn't the type to toot her own horn, but she had to admit to herself that her plans were sometimes just
too
good.
"Oh." Westfield came around to her side of the desk, his eyes falling to the boxes stacked beside her chair. Barbara could practically see the wheels turning in his head, that little spark of realization in his eyes. The chance to impress his cute teacher. The chance to prove her right, that he was the best man for the job.
Any
job. "Oh, yeah. Definitely."
"If it's not too much trouble..." Barbara clasped her hands together in front of her lap, giving a half-apologetic smile. The training from Bruce came in handy in keeping the act together, but the urge to break out into cackling laughter was there all the same. She watched with well-hidden glee as Westfield scooped the boxes into his arms, heaving them up so they were chest-level.
The young teen craned his head around the corner of the boxes, flashing her what was likely supposed to be a charming grin.
"It's no problem, Ms. Morgan. I got this." Westfield shifted his grip on the stack of boxes, grunting. "What'd you have in these, anyway? Bricks?"
"Oh, just some notebooks and textbooks. Boring teacher stuff." She flashed him a smile of her own. The dazzling, pearly white type - and well-rehearsed, too. Barbara reached out and gave Westfield's arm the faintest, softest of brushes with the tips of her fingers. The ghost of a woman's touch. Subtle. Calculated.
Effective.
"But it looks like you can handle it just fine.
Right?
"
She let her eyes linger on his arms just a bit longer than normal, just enough for him to notice. Then she turned her eyes up to meet his own and gave him a
look
. Nothing too obvious, but enough to get him
thinking.
"Absolutely." Westfield insisted. "These boxes are nothing. I'm good to go, Miss M."
"Thank you
sooo much!
I knew I could count on you, Andrew!" Barbara beamed at the young man, hugging her purse to her chest and giving a little bow of gratitude. She may have been laying it on a bit thick, but the results spoke for themselves. Westfield had caught a whiff of Barbara and the look in his eyes told her he wouldn't stop chasing until he had taken a bite. A
big
bite.
Barbara wasn't just leaving a trail of blood for the Great White. No, she had dumped the whole damn bucket of chum in the water. It was a dangerous game. But years of training under Bruce left her well-equipped to handle the challenge.
Some jock punk isn't going to turn Batgirl into shark food,
Barbara thought as she led the jock punk in question out of her classroom. She spared a glance back at the young man dutifully carrying the boxes and frowned.
Getting him to take the bait was the
easy
part, Barbara reminded herself.
She needed more than just his attention. She needed an
invitation.
- - -
Chapter Ten
Live Bait
"Isn't it kind of strange that Kingston Academy has some of the teachers living on campus along with the students?" Barbara probed, flashing Westfield a cheeky grin. She turned, hugging her purse to her belly as she walked backwards some distance in front of the younger man.
Westfield peeked around the side of the boxes he was carrying, squinting his blue eyes at the redhead. Only the top half of his head could be seen, but Barbara could make out the teen's expression of scrutiny. Had the thought simply never occurred to him before? Or was he concerned that someone finally noticed Kingston Academy's peculiar living arrangements?
"I never really thought about it." Westfield said after a moment.
Uh huh. Sure.
Barbara pursed her lips, turning back to walk normally again. She led Westfield further down the halls of the teachers' dormitory, the floral wallpaper design punctuated every few feet by dark wooden doors. The dorm was sparse of people, likely because the teachers who weren't wearing Brotherhood rings would rather spend their off-work hours in the nearby campus village instead of sticking around the creepy vibe of Kingston. And it was sure to stay that way until the late evening. Unlike students, teachers who lived on campus didn't have a curfew. At least that was the case on paper. More likely than not, Brotherhood goons played by their own rules.
"Right." Barbara kept her voice cheery, bubbly. If she was going to act as live bait, then she wasn't going to half-ass it. She had a role to play. "I suppose a teen boy like you is more worried about getting good grades, asking out cute girls..."
"Don't know about that. Cute girls usually come to me." Westfield fired back without missing a beat. The tall football player gave a short chuckle, sounding all too pleased with himself.
Charming
, Barbara thought sourly.
And to think I used to moon over guys like you back in high school.
"Huh." The redhead made an effort to keep her voice from dripping into a more bitter tone. She forced a flirty giggle, smothering the feeling of dreadful shame that dropped into her belly. "That doesn't surprise me. Guys who look like you tend to have the ladies wrapped around your finger."
"Got them wrapped around more than that." Westfield crowed darkly.
