Page 19 of Lady Killer

Which made the fact that I knew the engorged sphincter was currently raging under the thin veneer of charisma that he wore even more delicious.

To be fair, Locke had some redeeming qualities.

The man had style.

Personally, the suits were too stuffy for me, attracted too much attention. But what he was doing worked for him, and I could respect that.

And he was talented.

His ability to extract information from people was downright alarming. Locke was a deceptively patient animal, despite his combative nature, and was willing to play a longer game than I could ever muster the restraint for.

Unfortunately for all of us, he was also a bitter, uptight, raging control freak whose very existence was anathemato my own. And since Lucian had refused to let me kill, or even maim, his cousin, I was forced to settle for doing everything in my earthly power to get a rise out of him.

“ . . . this term we will dive deeper into the application of the core concepts in addition to exploring some central debates of the field and how they shape contemporary economic discourse . . .”

Goddess, he was pretentious. Worse still were all the students around me lapping up his words like dogs eating shit.

At least Starbright wasn’t falling for it. She was far too smart for hero worship, especially of someone so wildly undeserving.

I knew that despite his smooth, confident delivery, Locke was no doubt losing his shit over my presence in his precious sanctum. I wondered how many different ways he’d fantasized about killing me so far.

It would be a healthy exercise in creativity for him. Locke was an excellent inquisitor but mind-numbingly routine when it came to actually ending people.

As an artist, frankly, I found it offensive.

I rested my hands against the back of my head and began humming the 1990s superhit “Gonna Make You Sweat (Everybody Dance Now)”by C+C Music Factory under my breath.

Damn, they did Martha Wash wrong.

I was barely loud enough for Luz to hear me, but Locke’s eyes widened infinitesimally, as if somehow he just knew what I was doing, and it drove him mad.

Because he couldn’t kill me either.

I hummed a little louder. Luz looked over at me, her jaw clenched tight, incredulous rage written in her eyes.

Did I mention she was the best part of all of this?

Locke’s obsession with her ran deep, and I was the only one who knew the true extent of it.

I was following her the day of their showdown in his class and her subsequent visit to his office.

When I saw him stalking after her, the good professor had looked damn close to snatching her and gobbling her up. Luckily, for the both of them, I was there to remind Dr. Blackwell that someone was always watching.

As I slowly increased my volume, a couple students nearby picked up their heads, searching for the source of the sound.

I felt no remorse about flaunting my blossoming relationship with her to Locke.

Don’t get me wrong, protecting Luz and basking in her radiant presence was more than enough motivation for me to tag along, but I was still at my core a very bad man. Shedeserved nothing but honesty from me if this was going to work, so why pretend to be someone I’m not?

“What are you doing?” she whispered through gritted teeth.

Swaying in my seat to the rhythm, I gave her a languorous smile (see, I can use big words too) before closing my eyes and losing myself to the music in my head.

I could feel the number of eyes on me growing the louder I hummed.

It was only a matter of time before Locke exploded.

“EXCUSE ME!”

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