Page 4 of The Naughty Professor
The hiss became a roar.The beaker shook.A jet of greenish steam shot toward the ceiling.Students screamed, chairs scraped the floor and notebooks flew through the air.Someone yelled, “Run!”and the room erupted into chaos.
I stumbled back as the beaker exploded in a flash of heat and light, shards of glass raining down into the sink.A mushroom cloud of glittering carbon dust puffed up, coating everything—including me—in black specks.
Students bolted for the door, shrieking.Juniper remained at the rear of the lab, utterly calm, shaking her head slowly like she’d known this would happen all along.
Through the haze, two figures appeared in the doorway.
Dr.Joan Stanwyk swept in first, all sharp cheekbones and sharper eyes.Today she was in a tailored green dress that clung to her like it had been born there, a clipboard tucked under one arm.Her hand, as always, rested possessively on the arm of Professor Thorne Carr.
Thorne was a stunning man who made tweed jackets look like they belonged on magazine covers.His hair was dark blonde, a little unruly, his firm jaw coated in thick stubble that made my knees go weak.
I’d had a crush on him since my first day at the university.Not that he’d ever noticed me.Why would he?I was the awkward, perpetually broke junior professor who wore anal beads as a bracelet.
Now he was looking straight at me.
“What happened?”Carr asked, and I wanted the floor to open up and swallow me.
Joan’s fingers tightened around his arm.“Dr.Sterling,” she said, her tone halfway between a scold and a purr, “what on earth have you done this time?”
I wanted to sink through the floor.Static made my hair stand on end, and black dust covered my lab coat.Around me, the lab looked like a set from a disaster movie: overturned stools, a scorch mark creeping up the wall, students peering in from the hallway like they were watching a zoo exhibit.
And Thorne—Professor Carr—was here, his eyes flicking over me with a mixture of concern and, God help me, amusement.
Heat crawled up my neck, and my mouth went dry.Of all the ways to finally get noticed by Thorne Carr, this was not the one I’d imagined.
Juniper raised an eyebrow at me from across the room, as if to say, I told you so.
I swallowed hard, trying to summon words, any words, as Thorne stepped closer.
Could this day get any worse—or was it about to?
ChapterTwo
Felix
“Sterling,” Thorne said, his voice low but carrying in the ruined lab.“Don’t forget—you’re speaking at the remembrance service this afternoon.I’ll be speaking too.”
My stomach dropped somewhere around my shoes.The service.Right.For Dr.Alastair Greene, the history professor who’d collapsed mid-lecture two weeks ago, never to rise again.I’d been close to Alastair.Weekly lunches, long debates about whether history repeated itself or just rhymed.I’d volunteered to say a few words, thinking it was the least I could do.
Now, Thorne was telling me he’d be speaking too.
My brain short-circuited at the thought of sharing a stage with him.Thorne Carr.Professor of Philosophy.Tall, steady, heartbreakingly handsome in that salt-and-pepper way that made me want to curl into a ball.
Before I could respond, Joan clutched Thorne’s arm with one hand, tilting her head so her perfectly cut bob grazed his shoulder.“Oh, Thorne,” she said, her voice dripping like syrup.“This must have been so difficult for you.Losing a mentor like that…”
I tried not to roll my eyes.What Thorne saw in her—if he saw anything—I couldn’t imagine.Joan had two settings: pretentious and more pretentious.
Thorne, ever the gentleman, gave her a solemn nod.“Alastair was a good man.”
Juniper coughed loudly into her fist.“Don’t worry, Dr.Sterling,” she said, stepping closer and patting my shoulder like she was my bodyguard.“I’ll make sure you get to the service on time.Wouldn’t want you wandering into the wrong memorial and giving a eulogy for a strange dead guy.”
Joan turned her gaze on Juniper, and if looks could kill, they would have vaporized my teaching assistant on the spot.She sniffed and tugged at Thorne’s arm.“Come, Thorne.We should…prepare.”
He gave me a brief glance, unreadable, then allowed himself to be led away.
The moment the door shut behind them, Juniper muttered, “Does she rehearse her fake sympathy in the mirror, or does it just ooze out naturally?”
I snorted.Tried to stifle it.Failed spectacularly, and laughter bubbled out of me like one of my ill-fated experiments.
