Page 6 of Masters of Play

I'd clearly caught him off guard. There was a spark in his eye, a spark of interest.

"These women don't want to be raped," I continued my explanation. "They want consensual non consent."

The haze in his gaze grew. The desire was clearly growing. If I brushed up against him, I knew he would be hard. Ew.

"Surprisingly, the same percent of men want to be forced to have sex as well. The only thing I've never been able to figure out about you is if you want to dip your stick into a honey pot, or if you want a stick dipped into your—"

"Bitch!" he hissed. But he was smarter than I thought. He only used his words this time.

"I wasn't shaming you, buddy," I said. "That's your shame talking. I'll send you a copy of my dissertation once it's published."

Students gave me a wide berth. A few looked up at me with curiosity. A few with open desire. But I wasn't here to play today. I was here to work.

Once my dissertation was defended, meaning approved by the board, then I could get on with my life. I wouldn't have to answer to these people anymore. I wouldn't have to answer to anyone. I would be free to start my sexual health clinic. A place where even a Chad could come and work through his issues with shame and inadequacies.

My Converse squeaked as they moved from pavement to tiled floors. I'd spent far too many hours in this building. My blood, sweat, and tears were on the floor, under the desks, and all over the walls. But I was at the end. In fact, I could see the end.

At the end of the hall was the last hurdle I had to jump through to be free. Chad might've thought I was a hard ass. But he was still in his first year of graduate school. He hadn't yet had to stare into the face of the devil and not blink. I'd been doing that for the last two years.

I had no delusions that I was about to get my angel's wings. I at least hoped I'd leave this place with my soul intact. That was all up to the man behind the closed door. I just had to gird my loins before going in there. Luckily, my loins were still warm and toasty from the twins last night.

The door opened, and the sounds of crying preceded the person coming out. I had seen grown men sniffling uncontrollably as they walked out that door. This time it wasn't a grown man coming out. It was a woman. A redhead that I recognized.

Ginger stormed out of Professor Chase Sinead's office, her cheeks as flushed as her red hair. She was fully clothed, but a button on her blouse was askew.

A tall man darkened the doorway at her retreat. His brown gaze was hard, his chiseled chin high and set in its perpetual grimace. His black hair was swept back with a single gray streak just off center.

Professor Sinead, or rather Professor Sin, as many of his students called him, was only in his early thirties. That streak, we all knew, had come from his deal with the devil. No man should walk this earth with those looks and that amount of genius. He'd definitely made a deal with Lucifer.

It looked like Ginger had tried to make a deal with him and lost. Because Professor Sin was immovable when it came to feminine wiles. He was the same with masculine wiles, too.

To him, it all came down to what was in your brain, not below the belt. If you didn't have the right stuff, he would rake you over the coals. In the two years that he'd been my teacher and the chairman of my dissertation committee, he'd never once made me cry. My balls were too big for that.

"Ms. Prince."

My shoulders jerked back at the sound of that deep baritone that promised sin but would never deliver. Professor Sinead stood in the door like a dark prince. He beckoned me into the door, and I took a step into the bowels of hell. I wasn't worried about my soul. It was my dissertation that needed to come out intact, and I was well prepared for that.

Chapter Four

I'd been in this office several times over the years. It felt much like the principal's office back in high school. Though there were no motivational posters on the walls.

Professor Sinead's walls were bare, save for an academic calendar that was covered in black and red marker. Meetings and class schedules were in a sedate dark color while deadlines, testing dates, and end of period were carved in like what looked like blood. There was a little drip that brought to mind blood splatter hanging off the D of semester's end.

Shelving units and filing cabinets lined up like soldiers against every wall. On the flat tops of those were neatly stacked papers or books. Every edge of paper was aligned. Each book's spine perfectly straight. Nothing, not student, not parchment, would dare stray from the box Professor Sinead placed them in.

His organization system was clear. The As started in one corner. If my eyes followed the shelving around, I ended at the Zs. I bet if he dropped dead, anyone could come in here and take over his work.

No, that couldn't be true. No one could fill that man's six foot two form or size twelve shoes. Luckily, he wasn't in danger of dropping dead any time soon.

Professor Sin stood behind his desk, tall and erect. A study in lean lines of tense muscle. He never looked relaxed. He always reminded me of a coiled cobra, ready to strike at any second.

"Leave the door open," he said in his deep baritone. His voice had always vibrated through my ears and arrowed straight for my core.

I wasn't so special. His voice did that to every woman in his class. Anyone walking down the hall could look in and see every female's legs crossed under her desk as she leaned forward with baited breath, listening to Professor Sin's lectures of data sets and statistical analysis.

I gave the doorknob a little push. The frame bounced quietly against the wall, opening wider than before. Down the hall, another door pulled shut. But not before I saw Dr. Wroth's silver and gold bun duck inside.

I'd actually never gotten a good look at the reclusive woman in all my years here. She didn't teach any classes at the university. The word was that her research was funded by the government, which kept the university, and the psychology department in particular, swimming in grant money.

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