Page 12 of Forbidden Lessons

“Funding I assume you require in order to remain enrolled at this school?”

This time, her voice is little more than a squeak. “Yup.”

Ha ha ha. Broke ass loser.

“So what led you to believe skipping my first class was a good move?”

And suddenly I’m not smirking anymore.

Dude needs to lay the fuck off. If anyone’s going to be making Haven’s life hell, it’s me.

He almost made her cry. I can see her eyes shimmering.

“I’m sorry, Sir. It won’t happen?—“

He holds up his hand. “Professor.” Then he sighs and snaps his fingers at me. “Coursework.”

Fuck. He’s going to lay into me about the phone thing, I just know it. I’ve seen plenty of moods on Rooke. He’s currently atlevel five, Irked, but if Haven keeps annoying him, we’re heading into straight into Peeved.

I open his satchel and rifle through it, looking for the black folder where he keeps his class notes. I find a stapled page and yank it out, sliding it over the desk with a shove of my fingers.

Rooke cocks his head to the pages, and Haven glances at me as she picks it up from the desk.

I keep my expression neutral.

Last thing I want is Rooke picking up on any issues between me and Haven. He’s like an emotional bloodhound. I once saw him instigate a fight between two bros in his class that almost broke out into a fist fight.

The remaining notebooks are within easy reach, so Professor Rooke picks one up himself instead of snapping his fingers at me to do it.

He hands it to Haven, and you’d swear it’s a bomb how gingerly she accepts it.

“I’d prefer you hand this back to me at the end of the semester instead of…” For a moment, his voice drops as he studies the bright pink notepad Haven’s hugging to her chest like a shield. “…that.”

“Okay,” she says. Quiet. Uneasy.

It’s my second lesson as Professor Rooke’s TA, but I spent the whole of last week with him prepping for the start of his course. It’s not the first time I’ve heard a student struggle to get their words out around him.

It’s the first I’ve heard Haven sound like this, though.

Sure, she was shy when we first met. We both kinda were. But pretty soon she was yelling and screaming and laughing right beside me as we tore through the woods on whatever mad escapades we were on.

That’s the Miss H I remember, with her sun-bleached hair and curious smile, nose crinkled as she squinted in the sunlightand tried to figure out why the hell I was attacking yet another tree.

Not this mousy, bedraggled bundle of nerves.

“What’s the notebook for?” Haven asks.

“Weren’t you listening?” Rooke narrows his eyes at her, reaching across and tapping the cover. “It’s your Activity Log. It says so right here.”

“Oh, uh…I think I might have missed?—”

“I don’t have time to go over it again,” Professor Rooke says, glancing at his watch. “Meet me before class tomorrow and I’ll fill you in.”

“Okay, thank you.”

This is like watering a dead plant and waiting for it to spring back to life. It’s too fucking painful to watch.

I clear my throat. “Professor?” I stab my thumb toward the door when he looks at me. I’d rather not get into a one-on-one with him about taking that call earlier.

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