Page 17 of Savage Surrender

“Just passing by on my way to class,” I said, already moving my feet to walk away.

Once I did, I scolded myself for the flicker of jealousy that burned in me.

Jealous? What right did I have to be jealous?

Professor Remi was just my teacher.

A crush on my professor was quite possibly the stupidest thing I could fill my head with. It was such a silly concern, a non-issue in the big picture of what was happening in my life.

I don’t have time for this.He could kiss whoever he wanted, and any woman could try her best with him. It didn’t matter to me. It couldn’t matter to me.

Romance was dead to me. It had to be because I’d never have the freedom to actually decide somethingIwanted. I’d never have the right to act on something that interested me.

The intel of Professor Remi kissing some assistant in the building wouldn’t make Igor Petrov happy. And failing to appease my father with the information he did want wouldn’t help Maxim.

Still, as I entered the lecture room, I pushed the doors too hard. Anger simmered in my veins. My head wasn’t cleared of the annoyance and frustration. My heart raced, and no matter how many times I mentally scolded myself to snap out of this and forget about having a secret crush on my professor, I couldn’t force the strong feelings away.

Settling in for the lecture to start, I fought hard to find that stupid, trivial optimism I’d woken with.

But it was gone.

9

VIKTOR

Itold you no.

Jessica hadn’t stopped coming on to me since the day we met. It didn’t matter what the message was. She always had a reason to stop by my office.

Today, it was to confirm that I would pick up another class for a few weeks. Another faculty member had been in a car accident and would be off for a month. Since I was only teaching the one class that Irina was in, I had free time. I didn’t want to get tied up with another course since I wasn’t actually here to work for long, only as long as my cover required it. However, the other class, a poetry one, was short. And Irina was enrolled in it. An additional chance to see her would be productive.

I didn’t need Jessica to personally tell me that picking up this class was confirmed. I’d already spoken with the head of the department. The dean’s office wouldn’t be involved in this kind of an arrangement, so she had no hand in this to come speak to me about it at all. But I wasn’t born yesterday. I was aware of her eagerness to see me, no matter what. Perhaps she was one ofthose thrill junkies, always going for what she couldn’t have. My rejection could very well be the motivation for her to try harder.

Even going as far as leaning in to kiss me.

Irina had been walking by right then, and the timing of her heels loudly clacking on the floor was kismet. I was so glad that she’d interrupted.

“Don’t try that again,” I warned Jessica as I backed up to pick up my laptop bag. My lecture would begin in a couple of minutes.

“You know you want me.” She grinned, sitting on the edge of my desk.

I grabbed a file that she sat on, and I used enough force that it made her jerk to the side and stand again. Pouting for real, she furrowed her brow at me like she couldn’t believe I’d done that.

“I don’t.” I pointed the file at her as I rounded the desk. “Don’t assume you ever know a single thing about me.”

She hugged herself, still smiling. “I like it, this air of mystery you keep around yourself.”

I was no mystery, just careful about who I dealt with and what they could know about my real life—the version of me that included the Mafia.

“Don’t bother me again.” I left with that warning, not even caring that she remained in my office. Nothing incriminating was in there. I hardly touched anything, and I never wrote down anything that someone could trace back to me. Most of the paperwork had become obsolete, anyway. Documentation was all done via emails and online for courses and the registration of job positions.

Leaving her behind me might have given her the wrong idea, but there wasn’t anything I could do to change her idea that my office was always open to her. There would be no stopping her, not when she used her relationship to the dean as a means of demanding clout.

I hurried to the lecture, anxious and impatient to get there. Seeing Irina was a priority. I had to assess how she was reacting to catching me almost kissing another woman. If I were going to adopt the method of seducing her to get her to open up and talk to me about what Igor Petrov was up to, I couldn’t look “taken” and with another woman.

Irina was seated in the middle of the auditorium seating, and she didn’t react to my entrance. Most students shut up, used to my stern and strict protocol of beginning as soon as I walked into the room. I would often start with another mind-numbing lecture as I approached the podium, but I didn’t today. With the quiet hanging over the room, all eyes on me—except for Irina’s—it was hard not to feel like I had such a grand entrance. Like I was royalty sweeping into court.

“Morning. Let’s begin,” I said firmly as I reached my spot behind the podium. Plugging in my laptop took seconds, and connecting my slides to the overhead screen took even less time than that. Everything went as seamlessly as ever, and I spoke as I got set up.

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