Page 300 of In Love with a Cruel Billionaire

Him

THE PROFESSOR'S ALARMwoke him at half past four the next day.

While a dull, miniscule throbbing still nagged at his temple, his body no longer felt sluggish, and he was even able to leave the bed without tripping over his own feet.

Twenty hours ago, it hadn't been the case at all, with the flu causing the professor to all but crawl just to make it to the en-suite.

Then again, none of it should've happened if he hadn't been so damn careless in the first place.

The last time he had done something as stupid as this, everything had still been new and unfamiliar, his bitterness still raw enough to make him rebel against the drastic changes his life had to accommodate.

But he had no such excuse now.

No damn excuse except for the fact that his thoughts had been so damn entangled because of her and...

Never again, he told himself forcefully. Never again would he let her affect him this way. Never again would he let her affect him to the point of making him do things completely out of character and say things he had no right to say.

Never again,he repeated to himself as he drank his lemon-infused water and read his messages—-

WHAT THE FUCK?

Shock had him sputtering over his glass, but words on the message thread between him and Diana didn't even waver. Words that he seemed to have fucking typed while he had been in the throes of fever and delirium. Words that he could no longer take back—-

His doorbell buzzed.

Because she was already here, outside his damn house.

The professor moved in record speed, taking a shower while issuing orders to his staff on loudspeaker. But despite his best efforts at multitasking, he still ended up making her wait for a good ten minutes before he was sufficiently presentable.

His housekeeper had already escorted Diana into his living room, allowing her to see him as he came out of the hallway. She stood up right away, and a part of him did the same thing, standing in immediate attention the moment she came into view.

Shit.

He was in trouble.

No, make thatshewas trouble.

Big fucking trouble, the kind that came in petite, slender packages but packed a fucking wallop. The kind that came with eat-you, eat-me eyes that had the power to enslave bastards like him. And the most damn vexing thing of all, she was the kind of trouble that noticed right away the attention-seeking banana in his fucking pocket.

"G-Good morning, Professor." Her voice was faint.

"Good morning." His voice, on the other hand, was raspy, with the professor unable to help but notice how her gaze kept darting to the rigid outline his erection had made against his trousers.

"I, um, brought something for you." If he wasn't in so much pain, he might've been amused at the way she had to drag her eyes off his arousal and reach for something—-

The professor blinked.

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