Page 79 of Wings of Ashes
Professor Thierry’s brows arched above his sexy, wide-brimmed, black glasses when he saw her. He pursed his lips and glanced behind her, where only one bystander—the front desk worker—could overhear them.
“Miss Oadess,” Professor Thierry said softly as a greeting. He acted much more cordially than she would have expected after she removed her panties in front of him in his classroom hours earlier. “I was hoping to speak with you.”
“Oh?” Nix asked, still pissed off at the academy and unable to keep the anger from her voice.
“Could we…speak in private?” he asked her.
Nix glanced at the front desk worker, who gaped at them. He was probably shocked that the most handsome professor at the academy wanted to speak with the “Ugly Duckling.”
“Yes…apparently, there is a section of the library where few students are allowed,” Nix said. “Maybe we could go there? For privacy?”
Professor Thierry frowned. “I will not be having sex with you in the abandoned aisles of the academy library.”
“That’s not…” Nix pinched the bridge of her nose, closed her eyes, and sighed. She grumbled, “Nobody mentioned sex, damn it.”
She just wanted to figure out where the restricted section was.
She turned to the worker and asked, “Professor Thierry is allowed in the restricted section, right? As a professor here.”
The worker jerkily nodded.
“Great. Let’s go there. For a private conversation.”
The worker described to Thierry how to get there, and Thierry led Nix to a secluded area deep in the back of the massive library.
The lighting was even dimmer in the back, the tall bookshelves casting shadows. There were three shelves roped off, and a small metal gate prevented Nix from walking inside and grabbing the book she needed.
“I don’t know that we needed this much privacy…” Professor Thierry began but trailed off when Nix lowered to her knees in front of him. “Miss Oadess!”
31
CHAPTER
“What?” Nix asked after Professor Thierry yelled her name at her.
Nix bent further down on her knees to examine the lock on the gate to the restricted section of the library.
“What are you doing?” Professor Thierry asked in an absolutely scandalized voice.
“Do you happen to have a bobby pin?” she asked. “Or screwdriver? Actually, the metal edges of the temple tip ends of your glasses could possibly—”
“Are you trying topick a lockin front of a professor?” Professor Thierry asked incredulously. “You do not think I will report you?”
“I need a book or two that is behind this gate.”
He quirked one eyebrow and narrowed his gorgeous slate gray-silver eyes on her. “If the academy blocked off this section from students, it did so for a reason.”
Nix, struck with new anger, looked up to glare at her studly professor. Her glare elicited a reaction from him of stunned blinking. “You agree with the gatekeeping of knowledge, withholding information from certain select groups?”
Professor Thierry’s plush mouth opened. Closed. Opened again. “I agree that some topics may be too…dark for the younger generation.”
“You’ve spoken about shifter species genocide in your class. What topic could be so ‘dark’ that it should be forbidden to curious students?”
The student seemed to ask too difficult a question for the professor to answer.
“I want to learn about self-defense. Does not seem like too ‘dark’ a topic for a shifter student?” she asked.
Nix fumbled with the lock but knew she lacked the tools to get into it tonight. Giving up and promising to return later, she stood and turned to face her professor.
