Page 8 of In Control

I watch him, transfixed. As entranced as I had been when he’d locked eyes with me in the theatre.

The outfit he wears today is less formal. Jeans, a shirt and a dark blue blazer. The cotton of the shirt strains across his broad chest and the denim stretches across his thick thighs.

I’ve been dreaming about this man and yet I’d forgotten how exquisite he is in the flesh.

I can’t help remembering that voice in my ear, those hands on my hips, that body pressed against mine.

He hasn’t spotted me – we’re all bathed in darkness – and I have no scent for him to identify.

I can ogle him all I want. I rub my thighs together and float in the dark rumble of his voice.

At the end of his presentation, the lights flicker on for questions.

Sitting up straight and running my fingers through my hair, I raise my hand.

His gaze hovers over the faces in the audience and my heart pounds faster as his gaze edges towards me. Closer and closer until our eyes meet.

There’s a flicker across his brow, but apart from that he makes no sign that he’s recognised me. In fact, his gaze drifts on and he picks someone else to ask the first question.

As Tony from Professor Browne’s group asks a long-winded question, the alpha’s eyes dart back to me, sweeping over my form in a way that seems to heat his gaze. Then his eyes flick away.

He knows who I am. He recognises me.

I wait patiently. He picks three more people to ask their questions, but although he appears determined to ignore me, his eyes nonetheless can’t help but be pulled back my way.

Finally, there’s only me, my hand still raised.

He peers at his watch as if to say he has no more time.

“It’s only a quick question,” I call out. He meets my eyes and I’m back there, back in that room with his fingers doing wicked things to me.

“Fine,” he nods curtly, folding his arms across his chest.

I reel off my question, and he shifts on his feet for the first time. Bet he wasn’t expecting me to ask him something challenging.

He lets out a puff of irritated air and leans his weight on the lectern.

“Miss …” he gestures towards me.

“Sophia,” I tell him.

“Sophia, you may think you’re being smart to challenge that assumption, but I can assure you that far greater minds than yours have scrutinised my research and found it holds firm.”

I frown at him. What the hell does he know about the greatness of my mind? He’s just like every other arsehole. Just because I have a pretty face, they think there’s nothing between my ears. My mother insists this is why I decided to study physics.

“Oh Sophia,” she’d said, rolling her eyes at me in that languid expression I’ve learned to copy, “you always want to prove yourself. Who cares what they think?”

I do care. I’m as smart and hard working as any of them, even if I have lost my love for the subject in recent months. It doesn’t mean I don’t know my science. My question was a valid one and he knows it.

I stay in my seat as the other members of the faculty filter out of the lecture hall, some chatting together as they do, a couple stopping by the lectern to talk to the new professor as he packs away his notes.

His eyes continue to dart to me, sitting in my seat as he does, and soon it’s just the two of us, the door slamming behind the last student.

The professor adopts that pose again. Arms crossed, legs firm. He stares up at me.

I rise from my seat slowly and saunter down the steps. His eyes roam over me for a second time, taking in the pleated skirt and silk blouse I’m wearing.

“Hi,” I say, stopping in front of him. I’m wearing flats today and he towers above me.

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