Forbidden Heat (Firework Girls #1) Read Online Free PDF Page B

clearing my head.
    Our eyes meet and he halts.
    “Oh—” he says.
    “Professor Brooks.”
    “Miss Nikas.”
    I blink at him stupidly.
    “Sorry,” he says. “I was told there usually aren’t any students here this hour.”
    “Usually not,” I say. “I don’t usually come at night either. I usually swim in the morning, but I had a conflict.” I’m rambling, and entirely overusing the word ‘usually’, so I clamp my mouth shut.
    “I can come back later,” he says, gesturing toward the door and halfway turning, offering to go.
    I take a steadying breath. Why am I being such an idiot?
    “No, no. It’s okay. There’s nothing that says professors can’t use this pool, too. I’m done anyway.”
    I lift myself onto the edge, water streaming off my body. Even though I always feel a bit self-conscious in a suit—even the simple swimmers one-piece I’m wearing—something about being alone in here with Professor Gorgeous has me feeling extra exposed.
    When I glance at him—still standing there, watching me—he jolts into motion and heads for one of the concrete benches lining the walls. I likewise head for my towel, on the bench freaking right next to the one he chooses.
    “Are you on the swim team here?” he asks as he tosses his towel onto the bench.
    “No, I did that in high school, though,” I say, watching him kick off his sandals. God, is he going to remove his shirt?
    I don’t care if he is my professor, I really, really want him to remove that shirt. It’s not a sin to look is it?
    “I was in diving, too,” I say, starting to dry off. “But I’m not really interested in competing anymore.”
    “Do you play any other sports?”
    “No. I’m not too good at anything that involves a ball.”
    He gives me a funny look and I realize how that must have sounded. My cheeks are burning so I toss the towel over my head and start drying my hair.
    He doesn’t say anything off-color though. Instead he asks, “You don’t like basketball?”
    “Why does everyone think I like basketball just because I’m tall?” I say from underneath the towel.
    He laughs and I peek out from behind the towel. I like his laugh.
    He pulls his shirt over his head and oh my god this guy is cut. I take in his broad chest and abs as much as I can but he’s looking at me again and I can’t stand here ogling over my freaking philosophy professor.
    I look down at my cover up, resting on the bench, and absently rub my hair with the towel. What am I supposed to be doing?
    “So what was your conflict?” he asks.
    “Huh?”
    “You said you usually swim in the morning.”
    “Oh.” I grab my cover up and throw it on. Well, that’s a little better. “I had some work to do with my lab team. It was the only time they could all meet and I’m fine swimming in the evenings.”
    “That’s right, you’re a biology major. Also, what was it, chemistry?”
    I nod, pleased that he remembered.
    “What are you planning on doing with your majors?”
    “I want to get my master’s in microbiology. I’ve been studying up for the Biochemistry GRE. I’d like to research diseases.”
    He raises his eyebrows and nods. “Nice. That makes me think of an article I read lately about a breakthrough they’ve made with Alzheimer’s.”
    I blink at him. “The one in Scientific American?”
    “Yes, that’s the one. Pretty exciting stuff.”
    “It is!” I say, stepping closer to him, forgetting for a moment about his chest and his cuteness and his professor-ness. “They’re getting closer to a cure all the time.”
    “Can’t happen too soon,” he says. “What I found most interesting about the article is how they figured out how to grow the proteins they needed.”
    “Stroke of genius!” I agree. We discuss the science behind the breakthrough some more, sitting on the concrete bench as we talk. I even expand on some of the concepts a bit, explaining things the article simplified for the sake of a more general readership.
    “You