His body hummed, needing touch. Dale swore. In the midst of grading his assignments, he’d forgotten to pop another suppressant. Some of the other students glanced at him, but he never looked back as he strode by, hoping they’d forget his scent.
Gods, being in heat was a colossal pain. Surely professors were allowed to skip heats. That would be nice.
Dale slowed down when he approached his classroom, waiting for the previous class to vacate. They were running late. And he needed a teacher’s desk to hide behind, so he could avoid standing in the hallway, defenseless against twenty-two-year-old alphas. Like the one walking toward him.
Even before he stopped, Greg’s nostrils flared. Dale pretended to look away, but he knew Greg was sniffing at him. Then he sniffed again, and his tongue darted over his lips. Like he was hungry.
A thrill shot down Dale’s spine. He needed to grab a cold shower, maybe ten, and never step out of his bathroom ever again.
Inches away, Greg stopped, his gaze coasting hot down Dale’s body, from his chest to his hips to his shoes, and back up. He was shameless. And Dale loved it. Loved how Greg could do whatever he wanted, without fear of repercussions. But he was also young, and maybe that counted for his recklessness.
All he knew about Greg was that he’d started school at Meadowfall College last year. He wanted to be a scientist. His parents paid his tuition; no outstanding bills, and a very clean record. All A’s in his schoolwork, too. And he played football three times a week. Probably the perfect student.
“Where’s your alpha?” Greg rumbled, meeting his eyes. His voice sounded like thunder on a rainy day, and Dale couldn’t get enough of it.
“What alpha?” Dale blurted, then remembered June. His TA, who was kind enough to dab her wrists over his face during his heats, so he could pretend he had a partner, and no one else would bother him. Except June was gone, and Dale didn’t have an excuse to hide behind right now. “That’s not an appropriate question. I’m your professor.”
Greg’s gaze dropped to Dale’s neck, where his scent gland was. Dale gulped. There wasn’t any marking there. Dale had never bonded, even if he’d slept with others on and off. Then Greg glanced at Dale’s wrist, and of course there weren’t any markings there, either.
“You broke up with June?” Greg asked, his eyes boring into Dale’s. Dale’s pulse rushed through his ears, blocking out all other sounds except Greg’s voice.
Oh, gods, he wanted Greg to pin him. He wanted to have Greg’s babies, and this was 10 AM on a Wednesday. Not appropriate at all.
The bell screamed above his head. Dale jumped, his heart slamming into his ribs. He jerked away from Greg. He needed to get behind his desk, so he didn’t have to read I want to fuck you in Greg’s eyes. Except Dale was kind of wet, too, and maybe Greg could already smell that. He squirmed.
The classroom doors banged open. Students swarmed out into the hallway, a potent mix of woodsy, grassy, and floral scents in the air. Dale sagged with relief.
Behind him, Greg stepped closer, just enough that his heat radiated through the space between them. He bumped his arm into Dale’s, warm and solid, and Dale’s throat went dry. The rest of Greg’s body had to be hot, too. Greg could press up against him, and he’d lose track of all his thoughts, just feeling the solid wall of Greg’s chest on his.
Why he’d avoided dating, he couldn’t remember right now. Maybe it was because he preferred books. Maybe it was because of his glasses. Or because he’d never thought he’d looked any good, all thin and tall—Greg was half a head shorter than him, his shoulders broad, his body toned.
Or maybe it was because Dale still carried the voices from his past with him: You’re too boring. You’re always so busy with your research. You don’t have wide-enough hips, that’ll give you a bad childbirth.
They didn’t reflect his worth, but damn if he couldn’t keep those voices out of his head. What Greg saw in him, Dale had no idea. He was afraid to find out. Maybe all Greg wanted was another notch in his belt, and... maybe Dale was hoping for more than that. Maybe he didn’t want to hear the truth, because not knowing hurt less than being left behind.
The moment he glimpsed space in the classroom doorway, Dale squeezed through it, flushing hot and cold, his skin too tight.
The rest of the students trailed in behind him. Some of them looked questioningly over, but Dale ducked his head, setting the graded assignments at the corner of his desk, and the class schedule in front of his seat. His belly ached with his heat.
“I’ll be going through two assignments today,” he said as the last of the students filed in. He drew the answers for the first worksheet on the whiteboard. “You should have completed the homework on nanoparticles. In a while, I’ll return the graded assignments on semiconducting solids.”
Things went easier as he settled into the rhythm of teaching. He pretended that the students absolutely needed to know the differences between nanoparticles and nano dots, and the different ways nanoparticles were synthesized. He explained the unusual properties of nano materials, why research had bloomed in this field, and the iron nanoparticles his own research group was working on.
Dale kept talking, because he was afraid that if he stopped, he would start imagining what he looked like to Greg, standing in front of the classroom like this. It would crumble all his confidence.
He was forty-two. No student wanted a companion this old.
The minutes flew by as he explained the homework questions. The stack of graded assignments drifted through the classroom, students picking out their own work. Dale lost track
