All Chapters of Unprofessional - I shouldn't want my own student: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

Adrian Hale had always believed that predictability was a kind of peace. A lecture hall at eight in the morning, the familiar echo of shoes on polished floors, students half-asleep and half-engaged—these were the patterns that made his life quiet, clean, and manageable. No surprises. No disturbances. Nothing that required him to feel more than he intended.And then she enrolled.Eden Marlowe walked into his classroom. It was the second week of the semester—early, as she always did—and Adrian felt the shift in the air before he even saw her. It was subtle, like the faintest change in barometric pressure before a storm, but he felt it all the same. He always did.She wasn’t loud or dramatic. In fact, she moved with a deliberate calmness, her bag slung over her shoulder, her notebook in hand, her gaze sweeping the room before landing right where he stood.That look—steady, unhesitant, quietly bold—hit him with the force of a confession he didn’t want to hear.He forced himself to break e

Three o’clock arrived slowly… and all at once.Adrian had been sitting at his desk for nearly ten minutes, pretending he was reading the open book in front of him. In reality, he’d absorbed nothing. His pulse had been unsteady since noon, but now it thudded in a heavy, deliberate rhythm that matched each second hand tick on the wall clock.He heard footsteps in the hallway—light, unhurried—and his whole body went taut.The knock was soft.“Come in,” he managed, though his voice was rougher than he intended.The door opened, and Eden stepped inside.Not a girl.Not unsure.Not timid.She walked in with the quiet confidence of a woman who knew exactly where she was going… and who she wanted to be in front of.A faint smile touched her mouth. “Professor Hale.”He nodded, his throat tightening. “Miss Marlowe. Please—sit.”She crossed the room slowly, as though part of her was studying him just as deeply as she had in the lecture hall. The click of the door behind her sounded far too final

Adrian had chosen the library for its silence.He needed a place untouched by her presence, a place where the shelves and the muted lamplight might smother the heat still crawling beneath his skin. He’d told himself he was here to focus on research, to recalibrate, to reclaim the equilibrium she’d shattered in his office.The library had always been sanctuary for him—polished wood tables, narrow aisles, dust-thick quiet. The kind of place where impulse suffocated under the weight of discipline.But today, even the silence felt thin.He moved between shelves with a stack of books in hand, trying to pretend his thoughts weren’t circling her like a star around an inevitable gravity. He told himself it would fade. That it had to fade. He just needed time, distance, space free of her scent and her voice and her steady, unblinking gaze.He reached for a book, flipping through the pages without absorbing anything.Then he heard it.A soft laugh.Warm. Low. Familiar.His spine locked.No.No—

The week crawled.Every day felt like an hour, every hour stretched into something unendurable. Adrian told himself he was managing—burying himself in work, avoiding the library, taking different hallways just to limit the chances of seeing her. It didn’t help.Nothing helped.Because every time he closed his eyes, she came back.Not sweet.Not innocent.Just present.A gravity he no longer knew how to escape.By the time next Thursday arrived, he’d spent seven nights imagining her—wanting her—then hating himself for wanting her. He’d convinced himself that the meeting would be fine, uneventful. Professional.A lie he clung to because he had nothing else left.He arrived in his office early, hoping that settling in might ease the tension. It didn’t. He reorganized papers, adjusted the blinds, straightened the books on his shelf—busywork to keep his hands from trembling.At 2:59, a sharp knock echoed against the door.His pulse jumped.He shouldn’t answer.He should tell her the meetin

Adrian woke the next morning with a tight, aching reminder of the night before— not physical, not exactly, but something deeper and more insidious.A hunger that hadn’t faded.A knowledge that he had crossed some internal line simply by admitting the truth to himself: he wanted Eden Marlowe in ways he should never want anyone connected to his career.He showered too long. Stood with the hot water streaming over his shoulders, palms flat against the tile, trying—failing—to wash away the memories of his fantasies. Kneeling for her. Holding her hips as she rode him. Her mouth around—He groaned softly, forehead dropping to the wall.He couldn’t think about that. Not today. Not when he had to stand in front of a class and pretend he was composed.By the time he arrived at the lecture hall, his jaw was tight, his hands cold, his mind braced for war against himself.Students filtered in, finding their seats, a low hum of chatter filling the room. Adrian set his notes on the desk, st