Free Desires' Guardian by Tempeste O'Riley

at least Simon had made going out on a blind date seem reasonable.
    Before he knew it, Adrian Keys, his professor, was standing at the lecture stand to the right of the large teacher’s desk. Tonight they had a special event of sorts; another class was joining theirs for the evening lecture. Something about differing points of view or something. Personally, he couldn’t wait to see how the new kids reacted to his hot prof.
    Adrian calmly raised his right hand and called out, “Attention, please. My name is Adrian Keys. I will be your instructor this evening.” What caught Chase’s attention again was how beautiful the man was. Tall—well, taller than him—with hair so black it was almost blue, and eyes such a vibrant green they seemed to burn. As always, what he noticed after that was the unusual tenor of his voice. It was deep, kind of sexy, but also somewhat muted and flat in places. “And this gentleman,” he continued, “is Kelley, my feisty assistant. And, while I may not be able to hear what you say, I read lips and”—Adrian’s eyes twinkled as he smirked—“Kelley hears everything.”
    Kelley proceeded to hand out packets to everyone as Adrian continued with his introductory speech. “This is an advanced course. It is also accelerated, so I expect everyone to actively participate and learn all you can from the lecture and each other.” Adrian Keys continued to explain what they would learn over the course of the evening. Honestly, it was more of a miniconference, but who was Chase to nitpick over how they named things. Adrian stopped partway when two of the new girls kept chatting while he was lecturing.
    “Excuse me, ladies, but if you are not going to participate in the class, you may leave and accept a zero for today.”
    Chase shifted in his chair, as did most everyone, to stare at the two girls, who blushed and looked away from every eye on them. “But he can’t hear!” one of the girls whined.
    “No, but I can see. Now choose. Stay and learn, or leave and lose out?”
    Glad he wasn’t the one those piercing green eyes flashed on, Chase turned his attention back to the man at the front of the room.
    As he approached Adrian Keys at the end of the conference-class thing, Chase smiled. “Mr. Keys,” he signed, glad to have learned ASL in college—it had seemed logical, given one of his aunts married the sweetest man who happened to be deaf. Besides, he’d never been good with spoken languages. “I need your signature on this form, please. It verifies I am taking the computer forensics class and that I attended this special lecture.”
    A beatific smile spread across Adrian’s face. “Mr. Chase, right?”
    “Chase is my first name. Manning is my last.”
    “Chase then,” Adrian signed, then accepted the form and looked it over. “Police consultant? They have a department for this already, yes?”
    “Yes, but I have been contracted a couple of times, and it would be better if I had paper proof of all my skills for when they go to the DA or trial,” Chase explained and shrugged. Now that he was stuck helping Rhys, this would be even more important. Though he had hoped to get out of working for that man, he had instead ended up taking over part of the back office of the Coiled Dragon to house the agency’s tech area and his IT consulting firm. He still could not believe Mark had talked him into it, but the man was almost as persuasive as Simon was.
    Chase was pulled out of his rambling thoughts when Adrian waved his hand in front of him. “This your only class?”
    “No, I have one other. Its last session is tomorrow night.”
    Adrian again gave him the sweet, open smile that enchanted him every time he saw it. After signing the slip, he handed it back to Chase. “Glad to have you in the class and hope to see more of you.” His eyes dropped, and he blushed lightly before he turned and hurried over to Kelley. Chase grinned to himself. Cute and bashful, yum!
     
     
    A LMOST TWO