Savage Protection (Savage Reign #7)

Chapter 1

LAYLA

The rain in Louisiana smells different from the rain back home.

In New York, it’s sharp and metallic, like the city bleeds into the air and stains everything it touches. Here, it carries the thick sweetness of wet earth and warm stone. It clings to the sidewalks and the trees and the brick buildings like the whole world is trying to wash itself clean.

Except nothing ever really gets clean. Too many people have way too many secrets. Rain is not strong enough to rid people of their dirt.

Not me. And definitely not any of my friends.

I tell myself that as I sit behind a desk that isn’t mine, in an office that smells like someone else’s cologne and stale coffee while I pretend I belong here.

The truth is, I’m not sure where I belong.

My black-rimmed glasses fog faintly from the humidity every time I push them up the bridge of my nose, and my fingers are smudged with chalk dust from the lecture I just finished.

There is a light dusting of freckles across my nose that looks like it shouldn’t belong on someone who teaches at a top university.

Something soft and youthful that makes people underestimate me before I even open my mouth.

I know because every student in my lecture looked at me and immediately dismissed me as too young to teach them. I get that a lot given I’m only twenty-three. But fuck them. It’s not my fault I graduated at the top of my class at eighteen and hold a PhD in chemistry.

Outside my window, the sky hangs low and heavy, a bruised gray that makes the campus look muted and underwater. Students rush past with umbrellas. Their laughter carries through the glass in broken bursts, bright and careless.

I used to envy that kind of easygoing life. Now it just feels like something happening in another world.

My phone sits on the edge of the desk beside a stack of ungraded lab reports. It hasn’t lit up with a message from Professor Michaels in nineteen days.

Nineteen days since I landed in New Orleans with a suitcase full of skirts and books and the kind of stubborn loyalty that has always been my downfall.

I stare at my phone like it might decide to behave if I glare hard enough.

Nothing.

The small silence in the room swells into something bigger. Something that presses against my ribs. I swallow it down and pick up the next report. I read the first paragraph twice without absorbing it.

My mind keeps circling the same question that has been chewing at me since week one.

Where the hell are you, Daniel?

A knock comes at the open door before I can spiral too far.

“Professor Wren?” A young woman with a damp ponytail and a backpack clutched to her chest stands there, looking uncertain. “Do you have a minute?”

I offer her a small smile I don’t quite feel. “Of course. Come in.”

She steps inside, dripping rainwater on the tile floor, and I watch her hesitate like she expects me to bite. The anxiety on her face is familiar. It reminds me of myself at her age, walking into offices like this with shaking hands and a desperate hope that someone would take me seriously.

I stand, smoothing down my long skirt, the soft fabric brushing my ankles. My glittery sandals are damp from the walk back from the lecture hall, and the tiny rhinestones catch the fluorescent light when I move.

I look like I should be strolling through a bookstore with a latte, not teaching organic chemistry to juniors who keep asking if I’m old enough to be here.

“Hi,” she says quietly. “I’m sorry. I know you’re busy. I just… I’m really struggling with the synthesis section.”

I gesture toward the chair across from the desk. “Sit. Let’s look at it together.”

Her relief is instant, like she’s been holding her breath all day. She sits and pulls out her notebook, flipping to a page full of scribbles and chemical structures.

As she explains what she doesn’t understand, I nod and guide her through it with practiced patience.

I point to the mistake in her reaction mechanism.

I explain why her yield would be low. I show her how to stabilize the intermediate.

The light in her face is something I used to have for the subject.

Lately though, it’s just another topic I know everything about.

My luster has dulled, and I wish I knew how to get it back. Seeing my student happy is a close second, though.

Her eyes brighten with understanding, and for a moment, the tension that has been living in my body eases. Teaching has always been the one thing that makes me feel anchored. Like I exist for a reason beyond just surviving.

When she leaves, she’s smiling. She thanks me twice and stammers how I’m the best professor she’s ever had.

Ha! I almost laugh at that, but I’ll take it. I know she’s after a passing grade from me. Smart chick. I’ll give her that. I close the door behind her and rest my forehead against the wood for a beat. But yeah. It’s absurd how badly I want to believe every single word that came from her lips.

I pull back and glance around the office again, taking in the signs of Daniel’s presence the way I have every day since I arrived.

Fucker. When I see him, I’m going to wrap each of my digits around his neck and shake as hard as I can. If he wanted a month-long vacation, all he had to do was tell me.

Knots tighten in my stomach from worry. My brain says the grown man is okay wherever he is, but my gut is gurgling with dread that something is up.

He asked me for this. Begged me, actually. He needed help from someone who could fill in for him. Okay, sure. I can do that. I dropped everything I had going to help a friend and I haven’t seen him once since I arrived.

The rain is steady outside. I flick my gaze to the phone beside me for the twentieth time in an hour.

Still no message, no call. Nineteen days and counting.

I was supposed to fill in for him for a week, not three.

I stare at my last unsent text, fingers hesitating: Are you okay?

But it would only join the list of messages he’s never answered.

I gather my things, pressing a stack of papers into my tote.

The hallway is nearly empty. I hear only the soft squeak of my sandals and the hum of old lights overhead as I head for the lab to check on a student project.

For a moment, in the quiet, I let myself pretend Daniel is just running late.

That he’ll walk in, apologetic as always, with an impossible story and a grin.

But there’s an ache under my ribs, cold and growing. People don’t disappear like this for no reason.

An hour later, I step outside, and the thick humidity wraps around my lungs. The parking lot is mostly deserted. My car glistens with beads of rain, parked under a flickering lamp. The campus feels smaller than usual when it’s this late.

I check my watch. Damn. I meant to leave earlier.

I move quickly, head down, purse tucked under one arm, sandals splashing through shallow puddles. Halfway to my car, I hear footsteps behind me. They are a muffled thud in the growing silence.

I glance over my shoulder. Three men stand near the curb.

Expensive suits wrap around large bodies.

The man in the center smiles in my direction, his teeth gleaming beneath the lamplight.

Chills erupt over my skin. Another man, this one taller and broader, hangs back, his attention sharp and assessing.

His eyes land on everything around us before I feel the weight of his laser focus turn to me.

All three step off the curb and in just a few strides they are within earshot.

“Professor Layla Vren?” the smiling man calls out. His voice is smooth, unbothered by the rain. There’s a strong accent weighing his words. Russian.

I stop, tightening my grip on my bag. “Wren,” I correct him gently. “Who’s asking?”

The man in the middle with the diamond cuff links and an air of aristocracy about him closes the distance between us with a predatory ease. “You know Professor Michaels?”

My pulse stutters at the mention of my friend’s name.

The hair on the back of my neck stands up.

I take a step back but there’s nowhere to really go given my car is directly behind me and the three of them have circled me.

Daniel always told me I needed to get my head out of books and pay attention to my surroundings more.

I swallow past the sudden dryness of my throat. “Um, yes. He’s… he’s a colleague of mine. What’s this about?”

The rich Russian offers a slow smile that doesn’t touch his icy blue eyes. “You’ve been looking for him. Right? You and him teach the same material?”

I edge closer to my car and reach behind me for the handle. “I’m sorry, I don’t know why you would care about what either of us teaches. I have to go.” I hit the unlock on my car and pull the handle.

The tall man off to my left moves, blocking my path and slams a hand down on the door, forcing it closed. My throat goes tight as the third man to my right closes in.

“It’s okay, Professor,” their leader offers in a cold tone. From one second to the next his voice loses its warmth. “You come vith us.”

Sure. Go with the creepy dudes in the dark parking lot. A girl’s dream come true.

I shake my head. Despite the weather, my whole body turns icy cold. “Nope! Not happening.”

“Da, malyshka. Da. It is happening.”

A gloved hand darts out from my right, too quick for me to evade. Something soft presses hard over my nose and mouth.

Ice-blue eyes narrow on me. “Inhale, Professor. Nap time.”

I don’t tell him to go fuck himself because I’m too busy trying to not breathe and fight him off at the same time. I wrap my hand around a strong wrist and fight the hold on me, but I’m not strong enough. This dude must lift bricks in his time off. Nothing I do budges his grip.