Please Harder, Professor

Chapter 103

Sophie’s POV

The café Lolita chose is expensive, discreet, the kind of place where conversations stay private.

Tucked away on a side street I've never noticed before, it has no sign above the door—just a brass number and a heavy wooden entrance that suggests you either belong here or you don't.

Inside, the lighting is dim and warm, the tables spaced far enough apart that neighboring conversations become nothing more than murmured background noise.

I arrive early, nerves coiling in my stomach like snakes.

I'm not sure what I'm doing here. Making a deal with a woman who once shaped Adrian into the man he is today. A woman who trained him, molded him, then abandoned him to pick up the pieces of himself alone.

Everything I know about Lolita suggests I should run in the opposite direction. But desperation makes strange bedfellows.

I choose a table in the corner, positioning myself where I can see the door. The waiter brings water I don't touch, hovering with professional discretion until I wave him away.

My hands won't stop trembling, so I press them flat against the white tablecloth and force myself to breathe.

Lolita glides in exactly on time.

She moves through the café like she owns it—maybe she does, for all I know. Immaculate as always in a fitted black dress, red lipstick perfectly applied, a cigarette already balanced between her elegant fingers despite the no-smoking signs.

Her dark hair falls in soft waves around her shoulders, and she carries herself with an air of unbothered elegance that makes me feel young and desperate in comparison.

Which, I suppose, I am.

"Little lamb." She slides into the seat across from me, crossing her legs with practiced grace. "You look tired. Pregnancy not agreeing with you, or is it the company you're keeping?"

"Both, probably."

She laughs—a low, genuine sound that transforms her face into something almost warm. Almost.

The waiter materializes instantly. Lolita orders wine without looking at the menu; I request tea I won't drink. When he disappears again, she studies me with amused interest, like she's examining a puzzle she's already solved.

"So." She takes a drag from her cigarette, exhaling smoke toward the ceiling. "You called this meeting. I assume you have something specific in mind, or did you simply miss my charming company?"

I don't waste time on pleasantries. She'd see through them anyway.

"I need to know about Adrian's past. The years he doesn't talk about—after you left him, before he became a professor." I hold her gaze, refusing to flinch under her scrutiny. "I need to know about his connection to Bellamy. What exactly binds them together. What Adrian is hiding from me."

Lolita's eyebrow arches slightly. "You've been busy, haven't you? Asking questions, poking at walls." She taps ash into the crystal tray beside her. "Does Adrian know you're here?"

"No. And I'd like to keep it that way."

"Secrets from your keeper. How delicious." She sips her wine as soon as the waiter serves our drinks, savoring it, and making me wait.

"I should be honest with you, little lamb—I don't know the details of what Adrian became after I left. We haven't spoken properly in years, and whatever darkness he fell into happened long after I was gone."

My stomach sinks. "Then why am I here?"

"Because I said I don't know the details. I didn't say I couldn't find them. I have connections, Sophie. People who owe me favors, people who keep track of things others want forgotten."

Her smile sharpens.

"Whatever Adrian buried, whatever ties him to that man guarding you—I can dig it up. It will simply take time and the right questions asked in the right places."

She taps ash into the crystal tray beside her.

"I may not have witnessed what he became, but I know the world he fell into. I know the names, the places, the kind of men his father associated with. That's more than you have now, isn't it?"

My heart pounds against my ribs. "Then help me."

"Nothing is free." The words hang between us, weighted with meaning. "Surely you understand that by now."

I tense, my fingers curling against the tablecloth. "What do you want?"

Lolita waves her hand dismissively, smoke trailing from her cigarette like a phantom.

"I'm not asking for anything now. That would be crude, and I'm never crude." She leans back in her chair, studying me with those knowing eyes. "But someday, little lamb, I'll need something. A favor. A piece of information. Access to something or someone you can provide."

She pauses, letting the implications sink in.

"And when that day comes, you'll deliver. No questions asked. No hesitation. No running to Adrian for permission." Her smile sharpens. "Do we have an understanding?"

My instincts scream trap.

There's a trick buried in this arrangement—I can feel it lurking beneath the surface like a shark in dark water.

Lolita doesn't do anything without purpose, doesn't help anyone without calculating exactly what she'll gain in return. Whatever she's planning, whatever favor she'll eventually demand, it won't be simple or painless.

But I'm not in a position to negotiate.

Adrian won't answer my questions—he's made that abundantly clear. Bellamy can't, bound by a loyalty to Adrian that runs deeper than anything I can compete with. I've searched online, dug through public records, found nothing but fragments that raise more questions than they answer.

Lolita is my only door.

"Fine." The word tastes like ash in my mouth. "We have an understanding."

"Excellent." She raises her wine glass in a mock toast. "I so enjoy working with reasonable people."

I don't feel reasonable. I feel like I've just signed a contract in blood without reading the fine print. But it's done now, and there's no taking it back.

Before she can launch into whatever information she's prepared to share, I ask one more question. The one that's been nagging at me since I first dialed her number.

"Why are you helping me?" I search her face for something genuine beneath the mask. "Don't you have some special connection with Adrian? History? Loyalty?"

Lolita laughs.

It's genuine, throaty amusement—the kind of laugh that suggests I've said something genuinely entertaining. She sets down her wine glass, dabbing at the corner of her eye with one manicured finger.

"Oh, little lamb. Your vision of relationships is very cute." She shakes her head, still smiling. "You imagine loyalty and history create bonds that supersede self-interest. That because Adrian and I were once lovers, I should protect him from the consequences of his own choices."

"Shouldn't you?"

"Why?" The question is simple, unburdened by guilt or obligation. "Adrian made his choices. He chose to keep secrets from you. He chose to hide his past instead of trusting you with it. Those choices have consequences, and I see no reason to shield him from them."

She leans forward, and I catch a glimpse of something hard and calculating beneath her elegant exterior.

"My philosophy is simpler than the romantic notions you've constructed, Sophie. I look for my own purpose everywhere. In every situation. Every person."

Her eyes hold mine, unblinking. "You are useful to me. Your curiosity, your determination to uncover what Adrian has buried—these things serve my interests."

"What interests?"

"That," she says smoothly, "is not part of our arrangement." She reaches into her bag and withdraws a folded piece of paper, writes something on it, sliding it across the table. "A name. A place. Start there, and you'll begin to understand what Adrian was before he became the man you know."

I take the paper, my fingers trembling slightly.

"One more piece of advice, little lamb." Lolita rises from her chair, gathering her things with unhurried grace. "Be careful what you dig up. Some truths, once unearthed, can never be buried again. And some knowledge changes you in ways you can't anticipate."

She walks away without waiting for a response, heels clicking against the marble floor.

I sit alone at the table, the folded paper burning in my palm.

When I finally open it, I find a name I don't recognize and an address on the outskirts of the city. Nothing else. No explanation, no context, no roadmap for what I'll find.

I leave the café with the sinking feeling that I've just sold something I don't yet understand.

And the terrifying certainty that whatever I discover will change everything.