The lecture hall in the prestigious Hawthorne University was packed with eager students, but the air felt thicker than usual today. Sophia Bennett sat in the third row, her notebook open but her pen frozen above the page. At twenty years old, she was a straight-A literature major, sheltered by a strict upbringing and laser-focused on graduating with honors. Yet nothing in her orderly life had prepared her for Professor Alexander Voss.

He stood at the front of the room like a force of nature, tall, broad-shouldered, with dark tousled hair that begged to be touched and piercing emerald eyes that seemed to see straight through every facade.

At thirty-five,...