Agent Round: Adult Contemp. Romance - The Professor & Miss St. James

Title: The Professor and Miss St. James
Entry Nickname: Ivy League Sex Scandal
Word Count: 104K
Genre: Adult Contemporary Romance

Query:

At 25, all Jocelyn St. James has to show for her life are three homecoming crowns, two blue lines on a stick, and a ton of regret. She’s cutting her losses and heading for grad school at Dartmouth. Leaving Texas is her only hope of hiding her pregnancy from the baby’s father.

She’s got seven months until her due date. Not enough time to get a master’s degree or figure out the whole motherhood thing, but if she can manage not to ruin anyone’s life, she’ll be off to a good start.

When her sexy professor locks eyes with her on the first day of class, her fresh start is the first casualty of his killer smile.

Best-selling author, Michael Kensington is no average academic. Brilliant and gorgeous, he could charm the pants off any grad student, even a former homecoming queen determined to outrun her past.

If Jocelyn doesn’t address the rising heat between them, she won’t have a prayer of focusing on school. But when things get way more intimate than either of them intend, Jocelyn not only falls in love— she kind of falls apart. He’s quick to blame her hormones, but she’s got bigger problems.

With rumors of their affair spreading, and her mom coming for a visit, it’s just a matter of time before Jocelyn’s pregnancy is big news at Dartmouth and back home. Kensington wants to know what she’s running from, but telling him the truth about the baby’s father is not an option. 

If Jocelyn wants a future with Kensington, she’ll have to make a choice: lie to keep him close, or lose him to keep her secrets… Unless she’s not the only one with a past that won’t stay put.

First 250:

I make him nervous.

His eye contact falters when he glances across the desk at me. Dr. Edna Moss’s teaching assistant clears his throat and taps his pencil. A flush creeps up his neck.

I’m not sure what he sees in me. The usual, I guess. My two-thousand mile road trip must not look as bad on the outside as it feels on the inside. Because inside, I’m struggling.

The office reeks of air freshener. The smell nauseates me. Lately, I’ve come to depend on breathing through my nose to keep from gagging, but the revolting scent makes breathing much harder than it has any right to be.

“How long will Dr. Moss be?” I ask, ending our awkward silence.

He glances at me with lit-up eyes and a shy grin. “Any minute now.”

I return his smile with as much grace as I can manage. “Tell me your name again?”

“Will.”

“Nice to meet you,” I say.

“You’re new to Dartmouth?”

“Brand new.”

“Dr. Moss says you’re a star.”

“Wow. Thanks.” I have zero desire to flirt with this guy, but I don’t want to piss him off either. It’s a delicate balance. As men are.

“What are your languages?”

“French and Italian. Some Portuguese,” I say.

“Romance, huh?”

He doesn’t ask it in a derisive way, but the question still manages to dredge up every insecurity I have about whether I’m good enough to walk the halls of an Ivy League school.

“Yeah,” is my brilliant answer.