Hi folks! This is Sing to Angels here, with another tale which I hope you will all enjoy. It has been alpha read by my lovely friend, NightAngel. Take a bow if you please, my dear. I love you to pieces and I don't know how I ever got along without you. :) I've probably been working on this thing for about a month off and on. It is the first part in a series, I have yet to write the next installment, and if this story isn't received well then I won't bother writing it. It all depends on you, my friends. I have to thank you all for your wonderful comments so far, it has really helped me to write even more. However, I still need the comments, especially suggestions on how I can improve my writing. I never stop until something is the best that I can
make it so don't hesitate to offer a comment or two please. This is how we help each other, this community is great about that. In the last two months, I have seen how super all of you are. As fans of a canceled TV show, we have banded together and shown how much we really care about each other. So I dedicate this piece to all of you. Everyone have a great night!

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       As gently as the day flows into night, the auburn haired coroner lifted a scalpel and made two precise incisions on the chest of a recently deceased older man. The breath she used to keep her unruly hair in order made the strands float softly into the air before settling back to the place they were before. Not making his presence known, Lucien LaCroix walked into the lab. "Such beauty among death." He paused as Natalie regained her composure. "A pity that you cannot be a greater part of it."

"What do you want?" Natalie gasped out. "Don't tell me that you just came by to admire my style." She finished sarcastically.

  "Ah," LaCroix put his hands to his heart. "You wound me to the quick, my dear!" He said dramatically. Natalie's expression softened as she rolled her eyes and set down the scalpel, pulled off the rubber gloves and walked over to where he stood. Casually reaching up with her arms, she pulled LaCroix's face closer to her own. "If you wanted a kiss, why didn't you just ask me instead of pulling all of that Shakespeare stuff out and pounding me with it." Natalie smiled and leaned forward to kiss the tall, blonde vampire.

  Pulling back after a moment, LaCroix asked. "Have you given any thought yet to my offer?" He stroked the hair out of her face and slowly ran one finger down Natalie's cheek. She turned her face away from him. "I still don't think that is what I want, Lucien." She turned back to face him and looked straight into his ice blue eyes. "I'm only 26 years old, I just started working for the city as a coroner. I'm the youngest medical examiner in the entire province! I have such a great career ahead of me. I am holding life in the palm of my hand and it has given me exactly what I have always wanted. Why should I stop now?" Slowly, Natalie ran those palms up and down his chest, eliciting a small intake of breath from him when she started twirling his
nipple with the tips of her fingers. "Besides, I don't see why I have to make a choice now. We have years yet to be explored. I want to look a little bit older." She shyly looked up at him from under long lashes, "We don't want people to think that I am your daughter throughout eternity do we?" A small, golden chuckle escaped her lips as she reached up to kiss him again. Lucien pulled away from her abruptly. Startled, Natalie asked "What's wrong? Did I say something ?"

   "How could you say something like that to me!" He demanded, shaking her slightly. "You know about my daughter! I just told you yesterday." LaCroix released her arms and turned away, huddling further into his dark coat. Natalie tentatively put her warm hand on his shoulder, he shuddered slightly, trying to keep from letting the newly opened wound consume him.   "You can cry in front of me, Lucien. I won't turn away from you." Natalie leaned her head against his back and his shuddering stopped. He reached for the hand on his shoulder and grasped it. "I'm so sorry, my love. I didn't mean to upset you, I just wasn't thinking about what I said. I'm stupid, you can shake me all you want to if it helps." LaCroix laughed softly and turned to embrace Natalie in his arms.

    This show of emotion was new for him. Being raised as a Roman over 2,000 years ago had not instilled the concept of sharing what he was feeling, or to even acknowledge that he felt anything at all. How his dreary life had changed when Natalie Lambert walked into his college classroom three years before. She hadn't been interested in the required class, he remembered that much. She was there because she had needed the credit.

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  As Natasha Lambert bounced into the classroom, her wild hair free, she turned to look at her new teacher. Professor Lucien Cross was tall, with very blonde hair and icy eyes that made her teeth ache from clenching them. He looked like he was solidly built under the plain black and gray suit. Probably could arm wrestle an alligator and win just because he looked him dead in the eye and the toothy monster was scared to death. Natasha allowed a small laugh to escape from her lips before she settled into one of the seats
near the front of the room. The piercing eyes of the new professor looked at her and she suddenly felt very small and uncomfortable. After dealing with Nana for most of her life, Natasha felt that there was no reason to be so cowed by him. He was just a teacher. She started to feel angry with herself for acting like a six-year old who had just seen the bogey man under her bed.   Studiously ignoring the man at his desk, she opened her notebook and started doodling until class started. Apparently, she was too engrossed in the idle drawing to notice that the class had already started and the blonde man at the front of the room was looking directly at her. Coolly, Professor Cross walked up to her desk and let his shadow fall across her books.
Startled, Natasha looked up into the hard, blue eyes of her new teacher. "I take it that you want to be elsewhere?"

  Natasha blushed and lowered her head in shame. Her first day in a new class with a creepy teacher and she had been caught blanking out. She cleared her throat, "No, sir. I just wasn't p-p-paying attention. I'm sorry, sir." Tasha cursed herself inwardly for stammering like a fool. He was right though, she didn't want to be there. She was only taking the class because it was a required course, it was the last of the core classes that she had to pass. Natasha prayed silently that she could get a good mark in this one, the professor scared the daylights out of her and she didn't know whether she could keep her wits together.

    "Well, I suggest that you do pay attention to my class Miss...?"

    "Lambert, Natasha Lambert."

  Cross smiled slowly like a wolf. "Miss Lambert, I expect that this won't happen again. In my class you must keep up because I don't tolerate dunces-"

   "I'm not a dunce! I can keep up with whatever you throw at me!"

  "I also don't tolerate interruptions. You had best remember that, Miss Lambert." He leaned over her and put his hands on the sides of her desk. "I shall enjoy the challenge of teaching you. Let's see if you really can 'take what I throw to you.'" The professor's eyes took on a primal gleam, as if he was, honestly, looking forward to the challenge of breaking this proud, unruly student. It made Natasha shudder and wonder what she had gotten herself into.

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   The class settled immediately after seeing how their fellow student was put in her place. The lecture proceeded without incident. The students, afraid of being lashed by the sharp tongue of their new teacher decided not to ask any questions. That only infuriated Professor Cross even further. Quiet students did not learn their lessons.
     He stopped in the middle of a sentence and slammed a book hard on his podium. Everyone jumped and he started to speak again. "Don't tell me that not one of you has a question about my lecture! If someone knows more than I do then please," He made a wide, sweeping gesture. "Come up here and teach this class yourself. Otherwise, I expect full participation in this course." Cross encompassed the room in his hard, glittering gaze. "Is that understood?" All present nodded quietly and looked down at their notes. Tasha
raised her hand, proudly tossing her hair back.

   "Yes, Miss Lambert?"

 "I don't understand exactly how the Celts had the manpower and skill to sack Rome. Can you explain please?"

   Lucien smiled, yes this one would be fun, he could see it already. "Well, at the time of invasion, Rome was..."

     The class was a little more relaxed after Natasha had taken the initiative and they started to voice their opinions and questions, argued differing points. Suddenly, the class seemed to be more challenging to
everyone, even a bit fun. Soon enough, it was time to leave.   As everyone rose from their seats, stretching their limbs and putting their books in order for the long trek back to their dorm rooms, Professor Cross
called Natasha to his desk.

   "Yes, Sir?"

   Lucien pulled a sheaf of papers from out of a drawer and handed them to her. Puzzled, Tasha looked up with questioning eyes. "What is this for?"    His eyes almost glowed with the amusement he was finding in this. "This is your extra assignment. You stated earlier that you could 'take what I throw,' so prove yourself to me. Otherwise, don't make empty promises."   Natasha tried very hard to swallow the rising anger and not 'throw' the papers in the professor's sly face. How was she possibly going to be able to do this plus all of the other work that she had piled up on the sagging desk in her dorm? She almost opened her mouth to make an angry retort, but decided against it.
    "When is this due, Sir?" Tasha wondered if he could hear the irritation in her voice. He noticed, but didn't comment on it. "Three weeks from now. I expect it to be neatly typed, double spaced and clean margins. Originality and inventiveness is a plus, and if you can find extra information that is not required it will also be duly noted for extra credit." He waved his hand for her to leave, "Good luck, Miss Lambert. You may go."
   She looked down at the papers in her hand. The header said: Shakespeare, his life and times. "But, Sir! This has nothing to do with your class!"
  Lucien looked up, vaguely unamused by her continued presence at his desk. "No," He started slowly, as if speaking to an imbecile. "It has nothing to do with my class, but I figured that you might be up for the challenge anyway. It was all that I had on hand. You are *dismissed*, Miss Lambert." The sheer nerve! Natasha grabbed her books and fled the room before she said something that could possibly suspend her.

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    At first, Natasha was tempted to just write a short essay with a few extra footnotes about facts not commonly found about Shakespeare. But when she attended the next class with Professor Cross, she decided that the previous course of action would not do, not at all. There was no way that she would let that man take any pleasure in pointing out inaccuracies on the paper she wrote. It became her obsession.
   "There just aren't enough hours in the day." Tasha sighed, stretched and tried once more to concentrate on the tedious book on Elizabethan politics. So far, she had covered fashion, the theater, religion, common life, and royal life. There was so much left to be done though! The plays and sonnets to unearth from the bowels of her second home, the library. On top of work from other classes, this was murder. She rubbed her eyes with the tips of raw fingers and let them slowly slide down her face. Looking towards her roommate's desk, Tasha saw a bottle of pills. Curious, she got up to examine them and found them to be caffeine pills. Strong ones too.
   She glanced around to make sure no one was there. The coast was clear, her roomie still being in the shower. Opening the bottle, Natasha poured a small handful out and hid them in her pocket. Going back to her desk, she swallowed two down with a mouthful of Coca-Cola and attacked her books with new energy.

   Three weeks flew by. Natasha couldn't remember the last time she had had more than two hours of sleep. There were bags under her eyes and the formerly wild, free tresses of auburn hair seemed to be dull and lifeless of late. But the paper was finished, after she turned it in she could rest. Trudging toward the building where her class was, Natasha stumbled a little bit and leaned against a wall for support. "Come on Lambert! Pull yourself together here. It is just one more class, you can do it." With a supreme act of
willpower, Tasha pulled herself away from the rough brick wall and kept going.
  Walking into the room, she found her usual desk and fell into it gratefully. She opened her notebook and pulled out the paper on Shakespeare she had written and set it on the top of her desk, ready to turn in the
second he asked for it.
     Natasha watched as her classmates filed in quietly and sat down. As the professor came to the front of the classroom to greet all of the students, she saw him give her an odd look before continuing with the opening statement of his lecture. Tasha didn't hear much of it before her head started nodding.  Trying desperately to remain awake, she pinched her arm with all her might.  It did no good and soon she succumbed to the blessings of sleep.

     Lucien saw how exhausted Natasha was the minute she came through the doorway and sat at her customary front desk-chair. He heard the terrible thunder that was her heart, almost skipping a beat here and there. Was she taking drugs? While Lambert hardly seemed the type, one never knew. He looked at her more closely, trying to discover whether there were any dangerous drugs in her system from the smell she released into the air. With so many people, it was difficult to pick out one scent from the other. He would talk to her after class was over. He didn't have to wonder how long it was going to take for her to finally fall into the arms of sleep. She was out cold before he was half done with his lecture. He chose not to awaken her, but instead dismissed the class early.
   Going to her desk, he saw the paper that she had written for her extra assignment. It was thick like a book and as he flipped through it he saw that it was neatly typed and covered far more than even he expected. Beside the seat, her purse was open and he decided that it would do no harm to look for the drugs he felt sure she was taking. The inside pocket contained a small bottle of strong caffeine pills. Obviously she had been taking them so that she could study more than was healthy for her body. Picking up one of her hands, he studied the veins that were far beneath her skin and could tell she was severely dehydrated.
   Deciding that she needed rest badly, he put his hands under her legs, arranged her arms around his neck, and carried her into his office so that she could rest more comfortably on the sofa where he sometimes spent the day.

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       "Uhhh..." Natasha groaned softly and tried to move her arms, they felt floppy and uncooperative. "Are we feeling a little better, Miss Lambert?" She froze, that voice! Professor Cross! Where was she at? Slitting one eye open, she could see the faint outline of his large frame hovering over her. Had she passed out? The professor reached over and propped her back up more comfortably with a couple of pillows. "Here, you must drink this." It was a glass of orange juice, the condensation on the sides dripping onto her bare leg. Natasha lifted her hand and grasped it tightly. As she raised it to her lips, her hands started shaking so badly she would have dropped it if the professor's cool hand had not darted out to steady her. He gently pulled it
from the clutch she had around the glass and held it to her lips so that she could drink more easily.

   "I can do it myself. I don't need your help, sir." Cross looked at her with one eyebrow quirked up. "On the contrary, I believe that you do need my help at the moment. Accept it and comply or I shall be forced to take you to a hospital. You are severely malnourished, more than likely have drank nothing either, not to mention the pills I found in your pur--"

   "You went through my purse! How dare you do that!" The professor put the glass on the floor next to the sofa and looked at her with the icy blue eyes that made her shiver despite herself. "When an obviously ill student falls asleep in my class, I have the right to look through whatever I wish. I had been suspecting you were taking some form of drug, I just didn't know what it was yet." He saw her angry face and almost smiled. Such fire! If he could have her as a part of his family.... ah, but that was not the right frame of mind to have in this situation. "I did not report this to anyone....yet. I called the RA of your building and your other teachers. They have been informed you are ill and need time to recover from a bad flu. I suggest that
you go home and get the rest you need. Forget about your studies and classes, relax for a few days." The look of sheer murder on her face was laughable. "I do not need to rest for a few days. I will be fine by tomorrow and I will go to my classes as usual." Each word was almost spit out from between clenched
teeth. Cross casually leaned over her, making himself as imposing as possible. "You will not." Every word was clear and concise, leaving no room for argument from a normal person. "You will go home, rest, and consume some type of nourishment. If you do not, I will report that you need help for a drug problem and they will *make* you rest." Natasha looked at him from under bristling brows and said, "Caffeine pills are over the counter. Anyone can buy them, they aren't illegal. You can't cow me, Professor!" Now he smiled,
this had been expected. Cross held up a small cellophane bag. "No, but this is. And I have the ability to hide this somewhere in your room if I find out you have not followed my instructions." The baggie contained approximately ten pills, yellow with black stripes. They looked like bumblebees. "That is speed!" Natasha gasped out. How could he do this and get away with it? "You can't do that! Those are illegal and I could go to jail."
   Oh, he was enjoying this, she could tell by the smirk on his face. What did he want from her? Sex? An illegal favour? She decided to ask and he chuckled. "No, nothing so vulgar. I merely want some insurance to make sure my favourite student is taking care of herself."
 

End Part One