Page 11 of Broken by my Bully (Lessons in Cruelty Dark Academia #1)

Haven

Bullying. Philosophy. Psychology. Innocently objectifying a much older man.

That’s what I expected when I walked into Professor Rooke’s class this morning. Professor Rooke was asking for it, what with his rolled-up sleeves and just-tight-enough chinos. Not my fault he dresses like a young silver fox looking for a mate.

However, Kai ignored me like I was wearing an invisibility cloak ever since he came back from the cafeteria sans coffee, and maybe I was staring too hard at the professor’s forearms because he donned his tweed jacket minutes after class started, ending all objectifying. Innocent and otherwise.

Instead, Professor Rooke subjected us to over half an hour of morbid, violent, and now, downright pornographic paintings and photos.

Things were already getting uncomfortable when he started off the lesson talking about the Tuskegee Syphilis Study.

I wanted a hot shower and a good scrub after that.

Now I need a cold one .

I really, really hope I’m not the only person struggling to keep a straight face.

“Is that a blush I see, Miss Parker?”

I hear Melissa swallowing next to me.

Thank God, it’s not just me.

“Dante and Virgil in Hell,” Rooke announces, sweeping an arm to a larger-than-life projection of the Neoclassical painting. “These two aren’t just rough housing.”

One has red hair, the other, brown. That’s about all I have to tell them apart, because they’re both naked.

The detail is… ahem …exquisite.

“The counterfeiter and the impersonator, locked in mortal combat. But no one dies in Hell, do they?”

I sit up straighter, and then immediately try to relax my spine. It refuses, of course. Guess they wouldn’t be called triggers if you could just ignore them, right?

Professor Rooke scans the class before glancing back at the painting. “Look at the care Bouguereau put into capturing every tensed muscle. The fingers dragging through the skin. The painfully twisted arm. Exaggerating every detail. As if to make sure we, the viewer, wouldn’t overlook a thing.”

He goes over to his coffee cup and takes a long sip.

“I know it’s hard to look away from the main anti-heroes, but have any of you noticed this pair?” He points at the two figures standing just behind the struggling men. They’re fully clothed, huddled in close together like they’re conspiring.

“Just observers, right? And why wouldn’t Hell have a few walking tours scheduled every century or so?” This gets a few chuckles, but Rooke doesn’t even notice. He’s picked out his prey, and he’s honing in on them.

“Do they look ready to jump in and separate the two, Mr. Larkin?”

“No?” Larkin says in a wobbly voice.

“No,” Rooke repeats, then turns to the rest of us, flicking a hand. “Of course not. Why would they? They’re already dead. What harm could they possibly inflict on each other but pain?” He rolls his hand at the wrist. “Pain. And pain. And more pain. Unto eternity.”

He walks over to the blackboard and starts scrawling something in chalk, like he’s lost interest in his own lecture.

“Assignment,” he booms as he tosses the chalk into the slot at the bottom of the blackboard.

Good God.

He’ll have a lawsuit on his hands if a kid with a dodgy heart ever enrolls in his class.

Rooke walks back to the lectern, pointing over his shoulder at the handle on the blackboard.

@ rooke . bastian

“Each of you will DM me a pic—” He immediately holds up his hand. “ Not a dick pic. Keep it PG13, please.”

There’s a sad, “Aw!” from a guy at the back of the class, and Rooke flashes him a rare smile as he shakes his head.

He has to speak over the wave of muted chuckles and giggles that break out, but he manages just fine by barely raising his voice. Everyone wants to hear what he has to say.

“ Assignment ,” he repeats. “You’ve all been on high alert, I’m hoping, to spot any and all acts of cruelty you encounter.

” He mimics writing in a notebook without taking his eyes off the class.

“Fastidiously recording them in your Activity Log. This week, I want something visual. A piece of art. More precisely, digital art depicting cruelty.”

There’s silence as he slowly ambles from one side of the lectern to the other.

“No context. No explanation. No ‘caption,’” he adds a flick of an air quote. “Any questions?”

There’s a brief silence, but most of the students are shaking their heads .

“PG13 movies have tits in them,” Kai calls out.

“Hey, we’re all adults here.” Rooke pushes out his bottom lip, lifting his hands in surrender. He points at Kai. “And that was a statement, Mr. Jordan, not a question.”

That gets a round of laughter, and I’m one of the loudest. Which I instantly regret when Kai sends a death glare my way.

“Don’t forget, next week we’re digging into The Lucifer Effect. I expect everyone to have read the first ten chapters, and don’t bother coming to class without your book or your notes.”

Laughter turns into groans, but even those sound light-hearted.

Rooke’s class is fascinating, yet utterly disturbing at the same time.

I still don’t know if I like it, or if I’m just too morbidly curious for my own good.

Like the two guys in the painting, watching the damned souls fight. And the fighters? The one’s clamping down on the other’s throat like a vampire.

Their hatred for each other is palpable.

I cut my gaze to Kai and catch him staring at the painting too.

Could be me and him up there, and it’s almost as if he’s thinking the same thing.

Melissa and I both turn toward each other to put our things away, and she gives me a micro-smile as she slips her laptop back into its bag. “I think I’ll wear a bra,” she whispers. “It’s classier.”

I cough. “Sorry...what?”

She looks up at me through her lashes, and then glances over her shoulder, her red hair swinging in a shiny curtain around her head.

Is it a wig? Because, damn, normal hair can’t be that perfect.

Her brown eyes widen when she looks back at me. Rooke is busy talking to a student at the end of our row, so I guess she feels safe enough to lean in and murmur, “I heard you get a higher grade if you send him titty pics.”

“ Pfft . As if.”

She straightens, slipping her strap over her shoulder, then gives me a small frown. “Unhand your imaginary pearls. I know what you’re into.” She glances at my pink STFU notepad, then over at our professor, quirking her eyebrow. “He wasn’t serious about the dick pics. Rooke swings both ways.”

I turn to watch her leave, feeling like I accidentally slipped into a wormhole and ended up in a parallel universe.

He does what if you what ?

He swings?—?

Whoa. The maelstrom of inappropriate thoughts swirling through my head right now has reached T11 levels.

Wait. She knows what I’m into ?

Is Melissa high or something?

I shake my head, and catch Kai staring at me as I sling my tote bag’s strap over my shoulder. I tense, waiting for him to pounce. But he just studies me with this vague, considering look on his face as he taps a pen against his jaw.

Whatever the hell he’s plotting, it won’t work.

Just like the bruises he left on my wrist and arms, my fear of him has melted away.

He can grab me and push me around, but that won’t change a thing.

I’ve sacrificed too much to be here. The Social Change grant was a lifeline thrown into the shark-infested waters I was drowning in, and just in time, too.

I came to AHC prepared for the worst.

Okay, Kai threw me off my game for a day or so, but I’m back, and I can handle anything coming my?—

“So, Miss Lee…who are you, exactly?”

My head snaps to face Professor Rooke. A few of the students streaming past glance our way, but most are more intent on getting to their next lesson.

He glances over his shoulder at the painting.

Oh, that’s what he meant.

No, wait. I don’t get it .

“Are you the imposter, or the counterfeiter?” he adds, completely failing to clear things up.

“Huh?”

The last of the students clear out, leaving just the three of us behind.

Kai seems determined not to go anywhere, and my stomach is already tightening into a knot at the thought that Rooke might walk out and leave us alone.

But I can’t just walk away without answering him when it’s obvious my professor wants to talk.

Rooke’s brown eyes dart to my mouth, then over to where Kai’s sitting watching us. “You two have been glaring at each other the whole morning. Should I get my paints ready, in case you decide to tackle each other?”

I laugh, but cut the sound short when Professor Rooke’s eyebrows lift.

“We have…uh…history.” Because what the fuck else can I say?

We used to play fucked up games in the woods until one of us bled?

That he was the only person who ever made me feel like I belonged somewhere?

That Kai wasn’t done playing with me when I left, and now he’s made it his life’s mission to fuck with me until I leave?

“Childhood friends?” Professor Rooke’s tone is casual, but his eyes are sharp, like he’s cataloging every movement I make.

I shrug. “Childhood, yes. Friends, no.” It was always more than that. Still is, I guess, just on the complete other side of the fucking spectrum.

My teacher misses nothing. Which makes sense, because I guess he studied this kind of stuff.

“The most intense hatreds often spring from the deepest affections.”

“You don’t say.”

“Kai must have hurt you badly.” Maybe if he’d phrased it as a question, his statement wouldn’t have caught me so off guard.

“I—what?”

“When you were children. Did he hurt you?” His voice is gentle, almost therapeutic.

But Riversiders don’t snitch, fucking ever .

“Kids can play rough sometimes,” I say breezily.

His smile is too smug. Too fucking self-assured. “Especially when there’s no one around to supervise.”

Something about the way he says it makes me think he already knows.

About the woods.

About our games.

About everything .

“You’re not alone anymore, Miss Lee.”

He gives me a lingering scan, the corner of his mouth curling up terribly seductively. Or maybe it’s just the sight of those two men clutching each other so passionately that’s turned me into such a horndog.

“If you ever need to talk, my office hours are very flexible.”

I scoff before I can stop myself, and for a split second, something dark crosses his face.

“Wounds need the proper care to heal, or they’ll scar.” He takes hold of my wrist, digging his thumb right into the bruise Kai left there. I gasp, ripping my arm free.

“Don’t let him leave you scarred, Haven.”