Page 22 of Broken by my Bully (Lessons in Cruelty Dark Academia #1)

Bastian

The double shot of bourbon in Haven’s cocoa is starting to do its job. I can see it in the way her shoulders have relaxed, the way her guard has dropped just enough for me to catch glimpses of the vulnerable girl beneath all that brittle defiance.

She meets my gaze, chin lifted, like we’re equals.

Fucking adorable.

Drinking the booze I poured her without hesitation. Curling up on my couch like she’s safe.

Haven is a bird with a broken wing, and I’m the cat watching as she flaps uselessly on the ground to get away.

She has no idea how young she looks curled up like that. Nineteen years old, but the vulnerability in her eyes makes her seem even younger. The decade and a half between us should bother me.

It doesn’t.

It just makes my cock harder.

I study the faint bruise on her jaw, imagining the hand that put it there. So sloppy, emotional. Someone wanted to hurt her but couldn’t commit to causing any real damage.

The thought should disgust me. Should make me want to protect her, call the authorities, be the upstanding professor she needs. The good man she thinks I am.

But all I can think is what an amateur he is.

When I mark her, she’ll wear my bruises like jewelry.

I want to reach out and trace that bruise with my thumb. Want to press against it until she winces, until she remembers exactly how it felt when someone else’s hands were on her.

And then replace that memory…with something far more disturbing.

I take a slow sip of my spiked cocoa, letting the bourbon burn away what little’s left of my patience.

“You know, Haven,” I say, letting my voice drop to that tone that makes students lean in so they won’t miss the nugget of wisdom I’m about to drop. “There’s no shame in finding pain pleasurable.”

She tenses, prey recognizing a shift in her predator’s demeanor.

“Why would you think—” But she cuts off when I make a point of staring at her jaw. Her laugh is forced, uneasy. “I told you, I tripped.”

I ignore the pathetic lie. “The body can’t distinguish between intense pleasure and intense pain. Both flood the nervous system with the same electrical impulses.”

Her breathing changes, becomes shallow. Glassy blue eyes dart to the door, calculating escape routes, weighing her options. But she’s already made the mistake of getting comfortable in my territory, of letting the bourbon lower her defenses.

“It’s the mind that assigns meaning. During my research, I’ve found that those who’ve experienced early trauma often seek to recreate those patterns. They mistake familiarity for desire, violence for passion.”

Her breathing hitches.

Good girl.

She’s starting to understand.

“Often their decision to embrace or resist, to break the wheel or continue the cycle, is so biased it’s laughable. ”

My gentle approach isn’t working fast enough. She’s too good at deflection. Too practiced at hiding her secrets.

Time to stop playing the concerned professor.

I shift closer, close enough that she has nowhere to retreat unless she wants to climb over the back of the couch. Close enough that she can smell my cologne, feel my heat.

“Whose pain are you embracing, Haven? Yours or theirs?”

The way she shrinks into the couch cushions, the way her pulse hammers in her throat, makes my cock harden even more.

I can smell her fear now. Its sweetness mingles with the bourbon on her breath. Her pupils are dilated, whether from alcohol or adrenaline, I can’t tell. Don’t particularly care.

Forget her curves. Her soft lips. How she’d sound, moaning my name.

This is what I’ve been craving.

I used to collect butterflies, but that grew old fast.

Now I collect broken things.

And the first step of trapping something as flighty as Haven Lee is building trust.

I pull out my phone, making a show of checking the time. In reality, I begin recording.

For my research.

For my shrine.

For myself.

“Tell me about him, Haven.” I lay my hand on her knee, and the stunned girl doesn’t even try to shake me off. “Tell me about the boy who hurt you.”

The way she flinches tells me everything.

My cock throbs, imagining all the ways that boy must have broken her.

The ways I’m going to break her.