Page 50 of Broken by my Bully (Lessons in Cruelty Dark Academia #1)

Kai

I put off getting ready for the social committee meeting until the last possible minute.

I’m too late to shower—although I desperately fucking need one—so I throw on enough cologne to knock out a horse.

I take a gulp from the bottle of J?ger on my nightstand and slip a freshly rolled joint in my pocket for the walk to the sorority house.

It should only take five minutes, but I stretch it to ten. Awesome night for a stroll, anyway. There’s a hint of ozone in the air. Moisture and raw earth. Clouds skate over the stars, ghostly against the deep purple sky.

I had an epic day, despite my hangover.

Best part? Haven was nowhere to be found.

Bet she finally slunk home, tail between her legs.

Fucking skank.

Almost wish she’d challenged me for another round of ‘will he, won’t he.’

Except this time I wouldn’t stop. This time I’d squeeze until those pretty eyes rolled back and she went limp in my hands. This time I’d? —

No. Fuck.

Can’t think like that.

Not here.

I lay in bed last night, trashed out of my mind, but still wide awake, going through the photos I’ve been taking of Haven. No new ones since last week, but the ones I have are plenty.

I’d been intending to delete them. Instead, I ended up with my cock in my hand, stroking it as forcefully as I’d held onto her throat until I came so hard, it felt like I’d left my body.

Even just thinking about it, my cock is getting hard.

“Sorry, buddy. That bitch is gone. Gotta find you a new plaything…” I stop walking. “What. The. Fuck?”

I’m too high for this shit.

Weed doesn’t make you hallucinate.

But this, what I’m seeing? It can’t be real.

Rooke’s Tesla parked outside the GAZ sorority house isn’t out of the ordinary. He sometimes gets involved in social things. It’s the Land Rover that pulls up beside his car that I’m staring at.

Because I swear to fucking God, when the interior light comes on, it looks like Haven is behind the wheel.

But that’s fucked up, because at the diner she was getting into a shitty sedan from the early nineties held together with duct tape and prayers, not a Land Rover.

Also, she shouldn’t even be here.

I mean, fuck it, I almost strangled her to death. That should have been enough to send her back to Riverside, tail between her legs.

I’m close enough for her to look over my way and see me, so I flatten myself against the side of the GAZ house, trying to become one with the shadows.

The door opens, and Haven hops out, her mousy brown hair bobbing on her shoulders. It’s wild, like she was rolling around on someone’s bed. And her dress is creased, which just kinda cements the whole fucking scenario in my mind.

She fucked him.

She fucking fucked him .

A jolt of adrenaline shoots through me, my heart feeling like it wants to seize up.

I hear the odd word as she walks around the front of the car to speak to someone.

“…driving…keep up…crashed into…”

Professor Rooke appears.

I plow through a row of cute little flowers as I inch along the wall, trying to get closer without being spotted.

“…make me regret this,” he says.

There’s a fucking bougainvillea in my way, but I part just enough leaves so I can see the two of them through it. Haven is holding out something to Rooke, but he pushes her hand away, closing her fingers over whatever she was offering.

Car keys? Money?

The fury that hits me is almost physical. I tear out a handful of leaves as my hand clenches.

She’s mine to destroy. Not his to save.

“Here you are! I thought you’d driven off a cliff.” Melissa bounces down the steps of the GAZ house, and Rooke quickly takes his hand off of Haven’s. She lowers hers a little slower, frowning at him as he turns to Melissa.

I have to force air back into my lungs.

Nuh-uh. I’m way too high for this shit.

That touch was intimate .

Fuck this shit.

I step around the shrub and onto the curb, coming up behind Haven and Rooke. Haven’s the first to spot me, glancing over her shoulder and then giving me a stunned double-take.

“…almost did, but it looked like she got it under control at the last minute,” Bastian’s saying, but Haven’s eyes are locked to mine. “Didn’t you, Miss Lee? Miss Lee?”

She blinks, shaking her head as if she’s coming out of a trance. “Y-Yes, Professor, Sir. Um… ”

“Hey, Parker, did Ezra get the time wrong or something? I thought we had that meeting now?” I ask as I step up beside them.

Rooke, the fucking psycho, barely flinches when he sees me. But he’s pretty fucking quick to take a step away from Haven.

Yeah, you’d better back up, you motherfucking cunt .

Melissa sends me a cool glance. I don’t know her that well, but she seems pissed about something. But like just about everyone in college, she doesn’t dare let Rooke see.

“It’s tonight,” she snaps. “Just getting the new girl settled in. Go inside. Everyone’s waiting.”

She sounds like a fucking telegram. I keep expecting her to say ‘stop’ at the end of every sentence. Lord knows why Ezra thought this chick was fuckable. She’s way too fucking high-maintenance for my psychopath of a brother.

I saunter past as slowly as I can, straining for any last words from either of them.

Haven’s settling in ? What does that even?—

“Wait…I’m moving in tonight?” Haven squeaks like the little mouse she is. “But all my stuff is back at—I mean, in my car. My other car.”

“You already put everything in the trunk, Miss Lee. Did you forget?” Rooke says.

How the fuck does he know where her stuff is?

“Oh. Right.”

I glance back in time to see Haven slide a hand behind her neck. Her smooth, pale, unmarked neck.

I almost walk into a porch column.

Where the fuck is my hand necklace?

I marked her. Branded her. Made her mine.

Now she’s gone and covered it up like it never happened.

Like I never happened.

I scoff quietly to myself, shaking my head. Like she can just erase me with some fucking makeup. No way she can pretend she didn’t beg for more when I was choking her out against the tree .

Unless…Jesus…

What if none of that shit actually happened?

I know I went to class. I can clearly remember Bastian saying he was running late, and then keeping his class occupied. How devastated Haven looked when I read that thing about her car.

But now, seeing her standing there by Melissa and Rooke, a little wild and untamed, but perfectly unhurt…I’m doubting my own fucking sanity.

She looks up, our eyes locking.

And her hand slides from the back of her neck to the front. She traces her fingers over her skin, her lips parting. Then she licks her lips and looks away, facing Rooke with almost steely determination, eyes wide like she’s forcing herself to pay attention to what he’s saying.

It happened.

She covered it up, but it fucking happened.

A manic laugh shoots past my lips before I can clamp my jaw closed.

Little Miss Heavenly thinks she can hide from me? Burrow into this sorority house like it’s some kind of fortress? Move in with her rich little friends and her sugar daddy professor?

All she’s done is moved closer. Fucking minutes down the street from me.

She thinks she’s safe?

I’ve been sneaking in and out of windows since I was a kid.

I drag my fingers through my hair and head for the GAZ dining room. There are voices up ahead, some masculine, most feminine. The others are already here.

I’m the only one who’s late.

Me…and Haven.

When I turn to take my seat, ignoring a girl who turns to wrinkle her nose at me, and I see Haven walking in behind Melissa, I fall more than sit in the French-upholstered chair .

She gives me a nervous glance and pulls out a chair beside Melissa, keeping her eyes averted.

I cross my arms over my chest, kick my chair onto its back legs, and rock.

The guy sitting next to me leans closer, turning his back to the rest of the table. “Bro, you just spark up?”

How the hell did he smell anything through my cologne? Guy’s got the nose of a narco dog.

I cock an eyebrow at him. “Yeah, so?”

I think he’s from the frat next door to ours. They’re mostly jocks and party animals.

He shrugs. “Wanna roll a fat one after this?”

I grin. “Sure.”

My gaze flicks back to Haven. She’s staring at Hillary, GAZ’s head honcho—a slack-faced brunette with hair extensions, lip filler, fake nails, fake tits.

But as if feeling my eyes on her, she gives me another nervous glance.

I can see her throat move as she swallows.

Yeah, Little Miss Heavenly.

Didn’t realize you’d be next-door neighbors with your worst enemy, did you?

But it’s not just her I want to destroy anymore. It’s him too.

Professor Bastian fucking Rooke with his Tesla and his designer clothes and his hands all over what’s mine .

He thinks he’s so clever, playing savior. Probably gets off on rescuing poor girls, making them grateful, making them spread their legs for whatever crumbs he scatters their way.

Well, this time he picked the wrong fucking girl.

Haven doesn’t need saving.

She needs breaking .

And when I’m done with her, he’ll be next.