Page 3 of Cruel When He Smiles

I’m the one who people expect to fuck up. The angry one. The legacy with the attitude, the mouth, and the record. I throw apunch, and it’s a pattern. He throws a word like a blade and, somehow, he’s praised for it.

I hate him. I hate how he walks into the counseling office like he owns the air. Like we’re here for a coffee date instead of mandated anger management because I clocked him on the field. I hate how he greets Dr. Ellis with that flawless, toothpaste commercial smile.

But that smile is a weapon. Too measured. Too perfect. And his eyes—those hazel eyes with their flecks of green—they’rewrong.Empty, instead of being full of life. It feels like he’s watching the world from behind glass, bored and waiting to find something worth destroying.

And apparently,I’mthat something.

He doesn’t sit, he sprawls, claiming the space beside me like it’s his throne, and I’m just some peasant who should be grateful to sit in his presence.

The fucker doesn’t even look at me. That pisses me off more than anything else. If he smirked, if he threw a jab, if he acknowledged me in any way, I could respond. But this… this silence? This surgical removal of attention? It burns hotter than any insult could. Like I’m not even interesting enough to provoke again.

I breathe in and out.Focus.Stay grounded.Don’t snap.

Dr. Ellis is talking, but her voice is white noise under the pulse pounding in my ears. My hands are fists in my lap, pressing hard against my thighs, and I focus on the feeling of my nails leaving indents on my palm to keep from launching myself across the room.

He tripped me. Laughed. Whispered low enough that I couldn’t tell if I imagined it or if he really said it. Something about boys like me staying on their knees. My body acted before my brain caught up, and my fist connected with his jaw. A clean shot, and he didn’t even fight back; he just smiled.

And that should have been my first clue that I was playing a game I didn’t understand.

“Nathaniel.”

Dr. Ellis’s voice pulls me back. I blink, refocusing, and she’s watching me with that careful, measured look therapists always have, trying to pick me apart piece by piece to figure out what makes me tick.

My head snaps up, and I force my shoulders to relax. “What?”

“I asked if you think you might have overreacted.”

I huff out a bitter laugh. Next to me, Liam’s still lounging, one ankle resting on his knee, fingers tapping casually against the armrest. He doesn’t speak, but I feel him waiting.

“No,” I answer flatly. If she thinks I’m going to be the one to apologize, she’s out of her damn mind.

Liam beats me to it anyway. “I just want to say,” he starts, and I can already hear the act in his voice. A well-practiced performance he’s played a thousand times before. “I feel bad about what happened. I never wanted things to escalate like that. I take full responsibility for my part in it.”

I turn my head slowly, finally looking at him. Hispart in it? This motherfucker orchestrated the whole damn thing.

Dr. Ellis beams like he’s sprouting angel wings. “That’s very mature of you, Liam.” Then her eyes land on me, expectant.

I raise an eyebrow. “Yeah, no. I don’t feel bad for decking him.”

Liam lets out a quiet laugh, barely audible, but I hear it. Dr. Ellis doesn’t seem to.

“You don’t think you were in the wrong?” she asks.

I lean forward, forearms resting on my knees, staring straight ahead. “I think if someone runs their mouth, they should be ready for what comes next. I think Liam knows that. And I think he said what he said on purpose.”

She turns to him. “Is that what happened, Liam?”

He finally looks at me, and the second that our eyes lock, my whole body goes cold. Not because he’s angry or because he looks hurt. But because he looks too calm. His expression doesn’t change, but his gaze scrapes over my face like he’s cataloging pressure points and picking the perfect spot to slide the knife in.

Then he smiles. It’s faint, nothing you could pin anything on, but it drips with intent. “I think it was just a misunderstanding,” he says. “I never meant to upset Nate. I thought we were joking around. I guess I didn’t realize how sensitive he’d be.”

Sensitive?

This motherfucker.

I breathe in through my nose, slow and controlled, so I don’t snap, or give him the satisfaction of knowing he got to me. I know what he’s doing. He’s framing the entire thing to make it appear as if I was being irrational. Like he was just joking around, and I lost my temper.

LikeI’mthe problem.