Page 7 of Broken by my Bully
…you’re gonna regret coming home…
What the actual fuck just happened? I’ve seen Kai on a bad day. Like a really,reallybad day. That came nowhere close to what I just witnessed outside.
What the hell’s happened to him? Is he on crack?
“What is cruelty?” Professor Rooke’s voice demands my attention return to him, and I do my best tokeepit on him.
His eyebrows shift up when the class remains silent.
“What, no one’s going to pass off a Merriam-Webster definition they’ve Googled on their phones? Color me shocked,” he says dryly, as he picks up a paper coffee cup from the corner of the desk near the lectern.
There’s a satchel thrown haphazardly over the table, a neat stack of A5 spiral-bound notebooks, and a laptop neatly positioned in front of a chair behind the desk.
He takes a slow sip from his coffee cup, languidly scanning theclass before his gaze reaches me. This close, I can see dark irises, specks of silver in his closely cropped beard, veins standing proud from the back of his pale hands.
“Is it cruel of me to enjoy this cup of warm, rich coffee in front of all you woefully un-caffeinated students?” He addresses everyone in class but those eyes remain fixed on me.
I swallow hard. “Um…I guess not. We could have had coffee if we’d wanted?”
“Pity you weren’t here yesterday when I told my students that I don’t allow any eating or drinking in my class,” he says, taking another slow sip, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallows.
There’s a snicker somewhere in the back of the class, sending a flush of heat up my neck.
“Then yeah, that’s pretty fucking cruel,” I mutter, crossing my arms over my chest. When I hear myself swearing, I squeeze my eyes closed and murmur, “Shit.”
If my professor is upset by my language, he doesn’t show it. Makes me wonder how often his students swear at him.
“Nietzsche said, ‘When you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss also gazes into you.’” Rooke drums his fingers against the side of his cup. “Provocative thought, isn’t it? This idea that we’rechangedby what we study, no matter our intention.”
His lips flick into a melancholy smile that fades as quickly as it appears.
“That by examining cruelty, we riskbecomingthe very cruelty we’re trying to understand.” He pauses, scanning the classroom with intense eyes that quickly find their way back to me. “But isn’t that precisely why we’re here?”
The way he looks at me, it’s like everyone else has ceased to exist. He steps closer, voice dropping, a hardness to his tone that’s more than just being stern. Like he’s demanding I scrounge up whatever meager IQ I have and give him a satisfactory answer…or else.
“So I ask again. What. Is. Cruelty?”
I drop my gaze and force a shrug, refusing to be drawn into another trick question, but I can still feel his eyes on me. I lick my lips, trying to force my brain to figure out an answer, but thankfully the door swinging open diverts Professor Rooke’s attention.
My heart sinks into my chest.
Kai is walking back inside the lecture hall.
I quickly pat my face, making sure I wiped all his spit off. What the hell is he doing in this class, anyway? He must be a senior by now, unless he got held back a few years.
Shit, is that why he’s so upset to see me? Is he embarrassed because we’re at the same level, when we’re nowhere near the same age?
Kai is so busy staring at his phone that he doesn’t see me looking at him. I expect him to come and sit beside me, and my entire body tenses as I’m hit with dread anticipation.
Professor Rooke glances over at Kai, then dismisses him with an unreadable expression in his brown eyes.
But instead of sitting with me and the rest of the students, Kai climbs onto the podium and flops down into the chair behind the desk, eyes still glued to his phone screen. So I stare at him, confused, until he shoves his phone in the pocket of his joggers and looks up.
Straight at me.
And God, does he send a smug fucking smirk my way.
An electric shock jolts through my body.
