Page 9 of Breaking Isolde
I check the index and find the page. The text is mostly redacted, but the signature line at the bottom is still visible. So is the name of the witness. Mine.
A smile graces my face.
Good girl.
Trying to figure out what happened to her sister only makes me want to toy with her. Lead her around in circles. She won’t find anything. The only person who can tell her what happened that night is me.
And to get to the truth, she’d have to earn that privilege.
Preferably on her knees.
With my cock in her mouth.
That night, I watch her window from the library roof. Her light stays on until 2:37 AM. She does not draw the blinds. Her shadow moves across the wall, reading, writing, pacing. She never once looks out.
By the time I leave, the fog has eaten the quad, and my clothes are wet through. I go home, peel off the shirt, and stand in front of the bathroom mirror until the image makes sense again.
I want to destroy her. To consume her. To allow her to infiltrate every cell that was written with Casey’s name and replace it with her own.
Sleep doesn’t come easy, not when Colton is busy fucking some chick from Philosophy. Maybe a prof. Didn’t get a good look. But her fake moans are grinding my fucking gears and it takes me an hour to fall asleep.
In the morning, I do it all again. An hour of sleep isn’t enough, but I need to figure her out so I can be one step ahead.
I become a part of her environment over the next week, as subtle and constant as the chill in the walls. She gets up at 5:00 AM, runs the track at a punishing pace, and showers before the cleaning staff even opens the supply closets. She cuts her hair herself, in the mirror, taking off the tiniest bit. She wears the same shoes, changing only the laces—a deep purple.
Casey’s favorite color.
There are differences between them, sure, but none of them matter.
The key is in the eyes. She looks at the world as if it’s a system to be broken. I see it in the way she hacks the meal plan, sneaks into the restricted stacks, rewires her own reading lamp because maintenance is too slow. She plays the game, but only so she can learn where the rules are weak.
She’s not hiding, not really. She’s baiting. Testing to see if the predators are still here, or if the ghosts have finally gone soft.
At the third lunch, she switches tables. This time, she picks the far end of the main hall, right under the nose of the seniorclass. The Feral Boys are all sitting on their thrones—Jules, Bam, Colton, even the ghost of Cai. I watch from two tables over as she cracks her notebook, takes notes, and never once acknowledges the roar of testosterone or the way the boys measure her with their eyes.
Today, I don’t want to be noticed. I don’t want to be seen. I want to watch her, see what she does.
Julian is the first to try a move. I half want to punch him, but my Board meeting is in a week… then I can tell them that she’s written in the book as mine and they can’t touch her. But until then, she’s a free for all. He walks past her, bumps the table, makes a joke about “fresh meat.”
She doesn’t even blink.
When he leans over her shoulder, she says, “Can I help you?”
He grins. “Depends. You lost, or just slumming it?”
She looks up, deadpan. “Neither. But you will be.”
He blinks, a full second of confusion. Then he laughs and wanders off, but I see the tension in his shoulders. He’s not used to being dismissed. It’s perfect.
I think I might be in love with this woman.
She returns to her work. I file it away: unflappable under pressure, prefers direct confrontation, but only as a last resort. She’s a slow burner, not a spark.
The Board will eat that up.
I know I do.
After five days, I know her routine better than my own. I know when she takes her tea, how she holds her phone in public (left hand, always), the precise amount of time she spends in the shower (fifteen minutes, never more). I know the way she checks her reflection in any glass surface, but never stops to fix herself, just looks at the image, moves on.
