Page 208 of Lessons in Cruelty

Then there’s Professor fucking Rooke—predator disguised as salvation. One manicured hand open, palm up, offering me safety, security, belonging…the other wrapping around my throat.

The way he looks at me makes me feel seen in ways that should repulse me. Instead, it lights up circuits in my brain I didn't know existed. Whenever I’m with him, he peels back another of my layers with surgical precision, finding the rot I've tried to hide and telling me it's beautiful.

I feel both of them circling. Watching, waiting for the smallest misstep.

Both of them forcing me to question which parts of me are real and which parts I invented to survive.

College was my attempt to build something from the ashes of Haven Lee, trailer trash survivor.

I had a fucking plan. Keep my head down. Get a degree. Change my town…and maybe even change myself in the process.

Instead, I'm caught between a pair of monsters.

Some sick, broken piece of me thrives on it. Like I was always meant to be the lamb running from wolves.

Guess it makes sense—I only ever feel alive when I'm seconds from being devoured.

But how much longer can I keep this up?

The mental gymnastics of anticipating their moves, their manipulations, the sharpness of their teeth—it’s fucking exhausting.

How can I pretend to be normal when every nerve ending in my body is primed for fight or flight?

More importantly, which one of them will tire of the game first, and go for the kill?

Three weeks.

Three fucking weeks is all it took to unravel a lifetime of survival instincts.

Guess this is what happens when you try to outrun your past, instead of accepting that some people aren't meant for better things.

Or maybe this is just another test.

Another obstacle to overcome.

Another ‘what doesn’t kill you’ story I'll tell myself someday when I'm safe and whole and far away from men who see me as prey.

Only time will tell.

All I know right now, is that something has to give.

And I'm terrified that something…will be me.

Chapter 53

Haven

I fumble beside me on the bed, finding my way into a bag of chips without taking my eyes off the iPad in my lap.

Eating your emotions gets a bad rep. It’s the only thing that’s kept me going the past week. That, and Netflix. Melissa shared her password and her spare iPad with me on the weekend, and I’ve been lost in a rabbit hole of vapid influencers, hot guys with bad acting skills, and horror movies with hilariously bad special effects ever since.

I’ve been studying too.

I am, after all, in college.

I’ve also been working on my day drinking skills.

I am, after all, in⁠—