Still, I obeyed.
My lips parted, and he slid two fingers inside-past my teeth, onto my tongue, deep enough to quiet whatever questions still lingered in the back of my mind. I moaned, my throat vibrating around him, my cheeks flushing with heat.
Saliva pooled, my jaw ached, and the taste of him filled me like sacrament. I closed my eyes, lashes damp with unshed tension, surrendering completely to the way he owned this moment-owned me.
Then he pulled out slowly, deliberately, watching me the whole time.
And just as I took my first breath again- Crack.
His palm struck my cheek, sudden and merciless. The sound rang through the empty classroom like a whip.
My head snapped to the side. My breath caught in my throat. The sting bloomed instantly-bright and hot across my face.
But I didn’t cry or recoil. I just sat there, throbbing with confusion and hunger and guilt. Shocked. Soaked.
Because I understood it and worse-I wanted it.
Adrian crouched down in front of me, his hands resting on his knees, eyes locked on mine like they could peel back my skin and read the frantic rhythm of my heart.
“I am obsessed with you.”
I looked up slowly, trying to process the fact that Professor Adrian Lewis-master of emotional constipation-had just admitted to having feelings that weren’t carefully calculated and professionally appropriate.
His usual mask of indifference was completely gone. Those storm-gray eyes were on fire, burning with something raw and unfiltered that made my stomach do gymnastics.
“You’re nothing like Lisette or anyone else,” he said, voice going rough around the edges. “You don’t beg for love. Don’t play it safe. You submit and not because you’re weak. Because you’re stronger than anyone knows.”
My heart was doing that thing where it forgets basic rhythm and just goes completely feral.
“Adrian…” My voice cracked like I was fourteen again.
“I want you.” His hand cupped my chin with devastating gentleness, thumb brushing over what was probably a very obvious red mark he’d just left. “I want to possess you. Have you. Not just your body. Your mind. Your fucking soul.”
It should’ve been terrifying. Maybe it was. But all my stupid, self-destructive brain could manage was, “Then choose me.”
His brow creased like I’d just asked him to solve quantum physics while juggling.
“I want commitment,” I said, because apparently I’d decided to go full nuclear in this conversation. “I want to know I’m yours. Not just for tonight, not just in the dark. I need to know you want me when the mask comes off and we’re just two people who’ve completely lost their minds.”
“Sophie…”
“I can’t keep doing this.” The words came out in a rush, like a dam breaking. “The games. The punishment and reward system. The psychological chess match where I never know if I’m winning or getting demolished. I’m not her, I’m not a project, and I’m definitely not a fucking behavioral experiment.”
He stood slowly, stepping back like I was radioactive. Which, emotionally speaking, I probably was.
“I can’t give you commitment.”
My stomach didn’t just drop, it fucking plummeted through the earth’s core.
“I’m not built for it,” he continued, voice going quiet and deadly. “I wasn’t made for picket fences or anniversary dinners or any of that domestic bliss bullshit. I destroy everything I touch.”
“You’re breaking me,” I whispered.
His breath hitched. For the first time since I’d known him, I saw something crack in that perfectly controlled facade-regret flickering behind his guarded stare like a dying lightbulb.
“I know.”
“Then stop.”
“I can’t.”
My throat felt like I’d swallowed broken glass. “Why the hell not?”
He moved closer again, crouching back down to my level. His hand touched my face like he was memorizing the damage he’d done, cataloguing every crack in my carefully constructed armor.
“Because if I stop,” he said, voice dropping to that whisper that made my entire nervous system short-circuit, “I’ll lose the only thing in this world that feels real.”
I closed my eyes because looking at him while he said shit like that was like staring directly into the sun.
“Then what am I supposed to do when you break me completely?” I asked. “When there’s nothing left of the person I used to be?”
He didn’t answer immediately. Instead, he brushed my hair back with the kind of reverence usually reserved for priceless artifacts. Like I was something precious and fragile that he was simultaneously protecting and destroying.
And then he finally said it. Low, deadly, beautiful enough to stop my heart.
“Then I’ll keep picking up the pieces.”
My breath caught somewhere between my lungs and my throat.
“And I’ll put you back together,” he whispered, lips brushing against my lips. “Over and over again. Until there’s nothing left but me in you.”
I looked up at him through the haze of my own psychological destruction. I didn’t recognize myself anymore. The scared, controlled, color-coded planner girl was gone.
And maybe I didn’t want her back.
Maybe I just wanted to stay broken in his hands a little longer, see how far this beautiful disaster could go before we both went up in flames.
“Please tell me you brought caffeine,” I muttered, dragging my half-dead corpse across the campus quad like a zombie who’d made questionable life choices and was now paying for them in sleep deprivation.
Cleo practically bounced beside me like she’d been mainlining Red Bull since dawn. “I brought something better.”
I blinked through my exhaustion-induced brain fog. “What’s better than caffeine? Because if you say cocaine, I’m calling your therapist.”
“A man with breakfast.”
“Hi, ladies.” Ayden materialized behind us like some kind of rom-com fairy godmother with perfect timing. “Thought you might need fuel for Lewis’s daily psychological warfare session.”
He held up two cups of coffee and a brown paper bag that smelled like salvation wrapped in bacon grease.
“Oh my God,” I gasped, suddenly finding religion. “Marry me immediately.”
Cleo snorted. “You’re pathetically easy.”
“Only for coffee and food. I have standards.” I grabbed the cup like it was life support. “What else would I possibly need a man for?”
Ayden grinned, handing over what looked like a breakfast sandwich designed by angels. “Sorry Soph, I’m already contractually obligated to Cleo, but I remembered your usual-bacon-egg-and-cheese with enough hot sauce to strip paint.”
I almost cried actual tears. “If Lewis gets arrested for academic war crimes, I’m nominating you to teach literature. You understand human needs.”
“You think he’d actually go down for something?” Cleo asked as we trudged toward the Humanities building like soldiers marching toward battle.
“I mean,” I muttered, taking a bite that made me question every life choice that had led me away from this sandwich, “he’s collecting ethical violations like they’re fucking Pok?mon cards.”
She cackled. “Gotta catch ’em all, but make it predatory behavior.”
We reached the lecture hall just as the bell delivered its daily death knell. Seats were already half-occupied by my fellow academic prisoners. Lewis stood at the front, writing something on the board in that tight, controlled script that somehow made everything feel like a philosophical death sentence.
He didn’t look at me. Not even a glance. Which was either professional restraint or the academic equivalent of the silent treatment.
“Take your seats,” he said, tone clipped like he was addressing particularly disappointing lab specimens.
Cleo nudged me as we settled in. “Did you guys have another one of your psychologically complex disagreements?”
“Define disagreement,” I whispered back.
“I mean… was there kneeling involved? Because you look like a woman who’s either really pissed or really freshly demolished.”
My face flushed hot enough to power a small city. “Cleo.”
