The marble floors of Whitmore Academy echo with the particular loneliness of empty wealth—the kind of silence that reminds you exactly how much you don't belong.
I arrived early, before the students, before the faculty, before anyone could watch me fumble through corridors designed to intimidate. Heinrich's hand-drawn directions are clutched in my fist, the ink already smearing against my sweaty palm.
Left at the portrait of the founding headmaster. Right at the trophy case. Third door past the library.
The ceilings stretch impossibly high, adorned with chandeliers that probably cost more than my yearly salary. My footsteps sound intrusive, announcing my presence to empty hallways that clearly wish I would leave.
I am supposed to meet a colleague named Dr. Patterson. Literature department. Third floor. Office 312.
The directions lead me down a corridor I haven't seen yet—quieter than the others, tucked away from the main thoroughfare.
That's when I hear a sound that doesn't belong here. Low and rhythmic, muffled by wood and distance but unmistakable.
The door ahead is slightly ajar.
Keep walking, Skye. Find Dr. Patterson. Introduce yourself. Begin the job that will put money in your pocket and justify your presence in Heinrich Becker's home.
I should absolutely keep walking.
I look anyway.
A young teacher is bent over the desk, her palms flat against the polished wood, her skirt hiked up around her waist. Her blouse hangs open, the fabric slipping off one shoulder, and her head is bowed, hair falling forward to obscure her face.
Behind her, a male student in Whitmore uniform moves with a rhythm that is slow, deliberate, controlled. His blazer lies discarded on a nearby chair. His shirtsleeves are rolled to his elbows.
One of his hands grips her hip, fingers pressing into flesh hard enough to leave marks. The other is planted beside hers on the desk, his body curved over her back, his mouth at her ear.
He is saying something I cannot hear, but I can see the effect—the way her shoulders tremble, the way her fingers curl against the wood, the way she pushes back against him with desperation that borders on begging.
He responds by slowing down. Almost stopping.
The teacher makes a sound—frustrated, pleading—and he laughs, low and dark, before resuming at a pace that is clearly punishment for her impatience.
My mouth goes dry.
I register his profile before my brain catches up. The line of his jaw. The way his dark hair falls across his forehead, damp at the temples.
Kai.
My stepbrother. The student I am supposed to tutor.
He shifts his angle and the teacher gasps — a broken, helpless sound that echoes off the marble floors.
His hand slides from her hip up the curve of her spine, pressing her further into the desk, and he leans down to say something else against her skin. Whatever it is makes her whimper.
My heart is pounding. My skin feels too tight. I should leave. I should absolutely leave.
I push the door open wider and walk in.
The sound makes them freeze. The teacher—young, pretty, terrified—scrambles backward, hands flying to her buttons.
Kai turns with the unhurried calm of someone who has been interrupted before and has never faced consequences.
His expression shifts when he sees me. Surprise first—genuine, unguarded. Then calculation. He is reassessing me in real time.
I stand in the doorway and say nothing, letting the silence do the work.
The teacher is panicking. She smooths her skirt, her hair, her expression, none of it successfully.
"It's not—this isn't—" Her voice cracks. "Office hours, and there was a misunderstanding, and I—"
I almost feel sorry for her. Almost.
"You can go," Kai says, cutting her off with bored authority.
She hesitates, looks at me, looks back at Kai, and flees. The door swings shut behind her. Now it is just the two of us.
Kai leans against the desk—the same desk where, thirty seconds ago, he had a teacher pinned—and studies me like I am a problem he is solving.
"What are you doing here?" His tone is casual, but his eyes are not.
"I work here now." I keep my voice steady. "Literature tutor. As of today. Your father arranged it."
The flicker across his face tells me everything. He did not know. Heinrich kept the details from him.
I press the advantage. "Is this how you pass your classes? Charm and leverage and teachers who are too afraid to say no?"
His expression goes unreadable as he reaches down and zips his pants—slow, deliberate, maintaining eye contact the entire time. The sound cuts through the silence like thunder.
He does not bother with the rest. His shirt remains untucked, the top three buttons open, revealing a strip of chest still flushed from exertion. His tie hangs loose.
His hair is disheveled, dark strands falling across his forehead, damp at the temples. He looks like exactly what he is — a man who was just inside someone and does not care that I know it.
He steps closer. Then closer again.
I hold my ground, but my body betrays me. My pulse picks up. My skin prickles with awareness I did not invite.
He stops when there is barely a foot between us, close enough that I can smell him—sweat and cologne and the musk of what he was just doing.
Six months. It has been six months since anyone touched me. Six months since I let myself be touched, since Travis Walker, my ex, hollowed me out and left me too raw to want anyone's hands on me.
I hate that my body remembers what it is missing. I hate more that it is remembering now, with him.
Kai tilts his head, studying my face. His eyes drop to my throat, where my pulse is visibly jumping. A smile tugs at his mouth—slow, knowing.
"You're flushed," he says. His voice is low, almost conversational. "Ms. Dotson had to leave before I finished. If you're offering to take her place, I'm not opposed."
The words land like a slap.
My vision narrows. Dylan Cooley's face flashes through my mind—the student who wanted me and punished me for saying no. And now here is another one, still smelling like sex, suggesting I spread my legs for him like it is a reasonable offer.
"Touch me," I say, my voice steady, "and I will end you."
Kai's smile widens. He looks entertained.
"You could try," he says. "Or I could save you the trouble of replacing Ms. Dotson and just frame you instead. New teacher alone in a classroom with a student?" He shrugs, the gesture almost lazy. "Administration would eat it alive."
My stomach drops. I search his face for any sign he knows what happened to me. But there is nothing specific. No recognition. Just the confidence of someone who understands how power works.
He is bluffing. He has to be bluffing.
"Try it," I say. "See what happens."
Kai's amusement fades into intensity. He closes the remaining distance—not enough to touch, but enough that I feel heat radiating off his body.
His hand rises. His fingers brush my neck, featherlight, tracing up to my jaw. His thumb settles beneath my chin, tilting my face toward his.
"You talk like someone with teeth," he murmurs. "I like that."
I should pull away. I should slap his hand down and walk out and report him and end this before it starts.
I do not move.
"Get your hands off me," I say, steadier than I feel. "Or I swear to God, I will make you regret it."
Kai holds my gaze for a long moment. His thumb strokes along my jawline—slow, deliberate, proprietary.
"I know your type," he says, voice dropping to something almost intimate. "Good girl. Plays by the rules. Tells herself she's above all this." His thumb grazes the edge of my bottom lip. "But the moment someone pins you down and tells you what to do, you spread your legs and beg for more."
My breath catches. The words burrow under my skin, finding places I did not know were exposed.
I want to deny it. I want to slap him. I want to do something other than stand here with my pulse hammering and my face burning.
He releases me and steps back.
"You don't know anything about me," I manage.
Kai smiles—slow, dangerous, nothing like the golden retriever grin from my bedroom.
"Not yet," he says. "But I will."
He turns and walks out, leaving me alone in a classroom that still smells like him and the woman he was fucking five minutes ago. My hands are shaking. I tell myself it is anger.
I am almost certain I am right.
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