Chapter 34
Chapter Thirty-Four
Leif
The ice pack numbs my swollen cheek, but pain throbs beneath it, keeping time with my heartbeat.
Emily sits across from me, hands folded on the dining table between us. Jared shifts in the chair to my left, his arms crossed. Grady sits on my right, a notepad he pulled from his work bag resting untouched on the wooden surface.
No one speaks. No one needs to. The bruises on my face tell one story. Now it’s time to tell the rest.
“Carson’s pressure didn’t begin when he became the dean at Pinecrest Academy,” I say without preamble, the words slurring around my swollen lip. Outside, rain taps on the roof. “It resumed from Westbrook.”
The copper tang of blood lingers in my mouth despite the antiseptic Emily applied earlier.
“He uses the same playbook everywhere he goes.” I lower the ice pack, letting them see the full extent of the bruising. “He frames compliance as professionalism. Presents restraint as virtue. And he justifies crossing every boundary because of my secondary designation.”
Emily’s jaw tightens at this, a small muscle jumping near her temple. Her fingers curl tighter around each other on the table.
“He never starts with physical confrontation,” I continue, pressing on while my courage holds. “First, it’s meetings that run late. Small comments about my clothing. Questions about my personal relationships framed as professional concern.”
The bandages on my hands draw my eye, a stark reminder that I didn’t fight back. I never even considered it, and shame fills me at the realization.
I used to fight back. When did I become so weak?
“The first time he touched me was three months after I started at Westbrook. It started slowly, with his hand on my shoulder or elbow, always testing to see how long before I objected. When I moved away, he’d call it oversensitivity.”
My fingers tap the side of my glass, counting out the rhythm of memories I’ve kept buried. “By month six, he’d escalated to standing in doorways, so I had to brush past him to leave rooms.”
Jared’s hand curls into a fist on the table, knuckles white with pressure. His scent changes, salt air turning stormy as anger builds in him. But he remains silent, letting me speak.
“I tried managing it without escalation,” I admit, the shame of it burning my throat. “Scheduled classes during his administrative meetings. Kept my classroom door open. Never stayed after hours if he was in the building.”
Grady shifts in his chair, leaning forward. The notepad beside him remains untouched, though I know he wants to document every word. His restraint speaks volumes.
“When that didn’t work, I started missing faculty gatherings.
Ate lunch in my car. Declined mentorship opportunities.
Isolated myself from colleagues who supported him.
” The words come faster now, a dam breaking after years of keeping it all in.
“I believed he would lose interest if I kept my head down.”
I draw a slow breath through my nose. “But Carson doesn’t lose interest in things he considers unfinished.”
Mixie appears in the archway but doesn’t continue forward. Instead, she stares from a distance, sensing the tension filling the room.
I stare back, because it’s easier than facing them when I say, “At the end of my first year at Westbrook, he started changing the narrative.”
Emily’s nostrils flare, taking in my pheromones. What does she smell? Fear? Regret? The bitter residue of surrender? I can’t control it, can’t mask it anymore as the truth bleeds through every pore now.
“How?” she asks.
I trace a ring of condensation on my whiskey glass. “He stopped criticizing me in public, and I thought maybe I had misunderstood his intentions. That he was stern, but well-intentioned.”
Jared sets his untouched water glass back on its coaster and tugs at the sleeve of his shirt.
I shift in my chair. “He began introducing me differently at faculty meetings, not as ‘his project’ anymore.” Raindrops slide down the windowpane in slow rivulets. “I had become someone he was investing in.”
Grady’s pen poises over his notebook. “Go on.”
The clock on the mantelpiece ticks steadily. “He told the administrators I had potential. That Omegas in education often struggle without the right Alpha guidance.”
Emily presses her fingertips against the wooden tabletop. “And he volunteered to be that guidance.”
“For a while, it worked.” I focus on the glass of whiskey. “My evaluations improved. Parents stopped questioning my authority. If someone raised a concern, Carson shut it down before it spread.”
Jared exhales through his nose, the sound almost drowned by the wind outside.
I reach for my glass again. “Then he warned me that the rumors about my temperament would return.”
Emily’s knuckles whiten on the table’s edge. “Unless?”
I lift my eyes to hers. “Unless we formalized the relationship everyone already assumed.”
Grady taps his pen on his notebook. “You mean—”
“A courtship.” The single word falls like ash across the table.
“He framed it as practical,” I continue, staring at the amber liquid swirling in my glass. “Two professionals aligning reputations would offer stability for faculty and students alike. He said it’d remove the perception that I was an Omega without guidance.”
Emily’s jaw tightens. She shifts, the high-backed chair creaking under her.
“And you agreed?” Jared asks as he leans in.
“For six weeks.” I swallow, listening to the mantel clock’s echoing tick. “Long enough to realize the mentorship was never real. The first week, he was…attentive. Holding doors, leaving coffee on my desk, praising me in meetings.”
Jared’s brow furrows. “That doesn’t sound like Carson.”
I spin the glass between my palms. “It wasn’t meant for me. It was for everyone else.”
Grady nods, reading between the lines. “He stopped cornering you when others were near?”
I nod, shoulders tense. “But the moment we were alone, the rules changed.”
Emily breaks the hush. “How?”
“He started making decisions for me,” I admit, my throat tight. “Which committees I should join, which parents to avoid, which colleagues not to trust.”
My grip on the glass tightens until my knuckles ache. “He rewrote my curriculum without asking and claimed it reflected better on both of us.”
Jared exhales again, moving his empty glass. “And the touching?”
“It escalated.”
The word hangs heavy as rain continues to drum the windows.
“At faculty gatherings, he’d rest his hand on the back of my neck while we spoke to people.” A shudder rolls through me. “In the corridors, he guided me by the elbow as if I was too delicate to move anywhere on my own.”
I flex my bandaged hands. “Once he slipped into my classroom during a lecture and rearranged the desks around me.”
The chandelier above Emily flickers, sending wavering shadows across her tense jaw.
“He said a bonded Omega should reflect his Alpha’s standards.”
The hush that follows is thicker than the humid air.
“That’s when I saw the truth,” I whisper over the rain. “The courtship wasn’t protecting me. It was just legitimizing him.”
Grady’s pen scratches over his notebook. “So you ended it.”
“Yes.” A crack of thunder rumbles through the rafters, punctuating the word.
My attention drifts to a spot on the table as the memory sharpens in my mind. “I told him right after the staff meeting. I said the arrangement wasn’t working, and I wanted to revert to a professional relationship.”
Jared shifts, mumbling something indistinct. Maybe a curse.
“He smiled,” I say. “Calm. Unruffled. Patient, even.”
Emily’s chair creaks as she leans back. “What did he say?”
“That Omegas often panic when stability starts to settle in.” An empty laugh escapes. “He told me I’d ‘adjust.’ I think he was waiting for my Heat, so I wouldn’t be able to walk away.”
I shake my head. “First thing the next morning, I filed the withdrawal with the Registry. Thank God we weren’t living together. Carson hated the idea of sharing a space before bonding.”
Jared’s brow knits as he taps the tabletop. “But you were still teaching there.”
“Yes.”
And that was the mistake.
“The open house happened that night. I thought he’d be too busy preparing for it to realize what I’d done, and he’d have the weekend to calm down.”
Emily’s hands flatten on the table.
“Parents and prospective families were touring the classrooms. Carson arrived late, which was out of character for him, and he approached me right away.” The memory of the fluorescent lights and crowded hallways fills my mind. “He asked to speak in private.”
Grady shakes his head. “Let me guess. Supply closet.”
“Close. Storage room beside the gym.” My throat tightens. “I refused at first. But he kept calm. Parents were standing right there. If I refused, it would turn into a scene.” I swallow. “So I stepped into the hallway with him.”
The walls close in around us.
“He followed me into the storage room and shut the door.”
Emily’s breathing slows, controlled and dangerous.
“He said withdrawing from the courtship made him appear foolish. That I’d embarrassed him.” My fingers curl into my palm. “Then he grabbed my wrists.”
The memory brings with it the same fear I felt when trapped by Carson, both back in Westbrook and earlier in my motel room.
“He told me the Registry would never believe I’d ended things in the right frame of mind. That an Omega breaking courtship contracts raises questions about emotional stability.”
Jared’s chair groans.
“He tried to force me to reinstate it.”
Emily tucks her hair behind her ears, as if she needs the movement to stay seated. “And you refused.”
“Yes.” I straighten as thunder rattles the window panes. “And he shoved me into the metal shelving for not falling in line.”
My fingers flex with the memory. “I pushed back.”
The rain intensifies on the roof, drowning out the soft crackle from the fireplace.
“He struck first,” I say. “Caught my shoulder when I tried to slip by.”
A flicker from the bulb casts jagged shadows. “So I hit him.”