Page 36 of Make Me Lie (Rich Demons of Darkwood 1)

"Dean Worthington, I need a new room assignment. I'll stay anywhere. There has to be somewhere on campus that's available," I begged, feeling like I'd never done anything so useless in my entire life.

The Dean just looked at me with pity, but before he could say anything, Remington responded. "I'm afraid that your request is denied," he said cockily, flashing me a brilliant grin. "But please feel free to check back another time, the office is always open."

He smiled again, but this time it looked more sharkish, like you could see the predator that lurked beneath his skin.

"I have to say, Aurora, I'm quite disappointed that you aren’t showing more gratitude for the accommodations you've been given. Anyone on campus would love to be where you are. That’s something we're definitely going to have to work on."

This time I squeezed the chair so hard that it actually did crack underneath my fingers.

I shot the dean a pleading glance, but the coward wouldn’t even meet my eyes.

“Worthington, you can leave the room,” ordered Remington as he pulled his feet off the desk, making sure to take the papers with him so that they littered the ground underneath him.

Without a word, the dean got up from his seat and left the room, closing the door quietly behind him and taking away any hope I had of getting out of this situation.

I turned my attention back to Remington, taking my time to really look at him. Who were these boys that had this kind of control? This university was one of the best in the country, if notthebest in the country. And here he was, ordering the head of the school around as if he was nothing but an errant schoolboy. It was scary.

Remington leaned forward, putting his elbows on the desk as he stared right back at me. "Are you understanding the situation a little bit better, princess? There's nothing you could do at the school that we wouldn’t know about, that we wouldn't have control over. It will be much better for you to accept your fate with a pretty little smile. You can't run, and you can't hide. We control everything that happens here, and that includes you."

I was tempted to lunge over the desk and punch him. That's probably what I should have done, but instead, I crossed my arms in front of me and gave him the same look of cool indifference that he'd been giving me.

"Have anything to say?" he asked, raising an eyebrow, something I'd always been jealous that people could do for some reason. It figured that he would be able to do that. They probably all could. But why was I thinking about that?

"I think you've made yourself very clear… Sir," I added, watching the glimmer of heat in his gaze at the word and wondering what it would feel like to choke it out of him. It was errant thoughts like that that kept me up at night sometimes, wondering if I was closer to The Demon than I thought.

It only mattered if I followed through with them, I always told myself. And so far I’d succeeded in controlling myself. I turned around and began to walk towards the door without another word, knowing that the battle I had on my hands wasn’t going to be won this morning, obviously. I'd have to pick apart all of their weaknesses, find the things that could give me back control.

Or I could always try transferring to a different school.

As if he could read my mind, Remington's voice trailed after me. "You're not going anywhere until we say you're allowed to, Aurora," he warned, and the threat in his voice was clear. I wouldn’t be allowed to transfer, they’d make sure of that.

I walked out of the room before I lost control. The dean was sitting on a bench outside the door, the secretary standing beside him and stroking his shoulder inappropriately. I was pretty sure that the dean's wife had been at orientation with him. I think he had a couple of kids as well. Maybe that was something that Remington had on him, an affair. I'd have to look into that sometime.

As my shoes clicked against the tile, the dean glared at me, all the pity that had been in his gaze before completely absent. Evidently, he was blaming me for the embarrassment he’d just experienced in his office.

I looked away from him and his maybe mistress. Dean Worthington’s feelings about me were the least of my concerns now that I knew he was nothing but a glorified puppet.

I hurried through the still student free lobby and practically flung open the doors to the outside, taking huge gulps of the fresh air in like I’d been without oxygen this whole time. I wanted to scream, destroy something, pick a fight with someone… But all I did was drag my ass to class where I endured hours of the students whispering things about me and giving me dirty looks.

It was still better than before though. I'd still escapedhim. It was the silver lining that I would have to keep telling myself to survive all of this.

When classes were finally done, I headed to the women's locker room in the gymnasium and changed into running clothes, carefully putting all of my things away and locking the locker so that no one could get my stuff. I didn't go run around the track though. Knowing my luck, someone would probably try to trip me intentionally.

Instead, I ran outside, setting off down the road that circled the lake. I'd heard during orientation that it was a two-mile loop around the lake, and I ran around it six times until my legs threatened to give out. Running had always been a sort of therapy for me, a way to push my body so hard that all my problems could disappear for a little bit.

Surprisingly, The Demon hadn't tried to ruin it for me. At least a few times a week he let me out of the house to run free, like I was some sort of caged animal that he was giving some exercise. Whatever his intentions were with it, I hadn't tried to look too closely at them. I'd used running to transport my mind somewhere else, somewhere that was free.

I had a feeling that I'd be needing to run here quite a bit as well.

The sun was setting, and I reluctantly headed back to the gym to get my stuff before making my way to the Sphinx. I would've hung out at the library until it closed, but then I probably would be having to find that bridge to sleep under since the school still hadn't given me the combination to get into the secret society. If I headed back now, I’d at least have some chance to catch someone as they were going in.

It was just my luck, I only had to wait around twenty minutes before some member I hadn't met yet came back and let me in with him. He didn't mock me or say anything stupid, but he didn't give me the combination either, so I put him firmly in the asshole column with everyone else I’d met in the place.

I was starving, everything I’d eaten for lunch long gone after my run, but I didn't have it in me to go sit in the dining hall with my four torturers, or even to try and raid the kitchens. Instead, I slinked back to my room, thinking that if one of them did come and try and drag me to dinner, I really would start throwing fists. I was so done with the day.

Once safely in my room, I started my homework, and the hours flew by, blissfully free of any of the guys. After finishing up, I decided it was a good idea to wash up before bed since I was covered in dry sweat.

I locked myself in the bathroom, frowning at my appearance. When I’d started up at the school, what seemed like forever ago now, I’d looked in the mirror and seen a stranger. But at least it had been a hopeful stranger, with a whole new life in front of her. The person looking in the mirror now was still a stranger, but one that looked beat down...desperate.

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