When he leaned forward, she was unprepared. In a flash, he grabbed her by the collar of her shirt and dragged her across the desk. Her knees struck the sharp edge of wood; her belly scraped over the discarded briefcase. Stunned, she barely registered the crack of bone as she fell to the ground. She lay at his feet, dazed and whimpering. When he hauled her to her knees, her head lolled backward, and he shook her fiercely.

“Look at me!”

She pried open her eyes, afraid to see the face she loved twisted in anger. But it only smiled at her. “Nathan? What did I do?”

The answering blow to her cheek sent her flying into the credenza. Her lip split from the smash of his hand.

“You need to understand your place.” He came to stand over her, striking and kicking over and over until she curled into herself. “You’re mine, Analise. Mine.”

To hide from the pain, she thought of words—soothing, predictable words. The poetry of Greek. The steadfastness of Latin. For what seemed an eternity, his hands and feet battered her body, and she thought of Swahili and Mayan, of safety and protection.

When he was finished, Nathan lifted her nearly unconscious body and carried her up the stairs to the freshly painted room. The fumes had thinned but still hung in the air. After gently placing her on the bed, he shut the windows and locked them tight, shoving the key into his pocket. It was time for her next lesson.

Carefully, he knelt beside her, pressing his lips to her ear. “This is my house, Analise. Mine. You have no room. You have no home. Nowhere else to go.”

She cringed away from the gentle whisper, the harsh truth. Despite the pain, she defied him. “I can move back on campus.”

Nathan shook his head. “Not if I tell them to say no. Not if I tell the judge that you are too unstable to have control of your own accounts. I’m a respected professor and you’re an oddity, Analise. You have no parents, no friends. No one in the world who loves you, except for me.”

She refused to believe that love could be responsible for the aches that pulsed along her body and throbbed in her head. “Why did you hurt me?”

He stroked her hair tenderly. “Because I love you. You need discipline, Analise. Structure. Only I understand you. If you obey me, I won’t have to hurt you again. I won’t have to protect you from yourself.”

Through the haze of pain, she knew he wasn’t making sense, but the waves of agony muddled her mind. The air grew thick with the smell of paint.