I didn’t move. My feet felt as if they were glued to the floor. After the morning I’d had, after the bruises and the screams, I wasn’t going to let a handsome face and a bad attitude be the thing that broke me.

“No,” I said. My voice was shaking, but he could hear me.

His eyebrows snapped together, his green eyes narrowing. “Excuse me?”

“I’m not leaving,” I snapped, taking a step closer to his desk. “I waited an hour in that hallway, and I’ve been through too much today to let ‘get out’ be the first thing I hear from you.”

“Oh!” He smirked. He began tapping his...