My So Inevitable Professor Marcus

This feels like a Punishment!

Leena's POV

The address he’d given me wasn't in any faculty directory. I'd checked, a frantic, half-mad search through every official university resource, hoping to find some logical explanation, some benign reason for this strange, unsettling invitation. Nothing. It was as if Dr. Marcus Thorne existed solely within the confines of the lecture hall and then simply… vanished.

The taxi dropped me off two blocks from campus, on a narrow, cobbled street that felt like it belonged to a different city altogether. It was a townhouse—old, its brick façade a deep, rich crimson, almost entirely swallowed by a luxuriant, almost aggressive growth of ivy. The green tendrils clung to the walls, crept around the arched windows, and seemed to whisper secrets in the twilight breeze. Tucked behind a forgotten, almost overgrown alley, it felt less like a home and more like a carefully guarded secret. A black iron gate, ornate and imposing, guarded the front like a sentry, its cold metal unforgiving under my fingertips. I had to buzz, the small, brass button feeling impossibly heavy under my finger, the sound a faint, distant hum. No students were supposed to know where their professors lived. It was an unspoken rule, a professional boundary.

And yet, here I was.

My heart hammered a frantic rhythm against my ribs, a drumbeat of pure adrenaline and raw nerves. I almost turned back three times. Once, when the taxi pulled away, leaving me alone on the deserted street. Again, when I saw the forbidding iron gate. And a third time, my hand hovering over the intercom, the fear of what lay beyond the threshold almost overwhelming the desperation that had driven me here. But the image of my brother’s pale face, the stack of medical bills on the kitchen table, the chilling certainty of expulsion—it all solidified behind me, a wall of unavoidable reality. I had no choice.

He opened the door like he’d been standing just on the other side, waiting for me. There was no hesitation in his movement, no surprise on his face, as if my arrival was an anticipated, inevitable event. He was dressed in a black dress shirt, the sleeves rolled precisely to his elbows, revealing strong forearms dusted with dark hair. His jaw was cleanly shaven, and his dark hair, usually impeccably styled, had a slight, windswept disarray that made him look less like an academic and more like… something else. Something rugged, dangerous. There was no smile, no welcoming gesture. Just silence, and those sharp, storm-grey eyes that skimmed over me, taking in every detail of my hastily chosen, slightly rumpled clothes, my clutching hands, my terrified expression. His gaze was like ink soaking into paper, absorbing everything, missing nothing.

“You’re on time,” he said, his voice as smooth and cool as polished stone. It was a statement, not a greeting.

I swallowed, forcing a lightness into my tone I didn’t feel. “You sound disappointed.”

He arched a single brow, a subtle, almost imperceptible movement that nonetheless conveyed a wealth of dry amusement. Then, without another word, he stepped aside, the heavy door swinging inward with a soft creak, beckoning me into the shadowed interior.

The house was like stepping into a different century, a curated world of forgotten elegance and quiet intellectualism. The air was thick with the rich, earthy scent of cedar and something else, something faintly intoxicating, like old leather mixed with a hint of dark chocolate and dry gin. It was the smell of secrets, of untold stories, of danger wrapped in poetry. Books were everywhere, not neatly shelved, but stacked in uneven towers on every available surface, threatening to topple, forming labyrinthine pathways on the floor. Dim lighting from strategically placed lamps cast pools of gold on worn rugs and polished wood. There were antique maps unfurled on a heavy oak table, a collection of intricately carved wooden boxes on a mantelpiece, and in one corner, surprisingly, an old gramophone, its brass horn gleaming in the faint light. It was a place that felt alive with history, steeped in a profound, almost oppressive silence that begged to be broken by whispered words or the scratchy crackle of an old record.

I stood awkwardly in the entryway, clutching my worn messenger bag to my chest like a shield. My gaze flickered from the towering bookshelves to the silent, unmoving figure of Dr. Thorne, who had closed the door softly behind me. The silence stretched, thick and heavy, punctuated only by the rapid thrum of my own pulse.

“This isn’t tutoring,” I said finally, the words a little shaky, but laced with a desperate defiance. “This feels like… punishment.”

He turned to me slowly, his hands tucked casually into the pockets of his black trousers. The dim light seemed to sculpt the sharp planes of his face, accentuating the faint shadow of stubble along his jawline. His eyes met mine, steady and unwavering. “That’s because it is, Miss Hale.” His voice was low, devoid of any warmth, any pretense. Just the stark, unvarnished truth.

My pulse kicked, a hard, painful beat against my ribs. I knew it, of course, but hearing him say it aloud, confirming my deepest fears, was a different kind of blow. “Why go through all this trouble?” I asked, my voice rising slightly, a hint of genuine confusion mixing with my fear. “You could’ve just failed me. You could’ve ended my scholarship, expelled me. It would have been cleaner, simpler.”

He didn’t answer immediately. Instead, he walked toward a low, sprawling bookshelf, his movements fluid and unhurried. His fingers trailed along the spines of the books, a silent connoisseur in his element. He paused, then pulled out a copy of Wuthering Heights, its cover worn and softened with age. “Because I hate wasted potential more than I hate liars, Miss Hale.” He turned, the book held loosely in one hand, his gaze piercing. “You’re capable of brilliance, Lena. I’ve seen it. In your early work, there was a spark, a raw intellect that few students possess. It’s messy, yes, but it’s real. And this institution, for all its flaws, is meant to cultivate that.”