by Callie Hart
Fridays are weird at Wolf Hall. None of our classes align, the three of us separated and banished to different wings of the school in a way that definitely seems planned. Harcourt made sure none of us Riot House boys were close enough to scheme up any disruptive plans for the weekend around any of the other students, which is usually annoying. I’m glad that I won’t have to see either of them again until the end of the day, though.
I just need…
I don’t know what the fuck I need….
“I’ll be ready to leave at six,” I say, slapping a hand on either of the boys’ shoulders as I pass them. “See you back at the house.”
I yank open the heavy doors and walk inside the school, leaving them behind. Pax can’t let me go without having the final word, though. “You’re acting like she’s the pot of gold, waiting for you at the end of the rainbow, man. But you’re embarrassing yourself, Jacobi. She’s just a girl. She’s just a fucking girl!”
In The Dark…
I stop drinking.
He shoves the thin straw through the hole, goading me, trying to coax me into taking a sip, but I’ve made up my mind.
“Stubborn, stupid little bitch. Drink, damn it. DRINK THE FUCKING WATER!”
The human body can survive for weeks without food so long as it has water.
But if I don’t drink…
…then maybe it won’t take as long to fade away.
12
ELODIE
Being resurrected from the dead has its benefits.
Most important of which: my friends have started messaging me again.
I jog down the stairs, head buried in my phone, trying to read Ayala’s most recent text without getting busted by a member of staff. I’m smirking, cheeks aching, totally entranced by the look of abject sorrow on Peter Horovitz’s face—the guy even wore a suit to my memorial at Mary Magdalene’s—which is why I don’t see the dark black smudge fast approaching down the hall on my left.
Oh my god. Peter, Peter, Peter. That’s what you get for not asking me to the winter formal, isn—WOAH! The impact drives the wind right out of my lungs. I lunge, fingers grasping at thin air as I fall sideways, trying to close my hand around my cell phone. It’s too late, though. The device spins end over end, moving too slowly as it plummets, plummets, plummets…and hits the polished marble floor in the entranceway with a heart-rending crack!
My hip likely made the same unnerving sound when I hit the floor, but I don’t care about my damn hip. My phone. Jesus, if my phone’s broken, I am totally fucked.
“Impressive, Little E,” a cool voice says above me. From my sprawling vantage point on the ground, I look up and find Wren standing over me. He isn’t smiling. Not even his smug ass, arrogant, I’m gonna make you fall in love with me smile. Nope. Today, his face looks like it was carved from granite. Very angry granite. His eyes are so glacial and distant that a physical chill runs down my spine. “Pink and white polka dots. Didn’t have you pegged as a cotton brief kind of girl,” he says, arching an eyebrow as his gaze travels down my body…
“Oh my god!” My skirt. Embarrassment claws at me as I rip the tartan material of my skirt down, covering my ass, which was, until a second ago, on display for all the world to see. Of course. Of course I picked out my ugliest underwear this morning, and of course I walked straight into Wren and flashed him my dowdy granny panties.
Just fucking…great. Seriously. Just great.
Wren’s top lip curls upward; he looks disgusted as he steps over me. I get a close-up of the tread of his boots, three inches away from my nose, before I close my eyes, eaten alive by shame. “Looks like your phone’s just been decommissioned,” Wren grunts. “Too bad. Nearest repair place isn’t for fifty miles. Should’ve looked where you were going.”
I bite the inside of my cheek until I taste blood. Propping myself up on my elbow, at last registering the dull ache in my side, I reach out for my iPhone and go to grab it before it can sustain any more damage, but Wren’s foot sweeps out, kicking the device across the floor. It comes to a stop at the base of a plinth, on which the copper bust of balding Victorian-looking gentleman angrily sneers down at me.
“God, Jacobi. Way to go. Didn’t think it was possible for you to be even more of an asshole, but you just keep on leveling up.” Carina arrives, dressed in a yellow and blue Wolf Hall tracksuit, her hair tied back in tight, neat braids. She grabs the phone first, presumably so Wren can’t stomp on the damn thing and grind the screen to dust under the heel of his boot. She comes for me next, giving me a hand and pulling me to my feet.
Fuuuuck. My phone is toast. The screen isn’t just cracked. It’s dark and the back light’s completely out. This is just typical. The moment I finally get back in touch with Levi and Ayala, boom! With my laptop still out of commission and it taking an excessive amount of time to be replaced by Harcourt, my only means of communication with the outside world just died a death right before my eyes.
“Shit,” Carina whispers, looking down at the defunct glass and metal; it’s nothing more than a paperweight now. “God, I don’t think that thing’s salvageable.”
“It’s gonna have to be. My father won’t let me put a new phone on my credit card. No way. He just gave me this one. He—”
Stupid fucking girl.
Careless…
Reckless…
Thoughtless…
I flinch away from each word, bracing for a fist that doesn’t come. When I look up, Wren’s cold veneer’s cracked a little, and I glimpse something else—something that looks like…concern? Hah. Yeah. Now I’m imagining things. I must have hit my head.
“I’d drive you to get it fixed tomorrow, Elle, but I promised I’d help organize a party in town. I can take you next weekend, though?”
“Elle? Doesn’t suit you,” Wren sneers.
“Mind your own business, Jacobi. Go on. Fuck off before I go tell Harcourt what you did.”
His coal-black eyebrows shoot up. “What I did? She ploughed into me. I was minding my own business, on my way to class.”
“Just go,” Carina snarls.
I want to look down at my phone. I instruct my nerves and muscles to obey, but they pointedly disregard the command. Instead, I stare at Wren as he shrugs, his gaze searing into my skin like a brand as he backs away down the corridor. Carina waits until he’s out of ear shot before she says anything else.
“Arrogant prick,” she seethes. “I fucking hate that guy. I’d rather contract herpes than have to spend another minute at this school with him roaming around the halls like he owns the fucking place.”
I snort out half-hearted laughter, slapping the busted phone into the palm of my hand and cringing mournfully when tiny fragments of glass rain down onto the floor at my feet. “Herpes? Wow. You really must hate him.”
Carina scowls. She takes me by the sleeve of my sweater and pulls me toward our science class, just as the bell announces our tardiness. “Like you wouldn’t believe, Stillwater. Like you wouldn’t fucking believe.”
“Um…hey. Um…”
I glance up from my vegetable pesto pasta, surly and hostile. I must look hostile, too, the way I’m brandishing my fork like it’s a murder weapon and I’m about to sink it into the neck of an unsuspecting passerby. The pale guy with the grey eyes standing on the other side of the table quails when our eyes meet. He seems to grow even paler as the seconds tick by with neither of us saying anything. Poor guy. If I weren’t in such a monster of a bad mood, I might feel sorry for him on account of his awkwardness. My mood being what it is, however, I have no pity for him. He’s done this to himself. I’m putting out some blisteringly negative energy, and he made the decision to come over here and bother me. If he gets second degree burns from my withering stare, then that’s on him.
“My—my name’s—it’s Tom. Tom Petrov. That’s my name. And I just—” He puffs out his cheeks, blinking rapidly, shaking his head. I notice that he’s got a split lip. Looks fresh. Resetting himself, he steps forward an
d holds out his hand. “I’m Tom. Nice uh…to finally meet you. I just came over to introduce myself and to offer my services.”
I release him from my tractor beam stare, spearing a piece of undercooked carrot onto my fork, ripping it from the tines with my front teeth. Tom jumps when I bite down and the carrot crunches loudly. “I’m having a bad day, Tom. I’m probably not gonna be into the services you’re so kindly offering.”
“Oh, really?” He fiddles, picking at his fingernails. “‘Cause I heard Carina saying you broke your phone and you were gonna have to wait until next week to get it fixed, and I—well, I fix phones in my spare time, so…”
My fork clatters down onto my lunch tray. “You fix phones,” I say. “You fix phones?”
Tom nods. “Screens mostly. Sometimes I need to pull data, though. It can be tricky to get absolutely everything off a device. Did—did you drop it in water?”
“No. No, it just hit the floor pretty hard. It won’t even turn on.”
Tom nods. “Is it brand new?” he asks. “If it’s brand new and I replace the screen, it’ll void the warranty.”
“New to me. Not brand new.” Dad makes out like he’s giving me one of his fucking kidneys every time he replaces my cell phone, but I know from the little scuffs and nicks that they’ve always had at least one owner before me. Usually his military aide. He’s never been one to shell out money on something he can get for free.
“Then it’s probably outside of its warranty, anyway. You got nothing to lose, having me take a look at it.
The dining hall’s emptier than usual. People have been cooped up inside all week because of the rain; now that it’s finally stopped, they’re braving the cold and taking their food outside. I love the quiet, and I’m thrilled that I’m not being stared at by thirty people I don’t know the first thing about, but the thing I like about eating in the dining hall? The thing I like the best? Wren and his cronies are too good to eat in here with the common folk. Not once have I seen any of them disgrace this communal area with their presence, which means I’m safe here. I don’t have to worry about snide quips, or dirty looks, or a face so fucking pretty and evil that it makes me want to weep.
Wren would probably get a kick out of my inner conflict. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know that he’d be rubbing his psychotic hands together if only he knew how many traitorous thoughts I have about him every single fucking day.
But…
Jesus, I’ve just spent a solid twenty seconds thinking about Wren when there’s someone standing in front of me, waiting for me to hold up my end of a conversation. What the fuck is wrong with me?
Back to the matter at hand.
Giving my full attention to Tom, I size him up. “What happened to your lip, Tom?”
His eyes round out. “Huh?”
I point my fork at him again. “Your bottom lip. It’s split wide open.”
He touches his fingers to his mouth like he was unaware of the injury. “Oh! Oh, I was lying in bed this morning, looking at Instagram, and I dropped my phone. It hit me in the mouth. Stupid right? You ever done that before? Hurts like a bitch.”
I clear my throat, giving him another once over. “Why are you being nice to me? We’ve never spoken before.”
He shifts from one foot to the other, clearing his throat. “Well, I’d hate to crush any ideas you might have had about my philanthropic spirit, but, well, I get paid for this kind of work. I’m here on a scholarship, so…”
Oh, come on. I am such an asshole. It’s easy to forget that not every single student at these schools is rolling in paper. Some schools do have scholarship students. Some students at places like Wolf Hall even have jobs and need to work the weekends to help support themselves. I feel like a grade-A asshole for completely disremembering people whose fathers haven’t squirrelled away millions and are required to pick up the slack.
I sit up straight, pushing my food away. “How much?”
“A hundred if it’s just the screen. Including parts. If it’s one of the newer phones, I should have what I need here on campus. If not, I’ll have to order the stuff online, which usually takes about a week to arrive.”
“It’s last year’s model.”
“So, yeah. I should have you covered.”
“And if the phone’s fucked and you need to pull the data?”
“That’s an extra thirty. It’s not super hard. I could show you how to do it if you wanted to save money, but most people have me do it to save themselves some time.”
The data on my phone is minimal. No photos. No huge text strings that I’m sentimental over. It was clean when Colonel Stillwater gave it to me, so I’m not really concerned about that. Going radio silent, after my friends have only just discovered I’m not dead, though? I’m fairly concerned about that. “How quick could you get it back to me?”
Tom jerks. He looks surprised that I might actually be considering hiring him. “Uh, oh, well usually three days or so, but since you’re new I figure I could try and put a rush on it.”
“Okay.”
“Okay?”
“Yeah. I can’t get to Albany this weekend. I’d prefer not to have to wait until next weekend to get this taken care of, so…sure. Take it.” I dig around in my bag until I locate the busted phone, and then I hold it out to Tom across the table. He swallows, relief dominating his features. Damn, the poor bastard must be really hard up for cash.
He puts the phone in his pocket, backing away from the table. “Okay. Okay. Well, uh, thanks. If I can get it back to you any quicker, I’ll let you know.”
13
WREN
Breathing. Blinking. Swallowing.
Some skills are innate. We’re born with them. Without them, we’d die the moment we come screaming into the world, vulnerable and covered in viscera. I feel like I was spat out of my mother’s womb capable of tying a half-Windsor knot. It feels like a skill I came equipped with at birth. Because when you’re born into a family like mine and you’re landed with the kind of father I was landed with, such talents are required if you hope to survive.
I twist the black silk around on itself, tucking it up through the loop, feeding the length of material through the gap between the front of the knot, fiddling with it until it sits perfectly at the base of my throat. Who needs a fucking mirror for this shit?
“They’re gonna think you’re the waitstaff again,” Dashiell states, holding the door to the ballroom open for me.
“They always do.”
“A white shirt. That’s all you’d need to differentiate yourself. White’s totally acceptable, Wren. A white button-down wouldn’t put a dent in the whole bad guy façade you’ve got going on in the slightest.”
I follow him into the politely seething crowd, flattening down my collar with a smooth flick of my wrist. “I’m fine with what I’m wearing.” Actually, I’m far from fine. This is only the second set of clothes I’ve been able to wear since my punishment ended, and some ripped jeans and my favorite, ratty sweater would be much more preferable. This monkey suit is a fucking torture device.
Dashiell’s suit is classically cut and perfectly tailored. Pax’s suit is a Tom Ford, and retails for twenty grand. Both of them look so content in their luxuriously fitted finery that I hate them a little for it; I’m happy as a pig in shit during the most awkward, miserable, wretched situations, but being restrained by a suit is something I’ve never handled well. If my father could see me now, he’d laugh his fucking ass off.
“Don’t suppose any of the women at this thing are fair game,” Pax observes. Though it’s more of a sly enquiry than a true observation. There’s just enough of a lilt at the end of his statement to suggest that he’s open to Dashiell correcting his assumption.
Wise to his tricks, Dashiell snags a glass of champagne from a passing waiter holding a silver tray aloft in the air, his expression all business. “Pax, if you so much as look at a single one of the women in this room tonight, I will personally castrate you and fee
d your testicles to my father’s hunting dogs.”
Pax adopts a grumpy air as he, too, grabs himself a glass of champagne. “People don’t have hunting dogs in America, Lovett.”
Dashiell clinks his flute against the one in Pax’s hand, cheersing him. “Yes, they do. But either way, I’ll happily fly back to Blighty with your balls in a mason jar, buddy.” From the outside, Dash doesn’t look like the kind of guy who’d deign himself to get his hands dirty. There’s a soft, well-heeled vibe to him that has people betting against him in a fight. Looks can be, and are, very deceptive, though. Dashiell’s as fierce as they come. Irrespective of his breeding and his education, he’s not afraid to throw a fist or two. I’ve seen him shove his finger up a dude’s nose and rip his nostril wide open in a brawl before. Guy really does not give a shit.
Pax grumbles unintelligibly under his breath as he drains his drink in one. He doesn’t doubt Dash’s threat. He will steer clear of the women at tonight’s event, but that doesn’t mean he has to be happy about it.
“And don’t drink too much, either,” Dash says, surveying the room. He looks cool and collected, but he’s on edge, I can tell. He looks like he’s casually taking in the chandeliers, and the antique furniture, and the handsome people, dressed in all their regalia, but Lord Dashiell Lovett the fourth is looking for his father. It could be said that Dash is always looking for his father. For his approval, that is.
“Remind me again why we agreed to come to this travesty?” Pax growls. His eyes are steel-grey tonight, the color of the angry North Sea.
“Because you both owe me,” Dash answers brightly. “And because I asked you to. And because you’re good friends who would never fuck over their mate.”
Urgh. Doing things I don’t want to do in order to make someone else happy is not in my nature. “I need to send a text. I’ll be right back,” I mutter.