by Elena Lawson
It would be almost nine in the evening at the Abbey, and I was willing to bet the guys and whichever of our classmates dared to show up were already there. Elias was portaling Cal, Adrian, and grudgingly—after he heard what I’d allowed Draven to do to me—Draven too. Ms. Granger had insisted I allow her to escort me this one last time. She said she couldn’t stay late, but was honored to receive an invitation—I supposed she didn’t know the invites went out to all the professors at the academy.
Probably because most of the professors had tossed their invites in the trash without a thought, just like I was sure most of the other students had, too.
Good. Fewer people to sift through. I hoped there were only a handful of people who showed up, no matter how embarrassing that would be.
“We’re ready,” Bianca said with a curt little bow, playing the part of the princess she looked.
Granger shook her head. And I realized she’d even dressed for the occasion. She had changed into a deep burgundy dress that was just long enough to sweep the floor. The color suited her, and the deep red of her lipstick matched.
“You look nice,” I told her.
“So do you,” she replied. “Happy birthday, Harper.”
I smiled. “Thanks.”
It felt strange to know that today was the anniversary of my birth when we’d always celebrated it on another date. It didn’t feel like my birthday. But it was kind of nice to finally have a real one.
I’m an adult now—officially anyway, and that was a thing worth celebrating. It was a thing worth smiling about. I could come and go from the academy as I pleased from now on. I could take my guys and travel the world. Go see my family’s vacation home in Spain. Sip wine in the French Riviera. Tour Rome.
I’d done a lot of traveling in my short life already with Leo and Lara, but all it did was make me hungry to see more. Taste more tastes. Smell for smells. I’d always wanted roots, but now that I had them all I seemed to want to do was cut them off and fly away.
And now I could.
And in three more years, when I was done with this place, nothing could stop me—could stop us—I corrected, thinking of all my guys from going and doing exactly as we pleased.
“Oh,” Bianca gasped, her hands flying up to cover her O-shaped mouth. “I’m such an idiot,” she said. “I can’t believe I didn’t wish you a happy birthday yet.”
I opened my mouth to tell her I hadn’t even noticed, but she smothered the thought and knocked the wind out of me with a suffocating hug. “Happy birthday!”
I wasn’t surprised she’d forgotten, she’d been my drill sergeant all morning. Making me pace back and forth through the hallways in my heels. Stopping only for a few seconds to heal the worsening blisters and ache in the balls of my feet before we kept on.
But, hey, I could walk in them now, so, I supposed it was mission accomplished.
Granger lifted her wrist to look at the slim golden watch there. “We’re late. Your guests have probably already arrived. Shall we go?”
I inhaled deeply, reaching down inside of myself to find my game face. It was time to solve a mystery, and I needed to be sharp if we were going to end this once and for all.
“Let’s do this,” I said and linked my arm through Bianca’s.
What in the ever-loving hell is this?
When we appeared on the lawn outside the Abbey, it was like someone punched me in the chest and took my head and filled it up with helium. Unsteady on my feet, I wavered before regaining my balance.
Bianca and Granger seemed equally shocked.
Before us was a sight I wouldn’t soon forget. Rosewood Abbey was alight with both candles and witch-light. The blue and amber glows lit the entire mansion from within and on the lawn was a low white tent, lit as well, that held some refreshments and a three-tiered fountain of what looked to be red wine? I wondered if anyone else thought it looked more like blood in the moonlight…
But it wasn’t the music flowing out from the Abbey, or the pretty lights or the flowers or the fountain that really drew the eye… it was the people.
Oh my god.
“What?” Bianca said, mostly to herself, voicing my own confusion.
If there were the same amount of people inside as there were milling about the grounds, then at least half of the academy had shown up. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing and rubbed my eyes to make sure it wasn’t some trick of the light.
“Harper,” Granger said, taking the lead to walk toward the entrance. “I had no idea you’d made so many friends…”
I didn’t, I wanted to say, but I was speechless and was still having trouble picking my jaw up off the ground.
Bianca tugged me with her to the door.
“Are all these people actually here? I’m not hallucinating, right?”
“Nope,” she said and reached up with a finger to fix her smudged gloss. “I think you might be even more popular than queen bitch herself. She doesn’t even get this good of a turnout at her birthday parties.”
I gathered she was talking about Kendra but still couldn’t rectify what I thought I would find when we got here with what I was actually seeing.
I didn’t think popular was the right word for it, though.
Infamous was more like it.
All the students that showed up weren’t here to celebrate me because they were my friends, I realized. Suddenly it all made sense. They were here because I was unknown. A wild card. A mystery. And who could resist attempting to unravel one of those?
Apparently, none of the students at Arcane Arts Academy.
I caught a glimpse of Cal through the crowd of people inside and squinted when I lost sight of him, trying to find him again in the hoard of bodies stampeding through my house. I lost sight of him, and stood on tiptoe in the heels, but he was gone.
“Excuse me,” Bianca said, “Birthday girl coming through,” and pushed her way inside the front foyer.
For all she knew she could’ve been shoving the murderer—the same person who’d been tampering with her memories out of the way. I knew that whoever it was, they were here. Bianca’d zombied out for a bit on Thursday when she came back to our room. When she came out of the trance, I didn’t say anything, and it was like it never happened. Which only made me wonder how many more times she was messed with that we didn’t even know about.
Looking at all the faces now turning one after the other to study me, or wish me a happy birthday, or say what an awesome house I had, or just outright stare, I knew we were utterly screwed.
This was going to be a lot harder than we thought.
I had two glasses of fountain wine outside, thinking the spot out in the yard would make it easier to spot my guys, before Martin found us. “Miss Bianca,” he said with a little bow. “A pleasure to see you again.”
“You too,” Bianca said drawing Marcus closer to her side. “This is Marcus. Marcus, this is Martin, Harper’s butler.”
It seemed odd to hear him called that—demeaning, almost, even though by all rights that is what he was. But my Martin was so much more than that.
I stepped in before Martin and Marcus could be formally introduced, stooping down to Martin’s height to wrap my arms around his slight frame. “Thank you,” I said into the collar of his impeccably tailored tailcoat. “I don’t even have words to express how incredible this all is.”
“Oh, come now,” he said, peeling me off of him. “All I did was delegate.”
“Well, you’re a very good delegator,” Bianca said and I nodded my agreement.
“Happy birthday, Miss Harper.”
I grinned, filling another glass from the table with wine from the fountain and handed it to Martin. “A toast,” I said, and Martin couldn’t refuse, taking the glass from me even though there was clearly wine dripping down the side of it. Oops.
“To you,” Martin said.
“To Harper,” Bianca and Marcus said at the same time.
“No,” I corrected them, not moving to clink my g
lass to theirs. “Not to me. To the man who pulled all of this off without a hitch. To Martin.”
“To Martin,” Bianca cheered and Marcus followed closely behind her, repeating the words.
Martin blushed furiously and stooped his head to hide it, pretending to adjust his monocle. “Right, well…,” he cleared his throat. “Thank you, I suppose.”
“Could you escort me back inside?” I asked him, offering my arm. “I have to find Cal and Adrian.”
And Elias, and Draven, but I didn’t think it wise to tell anyone there was a vampire present—not even Martin.
“Ah,” Martin said, his posture becoming less closed off. “I’ve only just seen them before I came outside. They’re in the study. May I take you to them?”
“Yes, please!” I said and set my glass down. We’d already gotten several steps away when I remembered Bianca and Marcus and spun quickly to call out to them that I’d be back in a little while and to enjoy the party.
Martin directed me through the Abbey with ease, knowing all the alternate hallways and doorways that lead from rooms to other rooms to avoid the worst of the crowds. In the time it took me and Bianca to go from the foyer to the kitchen when we first arrived, Martin had taken me all the way through the entire house and deposited me right in front of the door to the study. Hell, he may even have done it faster.
He pushed open the door, and I sighed, seeing the four of them all together, as though they’d been waiting for me there this whole time.
Hurriedly, I thanked Martin for his help. I didn’t want to come off as rude, but if he stayed too long, he’d notice one of my guests wasn’t witch or witch’s familiar. For all I knew he might’ve been fine with it, but since Granger was still here somewhere, I thought it best not to push it.
I closed the door the moment he turned away and spun to find four pairs of eyes watching me, unblinking. Four mouths with lips slightly parted. Four near identical looks of shock.
“What?” I demanded. “Is there wine on my dress?” I searched the corset but found only cleavage and lace. Sighed. Bianca would’ve had my head if I’d stained it.
“You look,” Elias breathed, coming forward to take both of my hands in his. But he didn’t finish the sentence, instead, tugging me into his arms to plant a soft kiss at the nape of my neck. “Happy birthday,” he whispered into my ear, and I giggled, biting the inside of my cheek.
“Remind me to thank Bianca,” Cal said, stepping in with Adrian at his side, staring pointedly at the twin mounds of my breasts. “Her taste is… exquisite.”
His eyes ignited dragon’s fire green and stole the breath from my lungs.
Draven brooded silently and didn’t dare move, and it seemed Adrian was stupefied.
“You don’t look half bad, yourself,” I told Cal, and extended the compliment to rest of them. “You all look great.”
And they did. Elias was in a full suit in a deep silvery gray with a deep purple button-up and matching bowtie. I didn’t think I’d ever meet a man in a bowtie that I could confidently call sexy as hell. I seemed to be wrong about that.
Cal and Adrian were about as dressed up as I think they probably ever got. In dark wash denim and button-down shirts that were actually buttoned down several buttons. Cal in deep green, and Adrian in toasted almond color. It suited them.
And Draven—well, Draven wore what he always wore. A black shirt with that expensive looking dark gray jacket and torn jeans. Somehow, even without the finery, he managed to look just as delicious as the others and I licked my lips at the memory of what we were doing the last time we’d seen each other.
Shocking myself, the thought came unbidden into my mind; I can’t wait to do it again.
Only next time, I didn’t want him to stop.
I blinked back into the present as Elias squeezed my hand. Damn, how much wine had I had to drink?
“So,” Cal started, still unable to fully lift his gaze from traveling the length of my body. “Down to business.”
Ugh. Did we have to? Way to ruin the mood… “What’s the use?” I said, losing a bit of the excitement I’d just managed to scramble up. “Have you seen how many people are out there? We may have narrowed it down by a paltry fifty people.”
“Yes, but only one of them is going to actively be trying to find out what you know.”
“If whoever they are even took the bait,” Draven said, weighing in where he could. He insisted on coming to offer an added layer of protection. And because he didn’t want to miss my birthday, apparently, but he couldn’t actually help us pursue this person—not in a crowd of witches.
My stomach fell. “They did,” I told him. “At least, I think they did. Bianca was really off on Thursday night like she’s been every other time it’s happened.”
This would be news to all of them. I hadn’t had a chance to see them at all except for Elias briefly in first period in the mornings.
“Then we can’t let this opportunity go to waste,” Adrian said, crossing his thick arms over his chest. “If it worked then whoever it is will be looking for you. Watching you.”
Did I just turn into the bait?
“Go back out there and… do… whatever,” Cal said. “It doesn’t matter what you do, just be present, and keep moving around. We’ll be watching. If anyone follows you, we’ll notice.”
“What kind of half-baked plan is that?” I asked, exasperated.
“The only one we’ve got,” Elias said, and I released the tension in my shoulders, letting his steady gaze calm me.
All I was missing was a giant sign taped to my back that said, follow me! Yeah, over here, this girl! Come on!
I’d be circulating the party for hours. I’d slowed down on the wine if only because if I drank any more I’d be hopelessly drunk and completely useless. And managed to get some food down into my vacant stomach. Unsurprisingly, I’d lost my appetite this past week with all the added stress. A travesty I could add to all the others in my life.
There was nothing worse than feeling like you were hungry enough to eat a whole dang cow, but knowing if you did you wouldn’t be able to keep it down anyway. So, you just starved, became frail and hangry with low blood sugar.
“Kendra?” I said, my mouth full of some weird gray stuff that tasted a hell of a lot better than it looked. “What are you doing here?”
She pursed her lips, and I noticed she was alone. No Sasha or… well, Heather was dead, so…
I cringed. Oops. Even after everything Kendra put me through, I couldn’t help feeling that if losing Heather was anything like the mere thought of losing Bianca, then I was being an insensitive bitch.
“I—” she started, and I saw how very uncomfortable she was. In her short dress with the diamond necklace, her shoulders hunched inward. “I should have just—I shouldn’t have come,” she stammered.
“No, wait,” I said when she tried to turn away. It pained me to my very core to say it, but I forced the words to come out. “Stay,” I said, attempting a smile. “If you want.”
She looked at me like I was insane. “What?”
“Stay,” I repeated. “And I’m sorry about Heather.”
Kendra stiffened at the words and I saw the bitchy facade she wore like a mask all the time waver, just for a second. “Thanks,” she mumbled. “I just…” she paused. “I needed to get out of my house. My parents have practically had me locked up in my room all week and…” she trailed off and I raised my brows.
Okay. My lenience only goes so far. I wanted to tell her we weren’t friends, remind her of that fact before she got the wrong idea. But when she saw how I was looking at her, she clammed up. “Never mind,” she said. “I won’t be staying long. I just wanted to escape.”
“Upstairs,” I told her, using up the last bit of patience or care I had for Kendra Van Damme. “Go all the way to the end of the hall and use the door on the right. No one will bother you in there.”
I left before she could thank me—if Kendra was even capable of a thing li
ke gratitude—and made for the lawn again, tired from all the walking in circles and about ready to call it a night.
I caught sight of Elias on my back out for a wine refill and winked at him through the crowd. He was standing next to another professor, chatting. I forgot his name—but he was one of the younger profs and taught the fourth year students some advanced something or other. He wasn’t the only other teacher to arrive, either. Though Granger had left, I’d run into at least three other professors eating the fancy snacks or gazing at the paintings in the hallways. As though they’d been invited to a swanky museum instead of a teenage girl’s birthday party.
But I supposed the grandeur of Rosewood Abbey would draw a crowd even if it weren’t for the soiree Martin had organized for me.
Where was that old man? I’d seen him for barely a minute earlier and now he was seemingly gone. I wondered if he went home for the night but didn’t think he would leave without telling me.
“…still can’t believe she’s let them loose in her house!” I caught the tail end of a conversation between two girls a little to my right.
“Right? They could attack anyone at any moment. Shifter’s aren’t—”
“Excuse me,” I said in the most saccharine voice I could muster, trying to rein in my fury. They were first-years and I couldn’t unleash full-throttle Harper on their tiny asses. “But if you’re uncomfortable being here, may I suggest you leave?”
The pair flushed brilliant scarlet before they bowed their pretty little heads and sped away back toward the house. I hadn’t missed the looks all the people who’d shown up were giving my familiars. And I was sure Cal and Adrian didn’t miss them either. But this was my house. My birthday party. And if they didn’t like it, they could fuck off.
I was midway through filling my glass when I heard it. The sound was so muffled at first, I thought I’d imagined it. A shrill cry carried on the gentle summer breeze. The people near me didn’t seem to notice, but when I locked eyes with Elias, I knew he’d heard it, too. He rushed from his conversation and darted back inside, and I hiked up my dress to follow him.