Lolly isn’t finished. Her brow pinches as she says, “There are paths. So many paths, but you choose only one. It doesn’t matter, though. They all lead to the same end. With him.”
“Him?” I perk up. “Eric?”
She shakes her head, the frown deepening on her forehead. “No, not Eric.”
“Then who?”
She lets her hands slip from the ball and she looks up at me with more pity than I can handle seeing on a face. I have the sudden urge to smack it out of her. But then I understand why—
“Dray Sinclair.”
I blink at her for a moment before a smile writhes on my face, then turns into a fit of laughter. This is why no one takes this talent seriously. It’s complete nonsense, utter tripe.
Lolly just smiles at me.
I don’t take her seriously, with or without insane predictions.
It has become something of a routine.
I stifle a giggle as Eric nibbles on my earlobe, our limbs entwined. He has me up against the wall in a shadowy corner of the Academy, and holds me to him.
All my laughter and squirming doesn’t get me out of his arms. The threat of anyone stumbling on us exhilarates me, and I can’t wipe the grin off my face.
It’s not like we planned on this spot tonight. We just bumped into each other, and kissing is all we can seem to do right now. We don’t talk much. Who has the time? We spend all of our stolen moments getting up to all sorts of naughty.
But tonight, brisk footsteps echo throughout the quiet corridor, and we pull apart instantly. Instinctively, I duck behind the thick heavy curtains and drag him with me. We stay hidden as the footsteps draw nearer, then pass without pause.
Sighs of relief are pulled from us, and suddenly, getting caught doesn’t seem all that thrilling anymore. At least, it’s killed his erection and that means no more fun for me tonight.
Eric draws away from me. “We have to be more careful. We could have been caught.”
I nod, but I can’t help but feel a little jab to the gut. The spontaneity is half the fun. He plants a gentle kiss on my forehead, then leaves the little alcove first. I wait a while before going out after him.
Spontaneity or not, maybe my senior year at Bluestone Academy won’t be so bad after all.
I head straight for the mess hall. After my tray is piled high with my favourites—bacon strips, toasted sourdough bread, and fresh berries—I head for the rooftop garden, beside the Astrology zone. It’s quiet up here at dinner times, because no one wants to eat in the cold. And as I park myself on a stone pew that overlooks the icy mountain tops, I feel that extra bite in the air.
The shift in the seasons is everywhere—in the thicker, whiter snow dusting the mountains, in the eerie wind whistling all around, and in the nip of the icy air.
I don’t mind it, but it’s what it means that I dread. Winter is drawing nearer and with it comes the social season. The debutante ball, the engagements, the mass holiday to somewhere warm this time of year. It seems to sneak up on me, the reality of when I leave Bluestone Academy, I will leave Eric behind and be stolen away by the demands of my life. I won’t get to see him, or even Courtney, whenever I want. I’ll be stuck with the elite snakes. I’ll be stuck with Dray.
It’s gaining on me too quickly. First the Halloween party, then before I know it, Christmas will be on me and my life at Bluestone will be all that closer to an end. An end that I’m not sure I want anymore.
With a sigh, I pick at my meal and turn my gaze on a loose leaflet tucked under a potted plant. I reach out for it, my fingers already turning icy and red.
‘GARDEN PARTY,’ the leaflet says, ‘SENIORS ONLY.’
It goes on to say it’s on Saturday night when most of the students will be fast asleep—starting at 1am. Better chance of no teachers finding out about it that way.
Shame I don’t get to enjoy those parties with the elite circle always hoarding them. But they have been ignoring me lately, leaving me alone—and maybe, just maybe, that’ll stick long enough for the party.
If they leave me be for the next few days, I’ll drag Courtney and Lolly to the garden party with me.
I decide to risk it.
Chapter 5
The garden party was a bad idea.
Not because of the elite circle—who still ignore me like I’m a faceless, nameless junior—but because of the honeywine.
I’m plastered drunk and, early in the party, I’m already stumbling through the maze, trying to get back to the main courtyard before I paint the roof in my vomit.
Courtney and Lolly run ahead.
They had the bubbly pink juice that’s definitely made them both a little loopy. I’m just dizzy.
I’m trying my damn hardest to walk in a steady line, but mostly I use the hedge as a crutch and stumble behind my laughing friends. I don’t even think they are laughing at anything in particular, I just think the punch was spiked with something, and now we’re lost in the garden maze.
Creeping out from the leaves is the music some of the students smuggled in for the party. Sometimes I hear it coming from the main common room, too. Krum music, with a low beat and fast-talking voice tracks.
The half-breeds love it, eat it up like Halloween sweets, and there’s always a few who dance in a way that brings a blush to my cheeks. Though right now, I’m flushed from all the honeywine.
Ahead, the girls take a turn that’s too far for me to catch up. Leaning against the hedge, I take a rest and slip down to the cobblestones. Early dustings of ice are starting to grow over the ground.
Lazily, I trace my finger along the sheets of ice and write my initials. In the growing distance, I hear Courtney erupt with laughter again. Lolly really isn’t that funny, so I know the punch was spiked.
Even sitting down, the hedges seem to move, as if sucking in on themselves, then bloating back out. I blink a few times, but it does little.
“Olivia,” the voice floats out from the leaves, familiar and not unlike the ice that wears my initials. I frown at the hedges, trying to focus on where the voice is coming from.
“Olivia.” This time I look to my right. From the shadows of the long lane, he walks towards me, as striking as ever.
My heart falls as I realise it’s Dray. For a beat there, I almost hoped it was Eric, coming to save me from the maze. But of course, it has to be Dray.
Under the pale moonlight, shadows cut beneath his sharp cheekbones and above his clenched jaw. His jaw always looks clenched, as if he’s permanently angry at the world. Maybe he is, I don’t know. Maybe he’s just angry when I’m around.
Dray stops at my side and looks down his nose at me with gleaming blue eyes, paler than the moon this night. My heart aches a little at the sight of him, at my drunken mind pulling memories out from the dust.
In the distance, I hear Courtney break out into song, a solemn lullaby about a man who eats a hundred children. Her melancholic song almost climbs higher than the music playing in the courtyard.
I squint up at Dray. “Here to bury me in the bushes?”
He just stares down at me. “No.”
“That’s a change—” Before the last word even slips from my mouth, my body heaves and I barely twist around in time before vomit slaps onto the cobblestone.
Dray looks down at the splash on his shiny shoes. It’s clear and has the faint sickly scent of sugar and grapes. I make a face at it, then brace myself for the counterattack. It doesn’t come.
Dray crouches down beside me. His eyes, like ice-blades, rinse me over, then he reaches out for my face. I flinch as the back of his hand glides from my sweaty forehead to the high bone of my cheek.
“You couldn’t have aimed for the bushes you’re so fixated on?” He drawls, but there’s a nostalgic hint to his tone, one that sees my tummy flipping and my heart torn to pieces.
I burp in answer. Not like I meant to, it just happened. Hell, if my mother and father saw me now, I would be sent to live with Madame Bucher for the rest of the year
.
With a stoic mask fitted perfectly onto his painfully handsome face, Dray runs his hand down from my cheek to my waist, then slips his arm around me.
“Hold on,” he tells me and I reluctantly sling my arm over his shoulder. He pulls me to my feet. Well, he pulls me up. Mostly, he’s supporting me.
Side-stepping my puddle of vomit, he leads me further into the maze. I don’t know which way we’re going, but the music seems to get quieter the longer he drags me along with him. My stomach runs cold and drops to my gut.
“We’re going the wrong way,” I say, staggering beside him. I can’t help but lean into him—he doesn’t complain. “The courtyard is that way, I think…”
“I’m taking you back to the dorms,” he says. “You’ve had enough for one night.”
“No,” I whine and untangle myself from him. I almost fall back into the bush, but he reaches out and catches me.
I hit his hands from my waist.
“Don’t touch me!” I shout at him. “Why are you helping me?”
“Why,” he echoes with a scoff. He even makes a scoff sound refined and elegant. I feel like a muddy elephant swaying in front of him. “Your night is over,” is all he says after a beat. “Come on, I’ll take you to Brad—”
“I don’t want to go to Brad! I don’t want your help!” Oh, honeywine, why do you make me so foolish? “I don’t want you near me!”
His jaw clenches so tight it’s a wonder his teeth don’t shatter. “I’m not leaving you out here to pass out and freeze to death.”
“Seems you want me dead, so why stop campaigning now?” I sneer. It’s less effective with a stagger and wobbly balance.
“I’ve never wanted that,” he says and pulls me to him. I stumble and he catches me.
In a move so quick it works like a blur in front of me, he has his arm looped around my back and he’s hoisted me up. He cradles me, carrying the faint smell of that strong amber drink on his breath.
No matter how hard I thrash, he carries me through the maze, just like he promises. We come out the other end of the maze, where the door stands to the chalet. He takes me through it and carries me, not to the girls’ dorms, but to the small common room near my corridor.
He deposits me on a couch. As he turns his back on me, I think he’s going to leave, but he soon returns with a bucket that he rests beside me on the floor. At least this time I’ll miss the ground and puke straight into a bucket.
Dray sits on the other end of the small couch and pulls my feet onto his lap. Weakly, I try to pull them back, but his hands clasp tight around my ankles.
“Lay still,” he tells me. “I can’t leave until you’re all sicked out, in case you choke on it.”
“Like you care,” I scoff and roll onto my side, eyes on the friendly bucket. I catch his reflection in the mirror on the opposite wall. I see how he watches me, intensely.
“Why are you really here?” I ask him.
After a long beat of silence, he catches me off guard. “Do you like Eric Digger?”
Frowning, I turn and push up onto my elbows. My glare is rinsed through with suspicion. “Why?”
He shrugs nonchalantly, but there’s nothing casual in the burning blue of his eyes, like sapphire flames. “Humour me.”
I lower my lashes at his swaying body. Though I’m sure that’s the honeywine and he’s not actually swaying.
“I like him well enough. He’s a good teacher. Helpful.” Even drunk, I’m careful what I say to him. Anything can be used as a weapon against me.
“Is that all you like about him?”
“What else is there?”
He looks at me long and hard, like I’m the only person in the world and he can read my thoughts with good enough focus. But I’m the only person with him in this small common room, and I’m suddenly very aware of my vulnerability.
He seems satisfied and veers me into a conversation I can never be ready for. “I was not always cruel to you,” he says quietly. His words are so soft that I barely hear them.
It takes me a beat to catch up and, as his words sink in, he’s already opening his hand in front of me. Makut. That’s what he uses to grow a purple flower from his palm. A saffron crocus. The very same flower he once showed me in the gardens when we were children. The flower he once said was me.
I look up at him, startled. A fresh kind of fear rages through me, like fire.
“Do you remember that day?” he asks, watching the petals spread into bloom.
How can I ever forget it?
“The flower is me,” is all I manage to say, and maybe it’s too much.
He looks at me, and I’m struck by the intensity in his piercing eyes. Somehow, he’s moved closer without my noticing and I can smell the fresh berries on his breath. “It is,” he says, his voice almost a whisper. “It has always been you.”
I frown at him, a horrible twist in my chest, immobilising me.
Dray cups my cheek, his thumb running softly over my skin, and he inches closer to me. He pins me with his fierce gaze. He looks at me, not like I’m the only person in the room or the world with him, but as if I’m the only person in the world for him. A look that wipes me clean of any defenses.
His nose brushes against mine first and my lashes flutter. I’m a fucking fool. I close my eyes as his soft lips brush over mine.
Blame the honeywine. Best to always blame the honeywine, not my stupid, aching heart that still feels for him. No, it’s not that he was my first crush, my first true friend, my first love, and he broke my fucking heart and I need him to repair it right now—it’s the honeywine.
I should slap him. I should punch him in the face or puke all over him or do anything other than kiss him back. But that’s what I do.
I part my lips and melt into his touch.
I can feel the violent punch of my heart in my chest, almost painful, as Dray’s hand slides up to my hair and threads through the strands. His mouth is warm on mine, soft and flavoured. As his tongue delves into my mouth, a sweet sigh is lured from me.
My head falls back, and he takes full advantage of the access to my mouth. In seconds, he has me on my back. Supporting his weight on his forearms, he’s over me like a solid statue, kissing me with everything he’s got.
Overwhelming waves of long-buried affection start to wash over me, like waves crashing onto a cliffside, and my heart aches in my chest. Maybe it’s the alcohol, or maybe it’s all that pain I’ve kept hidden from even myself for so long.
My mind is too foggy to think much on it. Because suddenly, the waves turn sickly and nausea sweeps over me. Bile starts its climb up my throat. I shove at Dray, pushing him off of me, and before I can twist around for the bucket, a violent hit jolts me. Dray grabs the bucket just in time.
It’s not pretty. With my head buried in the tin bucket, the sounds coming from me echo like an exorcism gone bad. Still, I feel the tender strokes of Dray’s fingers through my hair and when he pauses to rub my back soothingly. It helps ground me, helps me feel steady on the swaying couch.
But I hate him for it, even through the fog.
I hate him for so much, but right now I hate him most because I kissed him back.
I wake to something solid against me. A muscular chest, heavy arms holding me in place.
A horrible punching sensation comes from within my skull, throbbing aches behind my eyes. I force them open and squint, heavily, at the glare of lit lanterns assaulting me. At first, all I can see is some pale marble. But then, the more I blink, the better I see it’s smooth, polished skin—familiar.
I drag my gaze up the bare chest as cold dread pools in my gut, up to the face of Dray Sinclair. He’s so beautiful in sleep that the breath is punched out of me. His pink lips are parted slightly, and his usually clenched jaw is relaxed, giving a divine appearance to him.
He looks like an angel—beautiful and dangerous.
An angel like the devil once was.
He sleeps soundly on the couch with me and without
a shirt. I almost panic. I almost spiral into a fit of screams and lash out at him. But with a glance at myself, I see that his white shirt is pulled over my sick-covered strappy-top like a blanket.
My worst fears are soothed as I see we both still wear our trousers. My breaths come out steadier now and I feel the fist around my heart unclench.
Slowly, I slip out of his arms and slide off the couch, careful not to wake him. I’d rather escape unmaimed. One night of drunken words don’t change anything between us, none of it wipes away years of what’s happened between us. It was just that—a drunken night that went too far.
If anything, I hate him more now than ever before.
I’m successful in untangling myself from his heavy arms and I scoot down to the floor. Beside me, a tin bucket is full of my sick. I shudder at the sight of it, then get the hell out of the common room.
First thing I do is shower—I shower away the night that never should have happened. A night I won’t ever let happen again. And I carry an odd, guilt-free thought with me the whole shower.
Did I cheat on Eric? That was a whole other problem for a whole other day.
Chapter 6
Slouched over the table, I try my hardest to tune out the clatter of the mess hall. It’s too noisy for after a party, too loud for my pounding head.
Lolly and Courtney have their heads rested on their folded arms, James—who didn’t come to the party—pushes rubbery eggs around his tray, and I massage my temples. We’re a picture of afterparty woes. Most of the seniors are.
I sigh and trade in my pulsating temples for my mug of black tea. I take small sips, careful not to stir the nausea barely kept at bay.
The faculty table this morning is full, not a seat left cold. I avoid looking up at all costs. I know Eric is up there and I’m afraid he’ll see what I did written all over my face.
It’s not like we’re together, really, or exclusive. Still, I can’t help feeling like what I did with Dray was wrong (in so many ways!) and something of a betrayal.
Bluestone Elites (A Paranormal Bully Academy Romance) Page 3
