“I don’t recall Mr. Rabbit wearing clothes like a second skin,” she observes. That heat on my cheeks grows hotter, like the flames under a cauldron.
“Enjoy your night, Ms. Laurent.” Eric’s clipped tone pulls me out of my shame and, instead, into a pit of worry. I know he puts on an act for the other teachers, but still, to speak to me so coldly…
He turns his back on me and I wonder if I’m reading too much into the gesture. I slip away into the crowd and search for Lolly and Courtney. I find them talking to my brother of all people, and I suddenly recall Courtney’s confession that they kissed at the garden party.
I’m storming over to them, fast.
Before I can rage on Brad, he turns as I stomp to a stop in front of him, and his face is wiped clean with shock. Shock that quickly turns dark and he’s looking murderous.
“What the fuck are you wearing?” he spits at me, his sapphire eyes darkening into pools of mud. “You look like a two-pence hooker! What happened to dressing in some aprons and … clothes that … that … cover you up?”
I level his stare. “I am covered,” I argue, and it’s true. Only my hands and face are free from the restraints of the costume. I’m even wearing thick black tights under my shorts to cover my legs. “And as for my dress, it was ruined, no thanks to you.”
He wasn’t the one to cut up my dress like a ham for dinner, but he knows his part in it well enough. If he left me alone, if the elite circle all left me alone, no one would bother messing with me, destroying my things.
Brad snatches me by the arm and steers me away to the corner, near the empty teacher’s table. I stagger to a stop as he releases my arm, and he’s very quick to round on me.
“How do you think this reflects on our family?” he seethes at me. “If father catches wind of what you’ve chosen to wear—”
“It’s just a costume,” I say dully. But then, I’m stuck cold with fear as I see a wolf advancing on me from the crowd, a dark, inky wolf in a white mask.
“Just leave it alone,” I say and I make to move past my brother. He stops me with an outstretched arm.
“What did you expect, O?” he snaps. “You arrive in that and think there will be no consequences? This isn’t the krum world, and you’re not one of them—you are an elite. Dress like one if you at least won’t act like one.”
I snarl up at him, “It’s a costume, idiot. That’s all. I’m not running through the village in my underwear. I’m wearing something I made to a Halloween party. I think you’re overreacting—”
“You are the Laurent heiress,” comes Dray’s cool voice. “You would do well to act accordingly.”
“Like I need lessons on behaviour from you,” I throw at him.
If looks could kill…
Brad unties his cropped black cloak from his shoulders. He still passes for a dark beast without it, and he throws the cape around my shoulders. The hem falls past my bottom, which I’m certain is what he’s aiming to cover up.
As he ties it in place, he mutters, “Maybe next time you’ll think twice before frolicking around like some cheap whore.”
I shoot him a smarmy smile. “Only when you stop acting like one.”
His face shutters. “What are—”
“You think I don’t know you kissed Courtney?” Dray’s eyes flash and he turns his dark look on Brad. I smirk and go on, “Kissing half-breeds, now that’s something father will want to know all about. Think about that the next time you want to rat me out for something.”
I shove by them, my shoulder smacking into the pair of them. They don’t pursue me and I’m free to join Courtney and Lolly. Only, my heart drops as I see Landon and Lolly getting a little close, which puts a damper on my night free of the elite snakes.
It isn’t long before Brad and Dray find their way back to us, drawn in by their friend. Not before I spot Brad empty a leather-bound flask into the punch bowls.
Honestly, the three of the snakes can’t be separated for too long at a time. Maybe they fear having to be their own person for a minute too long.
I fiddle with the string holding the cape to my shoulders. I itch to tear it off. Now my costume makes no sense at all, and I’m a little stung that the snakes think they have say over what I do and wear. Especially Dray. Who’s never taken much interest in me before unless it came to tormenting me.
He’s watching me now, his eyes like flakes of steel, as he offers me a fresh chalice from the punch they spiked. For a beat, I just flick my stare between him and the ruby-encrusted chalice, as if the seemingly innocent orange brew inside will reach out and grab me. But Brad sips from the flask, soaking up all the remains, and I decide it’s safe enough … and probably strong enough to get me through this painful night.
I swipe the chalice out of Dray’s pale, gloveless hand. His pink mouth twists into the ghost of a smile. A smile I haven’t seen him wear in a long time.
Brad smirks as I throw back a bitter gulp. Their spiking isn’t exactly the sneaky kind—one taste of this punch, and my tongue has picked up on the brew they’ve used. Blissful Brew, harmless and happy-inducing. Not so bad.
I swallow it back with a hard gulp and look over the chalice rim at the small group of teachers knitted together. I try to catch Eric’s eye, but he looks over me like I’m not here, smiling at him, wearing seductive promises in my eyes. At least, I hope I look seductive.
Dray snares my attention as he slips the chalice out of my hand. He sets it with his on a table, then takes my hand. “Let’s dance.”
I don’t have a moment to refuse before he’s dragging me over to the harpists and violinists.
Brad lets me go, leaving me to Dray’s arms. He pulls me into position, but I drag my feet.
“I don’t want to.”
“I didn’t ask,” he throws back at me.
I level his hard, steely eyes. Still, I let him move me with the songs from the harps. All around, gazes are latched onto us, questions in all of them. Most of them are wondering if I’m off-limits now, if they can still torment me and get away with it, or if I’m now under the protection of the elite snakes. Of course, I’m not, but I won’t do anything to challenge their fears. The longer I’m safe, the better.
And not everyone looks. It’s not unusual that we dance together. We’re forced to at elite social events from time to time, even when we so clearly despise each other. Besides, it’s not like I can outright deny him. I have rules to play by, even if I want to pick up that hefty rulebook and break his perfect nose with it. Instead, I let him spin me around before he pulls me back into his fold, his thumb brushing over my back. His gaze is hard like steel, forcing me to look away.
“Weren’t you coming as a princess?” he asks after a while of surprisingly comfortable silence. “These rags don’t suit you.”
Keeping my focus on those dancing around us, I say as dully as I can manage, “Melody Green saw to it that my original costume turned to real rags.”
He nods, a look of understanding darkening his face. His familiarity with me buys me some time away from Melody’s ghastly graces.
“So, how’s Nadine?” I ask cordially.
Nat is his rumoured soon-to-be fiancé from Paris. She goes to Loup Blanc Académie in the South of France. I’ve met her a handful of times, she’s nice enough, too nice for the likes of Dray.
Really, by asking after him, I’m just trying to scrape up the latest gossip while I’m let out of the torture chamber.
“I wouldn’t know,” he drawls, bored by the new topic. “We don’t keep in touch.”
“I heard you’re getting engaged.”
He laughs, something cold like ice and sends a chill down my spine. “Rumours getting ahead of themselves. We had a fling,” he tells me. “Nothing more.”
Something dark and old turns inside of me. I wrestle it back into that shadowy place where all my old memories and life stay buried, dust growing over them.
“Marriages are for politics,” he adds, and he says it so flippa
ntly it’s like he’s talking about the weather.
“What about love?” I ask, almost to myself. “Isn’t there a place for that in our world?”
He studies me, long and hard, and his eyes flicker like steel blades caught in the moonlight. “Mistresses and lovers.” His words sound so empty, that I suspect he hardly believes his own words.
In our world, there is no love, so there need not be a place for it, not in lovers, not in marriages. Just look at me and Eric. The lie I told him after we had sex the other night. I don’t love him, how can I? I’m so broken, we all are, and within us, there’s something ugly that lives—a place where no such things as love can grow.
“If you won’t marry Nadine,” I start, to distract myself from the yawning chasm of pain opening up within me, “who will you court at the debutante ball?”
Over the holidays, our elite social lives kick-start with an event for all the engagements and courtships to be announced. As an eligible debutante, I have to go, I have to be presented, but I’ll see no offers that night.
He side-steps my question. “I hear you want to bring a date to the ball.”
I thin my lips and, on instinct, look over at the throng of teachers. Eric watches me with a question in his stare. But it’s a distant look, devoid of the emotions writhing within me—and not for him, either.
“Where do these rumours grow?” I mimic him and play innocent. “Seems they come from thin air.”
Finally, the song ends and slowly eases into a lively jig that neither of us are all that interested in dancing to. I untangle myself from him and, as he bows, I curtsey. I don’t put much passion into the robotic movement.
He doesn’t allow my escape. Not completely. As I find my way back to the others, he’s on my heels, shadowing me through the hall. It’s bad timing to rejoin them.
They’re making their way over to the haunted house and I have no desire to go with them. But that familiar cold grip takes my arm. I look at Dray’s hand, his spiders wrapped around above my elbow, and he steers me along with the others.
But I see, ahead, Eric leaving the hall. I pull out of Dray’s reach and shove into the crowd for my escape. As I follow Eric out of the hall, a set of steely eyes burns into my back. At the doors, I pause and look over my shoulder. Dray is looking at me, at first there’s doubt on his face, then understanding seems to sink in and he’s looking murderous.
With cold fear in my belly, I leave.
Chapter 8
I bury myself in homework at the library to pass the days at the Academy. The novelty of Eric is started to wear, and no matter how many times we do it, it just never feels any better than the last.
I don’t want him catching on that my lust is dwindling. I still need him for my engagement plans.
I love you.
Those words should mean more to me, but there’s no room for love in my life. I loved Dray once. Young love, but still. And look what he did to me. So, I have to keep Eric at a distance enough to protect myself, but close enough to convince both him and my father that we should be together.
I mean, he’s kind and gentle, and he treats me well. Perfect on parchment. What other suitor can compare?
And yet, I can’t stop thinking about the Halloween Ball. It’s been over a week, and I still can’t throw it from my mind. How kind Dray was. How he looked at me. How he figured it all out.
Dray knowing what I’m doing with Eric is a colossal joke, and I might just be the punchline. He’ll interfere, he can’t help himself, and with his looks growing icier, it’s a wonder he hasn’t thrown me to the wolves, yet. He can bring down my entire world, everything I’ve built, with just that one piece of information. And he doesn’t even have to know, he can just guess, or suspect, and it’ll all be ruined.
So, I need to lay low. Keep my head down. Until the Debutante Ball, at least. That’s when I’ll make my case for Eric to my father. That’s when he’ll see how right we are together and be so moved, he’ll have little choice but to accept him.
If only Christmas could come now.
With a low groan, I drop my pencil to my workbook and run my hands over my face. The days seem to drag on by, like a carcass pulled by a lone wolf, and I still can’t seem to control my thoughts long enough to focus on my assignments.
I slump in my seat and drop my head to the table with a thud. I repeat, banging my head on the table as if to smack some sense into me.
“That won’t make you any smarter,” Dray’s familiar, cold voice slithers out like a snake through grass. “But I doubt you can get much dumber, so what’s the harm?”
With a weary sigh, I look up at him from beneath my lashes. He wears his all-black ski gear and shrugs off the lumpy jacket. Sheathed in a tight black sweater, he drops into the chair across from me.
“Don’t you have animals to torture or something?” I mumble. This is the first time since Halloween that he’s spoken to me, and I doubt it comes with friendly intentions.
He arches his brow over his icy eye. “Isn’t that what I’m doing?”
My eyes roll to the back of my head, then I start stacking up my books. Hanging around for him to strike isn’t what I’m keen on doing. Before I can bring my bag to my knees, he leans over the table, his arms folded in front of him. The material of his sweater strains against his biceps.
“Are you fucking Eric Digger?”
I reel back, as if struck. The last thing I expected was for him to come right out and say it. I stare at him, shook, and my grip goes limp on my bag.
“Am I what?”
Deny, deny, deny. Better than admitting to something he should never know.
He studies me, long and hard, and his eyes seem to darken into pools of deep grey. “How long?” he asks. I notice his fists clench.
“I don’t know what you’re—”
He slams his hand down on the table so hard that I flinch. The librarian looks over at us, prepared to tell us off, but she sees who made the loud bang, then busies herself with her work.
Dray’s fierce eyes pin me to the seat. “Don’t you fucking lie to me, Liv.”
My heart rinses in my chest. I try hard to keep my face smooth and eyes free of fear, but my hands ball into fists on my lap and I have to go rigid to stop the shudder from creeping over me.
“Why do you care?” I whisper, aware of the sets of eyes zoned in on us. “It’s my private business, Dray. You think because you were nice to me one night, you get an invitation into my life?”
“I’m in your life forever, whether you like it or not,” he hisses back at me. “Our families are tied. Always will be—”
“Yeah, but when I marry Eric, I’ll see the back of you forever,” I spit at him and stuff my books into my bag. “Even if it means letting go of my old life, then so be it. I’ll do anything to get away from you.”
He watches me stumble to my feet. I pull the satchel strap over my shoulder, looking down at him, his long lashes shrouding his eyes in shadows.
“You won’t marry him,” he says.
I lean down, fueled by a surge of rage that breaks through my fear, and I sneer at him. “Stay out of my life, Dray. You mean nothing to me. So, get gone.”
I storm out of the library. He doesn’t follow me.
Courtney isn’t in the dorm room, she’s with Lolly at the village, so I get the whole room to myself. I try and fail to work my way through bouts of homework, but eventually, after the sun starts to sink into the mountains and dark skies come, I scrape up my shitty assignment and head to the basements.
I find Eric in his office, a modest meal untouched on a plate beside a stack of papers.
He doesn’t look up as I wander inside. “It’s late,” he tells me, already halfway through grading the papers from my class. “You can’t keep doing this, O. Everyone else seems to have no problem with the deadlines,” he says and looks up at me. He peels off his glasses. “I already do what I can to keep your grades afloat—can’t you work with me a little?”
&nb
sp; I throw the crappy essay onto the table, then prop myself up beside it. “No can do, sir.” A playful smile takes my mouth, but it’s forced. “Besides, no other student does all the extra credit I do,” I add with a sly smile.
His look is withering. I distract him fast, and straddle him on the seat. Running my hands over his shoulders, I feel the tension under my palms, like his body is made of rocks.
“Your last assignment wasn’t even complete, O,” he sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. “I’m an apprentice. I can’t cover for you every time your assignments are late, incomplete, or just plain poor.”
I shoot him a sour look, my mouth pinched, then snatch back the essay from the table. “Fine, I’ll hand it in tomorrow.” Before he can argue that it’s late, I add, “I need time to finish it.”
What’s the point in screwing the teacher if grades aren’t polished up? I roll my eyes and leave him to his work, not that he seems too sad to see the back of me. As I leave, Landon catches me at the door, his suspicious eyes shifting between me and Eric. But Eric doesn’t even look up from his papers, he just gestures Landon inside. I go with a heavy, cold feeling in my stomach.
I spend the rest of the evening on the essay. I have a half-dozen more just like it to finish by tomorrow, not to mention I have to write father’s latest letter back. A letter that doesn’t inspire much hope within me.
He pretty much blocked any shot of me inviting Eric to the Debutante Ball as my suitor. Mind, he’s invited on his own, as a potential suitor to all of the debutantes, but he can’t come as my date. Father made that pretty damn clear. I wouldn’t mind it so much if it didn’t mean an opening for other suitors to chase me—especially my mysterious fiancé, whose name father still holds to himself.
By the time I’ve finished up most of my assignments and written my response to father, daylight is almost creeping its way up the sky and Courtney is sound asleep in her bed. I stuff the letter in an envelope, seal it over with wax from the burning candle on the desk, and head to the main foyer to the post-box.
The wooden floorboards are cold against my sock-clad feet as winter truly sets outside. The snow is thickening, the air is cooling, and I can see the faint traces of my breath in front of my face. Once I drop the letter in the post-box, I head to the mess hall for an early breakfast. If I eat now, before the morning crowd storms the school, I can keep working on my homework without too long of a break. Can’t let my grades slip without risking my plans for Eric. It’s my top priority to keep them up.
Bluestone Elites (A Paranormal Bully Academy Romance) Page 5
