by Rachel Shane
Keane shrugged. “But you’re planning on following in your dad’s footsteps…”
I opened my mouth to protest, but he shut his menu and it felt like he was closing that subject as well. He lifted his glass toward me. “To new beginnings and reaching our destination at the end.” He winked. “I hope mine includes you.”
God he was good, switching subjects with such ease and making me feel at ease in the process. That was exactly what I needed. Someone who knew what I needed. I practically melted into a puddle right there.
We ordered fancy items on the menu with French names I couldn’t pronounce but Keane assured me I would love. I assured him I wasn’t a picky eater and I’d be game to try everything. Except maybe intestines. He adjusted the order accordingly and I tried not to widen my eyes that he’d wanted to order some in the first place. We laughed as we scooped petits pois à la Française, which Keane explained was a fancy way of saying frothy lettuce soup with onion custard. Yes. Lettuce soup. And it was fucking delicious.
That course was followed by fillet mignon for me and lobster for him, both dripping in the richest butter sauce I’d ever tasted. He let me taste his, though he insisted on feeding it to me. I leaned forward and he held his fork out. I wrapped my mouth around it seductively, in an attempt to show him all the things I could do with it. His mouth practically watered watching me.
And then he ordered dessert. All of them.
My eyes bulged at the decadent cheese plate with several different stinky wedges. The Grand Marnier soufflé that looked too good to destroy with a fork. The macarons in pastel colors, each a work of art in themselves. Tahitian vanilla crème brûlée. Homemade chocolate truffles dipped in powdered sugar.
Everything smelled amazing, with sweet and spicy scents mixing together to form an aroma I wanted to bottle and spritz on myself.
He nudged the plate of cheese toward me. “Try the brie. It’s exquisite.”
My eyes said yes but my stomach protested with sharp pains. I’d already stretched it to the limit. Still, I stuck my fork in and pulled off a small amount. It melted in my mouth like butter and I squeezed my eyes shut in utter pleasure. This was better than every orgasm I’d ever had.
He lifted a lime green macaron from the plate and brought it to his lips. He practically let out a moan as he bit down. Screw being full. I tasted a bite of every dessert and with each one I wanted to die right there so that it would be my last meal. “Holy crap. Every single one tastes better than the one I just tried.”
“I bet I could top them.” He grinned at me in a way that sent my insides dancing. His eyes focused on my lips and I got his meaning. A kiss.
“Well then,” I said, running my tongue over my lips in a way that practically had him salivating. “I’d like to try that too.”
He lifted his hand in the air. “Check please.” We both laughed, earning sharp glares from the neighboring couples.
When the check arrived, Keane swiftly stuffed his credit card inside the leather case without bothering to look at the amount. In a few minutes, he’d paid and held out my jacket for me. I wobbled as we walked to the exit, feeling tipsy from the two glasses of wine and the sharp direction this semester had taken. I hadn’t expected to fall for Keane and I’d certainly never expected to talk to him in public, even if public was technically an hour and a half away from campus.
He tugged me down a hallway lit with twinkling vine lights. “I want to show you something before we leave.”
We turned another hallway until we entered an indoor forest. Leafy trees circled the perimeter, providing shade. Bright flowers popped to life throughout the room. A lone bench sat in the center of the room, surrounded by foliage on all sides. The twinkling lights twirled around branches and vines while paper lanterns swung from the ceiling, giving the place a magical glow. He led me to the bench.
He swept his fingers behind my neck, curling into my hair and pulled me close. Heat instantly magnified in my chest as our lips connected. His were soft and gentle and tasted like sugar and chocolate and everything I needed. I wrapped my arms around him, knotting my fingers in the tufts of hair curling at the back of his neck. The intensity of the kiss increased, our lips becoming more insistent, along with our hands. Or at least mine did. They trailed down his back, grabbing and snatching and exploring. He looked so fucking hot in his artisan jean and all I wanted to do was take them off him. I scrambled for the bottom of his shirt, rubbing my hands inside, and he pulled back, breathless, panting.
He gazed at me with hungry eyes. “Maybe we should…”
“Take this to the bedroom?” I asked hopefully. The conversation might have been harder here than it ever was at Key & Lock but we didn’t seem to have a problem speaking with the rest of our bodies.
He chuckled, biting his lower lip, which was swollen from my kisses. “I was going to say stop now. Before we can’t.” He glanced at his watch. “We do have to get to the Key & Lock meeting.”
That sobered me up real quick. Kissing Keane wasn’t the only thing on my agenda tonight. Suddenly I remembered that Key & Lock was also vying for my old house. I opened my mouth to ask Keane but he tilted his head to me. “Hey, there’s something I’ve been meaning to talk to you about.” He swept a lock of hair behind my ear, making me swoon. “I heard a rumor you were running one of the groups going after the vacant house on Walnut Ave.”
I bit my lip. “And I heard Key & Lock wants it.”
He nodded, twisting my hair around his fingers. “We do want it.” He leaned in, brushing his lips along my ear lobe. His warm breath sent shivers down my spine. “So…do you really need it? The podcast network is doing amazing without it.”
I swallowed hard. He was right, but the current situation wasn’t sustainable. Somehow, I had created more of a claustrophobic mess for myself than before. Now we had people traipsing into our house to use the basement and record their programs, taking away even more space that could have been used for privacy. “We need it. I’m suffocating in that house.” My stomach squeezed when Trevor’s name left my lips. “Why does Key need it?”
He grinned and kissed my nose, trying to play this off as cute. “I can’t tell you.”
I squinted at him, my heart beating fast. “But—I’m a member of the group. We share everything.”
His thumb traced circles over the back of my wrist. “I can’t tell you…yet.”
My heart pricked at his words. “Why not?” We told each other everything!
He knelt in front of me, taking my hands. “Because I want it to be a surprise. We’ve got a big reveal tonight and I don’t want to spoil it. After all, you gave me the idea for it the night of the ritual.”
Tonight. At the meeting. In a few hours. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to let me in on his secrets, it was that he didn’t want to ruin the effect of the planned reveal.
For now I could only count down the minutes until then, until I could decide where my loyalties lied. With old Rho Sig. Or with Key & Lock.
WE BARELY SPOKE ON the car ride to the Key & Lock meeting but Keane wore a crazy grin he couldn’t shake off, and I knew he was excited about whatever the announcement was. He even dropped me back at my house so I could change before heading over…and so we wouldn’t be seen together. I swallowed against the lump in my throat and reminded myself he was just abiding by the rules. The same way he wouldn’t break his silence early.
Still, I refreshed my makeup just in case, swiping on a few more sparkles, darkening my lipstick while telling Holly all about how amazing the date was. “The kiss. Oh my God, the kiss.”
Holly eyed me like I was crazy. “If it was so amazing, why are you back already?” She eyed my changed outfit, my flirty skirt replaced with jeans and a sweater. It wasn’t a ritual night, just a regular meeting, so I didn’t have to abide by a specific dress code. Some members loved to wear all black just for shits and giggles but my best alibi was the library. My best cover was to look normal.
I froze mid-lipstick
application. “We’re meeting back up at the library,” I said fast. “I told him I have a big test Monday and so he insisted on finishing the night there.” I let out a swoony sigh, as if I thought this was the most romantic thing ever. A guy who put the girl first. A guy who chose studying academics over studying the stretch of skin between my breasts. A guy who didn’t exist because none of this was true. We’d ended the night early because he had a secret he had to reveal to me and forty of his closest buds.
I traced my lips an extra time with the coral lipstick, tilting my body so Holly wouldn’t see my shaking hand in the full-length mirror.
She let a squeal and flopped backward on her bed. “Okay, I’ll give him points for that. But tell me, who was a better kisser, him or Trevor?”
Trevor. “Him!” I forced a replay of our kiss in my mind. Because the kiss with Trevor was only good in the moment. It went very sour once the pictures were released.
“At least this way we won’t get distracted.” Even though I would very much like to be distracted in his room.
“Did you find out dirt on why his org wants the old Rho Sig house?” she asked.
“Nope. I didn’t get a chance.” I ground out the words between clenched teeth. Ever since Harrison learned I was going on a date with the very guy that was after our house, he’d switched gears from wanting to trick Key & Lock into giving us free connections to wanting the same info I wanted out of Keane. But whatever info I found, I wouldn’t be able to reveal it to my friends without jeopardizing my spot in Key & Lock.
Before Holly could grill me with any more questions I’d have to lie about, I slid on my coat and braced against the bitter wind to head to the house, suddenly feeling weirdly alone even though I’d only been apart from Keane for twenty minutes.
This time when I entered the house, I was greeted by light and cheer. Gone were the candles that gave me an ulcer just thinking about choosing the correct one. Instead I followed the light-drenched hallway into the great room. Instead of a ring of people standing around, forty-eight leather chairs were spread in rows facing forward like a movie theater. Sororities had folding chairs. Key and Lock had handcrafted leather chairs imported from Italy.
A waiter handed me a glass of bourbon swimming in ice cubes shaped like keys. I went around the room, tapping the glasses of those who had already arrived, which was an unspoken ritual. The waiter was always a former member, now graduated. It was an honor for alumni to return to the house to oversee a meeting. We all dreamed of it. Once a certain A-list Oscar winning actor served us drinks. Highlight of my life.
Whereas I couldn’t imagine returning to Rho Sigma once I graduated. Maybe to gloat.
Mild chatter flooded through the room and I answered some eager questions about Trevor and Alexis, being careful not to blow my cover. Being careful not to mention Keane. He stood across the way, one hand casually slung in the pocket of his artful jeans. I tried to catch his eye but he purposefully avoided looking in my direction. I thought being in a secret society would be exhilarating but a secret relationship—if I could call it that—sent a thrill through me. It was illicit. It was forbidden.
It wasn’t in the tabloids. It was mine, only mine.
Still, even if we were allowed to parade the fact that we’d dated—were dating?—I couldn’t imagine telling anyone here. The members knew every secret of mine stored in my pores. I’d spilled them all on video tape as part of the initial initiation. Bare all so Key & Lock could do the same. Some people even took it farther and stripped down for their confessional interviews, but that wasn’t a requirement. All that mattered was you shared something you didn’t want anyone else knowing. At the time I thought it was a bonding exercise. But now I knew better. It was collateral. Blackmail. Everything on those tapes could be used against us. Those tapes kept our lips sealed.
Some people confessed to federal crimes. Cheating on their significant others. On tests. There were eating disorders, abortions, and suicide attempts and even a girl who admitted to stabbing a frog just because she could. Everyone had a skeleton in their closet and Key & Lock always found it. And recorded it.
My confession would ruin me before my career even began.
I hadn’t lip synced my way into a career like Trevor but I’d done something nearly as bad. I’d lied and cheated my way into where I am now.
I didn’t get that national hosting gig as a kid because of my talents. I got it because of nepotism. Because I rode the coat tails of my dad’s name and fame.
I was a hack. A fraud. A person trying desperately to prove I deserved this gig on my own merit, not because the network wanted to use my dad’s name in their own publicity. The podcast has been my first chance to prove myself for real, but if this news ever got out, it would all be for naught. I’d be blacklisted everywhere.
A clink of a spoon against a glass was the signal we all needed to shuffle to our chairs. The leather breathed a sigh of relief under my weight, and I braced my arms against the sides as Keane strode toward the front of the room, every eye following him.
He took a swig of his bourbon, savoring it and making us all wait before he set it down and began the meeting. Sometimes these meetings were about mundane things. Dues. Events that needed planning. Sometimes they were recaps of our secrets, just so no one would forget them, all of us cringing as our confessions played on a giant screen. Sometimes alumni came in and traded new secrets to us. Industry secrets for whatever industry they were in. Acting. Music. Finance. Law. Last year, the President of the United States spoke with us for twenty minutes before leaving and no one in the White House except a select few even knew he was even gone.
“Let’s cut right to the chase,” Keane said, and I tilted my head at him. “As you may or may not know, Key & Lock has put in a bid for the vacant house on Walnut Avenue.”
I straightened, the hair on the back of my neck standing on end. Unlike Rho Sigma where everyone would have been a flutter of whispers at that news, we all sat forward, waiting, watching, respecting.
“We’re not the only one vying for it, but I have no doubt it’ll be ours.”
His confidence was so goddamn sexy. And scary. Because it meant that my podcast would tank and die, along with possibly the rest of my career. Somehow this whole thing had gone from me needing my own bedroom to needing the podcast to survive.
“You might be wondering why we need two houses. Here’s why.” Keane clicked a button in his hands and a movie screen came down from the wall. A projector in the back switched on and a stream of light shot toward the screen, dust particles dancing in the beam.
I held my breath.
Keane clicked a button and a student appeared on the screen, his expression somber. The camera pulled out to reveal a McDonald’s hat as the guy stood at the register, helping a customer. “This is Emile. And this is Emile’s report card from his senior year.” Keane flipped to the next slide which showed a solid B average. Next to his list of extracurriculars there was a big fast zero. “Emile got into six colleges, all well respected. But his parents both lost their jobs right before his junior year started. Their financial aid forms were due before their tax returns. The school denied them aide. And Emile was rejected from every scholarship he applied for.”
I gasped, and so did a few other people.
“Now he works at McDonald’s for nine dollars an hour, trying to save up money to go to college. He’ll have to reapply though—the schools will only defer him for one year. But it’s going to take longer than that to save up.”
My skin went cold.
Keane flipped the image to a girl weeping on her pink bedspread. “This is Michelle. She’s estranged from her parents after their messy divorce. She lives with her grandmother, but on paper, her parents are her legal guardians. She, too, got into several colleges but was denied financial aid due to her parents’ wealth. Wealth that she has no involvement in. She’s trying to get legally emancipated but the process will drag out longer than it will take to pay the first tu
ition check.”
He went on to show twenty more kids, each with a financial hardship that prevented them from receiving student loans for the colleges they got into.
“And this…” Keane clicked to another picture, this one of the gala at the Met this summer, people decked out in fancy dresses, sipping wine with smiling faces that made my stomach squeeze in sharp contrast to the sick kids. “Is the last fundraiser I put together at the met. We raised two million seven hundred dollars that night alone. But it’s not nearly enough for what I have planned.”
He clicked to another slide, this one a spreadsheet with information and numbers.
Item Cost Per Year
Throckmorton tuition $43,550
Housing & Meals $15,315
Miscellaneous Fees $1,602
Books and Supplies $1,480
Transportation $705
Personal Expenses $1,500
TOTAL $64,152
He pointed at each line in turn. “Sixty-four thousand dollars. Per year!” He shook his head in disbelief. “It costs one single student 256 thousand dollars to get a Bachelor’s degree.”
His words echoed in my head like a gong. 256 thousand. Times two. Half a million dollars to send my brother and me here.
“That’s insane. The average American barely makes more than the amount required for tuition, not including all their other expenses, like mortgages, car payments, health insurance, and that pesky thing called food. But we can do something about that.”
His voice boomed through the room. He would be a great politician. His eyes held mine for the briefest of moments and I was glad he hadn’t told me in the restaurant. I was glad I was here to experience this with everyone else.
Keane flipped to another slide, showing a group of happy, diverse students standing on Throckmorton’s quad.
“Most scholarship programs provide funds to people with good grades, sports skills, or other talents. Financial aid helps those who can’t afford tuition but at an even higher cost: student loans with interest. It’s not fair for those people to have to pay more because they can only pay less.”
