It’s what I tell myself, anyhow.
But I’m not the only one who could go. Maybe it would solve her problem, but me breathing in this very room means it hasn’t, and that means I have problems of my own.
I think of the way Storm threw his arms around Lydia when she stood on unsteady steps on the threshold of the closet door.
She had a stuffed bear clutched in one hand, blood soaked into the brown fur.
Storm is less than a year younger than her, but he seemed even more so then.
He was covered in blood, but he never saw any of the actual carnage, despite the fact Cassia has never forgiven me for what I did that weekend.
Storm’s arms were so tight around her.
He stroked her back, because he couldn’t reach her hair, given their height difference at the time.
She didn’t hug him back.
She was dead, even then.
But I heard her cry.
The only time I ever have.
Cassia cuts her eyes to me and I have the uncanny sensation—not for the first time—she can read my mind.
She lifts her chin and stares down her slender nose at me.
I know that look.
It’s one she usually gives before she slits a man’s throat.
And I know there’s a blade on her somewhere, no matter that this meeting is supposed to be “friendly.” Nothing with us ever is.
I promised her, like Hawthorn, I was here briefly, and I could put more work in her books.
I don’t blame her for loathing me and the leash I have her on. The torment I put her through.
But it won’t stop me, and she has no idea it’s going to getso much worse.
She ruined my life once.
But I’ve made sure she’s paid for every day since.
It’s still not enough. And it won’t be until she’s mine.
I’ll kill each of her children if I have to, in order to make it so.
CHAPTER
THIRTY
SLOANE
The castle turrets blot out the graying sky. There is no rain, not yet, but the clouds hold onto it, and the sun is momentarily gone. It brings the chill back, not quite as cool here as in the mountains, and I turn to look at Storm by my side as cars zip downtown behind us, and my mouth is hanging open at the sight before me.
It reminds me of the streets of Edinburgh I’ve spent countless hours watching on my phone, hoping to go, looking at flights, searching for the perfect hotel, hanging up prints in my bedroom.
When I graduate, it will be real. But for now,thistowering gray castle built in a downtown city outside of Raleigh, it will do.
