“Why me? What did I ever do to draw his attention? Was I too outspoken or too weak?”
“You mustn’t think like that, sweet-tart,” Marcus rumbles. “You’ll drive yourself senseless.”
Cassian snarls out a growl. “I’m putting you on a plane tonight. Enough is enough.”
I look up at him so sharply it makes my head ache. “That’s no longer an option,” I whisper. “There’s… there’s more going on now. I’ll tell you when we reach the headmaster’s office.”
“There is nothing that could change my mind. Juniper, he’ll kill you—or worse, mate you.”
I shiver at the thought.
“Hear her out,” Marcus says quietly.
We reach the headmaster’s office, and he immediately ends his phone call and ushers us into the room.
He shakes his head sadly, ginger mustache twitching. “Pack Wells, asking if I had any more information on Trinity. It’s a saints-damned shame…”
I shoot him a hard look. “You should have taken the trade. Trinity’s life is worth it.”
“And yours isn’t?” Marcus growls.
“What trade?” Cassian grits out, his voice tight. His whole body is tense, the muscles in his shoulders twitching with alpha energy.
I stare down the headmaster but speak to Cassian. “If Fairhaven expelled its omega students, the Soldiers said they would return Trinity alive. They made their demands during the chaos of Fallen. But the administration won’t make the trade because of me.” I look over my shoulder at Cassian. “Because I have a special form of magic and need to be protected at all costs.”
“What magic?”
“An affinity we’re calling extra-cognition.”
“If you truly do have an affinity, Headmaster Langford is right not to have taken the trade. Your life is infinitely more important than Trinity’s.”
“Who are you to decide that?”
He stares at me, alpha challenge in his eyes. “Someone part of something far bigger than you know or would understand.”
I’m just about to mouth off, to tear into this alpha who thinks he can make decisions about my life when Marcus cuts in, his voice deceptively calm.
“Juniper is in danger.” He tosses the packet down on the headmaster’s desk. “You’ve seen one of these images. I don’t know if you’ve seen the rest. And I imagine you might recognize this.” He carefully unrolls Trinity’s scribe and sets it down on top of the packet.
“That belongs to Miss Wells!”
“It was driven into the door of Miss Rose’s cottage through the packet beneath it. We found it this morning. Something must be done about Andrew Radcliffe. He’s a clear and present danger to my client.”
“My hands are tied. I expelled him. I had him investigated by the Fairhaven police department. The board has overruled me in all academic matters and the police refused to prosecute.” His eyes flick to me, pity written plain on his ruddy face. “Miss Rose, your own father is a member of the board and voted to overturn his expulsion.”
I sit before I fall, dropping into the chair, a hand going over my mouth. “He-he what? After Rad tried to…” Saints, I feel faint. Sick and dizzy.
I will fucking end him. Cassian’s thoughts whip through my mind, a lethal calmness belying the violence he wants to wreak on Andrew Radcliffe. And beneath that deadly calm, he roils like a storm-swept ocean, waves of desperate concern crashing against a love so tender it brings tears to my eyes.
I shake my head, trying to sever our connection, sick at the thought of intruding on my past love’s private thoughts. But those thoughts… they’re all aboutme.
* * *
Luca is finally permitted backinside the wards that night and he holds me while I sob, while I mourn everything that could have been: our quiet life together in another country, a life of my choosing away from my family’s machinations.
Trinity’s safe return.
“I don’t want this,” I weep. “This affinity. I don’t want to be some special omega with powers that haven’t been seen in centuries.”
