Page 83 of The Ruthless Rivalry

The thing was, though, her confession stuck with me. How her mother used to punish her, taking food away if she didn’t perform well enough. The way she’d said it, so broken, but so casually, as if it was just another part of her life. It was hard to shake off.

Blair’s voice cuts through my thoughts. “You don’t get it, do you? You tried to make things happen, but you’ve been so far up your own ass with all this family drama that you couldn’t see the simplest solution.”

I snapped back to reality, looking over at her. “You’re not helping me here, you know.”

Blair shrugged, a devil-may-care grin playing on her lips. “I’m just saying, you need to stop overthinking everything. Sometimes it’s not about trying tomakethings happen, it’s about doing the right thing when it counts.” She tilted her head, feigning innocence again. “But hey, if you want to keep blaming me for your failures, I’m happy to accept the responsibility.”

I didn’t even try to hide my annoyance. “Nice try. This isn’t about me failing. It’s about you avoiding Altair, and we both know it.” I paused, feeling the heat of my own frustration building. “And just so we’re clear, I didn’t fail.” I just…shifted tactics for one night.

Blair grinned, clearly amused by the admission. “Keep telling yourself that.”

I pulled up to our house. Blair gave me a sideways glance, still wearing that teasing grin, as she grabbed the door handle.

“Home sweet home,” I said, coming to a stop. “You good?”

She shrugged again, a look of mild annoyance flashing across her face for a second. “Yeah, whatever. I’ll survive.”

“You should really stop avoiding Altair. You’ll have to face it eventually.”

She shot me a look but didn’t respond as she got out of the car and slammed the door behind her. It was clear I wasn’t going to win this argument tonight, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t going to try. Our mother was right, she couldn’t keep avoiding the hard stuff forever. Eventually, she’d have to deal with it and learn to adjust, the same as the rest of us. We all had our own issues.

I started the engine and pulled away, heading back to campus. I waited until Blair stepped inside the building before I let my foot off the brake, the engine rumbling to life as I pulled away. I was already late for our meetup, but whatever. They could wait.

When I pulled into the parking garage, I parked the car with a sharp turn of the wheel and stepped out, already feeling the weight of the evening drag on me.

A thick, sickly sweet scent slapped me in the face as soon as I unlocked the door to my dorm room. It was like a floral shop had exploded in here and then decided to throw a party for bees. I frowned, stepping inside and flicking the light on. I waved my hand through the air, trying to clear out the assault on my senses. It didn’t just smell bad—it smelled like someone haddumped a vat of sugar on a bouquet of dead roses and left it to rot in a damp basement.

The other smell, though—the one that had lingered for days and was only getting worse—was starting to irritate me, but I’d take that over this sickly sweetness any day. At least it was subtle, and I could almost forget it was there. This, on the other hand, was like being trapped in a perfume commercial. It made my teeth hurt.

I noticed a box, sitting on my desk, the white edges of the package standing out against the dark wood. My suspicion flared up immediately. With a quick step forward, I picked it up and glanced at the note—an envelope sealed with a kiss. Fucking great.

Without so much as a glance at the thing, I tossed it into the trash, not giving a single care about the contents or the note Ophelia clearly left behind for me to find.

I rubbed a hand across my face, letting out a deep sigh. The lock on the door was getting changed tomorrow, because there was no way I was letting this circus continue. Why had I given her a key in the first place? Oh, right. I’d been too lazy to get off my ass and answer the door every time she showed up when I wanted to hookup, so I handed it over like it was some sort of exclusive VIP pass. Now? I was stuck with a permanent reminder that my laziness had led to this mess.

But of course, I knew Ophelia’s stuff was anything but cheap. Everything she owned—her perfume, her clothes—was all about luxury, the kind of stuff you had to be someone to afford. Myself included, when we were together.

I grabbed the window latch and threw it open, letting the cool night air rush in. That helped, but the smell didn’t exactly vanish. It just sort of hung there like a bad decision.

I hated being up here. The top floor of the dorm, the very thing I’d been stuck with because that’s where they stuck all theLegacies. It was supposed to be some kind of symbol—always above everyone else. Even though heights made my stomach churn, I didn’t have a say in it. I should’ve pointed that out to Blair before I dropped her off. Let her know I didn’t get to pick anything about this, not even my own room and point out we all had things we had to suck up and deal with.

I looked down, hoping for some distraction, and there she was—my little troublemaker, chatting at the fountain below.

I whipped my head around, but of course, my feet hesitated like they had a mind of their own. She was talking to someone, and for a second, I thought it was Sly. But no, she wasn’t laughing like she did when he was around. This was someone else. Definitely a female.

I rubbed my jaw, irritation bubbling up in my chest. I couldn’t even pinpoint why it bothered me so much, but there it was. I didn’t like seeing her with anyone else.

I didn’t feel the usual nagging unease creeping in, the one that always came with being this high up. Instead, I just stood there, watching, as the night air came in. It wasn’t so bad up here tonight, I guess. Maybe it was the distraction, maybe it was her. Ultimately, I chalked it up to the fumes from the perfume still lingering in the air. That stuff was suffocating.

The thought of not knowing for sure who it was down there with Prescott gnawed at me. So what did I do? Grab my camera, of course. I mean, sure, I was pretty sure it was a girl she was talking to, but I had toconfirmit, right? I wasn’t about to just stay here feeling like an idiot.

I made my way over to my closet, my eyes still trained on the window. I wasn’t about to just keep guessing. But when I reached for my camera bag, I froze.

The bag was gone. No camera. No lens. Just an empty spot where my most prized possession had been.

For a long moment, I just stared at the vacant space, the absence of the bag slowly sinking in. My brain processed it, but it didn’t make sense. I blinked a few times, thinking it was a mistake. Maybe I was just seeing things. But no. The bag wasn’t there. And neither was my camera.

Who would be stupid enough to do this? Break into my room, touch my things, and take them? Steal them like some common thief, from aLegacy?

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