Page 71 of Pretty Secrets

But Eden? Damn. The girl is strong. The more I learn, the more I respect her for things other than her banging legs and tight ass. She’s living in her dead sister’s room, pledging her society, practically walking in the ghost of her footsteps. Not once has she mentioned uprooting her whole life, but that has to be the case. Doing it for her parents since Delilah was the good girl. The one who—even if unconventionally by our society standards—was going to do something with her life. Eden was always the sister they brushed under the rug. Out of sight, out of mind. People telling jokes about how she was probably pregnant on the West Coast because she never showed up to shit.

Instead, she was living her life. Like me. Until I got dragged back, and she did too. We’re more alike than she thinks and I care to admit.

Barclay walks into the room. He’s dressed in his normal class attire—button-up shirt, suit jacket hanging open. I’m still trying to figure this motherfucker out. He’s not here to teach Economics, and the reveal of his secret clearly says he’s not here for the Knights either.

So, why the fuck is he here?

I can’t just ask him because he’d laugh in my face. I haven’t told Grandfather about his secret, and I don’t plan on it either. Barclay isn’t my concern, but the more he’s around, the more I understand him too. He was always such a gigantic asshole, walking around like he was God’s gift. Still does, actually, but in Jarvis Hall, it’s mellowed.

He doesn’t greet me with a smile, but he does peer up the steps, searching for the girl we’ve all been orbiting around. “The Knights won’t stay quiet for long.”

“Maybe they’re waiting for their feet to heal?”

He chuckles. “Like they give a fuck. I think it just means their next test will be hard. The anticipation is killing me.”

I grunt in response. It’s hard to compare these Trials to my own. Everything was a blur back then. I didn’t take shit seriously. I was in my burn-the-world-down phase, acting out because Grandfather was trying to take pity on me, and I really didn’t want anything from him except an explanation as to why my father was no longer around.

I never got one.

It wasn’t until I got kicked out of the Knights while a Fledgling that I understood he’d been trying to help me in his own way. But even then, I saw it as him trying to make me in his own image. He wanted me to be the rule follower, to toe the line, to be the perfect Jarvis.

That’s when I lost my shit and left, rid myself of this fucking world. I had no parents to track me down. No one to look after me. A year later, I came crawling back like a little bitch. I should’ve stayed gone. Now, here I am, getting a second chance, and I’m back in the same boat. I should be taking everything I know about Eden right to him. Instead, I’m keeping it close to the vest. A crisis of fucking conscience is the only thing I can chalk it up to. Every day, I tell myself I’m going to go to him with every scrap of information I know, only I don’t. She’ll come downstairs looking sad or like she has a fire inside her, and I can’t extinguish that. No matter how hard I try to talk myself into doing what Grandfather’s asked of me, I can’t.

He’ll get suspicious soon, though. He’s an untrusting old fuck, but I don’t suppose you get to where he has by trusting anybody.

I hate him. I’ve dreamed about putting a bullet in his head and carving my name into his body so he knows it was me…along with the messageFor Dad.

“You seem grumpy,” Barclay notes.

“Aren’t I always?”

“Yeah, it’s just worse today. You have this wholedon’t fucking talk to melook on your face.”

“Yet, you’re still fucking talking…”

He grins. “I’m not pandering to your tantrums, Jarvis. We’re here for Eden, and that’s it.”

“Are we, though?” I ask, anger building inside me. I guess I am in a damn mood. “Because it sounded like you were here for a different reason. I mean, other than the revelation that you want to fuck our little charge up there.”

Barclay’s face hardens. “Get over yourself for one fucking day. Go get fucking laid.”

“That’s another thing,” I growl out. “How long are we going to wait to give Eden her reward? We all know what it is.”

Barclay shakes his head. “You’re a caveman.”

“No, I’m a realist. They obviously had a good time, but he alone won’t satisfy her. You saw how she—”

“I felt it,” he grinds out, hands turning to fists. “I tasted every last drop, so I know.”

Standing, I go toe-to-toe with him. “It should’ve been me.”

“Except you backed away like a coward, so a man had to do the job.”

I swing. It’s reckless and uncontrolled, and Barclay easily shifts out of the way as if he was avoiding a darting mosquito. I roar, angrier that I missed than at what he said. “Don’t push my fucking buttons.”

His jaw hardens. “Think from her point of view, Leo. Her best friend revealed his feelings and fucked her. Whether she liked it or not, she doesn’t need to worry about two other cocks right now.”

“Even the prince said her fantasy was all of us. It was his idea.” I don’t know why I’m so irate about this. Maybe because I think if I fuck her, I’ll be able to get it out of my system andthengo to Grandfather. That would be ideal. My body just wants to sink inside her so bad.

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