Page 116 of Endless Anger
Tag doesn’t seem to mind at all that I missed our date. He shows up at my desk in Politics of Conservation, propping his elbows on the edge and grinning while I explain what happened.
Well. I leave out the part about Asher fingering me in the library. Frankly, I’ve been trying to forget about it myself, and I don’t want to make Tag feel like I ditched him solely to fuck around with someone else.
Even though I made it clear the date was platonic, it still feels shitty.
Not to mention the whole blood fiasco. The school didn’t officially confirm or deny anything, but I know what blood looks and smells like. And the only way to get that much is for something—or someone—to have been systematically drained of it.
Not to mention the Death’s Teeth emblem painted on the wall above it.
“You look like you haven’t slept in weeks,” Tag says, tapping the desk with a rolled stack of papers. “So I’ll be honest. I feel like that’s a good punishment for you standing me up.”
I rub my eyes, too tired to even care that it’s smudging my makeup.Aurora, whose room I’ve been crashing in to avoid an invite from Asher, snores like a fucking freight train.
But I wasn’t sleeping well before anyway, so it’s not like it matters exactly where I spend my nights staring at the ceiling, wondering if I’m in actual danger or if I’m just some beacon for terrible luck.
Maybe Dean Bauer is right, and the incidents are my fault—not by active involvement, of course, but maybe my aura is attracting unfortunate events.
Or maybe someone wants me to leave campus so bad, they’re willing to literally slaughter other students to achieve that goal.
No part of me would be surprised if that asshole was Beckett. He clearly sees me as a threat to whatever community he’s trying to build here in our last semesters.
“I think I’m losing my mind,” I admit, dropping my face into my hands.
“I’m flattered,” Tag replies. “But not worth all that. Besides, I wound up having a good time anyway. You’re now looking at a volunteer set designer for the play.”
My brows lift. “I didn’t know you had a set design interest.”
“Eh, I don’t. But that girl you’re friends with, Yuri what’s-her-name? She’s the coordinator or something, and I’mveryinterested in getting closer to her.”
“Moved on from me already?”
He holds up his hands. “Hey, a guy can’t wait around forever, though Iwilltake payment for your sins in the form of you going to a Curator party with me.”
Groaning, I fold my arms on my desk and bury my face in my elbows. I will never understand this campus’s obsession with that stupid group or its parties, but since I already ditched him once, I tell him I’ll see him later tonight.
Beckett’s eyes find me from the front of the classroom where he’s been chatting up Professor Ouellette for the past ten minutes, much to her dismay. She’s seated behind her desk, pumping hand sanitizerinto her palm and listening to him with a mildly irritated look on her face.
The gold ring she wears on her left hand is bright against her brown skin and new. I wonder when that happened and if her partner is aware of the history that comes with the founding families. Even the ones who removed themselves from Fury Hill but have somehow found their way back.
Eventually, Beckett breaks away from the professor, and she turns around to write on the whiteboard. Instead of taking a seat, Beckett meanders over to me, joined by Eli and Tiernan something.
“We missed you at Avernia’s midterm budget meeting.” Beckett’s smarmy smile sends a shiver across my skin as he places a hand on my desk.
I scoff but don’t reply, opening up my notes from last week.
“It felt a little weird having discussions about where to allocate school funds without some chick sitting in the back row questioning every single bullet point,” Tiernan adds. “You’ve been a little subdued lately though.”
“Guess we have Anderson to thank for that.” Beckett cocks a brow, taunting me. “Though I can’t figure out for the life of me why a promising student like him would want to slum it with trash.”
“Aw, are you jealous?” I lean forward, returning his overly-sweet grin. “You wish it was you he was obsessed with, don’t you? I’d heard rumors that you were into powerful men, but I didn’t realize that extended to students too.”
He narrows his eyes. “Notallstudents. Just that one.”
“Why? You do realize he doesn’t give a shit about you, right?”
Tiernan crosses his arms. “What, like he cares about you or something? The dude seems seriously unbothered.”
Eli doesn’t say a word, tracing his index finger over a big AC carved into one of the desks.
