Page 11 of Riot House
He couldmakeme stand down. If he wanted to, he could involve Dash, and the two of them could vote that I stay away from Elodie until the end of fucking time. House rules. We try to avoid forcing each other to do anything most of the time, it only winds up with someone getting hurt, but it wouldn’t be an unprecedented move. Pax really must like the look of Elodie, which makes me want her even more.
She alreadyismine, though, and this claim he’s trying to make on her is boiling my fucking blood. “Ten days, Pax. Go see your Mom in Prague afterward.”
He looks horrified. “Why the hell would I dothat?”
“All right. Fine. You get the boat. Two weeks in June. But I so much ashearyou’ve been making Molotov cocktails again and I’ll call in the fuckinggendarmerie.”
If anything, this only seems to make the smile on the piece of shit’s face spread even wider. God, what the fuck am I doing? This is going to be an unmitigated disaster. I can already feel it in my bones. “Stop crowing. I can hear the laughter bouncing around the inside of your thick skull from here,” I grumble, spinning back around to face my desk. I won’t be able to write anymore. I know I won’t. I’m relieved that ownership of Elodie Stillwater has been cleared up, but there’s a rank taste in my mouth that I can’t shake now.
I made a copy of her file with all her personal contact information a week after I took the photo. I considered calling her before she even arrived, just so I could hear her voice and stop driving myself mad with wondering what she would sound like. I’d managed to show a little restraint, though. But I couldn’t stop myself from texting after our English class. I’d wanted to rile her up. To watch her reaction from afar. Annoyingly, she’d barely reacted at all. She’d been confused at first, because she didn’t know the number, I’m assuming, but then her face had gone blank.
No fear. No anger. No irritation. The only emotion I saw cross her face, from my casual lean against the wall fifteen feet away, was a brief flicker of amusement, at which point she’d tucked her phone back into her pocket and jogged up the steps towards the biology labs without a backward glance.
“Why are you so dead set on this girl, anyway?” Pax asks, making a hell of a noise as he purposefully fires the lid on a can of pringles across the room, jams his hand inside, pulls out a stack of chips and stuffs them into his mouth.
I tap out a sentence, focusing on my laptop screen. “She’s nothing. She’s unimportant.”
“Bullshit, Jacobi. You haven’t shown the slightest bit of interest in a girl since Mara and you know it.”
BANG!
I think I just shattered my laptop’s screen.
I shouldn’t have slammed it closed so hard, but then again Pax shouldn’t have just uttered that name within my earshot. He knows better than that. Closing my eyes, I inhale a shaky, uneven breath, trying to level out the rage spiking in my bloodstream. “I’m glad we ironed out a deal withThe Contessa,” I grit out through my teeth. “You gotta get the fuck out of my room, though, dude. I’m serious. I gotta get this paper done. I need to clear my head, and I can’t do that with you bringing that shit up, yeah?”
I wait for Pax to argue. Arguing is second nature to him; he grew up in a house full of lawyers. For better or for worse, he chooses to keep a civil tongue in his head instead. “All right, man. No drama. I’m gonna head down to Cosgroves’ and grab some beers. You want something?”
I clench my jaw so hard that it cracks when I force my mouth open to speak. “Not beer. A forty of Jack,” I tell him.
“Whew. Going big on a school night. My favorite kind of Jacobi.” He leaves, humming a raucous song under his breath, and I sit very still, with an image of Elodie Stillwater blazing in my mind.
Why am I so dead set on her?
Because she’s innocent, and I’m not.
Because she’s wholesome, and I’m not.
Because she’s untainted, and I’m not.
And, most importantly of all, because she’ll besopretty when I make her cry.
5
ELODIE
“We should have met yesterday,Ms. Stillwater, but I’ve found that giving a student a day or two to settle in can be helpful. I knew Carina would do a good job of showing you around. She’s a good girl. A good friend, if you’re in the market for one. I apologize for putting you all the way up there on the fourth floor, but four-sixteen was our only available room. I hope you’re comfortable enough. Please pass on our apologies to your father. Colonel Stillwater was very clear that he wanted you situated on the second floor, but there’s nothing we can do right now. Maybe next semester—”
“Really, Principal Harcourt, it’s not a problem. I don’t mind being on the fourth floor.” Yes, it’s a pain in the ass having to hike all the way up those stairs, but apart from being in such close proximity to Damiana and the blistering cold in my room it doesn’t really make much of a difference where I sleep in this godforsaken place. It’s all the same to me.
Principal Harcourt nods, fidgeting in her chair. Her office is imposing, just as old and drafty as the rest of Wolf Hall, but it’s light and airy and feels less oppressive than the rest of the academy. The woman herself is in her late forties, with a touch of steel grey in her long dark hair that’s swept back into an uncompromising chignon. Her eyes are a little distracted, unfocused as they flit around the room, landing on everything from her academic texts, the plaques on her walls, and the wilting peace lily in the pot on her desk, but never resting on me.
“I had the pleasure of meeting your father once. Quite an intimidating man,” she says breathily.
Intimidating? She really doesn’t know the half of it. I fiddle with the apple I’m holding in my hands, worrying at its stalk. The inch-long woody stem snaps off in my fingers, and I let it fall to the floor. “Yes. He’s very well respected.” I could say so much more. I could tell her about the nights I spent twisted up and afraid beneath my bedsheets, wondering if he was going to burst through my bedroom door at any moment. She’d understand then how unimportant the location my bedroom here at Wolf Hall really is to me, so long as I’m as far away from him as is physically possible.
“Now,” the principal says awkwardly, opening up the top drawer of her desk. She takes out a sheet of paper and sets it down in front of her, sliding it toward me. “I hate to have to go through this with you, but I’m afraid it’s academy policy. Here at Wolf Hall, there are a number of things we do not tolerate. As you’ll see from this student-faculty agreement, the use or possession of drugs is strictly prohibited. We also do not allow any sort of…carousing. Ahem. Contact of a sexual nature is also prohibited. No members of the opposite sex on any of our female or male floors. No inappropriate touching, or…or…well, you can read for yourself there, can’t you. You can leave the academy on the weekends, but doors are locked by nine o’clock sharp. During the week, you must remain here on school grounds. From Monday through Friday, leaving Wolf Hall for any reason without prior written permission from myself or another member of the teaching staff is taken very seriously. There are other items on the list that you can review at your own leisure. I take it none of that will be an issue for you, though?”
“No, of course not.” Jesus. Who does she think I’m going to be getting hot and heavy with? And I’ve never stepped foot in New Hampshire before; as far as I’m concerned, this place might as well be the seventh circle of hell and there’s no way out for me.
