Page 102 of Riot Rules
The gazebo is in darkness when we reach the center of the maze. The octagonal building isn’t very large—maybe only three hundred square feet—but it’s comfortable inside. I unlock the door with one of three keys in existence (guess who has the other two), gesturing for Carrie to go inside first.
She’s uncomfortable, I can tell. She shifts from one foot to the other as I turn on the small lamp on the bookshelf and quickly begin to build a fire in the grate.
Her stony, clipped voice breaks the silence. “Don’t bother with that. We aren’t gonna be here long enough for it to make a difference.”
I ignore her. Outside, it’s a lot warmer than it has been recently, but Carrie came down here in nothing but thin sweatpants, a t-shirt and an oversized cardigan. I’m already responsible for breaking her heart. I won’t be held accountable for her catching pneumonia, too.
She huffs, but she doesn’t object further. I’m glad of the extra seconds of silence, of something to do with my hands and an objective to focus on while I try not tofreak the fuck out.It’s been a long time since Carrie and I were alone together. This feels stupendously important. I have to be careful not to do anything or say anything to fuck this up.
Soon, orange tongues of flame lick at the throat of the chimney, leaping kind of high, actually, and there’s nothing else left to do but face her.
She’s looking around, surveying the books on the shelves, and the rug, and the lamps, and the mirror above the mantel, her expression warlike. “You realize how ridiculous this is, don’t you?” she whispers. “This place is on academy grounds and somehow it belongs to Riot House. It’s an unspokenfact. It’s just…yours. No one else can come here.”
“Not if they want all ten fingers and toes intact.”
With a derisive huff, she shakes her head. “You’re not even going to deny the special treatment, are you?”
“Why should I? This was Fitz’s territory up until a couple of years ago. He brought seniors here to screw them. Pax and I started showing up here sohewouldn’t. We staked our claim. No one challenged us for it. This place wasn’t given to us, love. We took it.”
“Don’t youdare.” Her voice breaks on the last word. “You don’t have any right to call me that. I don’t give a shit if it is a throw-away term that doesn’t mean anything to you. You don’teverget to use that word when you talk to me. Not ever again.”
“Carrie—”
She hurls something down on the ground at my feet. It lands with a loud slap and skids across the rug, colliding with my shoe. Instead of looking down to see what it is, I lock my gaze on her, refusing to look away. “It was never a throw-away term with you. Idoknow what that word means.” She’s about to snap back at me, but I stop her before she can speak. “Why did you tell Elodie that we were only together a couple of days back at the café? You rewrote our entire history.”
She shakes her head, anger twisting her features. Even furious like this, she’s still breathtaking. “Why do you think? I was embarrassed. I didn’t want her knowing how long I let you manipulate me for.”
“I didn’t manipulate you. I never lied to you once.”
She clenches her jaw. “Juststop. You tricked me for months. I let you do that. That’s on me.” She pulls her cardigan tighter around her body. “But I’ve learned my lesson now. You can’t look me in the eye and make me…make me feel…” She pants, as if the things she can’t say are causing her great pain. “I’ll never believe a word out of your mouth again, so quit wasting your breath and pick up the book.”
It's hopeless, then. Since Alderman’s phone call, when he told me to make it up to Carrie, I’ve spent every waking moment trying to figure out how I might do that. A part of me was so sure that if I looked her in the eye, explained everything, and told her how much I loved her, that she’d recognize my sincerity and know that I was being truthful. She never will, though. She’ll see the honesty and the pain in my eyes, and she’ll attribute both to impressive acting skills. I’m screwed, no matter how I handled this.
It reallyisover.
I bend down and pick up the book—that’s what she threw at my feet—turning it over in my hands. It’s heavy. Bound beautifully, the leather soft as butter and supple beneath my fingertips. “What is this?” I flip it open. Inside, the pages are covered in loopy black and blue ink—very girly, childish handwriting covering every page.
“Mara’s journal. The last few pages are off. They don’t read like the rest of the entries. None of it really makes sense. It feels as if she’s trying to implicate Wren in something.” Carrie sniffs, holding the back of her hand to her mouth. Her eyes shine brightly, wet with tears that she obviously doesn’t want to shed.
“Wren?” I leaf through the pages, turning to the back, trying to find what she’s talking about. “That’s bullshit. We should burn it. Why would she have tried to implicate him in something?”
“I don’t know! This has nothing to do with me. It never has. I shouldn’t even be here right now!”
“You’re right. I’m sorry.” I whisper. “God. It’s just…after everything, the drugs, the deal with Fitz…I just don’t want any of this coming back to hurtanyof us down the line, okay?”
Carrie’s face crumples into an unhappy grimace. She steps toward me—the closest she’s been in an age—and takes the book from me. “We can’t burn it. The cops need to know. What if there’s something important in here? What you’re asking me to do…It isn’t fair. There have got to be consequences. He can’t just—” She stops talking, a miserable sob working free from her. Her tears have finally spilled over, and they’re flitting down her cheeks. “He can’t be allowed to get away with it again. What if…what if he hurts someone else. What if he hurts Elodie?”
“You’ve gotta be kidding.” How can she even suggest such a thing? She’s seen the way the bastard looks at Elodie. She knows how much he cares about her. For better or for worse now, we all do. I know Wren would never hurt Elodie, and Carrie knows it, too. “You know Wren didn’t do shit to Mara, besides call her a ho in the dining hall. You’re lashing out at him because you’re mad at me, and for once, he doesn’t deserve it. You know this has more to do with Fitz than it does with him.”
The stubbornness I used to find so endearing when Carrie and I were together rears its head; her eyes are hard. Two tiny little lines crease the skin between her eyebrows. The expression, coupled with her tears, make me want to fucking die. “Maybe it doesn’t. Even more reason to report this to the cops.He’sdangerous, too, Dash. You know he is. We can’t allow someone else to suffer because ofhim, either. Not because we’re too chicken shit to speak up, for fuck’s sake.”
She just wants to fight. She’s swinging so wildly from Wren to Fitz that the two of them might as well be interchangeable. This isn’t about them. This is about me, and what I did to her. At long last, I’m a little rankled. “Look. You have no idea what you’re talking about. How can you know she wasn’t high when she wrote that? She was out of her mind ninety percent of the fucking time. Mercy saw to that. Just throw it into the fire and let’s just wash our hands of this entire thing.”
“But Elodie—”
“I know she’s your friend, Carrie, but I don’t know the girl. If you care about her so much, then make sure she stays the hell away from him. Shouldn't be too hard. He'll forget all about her soon enough, and then you won't have to concern yourself with her safety anymore.”
“How can you be so cold? How can you be so detached from this?”
