Page 28 of Pretty Little Psycho

Your silence is all the response I need. See you tomorrow night, Firecracker…

Fuck. I want to scream.

Maureen

After taking two showers to get all the mud and grime off my body, I dress, grab my book bag, and head down the twisted path toward the main hall of Tenebrose Academy. I’m not more than a few feet away from The Nest when a willowy figure pops out from between the trees.

“Hi, Maur!” Jessamine shrieks, sending a flock of birds to scatter.

I jump and nearly twist my ankle on a piece of fallen dogwood. “For fuck’s sake, Jess. You have to stop scaring me like that.”

And in true Jessamine fashion, she shrugs, looking wounded and surprised all at the same time. I have to remind myself that she’s a ghost from another century and has zero awareness of her ability to defy space and time. “Ugh, sorry, Maur. I was trying to announce myself louder this time, so you didn’t think I was sneaking.”

The trees are taller and closer together than I remember from last night. It provides an eerie blanket of darkness that creates more shadows. More places for creepy things to lurk. I sigh and start walking again. “Well, it had the opposite effect. Maybe next time, try just walking up like a normal person and saying hello.”

She sticks out her lower lip in a pout. “Okay.”

I feel bad. It’s not her fault she’s a ghost. “It’s fine. I’ll get used to it.”

Her blue eyes sparkle, and she perks up again. “Are you excited for your first day of school? I remember my first day. At least, I think I do. Professor Erebus says I get my days confused.”

What the actual fuck was up with that? “Jessamine, that’s the third time you’ve brought him up. What’s the deal with you two?”

Her eyes widen. “Nothing! We’re friends. He’s not like the others.”

Oh, not like his psycho nephew who terrorizes girls he barely knows?

I’m about to press for more details when Villette calls my name from behind. “Hey, wait up!”

I turn to see her svelte figure jogging toward us. Her makeup and hair are flawless as usual. “Well, aren’t you perky in the morning,” I tease.

She laughs throatily. “The curse of having an insomniac for a brother. Someone had to be cheery in the morning.”

As we walk, I catch traces of rose, hyacinth, and the faint trace of something familiar. Something I can’t quite place. “So, are you from Raven’s Gate or did you transplant in like my dumb ass?”

Villette scrunches her nose at me. “Already hating it here, I take it?” She shakes her head and laughs. “No, I’m from Ever Graves.”

Jessamine skips around us as we walk. “Villette Crane,” she chants. “The prettiest girl in Ever Graves.”

I stop, making a decision that may make her wish she’d never befriended me. “I’m a Blackwell,” I say abruptly.

Villette smirks. “I know.”

“How? Oh, wait, let me guess, Riot and his hellhounds have told everyone.” Fuck. I came here to start fresh and yet I’m once again the subject of drama.

Villette fumbles with the buttons on her black cashmere sweater. She shakes her head. “It wasn’t hard to figure it out. Tenebrose only accepts students of a certain… caliber. I knew you weren’t related to anyone from Nocturnus. Or me. Plus, you are sharing an entire floor with Libra Thorn. Only founding members of Tenebrose and Ever Graves get those rooms.”

There’s so much my mother has kept from me…

I dig my heels into the soft dirt. “Can you tell me why everyone hates my family?”

Her eyes widen. “You don’t know?”

I sigh. “My mom was cut off from them when she got pregnant with me. I was raised in Wickford Hollow. I’ve never met anyone from her family, and she never talks about them.”

Villette’s face falls. She looks at me with what appears to be pity. Great.

Jessamine nods. “The ravens know.”

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