Page 76 of Kingmakers, Year Four

Tristan is paying zero attention, distracted by Cat’s friend Perry Saunders who’s hanging off his arm, babbling away at him with an expression of intense admiration plastered across her face. When he tries to escape, several more Sophomore and Junior girls surround him, drowning him in the celebrity adoration that comes from winning a challenge, even in third place.

Hedeon hasn’t asked anyone to dance. He’s standing at the edge of the sand, sipping a drink, watching everyone else. His face is deeply shadowed, the marks on his body dark as tattoos, almost seeming to writhe in the shifting firelight.

Then Cara Wilk steps into view, waving shyly to her sister. She’s dressed simply in a pale blue dress, her dark hair loose around her shoulders. She dips her bare toes into the sand, her shoes abandoned in the grass.

Before she can join Anna and Leo, Hedeon cuts across the crowd of students, roughly shouldering aside anyone who stands in his way. He blocks Cara’s path, glowering down at her.

Cara looks up at him, wide-eyed and startled, lips parted.

“Do you want to dance with me?” he grunts.

Cara’s reply is so soft that I can’t make it out over the music. She must have agreed because Hedeon pulls her onto the sand.

Anna is the ballerina, Cara the writer. Yet Cara has enough of her sister’s grace that she slips into a smooth and even sensual rhythm within the rough circle of Hedeon’s arms.

Dancing seems to relax her. Within a few minutes, she’s able to look Hedeon in the face and answer his questions without blushing too much.

Hedeon doesn’t take his eyes off hers, not for a second. His hand rests possessively on the small of her back.

Nix observes their interactions with the same interest as me.

“Opposites attract,” she says, smiling slightly.

“Do you think that’s true?” I ask her.

“Sure,” she says, her eyes locking on mine once more, Hedeon and Cara forgotten. “I’d never want to be with someone with my same flaws.”

“What flaws?” I laugh.

“Horrible temper, obviously. Always blurting out stupid things . . .”

“Not stupid,” I correct her. “Just honest.”

“I’m a grudge holder, too,” she admits. “My father never forgives. And I think . . . I’m too much like him.”

My stomach clenches. “What would you hold a grudge about?” I ask her.

“I hate being lied to,” she says, her green eyes looking into mine, unbearably clear and direct. “It’s why I’ve been so angry with my father since I came here. I thought he was honest with me. And now I realize there’s things he didn’t tell me. Lies of omission are still lies.”

I have the horrible, panicked feeling that she knows. That she’s talking about me, not her father.

“Honesty can be difficult,” I say, through stiff lips. “Not everyone knows themselves as well as you.”

“He knows his reputation, whether he agrees with it or not,” Nix says, angrily, bright spots of color in her cheeks. “He could have warned me.”

I let out a breath.

She really does mean her dad.

“Well, he let you come here at least.”

“I’d like to see him stop me,” Nix says, her color only rising.

If anyone could fight Marko Moroz tooth and claw, I think it’s his daughter.

“God,” Nix groans, as her leg twitches beneath her. “Aren’t you sore? I’m fucking dying from that challenge.”

“Come on,” I say, leading her off the sand, toward the stand of trees surrounding the beach.

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