Page 137 of Cruel Legacy

“We’re The Trium. We’re one. My word is theirs and their word is mine. Theona LaReaux lives in Vale Tower. She is mine. She isours.”

He taps his knife against his chin. “Now I’m not unsympathetic to the embarrassment Stefan experienced at Thea’s hands. Just as you’ve both already mentioned, she’s mouthy as fuck. Makes you wanna cut out her tongue.”

He stares off into space as if imagining what that would look and sound like. Whatever he’s thinking is enough to put a smile on his face. Sick fuck.

I redirect this conversation to try to find a resolution. “Finn, what are you thinking is compensable?”

“I say we deduct house points from Rho Beta Psi and allocate them to Ironside.”

I hate the idea, but it’s also the easiest path to take with zero bloodshed. I look at Holden, who agrees.

Turning my attention to the rest of the room, I say, “Now, to make sure we’re on the same page. The Trium acknowledges the role our resident played in the altercation and will take appropriate action to make sure something like this doesn’t happen again. However, if it does,” I make eye contact with each and every one of them. “Theona LaReaux is a Trium matter to deal with. From here on out, any correction or embarrassment that needs to occur will come from us. If we need to delegate the tasks, we have no problem reaching out for assistance.”

It’s not even like I care that Michael and his goons want to make an example out of her, but they were stupid to try to do it in front of our building, and that’s the point we’re making here.

* * *

We adjourned our meeting after settling on a reduction of twenty house points. We had to promise our frat that we’d participate in the next three house selected challenges in order to get them to agree.

I haven’t checked the calendar but if we haven’t signed up already, that means they’re boring, easy, or both.

Finn thinks it’s a small price to pay for maintaining order. I agree. I’m just pissed we have to deal with this shit at all because of her.

This should have been an easy task. Watch her. Report back. All this bullshit we’re dealing with and I’m supposed to believe she’s a nobody? There’s definitely something off with this girl.

“Keeping an eye on this girl is turning out to be more trouble than it needs to be.” I walk over to my fridge to get us all drinks. “She’s gotta be a league plant. There’s no other explanation for it, which means from here on out we have to make sure we’re always in game mode. We can’t leave any room for them to doubt that we deserve to be league members.”

“She’s not a plant.” Finn says from his place on the couch.

“Do you have proof that she’s not? Because the lack of evidence proving herinnocenceis pretty damning, if you ask me.”

“Since when does no proof, prove anything?”

“Since Holden hasn’t been able to dig up a single lead on this girl outside of the paperwork, we initially found. It’s a professional level black out.”

Holden’s nodding his agreement. It’s not this hard to dig up information on normal people.

Finn’s fun is in jeopardy, so he’s in argument mode. “Maybe what we found is all there is. Or do you think her foster care and juvie records are a deep fake?”

“I think none of us know anything about this girl to make a decision one way or another, and I don’t like not having answers.”

What I like even less than no answers is having to deal with this drama with the other houses right after my grandfather spent the afternoon on campus.

I guess I should be happy nobody acted an ass until after he left. I’m sure he has spies around to keep an eye on things, just like all the other council members do. Anyone could be a spy. That’s why I only trust the people in this room.

“I hear what you’re saying, Pax, and you know I’ll go along with whatever the two of you decide, but I think Thea’s harmless. If her records are lost or locked or whatever, it doesn’t matter. I know who she is now, and she’s not some secret league asset. Everything that happened the night she came into town was just a coincidence.”

“Did she tell you that when she was winning that knife off of you?” He still hasn’t explained what the fuck they bet. Finn never loses a bet, so if she knew how to win, that’s another check mark in the column, for she’s specifically here to ruin us.

“I’ve watched her. Followed her around, and spent time with her. She’s never once gone near anyone from The League. The only Wrens she’s come into contact with are the ones on campus, but we’re the only ones she’s ever interacted with.”

“It could all be electronic communication.” Holden says without looking up from his tablet. “She hardly uses her Prospectus account and isn’t all that active on any other social media platforms, either. That means she’s probably got a ghost account. I could get into her phone and laptop, if you want.”

I haven’t asked him to do it before now. He’s got rules about who he hacks and why. It’s never just arbitrary, or to simply spy on people out of boredom. They have to be a target and I’ve been hesitant to make her an official target, even though my father has given me a reason to. Why is that?

I look over at Finn. He’s kicked back on the couch, hat in his lap, a stupid smile on his face as he stares at his phone. If there’s something to find, we need to do it before he gets any more attached to her. I nod my head, giving Holden permission to break into her electronics.

“We might need to install a tracker on her phone too...”

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