Page 117 of Heartless Legacy

I put all thoughts of lips and tongues out of my mind, allowing myself to get sucked into the lecture. I missed this feeling. This contentment. This happy little jolt I get when I’m learning.

Pax leaves class while I’m still packing my bag, and is halfway down the path by the time I exit the building, dragging Eloise behind him. An amused chuckle on my right drags my attention from Pax and company to the man sitting on the pedestal at the top of the stairs.

“Do I even want to know what you did, Pet?”

“Me? I just got here. What did you do?”

“No, no, no. Pax was already dragging her out of the building when I walked up. He’s clearly trying to put some distance between the two of you.”

That’s a stretch, but if it’s true, I honestly have no idea why. It’s not like I was planning to tell her he used my thighs for earmuffs.

“Oh, this is too good.” Finn jumps down from the pillar, his smile widens as he gets closer. “Has my pet been a naughty little girl?”

“I’m not your pet.”

“You’re my everything. Pet is what I choose to call you.”

“Your everything? Um… I didn’t sign up for that. Find someone else. I’m too entrenched in my selfish era to give a shit about your well being.”

He looks so earnest, sounds so certain, when he says, “There can never be anyone else, Thea.”

The intensity of his stare makes me itchy. “It’s easy. Just pick someone you can truly trust, the same way I’ve picked someone.”

He leans in, stealing a kiss, then flicks his knife out, offering me the handle, the tip of the blade against his chest. “There’s no one I trust more than you.”

Now, isn’t that some shit? I’m basically planning to destroy Malcolm and anyone he’s close to in The League of the Daggered Raven, which means I’m the absolute last person he should trust.

“Hello?” I answer my phone while keeping an eye on the little psycho. I might be conflicted about my feelings about Finn, and slightly annoyed that he’s so damn certain that we’re getting back together, but I don’t need him impaling himself like we’re acting out a scene from Romeo and Juliet.

The voice on the other end of the line says, “We got a bite.”

Chapter 70

Finn

The energy on campus is crazy. I haven’t seen this level of suspicion between fraternity and sorority members since that time we dismantled Tyler Stuart’s car. I love it. I was skeptical about this whole fight for bloodline status challenge that the league has implemented, but it’s turned into a point of amusement in an otherwise boring school year.

The challenges are happening more often for second-year prospects and above, but there’s also some kind of drama happening amongst the first years. The scoreboard shuffle is coming up and they’re all scrambling to maintain their rankings. I don’t know what it feels like to worry about scores. I’m tempted to see what it feels like to fall out of the top spots. Just once. Just to see what happens.

I take my seat next to Thea, ignoring the way she rolls her eyes at me. “Morning. Did you sleep well?”

It’s an honest question. The dark circles under her eyes haven’t faded. She’s put on a little more weight, but she’s still thinner than she was. I really wish she’d open up to me and tell me what happened to her when she was gone. Deacon Wolfe probably knows and he won’t betray her secrets without theproper motivation. How mad would she be if I tortured it out of him?

Thea is serious about her studies. She stopped telling me to find a new seat after our night on the beach, but she threatens to slit my throat if I talk to her during class. I don’t want to talk today. I’m actually pretty tired too.

An hour long nap sounds good. I scoot my desk closer to hers and grab her left hand with my right, linking our fingers together in my lap. “Take good notes, Pet. I’ll get them from you later.”

She makes a feeble attempt to pull her hand away. I just bring our clasped hands to my mouth, placing a kiss against the back of her hand and return it to my lap as I scoot down in my chair to get more comfortable, then close my eyes, drifting off to sleep.

I went to Thea’s dorm to get a copy of the class notes yesterday, since I’ll need them for a quiz we’re having at the end of the week, but I left empty-handed because she wasn’t in her room. When I asked about them today, she said she’d email them to me.

Ordinarily, I’d be fine with that, but Thea agreed to share her notes too easily. Nothing with Thea iseverthis easy. Theconstant push and pull is what I love about her. So the quick compliance means she was trying to get rid of me.

She left the library an hour ago, and is now sneaking around Canyon Falls. It’s not in the,I’m in the middle of a challengekind of way, either. There is absolutely nothing at the Pidgeon Bank that should interest her. She walks around the building, staring up at the windows from different angles, then walks down the block to the museum, and does the same thing. Her last stop is Ventiman Jewelers. She goes to the back of the building and is there for so long that I move in to get a closer look.

I watch as Thea picks up a rock and tosses it at the streetlight, shattering the lightbulb, then does the same for the next light, blanketing the back of the building in complete darkness. This business is owned by Isaac Ventiman, a mid-level councilman. Is she casing the place?

This is the type of behavior we’re encouraged to report. Well, fuck that rule. If she’s fucking shit up, I’m gonna give her a sledge hammer.

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