Page 346 of A University of Betrayal

My breath hitched the moment I realized the truth.

I could do nothing but stare at him. And suddenly, chaotic fragments of memories flashed past me in my head. Those memories in which Miles appeared rose up like a gigantic wave and smashed down on me with a crash. It was like a movie that suddenly made you cry, even though you didn’t know why. Or one that you couldn’t stop thinking about, but you had forgotten the title, and now you were looking for it everywhere with this ever-increasing feeling of longing. As if the movie could fill a gap that you wished wasn’t there. A movie that was better forgotten.

I wished I could erase all those memories. I wanted someone to take them away from me.Right now.Because they were taking over...

Shock settled over my entire existence.

“Miles! Are you out here?” a voice called out, and we both flinched at the same time.

Larissa.

I immediately slid backward, further behind the wall, and Miles finally managed to take his desperate gaze off me, turn and look in the direction of the source of the voice.

“Yeah. Is something wrong?” he asked in a calm and determined tone, and I knew immediately that it was just his facade.

His hands rested behind his back, one clutching his wrist as if he was hurting himself.Because of me.

We had both become confused…

“We want to start.”

Miles seemed alarmed, distracted, for a moment, which I used to slip through the nearest side entrance and press my back against the cold stone wall.

I held my breath, pressed my hand over my mouth.

“Just a moment. I’ll be right there,” Miles said, and I heard Larissa sigh before her footsteps moved away.

I heard nothing for a while, then footsteps coming my way.

My shock intensified and more tears began to fall down my cheeks.

“Emely.” It sounded so soft and pleading. I had never heard him say my name like that before.

When I didn’t answer and hoped he wasn’t coming any closer, I heard a scrape on the ground. A stone was kicked away and hit the wall near me.

I flinched.

“Damn it!”were his last words.

Then hasty footsteps.

And when I knew he was gone, I collapsed on the inside. I slumped down the wall, onto the even colder stone floor, and let out all the tears I had gathered over the last few weeks. And there were a lot of them.

A tearfor Julian and for the fact that I hadn’t foreseen that we weren’t meant for each other, that I had first had to see that he simply reminded me of better times that I still seemed attached to.

A tearfor Mica, and for all he had done for me without me realizing or appreciating it.

A tearfor my pack, for whom I would never be perfect enough.

Andanother tearfor this naive little girl who wanted to show everyone how well she could cope, how strong she was, and what she could endure.

I cried so hard that I had to press my hand over my mouth again to not be heard.

Iwas the idiot. The naïve girl inside me that I finally had to break away from. The one who cried and shed her tears mainly because of one person.

Miles DeLoughrey,a Ruisangor. But he wasn’t my worst enemy. It was my heart. Miles DeLoughrey had gotten what he wanted. Access to my miserably cursed, traitorous heart.

It hammered violently in my chest.Because of him.

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