Page 15 of Claiming Pretty

Anything to fill the silence, to avoid whatever he was about to say.

“Ava, you can’t avoid talking to me forev—”

“Shh,” I snapped, twisting the volume knob to drown him out. My stomach flipped as the announcer’s voice cut through the tension.

“…Darkmoor student Marie McConnell, who went missing last week, has tragically been found dead. Preliminary reports from the coroner’s office suggest she was poisoned by a drug derived from oleander…”

The words hit me like a blow, a cold shock spreading through my veins.

Oleander. My foster father’s vile recipe. The Sochai.

This is the Society cleaning up.

My hands clenched into fists in my lap. My stomach churned, nausea rising as the weight of the truth pressed down on me.

If we didn’t take them down, if we didn’t stop them—I’m next.

I glanced at Ty again, but he kept his gaze locked on the road, his jaw tight, his hands gripping the wheel a little too hard.

He was thinking the same thing. I could feel it. The unspoken fear, the urgency crackling like static in the air.

The car slowed as we pulled up to the gates of mymansion in Dublin, the wrought-iron looming dark and silent against the backdrop of the glowing city beyond.

I stared at it, my chest tightening further.

Home.

But the word didn’t feel right anymore. I felt like an intruder, like somehow I didn’t belong here anymore.

My gaze shifted to the mansion next door—the one Ciaran had been living in. Its windows were dark, the porch light extinguished, leaving it shrouded in shadows.

A pang of uncertainty gripped me. Was he still there? Had he waited for me, night after night, hoping I’d come back? Had he been looking for me? Or had he left, given up, moved on?

The thought twisted painfully in my chest, but deep down, I knew the truth.

Ciaran wouldn’t stop looking for me. He couldn’t. No matter how much time had passed, no matter what had changed, he would never give up on me.

Helovedme.

Another wave of fear twisted in my stomach, tangling with the other emotions already flooding me.

How would Ciaran react to what happened over the summer? To what I’d done? Tome? Would everything still feel the same between us, or had everything changed for him too?

The car rolled to a stop, and Ty turned to me, his smirk breaking the tension in a way that felt too easy, too deliberate.

“Welcome home, hummingbird.”

The nickname made me blink, caught off guard.

“Why do you call me that?” I asked, my voice quieter than I intended.

His smirk deepened, his eyes glittering with a private meaning he didn’t share. “Maybe one day I’ll tell you,” he said, his tone teasing, maddeningly cryptic.

Before I could press him, he leaned in. His hand found my chin, tilting my face toward his, and for a moment, all I could feel was his warmth, his presence enveloping me, consuming me.

My breath hitched, my lips parting instinctively as he drew closer, the world narrowing until it was just him.

Just Ty.

---