I’m still not sure how I’m going to get inside the school, but I got myself in before. I can figure something out.
He nods. “Fair enough.”
“You won’t try to stop me?” I blink up at him, surprised. “And you won’t tell Everleigh?”
“You sound like you know what you’re doing.” He gets up from the lounger, then stops and looks at me, suddenly a little scary. “And that other thing. The thing that happened to you. If you ever want to do something about that, let me know.”
Lawrence Wentworth’s servants found him with a pillow over his face and a gun in his hand. It looked like a suicide, but itwasn’t. It was Kylian, and I think he just asked me if I want him to kill the alphas who grabbed me.
He waits for a response.
“No, thanks. I’ll get to that on my own.”
That pain is mine. The revenge has to be mine as well.
He nods and walks inside.
I take in the view for a bit longer. When the delicious smells of Rune’s Cajun cooking make my stomach rumble, I go inside to eat with my sister and plan my assault on Haven Academy.
I spend two days at the Pack Ashe mansion.
Kylian knocked on my bedroom door and casually mentioned that their driver would drop me off at the academy and pick me up two hours later, solving how I’d sneak in.
I was going to say that I was River’s sister, Juniper. Then I would take forever hunting for my invitation in my bag and pretend to cry when the search overwhelmed me.
No guy likes it when a girl cries. It makes them uncomfortable. The guard would wave me in to get me to stop, so he didn’t have to deal with my endless tears.
That hadn’t been necessary.
“Just stay in the back seat. The driver will get you in,” Kylian had said.
The drive to Haven Academy was uneventful, though my chest had felt tight as we approached the gates, remembering what had happened to me outside of them. I swallowed my panic, spritzed myself with the cherry and praline perfume I had stocked up on, and settled back into my seat.
The gates swung open after the driver had a brief conversation with the guard outside.
I’m wearing a dark green velvet dress that conceals the belt marks crisscrossing my back. It has a cinched waist, a full skirt that hides my black strappy sandals, and off-the-shoulder sleeves.
My shoulder-length auburn hair is wavy, and I’ve swept half of it into my face, so I have something I can hide behind if I spot Ms. Arkwright or she spots me. No other teacher has eyes as sharp as she does. She would have questions about what I’m doing here that I couldn’t answer.
As I move around the packed ballroom illuminated by crystal chandeliers, an orchestra plays classical music on the half-stage.
For the last fifteen minutes, I’ve drifted around sweet-smelling omegas and deliciously scented alphas, sipping from a glass of champagne that I passed to a server. I haven’t seen River, and it’s time to do what I came here for.
The last time I was in Haven, I made a conscious effort not to hurt anyone. I quietly tried to convince omegas it was in their best interest to leave before they wound up tied to an alpha who treated them like a piece of meat.
Fuck quiet. I’m here to burn this school to the ground.
“Shit,” I mutter a curse when I spot a familiar face and quickly spin around to avoid him.
Xavier.
I bounce off a chest that feels like granite, and powerful arms pull me close and whirl me across the dance floor.
A familiar whiskey and bergamot scent tickles my nose.
“I had this,” I mutter.
“You’re family,” Kylian says. “You don’t let family walk into trouble without being there to back them up.”