“I’m saying you’ve fooled around with this academic nonsense for long enough.” My mother gives me a determined, withering look. “You’ve had your fun, but it’s time to step up and face your responsibilities to this family—before your father works himself into an early grave.”
She walks away before I can respond, but her words echo, striking deep into the guilty heart of me.
I’ve been fighting this part of my life for as long as I can remember. Holding out against all their expectations and pressure, doing everything I can to ignore the fate that’s been written in my DNA since the day I was born—and the day that Edward died, leaving me as heir to it all.
But seeing my father in the hospital bed like this, I know deep down that there’s no running from my destiny anymore.
Things have got to change.
Chapter4
Tessa
The early morning Oxford streets are blissfully empty as I pound the pavements, running my regular route through the old part of town, with its historic colleges and ancient architecture. I feel the burn in my limbs, but I don’t let up, looping back to Ashford to jog through the quad and down along the riverbanks.
It’s quiet here. Fall has arrived in full splendor, and the leaves on the trees are changing to vibrant reds and orange; the air brisk, and dawn mists still hanging low over the meadows. I can see the crew team, out on an early practice, but I don’t pause to watch.I need to clear my head. Alone.
So much has happened these past few days, I’m still reeling from all the revelations. From trusting Saint, to wondering if he’d betrayed me, and then questioning that all over again… I’ve got emotional whiplash from the changes. I don’t know what to think anymore.
But I can’t deny how I feel in my heart.
I miss him.
I finally pause to catch my breath, panting hard, my breath fogging the morning mists. It’s been two days since that night outside the library, and I haven’t heard a word from Saint. I told him not to contact me—so it makes sense that he wouldn’t reach out—but every time I think about calling, I remember the look of betrayal in his eyes when I accused him of hurting Wren.
What can I say to him now?
I was hurting, confused, wishing desperately that it wasn’t true—but still, that’s no consolation when you’ve basically accused your boyfriend of being a sadistic monster.
Does he hate me now? I wouldn’t hold it against him if he did, even if it did seem incriminating at the time.
And now there’s a new wrinkle in my investigation. The serpent crown tattoo.
Saint said he got the ink on a drunken dare with some friends before Finals, and I can’t stop the part of me that's fixated on that fact now. Because it means I have a lead again. Maybe the secret society angle wasn’t a dead-end, after all. Maybe those mysterious notes were pointing me in that direction, because Saint and his friends are members.
The annual party was the hunting ground. Wren was taken—by one of them.
And now I have a new pool of suspects—and it’s tantalizingly small. The men with that tattoo… I may have fucked everything up with Saint, and been completely wrong about him, but it turns out that I’m closer to the truth than ever.
I just have to find out who these other men are.
I finish my run,and slow, stretching. The college is coming to life now, as I stroll back through the quad and stop by the gatehouse to check my mailbox. I’m half-hoping for another helpful anonymous note; hell, even a vaguely cryptic one, but today, there’s nothing waiting for me in my mail cubby except a few random flyers for college events I’ll never go to. I cram them in the trash and pause in the old stone gatehouse to say good morning to Blake, the weathered porter on duty.
“Getting chilly out, eh?” he smiles at me, wearing a knit scarf in the Ashford College colors, crimson and black.
“I like the fall,” I confide, “All the leaves changing, everything getting cozy.”
Blake chuckles. “Just like your sister,” he says, and I feel a jolt, remembering he would have chatted with Wren, just like this. “You wouldn’t catch her without one of those pumpkin cream coffee drinks in her hand.”
I’m hit with a memory of my childhood autumns, playing out in the leaves with Wren. We would spend hours in the backyard, collecting the most vivid colors to make collages and prints.
“It was her favorite season,” I agree, before realizing my slip—talking about Wren in the past tense. I haven’t told anyone here at college that she’s dead, but luckily, he doesn’t seem to notice, too busy sorting packages behind the desk. “Anyway, I better get to the library. Essays due.”
“You take care,” he gives me a friendly smile. “Oh, and send my best to Professor St. Clair. Terrible news,” he adds, tutting. “Tell him we’re all hoping for the best.”
I frown, confused. Is he talking about our breakup? But no, he wouldn’t be so tactless. “What do you mean?” I ask.
“His father,” Blake replies. “Everyone at the college is praying for his speedy recovery. ’Course, Alexander St. Clair is made of sterner stuff. I’m sure it’ll take more than a heart attack to slow him down.”