Deceit (Gallows Hill #1)

2. Chapter One

Chapter One

Skyla

“ I ’m taking the airwrap as a sign of protest!” I shout down the hallway.

My aunt Steph shouts back to me as she makes her way down the hall.

“The hell you are! That was my birthday present from you,” she laughs before peeking inside the doorway.

Her blonde hair is only a few shades darker than my own and her eyes aren’t the same as mine or my mom’s. Instead of the deep emerald green I inherited, she got my grandfather’s hazel eyes that look absolutely mesmerizing against her creamy skin.

“What can I say, I have excellent taste,” I tease before my smile slowly dims.

I turn away from her, bending down as I rifle through the bathroom cabinets, knowing I’ve grabbed everything that is mine. I just don’t have it in me to turn around and let her witness me fall apart for the ninth time this morning alone.

She bends down beside me, rubbing a soothing hand up and down my back. It helps a little, balming the hurt from what comes next, the only way a parent should be able to. Aunt Steph is so much more than that, though. She isn’t my biological mom, but she might as well be in every sense of the word.

I was three when my mom passed away. Boating accident, I guess. Though I only have one or two hazy memories of her, Steph tells me stories about her often. Steph was her younger sister and to her, my mom hung the moon.

When it was time for me to start boarding school here in London my father had no qualms about sending me away without a single friend, family or even parting look. Aunt Steph wouldn’t allow it, though. She was somehow able to convince him to allow her to move with me.

From three-years-old to nineteen, I’ve lived in this flat just down the road from my school. All of my friends are here, my memories. Every Christmas and birthday started around this brick fireplace and every batch of diet breaking cookies were baked in this kitchen. The flat was nothing compared to the mansion that awaited me back home in Massachusetts, or what most kids were living in when they were on break here in London, but it was ours and it breaks me that I have to leave it all behind.

“You’ll visit often, it’ll be okay.” Steph smiles through watery tears.

I swallow roughly, shaking my head as I speak.

“Why won’t you just come with me? Please? All you ever do is complain about England anyways, ‘It’s too cold, it’s too busy. The beer is warm, and the food is weird,’” I say, in my best imitation of her whining.

She rolls her eyes but pushes my shoulder to the side with a smirk.

“I do not sound like that.”

“You most certainly do,” I laugh.

Smiling sadly, she shakes her head.

“We’ve talked about this, Sky. I just got that new job at the firm. I’ve worked really hard to get here, I don’t want to throw that away.”

I knew I was being selfish by wanting her to come with me, but who can blame me? It’s like I’m losing a parent all over again, one I actually remember.

A sharp knock comes from the front door, sending my stomach plummeting before we share a look. Without a word, we move into the living room where my half a dozen bags are packed. My entire life being stuffed into a luggage set, destined for its new home at Gallows Hill University.

It was always the plan that once I graduated I would attend there, I just didn’t realize how fast everything would go by. Maybe I’d feel less devastated by it all if my father and I were closer or friendly in any meaning of the word.

He’s not a cruel man, he’s just…aloof. Unbothered by pretty much anything that doesn’t have to do with his precious company or the stock market. It’s how he made his grand fortune, and he loves them like one would love a child, or more so in our case.

Now, I know I sound like the typical dramatic nineteen-year-old with daddy issues, but who could blame me? The man only shows up once a year, every year, on my birthday. He takes me to dinner, makes uncomfortable small talk about my studies and then he’s gone the same night. I didn’t understand it as a kid, I didn’t get why he didn’t want to spend time with me, why he didn’t love me like the other kid’s parents did. Eventually, I accepted it and now, I’m indifferent altogether.

Obviously, indifference isn’t a fantastic feeling when I’m going to be living with the man. Maybe this will be what we need to have a functioning relationship, though I’m not holding my breath.

Steph opens the front door, and two men that I recognize as my father’s personal security step inside before he files in after them. I’ve asked him a few times why he never goes anywhere without them, it’s not like he’s the president or anything, he’s never answered, though. Either he doesn’t want to answer, or he doesn’t feel I’m worthy of the wasted breath, either way I stopped my interest in really anything to do with him a long time ago.

“Stephanie,” he says, in a superior tone as he lifts his chin to her.

“Henry,” she responds, in a tone that is equally respectful but holds a touch of contempt.

He doesn’t appear to hear it or doesn’t care before he faces me, his eyes raking over me like he’s looking for a single hair out of place. He won’t find one, though. I know how he is. The man takes OCD to a new level and appearance is everything to Henry Parris.

My white shorts come down to my mid-thigh and my pin-striped dress shirt is tucked into them. There isn’t a wrinkle out of place on this balmy London day, my hair perfectly smoothed and straightened.

I stand still, awaiting his evaluation to be complete when he finishes with a satisfied nod and a stoic face.

“The plane is waiting,” he says, turning on his heel and walking out the door, his security carrying my bags as they follow after him.

A ripple of defiance stirs inside of me and though I know it will implode my life itself, I want nothing more than to tell him to leave without me. That I have no intention of getting on that plane and will proceed to live my life the way I and only I desire. Of course, I don’t say or do any of that. Like the good daughter I am, I keep my mouth shut, lower my head and walk out the door after him. I only stop for half a moment, turning and hugging Steph with everything I have. She holds me tighter, whispering that she will call soon, and I hold onto that, desperately.

I don’t know exactly what awaits me back in Salem, but I know it won’t be nearly as wonderful as the life I’ve lived here.

We are in the air, slicing through the early morning sky like a hot knife through butter when my father sets down his phone, his signature gaudy silver ring glinting in the light as he looks up at me across from the coffee table between our chairs.

“You’re getting married.”

I don’t think I hear him correctly, so I wait for him to continue whatever sentence he was actually trying to say. He doesn’t say a word, though. Instead, he just stares at me like I’m the one who is supposed to respond.

“I beg your pardon?” I ask, in the most demure voice I can muster.

“You’re engaged to be married. The date has been set, June twenty-third.”

I blink at him slowly, doing my best to keep my tone light and my question simple.

“And, who am I expected to marry?”

“Asher Putnam.”

“Who is that?” I practically scoff, biting my tongue as soon as I do.

The impartial mask he was wearing slips away as he narrows his eyes at me.

“Your fiancé. That’s all you need to know.”

Well, I’ve already upset him. Might as well bring it home.

“I’m too young to get married. I’m only nineteen. I just turned nineteen. I can’t get married, especially to a man I haven’t even met.”

“I’m aware, Skyla, which is exactly why you will spend as much time with him during your time at Gallows Hill. I’ve arranged your schedules to coincide as much as possible, and his father has ensured he will stay on campus so that you two can get to know one another.”

I pause at that.

“Wait, I’m not staying at the house?”

He rolls his eyes like I’m being stupid.

“Of course not. You will be staying in a dorm, same as all of the other students.”

“I just assumed that because Aunt Steph and I—”

“The only reason I allowed you to live off-campus was because of Stephanie’s insistence and my disinterest over the subject. However, Gallows Hill University is my alma mater, all eyes will be on the both of us and it is crucial that we do not disappoint,” he says, his meaning clear.

That you don’t disappoint. Henry Parris could never disappoint anyone, he’s perfect. I’m the daughter he’s practically hidden away since birth.

I’ve done enough research on Gallows Hill to know that it is an elitist school. Invitation only and it churns out some of the most influential and important people to America’s society over the last three-hundred-years. Two presidents, five governors, one tech mogul and countless prestigious judges, lawyers, scientists and doctors. All circling back to this university. It’s the best of the best and I have to go there. No, get to.

“I won’t disappoint you,” I promise, lowering my eyes as a form of respect that he seems to enjoy.

He nods, reaching his palm out and patting the back of my hand twice.

“Good. Be the respectable young woman you were raised to be, get to know your fiancé and trust no one else. The Putnam men are good people. They will protect you.”

Nodding my head, I turn to look out the window. I assume he means Asher’s father as well, since this is very clearly an arranged marriage. I don’t know why I’m so surprised. He has hinted at the idea of an arranged marriage for quite some time. I just always thought he was joking or at least I had hoped. The man doesn’t have a joking bone in his body, though, so this is really on me.

My cage must look so pretty to others on the outside, all gilded and shiny. Make no mistake, though, bars are bars. I’ll never be free to make my own choices, to live my own life. My fate was sealed the moment I was born, and my birth certificate signed with the last name Parris.

I’ve talked with Steph about it for years, spoke about running away, begged her to come with me. Each time I did though, her face would pale, and she made me promise I would never say those things again, that I would never do those things. If it wasn’t for her, for fear of never seeing her again and maybe for fear of what my father would do to her if I did disobey him, I’d have been gone a long time ago.

So instead, here I am flying away from the only home I have ever truly known, to an unknown man and an unknown place.

I’m thrilled.