Kingmakers, Year One

20. Dean

20

DEAN

I thought I’d snared Anna, and it would be a smooth progression from our first date to me taking full possession of her.

Instead, a most unwelcome and perverse thing begins to happen.

The more I tighten my grip on her, the more she tries to slip away.

It’s not conscious on her part. But I can see that any time I try to get closer to her, she pulls away. She never rejects me outright. But she’s always dancing away from me, just slightly out of reach.

It’s a constant effort to keep her away from Leo. It takes foresight and planning.

I knew he’d try to do something for her birthday, so I got up early and staked out her dorm.

Sure enough, he came strolling up with a hothouse orchid right before breakfast. He left it outside her door, probably thinking she was still asleep, though in actuality she was in the cathedral across campus.

As soon as he left the Solar I ran up the stairs, grabbed it, and chucked it down the garbage chute, pot and all. There was no card. Pity—I wanted to see exactly what Leo would dare to write.

I’d gotten her a box of handmade toffee from the sweet shop in the village. Anna thanked me, but she didn’t try it right then and there, only tucked it in her bag.

She’s been spending more and more time with Chay and Zoe, which makes me feel that she’s deliberately avoiding being alone with me. At the same time, whenever Bram or my other friends join us, she slips away as if she can’t stand to be around any of them.

That part might be genuine—Bram is abrasive as fuck, and in some kind of vendetta with Chay. They despise each other, and our two groups can’t coexist in the same space for five minutes without a fight breaking out between them.

It probably has to do with the fact that neither of them has a filter between their brain and their mouth.

Today we’ve barely crossed paths on the commons before Chay says to Bram, “Did you notice I beat your score on the range today?”

“It’s a fuckin’ tornado out there,” Bram replies, his expression sour.

“And yet I managed to make eight headshots,” Chay smugly informs him. It’s not as windy inside the castle walls as without, but she still has her arms crossed over her chest with her hands clamped under her armpits.

Anna comes hurrying through the gates as well, head ducked down so she doesn’t see us until she’s almost running into us.

“How about you?” I say to her. “Were you setting records, too?”

As Anna looks up, startled, I realize that she’s wearing someone’s sweatshirt. Someone very large, because the sleeves hang down over her hands and the hem comes down lower than her skirt, so it looks like she’s naked underneath.

I already know without asking who it belongs to. The pink in her cheeks isn’t just from the cold.

That jealousy I thought I’d conquered comes roaring up inside of me like a fire-breathing dragon. It wasn’t dead—only sleeping.

“No,” Anna says. “It was too cold.”

Even with that sweater on? I want to say, but I bite back the words before I let slip how angry I am.

I hate that she has classes with Leo when I’m not there.

I hate that she has eighteen years of history with him.

I hate that Leo Gallo was ever born.

“I need to see you tonight,” I say to Anna abruptly.

“I . . . I’ve got homework.” She won’t meet my eye.

“I need to see you,” I repeat. It’s not a request.

Anna does look at me now, her thick black lashes sweeping up like a fan, and ice pale eyes piercing right through me.

“Alright,” she says at last. “I’ll meet you after dinner.”

She takes Chay’s arm, and they hurry off to their next class.

Bram cocks an eyebrow at me, unsmiling. His idea of handling a woman is bending her until she breaks. He thinks Anna has me wrapped around her little finger. And he might be right.

Anna has taken the soul out of me. She’s holding it tight in those slim, pale hands.

It’s time for me to take something from her.