Page 78 of Bound By Fury

His gaze slides up my throat before meeting mine, something harder there now.

He releases the pendant, glancing down to my lips. His throat bobs as he looks away, a flush spreading up his neck, spilling across his cheeks. I can hear nothing beyond my heart drumming in my ears. His knuckles are white as he grips the pencil in his hand. I watch as it cracks beneath his touch, the wood splintering slowly.

Time has come to a stop.

Out of the corner of my eye I can see some of the other students staring. They have been this whole time. They whisper to one another, their mouths hidden behind their hands.

We sit there for longer than we should, electricity buzzing between us.

“Ms. Scott!” Dr. Rogers’s voice breaks through the spell and I jump, turning just as she finishes smoothing back her hair.

She’s winded, and her eyes are wide and bright, her scarf half unraveled. She’s also fifteen minutes late.

“Would you mind turning around in your seat, please, so we can get started?”

Murmurs from the class send heat to the tips of my ears as I face the front of the room.

This is the second time my necklace has caught Malachi’s attention. Does he know what it means? Does he know about the witches? There was something else in the set of his mouth. I just can’t figure out what.

Idly my hands draw the symbol in the margins of my paper. Again and again as Dr. Rogers drones on.

I stop when I feel a light brush against my hair. The softest touch at the back of my neck like a breeze. Malachi gently pulls one of the spiral curls, just like he used to, sliding his fingers down until it elongates into a pin-straight strand before releasing it and watching as it springs back into a coil.

I stiffen and lean forward, avoiding the tenderness of his touch.

You are my fucking business.

Even if he is a part of all this somehow, even if everything I’ve ever known about him was a lie, he will know, without a shadow of a doubt, that I’m not someone he’s going to walk all over. I might not know exactly what’s going on, but I do know one thing for certain—I feel a change happening deep inside me, and I’m not going to back down from it anymore.

If anyone needs to be scared, it’s him.

TWENTY-SEVEN

EARLY FALL IN EARNEST IS nothing like it is back home. By six in the evening a bitter wind sweeps through, colder than it would be in Pine Grove during midday December. By eleven I can see my breath in front of me, and I grin when I sense the turning of the season, beneath it the quiet promise of a true, white winter.

I pull the hood of my black sweatshirt over my head and blow on my hands.

“Thank you all for meeting me here tonight.” My voice is low, and though I genuinely mean the words, I stifle a laugh when I glimpse the glare Missy is shooting my way.

“I wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Daisy says.

Sam gives a noncommittal grunt.

“Okay, well…” I crane my head and peer at the top of Biltmore Hall, the turrets blackened by night. “How the hell are we supposed to break into this thing?”

Missy stalks past me and puts her Ariana Grande-sleeved palm on the handle of the door and flings it open.

“Wha—” Daisy gasps from behind me.

I glance around, nerves making me jumpy.

“Come on,” Missy hisses over her shoulder as she saunters right into the building like it’s not supposed to be locked.

We follow close behind.

Even though this entire thing was my idea, I hesitate before I join them.

“How—” I start, as I meet them in the western hallway of Biltmore.