Page 74 of Divine Oaths

But Kasem reached for me, brushing his thumb against my cheek.

I was already dizzy from the nosebleed, but craning to look up at him with his tall, graceful frame and searing brown eyes with the flecks of gold in them made me lightheaded and breathless.

“Be still for me?” he whispered.

I swallowed, nodding heplessly, unsure.

My heart beat a thousand miles per minute, and even the heat between us was electric, pulsing with curiosity and longing.

Since the fire at my Westfield audition, I’d been used to taking care of myself. I’d never had someone be so attentive to my needs. Not since Jojo. And even then, it hadn’t been like this.

Kasem withdrew a handkerchief from his pocket. He dabbed the blood from my nose, his touch gentle, his fingers trailing to my parted lips as he pulled away.

I drew in a breath.

My mind raced with the memory of his tongue tracing my lips and how he’d pulled me to him, kissing me, tasting me, and leaving me longing for more.

“About what happened in the dining hall,” I said, my cheeks burning. “I shouldn’t have done that. I’m sorry.”

“Are you?” he asked, and I couldn’t tell if he was disappointed or teasing me. “I mean, my brother was right there. Exactly where you wanted him to be, right?”

“Kasem—” I began, but he waved away the apology.

“I’m a Saint James,” he said. “People have used me for less. I grew up with them befriending me to see what they could get of the inheritance. They’d toss me aside once they figured out that, as the secondborn, I was getting nothing. And even then, people got close to me just to find a way to Ojore. When all that changed and I was the one named heir, I was their world again.” He laughed. “At least you had the decency to be transparent. So be honest, Sianna. Just admit it.”

I knew Kasem was waiting for me to say it. But I couldn’t. Because truthfully, I wasn’t even sure why I had kissed him or what I’d wanted to come from it.

“You’re in love with my brother,” he observed, his voice cool, measured.

I looked away, my heart racing at the intensity of his stare.

But my silence was answer enough. And in turn, his came in the bitter light of amusement in his eyes, his laughter as bemused as it was pitying. There was a distance between us, one that hadn’t existed since we’d first met at Gus’s shop.

“Maybe I once was,” I said, defiant, angry now, at myself, at him, for his nonchalance. “But what would it matter to you, Kasem? I shouldn’t have kissed you. I know I was wrong for that. But you’re the one who leaned in. Don’t act like you didn’t feel some sort of vindication kissing me in front of him.”

“Despite what it may seem, I don’t actually get a kick out of making my brother hate me more than he does. I never wanted Westfield. I never wanted anything of his.”

“I’m not his,” I said. “I’m my own person.”

“So you kissed me for yourself?”

Against my cheeks, heat bloomed hot and scorching. “Trust me, it won’t happen again.”

Kasem didn’t look at me, which was somehow worse than when he was angry.

I tried to steer the conversation back to shore, pushing down the painful knots forming in my chest. “Look. Can we just make a plan for finding Pete or Jay or whichever one of them is here at Westfield? The sooner we break your curse, the less time we have to spend with each other.”

“You should have said that from the beginning,” Kasem said, his voice calm yet biting. “Before the expulsion, they were both Sigma. And if they found a way to sneak back onto campus, they’ll probably find a way to infiltrate Sigma events like rush.”

So then I had to do it. I really had to join Theta and somehow get Luke to follow through with rushing Sigma. Vivian would hate it, but it wouldn’t matter at that point. This was the best chance I’d have of trapping Pete or Jay. Kasem and I would be able to interrogate them and get closer to figuring out how to break our bond. It’d even mean vindicating Jojo, not that it should still matter to me whether or not he was involved in the stabbing.

“The girl who jumped from Theta House told me that Danny, her ex, was going to do some exposé on Westfield and your family. He was friends with Nathan. Did Nathan know about the curse? Did Pete or Jay, before they were marked?”

“They’ll know as much as any of Sigma’s members do,” Kasem said. “And like I explained before, I never met Danny, not outside of Sigma events. I don’t know what the three or four of them shared with one another about what was going on at Westfield and how my family was connected to it.”

“Then the answer has to be tied to what Danny found.” I recounted my conversation with Sarah to him. “If he wasn’t really marked because of the curse, if someone connected to your family found out that he was researching their ties to the accidents on campus, then maybe Sarah’s right. Maybe Danny’s death wasn’t an accident. Maybe it was murder.” If Alaster and the Board would go so far as to cover up the curse’s manifestation on campus, then maybe they thought they could use the accidental deaths to bury Kasem’s family secrets.

“I saw a vision of the past, in this room. They’re paying Jojo to come up with some research to supposedly explain the accidents on campus as hauntings,” I said, making the connections. “And then I bet they’ll just start advertising Westfield as a prestigious school with some historic, haunted buildings, and no one will bat an eye when the accidents keep happening.”