Page 82 of The Bargain

“Don’t fall for me, Desdemona Sutton-Knight, and I won’t fall for you.”

And I’d felt the sting of tears in my eyes and the knot in my throat closing tight, and I’d felt my heart shatter and harden, because I knew he was right—that he, like me, could see that we were on the verge of making a terrible mistake. Love a black hole, pulling us in. Maybe it’s already too late, like light particles that have strayed too close to the event horizon, when falling into the black hole is as inevitable as moving forward in time.

I’d only been able to choke a single word out.

“Deal.”

We’ve not spoken since.

31

Fifth Rule

Desdemona

It’s the last day of the term—and my final chance to invite Elias over for the holidays.

Which is why I find myself leaning against the tiled walls of a science building corridor, my books propped against my thighs, staring out of the window.

The winter really is here now: the trees shed all their leaves without me even noticing. Now they seem to tremble, skeletal and bare, beneath a keen, piercing wind. The sky is a bleak, bleached grey, an absence of colour.

I was hoping to catch Elias coming out of his final class of the afternoon, physics, and ask him in the bustle of students, leaving no space whatsoever for any awkwardness, or, worse, intimacy.

But it’s been almost fifteen minutes since the students filed out. On his way out, Gabriel North, the headmaster’s angel-faced son, casts me a small, private smile. In contrast, Benjamin Montgomery, a second later, throws me a haughty look and shakes his head as he walks past. As if he can judge anyone after what happened with Emerald. I don’t even bother acknowledging him and return my gaze to the window and the bleak landscape beyond it.

Finally, the door opens, and I hear a deep, warm male voice call out, “I mean it, Elias. You’ll give it a good think, won’t you?”

Elias’s voice precedes him as he walks out, light and amused, “Of course, sir, don’t you worry one bit.”

The door closes with a dry clack, and for a moment, Elias pauses in the corridor. His old backpack is so heavily packed his shoulder sags beneath the weight. His back is to me, and I watch as his posture stiffens, and he wipes a hand over his face in a curiously exhausted gesture. My heart squeezes painfully at the sight.

“Think about what?” I ask, curiosity getting the better of me.

I push off the wall as Elias whips around, startled, for once.

It’d be almost satisfying, to watch him be the one on the back foot, if I didn’t witness what happens next: Elias’s expression, clouded with thoughts, clear immediately, as if the clouds had been pushed away by a swift and impassive wind. His eyes find me, settle, darken, eyelids low, gaze appreciative. Pleasure blooms in the slow stretch of his smile, as artificial and beautiful as a hybrid tea rose.

And just like that, the real Elias is shoved aside, tucked away, and the seductive mask falls into place.

And knowing it, witnessing it, isn’t enough for it to fail, because I can practically feel the warmth flooding into my cheeks, the quickening of my too-eager heart. I must be so much weaker than I ever imagined: I know what he’s doing, I know his tricks, I know I want more.

I’m being truthful with you, why won’t you be truthful with me?

“Mazzati loves me,” Elias answers glibly. “He’s keen on me doing this physics thing.” He hoists his backpack higher. For someone who pretends not to care, it seems full fit to burst. I open my mouth to ask what ‘thing’ he’s talking about, but he’s already leaning closer, slipping back into that lazy, interested drawl he always uses when he’s deflecting. “Have you come to say goodbye?”

“Not quite,” I tell him. “What physics thing?”

His eyes flick away, a splinter of time, and there’s the faintest tightness in his jaw.

Both are gone in a second.

“Come on, love. A girl like you?” he says, stepping closer still, and I find myself pushed back against the wall, the pale tiles, a shiver tickling across my skin. “You think I’d ever want to bore a girl like you with schoolwork shit?”

“I happen to like schoolwork shit,” I tell him, refusing to take the bait. “You didn’t answer the question.”

But now he’s got me pressed into the wall, and I can smell him, his skin and his cheap cologne that makes me want to melt, and his dark eyes on me like a physical touch despite the fact there is currently zero physical contact between us.

The worst thing is that I know what he’s doing: he’s hiding something from me, and he’s using what happened in the observatory to do so. And this is something that matters to him. So why hide it? Because he thinks I’d use it against him?