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“I can’t.”
“Sometimes I feel like I don’t really know you.” She looked away, and a flicker of something he’d never seen before gleamed in her eyes. As if her frustration could boil over and turn her into someone else.
“Don’t say that.” He squeezed her hand. “You know more of me than anyone.”
“Then I know you want me on your arm, wherever you’re going.”
She wasn’t wrong. His father had promised Headmistress would help set him up with someone from a “good family” after Yagrin finished his early Dragun years. To further the family lineage. But Yagrin hadn’t figured out how to break it to them that that was where he drew the line. He could do their Order errands, be the monster that they wanted. But in every other way, he was Red’s. For as long as she would have him.
“Take me to the ball, Yagrin.”
He hated the way her forehead wrinkled when she was disappointed. The way her lips pursed out. But he couldn’t. It wasn’t safe. For now these visits to her farm, moments of escape, were all he’d been able to settle for in the last several months. He wanted more for them. But when had what he wanted ever truly mattered?
“You’re ashamed of me,” she said, sticking out her lip coyly. “Agree, and I’ll put you on your ass.” She roped her arm behind his back and pulled him into a headlock.
He wriggled from her hold and threw her over his shoulder. She beat on his back, unwinding the knot he was with her laughter. She was the dusky glow of sunset, a cozy blanket by a fire. Out here in the middle of nowhere he was more at home than he’d ever felt at Hartsboro.
She pulled at his pockets and out came a knitted beanie. He groaned. He shouldn’t have brought the hat with him. She wouldn’t be insecure about where he’d gotten it. She wasn’t like that. Red knew who she was. And never settled. Still, it was weird, carrying around a dead girl’s hat in his pocket. He needed to turn it in already.
“Should I even ask?”
He stuffed it back in his pocket.
“Take me! So we can make fun of all the rich, stuffy people. Otherwise, you’ll go but not have any fun.”
He set her down on her tiptoes and she laced her arm around his. They walked in silence until the sun was an ember on the horizon. He loved that about her. How she gave him time to think. He knew what he wanted to do: make her happy. But it was a risk.
“Are you scared of these people?” She grabbed his jaw and made him look her square in the eyes. Insistence glinted in her sandy brown eyes, where he imagined he saw his true reflection.
“We’ll need to get you a dress.”
THIRTY
A whole day rushed by since passing Second Rite, and I spent it in session after session. Things are only getting busier. Moonlight glints on the polished floors by the time I’m two turns from my door, where I spot Jordan with an armful of long, rolled papers and envelopes.
“Here to congratulate me again one-on-one?” I haven’t seen him since the reception yesterday.
He glances over his shoulder as we step inside my room and find Abby’s bed is tidy. She’s still out, apparently.
“I don’t get why you’re allowed in the Belles Wing after curfew.”
“I’m technically not an inductee.” An uproar of chatter in the hall spins him on his heels, and he closes my door quickly.
I side-eye him. “What was so important you’d break a rule?” I tease.
He unloads all but one of the bushel of posters in his arms, setting them on my bed. Then hands me a stack of envelopes, letter after letter with my name on it.
“What is all this?” I flip, tearing a few open. “Invitations? To social events.” One is from the Tidwell Committee. “Oh, I wonder if I can give this one to Abby. She was hoping to go to that one.”
He takes the envelope, opening it. “That’s not how this works.” He reads the invite aloud. I and a guest are invited. I groan and plop down on the bed.
“If one more person thinks of something else I have to do to induct in this Order I’m going to scream.”
“That is not how most respond to an invite to the Tidwell, you know?”
I take the invite and set it aside with the others, turning my attention to the long, rolled scroll. “And what is this?”
He stretches it out across my desk, and it’s filled with petite renderings of streets and buildings.
