Arelia, Margaux, and Chloe are in the corner of the ballroom whispering to one another, so I say a quick good-bye to them before heading out the front door.
Blake is sitting on the step and jumps up as I walk by. “Hey, Eveny, where are you off to?”
“Heading home,” I say without stopping.
He hurries to catch up with me. “I’ll walk you. You never know what might be lurking out there this time of night.”
“I’ll be fine,” I tell him. I can’t resist adding, “Maybe Arelia could use an escort back to her place, though.”
He looks surprised. “She was just showing me around the house. Nothing happened.” He grasps my forearm as he adds earnestly, “You’re the girl I’ve been thinking about all night.”
“Eveny?” comes a voice from the darkness behind me. I turn to see Caleb striding out of the house. Somehow, the toga looks better on him than it does on anyone else at the party. “What are you doing?”
I open my mouth to answer, but Blake beats me to it. “Hey, man, I was just about to walk her home.”
“I’ll do it,” Caleb says instantly. He walks right past Blake and offers his arm to me. “C’mon.”
“Look, man, I was talking to her—” Blake begins, but Caleb cuts him off.
“She’s my girlfriend,” he says, which makes my cheeks immediately heat up. “And I’m taking her home.”
He turns and begins striding down the driveway, pulling me with him, before Blake can respond.
“Hey,” I say, my heart fluttering madly as soon as the sounds of the party have faded behind us and we’re alone. “Where’d you come from? I haven’t seen you all night.”
“I was around.”
“You called me your girlfriend,” I say after a minute. I’m thankful for the darkness, because he can’t see me blushing.
“Oh,” he says. “I didn’t mean it, obviously.”
I shake my head. “Yes, because that would be horrible.”
“Sorry,” he says. “That came out wrong.”
I blink a few times. “Well, if I’m so repulsive to you, why did you drag me away from the perfectly nice, cute guy who was hitting on me?”
He stops walking and looks at me in surprise. “You were interested in that guy? I thought I was saving you from him.”
“I didn’t ask you to save me,” I snap.
“And you’re not repulsive,” he says after a pause. “At all.”
“Gee thanks,” I say. “I can’t think of the last time someone said something so flattering to me.”
“Eveny—” he begins, but he stops as I pull my arm away from his.
“I can take it from here,” I say, already quickening my pace toward my own front porch, which is visible on the hill up ahead. “Good night.”
“But—” he begins to protest.
“I said good night,” I say stiffly. I double my pace and continue ahead without looking back.
That night, the dream about the parlor returns, and it’s even more vivid than last week. I hear screaming and crying as the blood pours out, and I see someone creeping from the room, hugging the shadows. I can’t make out his face or any of his features in the darkness, so I follow him as he walks through the front door.
But the moment I leave the house, it begins to crumble. I run into the yard, but I lose the man in the darkness as I turn in horror. My beautiful mansion, the one my ancestors built, disintegrates, its bricks and stones crashing to the ground with a mighty roar. “No!” I cry.
But the tide of blood from the parlor is rising around me now, hot and sticky. I try to run from it, but as I get to the edge of the cemetery, it drags me down and pulls me under.
UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE
HarperCollins Publishers
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18
On Monday morning, I wake up to a missed call from Meredith. When I play back her message, I grit my teeth as I listen to her chirp, “I hope you’re not still mad at me. What Trevor and I have is special, and I know you’ll be a good enough friend to understand.” What irks me about her behavior has little to do with the feelings I once had for Trevor. With the distance of a few weeks and a thousand miles, and with destiny and power swirling around me in ways I never could have imagined, Trevor feels irrelevant.
What bothers me more is how easily Meredith has rejected the idea that my feelings could be hurt. The reality is, she simply doesn’t care.
I’m still grumbling to myself as I head out the front door, and I almost trip over Caleb, who’s inexplicably sitting on my doorstep. He hastily stands and brushes his hands off. “Sorry, I didn’t know if your aunt was up yet, and I didn’t want to wake anyone.”