Page 110 of The Tartan Thesis

“Torin…” Freya’s voice is cautious. “What are you thinking?”

“Nothing,” I say and clear my throat. I walk into the sitting room and glance around. “Just that Beau and I need to talk when he gets up. You know I don’t like loose ends.”

“Aye, I know you’re an anxious control freak,” she says.

“Har har.”

My gaze moves over the desk, and I frown. Papers are stacked in chaotic piles, books left open with their spines cracked, and pens are scattered across his desktop. Given how tidy the rest of his house is, this corner is a cluttered mess.

“What about your new lad?” I ask, trying to change the subject as I reach out and straighten a page. “Is he alright or a dobber?”

Freya launches into it, but I only catch the first bit because all I can see are the words on the page in front of me.

"Burning the Glen: The Role of Scorched Earth Tactics in Pacifying the Highlands"

Beau Fontenot

My fingers go still against the paper. I lift the cover sheet toward me, slower than I mean to, like the letters might rearrange themselves if I don’t move too quickly. They don’t. His name is still there. The title is still there.

He told me he’d moved away from this topic, hadn’t he? He promised.

My pulse kicks up as I flip through the pages, taking in a substantial reading list, provisions for rare primary sources, a thorough outline of the topic. This is no small rough draft. It’s a complete thesis proposal.

I swallow hard and set the pages down, only to find more beneath them—printed articles, journal PDFs, titles echoing the same themes over and over. Clearances. Pacification. Highland suppression.

My eyes land on the notepad beside them, fingers clumsy as I open it. The latest page is dated this week, his handwriting filling the margins with observations, connections, questions. I turn back further. And further.

He’s been writing notes about my topic since the start of the year.

The truth sinks in, my heart sinking with it: Beau lied to me.

My pulse is pounding, and my head starts to ache. Freya continues talking, but her voice has blurred into meaningless noise.

Why would Beau break his promise? The man who has everything. My mind scrambles for footing, grasping at anything that makes sense.

His first term. He struggled with Scottish history, his own area of study. Then I came along, and his grades have gotten better. Because of me.

It’s happening again. Just like with James.

My chest tightens, breath coming shorter, trying to make the pieces fit together.

I still don’t understand. If he’s stealing my topic, then why is he wooing me now, after all this time? Wouldn’t he want to keep me at arm’s length if we’re going to be in competition?

Then I think back on our timeline. I haven’t spent nearly as much time helping him this term.

A cold, creeping thought edges in.

Beau wanted his Scottish tutor back. And he was willing to shag me if he could get what he wanted. The thought grates against something in my brain. It doesn’t quite fit, not completely, but it’s the only explanation my mind will settle on, and it lodges there.

“Torin?” Freya’s voice cuts through, louder now. “Torin, are you even listening?”

“I, er—I have to go.”

“Wait, what—?”

I hang up. My hands shake more than ever as the awful truth sinks in, turning my once fluttering guts to stone.

Behind me, the floorboards creak. I turn. Beau is coming down the stairs in a tight pair of boxers.