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“How bad is it?” I asked.
“Bad,” Montgomery answered. “Rafe and I tried to fight for you both. But we’re new members. Our say doesn’t go far.”
“So are we fucked?” I asked.
“They’re ready to see you,” Montgomery said. “That’s all I can tell you.”
21
Consuela
I clutched Beau’s jacket around myself as if it were an anchor to safety, to him, to everything that had happened before this wretched night.
But as we walked back into the room of stern-faced Elders, I knew no jacket could shield me from their wrath or judgment.
“The Elders have come to a judgment in the matter of the Initiate and the harlot belle,” declared the Elder who’d presided over my “confessional” earlier.
He stepped forward and banged his cane on the floor. I felt Beau stiffen beside me and didn’t miss the way he sucked in a breath of air, tense and waiting for their decision. I squeezed my eyes shut, unable to watch. Dear God, I’d never considered that my deceit could cost him his inheritance. I’d never be able to forgive myself if he lost everything because of me. I’d just rushed headlong forward, panicked about the pregnancy, terrified of the child growing up the way I did, feeling unwanted or unloved, cast out by even one of their parents and determined to do everything I could to control an uncontrollable situation—
“The harlot belle is to be expelled with nothing. Her deceit and treachery will have no reward from this sacred and honored Society.”
All around the room, canes banged the floor in solidarity with the judgment.
There it was, the official failure of all I’d hoped for.
I opened my eyes but kept them cast down to the floor. Beau went even more tense beside me.
The noise of the canes finally died down and the Elder’s voice came booming out again. “We further declare the Initiation complete at no fault of the Initiate himself. We believe that no son of the Order would be complicit in such a deception and that Beau indeed did not know. Thus, Beau Radcliff, you have passed the Trials of Initiation. We welcome you to the brotherhood of the Order of the Silver Ghost. Come forth to receive your robes.”
Beau stepped forward as canes banged the floor, leaving me all alone, shivering, naked except for his jacket.
I turned and immediately fled the room, the thunder of the canes echoing behind me. That was it, I was officially out of here.
I was a harlot? Screw all of them. I ran upstairs but then realized I didn’t really have any “things” to gather. I changed into some decent clothes, the ones I’d brought in a small bag when I’d come. Everything else was clothing that was provided. There was nothing else to pack or take.
I took the back stairs down to the kitchen. Where I ran into Mrs. Hawthorne.
“I need my phone,” I said to her. “Give it to me.”
She frowned. “You can’t just leave. You need to speak with Beau. Make things right.”
I scoffed. “Look, I’m outta here. He had a chance to stand up for me. He didn’t.” I knew it was irrational as soon as it came out of my mouth. Beau had his whole future on the line back in that room, and I was the one who’d put him in that position. Still, this was all too much.
And it wasn’t like in the foyer he’d said he loved me back after I stupidly opened my big mouth and confessed my feelings like a big idiot—
“Just give me my phone! I need to get the hell out of here!”
My nose was stinging and that meant tears were just seconds from following.
Mrs. Hawthorne frowned in disapproval, but she did disappear into the pantry and came back out with my phone. Jesus, it was hiding there the whole time?
“You should really wait and talk to—” she started.
I snatched it out of her hand and all but ran for the side exit I knew was off the small hallway out back of the kitchen.
As soon as I hit the hot, humid air of the Georgian summer, I felt like I could breathe. Except as soon as I sucked in a big breath, I was sobbing.
I started running. I needed to get away from the Oleander. I needed to put as much distance as I could between me and that fucking nightmare of a place.
Except even as I had the thought, I knew it was a lie. Because really what I was running away from were the wonderful memories with Beau. All the nights he’d held me close, his arm wrapped around me, his hand brushing my stomach. The way he’d whisper in my ear and tease me about what we might name our child.
How he’d caress me, and those caresses would turn more intense until we were making furious love in the middle of the night. How safe I felt in his arms, safer than I’d ever felt at any point in my entire life.
