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My love. He’s bringing out the artillery. Francis had never been the sentimental one. I shook my head firmly, and when I saw sadness pooling in his eyes, I reached out and cupped his cheek with a trembling hand. He leaned into my touch, and I almost broke down then and there.
“Soon,” I whispered. “Do you trust me?” He nodded. “I need to figure out some stuff, and I need to do it alone. This is my battle, not yours. When it’s over, I’ll come back to you. And it will all be just like before. The five of us against the world.”
“It’ll never be like before.”
I bit the inside of my lip. He was right.
“Maybe we’ll get lucky, and it will be better.”
He didn’t believe it, and I didn’t believe it, either. It was all too bittersweet, and the two giant girls from before had moved closer to watch the second episode of their favorite telenovela, this time with another male protagonist.
“I’ll be waiting,” he said.
I chuckled. “Thanks for saying that. I don’t know about the other guys…” And I was actually talking about Paz.
“We’ll all be waiting until the end of time, Mila. Stop pretending like you don’t know that.”
That almost made me cry. I walked away, and he didn’t stop me.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
The last thing I needed when I returned from the field trip to the Colossi Valley was to find Sariel fucking Gracewing in my room. Corri flew toward me, the incessant buzz of her wings betraying her panic.
“I’m sorry, Mistress. I tried to kick him out. But I’m tiny, he’s big.”
I doubted that was the problem. Pixies could do pretty much anything. Their magic was stronger than a mage’s. Sariel had probably pulled at her heart strings. My guys were proving to be good at that.
“Leave us alone, Corri.”
She twirled in the air, then poof! Disappeared in a cloud of pixie dust.
“What do you want?” I shrugged off my uniform blazer and dropped it on the couch, then went to the fridge to get a bottle of water.
“Don’t be so cold. I miss you.”
I squeezed the bottle too hard, and some of the water spilled all over my chin and chest. I miss you too, I wanted to say. I didn’t. I turned to face him.
“Sariel, you can’t be here. You can’t just teleport in my room whenever you like.”
“I gave you space. We all did. Plus, it didn’t bother you in the past.”
“It was different then.”
“I don’t understand what changed. Francis is sorry. We’re all sorry for forcing you to do the ritual in front of that stupid cult. Will you ever forgive us?”
“It’s not about that.”
“What’s it about, then?”
He knew. In that moment, looking into Sariel’s blue eyes, I felt like they were onto me. The four of them. They’d figured out a long time ago that I wasn’t upset about the ritual after the Yule Ball, but that I was hiding something from them, and it was easier to hide it if we weren’t together. Maybe they even knew what it was, and they weren’t saying it to my face because they wanted to give me a chance to come clean.
Stop it. They can’t know. Since when are you paranoid?
“Mila? What is it about?”
I sighed. “It’s personal, and I’m taking care of it. Family related.” Well, I wasn’t technically lying.
“Okay.”
