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“Well, as long as you’re not saving yourself for Cade. Because we all know he hasn’t saved himself for his prosapia.”
I wince at her words. Again, she’s right. Cade is a player. Even with Brook always waiting in the sidelines, everyone knows Cade Kingsley doesn’t do exclusive.
Will that change now?
Or will he continue to fuck other girls while he waits for our Coligo?
“God, I hate this,” I grit out, clutching the pendant in my fist. I want to tear it off, to yank the damn chain and smash it into a thousand pieces. But I don’t, because already I’m becoming docile. Everyone expects me to behave as Cade’s prosapia. Anything less will be deemed unacceptable—by Cade, the Electi, and Quinctus.
At least he can’t physically touch me until our unification ceremony. And after the huge shock of my name being pulled from the calix, none of the elders seemed in a hurry to announce the date of our Coligo. My father seems to think we’ll have at least until the full moon after next.
“I know you’re upset,” Annabel soothes, “but maybe if you give him a chance—”
I make a derisive sound in my throat. “You don’t give someone like Cade a chance, Bel. He chooses whether to let you have a chance. To walk at his side or kneel at his feet.”
That’s what worries me the most. I’m not submissive, not in the way some girls are. He might scare me a little, but it’s not enough to make me cower… and that is a problem to someone like Cade.
I grab the nearest thing to me and launch it across the room, watching with dismay as the glass smashes into pieces and scatters across the floor.
“Better?” Annabel lifts a brow, hardly surprised by my little outburst.
My lips purse as I stare at her, my body vibrating with anger. I will be better when this nightmare is over. When Quinctus realizes they made a mistake, that I’m not the girl for Cade after all.
Because there is no other explanation.
It’s a mistake.
It has to be.
The next day is as unbearable as the last. Cade is extra clingy, holding my hand in a vise-like grip as we move around campus. The pendant sits heavy against my chest. I almost didn’t wear it, but if I want to appease him, to buy myself some time, I know I need to play ball.
“I like this.” He skims the hem of my skirt, his fingers brushing the backs of my thighs.
“I didn’t wear it for you,” I reply.
Ashton snorts, grumbling something about ‘needing to break me in.’ I cast him a dark look, but he only glares back.
I like him least out of the Electi. He’s too close to Cade, too much of a bad influence. Not to mention, he’s Brook’s older brother. I’ve heard the stories about Ashton Moore. The threesomes at parties, the fights, the girls running from his room with tears streaming down their faces and bruises on their bodies.
Ashton is dangerous, and he’s Cade’s closest friend. He’s also not officially an Electi, which affords him a certain amount of freedom where his actions are concerned.
“No?” Cade whispers against the soft skin of my neck. “Then who did you wear it for?”
My spine goes rigid, but I force myself to relax. Now is not the time to be thinking about Bexley and how his piercing blue eyes follow me around campus whenever we cross paths.
After that afternoon in my dorm room, he’s mostly kept his distance. But I feel him, watching. Waiting. He needs to stay away—for his benefit, and mine. But I can’t deny a tiny piece of me likes feeling him there, in the shadows. Like a guardian angel watching over me.
Except… something tells me he isn’t an angel at all.
A shiver zips up my spine and Cade tenses. “What is it, babe? What’s wrong?” He brushes the hair from my face and grips my chin, forcing me to look at him.
We’re sitting outside in the quad. Brandon and Sasha are arguing over something. Ashton is practically fucking a girl I don’t recognize on the bench. And Channing is busy texting someone. I don’t know where Tim is. Probably off with Fawn. I’ve only met her a couple of times, but she doesn’t seem to like Cade either.
Maybe we could be friends. Although, she seems happy with Tim, in love. Whereas I can’t ever imagine falling for a guy so conceited, arrogant, and cruel as Cade.
“Have you told her yet?” Ashton pipes up.
“Ash,” Cade warns in that low growl of his.
