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“I am not a kid.” My dorm room trembled. I desperately willed my shadows to extinguish, despite my righteous anger.
“You don’t think it’s questionable how he just picked you at random?” Aubrey scowled at my shaking room. “How the only tie he has to you is that your own goblin doesn’t see a problem with this? Have you slept with him yet?”
“What?” I repeated, voice shaky. “No! That is none of your business, anyway.”
“You will regret this.” Aubrey crossed the room. “Once he gets what he wants from you, I doubt he will ever reappear in your life again. If you continue to see him, I will take matters into my own hands.”
“By doing what?” I retorted.
“I will find the principal myself and tell him I’ve seen you two together over and over again,” Aubrey said. “I’ll kidnap Cordelia if I have to. Make her my witness.”
“Leave Cordelia out of it! Isn’t she a little toohomelyfor us anyways? And if I had any choice, I would not want to be with him again.” My breaths panted out, in tune with my racing heart.
“Actions speak louder than words,” Aubrey said, face-to-face now. “You’ve checked out every book about demons, monsters, and immortals in the library, but not one on bargains.”
I was struck silent, hating how she pointed out the obvious. That if I wanted to escape this bargain, I could have put more effort into it.
“Tell me, Luna, do you really know him?” Her white teeth flashed.
“I know him better than you!” I shoved her out of my personal space.
“You don’t know anything about anyone, Luna! I doubt you even know your friends at this point. You’re too busy chasing a monster,” Aubrey said, backing up only inches.
“I know you’re crossing a line right now! What’s there to know about my friends?” I couldn’t believe she really came here just to fight with me–
Aubrey ripped the cracker from my hands and crushed it. “Focus, you self-absorbed freak!” She huffed out a breath. “How old is Cordelia?”
“What?”
“How old is Cordelia?” Aubrey repeated.
My mind went blank. “18. She’s a freshman like us.”
“She’ssixteen, Luna. Sixteen. And when I rescued her from her suicide attempt, you couldn’t even be bothered to talk to her after because you were so busy focusing on Reaper and school and yourself! Because if you took more than half a second to look up at the world around you, you’d realize one of our friends is a child who needs togo home! And she can’t do that if she’s surrounded by friends here!”
Cordelia was a kid? She never drank. Or partied. Or fought.
The room spun, guilt washing over me so intently I could drown in it. I never knew she was so young.
“You don’t even know the people around you, and you think you know the Reaper?”
I watched the storm forming in Aubrey’s eyes, processing. Boldly, I decided to ask what I was really thinking. “Are you jealous that I’m dating him?”
Her smile became sadistic. “No, because me and him have history.”
My shadows sank deep, retreating into the pit of my stomach. How long? When? How?
“You aren’t special. You aren’t the only one he’s pursued. He’s not dumb enough to flaunt his past in front of you, but I’ve known him longer than you have.”
My shadows burst from my skin, whipping around me.
“I’m going to pretend I don’t see those.” Aubrey scrutinized my shadows with distaste.
“Prove it,” I gutted out. “Prove you and him have history.”
“He acts the way he does because he has a father that detests him,” Aubrey held up a finger with each truth she revealed about him. “He has a kingdom and citizens that adore him because he showed them kindness in death. Preventing the gumiho from taking lives is his life's mission.”
My knees met the floor. There was no way she would know that unless…
