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Max snickers, his breath fluttering my hair. “You’re not sucking the right dicks, then.”

I roll my eyes and ignore him, focusing my attention on the professor, bending forward over my notebook to concentrate on my notes. Neither of them actually wants me to go to Martha’s Vineyard. They’ve clearly deduced that I’ve got plans already, and they want to know.

I’d rather take a bullet point blank to the skull than tell them.

At the end ofthe lecture, I pack quickly, throw on my coat and stride out. Dahlia is waiting for Maximilian and Anthony outside the lecture hall, a bored expression on her face, tapping on her phone with her long burgundy fingernails clicking across the screen.

“Ugh, hurry up,” is her greeting. “Anthony, I’m dying for a smoke.”

The distraction is all I need. I hurry past with a hasty wave and make a beeline out of Blackstone before the three of them can surround me and press me for more information.

Outside, I stop to catch my breath and button my coat. Night is falling, made darker by the low heavy clouds, which have finally unleashed the full force of their fury. Rain falls in a deafening rush, slanted with force and wind.

“Sophie!”

I jump, startled to hear my own name—my actual name. Not Miss Sutton or Sonya ordead queen. My steps falter and my throat closes up when I spot a tall, athletic figure, golden hair anda beaming smile.

Evan stands at the foot of the steps, umbrella in one hand, curls damp with rain, an enormous bouquet of roses cradled in one arm. In the nascent darkness and the pouring rain, he looks like a sun-drenched god that’s wandered by error into the human world. Even in the rain, he radiates light and warmth, like the only part of the world untouched by the storm.

He steps forward, oblivious to the pit of dread I’ve just tripped into. I want to rush down the stairs, to throw myself into the safety of his arms, to let him take me away somewhere far from here, but I’m frozen in fear, suspended in the dread of being caught making a horrible mistake.

Low laughter and the crackling burble of a vape mingle behind me. My stomach plummets. My shoulders lock, throat closing up. The soft puff of exhaled smoke, the smell of artificial berries and cream, and then Maximilian’s delighted voice, like the deadly crack of a sprung trap.

“The Knight heir, huh?”

My heart sinks. I don’t look at Maximilian, but the weight of his arm settles over my shoulder, his cologne overpowering the air, his voice dripping with mock surprise.

“I take it back, dead queen. Youaresucking the right dicks.”

6

Bruised Plum

Evan

All week, I imaginedSophie stepping into the light, her dauntless eyes and pretty smile washing away months of guilt and distance and loneliness. And then I see her, and everything I pictured—the feast of the starving man’s imagination—fades away like a snuffed candle.

Sophie emerges through the open doors, standing for a moment to stare at the rain. Her dark brown hair is tied back in a simple ponytail; she’s wearing plain black boots and a long coat and has no ornament aside from small gold hoops on her ears. Her summer tan has faded; her skin is pale, her cheeks slightly flushed, her eyes sunk in a bed of shadows. She looks tired, and worried, and so fucking sad.

All week, I built this up in my head, planned where I’d take her, what I’d say, how I’d make her laugh. A hundred different versions of this moment, and not a single one looked like this.

All I can think of is how much I want to hold her, my chest a pillow for her tired head, my arms a shield against all the pressure and stress that’s making her look like this.

“Sophie.”

But the moment her eyes meet mine, her expression changes. Relief doesn’t bloom on her face—it shatters, crumbling away, her features sinking with dread.

I don’t even have time to react before a familiar face appears, pale and smug, crowned with reddish hair. Maximilian Fitzpatrick, the youngest son of former US senator Maximilian Fitzpatrick Senior. The world of the New York elite is a small one, and Maximilian is the kind of person that likes to be seen.

And the exact last kind of person Sophie Sutton would ever willingly associate with, so when he throws his arm around her shoulder and whispers into her ear, my fists clench on instinct.

I’d always dismissed Maximilian as a harmless brat, all money and no spine. But seeing Sophie’s face when he hangs over her like a leech, the way her eyes are cold and far away, makes every muscle in my body tighten with protective tension.

“Fitzpatrick,” I greet him coldly. Maximilian is about Sophie’s height, which is still over a head shorter than me. He’d take his chances if he didn’t think I would put hands on him, but he doesn’t know me well enough to guarantee that Iwouldn’t. “Never heard of respecting personal space?”

“Sophie doesn’t mind,” Maximilian says, eyes flicking towards me.

Behind him, I spot Dahlia Lindenfeld, the daughter of some tech entrepreneur who made his wealth in Silicon Valley, and some guy I don’t know, sharing a vape pen. They watch on with amusement, and I realise that Maximilian is in his element, because he’s got an audience.