Page 23 of The Darkest Note

Mr. Mulliez taps his desk. “We agreed that we’d work on that fear of yours. Yet I haven’t seen you volunteer to play in class or engage in any musical activities—whether as yourself or as an alter ego.”

“I’ve been busy,” I stammer.

“You’ve been running.” He straightens and walks over to me. “Cadence, ever since the night I heard you play for the first time, I knew your approach to music was… different. You see patterns in places where no one else would look to find them. You weave stories into every note. It’s something special. Something extraordinary. That’s why I went right up to you and offered you a chance to study at Redwood Prep. It wasn’t so you could blend in. It was so you could shake things up.”

I remember that night with clarity. When Mr. Mulliez first approached my piano, I thought he was going to proposition me as so many of the sleazy customers at the upscale lounge did.

Instead, he changed my life. It was the first good thing to happen to me since mom left Vi and I alone.

I never thought I’d have a chance to enroll in a school like Redwood Prep. Much less minor in a music program supported by none other than music legend Jarod Cross.

“I’m sorry to disappoint you, Mr. Mulliez. I really am.” I stare at the floor. “But I don’t want to shake things up. All I want is to graduate, put Redwood Prep on my resume and get a better-paying job. I want my sister to have a roof over her head and food in her stomach. I want to have a normal life with normal problems.”

His eyes widen and he gives me a sympathetic look.

I pretend not to notice. “I don’t want to change Redwood. I don’t want to be in the spotlight. I don’t want any of it.”

He sighs heavily. “I understand, Cadence.” His lips arch up, but it seems like it’s a struggle to smile. “I’ve kept you long enough.” He juts his chin at the door. “Start working on your assignment.”

“I will.” I take a few steps to the door. Then I stop and swerve back. “Mr. Mulliez, it might not seem like it, but I really appreciate everything you’ve done for me.”

“Don’t mention it. I, as the kids say, got your back.” He thumps his chest twice and then gives me a peace sign.

I snort. “Don’t ever do that again.”

He laughs and shoos me out.

I push the door open and my smile wobbles. Guilt twists in my chest like a knife. Mr. Mulliez plucked me out of my hopeless existence and gave me a fresh start. I hate that I can’t fulfil his expectations for me, but it would cost too much to get over my stage fright and flaunt myself in front of Redwood.

I can’t do that.

What Icando is turn in the best Unconventional Music Theory assignment Redwood has ever seen. Just to make it clear why my scholarship was worth it.

I head outside and tilt my face up to the sun for inspiration. Redwood Prep’s gardens are something out of a fantasy. The lawn goes on for miles with plenty of trees and cute picnic benches nestled under the shade.

I take a step forward when I feel a presence behind me. A voice like raw silk whispers, “New Girl.”

I jump out of my skin when I look over my shoulder and see Dutch, Zane and Finn surrounding me. My tongue turns heavy and I instantly back away.

“Want to work on Mulliez’s assignment together?” Finn offers.

My jaw drops to the grass. “What?”

“Most of the kids already chose their groups,” Zane says easily. His voice is a lot huskier than his twin’s. Up close, I can see even more differences between him and Dutch.

Where Dutch looks like he’d bludgeon someone to death if they made him mad enough, Zane looks like he’d smile even when he shoved the knife in his victim’s chest.

Dutch is brooding and dark and sullen, while Zane emits ‘life of the party’ vibes. He doesn’t justknowhow to have a good time. Heisthe good time. Unlike his twin who’d suck the life out of any room he enters.

Finn is harder to get a read on. He’s not dragging around a dark cloud of doom the way Dutch is, but he’s not as wild and loud as his brother.

There’s something cold and calculating about the way Finn watches me. A heady mixture of restraint and ruthlessness runs right under the surface, as if he could be worse than his brothers if he wanted to, but he chooses not to take that path.

Zane lifts a hand and rakes it through his perfect, shampoo-commercial-ready hair. The rings on his fingers glint in the sunlight. “We need a fourth member.”

“In your band?” I gawk.

Dutch glowers. “Why the hell would we ask you to join our band?”