Page 19

18

VEIL

M y bare feet pound against the dewy grass as I run in terror. If I dare pause and look down, I know I would find my feet cracked and bleeding.

Even worse, I’m naked, lost in a hedge maze while a monster with haunting eyes relentlessly chases me.

I look back over my shoulder and scream.

His hands drip with blood and gore, reaching, grasping, clawing.

If I stop, he catches me.

If I stop, he catches me.

If I stop ? —

I jerk awake in a cold sweat. Disoriented, I scramble to sit up in bed, swiveling my head side to side. The room is dark, but the slivers of light from the waxing moon filtering through the windows illuminate enough of my surroundings for reality to snap back into place. That, and the scent of blood oranges and cloves clinging to the threads of the T-shirt I’ve been forced to sleep in.

Laying a shaky hand on my pounding heart, I try my best to regulate my breathing while my gaze falls to the body slumbering next to me.

Having to share a bed with the same man who hunted me for sport must have triggered my recurring nightmare. Admittedly, waking up from said nightmare now doesn’t bring the same relief as it did before.

The monster has already caught me.

When I finally resigned myself to my fate last night and agreed to sleep in Gemini’s bed, he promptly gave me a shirt to sleep in before jumping under the covers, completely nude.

I acted unaffected and kept my eyes cast down until I had no choice but to crawl under the duvet next to him. Curling my body into itself, I laid on my side on the very edge of the mattress, deliberately facing away from him.

He didn’t protest and simply turned off the lights with a few claps of his hands.

The only silver lining with having to share a bed with Gemini Foley is that his mattress is ridiculously massive. If I stretched my arm out now and tried to reach him, my fingertips would still fall a few inches short of his naked arm.

Idly, I watch him sleep. One arm flung over his head, his lips slightly parted as his chest rises up and down, breathing deeply in and out. He appears harmless like this, with his eyes closed, face smoothed away from any conniving expression. He could nearly pass as a sane member of society like this. Almost.

I stifle a sigh that seems to originate from the very center of my soul. Bone-deep exhaustion soon replaces my pounding heart, and my mind turns to fog. Settling back onto my side, I gently rest my head on a pillow that smells like Gemini and let my drooping eyelids close, eventually falling back asleep till morning.

I’ve been reading all afternoon on one of the terrace daybeds when Gemini returns. He was gone for most of the day—most likely to do with the large crowd I could see, even from this far away, making its way through the city streets.

He’s relaxed his control over me in the past couple of days, but I would be naive to believe I could walk out of his home without anyone stopping me. Although I never see them, I can feel his security team’s eyes on me, surveilling me when Gemini can’t watch me himself.

I’m like a bird with its wings clipped. I can’t escape, even when the yearning for it has become almost unbearable.

I lift my gaze to meet his when he approaches me, and I’m nearly knocked over by the surge of energy emanating from him. His eyes are wild and bright, his black eyeliner even more pronounced today. Whatever celebration was happening down there, he certainly dressed for the occasion, looking quite regal in a yellow tailcoat and white lace gloves.

“Come with me,” he orders with an enigmatic smile, and even his voice strums with electricity.

I notice his split lip is now almost healed, but his black eye is still purple. I feel no remorse at the sight.

Instead, I wonder what happened today for him to seem so enlivened. But I don’t bother asking, my curiosity having dulled with the passing days of my captivity. However, the suffocating boredom of that same captivity has me following him without a single protest.

When I realized he was taking us into the city, I tried to conceal my excitement. But the subtle lift of Gemini’s mouth as he watched me from his seat on the boat told me I wasn’t hiding it as expertly as I believed.

After crossing the water, we take the town car. A few minutes later, we arrive in front of a dilapidated building just a few streets away from the harbor. I recognize the facade of Animus immediately.

Antoinette, Madeline, and I would come to watch Zazel perform at the Pravitian circus whenever we could afford it. My heart aches at the memory, and I hope that maybe Zazel is inside.

Something about Gemini’s demeanor tells me that he’s waiting for some kind of reaction, but I refuse to give him the pleasure of one. I keep my face as smooth as stone and take his hand while stepping out of the car, following him inside.

To my dismay, the circus is deserted.

Cloaked in darkness, it appears to be closed for the day.

“Sit,” Gemini says, pointing to the stands facing the stage.

I roll my eyes at the order, but still do as he said. He misses my small protest, too busy jogging away and disappearing to the back.

I wait, my impatience manifesting as a bouncing knee and me biting the skin around my thumb. Finally, a single spotlight turns on, illuminating a large circle at the very center of the stage. I perk up, wondering what will happen next.

Gemini returns, his smile just as mischievous as ever. He's changed into a striped pair of jeans and a cropped leather vest, his chest bare underneath.

Strutting up to me, he offers me what appears to be a pale pink leotard.

He hasn’t yet said a word, simply waiting for me to take the outfit out of his grasp. I let the silence hang for a little while longer, staring back at him.

Eventually, I cave. “Why are you handing me this?”

His smile widens, as if he won the game, and I immediately regret asking.

“Oh, this?” he says in an infuriatingly innocent tone. “It’s for your audition.”