Page 29 of Venom (St. Sebastian’s at Cravenmoor Academy #1)

Blake

“ G ot it.”

The words are clipped, efficient, and entirely expected.

They are the final piece of data required to complete the equation.

My eyes, which had been closed in a moment of meditative focus, snap open.

The world comes back into sharp relief: the manicured lawns of the quad, the gothic stonework, and the panicked, self-important face of the girl standing before me.

Ana Countridge. The epicentre of this tedious, predictable drama.

Before the sound of my quiet inhalation has fully faded, my hand snaps out. There is no wasted motion, no theatrical wind-up. It is a simple, biomechanical action, precise and final. My fingers wrap around her throat.

A sharp, bird-like gasp escapes her lips.

Her perfectly manicured hands, the nails painted a garish shade of crimson, fly up to my wrist. They scrabble uselessly against my skin, the frantic, ineffective scratching of a trapped rodent.

The fear in her eyes is a delicious, satisfying thing to witness.

It is a pure, unadulterated emotion, a fascinating chemical reaction.

The smug certainty she wore so proudly just moments ago, the belief that she was a player in a game she controlled, has shattered like cheap glass.

It is replaced by the raw, primal terror of a cornered animal that has just realised the hunter was never playing a game at all.

“The clock tower,” I say, my voice a soft, conversational murmur that is far more terrifying than any shout. I watch the recognition, the dawning horror, flicker in her panicked eyes. “A decoy at the boathouse. Very clever. Almost impressive, for you.”

A choked, gurgling sound is her only reply. Her face mottles, a canvas of blotchy red and pale white. Her chest heaves with silent, panicked breaths that do nothing to fill her lungs. Her pulse hammers against my thumb, a frantic, terrified drumbeat. It is the rhythm of consequence.

“But here is your mistake, Ana,” I continue, leaning in so my lips are almost brushing her ear.

I can smell her expensive perfume, a cloying floral scent that tries and fails to mask the sour tang of her fear.

“You fundamentally miscalculated the players. An amateur error. You saw the board, and you thought you were moving pawns.” I tighten my grip, just enough to make her choke, a small punctuation mark on my statement.

It would be so easy to crush it. A simple application of pressure.

But that would be messy. Inelegant. “You were not.”

I hold her there for another second, letting the reality of her situation permeate her consciousness. “You set a rabid dog on a queen, and now the queen’s knights are coming. Not for the dog. He is an irrelevance who will be dealt with. They are coming for the architect of his leash. For you.”

I let her go as abruptly as I seized her.

The release of pressure is absolute. She collapses against the rough stone wall of the archway, a puppet with its strings cut.

She gags and sobs, making great, ugly, gulping sounds as she drags air back into her lungs.

Her hands fly to her own throat, clutching the skin as if to reassure herself it is still intact.

I watch her with the detached curiosity of a biologist observing a specimen.

I brush a non-existent speck of dust from the cuff of my bespoke suit. Her reaction is textbook. Predictable.

“Pray they get to Headley before he does something irreparable,” I advise her coolly, my tone that of a financial advisor discussing a poor investment.

“Because if she is harmed—truly harmed—your life as you know it is over. The social standing you hold so dear, the wealth you take for granted, the very name ‘Countridge’… it will all be rendered worthless. I will not just burn your world to the ground. I will personally salt the fucking earth so that nothing can ever grow there again.”

She stares up at me, her face a pathetic ruin of smeared mascara and abject terror.

The illusion of her power, an edifice built on her father’s moderate success and her fleeting beauty, has been stripped away.

All that remains is a spoiled, frightened child, utterly unequipped for the reality of the world she has blundered into. It’s a tedious, predictable sight.

I pull out my phone, my movements unhurried, a deliberate display of calm in the face of her hysteria.

It is a performance for her benefit, a final lesson in the vast, unbridgeable chasm between her power and mine.

I dial a number from memory. It rings once before a clipped, professional voice answers. “Sir.”

“It’s time,” I say, my gaze never leaving Ana’s crumpled form on the ground.

I want her to hear this. I want her to witness the precise moment the axe falls.

“Liquidate all assets connected to the Headley Group. Initiate short positions. Call in any outstanding markers held by our subsidiaries. I want a cascade failure. I want them bankrupt by sunrise.”

“Understood, sir.” The voice is calm, unquestioning. It is the sound of absolute loyalty and terrifying competence.

“And Countridge,” I add, a thread of pure ice entering my voice.

Ana flinches at the sound of her name, a fresh wave of sobs shaking her body.

“Begin the preliminary work. A full forensic accounting. I want to know every vulnerability, every dirty secret, every offshore account, every political favour owed. I want to own them, body and soul.”

“It will be done.”

I end the call without another word. The silence that follows is punctuated only by Ana’s pathetic, hiccupping sobs. I slide the phone back into my pocket and look down at her, a specimen of failure.

“You see, Ana,” I murmur, straightening my tie, an island of perfect order in her chaotic collapse.

“The difference between us is not merely wealth or influence. It is a matter of lineage and intellect. My family builds empires. Your family manages a portfolio. We operate on a scale you cannot even conceive of. You thought you were playing chess, but you were merely knocking over draughts pieces in a sandpit. You have no real power. You are a liability propped up by a name that is, at best, mediocre. Excellence is earned, generation after generation, through blood and will. My family has earned every ounce of its power. You are about to learn what it means to be exposed as utterly, devastatingly average.”

I turn my back on her, leaving her to drown in the mess she has made.

My part in the physical confrontation is over before it has even begun.

I walk away from the archway, back into the open quad.

The sound of her sobbing is a gratifying, if slightly irritating, postscript to our conversation.

It is a simple equation. An insult to Venetia is an insult to my interests, and insults to my interests are debts that are always, always , repaid with ruinous interest.

My stride is calm, measured, as I walk towards the distant clock tower.

Annihilation is my art form. Rafferty and Viper are effective tools, scalpels for the visceral work.

They will make sure Headley never even looks at Venetia again.

His punishment will be physical, immediate, and absolute.

While they are breaking a man, I am breaking his entire lineage.

It is a far more permanent and satisfying form of destruction.

Ana’s punishment, on the other hand, will be a slow, public dissection. Humiliating. Complete.

The quad is no longer quiet. Small groups of students are gathering, their faces illuminated by the glow of their phones. The first whispers of the night’s events are rippling through the crowd. Nothing stays quiet for long at St. Sebastian’s. Rumour is a currency here, and I am its master banker.

I reach the base of the tower and stop, my hands sliding into my pockets. The heavy oak door hangs broken on a single hinge, a testament to Viper’s unsubtle, yet effective, method of entry. From high above, I can hear a muffled thud, followed by a sharp cry of pain that is abruptly cut off.

I don’t go up. My role is not in the visceral theatre of retribution.

My battlefield is the balance sheet, the boardroom, the phone call that ruins legacies.

I remain down here, on the ground, the architect of the aftermath.

I am ready to receive the queen when she descends from her tower, ready to ensure the story of her bloody coronation is told exactly as I write it.

Not as a victim, but as a victor. An asset who has, once again, proven her value.