27
Tagus Fair!
Music, food, and secrets!
Zero hours before the fair
Welcome to the annual Tagus University fair!
My name is Jude Derry, and I’ll be your guide and narrator. Please adjust your knickers, keep your legs closed, and try not to laugh too loudly during the tour.
If you were expecting stuff like food stalls lining the pavements, you’d be seriously underestimating just how far the country’s most elite university would go.
Let’s take a closer look: lights strung everywhere, wooden booths with creatively painted signs, a stage for bands, and music being pumped out all over the place thanks to the massive amplifiers scattered all around the fair.
And if you couldn’t get close to the stage, no sweat; you could watch the bands from anywhere on the giant screens set up around the fair.
What’s more, at least six guys from the audiovisual department were operating professional cameras to record and broadcast the performance on the screens.
There was also a Ferris wheel, bumper cars, people wearing party hats, and a guy dressed as a huge, outrageous platypus character, gyrating his hips and pretending to fuck everyone. And it was actually funny.
Sounds great, right?
Well, four big things were about to go down.
The first I’ll call “The Heartbreaking Scene.”
Before that, though, I showed up with Aegan.
It was around 7:00 p.m. because the asshole took so long to get ready.
The night sky looked spectacular above the glow of the lights.
Laughter rang out from people playing games, while others strolled around, nibbling cotton candy and sipping booze from hidden flasks, buzzing and brimming with the spirit of Tagus.
I thought we were heading for the stage, but before we got there, a girl came rushing over. I recognized her as one of the fair organizers. She had curly hair and was in charge of the scheduling.
“Aegan, I did it,” she told him nervously. “I changed Regan’s name for your name in the speech. You can get onstage, but you’d better be fast so the chancellor doesn’t stop you.”
Next to me, Aegan’s face glowed with smug satisfaction. He’d obviously plotted with that girl to deliver the speech after Regan had tried to steal the spotlight from him.
“So, are you really going to take to the stage instead of Regan and give the speech?” I asked Aegan, half-stunned.
“I’m only taking back what’s mine,” he replied, resolute.
“Also, I think there’s a problem,” the girl warned, sensing Aegan wouldn’t react well. “The speech has been pushed back twenty minutes. I’m not sure when it got changed, but there’s a new event now over at the Ferris wheel at the original time.”
So nobody missed them, all events were announced over the loudspeakers ten minutes in advance.
Aegan frowned.
“What event?” he demanded to know.
“No idea,” the girl replied. “It doesn’t say, but it’s highlighted as being important.”
Aegan thought that was ridiculous.
“What the hell could be more important than my speech?” he complained.
“Um, kids dying of starvation,” I said, like it was obvious.
“Shut up,” he blurted out, now in pigheaded mode. He then gave me an order: “I’ll head to the stage to get ready, and you’ll go to the Ferris wheel. Find out what it is and have it rescheduled for later. Send me a message.”
I couldn’t be bothered with arguing with him, not before shit was about to go down. I’d have to be the world’s best girlfriend so he wouldn’t suspect anything.
“Sure, sweetie,” I accepted with a smile.
Aegan and the girl headed toward the stage, while I made my way to the Ferris wheel.
The speech wasn’t for another thirty minutes.
My plan was to hand the USB to Lander a few minutes before so nobody could see what was on it.
I was kind of nervous about what would happen after Aegan’s big speech, but I was more than ready.
There was no backing out now. Tonight, he would be toppled for good.
Everyone who sucked up to him would finally see him for what he truly was: a murderer.
He would be kicked off his pedestal. There’d be no more “perfect Aegan Cash.” Heads would no longer be buried in the sand.
The Cash family’s reign would come to an end.
I didn’t notice anything unusual going on by the large Ferris wheel that was slowly revolving under soft romantic lights. Just Tood the platypus, who was pretending to fuck Kiana from behind.
I hadn’t spoken to her or Dash since what had gone down in the auditorium. As soon as the mascot saw me, it started doing a ridiculous dance before the person inside pulled off the top half of the costume and stuck their head out.
There was a mischievous smile. It was Dash!
“Jude, you’re not getting into the spirit of the fair!” he laughed, shaking his wavy hair. He was holding Tood’s head under his arm.
“Not if the spirit happens to be randy,” I said.
“Pfff, you should see what’s going on inside the house of horror,” he joked. “They aren’t exactly screams of fear.”
“Got preshow nerves?” Kiana asked me, referring to my plan.
“A little,” is all I could say. “Hey, what are they going to do here in a little while? There’s an event on, and Aegan wants to know if it can be pushed back. Actually, he’s demanding that it be pushed back.”
Dash shook his head. “It’s just a little something to keep people entertained, and it can’t be pushed back because the chancellor has already given the go-ahead. My hands are tied.”
“But what is it?” I insisted.
“It’s a secret,” he said excitedly. “You’ll see. All I can say is it’ll be really fun. And there’ll be prizes.”
“But . . .” I said, trying to get more information out of him, but I couldn’t get the words out before I saw something a few feet behind him.
Adrik and Artie were standing in front of one of the shooting target games.
He was trying to win her a prize, which was such a cliché. She was laughing because he kept missing. He looked the true gentleman. She was lapping it all up. It looked like a date, and they seemed to be getting on like a house on fire.
I didn’t know what to feel. It looked really weird, seeing them together like this.
And I felt hurt. It wasn’t jealousy, or anything horrible or malicious; it was more like sadness, because I really would have loved to be in Artie’s place.
I’d never been on a real date with anyone.
Nobody had ever tried to win anything for me.
Nobody had ever done silly things just to make me laugh.
And for Adrik, who I was head over heels for, to do all those things with Artie was . . . crushing.
I thought things couldn’t get much worse. And then my heart broke.
He suddenly gave up because he wasn’t winning anything. She put her hand on his shoulder as if to say don’t worry, and then, one thing led to another, and they started kissing.
I couldn’t look away, no matter how much I tried. He was far bigger than her, with his great big masculine hands holding on to her waist, pulling her into him. She stood on her tiptoes so she could wrap her arms around his neck.
It was a passionate, intense, sexual kiss.
Adrik opened his eyes and, while still kissing Artie, looked at me. He knew I was there, just a few yards away, watching him, and he didn’t stop. In fact, he started heating things up a bit, sliding his hands down to touch her ass. If he was trying to send me a message, I got it loud and clear.
My heart was pounding. My eyes were as big as plates. How the hell had I questioned whether to go through with my plan just because of Adrik. During a stupid moment of weakness, I’d considered not doing anything to Aegan. Ha! I must be really stupid to think Adrik was different.
“Should we get you a stretcher in case you faint?” I heard Dash say to me.
I turned my attention to him. Kiana and Dash kept shifting their gaze between Adrik, Artie, and me, waiting for me to finish what I had been saying moments ago. I couldn’t hide my stunned expression.
I didn’t know what lie to come up with.
“Relax, Jude, we’re not going to judge you,” Dash said.
“It’s a good thing you don’t really like them,” Kiana remarked, giving me a suspicious look.
“I don’t know . . . to be quite honest, when he was kissing you in the video, it felt like he was thinking, ‘I’ve never tasted anything this good,’” Dash said, sounding like a pro. “This kiss with Artie is like, ‘Okay, meh.’”
Kiana ignored Dash’s comment. “Come on, Jude . . . you don’t actually like Adrik and Aegan, do you?”
I could hear Artie’s mischievous giggles. I looked back at them. Adrik whispered something to her, and then they continued strolling through the fair. This time they headed over to the Ferris wheel. The asshole wanted to be close by, so I’d see them, didn’t he?
“No,” I said dryly. “Kissing Adrik was just a mistake that made Artie hate me and made people think I’m . . . Candy Candy, falling for every guy who looks sideways at her.”
Kiana raised an eyebrow and made a gesture as if to say, Back up a minute.
“Artie stopped talking to you because you kissed Adrik?” she said, finding it hard to believe.
I nodded. Dash let out a laugh while shaking his head. “That’s very hypocritical of her,” he said.
“Why?” I asked, intrigued. “It was Adrik who asked her out, and she’d already told me she liked him.”
Dash gave Kiana one of those looks that only they could understand.
“She didn’t tell you, did she?” Dash asked, clearly wanting to share.
“What? Tell me now.” My patience wearing thin after what I’d just seen.
“Artie slept with Aegan.”
Now, that was a bombshell. “What the hell. When?”
“Last year,” Dash said, in a hushed voice, glancing around.
“They were together for about a month. He was going out with Eli at the time. We went to a party and they hooked up. Then he dumped her, like he usually does. She took it quite well, all things considered, but it obviously had an effect on her.”
I raised my eyebrows, still surprised.
That’s why Lander had said he hoped she would “get over it.”
Get over her breakup with Aegan! Wait a minute . . .