Chapter 21
Violet
“No offense, Vee, but you look exhausted,” Cherry said, sliding her tray across from mine in the dining hall. “I hope you’re not sleepwalking again.”
She was right. I wasn’t looking my best and brightest today, because sleep had been elusive lately. Too many thoughts spinning through my head, too many dead ends, too many questions without answers.
“I’m just tired,” I said, stabbing at my potato bake without much enthusiasm. “I was up all night studying.”
Ginny dropped into the seat beside Cherry, her red hair pulled back in a messy bun. “C’mon, Vee, it's Halloween! You're supposed to be excited about parties, not acting like a zombie. Unless… ooh, costume idea!”
I managed a small smile. “Yeah, that’s a good idea. I won’t even need all the crazy makeup with these dark circles.”
Right now, we were all pretending everything was fine, skirting around the real reason I hadn’t been sleeping.
It had been two weeks since I infiltrated the Dionysus Club's initiation ceremony. Two weeks since I'd watched them cut initiates' palms and mix blood with wine. Two weeks since I'd seen Daniel Northmont—Jeremiah's stepbrother—sworn in as a new recruit.
Two weeks, and we'd gotten absolutely nowhere.
Jeremiah finally arrived, dropping into the chair beside me with a frustrated sigh.
“I’ve still got nothing,” he told us, keeping his voice low.
“I managed to clone my brother’s phone yesterday while I was helping him with a study sesh, but there's nothing useful on it. Just standard freshman stuff. Group chats about classes, some gym bros talking about protein powder, Instagram DMs with girls. Nothing about the Club.”
My heart sank, though I'd been expecting it. “They're probably too smart to put anything in writing. Or they’ve all got secret burner phones.”
“Or one of those encrypted chat programs,” Dylan added from the head of the table.
“Probably,” Jeremiah replied with a nod. “I'm going to keep trying, but I don't know what else to do. He doesn't talk about it, for obvious reasons.”
Because they'd trained him well. Sworn him to secrecy. Made him understand what happened to people who tried to talk.
People like Cal.
“We'll figure something out,” I said, though I wasn't sure how much I believed that anymore.
I'd spent the last two weeks trying to track down other people Calista might’ve known; people who might have information about her final days.
But every lead had turned into another dead end.
Friends who'd transferred or graduated. Professors and old dorm neighbors who claimed not to remember her.
Staff who'd clearly been paid off or scared into silence.
The Dionysus Club was just too damn good at covering their tracks.
And then there was the matter of Kane Sutherland…
My stomach churned at the thought of him. His fraternity brothers had reported him missing shortly after our disastrous meetup at Revs. The police had questioned me, of course, because according to their investigation, I was likely the last person to have seen him.
I'd told them that we arrived at Revs in separate vehicles that evening, that the meetup hadn't gone well, and that I'd left early and gone back to my dorm without him.
All true.
What I hadn't told them was what happened in the parking lot. The way Kane had shoved me into the wall. The bruises he'd left on my arm and back. The way Julian had appeared out of nowhere and knocked Kane right out.
I knew I should’ve told the police about that. Should’ve mentioned that Julian had been there, that he'd been following me, that he'd done something with Kane after I was safely back in my dorm.
But I hadn't, and I didn't know why.
Every time I tried to form the words ‘Julian Valcourt was there too’, something stopped me. Some twisted part of my brain that whispered, ‘he was protecting you’ and ‘Kane deserved whatever happened to him’.
Which was insane. Completely insane.
If Julian had killed Kane because he hurt me—and the rational part of my brain said he probably had—then I should be absolutely horrified. Petrified. Running straight to the police to report everything I knew.
Instead, I mostly felt... confused. And something else that felt disturbingly like gratitude.
Kane had hurt me. Left bruises on my skin. And then he'd vanished, and some dark part of me started whispering that I was safer now. That Julian had made me safer.
I hated that I felt that way. Hated that I'd covered for a man who was almost certainly a dangerous killer. Hated that when I thought about Julian stepping between me and Kane, my pulse quickened for reasons that had nothing to do with fear.
Julian obviously knew it, too. After all, he had to know I'd covered for him with the police. Which made what came next even more confusing.
The text.
I saw you.
Two words that had been haunting me for two weeks. I knew Julian had sent it, because no one else had been close enough to recognize me in that ritual chamber. But it seemed like he hadn't reported me to the Club. Hadn't told anyone what I'd done.
Why?
I'd spent countless sleepless nights turning that question over in my mind. Was it a tit-for-tat sort of thing? You didn’t rat on me to the cops, so now I won’t rat on you to the Club?
Or was he planning to blackmail me? Use what he knew as leverage? Was he waiting for the right moment to expose me? To watch me squirm in front of his so-called ‘brothers’ in some dark chamber beneath the estate?
Or… was there something else going on?
Three days ago, something had happened that made even less sense to me than all the other stuff.
I'd been leaving the library late, arms full of textbooks, and I'd tripped on the steps.
Completely ate it, books flying everywhere.
And suddenly Julian had been there—just there, like he always seemed to be—and he'd caught my arm before I totally face-planted on the concrete.
For a moment, his hand had lingered on my elbow. At the same time, his stormy blue eyes had locked onto mine, and I'd seen something there. Something that looked like desire. Longing, even.
But that was crazy. Julian Valcourt didn't want me. If he did, he wouldn’t have left that message in blood on my wall or sent me those creepy texts demanding I stop asking questions.
He was just fucking with my head; playing some kind of twisted game that I didn't understand.
The idea that he might actually be romantically interested in me was absurd.
Right?
“Violet? Hello?” Dylan’s voice pulled me out of my reverie. “You completely zoned out.”
“Sorry,” I said, forcing another smile. “Just thinking.”
“About what?” Cherry asked, leaning forward.
About how I might be protecting a killer. About how that should terrify me but it doesn't. About how every time I close my eyes, I see Julian in that black mask, and I don't know if I want to run from him or toward him.
“Nothing too important,” I said, waving a hand. “Just a paper I need to start writing.”
“God, that reminds me, I really need to—”
Cherry was cut off midsentence by a girl shouting across the dining hall.
“It’s out!”
Every head snapped toward the entrance, where a petite brunette stood, chest heaving and eyes wild with hysteria.
“It’s out!” she shouted again, voice cracking slightly. “The List is out!”
For half a heartbeat, the dining hall was completely still. Then chaos erupted.
Chairs scraped, silverware clattered, and the air filled with shrieks and gasps as students surged toward the doors in a mad stampede.
I turned back to my table, heart pounding. My friends stared at one another, their half-eaten meals forgotten.
“Should we go?” Cherry asked, her voice barely audible over the commotion.
Jeremiah slouched back, trying for nonchalance but failing. “We can just check it later,” he said. “It’ll be crazy out there right now, and it’s not like any of us will be on the List.”
“You don’t know that for sure,” Ginny said, brows dipping in a frown. Her eyes skated over my face, and I registered a flash of concern in them. “I mean, we never thought one of us would end up on it last year, and then—”
She abruptly cut herself off as Dylan gave her a warning look.
“I think we should look,” I said in a low voice. “The anticipation’s going to drive us crazy if we don’t.”
“Agreed.” Cherry rose to her feet, her chair screeching back. “Let’s go.”
We joined the clamoring crowd outside, heading toward the eastern quad. I could hear snippets of conversation rising above the rush: names, speculation, laughter edged with fear.
“I bet my roommate is on it. She’s totally obsessed.”
“So the Selection’s actually real? I thought you guys were just trolling me.”
“My roommate swears her cousin never came back.”
As we reached the heart of the crowd, I saw it: the Selection List, nailed to the notice board on the outer wall of the Artemis Building. It was printed on a single off-white sheet of parchment, edged with crimson wax seals.
Just beyond the edges of the mob, half-shrouded in fog, stood several masked figures in black cloaks. Men from the Dionysus Club, acting as silent sentinels to ensure no one attempted to photograph the List, tear it down, or copy it into a notebook.
Jeremiah edged forward, and the rest of us waited with bated breath as he craned his neck to look over the crowd. His hand suddenly flew to his mouth, clamping over it as he jerked backward. Then he went dead still.
“Jer?” Dylan called out, voice almost lost under the noise. “What is it?”
Jeremiah finally turned to face us. His gaze instantly locked on mine, panicked and hollow. “It… it’s happening again,” he said hoarsely. “I’m sorry, Vee.”
My stomach dropped.
No. It can’t be…
Adrenaline surged through me, and I pushed my way forward, Cherry right beside me. A girl at the front let out a strangled scream before bolting, shoving people aside as she fled across the lawn.
Cherry slid into the spot the other girl had left open and grabbed my wrist, yanking me toward the parchment. “Vee,” she breathed, eyes wide as saucers. “Holy shit.”
My gaze followed hers, landing on the final name.
Violet Jayne Calloway.
The letters blurred before me as my pulse roared in my ears. The air around me seemed to have thickened, pressing against my chest until it hurt to breathe.
“Th-that’s me,” I said woodenly, as if I’d somehow failed to introduce myself to my friends when we first met.
“I know, babe,” Cherry murmured, squeezing my hand. “I… I can’t believe it.”
Another burst of adrenaline suddenly shot through me. Heart hammering, I slid my hand out of Cherry’s grip and stumbled back, shoving through the wall of bodies until I broke free on the outskirts of the mob.
I could hear my friends following, and I blindly reached for Cherry’s arm again as my knees threatened to buckle.
“Guys… what the hell am I supposed to do now?” I asked, voice coming out in a choked whisper.
Cherry’s voice shook as she answered. “There’s only one thing you can do,” she said. “Run.”