Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
EDIE
I sneak into the suite I share with Odetta, clutching my rain poncho around me.
Odetta’s sleeping—no surprise there, being that it’s four in the morning on a Tuesday. In a few hours, normal students will be getting up and going to Butler Library to study, grabbing coffee and pastries at the Hungarian Pastry Shop, or hitting the fitness center for an early workout.
And here I am, just getting in.
Quietly as I can, I pull off the plastic rain poncho and strip off the ruined red dress, shoving it into the bottom of my dirty clothes bag like evidence from a crime scene.
I stuff my clutch full of money under my pillow and take a shower that does nothing to wash away the electricity of Luka’s touch still pulsing through me.
My body still vibrates with his fingers, his mouth, the intoxicating weight of him pressing me down.
I towel dry my hair, throw on a faded sweatshirt, and sit cross-legged on my bed. With trembling fingers, I pull out the money and count it under the glow of my desk lamp.
Thirty thousand.
My mind spins with what to do with it—lodging, classes, credit card, food. My debt has been spiraling out of control, but with this huge windfall, things can turn around.
It seems illegal to have this much cash. Only criminals would have this much.
But I am a criminal—a criminal on a leash, and the other end is held by Luka Zogaj.
I google him, trying to get his history, or just any kind of information. There’s nothing much but names and addresses of a lot of Zogajes. There is, however, a Zogaj family associated with the Albanian mafia clan known as the Ghost Hound Clan in a list on Wikipedia.
Ghost Hound Clan. What the fuck.
I peer over at Odetta, still sleeping. Whatever happens, I have to keep her safe from all of this.
I divide the money into four small stacks. I wish I had some sort of a professional hiding place like in the movies—a dresser drawer with a false back or a puzzle box or something. I settle for stuffing it all into a sock and shoving it into the back of my underwear drawer.
What if he finds out I’m a college student? Will that look strange? Or maybe not. College is expensive.
I don’t want the ice cream I promised myself anymore, so I try to sleep, but I’m too jacked.
I tiptoe to the bathroom, fill a glass of water, and stare down at 113th Street.
Nine stories below, blue Columbia banners flap from the row of streetlamps illuminating empty streets, parked cars, and shuttered shops.
It’s always bright here in Manhattan, unlike back home in the suburbs of Hartford, where night was actually night.
This is my fourth year here and my third rooming with Odetta. Odetta’s in the history department, too—early Roman Empire—but she wants to do law.
I specialize in the medieval and Crusades eras. I’m going to do my thesis on Byzantine princess Anastasia Laskarina, who is thought to be one of the earliest female historians and the first known teen historian.
Learning about her as a young girl sparked my passion for history. I loved imagining her in her castle chambers or out on walks with her ladies, observing history brewing all around her. I loved to think about her with her journals, writing everything she saw.
I have a dream of writing a book focused on teenagers in history—not just those who shaped events but those who recorded their experiences firsthand. I want my textbook to encourage kids to observe, reflect, and think critically about their worlds.
This idea of mine helped me land a full-ride scholarship, but it wasn’t bullshit I said for the scholarship. It’s a plan I mean to carry through. Write the textbook. Be a teacher.
It’s a plan that Bender could destroy with one word. Nobody will hire a teacher with a criminal record.