Chapter 15
FIFTEEN
RUELLA
I stare at the text as I sit on the end of my bed. I need to try and mentally prepare for the conversation ahead, but there’s no preparing when it comes to Archibald Astor, he knows exactly how to cut you deep and keep you bleeding out for days.
I swallow the lump away in my throat and grip my phone as my mind replays the scene from the dining room earlier this afternoon.
I don’t know where it all went wrong. I had planned on spending the evening with Max, we were going to have dinner then go to the study hall for an hour to work on our English paper together.
All the while I was going to make him tell me everything about Marlowe and the other missing girls.
While we ate, he did open up in regard to my sister, how she was studying English literature like us and sat next to him in the first class of the year where they hit it off right away.
They sometimes ate dinner together and studied for exams in the hall where we were going to go tonight.
He never understood why she always refused to spend any time together outside of that, but she was always too busy.
He finally got her to agree to a date in the summer break, but…
then she disappeared. He tried to text and call but he got no reply.
He asked the teachers and they responded with the same crap they usually do, that she dropped out.
I know that’s a lie, Marlowe would never leave a steady flow of cash to slum it alone.
He looked saddened as he spoke. “It just really sucked that she didn’t tell me she was leaving, and that she didn’t even say goodbye before she left,”
I nodded and said I was sorry he went through all of that, all the while banking all the information to stress over later.
Asher Vander turning up and standing before me, irritation burning off him, was not what I expected.
It completely derailed my night of pushing for more information about the other girls.
Max had mentioned Marlowe, and now Bronwyn, being one of many girls to drop out.
The same line Lilia gave me, he repeated like a mantra, almost like they are trying to convince themselves rather than others.
It’s getting really frustrating. Like I am walking a maze, getting excited by finding a new route and then finding myself at the exact same place.
I think that’s why I blurted out about it to Asher, I wanted to be as blunt as I could without giving too much away.
I didn’t expect the suspicion and anger that came along with it.
He did look ridiculously tired though, and empty. Really empty. It reminded me of… well me.
My phone buzzes in my hand and I groan at the sight of my father’s name flashing across the screen. I take a deep breath before accepting the call.
“Hello,”
“You better have something for me or so help me god I will kill you myself,”
I bite my tongue until I can taste a metallic tang.
“I broke into the records room and Marlowe’s folder had been moved into a drawer with some other girls. Girls that have also disappeared from the Academy. One going missing as recent as this term,”
“Wha…”
“Before you go any further, let me finish please,” I demand and for once my father listens.
“The faculty are sticking by the story of people dropping out due to the pressure. Apparently, the ones who have gone missing all have unstable homes. Even the students don’t question it anymore,” That information came from Mrs Owens, the woman from the head of admissions.
I stopped her the other morning when I noticed her standing at Bronwyn’s room, a box of the missing girls’ things by the staff members feet, as the cleaners cleared out the rest.
The sound of glass shattering on the other end of the line is the only sign he’s still there.
So, I keep going.
“There is one girl,” I say, my voice barely steady. Guilt coils in my stomach. Even speaking her name into this space feels like betrayal, but I have to think of myself. My own freedom. My own survival.
“Her file was in the drawer along with the others, but she isn’t missing,”
There’s a pause.
Then, “What’s her name?”
Something in his tone pulls the breath straight from my lungs.
I change my mind. Immediately.
“I’m keeping that to myself,” I say, heart pounding. “But trust me, I’ll handle it. I’ll find out what she knows,”
Silence stretches. I brace. I know what’s coming. He doesn’t need much to twist a decision like mine into punishment.
If I give him her name, he’ll find someone to disappear her before I can blink. He’ll rip the truth from her, and if there’s nothing to find, he’ll find someone to kill her anyway. That’s just who he is.
He exhales, slow and dangerous. “Listen to me, you ungrateful little fuck,”
And then it begins.
“Do you know what I wanted to do when you first turned up on my doorstep? Crying, wrapped in a blanket like someone was supposed to care?” He laughs, bitter and sharp like broken glass. “I wanted to feed you to the fucking dogs,”
My stomach drops. I can feel the blood draining from my face.
“I was halfway to the kennels before Delphine came running after me. Not because she gave a shit, don’t flatter yourself.
She’d read the letter your filthy bitch of a mother sent with you.
She threatened to ruin everything. Said if I didn’t take you in, she’d blow open everything, names, locations, bank accounts,”
He spits the next words like poison. “So, I kept you. Dressed you up like one of us. Fed you. Schooled you,”
My eyes sting. I clench my jaw so tight it hurts, but it doesn’t stop the tears.
“But I never loved you,” he hisses. “I tolerated you. And I made damn sure you paid for every second you stole from me. Every fucking day, I broke you a little more,”
A sob escapes my throat before I can swallow it. I press a fist to my mouth, but he hears it.
“Oh, don’t start crying now,” he sneers. “What, still hoping someone out there might care? Your mother dumped you like trash, only checking in to make sure you are still alive. Marlowe can barely look at you. Nobody wants you, and deep down, you know that. You’re a walking mistake,”
“Stop,” I whisper. It comes out cracked and pathetic.
But I don’t hang up.
I can’t.
It’s like watching a car crash in slow motion, brutal, inevitable, and too horrifying to look away from.
“I’m not going to let you fuck this up,” he continues. “I want hard proof, evidence that the Academy’s hiding something. If I get that, I’ll tear the place apart. Until then, get me the files on the other girls. All of them,”
His voice drops, cold and final. “And if you haven’t squeezed something useful out of the one you’re protecting, then it’s you I’ll deal with. And you know what that means,”
The call cuts out.
But I don’t move.
I stand there, staring at nothing, the phone still pressed to my ear.
And I feel it. like something inside me has just cracked wide open.
I have always been pushed away and ignored when I asked about my mother. Delphine called her a whore and that she was most likely dead. I made up stories in my head that she had to give me to that monster, she didn’t have another choice. Now I know different.
Archibald may be many things, but he is no liar.
I eventually wipe the back of my hands across my wet cheeks and drop the phone to the bed as I stand. I need to get out of here.
I need something to numb this pain. The constant ache that is my shitty life.
I don’t want to think anymore, don’t want to replay memories or wonder what’s coming.
I want to feel the steady beat of my heart in my chest, a reminder that I’m alive.
That’s all that matters. Everything else, every heartbreak, every shadow, is temporary.
The future is mine to take, if I can just survive the present.
I remember Corden mentioning the billiards room on the second floor, and the not-so-secret stash of alcohol hidden there.
Not like it needs hiding. The faculty stay in their own building on the estate, and they know exactly what goes on.
If they can turn a blind eye to missing students, what’s a few bottles of liquor?
I grab my cardigan and shrug it over my thin vest top. I hesitate over the sleep shorts, bare legs in this cold, but say “fuck it” under my breath and slip on my fluffy slippers before heading out.
It’s ten o’clock on a Friday night. Usually, I’d steer clear of any shared space, but the Deveroux house is throwing one of their usual parties, loud enough to rattle the windows.
Most students will be there, those who aren’t are probably buried in books like Deena, or hiding in their rooms like I usually am if I don’t have a little investigating to do.
As I make my way down the halls, bass thumps through the walls, a heartbeat of its own. I can picture the chaos: glittering lights, spilled drinks, Corden’s grin in the middle of it all. The thought of him softens something in me. I slide my phone from my pocket and shoot him a quick text.
We haven’t spent much time together this week. And… I miss him. More than I thought I would.
I smirk before climbing the stairs to the second floor, though my mood seems to drop with every creaking step along the polished hardwood.
A chill licks at the back of my neck, slipping beneath the cardigan, and I pull it tighter around my shoulders like it might shield me from the weight pressing down on this place.
The large mahogany door to the billiards room looms ahead, its ornate carvings darkened with age. I pause, pressing my ear against the wood. Silence. Thick and absolute. Good. I’m in no mood for company. Just me, a bottle, and the ghosts of my own thoughts.