Chapter 46
NOVA
Iwas doing my makeup in front of the bathroom mirror, the door ajar so I could listen to the Glass Animals album playing from Hudson’s speakers in the living room.
Music had been tricky for me lately. It was uniquely painful that one of my biggest sources of comfort now simultaneously twisted a knife into my already broken heart.
To add insult to injury, the alpha reader ghosted me after she said she would read my book over Thanksgiving.
I tried to remind myself she’d had a death in the family, and maybe she still wasn’t able to get to it.
But I couldn’t shake the nagging feeling that the reason she’d ghosted was because she had read my book, and she didn’t have the heart to tell me it wasn’t the hit I’d thought it was.
After this weekend, I’d start looking for a job with a steady, reliable income. I’d still send the book to a new reader, or maybe query agents, but I didn’t want to get my hopes up. I had to stop being delusional. It was time for a Plan B.
The disappointment swimming in my eyes and weighing down my shoulders was hard to face in the mirror.
Hudson and I had already been through the round of discussions and debates about tonight, and the conclusion was always the same. Yes, it was stupid and dangerous. Yes, I was going to do it anyway. Eyes wide open.
I’d messaged Lorelei back, demanding more information, asking her why she’d run from me if she wanted to see me.
She’d replied, Because it was The Hunt, and you were hunting me. We can’t talk here. I’m sure you understand why…
It was chilling, the idea The Circle and Roman could somehow access my social media accounts, tamper with my algorithms, read my messages, track me in the city, find out where I lived.
They watched us all from a panopticon, an all-seeing eye.
At first, I thought they were satirizing conspiracies about the wealthy, but reality looked far worse.
Lorelei was trapped in a circle of people who had infinite resources to make sure she never escaped. She was trapped with Roman, and I highly doubted she would be okay with the fact that the Master she served was aggressively pursuing me.
“I have something I need to confess,” Hudson said when I finished applying eyeliner.
“A lot of confessing from you lately.”
“Yeah, well…” He sighed. “Wes texted me after you broke up. He asked me to tell him if you were ever contacted by the cult again, or if I thought you were in danger.”
My heart beat wildly against my ribcage. I set the mascara down as my hand became unsteady. Just the mention of Wes flooded me with more emotion than I knew how to deal with.
“So, last night, I told him you were going to the party.”
I shouldn’t have been feeling relieved and hopeful. I should’ve felt hatred and indifference. But I didn’t. Not at all.
I’d thought about reaching out to him every day since Thanksgiving, but I talked myself out of it every time. I was still stubborn and hurt. Wes had let me go. He’d shut down instead of fighting for me, and that wasn’t the kind of love I wrote about in my novels.
“And?” I asked.
Hudson frowned. “He didn’t respond.”
Everything inside me deflated. I nodded, bitterness lodged in my chest as I continued applying mascara.
“That’s all I need to hear,” I said coldly.
“I’m sorry, Nova. It surprised me too, especially after his initial message. I don’t know.”
“And we’ll never know,” I said, steadying myself with a glare into my own dark eyes in the mirror.
“I thought I understood him finally, but maybe I never did. You can’t understand someone who keeps you in the dark, who guards himself with secrets and gives up the moment he’s revealed.
” Tears pricked my eyes, and I ground my teeth, forcing them to dry up before they ruined the makeup I’d just put on.
“He gave me up like I never meant anything to him. All that talk about protecting me from The Circle clearly only applied when he saw me as his. And now that I’m not, he couldn’t care less. ”
Hudson’s face fell. He looked at the counter for a moment before rubbing my shoulder. “I believed him too, Nova. I really did. I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine,” I lied. “I’m over it,” I lied again.
I couldn’t justify taking a car right now, so I wore sneakers with my lacey white satin slip dress covered by my big winter jacket. I’d brought heels in my bag, as I knew The Circle turned away anyone who didn’t respect their elevated dress expectations.
They would hate to know I spent a whopping twenty-five dollars on my slip. It was revealing enough to pass in a sex party without showing more than I was willing to show tonight.
I’d pressed Lorelei for an exact location to meet her, knowing we wouldn’t have our phones, and I wanted to get this over with as quickly as possible. But she’d stopped responding.
As I approached the church, I couldn’t help but feel like a sacrificial lamb in white on the way to her own slaughter.
A black SUV pulled up to the curb, and three women in wintry blue gowns and furs stepped out of the car with an old man in a suit.
The women each wore flashy diamond necklaces, walking arm in arm toward the church.
When I climbed the steps after them, they glanced at me in my beat-up sneakers and long puff jacket like we couldn’t possibly be going to the same place.
Inside the entry hall, a man with sideburns in a tux immediately stepped forward. “Please wait in line here for phone and coat check. And be ready to deliver your unique, individual passwords.”
They wanted to be Eyes Wide Shut so badly.
I fought the urge to roll my eyes at The Circle’s theatrics. I stepped into the line facing the check-in desk, where my least favorite cult underling now stared at me with a sharp gaze. Her auburn hair was in a perfect, cunty bob, and I could already tell she was taking her job way too seriously.
Oh, how I’d missed her.
The women in diamonds stood behind me, and two women in front of me were leaned in close, clearly gossiping.
“Guess who’s here,” the woman with big brown eyes and warm, tan skin whispered to her mousy brunette confidante. She leaned in close and whispered.
I was not ashamed to admit I leaned forward a little, just barely catching the name of a hot male actor.
“Oh my God, stop.”
She nodded, beaming with satisfaction. “Mmhmm. It’s not fair that most of the moneybags in New York are ugly. We need to get to the LA location’s grand opening. Their moneybags have a much higher chance of being wealthy and hot.”
Oh, God. Not an LA version of The Circle. I shuddered to imagine the traction a pseudo-spiritual kinky cult could gain in Hollywood. Forget complimentary reiki on the way out. I bet they’d offer complimentary buccal fat removal.
This place did not need to be spreading across the country like a damn virus.
“And guess what else,” the first woman continued, still whispering. “Jayne hates her LA female counterpart.”
“Ohmygod why?”
“Because she’s a huge social media influencer and self-proclaimed spiritual guru. Like, huge. I mean, you probably already follow her. But also, there’s this—”
“Do you mind?” the mousy brunette suddenly asked, whipping her head to look at me pointedly.
I took a step back and raised my hands in the air. “My bad.”
The other girl assessed me. “You’re going to run and tell Jayne and Jayne’s bathwater drinker, aren’t you?”
I lifted my brows. “No. I was riveted for my own pleasure only.” I paused. “Do you mean Maisy?” I couldn’t help but smirk a little at the description.
The smirk seemed to work in my favor, as the brunette giggled and her friend relaxed an inch. “Last holiday party, I watched that girl literally beg to suck Archer’s dick just to taste Jayne on him. She thought it would transmute ancient wisdom to her or some shit.”
This information did not surprise me.
Wait a damn minute.
“Last holiday party?” I repeated. “I thought Maisy only ascended this summer…”
Both women exchanged a look. “Girl, nooo. Maisy has been Jayne’s lapdog since opening night.”
It was their turn at coat check, which ended our conversation but left me reeling all over again.
I ran through each interaction I’d had with Maisy since I’d entered The Circle.
The way she’d guided me along, told me how everything worked, what rules to follow, pushed me in specific ways—toward Archer and Jayne, toward Roman.
“Password?” my auburn-haired nemesis asked, irritation in her tone.
“Eyes wide open,” I said, shrugging out of my coat and handing her my phone.
The moment it was in her hands, it felt like I’d crossed some grand point of no return. I was on my own now.
“Just you?” she asked casually, cruel humor dancing in her eyes. “No Just Wes?”
I plopped my socks and nasty sneakers stained with dark subway matter and road debris right down on the desk in front of her. Her smirk fell, and she glowered at the sneakers and socks with alarmed disgust.
“Yep, just me,” I chirped with a wide smile. “Have a great night!”
Now bare in my lacey slip and silver heels, goosebumps erupted on my skin.
“Right this way, Nova,” said a friendly volunteer I vaguely recognized. “Welcome to the winter wonderland.”
When he opened the doors to the nave, a dark wooden barrier stood before me, blocking me from continuing. In the center was a large wardrobe.
I stared for another three seconds, processing, before I sighed and stepped forward. When I opened the wardrobe, I was met with a couple fur coats hanging on a rack and another door in the back. Voices floated from beyond the portal.
I stepped into the wardrobe, opened the second door, and slipped into The Circle’s world between worlds.
The first thing I saw was Santa Claus sodomizing a reindeer.