Chapter 53 Orion
ORION
My head is not in the right place as I take my seat beside the teacher at the patterning class.
I open the book, looking for today’s lesson, but this is the last thing I want to be doing.
All my thoughts are consumed by a certain blonde to the point I think I’m starting to hallucinate.
She arrives in the class, all pretty, dressed in the clothes I made for her, and holding her textbook against her chest.
“You’re taking this class?” I mouth from across the room.
“Yeah,” she mouths back, picking a seat too far from me for my liking.
Long tables, rather than individual desks, line the room.
Sable sits on the left side, away from everyone but two brave people who dare to take a seat on the same bench.
I watch them carefully, but they don’t even glance at Sable, and my shoulders relax.
The class starts with some discussion and instruction, but very quickly, the students are sent to work.
This is when I help around, moving between tables and looking over their shoulders to see if they are doing it right.
This time, I don’t even pretend and make a beeline to her.
“I didn’t expect to see you in a classroom so soon,” I say.
“I’m not the kind of girl to wait, Orion. There weren’t many classes I could still fit in, and time was ticking.”
She doesn’t look at me when she says that, her eyes cast down to the patterning paper, markers, and scissors at the supply cart.
This is an intro class to patterns. At first, they need to create something similar to what the mannequin at the front of the class is wearing.
She sketches out the general shapes she’ll need across the paper, and I notice her shoulders are tense.
I can feel something is wrong. It’s so fucking obvious that it hurts.
I stop her movements at once, taking her trembling fingers between mine.
“What happened?”
She glances at me just once and shakes her head.
“Not here.”
That’s a sure-fire way to get me from one to one hundred. I puff my chest and scan the class. If she can’t talk to me because they’re here, maybe I should get rid of them.
“Don’t start anything,” Sable whispers. “No one in this class did anything.”
“So who?”
I don’t care what she says. I will send them all packing, professor included, if she gives me a simple nod. But Sable doesn’t give me anything. Instead, she sighs, annoyed at my overprotection.
“Someone stopped me in the hall to show me the video,” she finally bites out.
“The video?” I ask, not sure if we are talking about the same thing.
Her mouth thins into a line before she spells it out for me. “The video you all wanted to hide from me so badly.”
Pure panic bursts in my chest, but I grab her by the hand and pull her into the hall, knowing we can’t talk here.
That damn video forever plays in the back of my mind, Soren wearing my face and fucking someone who isn’t Sable.
It hurts me more than I can put into words because that day I lost her and my brother, but only one of them came back to me.
“Do you hate me?” I ask, my voice cracking as I close the door behind us.
Her blond ponytail whips as she faces me so damn quick, eyes burning. “Why? What did you do?”
I shake my head, hating that I have to explain this to her. “He looks so much like me. There’s no way you can see that and not feel repulsed. I do.”
“Oh, I felt very repulsed.” She nods.
Her words make me flinch. Fuck, how much does it cost to swap faces like that awesome movie from the ’90s? Yeah, it wasn’t real when the movie premiered, but I’m sure the technology has evolved since then.
“What can I do to make this better?” I rush to ask. Besides the whole face swapping that I’m going to look into soon.
“I smashed her phone, and that felt really good.” She smiles a little.
I chuckle, happy she did something in response. “Who showed you the video?”
“Some girl. She never told me her name.” She bites the side of her cheek in thought. “I wish we could do something to erase that video forever. That can’t be helping.”
“I thought about a million ways to never have to deal with that thing again, but there’s no use. People downloaded, and some even recorded their screen. It’s out now.”
She deflates with the news, eyes sad, and I want to kill my brother all over again. How fucking irresponsible to make everyone so miserable. His best friends and the girl we love. And what hurts the most is that I was sure he loved her too. I’ve seen his eyes so many times.
I clear my throat. “I’m sorry I insisted that Soren be a part of everything.” I don’t even have words to explain this pain, being the one who pushed so hard for our own destruction. At the time, it felt like my brother was just fighting fate, but now I think that was me.
“What are you talking about?”
“I feel very responsible for everything, Sable.”
To my surprise, she laughs. “Of course, you do. You all feel responsible in one way or another. Tell me, how are you responsible for anything that happened to me?”
Her tone is mocking, but I know what part I played. “I pushed you and Soren together. And now you have to look at me and see him.” I shake myself in anguish. “I’m looking into face swapping, if that helps.”
She laughs. “What?”
“I’m not sure yet. But all I’m saying is that I love you, and I thought he did too. I’m sorry.”
Sable faces me with the most beautiful smile playing on her lips. I’m a goner when it comes to this girl; that much is painfully obvious. She turns her back to the bench, watching me full of mirth, but I don’t really get the joke.
“That’s what you have to tell me? That you love me, and that you’re looking into face swapping?” she asks.
“I’m not promising anything yet. I just don’t have the details,” I say.
“About the love part or the face part?”
I groan because she’s obviously making fun of me. “I love you. I can promise that. The last month without you was hell.”
She takes my face between her palms. Sable kisses me so gently.
I want to keep it clean, but once I taste her, I need more.
I push her to the bench. My hands grip her hips before I can stop myself, and I lick her lips, asking for entry.
She moans softly and kisses me back, her hand sinking into my hair, and I can die right there and be in fucking heaven.
The door pushes open, and the professor clears his throat.
“Need water, Professor?”
“Get back to work, Rook.”
He closes the door, and I push her back inside. “Finish your assignment, Miss Briarwick,” I tell her with authority.
“Oh, yes, I’d love to do just that.” She pushes me away to head back to her station.
Reluctantly, I visit the other students.
They are just as scared of me as they have always been, but this time, I don’t even feel accomplished.
They are annoying bugs in the way of my time with Sable.
Most of them have no talent whatsoever. I critique their work.
Some of them dare to ask me questions, and I answer them, even if my eyes keep going back to the blonde at the side table.
Eventually, I let myself go back to her, my sketchbook in hand. I’ve been working on a new wardrobe for her, something that embodies her perfectly, and I know she loves fashion. I want to know what she thinks before getting started officially with a million dollars in couture fabric.
The job has never been about pleasure. The Rook is a fashion empire, and I want to take over once the old man dies.
Yet these days I find myself painfully hard while sketching, imagining how she’ll fit in the clothes.
I create long slits to every skirt, and low back so I can feel her skin on mine even when we are in the world.
“I have something to show you.”
She doesn’t look away from her assignment. “Aren’t you supposed to look at what I’m doing?”
I glance at her work. It’s obviously much better than most of the class. I grunt and move her hands, showing angles where the pattern can meet and create a softer line for the bust. It’s a minimal change, but it brings the design together.
“That’s incredible,” she breathes out, and I can’t stop myself from feeling proud.
She crosses her arms over her chest. “Show me.”
I open the sketchbook and push it to her. Pleasure spreads over me when she gasps, admiring my work the way I’ve always wanted it to be admired.
“Genius,” she says softly.
“It’s your new wardrobe. I want something that really shows who you are.”
The bloodred color is a huge part of this, bolder and stronger hues because she’s a predator like us, sitting at the top of the food chain.
“I love it.” She nods. “Though I wish sometimes I could just wear my sweats.”
“Sure, I can design that too. Soft sweats with no underwear so I can just remove them all and find you naked?”
She laughs. “Perfect.”
I can’t resist, and I kiss her again. She’s self-conscious in front of the audience and steps away from me quickly.
I let her go, wondering if that’s how she felt being paraded around constantly.
The class is about to end, and soon I can have her for myself.
Her eyes are down, looking at the sketchbook, fingers trailing over the soft lines.
“You know I love you, too, right?” she says.
Fuck, if that doesn’t warm my chest. “I didn’t.”
“Pay attention, Orion,” she jokes. “I love you, and I don’t want you to worry.”
“About what?”
“About Soren.” She shrugs. “He loves me too.”
She sounds so fucking certain I don’t have it in me to tell her she’s wrong. Love doesn’t do what he has. She must see my face because she reaches to squeeze my hand as if she needs to reassure me.
“We’re still meeting at six?”
As if I’d ever say no to her. “Please.”
“I’ll see you then.”
And I have to bite my tongue not to pressure her to know her every step in between.