Chapter 22 "Collateral Hearts"
ADRIAN
Adrian was getting ready for bed when his phone rang.
His grandmother. Again.
He'd been avoiding her calls all week, responding with brief texts claiming he was busy with classes and practice. But Margaret was persistent.
"Hi, Grandma," Adrian answered, trying to sound casual.
"Adrian. Finally." Margaret's voice was clipped. "We need to talk."
"About what?"
"About your assignment. About Ember Winters. About the fact that you've been spending time with her but haven't brought her to me yet."
Adrian's stomach knotted. "I'm still working on it. Building trust takes time"
"You've had time. And from what I understand, you've had plenty of opportunities to bring her to the estate." Margaret's tone grew sharper. "The basketball game is tomorrow. The party after. She'll be there, won't she?"
"She's coming to the game. But I don't know if she'll want to go to the party"
"Make her want to. Or better yet, bring her to the estate directly. Tell her you want to show her something. I don't care how you do it, Adrian. Just get her here."
"And then what? You perform your ritual and she dies?"
"She's already dead, Adrian. She died the moment Rosanna Vale's spirit took residence in her body. What I'm doing is ending the curse before more innocent people die."
"Ember is innocent"
"Ember Winters is a vessel for a murderer. Nothing more." Margaret's voice softened slightly. "I know this is hard for you. I know you've developed feelings for the girl. But feelings don't change facts. The Scarlet Woman must be destroyed, and the girl is collateral damage."
"There has to be another way"
"There isn't. I've spent decades studying this curse, Adrian. Decades. If there were another way, I would have found it." She paused. "Tomorrow night. Bring her to the estate. That's not a request."
The line went dead.
Adrian stared at his phone, his hands shaking.
Tomorrow night. The game. His date with Ember. The first real date they'd have, where he could tell her how he felt, where maybe
Where he was supposed to lead her to her death.
Adrian looked at himself in the mirror. Dark circles under his eyes. Jaw tight with stress. He looked like his father in the old photographs the same haunted expression his dad had worn when he'd been dealing with his own family obligations.
His parents had died to escape the Ashcroft legacy. To give Adrian a chance at a normal life.
And now here he was, trapped in the same cycle, being forced to choose between family duty and his own heart.
Adrian pulled out his phone and opened his messages with Ember.
Still excited for tomorrow?
Her response came immediately, like she'd been waiting:
So excited! I've been reading up on basketball rules so I don't look completely clueless.
You don't have to do that. I'll explain everything.
I want to understand what you love. That's what people do when they care about each other, right?
Adrian stared at that mes when they care about and felt something crack inside his chest.
She cared about him.
And he cared about her.
Which meant he couldn't do what his grandmother wanted.
He couldn't bring Ember to the estate. Couldn't let her die.
But if he didn't, if he defied Margaret his grandmother would find another way. Would hurt more people. Would continue this cycle of violence that had been going on for over a century.
"Right", Adrian typed back. That's exactly what people do.
I can't wait to see you tomorrow.
Me too.
Adrian set down his phone and stared at the ceiling, trying to figure out how to save the girl he was falling for from the grandmother who raised him.
And coming up empty.
JORDAN
Jordan sat in his car outside Sterling Hall for twenty minutes after Maya went inside.
He'd almost gone after her. Almost turned off the engine and followed her up to her room to apologize, to say he'd overreacted, to try to fix what he'd broken.
But he couldn't.
Because he hadn't overreacted. He'd been honest. And Maya needed to understand that their relationship couldn't continue like this one-sided, with him doing all the work while she disappeared into whatever crisis she was managing.
Jordan finally drove home, his chest aching.
Six months. They'd been together for a year, and he'd thought he'd really thought—that Maya might be the one. The person he'd introduce to his family at Christmas, the person he'd talk about moving in with after graduation, the person he could actually imagine a future with.
But you couldn't build a future with someone who was always somewhere else.
When Jordan got back to his apartment, his roommate took one look at his face and grabbed two beers from the fridge.
"That bad?" Marcus asked.
"Worse." Jordan collapsed on the couch. "I think I just broke up with Maya."
"You think, or you did?"
"I told her we needed time to figure out what we want."
"So you didn't actually break up."
"It felt like breaking up." Jordan took the beer Marcus offered. "She forgot our anniversary, man. A year. She didn't even remember."
Marcus winced. "Ouch."
"And the worst part is, I know something's going on with her. Something big. She's stressed about something she won't talk about. But she won't let me in. Won't let me help. Just keeps shutting me out."
"Have you asked her directly? Like, sat her down and said 'tell me what's wrong'?"
"Multiple times. She always says it's just school. But it's not just school." Jordan ran his hands through his hair. "I think it has something to do with her friend. Ember. And that guy Kelly she's always researching with."
"You think she's cheating?"
"No. God, no. Maya would never." Jordan was certain of that, at least. "But I think they're involved in something. Something she doesn't think I'd understand or believe."
"Like what? A cult?"
Jordan laughed despite himself. "I don't know. Maybe. Or maybe she just doesn't trust me enough to tell me the truth."
"That's rough, man."
"Yeah." Jordan drained half his beer in one go. "I love her. I really do. But I can't keep being the only one trying. At some point, you have to let people go if they don't want to stay."
"Is that what you want? To let her go?"
Jordan thought about Maya's face when she'd realized what day it was. The genuine horror and regret in her eyes. The way she'd reached for him, desperate to fix what she'd broken.
"No," he admitted. "But I don't know how to hold on to someone who's not really here."
Marcus didn't have an answer for that.
Nobody did.