Home > Here Lies a Saint (Here Lies #2)(2)

Here Lies a Saint (Here Lies #2)(2)
Author: C.L. Matthews

A click in the lock snicks when I've rotated the mechanism enough to match. When I open the door, my heart sinks.

It's empty.

There's absolutely nothing in this room.

Not a chair, nor a desk, and definitely not where I imagined finding the information I need.

Rushing out of there, I feel staying is too much of a risk. I shut the door, going upstairs and wondering if this whole thing is a setup or if they really have a vacant locked room for intrigue alone.

Taking the steps two at a time, I don't stop at the floor where we always hang out. Instead, I go up and up and don't stop until I've hit the top. The attic is another place on my list.

After pulling the drop ladder down, I finagle my way through. Looking around and not seeing any witnesses, I close the hatch and bring out my phone as a flashlight. When I turn it on, my heart stops.

It can't be.

My eyes run around the room, the very room I remember seeing as a kid. There's a hope chest engraved with Grim. A standing mirror is surrounded by cherry wood etched with daffodils and wheat. A big poster bed in the center is attached to a frame that matches the mirror and chest.

Fuck.

Fuck.

Fuck.

I think of how much I remember about this room. What brought me here all those years ago. The fear laced in every breath I took.

The walls are bare. They're that eggshell color real estate agents inform you sells best when putting your house on the market. There's a carpet, old and withered but entwined with life and madness.

What draws my attention most is the way the moonlight shines in through the glass above the window pane. It's shaped like... fuck. It's shaped like a serpent. I stare at the ground at where it points—on top of the rug.

This feels like some weird-ass fantasy novel, the light coming into a room and pointing at the ground. Maybe it's a coincidence? It's not like this is fiction.

I move the carpet over from the floor and see a hatch. The center of the lock looks exactly like the little emblem on my necklace. I pull it from around my neck, the sword Mom gave me for my sixteenth birthday shining bright against the flashlight pointed at the wood hatch. Sliding it into the metal-encased lock, I turn it until a click sounds out.

"Fuck," I audibly gasp.

Inside the floor sits a book.

The one I've been looking for.

The one I've spent the last year in search of.

The one that'll save us all.

 

 

Chapter Two

 


Present

Lennox

I warned Colt.

But like every time I’ve tried giving advice to her, she doesn't take it.

When you're raised in this world, told what would happen if you break the rules of the game, and beaten until those warnings become creed, you know when shit will go down.

Stopping Colt before she made it to the Dean's office was for her protection. Did I know they'd kill Yang for her part in this? No. Did I know Yang would be here? No. Did I know someone would pay the price for them running amuck and seeking answers they had no right to have? Yes.

If anything, though, I thought they would hurt Colt.

I stare at Colt on the sodden ground. It smells of death, dew, and sadness.

Her eyes are filled to the brim with sorrow. Her normally dark contrasted face full of makeup is bare. Her blue eyes, the ones I've loved since seeing them the first time, are present. They're crystal clear and visible in every sense.

The pure heartbreak she's experiencing has me on edge. Not for Yang but for Colt. Unlike Colt, Yang knew the rules. She knew what she was doing.

She betrayed the cause and paid for it.

We’re still with Yang’s body in the grass outside. "Everyone needs to leave," Dean Rimbaur explains, clutching her chest. She's in a nightgown and robe. Her intent was apparently sleep, while the rest of the guys and I prepared for the walls to tumble.

None of us make a move to leave.

She narrows her eyes at us. "Mr. DeLeon, you may be student body president, and your father may be one of our largest donors, but you do not get to disobey me."

Emily Rimbaur is a formidable woman. She's tiny, a buck twenty-five tops and short, but her tenacity and drive to prove that having a pussy doesn't make her weak is definitely something to respect.

I nod at the others, and all but Tennison leave. His face is ashen, depleted of what little light he has, and seeing his fear and the trepidation in his posture and knowing he's as stiff as Yang's body... I can’t fix all that.

He's the empath of the bunch.

Feels too much, experiences it all, and hurts others to offset the pain riddled inside him.

Much like Ross, Tennison uses his humor to counteract his pain. Unlike Ross, he's constantly and visibly unhappy. Ross acts the sobering kind of happy. Fake. Over the top. Flagrantly obtuse.

"Going to get him?" Jordan asks, placing a hand on my shoulder. We’re in the tree line between Opal and Crystal.

I shrug him off, still not over the bullshit he said about Maxim. Hell, or the shit he said about Cassidy.

He smirks at me, that fucker with his charming persona and asshole reality. I hate it.

I hate him.

"He's coping how he can."

"He didn't even like her," Ridge comments, following us close behind as we trail through the aspens. The air is humid, the cold kind that brings a clamminess to skin and an unbearable bone-deep chill.

"She's not who he's coping for."

"She'll be fine," Ross mutters, but when I rotate and spy his solemn expression, I know as much as he does that she won't be.

She lost Cass less than a year ago. Yang might have been at Duponte this year, but she mattered to Colt, keeping her sane and happy during the times we’d abandoned her.

"Yang knew what she was doing," Ridge adds, and I want to smack him for stating the obvious. Whether he said it to make us all more aware of the fine line we dance on or because he needs to believe it himself to stop pussyfooting around the truth we all hide, we need to keep our distance now more than ever.

The winter assembly will be here in days, and while Yang was murdered, they'll cover it up. They'll say it was something like she got wasted and mauled by a bear. Then, we'll go on pretending life isn't shit and we don't lie to cover up the fact that everyone here is suspect.

Even these four guys I once-called friends.

When you're a founding family member, you're either a murderer or murdered. There's no in-between.

Jordan’s hand clamps onto my shoulder again, but this time, he adds pressure, stopping me in my tracks. The others continue toward the cabin, where intended on meeting and decided on a plan to keep Colt safe while also trying to understand information she had. We wanted to protect her and fucked up along the way. There was never supposed to be a moment where her and Emeralds were in the same sentence. The mistake is in our hands, and now she knows too much.

To them, she’s a liability.

“They killed her tonight,” Jordan mentions.

My body stiffens. How did they not kill Colt? Did they think Yang was Colt? Or did they merely kill Yang because she betrayed the oath? Did they send cleaners? Are we going to pay the price for their choices?

“Yes, Captain Obvious, do you have anything more insightful?”

“I’m just saying I’m shocked they were here when we told everyone we’d be gone. Think it was planned ahead?”

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