Shallow Grave

Another vignette from the Miami Witch universe. Darius Kendall, scion of the powerful Kendall family, is being targeted for assassination. To make matters worse his ex-girlfriend wants to talk. 

Other stories in this universe:
WISHFUL THINKING  (high school Ember)
DANGEROUS AND BRIGHT (graduation night with Ember and Darius)

***

Darius slammed his phone down and stared out the window at the palm fronds gently swaying in the ocean breeze. It was a great night: full moon, white sand beaches, the surf’s gentle song, the local PD was cooperating with the operation, and no one had tried to kill him in nearly a week. That had to be it. Everything was too perfect. So the universe tried to throw a wrench at his head and conspired to give his ex-girlfriend his phone number.

“Someone hates me.”

“Obviously,” came the dry reply from across the room. Ember Li was the Miami police department’s liaison with Miami Society – a magic users who lived in around the South Florida city – and when the death threats came in he’d been given the choice of working with her or her boss. Since Miss Li answered to a dragon he’d gone with the one option that didn’t risk getting his head literally chewed off.

Which meant working in close confines with a woman he’d known since they were pimply teenagers.  She’d been easier to deal with then, tall and gangly and prickly as a cactus. If there was such a thing as a time travel spell he would have gone back and warned himself that the quiet ones were always the deadliest.

She leaned over the map spread out on the table, trying to pin down a time line of the assassination attempts, and her white shorts molded to her perky rear end. Darius pulled his eyes away, only for his gaze to snag on the gold ankle bracelet glittering over her bare foot. Long, milk chocolate legs sculpted to perfection, curves, black hair with hints of cinnamon, a creamy white shirt that left one shoulder bare... A groan escaped his lips.

Ember shot him a quizzical look over her shoulder. “What?”

“I’m hungry.” That had to be it. Low blood sugar was the only reason he was thinking about licking her like an ice cream cone.

“Fridge is over there.” She pointed off to the left in case he’d forgotten in the last ten seconds. They were in a private resort suite used by Miami PD on the very rare occasions they needed a safe house no one had heard of. Or so Ember said. He strongly suspected her draconic boss owned the property and was letting him hide here because there were magic wards strong enough to make even a fae high lord think twice about invading.

Darius rummaged around and found a salad left over from lunch. Popping the lid off the container he decided to dump his problems on his unwilling companion. “That was my ex on the phone.”

“Does she want you dead?” Ember asked as she made another mark on the map.

“She wants me to get back with her.”

“So, this is a pointless conversation and you’ll stop yammering now?”

He stabbed at his salad. “I guess. I... do your exes pop back up from time to time?”

“Nope. I don’t dig shallow graves.”

The clock ticked in the following silence. Darius stood frozen, fork full of lettuce half way to his lips. “Um...”

Ember froze, then slowly thawed, her back arching with sensual grace as she stood up. “Did I say that out loud?”

“Uh huh.”

“Oh. Awkward.” She turned with a little half-smile. “I was joking. I hardly ever kill my boyfriends.”

“Hardly ever isn’t the same as never.”

She pressed her lips together and batted her big, black eyes. “Nobody missed him?”

He took a bite of his salad. “Did I know this guy?”

“No! He was a college boyfriend, not someone from Society.”

“You don’t date anyone in Society.” He’d checked. Regularly. Ever since their paths had crossed one night in Atlanta he’d felt a desire to keep tabs on her social life. Once she moved back to Miami he’d taken their working relationship as an excuse to ask around. For security reasons.
Ember wasn’t ranked as a sorcerer and so in Society she was seen as a minor player. Having seen what she could do with Earth magic, Darius privately ranked her as one of the top ten deadliest people in Miami.

He waited for her to explain. “You’re not trying to kill me, are you? This isn’t some elaborate ruse?”

“Are you dead?”

“No.”

“Then I’m not after you.”

He finished his salad in silence and when she still hadn’t divulged any more information he went and sat on the table. “Spill.”

“What? You’re my confessor now?”

“I’m the enforcer for Miami Society. Eventually, I’ll find out. Why not explain why you’re ex is six feet under now and save us both time?”

She frowned at him, a delicate look filled with disapproval and mild disgust. “He’s not buried. He was cremated.”

“By you?”

“By the state of Louisiana.” She rolled her eyes and sighed. “You aren’t going to give up, are you?”

“Nope.”

Ember pulled a chair over and sat back. “So, my sophomore year at Tulane there was a serial killer in the area. He drugged his victims, raped them, and then gave them an overdose of one of the more popular party drugs. Everyone thought it was bad parties until one of the girls found dead was a known anti-drug activist and lesbian with a long-term girlfriend. Since she clearly would be having sloppy sex with boys during a drug rage people started asking questions.”

His stomach twisted. “You didn’t tell anyone at home about this?”

“His targets were all white girls. I thought I was safe. And I’d just met this really nice guy. We had biochem together. We studied together a few times. Ate dinner out once. And then he asked me to go see the local theater production of Guys and Dolls. I thought it would be fun, and it was.”

“But?”

Ember shrugged. “During the intermission he brought me back a water he’d already opened. I didn’t think anything about it, but it tasted a little bit off. Almost stale, like it’d been sitting in a hot car all day. I drank a little, but not much. On the way home he kept nagging me to drink more water. Telling me I’d get dehydrated or whatever. So I drank it.”

Darius’s fists balled up. “What’d he do to you?”

“He walked me into my apartment and started groping me. I told him to knock it off and threw a hex at him. A little one. Used a little bit of alder powder. It should have made him run off. It killed him.” Her lips twisted in a studious frown. “The drugs he slipped in my water upped my natural powers.”

“Fear does that too,” Darius said quietly.

“So I’ve heard.” She shrugged. “Anyway, I called my friends, we drug him to the car, drove across town, and dumped him in a bad part of town. The police found the body in the morning, wrote it off as an overdose, and when the DNA test came back matching him to the rape victims no one mourned his passing. I’m a little more careful now.”

“A little?” Darius smirked. “Have you dated anyone since then?”

“Nope.” She turned back to her map. “Can’t seem to find anyone who interests me.”

He walked around the table to peek over her shoulder. “Liar,” he whispered in her ear.

The look she tossed over her shoulder was heated, seductive, and promising. “You wish.”

Darius reached out and caressed the thin gold chain hanging around her neck until he caught the pendant, a small gold seahorse. It had been a graduation present, an apology for the four years of hell he’d put her through. She’d worn it that night in Atlanta when he finally stole a kiss. And she’d worn almost every day he’d seen her since her return to Miami. “Sometimes, I think you like me more than you’ll admit.”

“Sometimes, I think you’re right.” She pulled a picture from the suspect pile. “But right now, I’m going to worry about arresting your would-be killer. Guess who?”

Wishful Thinking

*Author's Note* Amy neglected to mention that we were going to be blogging all of this for the public view and so I decided to keep playing in the world of Ember Li because... well... why not? Ember is a cool character with a fun story and one day I will clear my plate and write MIAMI WITCH (post-college Ember). For now, here's another Young Ember story.

***

"You're late. Again." Mrs. Danwood looked over her gold rimmed spectacles at Ember. "What is your excuse this time?"

"I had to go change my clothes," Ember said quietly, aware that every eye in the class was on her. "I spilled milk on myself at lunch."

"Careless." Mrs. Danwood sniffed disapproval. "You will stay after school today to make up the missed time. For now, take your seat and write a five hundred word essay on why punctuality is considered the politeness of princes."

Because princes didn't have to fend off thrown meatballs and hexes at lunch. Princes didn't have the word PIG scrawled with pig blood on their lockers. Princes didn't have to keep their mouths shut when they wanted to tell the truth.

But it didn't matter. The Eleanor Maker Academy was not the place where an earth witch with no money, family, or power would ever be safe. It was bad enough that she was on a scholarship because Grandfather Li couldn't afford the outrageous tuition, but at least the other scholarship students had some power. After four years Ember still hadn't learned to touch the inner place of her soul where high magic resided. She could see it in her mind's eye during meditation. She could sense the spark of magic in others, hear the magical heartbeat of the soul when she focused enough, but she couldn't connect her outer self to the inner spark. Sorcery, magic fueled by the soul, was beyond her reach.

She sat at her desk in the corner of the room and quietly scribbled nonsense about being on time while her classmates slipped into prophetic trances. Jennalynn Twell woke with a gasp and shouted that she was going to be in a boating accident. Mrs. Danwood hurried to her side to calm her down. Terran Rih said he saw himself finding a mound of fairy gold in Ireland. His mother was an immortal sorceress who often visited the courts called fey so it wasn't that farfetched. The other prophecies were less enlightening, test grades and scores and one person predicted a Miami Dolphin's win over the Denver Broncos. Several people stopped to write the score down in case there was betting available for the game.

Ember ignored it all. Even if she hadn't spent twenty minutes in the nurse's office waiting for grandfather to bring extra clothes she wouldn't have felt comfortable enough in this crowd to slip into a trance of any kind. She'd probably wake up with a dick drawn on her cheek, or a pig snout on her forehead. Again.

The air cooled around her and she felt the weight of someone's stare, a gaze heavy with magic. She looked up through her eyelashes. Across the room, arms folded across the chest, was the handsomest and cruelest boy in the school: Darius Kendall. Sharp cheek bones, pale hair, deep blue eyes... the scion of the Kendall family had arrived at Maker Academy already well-versed in sorcery. Half the classes he took were ones she'd never even qualify for, let alone pass. He was taking defensive and dueling classes, training to become his clan's enforcer. The Li clan consisted of two people and between her and her grandfather Ember felt confident they might be able to make a blade of grass shiver on a windy day, but no one else was likely to be intimidated. Earth magic was subtle. It was homey magic meant to comfort and sooth. Sorcery was the magic that changed the world.

The bell's sharp ring brought Ember out of her thoughts. Darius was still glaring at her like she was some strange bug.

There was a giggle behind her and a black sharpie floated in the air toward her face. Ember swatted at it with her book. Magic tugged at her book. She pulled back as hard as she could, but the magic pulled harder and the book flew across the room to clatter against the wall.

"Miss Li!" Mrs. Danwood gasped. "Do not throw books in class!"

"I was trying to- " Ember stopped to grab at the sharpie. "Stop it!"

"I just want to fix your makeup," Jennalynn said with a giggle. "Come on, pig. I saw it in a prophecy trance. You're going to have a snout on your face when you walk home."

Most the class laughed.

Darius stood up. "Enough."

The sharpie burned cold in Ember's hand. Pain made her let go and it dropped to the ground, shattering like glass when it hit the floor.

"Come on, Jennalynn," Darius said. "Let's get to the beach. I want to see the new bikini you bought." He held his hand out for Jennalynn but his eyes were looking at Ember, two cursed sapphires trying to burn her soul away.

Mrs. Danwood ushered the other students out. When she came back she looked down her nose at Ember. "You shouldn't pick fights with the other students. It reflects very poorly on your family and upbringing."

"I didn't do anything to Jennalynn," Ember protested.

"If that were the case I am certain Miss Twell wouldn't have bothered you. She's a very sweet girl. Not as talented as some, but vastly superior to you. I know even jumped up dirt witches need a basic education in magic, but sometimes I wonder if you couldn't have gotten enough instruction for your limited talent from a few weeks of summer camp. You've wasted four years of scholarship money." Mrs. Danwood shook her head in quiet outrage.

"I'm sorry, Mrs. Danwood. If anyone had asked me I would have chosen another school." Any other school. One with metal detectors and gangs and dropouts. A place where she'd be judged by her mixed racial heritage rather than her magic. This was Miami, being mostly Korean and Jamaican made her one of the cool exotic girls in most of town.

Mrs. Danwood tapped her desk. "Never mind that. We'll work with what we have. Now, tell me, how are your trances coming along."

"They're better," Ember said. "The scenery never seems to change, but I can picture people and writing. Never food though. I've tried and all I ever seem to see are lemons."

"Hmm." Her teacher sat in the desk beside her. "Most people see scenery before people, but it's not uncommon to be able to see one and not the other. Can you interact with the people you see? Do they talk?"

Ember nodded. "The writing is usually accurate. Most of the time it's a news headline or a comment on one of my reports. Once I saw a note that was getting passed, but I don't know who wrote it so I couldn't confirm it. With people..." She frowned. "They always tell me things. One time I saw Mrs. Mieor, my math teacher, and she told me that she planned to have a quiz on accounting practices. We had it two days later."

"Not that usual form of prophecy, of course," Mrs. Danwood said, "but not unheard of."

"Is it because I can't do sorcery?" Ember asked. That seemed like the only logical conclusion. "I thought maybe I have weird trances because I'm weak."

Mrs. Danwood grimaced. "Prophetic trances aren't based on sorcerous magic. The trance is brought on by calming your mind and opening yourself to the flow of magic around you, to breath it in like air. The prophecy comes like a sweet perfume floating on the spring breeze, you have a hint that there is more but you only catch one note of the scent before it fades. Some people see a person, or a place, or hear a voice. The more you practice the better your trances will become. No one can ever become perfectly accurate, the prophetic vision is a hint of a future possibility. We all have free will. We can all change the future. But there are ways to determine how accurate a vision is. List them."

Ember sat up straight and tried to remember her notes from the day before. "Indicators of vision accuracy are: number of repetitions, vividness of detail, number of magicians who see the vision, and the strength of the memory after the vision."

"And the likelihood of occurrence," Mrs. Danwood said. "Not all are needed, but if fifty magicians all dream that dinosaurs are about to invade South Beach and they all recount the same details it doesn't mean dinosaurs are coming. It's far more likely that someone used a spell to cause a mass hallucination, or that someone is making another horror movie with dinosaurs in Miami."

Ember nodded.

"Very well. I would like you to enter a trance now and focus on the future. How far have you reached in your previous trances?"

"I'm not sure. There was one I had last year that came true in November, and not all of them have been realized yet. But I don't know if that means they were inaccurate, or if the future changed, or if they haven't happened yet."

Mrs. Danwood looked pleased with the answer. "Very good. I'm glad to see you did the reading. Your focus for this trance should be your own future. Try not to look ahead for headlines and football games, please. I want something that will happen to you."

Ember nodded and sat back in her seat. She focused on everything. The room smelled of sweat, perfume, deodorant, cleaning spray for the whiteboard, and Mrs. Danwood's hairspray that she used to make her silver hair a helmet of curls. The air was a little too cold for comfort, the super-efficient air conditioner blew it around in a steady stream past her. She could still taste lunch in her mouth, cheeseburger, salt, and the aftertaste of the mint gum she'd chewed after eating. Her shirt felt itched her arm where a thread was loose, her feet were hot in her running shoes she hadn't had time to change out of after gym. They were still a little damp.

One by one Ember acknowledged each sensation and let it go. The smells were dismissed, then the taste, the feel of threads and cold air on her skin. Her mind drew inward toward the spark of life. The noise of the air conditioner and herr own breathing fell away until there was silence and darkness.

Ember opened her inner eyes and saw the long hall that ran along on the west side of the courtyard. It was always this hall, classrooms to the left, columns and arched windows where she could see palm trees swaying in the sea breeze to her right. The carpet beneath her feet was maroon with gold accents, faded from decades of abuse. In real life this wing was used for science, dueling, and conferences. Most days it was abandoned and Ember had retreated there to eat in silence on the really bad days when the bullying became to much. It was her place as much as any room in the school could be. She felt safe there.

In the trance she was walking barefoot, a white skirt blowing in the unfelt breeze. It was a beautiful skirt, soft and light and probably more expensive than she could ever afford. Dream Ember always had a better wardrobe, and that thought almost pulled her out of the trance. Ember refocused, letting her sense seek out input from the trance. Magnolia blossoms perfumed the air, the trees swayed gently, her skirt billowed and moved as if she were caught in a hurricane but she couldn't feel the air moving against her skin. So, everything else was chaos but she was calm. Maybe that detail mattered.

She looked around the hall, glanced backwards over her shoulder at the dark doors behind her. Looked forward again and saw Darius standing there. He held out his hand to her the same way he'd beckoned Jennalynn earlier. Ember waited to see where the trance would take her, rolling her conscious thoughts away from her dream body and observing like she was supposed to.

Dream Ember stepped forward, skirt snapping, hem shredding.

Darius took her hand and the wind stilled. Everything fell. The unseen tempest was becalmed.

Darius's mouth moved, but she couldn't hear the words. She felt something though, peace of a sort. Confidence, that was it. Ember pinned the memory of the feeling. She felt confident, calm, happy... never words she'd associate with Darius Kendall.

He smiled, said something she couldn't hear, leaned forward and kissed her.

Soft lips pressed against hers. She could smell sea salt and some expensive cologne. His hand moved to her lower back, pulling her closer. Dream Ember leaned in, opened her mouth to his questing tongue, felt his body brush against hers.

Ember opened her eyes with a startled gasp, every detail of the kiss burned into her mind.

Mrs. Danwood raised her eyebrows. "Are you quite all right, Miss Li?"

"I ah... I, I..." She shook her head. "I must have fallen asleep. That, that wasn't a prophecy."

"Are you certain? It seems to have affected you badly. Was it a tragedy? There are ways to prevent those if you know their likely to happen."

Her hands shook. The emotions, good ancestors, she'd felt so strong. Like the whole world was hers to command. Because he touched her hand. "No, I'm just being silly. I dreamt I kissed the boy I have a crush on. It's really never going to happen."

"People can change," Mrs. Danwood said hesitantly, but not convincingly.

"Not happening." Ember said. "He's good to look at but he's not the kind of crush where I actually want to be near him. I mean, if he kept his mouth shut sure, but he's pretty to look at and nothing more." She grabbed her essay. "Here, can I be done? I'm supposed to help Grandfather Li at his shop this afternoon."

Mrs. Danwood took the paper with a reluctant sigh. "Very well. Do try another trance before Monday. I'd like you to manage a trance without falling asleep, if you please. For today I'll mark this down as a failed spell."

Failed. Again.

Ember left the room, misery wrapped around her like a cold, wet blanket. Teenage hormones sucked. Clearly this was a sign telling her to leave Miami. Maybe she could still apply to Tulane, or maybe somewhere in Alaska. Somewhere far, far away from the pretty but poisonous Darius. She sniffled and wiped away a tear, not for the kiss. Most guys could kiss well enough according to the books she'd read, but those feelings. Ancestors... it was a good thing she wasn't a sorceress, she'd trade just about anything to feel that powerful and calm again. To feel in control. To feel wanted.

Pathetic.

Dangerous and Bright

Ellie Lindell's house was the only possible place to hold the graduation party. The Lindell family controlled the flow of exotic wines, the kind that let you see the future or change the past. Not all of them were legal, but what was the point of being part of High Society if you couldn't break the rules a little?

Laughter echoed off the bougainvillea-covered walls. Four hundred and sixty-three graduates this year, sorcerers and wizards of standing and renown, almost all of them able to touch their inner soul and use it to fuel their magic. Ember Li knew she didn't fit in, that the party wasn't for her. She was an Earth Witch, a dirt witch, a pig. Lesser, somehow. Able to see her inner fire but unable to touch it. If Grandfather Li hadn't taken care of a messy ghost problem at the Dean's home the summer before her freshman year, she would have gone to a Miami public school and graduated with a classic education in carjacking, drug dealing, and creative linguistic putdowns.

Entry into the upper echelons of Society had forced her to learn the classics from her neighbors living south of Little Havana. In school she'd learned English, math, science, and how to create potions that could change the world. Not that it mattered, she thought as she dipped her toes into the dark pool. Ellie's parents had closed off this wing, something about a bat problem, but Ember found her way through the dark. It was quiet here, and as cool as she could hope for on a balmy May evening in southern Florida.

Fireworks lit up the front lawn, brilliant blues and golds, a sign that the Seer Wines were being brought out. Everyone would sip, peek into the future, try to find some hint of what was to come.

Ember slipped into the pool. She didn't need wine. She was a Li, and seeing the future was simply a matter of finding the path of luck. Her path was splitting right now. It would have been a nightmare for someone else, absolute torture for some, but she knew how to handle splits like this. One path led to working in Grandpa's shop at the mall, peddling second-rate Korean trinkets to tourists. It was a good path. Respectability followed. Life, safety, perhaps even a tempered sort of love that was comfortable and soft as a worn blanket.

She dropped her dress at the poolside and dove into the cool water.

The other path felt like this – swirling warmth around bare skin with the promise of so much more – it was a risky path. Tulane University in New Orleans, a new kind of magic, a hazy future with brilliant colors and many risks. That path led to life too, but a much more vibrant one, something with more ups and downs.

Ember surfaced, the warm heat of the night kissing her skin. She didn't like risks. She liked choices, like walking away from the party and all the people she hated and coming up here to escape. It wasn't proper to leave before the party was over. The Lindells might be insulted, and the Li family which consisted of just Ember and her grandfather wasn't strong enough to withstand a war with the wine-growers. But she could choose to walk away and stay. No one downstairs would miss her.

She dove down again, hands skimming the deep bottom she could only half see, half sense. There was a mosaic hidden down there, hidden by the dark of night and the clouds flitting across the moon. Ember swam for the pool edge and climbed out, water dripping off her black hair as she tried to make out the pattern beneath the waves. What was it? A mermaid? A seahorse? Something swirly.

Lights turned on in the window-lined hall beside the pool. All too aware she was naked and dripping wet, Ember dropped back into the dark water.

Door hinges creaked in protest as the door opened and the words, "- not supposed to be up here," floated across the water.

Ember skimmed under the water, surfacing in the corner nearest the hall where she couldn't be seen from the door.

"Someone came up here," a voice protested. It sounded like David Entrees, youngest son of his family and all around bully. The first day of school he'd started oinking at Ember, he'd oinked when she crossed the stage at graduation too.

"Let's go back to the party. The pool's dirty." That was Ellie's voice. She was going to make someone a wonderful doormat of a wife some day.

"Hey."

Ember shivered. Darius Kendall, bane of her existence, scion of the powerful Kendall family and a top-rank sorcerer even at his young age. He was eighteen and might burn her for fun. Darius was the reason she'd cut her hair the second day of school and burned it for protection against bullies.

"What are you doing up here?"

Her gaze flashed to where her thin summer dress lay crumpled by the poolside. If Ellie saw that... her blood ran cold. There was nothing good that could come of this. Why'd David have to come up here? Why wouldn't they just... Her dress vanished.

She'd been staring at it, and now there was nothing by the pool. Thank all her mindful ancestors.

"My mom's had the pool closed all year because she had a dream about a body floating in it," Ellie said. "If she catches us up here, it'll be my body."

"I'm telling you, someone came down the hall," David insisted.

"Let's go," Darius said. "We don't want to get Ellie in trouble."

"Fine."

Their footsteps retreated and the door creaked shut. Ember waited in the water until the lights were turned off and then swam for the far side of the pool where she'd left her dress. She reached out of the water, patting the ground. It wasn't like it was an expensive dress, just a little cotton thing to throw over her bikini before the party, but going downstairs like this to where her bikini was drying after Trish Myrtle had "accidentally" dropped red velvet cake on her as she headed for the main pool was going to be tricky without a cover up.

A foot appeared in her line of view.

Darius Kendall, regal in black slacks and a button up shirt, bent down and picked up her dress.

Ember backed away, swimming further into the murky darkness. "What do you want?"

"Nothing. I'm giving everyone a present tonight for graduation. This is yours." He dropped her dress back on the ground. For a moment he seemed to be looking for her, but his gaze swept past her. The depths of the pool shimmered with an eerie glow, illuminating the bright mosaic. "It's a seahorse." The light snapped away at the beck and call of the sorcerer. Darius walked away.

When she was certain she was alone, Ember climbed out of the pool and grabbed her dress. The night was warm, and she dried quickly as she sat on the edge of a chair. A half hour later she felt ready to face the horde downstairs again. She shook her dress out and a necklace fell to the ground. Ember picked it up by the chain – a seahorse, a golden seahorse on a golden chain. Darius's gift.

She hung it around her neck, feeling the weight of it; he hadn't given her a cheap trinket. The Kendalls were a wealthy family, but her grandfather sold enough jewelry that she could guess the worth well enough. If he'd wasted this much money on her it was going to be fun to see what he'd bought everyone else.

She hurried down the hall, taking the steps two at a time, and then crept in through the back door past a caterer who gave her a disparaging look. Right, party guests stayed out front, servers in the back, and mixed-race Korean-Jamaican bastard babies weren't supposed to be here at all. Ember smiled hesitantly and stepped face to face with Ellie.

"Li! There you are. Darius was just handing out his presents to us. Well, to the rest of us." She smiled smuggled. "Isn't it divine?" She held up a blue orchid in a plastic pot.

Without even trying Ember could tell the plant was sick, a greenhouse knockoff anyone could buy at the corner store for a twenty. "Lovely."

"And, where's your flower?" Ellie crooned, eyes laughing.

Across the room Darius stilled. His blue eyes bored into her, daring Ember to say something. Daring her to share their secret with the world. But that couldn't happen. Darius was a rising power and if anyone knew what they kept locked behind walls of hate she'd be tied to him, and that path led to death. Hers. His. Everyone’s.

She shrugged. "He didn't give me one."

Snickers circled round the room. Everyone laughed at her as tears stung her eyes.

It was better this way.

She'd leave for Tulane, follow a path dangerous and bright, and maybe one day things would be different. Maybe one day she would be able to look at Darius and not see death. But not today.