Chapter 45

The guys stayed at my side every moment of the next week, and it should have been stifling but all I felt was gratitude and relief. When they were with me, Nightmare couldn't get to me. Even if she commanded me again, they wouldn't let me hurt anyone or dispose of another body. I was safe.

That safety was the only reason I was able to shower and change into my red and silver ombre tulle dress today. I bought it on a bad day a year ago, when I needed something good among all the bad I'd faced that year, but I'd never had the nerve—or occasion—to wear it. The bodice was made of a bold crisscross of red fabric, with cut-outs and straps offering glimpses of my ribs and my sides, before beautifully soft tulle swept to the ground, a high slit baring my left leg. I loved it. I just wished I was wearing it for something other than Alastor Carmichael's fundraiser.

Someone would be with me all night, though. I'd never be alone.

I jumped at the cold knuckles that skimmed my bare back, but all my tension melted at the kiss Misery brushed over my shoulder.

"You look to die for, Prick," he said tenderly, his knuckles trailing lower and sending a rush of shivers through me. When his hand moulded to my ass, I turned my face to kiss him, wondering when hatred had turned to tolerance and tolerance to affection. Probably all those days he spent with me at my worst, watching animal videos and making sure I ate, offering solidarity and comfort.

The first kiss was disconcerting, and I drew back with a frown at the roughness of his mouth instead of the silken warmth I was used to. It was the blue-eyed asshole who stared back at me, and even though I knew it was my Miz underneath the fa?ade, I still couldn't help but feel a sense of loss.

"All your pretty hair," I murmured, turning to run my hands through his much shorter black hair. When he frowned, the expression familiar even if the face was not, I added, "This hair's pretty, too."

"It was, until you messed it all up," he agreed, scowling behind his wire-framed glasses.

"Oh," I said, a smile tugging at my lips. I dove both hands into his hair and made an even bigger mess. "Oh, no."

Miz's eyes darkened, not rich gold but piercing ice blue in this form. They still made my stomach leap and drop, though. I knew the punishment they promised, and I couldn't help but remember when he'd pinned me to the bed and made me come over and over with his wand.

"You look more debonair this way," I told him, flattening a few choice strands before I laid another kiss on his lips, lingering this time, his cock growing hard where it pressed against my hip.

"Debonair," he repeated, a glow of pleasure in his eyes. "Hm."

He liked the compliment, and we both knew it. I kissed his jaw and drew out of the circle of his arms, giving myself a last check in the mirror, twisting the crown ring around and around my finger.

"I'll never leave your side, Cat," he reminded me, missing nothing.

"I know," I agreed, and summoned a smile, grabbing my clutch and jumping when it vibrated. "Shit," I hissed and fished out my phone. "It's probably Honey with another disaster."

She'd been roped into organising the fancy shindig by her boyfriend—yes they were official—and had been putting out mini fires all day. Caterer fuck ups, missing flowers and evergreen boughs, a Christmas tree lacking ornaments. Every few hours there was a new tragedy, and while I hated hearing my friend stressed, I couldn't bring myself to feel sad about Alastor's event falling apart.

I answered the call and put the phone to my ear. My heart stuttered at the silence on the other end.

I ripped it away from my ear and ended the call without sticking around to listen to them breathing. This was the sixth call I'd had.

"Wrong number," I said to Misery, shoving off my unease and dragging a deep breath into my lungs.

Miz's eyes turned murderous, but I just faked calm and headed for the door.

I was disappointed when Miz and I walked out of Lawrence House, hand in hand, crossed the park with its many trees and double fountains1 and found the gala set up in a giant gazebo behind Everard Tower wasn't in flames or falling apart.

Miz paused with me beside the tower—it was a three-storey building, and not even cylindrical, so calling it a tower seemed aspirational—to watch the staff, students, and esteemed guests who'd flown onto the island mill around in their white-tie finery.

"We can go home," Miz reminded me, squeezing my hand. He looked insanely good in a fitted tuxedo, his shirt as white as snow but offset with an ice-blue bow tie that matched his eyes. I wanted to see my Miz in the suit, though.

I shook my head. "It'll be fine. I only have to stay an hour and half, then we can bail."

"Bail?"

"Leave."

He scowled at the gazebo, at the sculpted topiaries that had been wrapped in golden fairy lights, the mammoth Christmas tree by the entrance to the gazebo where tables had been set out, laden with drinks and leather-bound catalogues. The whole area looked like a festive explosion, and even smelled of Christmas—fir and cranberries and cinnamon. I didn't know how they'd managed it, and I was annoyed to find myself admiring the area.

"Language is annoying," Miz said, and led me out of the shadow of Everard Tower towards the throng of people, his head swivelling as he scanned the area. We were pretty enclosed here, between the tower and the woods, but the lights made it seem brighter, bigger.

"Are you okay?" I asked as we approached the table. We were close enough to the lake to be able to glimpse it between the trees.

"I'm fine." He lifted my hand to his lips and brushed a kiss to my knuckles. "Are you?"

I swallowed. The last time I was on this side of the campus, Honey and I pushed Dean Fairchild's body into the lake. "I'm fine," I echoed his words. I wondered if we were both lying.

"Honey," he pointed out, lifting our joined hands to gesture at my friend dressed in a gold silk dress and heels, storming across the ground2 to throw a single red rose into the woods.

"Honey?" I called, hurrying across the space past mingling guests, snatches of conversation reaching me—business deals being done on the downlow, a trio of judgemental women sneering at the latest equality bill passed in parliament, even a marriage being arranged between a businessman and a politician, with zero input from their children. "You're still being sent roses? Why didn't you tell me?"

Honey sighed, crossing the grass to meet me halfway. "I thought it had stopped, and honestly, you've been stressed enough after—"

Yeah. After.

"I didn't want to give you anything else to worry about," she said with a sad smile, giving Miz a questioning look. "Do you think you can let my bestie go so I can hug her?"

"No," he replied, point blank.

I snorted and pulled my fingers free after a reassuring squeeze. The second he let go, Honey flung herself at me.

"You look hot, Cat. Megawatt hot."

I laughed, hugging her back. That's what we used to say when we were tweens—there was a whole scale of hotness, and we had ranked boys on it. Harry Styles was megawatt hot, but we'd argued about Tom Hiddleston.3

"You look megawatt hot, too, Honey." I stepped back to look at her, the gold silk hugging her curves and trailing artfully behind her. I told myself she dressed killer for herself and not her boyfriend, but I was pretty sure it was denial. "Seriously. Do you know how much money you'd make for homeless cats if we auctioned you?"

She rolled her eyes, her cheeks flushing pink. "Oh, shut it. It's items and experiences only, no humans auctioned."

I tilted my head. "What do you class as an experience…?"

She elbowed me, giving me an unimpressed—but thoroughly amused—look. "Who's your date, anyway? Don't tell me you have a fourth husband."

"If she had a fourth husband, I would slit his throat in his sleep," Miz informed her conversationally.

"This is Miz's med student face," I told her. And when her eyes widened with disbelief, her mouth popping open, I added, "I've found it's best not to think about the how of things, and just shrug it off as magic."

"Yeah." She still stared at him, looking for a seam of where the illusion met his real face. She wouldn't find one. "Magic. Got it. Hey, is that Byron's guy?" she asked, looking beyond me to where the path snaked between Everard Tower and the laboratory. I spotted who she meant instantly—a tall guy our age dressed in fitted trousers and a white shirt with a narrow tie, his sandy hair swept back from his deeply tanned face and an expression of anxiety tightening his features. Yeah, I knew that feeling.

"That's him!" I confirmed, grinning. Honey hadn't met Gustin, Byron's boyfriend yet, but now was the perfect chance. As little as I liked being social and talking to new people, Gustin was one of us by extension of Byron, so I had to make an effort.

Miz held out his hand—calloused and deep gold compared to his usual soft, pale hand—when I took a step, and I answered his plea, or command, and slid mine into it as we crossed the light-strung field.

"Hey, Gustin!" I called, and smiled when he turned, recognising the dread in his body language. "I don't know if you remember me, we met once. This is Honey, we're Byron's friends. Is he coming tonight?"

He'd been absent more and more, and increasingly hard to track down, but I couldn't blame him for spending all his time with Gustin. The man was elegant and pretty and seemed really sweet.

His soft green eyes narrowed with confusion when we reached him. "Byron…?"

"Yeah," Honey said with sly glee, "you know, your boyfriend."

Gustin blinked, and then blinked again, looking from me to Honey to Miz. "I know who you mean, but he's not my boyfriend. I barely know him. Maybe you've confused me with someone else?"

My world, previously turning on its axis, screeched to a halt. "Yeah, maybe," I heard myself saying. I nodded when he excused himself politely, clearly uncomfortable.

"Maybe it was a different guy," Honey suggested, her voice brittle. "There's an endless supply of pretty men at Ford."

"He pointed Gustin out to me, and addressed him by name," I replied, my voice strangely dull. "He said he's shy, and that's why he didn't want to spend time with us. Because he had anxiety."

Honey didn't say anything. There was nothing she could say.

"It's clever if you think about it," I said bitterly, holding onto Miz like a raft in a storm. "I'd empathise with anyone who had anxiety, so I'd give them space. And if he chose someone shy as his fake boyfriend, he'd always have an explanation why they weren't spending time with us."

"And the fake boyfriend would give him a cover when he disappeared for long periods of time," Miz pointed out, his mouth pressed into a thin line.

Honey's shell shocked expression morphed into understanding and disbelief. "He lied to us."

It wasn't just me he'd lied to—he'd given Gustin as an excuse when he left Honey and I at breakfast, at dinner, during study sessions. My stomach knotted.

"But why would he lie?" she asked, her hands crumpling the fine silk of her dress.

My heart hurt. "There are so many reasons, but one really obvious one." Miz pulled me against his side, his arm around me. "He wasn't there that night we got cursed, or there'd be a mark—his hair colour different, his behaviour changing—but Nightmare got to him. She must have."

It was the only thing that made sense.

"What if…?" Honey began, chewing her bottom lip. "The Assassin…"

"No," I argued instantly. "No."

Byron wasn't the one who tormented me with texts and threats, who I chased across campus that night, who'd been seen by multiple people stalking the grounds of Ford with blood dripping from a knife. The same days people were killed.

That wasn't Byron.