27. TRUTH

27

TRUTH

C harlotte kept her eyes trained on the jasmine plant sitting on the massive desk with ornate carvings of thorn-covered vines. The plush, black leather chair she sat in did nothing to alleviate her uneasiness.

Blackthorn Academy.

She didn't understand why her friends led her onto the academy grounds through the enormous black gate with the letters "BA" in ornate script welded into the bars. For years, she wondered what the campus looked like beyond the road leading from the plaza lined with live oaks dripping with Spanish moss, but shock overloaded her system, and she recalled nothing of the trip across campus aside from the panicked ramblings of Riley and the others trying to calm her.

Her gaze moved down to the bandage on her inner forearm.

When Lukas led her into a building on the right side of campus, Dominic took charge, providing hurried direction to a pair of women wearing latex gloves who appeared uncomfortable with Charlotte's presence. They tended her wound and bandaged her up before Lukas and Dominic whisked her away to this office filled with the smell of old books from the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves lining the walls.

Dominic's authoritative tone toward staff members seemed odd coming from a student, but she had more pressing matters on her mind than worrying about why everyone, including her friends, seemed to defer to him.

Faint red tinted the pristine bandage, showing her wound still bled. A wound caused by a bite.

A bite from a vampire.

A vampire like Aiden.

Aiden.

Aiden is a vampire.

It explained the strange growls she found peculiar but never questioned further. Some people expressed strange ticks, made odd noises, and displayed involuntary behaviors. She wouldn't put a spotlight on something he might feel self-conscious about. Maybe she should have.

It also explained the blood he drew during the last time they had sex.

Oh god.

She had sex with a vampire.

The thought should terrify her. It should have made her want to run away in terror, but it didn't. Well… Her nose wrinkled. Anyone else besides Aiden would terrify her, but he didn't.

Even faced with the truth that he wasn't human, she didn't feel afraid. Her mind replayed what he looked like standing before her covered in blood, eyes glowing, sharp fangs stained with the blood of a man he'd killed.

A man he'd killed. For her .

Aiden didn't hesitate to eliminate the man who bit her. The man who had made the last several months of her life a living hell. Why had a vampire wanted to stalk her?

If she were honest with herself, once the terror of the threat disappeared, knowing Aiden would protect her to that extent felt exhilarating. He wouldn't hurt her.

Sitting back, she rested her head against the back of the chair as the adrenaline thrumming through her system receded.

The chandelier overhead cast amber light over the room, reflecting on the large window behind the desk, allowing her to see the trees and garden on the other side steeped in moonlight. She wondered what lurked in the darkness outside.

Was the campus safe?

UGA wasn't. Noah attended, and he was a vampire. The blue glow of his eyes confirmed his lack of humanity, leaving no room for confusion.

Her eyelids lowered, and she sighed.

How had she believed him to be human? Shouldn't there have been warning signs? She recalled how he liked to touch her a lot more than others, and Rachel's apprehension. While none of it screamed "I'm a vampire!" it made her pause. She rationalized that his behavior developed from his attraction, but there were things he did that normal humans didn't. Like, how did he know where she lived?

Aiden didn't show any red flags, she reminded herself. Except the growls and the blood drinking. He also acted more aggressively than how he acted in everyday life when they fooled around. Was that a vampire thing? She was all for that side of vampirism, if so. Maybe it's an Aiden thing. Either way, she liked it.

So he showed more vampire red flags than Noah. Why didn't it bother her like Noah's behavior did ?

The sound of the heavy wooden doors behind her opening startled her out of her thoughts. Thoughts she should not be having while facing a crisis. Priorities.

Her libido made her an idiot.

She sat up straight, turning in the chair to see a slim Asian woman dressed in a black pencil skirt, jade chiffon blouse, and sky-high stilettos that Charlotte would break her neck attempting to wear. Her shiny black hair rested at her nape in a simple chignon accented by a pearl clip.

Russet eyes settled on Charlotte, making it hard not to squirm under the intense scrutiny. "I never in a thousand years thought we would encounter this situation again," the woman said, her voice calm and measured.

As she moved across the room, she didn't make much sound.

Lowering gracefully into the high-back leather chair behind her desk, the woman pressed her lips together, a scant breath escaping her nose. "At least this time, I hope you remain conscious."

"Conscious?"

"The last time we explained the truth to a human, she passed out. With your previous encounter with our kind, you've seen our fangs and glowing eyes. I don't foresee fainting."

Charlotte's brows flexed, pulling in at the center. "To a human? Our kind? Does that mean you're also a vampire?" Her spine stiffened. The woman didn't seem dangerous, but Noah hadn't either.

"Settle yourself, Miss Walsh. I have no intention of harming you. My name is Soomin Velastra, Headmistress of Blackthorn Academy." She laced her fingers across her lap, lowering her elbows to the arms of her chair. "And no, I am not a vampire. I am a Vasirian."

"I've never heard of that before."

A faint smile pulled at the headmistress' pale pink lips. "Then we've done our job properly. The world cannot know about our existence. It's dangerous."

"Why? Would we be in danger if we knew?"

"No. My kind would. Humans fear what they do not understand, Miss Walsh." The headmistress gave her a pitying look. "They hunt and eliminate the things they don't understand. Sometimes capture and experiment on them. My kind lives alongside humans in peace, and we want to keep it that way."

The scene from the alley in Athens flashed through her mind. The poor human was attacked by one of her kind. Her eyes slid down to her arm. Another attack on a human. Somehow, she found the talk of peace almost laughable, all things considered.

The headmistress tracked Charlotte's gaze.

"There are some who live to cause discord. Like with humans, our species also have members in our society that go against our laws. It doesn't matter the species, Miss Walsh—"

"Charlotte, please."

The headmistress inclined her head. "Very well. All species have troublemakers. Law breakers. The rogues live outside Vasirian law. They believe humans are nothing more than chattel to use for feeding, manipulating, and gratification."

"And the person who attacked me?"

"A rogue." She lifted her hand, waving it to the side. "The closest I can think of to compare them to as a human equivalent is gangs. Human gangs tread the bottom rung of society, bucking the system, and taking what they will with no regard for human decency."

"You're really not a vampire?"

"I can see where you get that impression, but the Vasirian are a different species from humans. Vampires do not exist." She smoothed a hand over her knee. "It's speculated that the myths and legends surrounding the blood drinking, fang-bearing creatures of the night who attack in a frenzy of bloodlust relate to a condition Vasirian suffer when they haven't fed in a long time."

Charlotte's eyes widened a fraction. They had fangs; Aiden drank blood from her. Her shoulders sagged as the rational part of her brain took over. Of course they fed. But if they were different from rogues…

"You don't drink human blood?"

"We do." A hand lifted to stop Charlotte from asking questions in panic. "Through donations received from clinics. We drink from blood bags freely given by humans, though they don't know we are one of the recipients of their donations. It is against our laws to consume blood from a live source—hence the rogue's disregard for the law in attacking you."

Charlotte didn't mention Aiden tasting her blood. She didn't want him to get in trouble for breaking the law.

"Now, to my point." Headmistress Velastra tapped a manicured nail on the arm of her chair. "The media's display of rabid monsters likely relates to sanguis manie —blood mania. This condition occurs when a Vasirian goes for an extended period without blood. The time varies for each of us, and the younger we are, the shorter the timeframe is. While we need normal food and drinks like you do, we also require blood, or our body shuts down."

"Shuts down?" She frowned. "Like dying?"

Headmistress Velastra nodded. "That is the end result. We experience several stages before that happens. Tremors, anger, weakness, fatigue… We eventually begin a descent into madness, where we hallucinate and become nothing more than rabid beasts searching for blood. The final stage if we don't get enough blood to stop the madness before it overtakes our brain is death."

Charlotte sat back in her seat. The illness sounded terrible. When Aiden lived with her, he seemed fine. She wondered where he fed because there weren't blood bags anywhere in her apartment—not that she could see at least. Wouldn't blood bags need proper storage?

"Now, we need to discuss why you're here tonight."

Her chest tightened.

The casual conversation lulled her into a false sense of security, allowing her to push aside all the unpleasantness of the night to learn something new about a species she had never heard of before. It aligned with her interests. She loved the obscure and unexplained.

"We believed Blaire was the only human capable of bearing a Korrena mark until the Oracle's prophecy came to fruition. But now that you've—"

"I'm sorry, ma'am. I need to ask… What is a Korrena? I heard it mentioned before they brought me here." Her face screwed up. "Oh, and prophecy? What Oracle? I haven't heard about that."

As much as she wanted to ask where Aiden was, and mention he was the one who used the terminology, something told her not to. Dominic said he did something punishable by death. Was he on the run? Was he okay? Her stomach soured as fear for him threatened to take over.

Headmistress Velastra closed her eyes for a moment and then nodded. "I apologize. When I explained everything to Blaire, I threw her to the wolves by thrusting the information at her all at once and left her with a packet of paperwork I composed before her arrival." She sighed in a way that sounded defeated. It didn't suit the put-together woman. "Admittedly, that wasn't the best way to approach the situation, but I was new to it. In this case, I've had no time to prepare, so I will do my best to answer your questions. If I go too fast, please interject. No apologies expected."

Blaire knew all this? Why did she know? Before Charlotte could follow that line of thinking, the headmistress spoke again.

"First, the Oracle is the oldest living Vasirian. She is four hundred years old."

"Holy crap." Charlotte blinked repeatedly. "Are you guys immortal like they say vampires are?"

A soft chuckle that seemed out-of-place coming from the reserved woman before her filled the air. "No, that would be a myth humans perpetuated. We live for a very long time. Hundreds of years. Our physical aging slows to allow for such longevity. The students here range from their late teens to their mid-twenties, and it is during this period that the aging process initially decelerates. When we're in our seventies, we appear as young as someone in their early to mid-thirties, and our aging slows further, allowing us to resemble a forty-year-old human at one hundred." She paused. "As an example of it in action, I'm seventy-five."

Charlotte's mouth gaped. The headmistress didn't look a day over thirty-five, so seventy-five surprised her.

"Again, the aging process slows until we cease aging upon reaching the age of one hundred and fifty years old, appearing no older than sixty."

"That's convenient."

"What is?"

"Well, if you look like a sixty-year-old human, then you're near retirement again, right?" At the headmistress' nod, she added, "Well, you can avoid questions then. I mean, unless you go out in public in ten or twenty years."

"We have our ways of handling that."

Charlotte's lips twisted to the side. She wanted to ask what those ways were, but she already felt overloaded with information, and she knew the headmistress was far from done. Her eyes went big as something dawned on her.

"Oh my god, wait a minute. You said something earlier!"

"Yes?"

"The students here. Are they Vasirian too?"

The soft chuckle slipped again. "That's correct."

"So that means…"

The headmistress crossed her legs, waiting Charlotte out, allowing her to come to her own conclusions.

"It's not just Aiden. The others are Vasirian too. Holy crap! Is Blaire a Vasirian? How can they come out in the sun? Come to think of it, how did Noah do it?"

"Myths, Charlotte. Sun can't harm us. And yes, your friends—with the exception of Blaire—are Vasirian."

Charlotte slumped in the chair, sliding down with her hands over her face, muttering into her palms. "I can't believe it. No wonder I never fit in with them. They were keeping secrets from me."

"To be fair," the headmistress said, "it is against our laws to reveal the secrets to humans. If a human finds out, we have to wipe their memory to protect ourselves. Your friends were protecting you and following the law."

"Does this mean you're going to take away my memory now?" She didn't want to forget.

"No. The issue of the Korrena throws a wrench in that."

"Oh yeah, that. You were gonna tell me what that was. Sorry. This is so much."

"I told you. Your apologies aren't necessary. This is foreign territory for you, and in some ways, it is for us as well. While we went through it with Blaire, we didn't expect another human to manifest a Korrena mark until the prophecy fulfilled itself."

A knock sounded on the door .

"Come in," the headmistress called.

When the door opened, and Blaire stepped inside, Charlotte jumped from the chair. She stared at her best friend, emotions ricocheting around in her chest like balls in a pinball machine. Relief at seeing a familiar face, confusion, and a small tendril of betrayal hovered in the back of her mind like a wraith.

"I thought it wise to bring her in to help in this situation. A friendly face—someone like you."

Blaire came forward and stopped in front of Charlotte. "I'm so sorry we couldn't tell you." A tear trailed down her cheek. "I wanted to tell you so many times. I wanted you to know the truth."

Charlotte looked at her feet. She still wore the strappy heels from the club, her sexy outfit feeling out of place and uncomfortable in the light of the cozy office.

"I was about to explain to Charlotte what a Korrena is and about the prophecy. Your timing is perfect," the headmistress said, motioning to the other black leather chair beside Charlotte's that Blaire took.

Charlotte sat back down. She would have to face the emotions she felt about not knowing everything later. Right now, she couldn't do it.

"A prophecy was given long ago foretelling Blaire's arrival in our world. Only recently have we uncovered her connection to an ancient bloodline dating back many centuries. A bloodline filled with magic, linking to the witches and warlocks of old who were eliminated in a mass genocide to appease a king's lust for power. Blaire is the only descendant of this bloodline, and her becoming one of our kind will herald the awakening of any human with dormant magic in their blood, allowing them to find their Korrena mate."

Blaire looked at Charlotte. "The Vasirian have a king who rules over them and sets their laws. I met him when we went to Europe. There's an entire family in power and extended courtiers called the Blackthorn Clan."

"Like the school?"

"Yeah. It's named after them. Dominic is a distant cousin of the royal family. He's part of the clan."

Well, that explained why everyone followed his lead without question.

She turned in her seat toward Blaire, resting her hand on the arm of the chair. "But witches? Seriously? Magic? That's a thing?"

Blaire suppressed a smile, but her lip kept quirking. "‘fraid so."

" Jesus, " Charlotte breathed. "Wait. Does he even exist?" She didn't consider if she believed the Christian faith, but was it wrong to even use the word?

Blaire's face scrunched.

The headmistress shook her head. "We've believed for many centuries that multiple gods governed our existence and that humans got it wrong—and right on some levels. It felt like the Greeks got closest to what we thought to be the truth, but even they were incorrect. The Oracle informs us the stars created us and watch over our actions."

"The stars?" Charlotte deadpanned.

"Celestial Conclave, to be precise. Similar to gods but manifested in stars. Beings without corporeal form like you would believe gods to have."

"This is crazy."

Blaire laughed. "How do you think I feel? I'm supposed to save an entire species."

"What?" Charlotte winced when the headmistress' eyebrows rose in surprise at her high volume.

"Yeah. The prophecy. If I don't become a Vasirian, the species eventually dies. "

"Are you serious?" Charlotte caught an odd note in Blaire's tone. "How do you become a Vasirian?"

"A very risky process—Lukas and I have been forbidden to attempt it while the rogues are a problem. Failing means death, so I'm kinda motivated to obey."

"Why you?"

"The magic."

"You're a witch?"

"The last one alive."

"I'm dreaming. This has to be a dream."

"I would say it's not so bad, but if you'd been here over the last year…" Blaire shook her head. "That's for another time. I promise to explain."

Charlotte jumped when the headmistress clapped her hands.

Blaire laughed. "Don't worry, she does that a lot."

"Well, sometimes I must redirect wayward students," the headmistress said with a slight smile. "Now, our kind is in danger, yes, but that's not what is important right now. At least not for you and why you're here. That information is what we need to focus on."

Right. Why was she here? Why were they letting her in on all the secrets now? Were they going to kill her?

"Please don't kill me," she blurted.

Blaire looked at her in horror.

The headmistress frowned. "Why would we do that?"

"For knowing your secrets."

"We're choosing to share them. You're in no danger of death. Relax."

Blaire reached out and touched Charlotte's arm. "I wouldn't have brought you here if I thought they'd kill you."

Charlotte rubbed her eyes, and her fingertips came away black. She'd forgotten about her smokey makeup. She suspected she looked like a swamp monster.

"Aiden informed me he saw his Korrena mark on you," the headmistress said.

She perked up at the use of Aiden's name.

"A Korrena is what our kind calls a mate—a pair. The word Blaire used to best understand it was what humans call a soulmate."

"Soulmate?" Charlotte glanced at Blaire.

She nodded. "Lukas saw his mark on me one day when I left work. Headmistress Velastra came to see me the next day, you remember?"

Charlotte thought the headmistress looked familiar. "Yeah, sort of. I thought she was a professor though."

"My title has changed, but we have encountered one another before."

"Anyway, the mark"—Blaire pointed at the tattoo on the side of her neck that matched the one Lukas had—"isn't a tattoo. Apparently Korrena pairs have a unique marking to them only. Yours won't look like this. It won't even be in the same spot."

"Where will it be? What does it look like?"

"I don't know. Aiden didn't describe it or say where it was."

"I haven't seen a mark anywhere."

The headmistress laced her fingers over her knee. "The mark isn't permanent until you seal the bond with your pair."

"That's done by sex and blood sharing," Blaire said, leaning over.

"But we've had sex, and he's—" Charlotte bit the inside of her cheek and winced.

Blaire blinked. "He's? What?"

"I don't want him to get in trouble."

"Whatever he's done, I would like to know," the headmistress said. "It will help me guide both of you through this transition. I am aware of what he did to the man in the alley who attacked you." She inhaled deeply through her nose, sitting forward and placing her arms on the desk. "Charlotte, I protect my students. I understand what drove him to commit the crime. Having Dominic Harrison's backing made it easy to cover what Aiden did. But no one outside of those involved can ever know. Understand?"

"I understand," she whispered. The unspoken consequence of the headmistress' words settled over her like thick tar, stealing her breath. Aiden would die. She looked at Blaire, unable to look at the headmistress when she admitted what happened. "Aiden drank my blood. When we had sex last time, he bit too hard or something and I bled a little." She drew a breath and rushed to add, "He didn't use fangs! I would have noticed the difference. He's… bit me other places where I could see. I know what it feels like when he uses his normal teeth."

Her face flamed. It embarrassed her to admit something about her sex life in front of the headmistress of Blackthorn Academy. It was weird to discuss her sex life with a stranger at all, but she had the feeling this was normal for them. If it had been Blaire alone, she wouldn't balk at having a conversation about it. It wasn't like she knew what his fangs felt like, but she suspected there would be pain. Aiden's bites never hurt.

"So not only have you engaged in sexual activity, but he's tasted your blood?"

She nodded.

Blaire didn't seem to bat an eye at the clinical way the headmistress asked intimate questions. If sex was part of whatever the sealing a bond thing was, it made sense. She had to learn about it somewhere. Was it so different from counselors and sexual education classes? At least she wasn't in a classroom full of students talking about sex .

"Then you've come close to sealing the bond without realizing it." Before Charlotte could ask what it would take, the headmistress continued. "The mark is special to your pairing and is a symbol of your lasting bond. Pairs who have formed deeper connections can see their mark on occasion, but the visual is fleeting. It is the bond calling to the other, making itself known."

"So what does a bond mean?"

"Korrena pairs have a special connection no others share. You will connect on an emotional level where, if the emotions are intense enough, you will sense them. No other person can ever bond with you this way for as long as you live. It's the greatest love you'll ever know."

Love? If she was Aiden's Korrena, did that mean he loved her?

As if reading her mind, the headmistress said, "Many Korrena pairs sense their bond before it reveals itself. The pair may have already formed a romantic relationship prior to their awakening. In some cases, they don't know each other, and they adapt and get to know one another. In some cases,"—she gave Blaire a pointed look—"they might dislike one another."

Blaire scoffed. "There was a lot more to it than that. We didn't actually hate each other." She rolled her eyes.

"But wait. Are you saying if the mark shows up you have to be with the person? What if you're enemies? What if the person is a bad person? Like one of those rogues?"

"The bond is a magical thing, choosing pairs that are compatible but might need to get to know one another and allow a connection to form organically. You don't have to accept the bond, but it's painful to be away from your pair. It can make you physically ill."

Charlotte laughed. "Well, that explains a lot."

"How so?" Blaire asked.

"Recently, both Aiden and I were sick. "

"I remember he was. I didn't know you were."

"I went to Atlanta with my mothers. We didn't see each other but once in two weeks until tonight."

"Well, you won't be ill anymore if you choose to accept what I offer," the headmistress interjected.

Charlotte turned to look at her as russet eyes narrowed.

"Like I offered Blaire, I am extending a scholarship from the clan to attend the academy so you can be close to your Korrena, preventing the illness associated with your separation. You may enroll in any program you wish and obtain a legitimately recognized degree like any other university in the country."

Blaire smiled. "That solves the issue with being away from your moms."

"My moms," Charlotte mumbled. Lines etched her forehead. "What about my mothers? What do I tell them?"

"They cannot know about us," the headmistress said. "In Blaire's case, she could abandon her old life, but based on what Blaire, Aiden, and Riley have shared with me, I understand you are very close to your mothers."

Charlotte nodded.

"They can know of the scholarship, and that one stipulation in receiving a full scholarship is you must live on campus. We will provide all your living expenses and additional money for anything you need or want within reason as an allowance."

She hated the idea of lying to her mothers, but what other choice did she have? If she refused, they might wipe her memory. If she refused, she wouldn't see Aiden again. She finally had the chance to get a degree close to her family, be with her friends, and maybe experience a relationship worth having.

Straightening in her seat, she took a deep breath .

"I really like Aiden, so I'm willing to see where all this goes. I mean, I wanted to change majors anyway, so this is good timing." She shrugged, hoping to convey a lighthearted confidence, but she didn't know if she had succeeded.

"I'm really sorry I never told you anything," Blaire said, a look of regret overtaking her features. Her eyes sparkled with liquid emotion.

"I understand it now."

"Come in. She's accepted," the headmistress said, looking over their heads. Had someone knocked?

"You're staying?"

Charlotte twisted in her seat, eyes widening as Aiden strolled into the room in jeans and a T-shirt instead of the clothes from the club. He didn't have any blood on him, and the wound on his cheek was nowhere to be seen. He looked like himself again. When she didn't say anything, too caught up in looking him over for injury, his expression shuttered, and his Adam's apple bobbed. Her chest tightened as hopelessness gripped her.

"Is that you?" she whispered.

His dark brows lowered over his eyes. "What do you mean?"

"Are you sad?"

His head flinched back, his beautiful green eyes widening.

"I'm staying," she said, hoping to quell the sick feeling in her stomach. A feeling her instincts screamed were Aiden's feelings echoing through her.

"You feel me," he murmured, reverence in his voice.

"I think so. If you were sad." Her teeth sank into the edge of her lip as she drew it into her mouth.

"I can't believe this is happening." He laughed to himself. "I've waited for you for so long."

"What? "

The headmistress spoke up, breaking their connection. "We spend our lives learning of the Korrena bond and our mate to prepare for the awakening, which only happens in the latter teen years. Aiden is twenty and is past the age where normal discovery happens. Not everyone finds their pair, so many his age without a bond often feel despair at the possibility it'll never happen. His own mother didn't discover her pair until eighty-one years of age."

Charlotte looked back at Aiden, and he offered a sad smile. She couldn't imagine growing up knowing there might be a soulmate meant for her—someone destined to be her other half—and then discovering they didn't exist.

"It's because you were human," he said. "I don't know how it's possible, but it happened."

"I need to speak to the Oracle," the headmistress said. "This development needs to be explored. We need to know how it plays into the prophecy. For now, show Charlotte to her room. Classes are not in session and won't be for another three weeks. This should allow you time to acquaint yourself with the campus and the student body. It should be easier for you since your relationship with your Korrena is less volatile than someone who shall remain nameless experienced with theirs."

"Me. I'm nameless," Blaire said with a self-deprecating laugh.

The headmistress looked up at the ceiling as if asking for guidance.

"Listen, if I couldn't laugh about it, I don't know what I'd do." Blaire looked at Charlotte. "You have it easy. When I first came here, Headmistress Velastra was stone cold. Nothing could crack her poker face."

The headmistress arched a perfectly manicured eyebrow. "Poker face?"

"You never laughed, sighed, or anything. Riley even said you were like that. Now you smile and show your frustration with us."

Headmistress Velastra smoothed her hand over her pencil skirt, clearing her throat. "Well, you are a frustrating bunch I have grown rather fond of." Before Blaire could say anything else, she turned her attention to Charlotte. "Again, your relationship is stable with your Korrena, and you have friends already at the academy. Your transition should be easier than it was for Blaire."

Aiden stepped forward and motioned for Charlotte. "Come on. I'll show you to our dorm room."

"Our dorm room?"

"Yeah. Did you tell her about the sickness?" He looked at the headmistress.

"I did."

He scratched his jaw. "To curb the discomfort of being apart—the sick feeling—they let us share rooms." She recalled their conversation about coed dorms. Now it made sense. Somewhat. "We have our own bed each, though," he added, and she wondered why he felt the need to mention it. It seemed normal for a dorm room to have two twin beds.

"Unless you want a big bed to share," Blaire said. "After you seal your bond."

Aiden sighed. "Yeah, or that." He motioned toward Blaire with his hand.

Charlotte looked at him, unsure why he sighed or why he looked uncomfortable. His cautious demeanor made little sense. Whatever connection she felt before wasn't working. She couldn't feel anything. Maybe whatever he felt wasn't strong enough?

"We can discuss any changes you would like to make to your dorm at another time. For now, it's late and you need to get settled in. We will get your belongings from your home tomorrow."