Total pages in book: 127
Estimated words: 117363 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 587(@200wpm)___ 469(@250wpm)___ 391(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 117363 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 587(@200wpm)___ 469(@250wpm)___ 391(@300wpm)
“What if it wasn’t?”
Jean sent him a blank look. “What?”
Kevin’s mouth gave a violent twitch, as if he regretted speaking. It took him a minute to find the courage to speak again, and the words had Jean snatching his hand out of Kevin’s slack grip: “What if your place wasn’t at Evermore?”
“Did a week away from the court damage your ball-battered brain?” Jean demanded. “I am a Raven. For you to insinuate otherwise is as insulting as it is ignorant.”
“What if Edgar Allan let you go?” Kevin asked. “You belong on the court, but it doesn’t have to be theirs. If it means keeping Andritch from interfering further with the Nest, the master might sign off on a transfer. It does not matter where you go; you will still end up where you belong.” Kevin gestured to his own face, and Jean knew he meant the perfect Court. “That could be enough.”
“Could be,” Jean threw at him. “Might. You feckless child. You have forgotten yourself.”
“Tell me I’m wrong,” Kevin insisted.
“The master would see me dead before he let me go,” Jean said, and swiped a hand through the air like he was following a headline: “‘Jean Moreau kills himself after being sidelined indefinitely with injuries’ would win us the sympathy of the press and an extra edge in our remaining games.”
Kevin considered that before agreeing, “It would shake up the Big Three matches. Penn State wouldn’t pass up a golden opportunity, but USC would hold back out of respect for a mourning line-up. It’d be better if they didn’t,” he said, a little grumpily. “They have a real chance this year, I think.”
“Your blind loyalty to those clowns is exhausting.”
“Some of them you like,” Kevin reminded him.
“Don’t you dare,” Jean warned him, unamused. Kevin lifted one shoulder in a light shrug, unrepentant to the last. Jean resisted the urge to push him off the bed by the skin of his teeth. “The way you fawn over them is unbecoming.”
“Their kindness matters,” Kevin said. “If anyone were to say the Ravens only won because USC held back, Edgar Allan’s reputation holds less weight. You know the master can’t allow that. That’s why you’re here for now and why he’ll at least let you live through finals. This is your one chance to get away.”
“I am a Moreau,” Jean said, too sharp. “I know my place even if you’ve forgotten yours.”
“Andritch—”
“—is not my master. He can say go all he likes. I will beg him to reconsider if that is what it takes.”
Kevin went quiet for so long Jean assumed he’d won. It was a little unnerving that he even had to push the matter. The Kevin Day he’d spent four years living alongside would never be so deluded as to suggest Jean walk out on the Moriyamas. Just thinking it was enough to put Jean’s heart in a vise, so he focused on the easier insult of leaving the first-ranked team. No other team in the nation deserved his skills.
“You are a Moreau,” Kevin agreed at last. Jean had one second to think Kevin had come around and remembered himself, and then Kevin said, “He is—was—a Wesninski. He still walked away. He told us he refused to sign the transfer paperwork.”
It was Jean’s turn to look away. He honestly had not expected Nathaniel to survive the consequences of that ferocious defiance. If not for Jean’s own weakness, maybe Riko really would have killed him that night. Holding Nathaniel down while Riko slowly waterboarded him meant he couldn’t cover his ears against the noises Nathaniel made, and Jean had nearly bit through his own shoulder to keep from screaming. Once Jean started spiraling too badly to hold on, Riko had had to back off. Riko had not forgiven him for being so fainthearted, never mind his part in creating such trauma in the first place.
“Jean. Jean.”
Fingernails dug into the lines on his wrist, snapping him back to the moment. Jean realized too late he had a hand around his own throat. He made the mistake of looking at Kevin, and the white-faced look on the striker’s face said he knew exactly which memories Jean was trapped in. Jean couldn’t breathe, but forcing his fingers to relax was almost impossible. Kevin had to tear scabs open and dig into the raw flesh underneath before Jean could find his center again. He sucked in a ragged, desperate gasp as he finally let Kevin pull his hand free.
“He didn’t,” Kevin whispered. “Jean—”
Jean almost didn’t hear him through the hammering staccato of his heart. Drowning, he was drowning, he was— please stop please stop please
“We did,” he said, or thought he said. His mouth was heavy with the memory of wet cloth. “And then Riko had me dye his hair and send him home. He could live with us or die with them.” Jean reflexively reached for his throat again, but Kevin forced his hand back down to the blankets. Jean shuddered as he tried to force his memories back into their place in the depths of his mind. The chains felt horrifyingly weak when he tried locking that box closed again. He cast about for anything to save him and stumbled over Kevin’s curious phrase: “Was a Wesninski?”