I look up at him with a smile. Chase strike me in the face hard.
“I can kill the bitch tonight,” Chase yells at me. “Where is she? We all know you are hiding her. We will find her. I promise you, I will make it quick if you tell me now! I’ll make it so much worse for her if you don’t.”
I spit out blood on his cloak and smile at him. “Who taught you how to hit? Fucking pitiful.” Chase strikes me again, harder, and I keep the pain inside without showing much expression besides regaining my senses.
“Call him off, Aldridge,” my father demands of Davis.
“My son has a point,” Principal Aldridge says.
My father walks up to me, leaning into my ear. “You need to help me, son. You need to tell us where she is. I can maybe save you tonight.”
I look at him with a sense of guilt. Some of the things he said tonight, I did not expect. He seemed as if he would do almost anything to save my life tonight. He brought me to The Beasts over a sense of duty. He probably thought he had the power to help me.
I disappointed him, but that doesn’t matter anymore.
“I’m sorry, Dad,” I say to him quietly. I look up at him and see for the first time an expression I had never seen worn by my father. Fear.
“I love you,” I say to him. The words escaped me before I even thought about saying it.
“You can call off the search!” a woman’s voice yells out from the entrance of the tower. Elle Maven takes off the hood of her grey cloak, and the crowd of members go instantly quiet. Elle removes her cloak completely, and a camera and several cell phones are hooked up to some makeshift vest she is wearing. “These cameras are all live! So, do not try anything! If my friends see that any harm is done to me, they will send the feed live to all social media platforms!”
Thomas Winters raises a gun towards her, but my father orders him to lower his weapon.
“What are you doing?” I yell at her. She looks at me coldly, then back at my father and the crowd of members.
“What do you want exactly, Ms. Maven?” Principal Aldridge demands.
“You have our attention, Noelle,” my father says.
“I won!” Elle says confidently. “And it’s Elle, Arthur.”
“What are you talking about?” Principal Aldridge asks, laughing to himself.
She looks at him, pointing one of the cameras to his face. “Principal Davis Aldridge. Good to see you again. As I just said, I won. I’m your Alpha.”
Chase laughs. “You were always crazy, and now you’re stupid for coming here.”
Elle points one of the cameras at Chase. “Chase Aldridge, I’m not stupid, and you shouldn’t talk to your Alpha that way.” She smiles at him and gives a wink. “What was the deal? Make the Sacrifice hate you. Then manipulate the Sacrifice to love you. Then perform the Ritual.” Elle points at me. “Lance hated me. After last night, I’m fairly sure he’s deeply in love now.”
“This is ridiculous!” Chase yells.
“She has a point, son,” Principal Aldridge says. His words make Chase’s blue eyes turn to pure ice.
“She’s not one of the Chosen!” my father yells. “That’s an obvious rule.”
“History shows there are ways around that,” Principal Aldridge says with a smile. “It happened before.” He looks at me and the cameras on my body. “Under such circumstances, I don’t think we have a choice.”
“She’s a woman!” Chase yells, rolling his eyes.
Principal Aldridge turns to Chase. “Being a woman doesn’t prevent one from becoming a Beast or Alpha. We just never had a woman so…interesting before.”
Chase walks up to his father in a fit of rage, and the two talk in whispers.
“This is bullshit!” Chase yells, but his father ignores him. Chase looks out into the crowd of members. The chanting for violence has stopped. All attention is on what is happening with Elle and Principal Aldridge. Chase jumps off the stage and pushes through the crowd.
When Chase is near Elle she yells, “Don’t try anything! I got your close up on camera, and you look like shit.”
Chase looks back at his father, before storming out of the clock tower completely.
Principal Aldridge steps forward on the stage. “I’m sure you know that the competition can’t be over until the Ritual is completed. So, what do you propose, Elle?”
Elle looks at me for a moment, then back at Principal Aldridge. “Lance’s life. I can do it now, tonight. All of you will be witnesses. I already have the cameras taken care of. Of course, if anything happens to me after this is, all the footage will be released.”
Out of desperation, or just a fuck it all attitude, I smile and whisper, “Proper leverage. Congrats, Elle, you get to be me.” I look at her, and she smiles back coldly.
I absolutely love her.
I wanted to save her, and with my life, that could happen now. I wanted to escape Ryland, and that never would have happened anyways.
Principal Aldridge turns to my father with a thin smile. “He was going to die anyways, Cain.” He turns back to Elle. “Usually, the Ritual is a more private matter, but I think we can make exceptions to the rules sometimes. How exactly are you going to complete the Ritual?”
Elle smiles. She cannot hide her sense of victory from her face. “Bind his hands, and one of you bring him to me.” She looks at me again. “Then bring me a knife.”
Principal Aldridge nods his head with a smile. “Thomas, can you help Ms. Maven, please? Bring her Lance.”
Thomas looks at my father, then back at Principal Aldridge before carrying out the orders. He quickly ties a piece of rope around my hands. He smiles at me before picking me up. Thomas throws me over his shoulder and fireman carries me over to Elle.
