Virtue (Briarcliff Secret Society Series Book 2)

  Copyright © Mitchell Tobias Publishing, 2020

  Cover Design by Regina Wamba at Maeidesign

  Editing by Madison Seidler

  madisonseidler.com

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior permission of the publisher.

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  Briarcliff Academy Student Playlist

  Hell to the Liars - London Grammar

  The World We Made - Ruelle

  The Almond Tree - Hannah Peel

  Be Kind (with Halsey) - Marshmello, Halsey

  death bed (coffee for your head) - Powfu, beabadoobee

  Hide and Seek - Imogen Heap

  Born Alone Die Alone - Madalen Duke

  Say Your Prayers - Blithe

  Hold On We’re Going Home - ASTR

  Breathe Into Me - Marian Hill

  Find the rest of the playlist on Spotify

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  A Note from Ketley

  Also By Ketley Allison

  About the Author

  1

  The afternoon sun shimmers against the landscaped grass behind the academy and a cool, autumnal wind pulls at the loose strands of my kinky brown waves I’d attempted to tame into a ponytail this morning. The maroon ribbon I’d tied around it flaps against the side of my cheek before getting caught in my lip gloss, which I’m pretty sure is a sign I shouldn’t be here.

  Heck, if the wind so much as shifts, I’m taking that as solid proof that this is a terrible idea, and I’m turning right around and—

  “Callie. Hey, you came.”

  Ivy separates herself from the crowd of students milling in the center of the quad where an elaborate stone fountain spurts water out of a rearing wolf’s mouth, the rest of his pack keening beneath the curve of his majestic form.

  “I didn’t think it’d be right if I avoided it,” I say to Ivy once she reaches me. Her pale blue eyes cloud with concern, but she hooks my elbow and drags me into the fray.

  “Probably not,” she agrees, and to my horror, ushers us to the front.

  “Ivy, I’m not sure I—”

  “Nonsense. If you’re going to be here, you might as well put face-time in.”

  “Actually, I was hoping for the opposite.”

  “Why?” She spins to face me, her baby blues turning cold. “You didn’t do anything. Not to Piper, not to anyone. Why shouldn’t you be present for her birthday memorial?”

  It’s been twelve days since Dr. Luke was put in handcuffs, and the professors agreed that enough time has passed to lessen the trauma of violently losing a student and watching a beloved teacher be arrested for it. They decided the best way to honor Piper’s life is to do it on her birthday. Because hers falls on a Saturday this year, the headmaster thought it would be better to hold the service on the Friday before, since on weekends, pupils are less likely to show up.

  Oh, and did I not mention that today happens to be my birthday?

  “Now that Piper’s killer has been caught,” Ivy continues, “any suspicion over your involvement should be long gone, don’t you think? I mean, you didn’t push her off Lover’s Leap. Dr. Luke did.”

  Ivy’s opinion seems to ricochet off the surrounding stone and into each nearby student’s ears, and my cheeks burn as heads swivel to the source, then bounce over to the cause.

  “Yep. Bad idea,” I say as pinpricks of hate-glares pierce my body.

  “Ridiculous,” Ivy says, then spins us to face the front. “There. Now you don’t have to look at them.”

  “Uh-huh. But now they all can look at me. With my back turned.”

  “Jeez.” Ivy throws an arm over my shoulder and squeezes. “We need to give you some better memories here. After this shindig is over, let’s head to my room and celebrate your birthday the classy way: with cake and cherry wine.”

  Last weekend, Ivy went home to visit her parents in Philadelphia, managing to smuggle her favorite Danish cherry wine in her luggage when her mom was busy baking her hindbærsnitte, the most delicious raspberry pastry squares Ivy also had the foresight to bring back with her and shove into my mouth.

  Ivy means well, but I doubt the promise of sugar and alcohol will be enough to sweeten the taint left on me when Piper plunged off the nearby cliff just off school property. I was her roommate. I could’ve stopped it, or at the very least, seen it coming.

  Murmurs sweep over the crowd, distracting me from my thoughts. I listen to the shoes scraping against the stone ground until a path forms through the middle of the gathering.

  Ivy possesses the gift of being tall, and she sees whatever is making the students part like the Dead Sea before I do.

  Her eyes widen, and her lips thin. “Incoming.”

  I don’t look, because I know who I’ll see. I’m happy to keep my gaze straight ahead, at the wolf barf fountain, as Chase and his friends saunter down the makeshift aisle.

  That is, until I hear one word, whispered by a student behind me, that whips my head around.

  Pregnant.

  I force myself to look forward again. If caught, my devastation would only fuel Chase’s crew. I can’t react. I can never let them see.

  Not if I want to discover the lies behind their motives and the secrets they’ve traded in return for their soul.

  2

  My stomach clenches as I feel heat start at the back of my neck and prickle down my arm. I glance to the side, catching the source, and I meet the soulless amber depths of Chase Stone’s eyes.

  We connect for a meager second, but to me, it’s ages of time that tether us across the quad, an unblinking connection that shoots ice through my veins yet heats my blood to unbearable levels.

  The last time I saw him, those eyes were lit with two candle flames burning their golden incredulity through the bronze. In that moment, he answered the question I posed, the truth that would define us with a simple, “Yes.”

  Chase’s gaze flicks away the moment I flinch at the memory. His attention doesn’t return.

  His friends stalk behind him—Tempest, James, and Riordan. Piper’s former best friends glide around them in beautiful, despondent repose—Falyn, Willow, and Violet. Piper’s younger sister and doppelgänger, Addisyn, holds Falyn’s hand as they keep close
to the guys but force their chins up and eyes forward, while Chase and his buddies glare at the students daring to mumble their opinions nearby.

  …pregnant…

  Piper’s…

  …do you think…

  Chase’s…

  Or Dr. Luke’s?

  Bile forms a waxy ball in my throat, and I swallow the lump as they make their way down a pathway sliced open by simpering student bodies and to the front. Voices ripple into choked whispers as they pass. To my relief, the elite crew takes position on the opposite side where Ivy and I stand. Students who waited early for a front row view scramble back to accommodate their chosen spot.

  I’m suddenly desperate to meet Chase’s eyes again, maybe find some sort of clue amid the cold bronze and pull out a reality different from what he told me the night I crawled into his arms, shivering from the night’s air seeping through my dorm’s windows.

  “Mm.” Chase stirs as I lift his upper arm while crawling back into bed, finding a warm nook under his chin to nestle under. “Who was that?”

  I stare at my phone I’d placed on my nightstand, not yet locked and asleep. “Ahmar.”

  “Oh yeah?” Chase rolls to his back on a grunt, taking me with him until I’m sprawled across the carved muscles of his torso. “What’d he want so fucking late?”

  “To tell me something.”

  Chase idly strokes the top of my head, the movement doing more to lull him into slumber than me. “What did he say?”

  My lips part on the answer, but my throbbing heartbeat gets there first. Chase feels my racing pulse against his chest, because he stiffens and says, with careful resonance, “Callie, what’s wrong?”

  “Piper. She was pregnant. Before she…”

  Chase’s body, granite-smooth and impenetrable on a good day, turns cold beneath my touch.

  I lick my lips, my fingers curling against his stomach. “Is it … I mean, could it be…?”

  “Mine?”

  “Quiet, please!”

  Headmaster Marron’s booming voice, amplified by the surrounding structure of the academy, rips me from the reminiscence. He assumes his position behind the wooden podium centered by the fountain, brought outside for this specific occasion.

  His silver eyes scan the crowd as smoothly as his combed back, graying hair.

  “We’re gathered here today for an important remembrance,” he begins, “and what was a tragic ending to one of our brightest, most beloved students, Piper Harrington.”

  A few students snort their disagreement nearby, but I remain carefully mute.

  “Many of you voiced your concern over a professor being responsible for such a heinous act, but while the investigation into Dr. Luke continues, I am here to assure you, and any parents or guardians who contact me, that you are safe on this campus. You are cared for, and your opinion is respected by every faculty member here.”

  Okay. Now I snort.

  Marron cuts a look in my direction, and I cover up my derision with a cough. Ivy smirks beside me.

  “We will do everything in our power to ensure your continued trust, including our full cooperation with the police while they valiantly pursue the closing of this matter.” Marron clears his throat. “Now, onto the true reason we’ve assembled on these hallowed grounds. Miss Harrington, please.”

  Marron gestures to the front where Addisyn stands. She releases Falyn’s hand and pulls out her prepared speech from the inside pocket of her blazer as she takes Marron’s spot behind the podium.

  With a trembling voice, she begins. “Piper was my older sister, my confidant, my best friend, my whole being.” She rubs her palm down her nose in an attempt to collect herself, her fingers shaking with the effort. “We grew up as sisters, but we were more like twins. We did everything together, including … including dreaming about going to the same college. Raising our future children together. Buying a house on the same, the same s-street…”

  She breaks down. My heart pulls as I watch, feeling more like an unwelcome spectator to a violent car accident, one who doesn’t have the right to be privy to such devastation.

  I didn’t have a strong connection to Piper, and while a good portion of the school moved on from her death, and the re-shuffling of social stature occurred with the ease of mixing a Vegas card deck, there were people affected. Piper’s sister is now an only child. Her friends have lost their ride-or-die. Her parents have lost their oldest daughter.

  None of it sits right with me. This gathering, Marron’s thinly veiled speech to protect the school from liability during what should be a memorial, the fact that it’s my eighteenth birthday … and I’m turning an age that Piper never will.

  And whether or not Piper wanted to be a mother, she’ll never get to make that choice for herself.

  “I need to leave,” I murmur to Ivy.

  She jolts at the way I grip her arm, much stronger than my voice. “Seriously? We’re at the front. We’ll make a scene.”

  “I—I have to,” I say. My stomach isn’t making any promises to settle. “I can’t be here.”

  Ivy curses under her breath, but scans for a subtle exit-point.

  I don’t waste time and instead grab her hand and drag her into the space between the podium and the first row of students, bending low so we don’t obscure anyone’s view of Addisyn’s sobs.

  Ivy stumbles behind me but matches my speed, until a pair of non-school issued, knee-high boots block my escape.

  “Leaving so soon, possum?”

  I lift my gaze to Falyn’s, her sterling eyes shimmering with well-placed tears.

  She waits for my stare to land on hers. “By all means, stay. We haven’t even gotten to the part where Addy mentions your homewrecking, skanky ass.”

  Blood curdles within the broken chambers of my heart.

  Ivy pulls on my sleeve. “Don’t engage.”

  I ignore my friend, because it feels so much better to direct my unrest somewhere. “Careful, Falyn, your frown lines are showing.”

  Falyn’s bleached blonde eyebrows pull together at my statement. The fact that she’s already on a Botox regime is such easy fodder to use, and I’m a little disappointed in myself for not coming up with something better.

  I add, “You’re right about one thing. I’m not welcome here. So, let me leave.”

  Marron and the nearby professors lining the front of the makeshift stage eye our scuffle, but don’t interrupt Addisyn. Not yet, considering our voices are low, and all they see is Falyn’s stricken expression, like we’re commiserating on Piper’s loss, not testing the strength of our claws.

  “No fucking way,” Falyn says. “I want you to witness the hell you’ve caused. Piper’s dead because of you.”

  I stifle the resigned sound wanting to escape from my throat. “And how’s that?”

  “Let her go.”

  The deep, leveled words, as dark as the soil beneath stone, causes both our bodies to stiffen. Falyn tenses at the order, and I at the low purr in his tone, a permanent silk that always accompanies his voice.

  Chase’s gaze is molten against mine, burning into my core with such fierce heat, I can’t look away in time.

  “Go, Callie,” he says.

  We haven’t spoken in weeks, and he’s echoed the very last words I said to him the night he didn’t deny that Piper’s baby could be his.

  My throat’s too thick to voice sound, so I give a curt nod, aiming to skirt around Falyn, Ivy frantically pushing against my back. We’re drawing too much attention.

  Falyn’s hand snaps out and wraps around my bicep when I try to pass. She hisses in my ear, “Listen.”

  “… and while I can’t bear to be without my sister, I’ll fight for her,” Addisyn continues into the microphone. “And bring some justice to her short life. Dr. Luke remains behind bars, but there are others out there who contributed to Piper’s misery. A girl who made my sister so heartbroken, she ran into the arms of an older man for solace. A teacher.”

  Marron stands. “Al
l right, Miss Harrington.”

  “You, Callie Ryan.”

  “That’s enough,” Marron says, striding to Addisyn’s side and searching for the off switch on the mic.

  “If it weren’t for you, my sister would be here!” Addisyn screeches, pointing a trembling finger. Murmurs transform into loud voices as they follow Addisyn’s direction to witness the center of the spectacle. Me.

  I open my mouth. “That’s not—”

  “Not here,” Ivy says, her hands clamping round my shoulders. “Let’s go. Before this—”

  “Chase was her soulmate!” Addisyn screams. “And you took him from her!”

  I give in to Ivy’s desperate shoves, but I can’t tear my gaze away from the girl falling apart on stage. Yet, instead of watching her crumble, all eyes are waiting for me to break.

  “Not her fault!” a male voice booms through the crowd.

  A sense of relief washes over me at the thought that Chase would stand up for me—but it’s not him. It’s James, Chase’s buddy with the shaggy, reddish-blond hair and hazel eyes sparkling with mirth, but not the happy kind. He gets off at making jokes out of people without giving a shit on where or how he does it, and he’s zeroed in on his next target.

  James’s lips pull wide. “How could Chase resist those tits and that ass?”

  I stop listening. The lewd words coming out of such a pretty face should be shocking, but here at the academy, it’s not. There’s no point in arguing that Chase and I were never together when Piper was alive, if I can even call us a pairing. There’s especially no justice in pointing out that despite my “stealing,” Chase still managed to possibly get Piper pregnant.