Page 62 of Us in Ruins
Isla’s feet led her to the wetlands at the mouth of the Tiber. A boat was coming, and it would take her away from Reed for good. She’d never have to see him or his goofy smirk or his round brown eyes ever again—even if it broke her heart.
Margot turned the page, and Reed arrived in the scene, his back to Isla and dripping with river water. What are you doing here? Isla spat. He’d betrayed her when she needed him most. Margot knew what happened next—Reed would turn, get down on one knee, and propose to Isla with an emerald gem. He wasn’t a double agent but a triple agent, and he’d only made that deal with Durham to afford the ring Isla had swooned over during their detour in Florence.
But when Reed turned, it was Van instead, green eyes gleaming in the saffron sun.
Snap out of it, Margot. This wasn’t helping. He wasn’t Reed Silvan, and she wasn’t Isla Farrow. No matter how much she might have wanted to be.
For starters, Van’s idea of a romantic gesture was petty theft. Never mind the whole turning-back-into-a-statue thing. Even as the train rocked gently around a corner, sunlight caught on a trail of marble that seeped down Van’s skin, crawling out of the gash on his arm. Spreading with every second they spent away from the Vase. When he turned to watch the rolling countryside, it peeked out from underneath his sleeve and webbed up the side of his neck.
She couldn’t lose him. Not before she had the chance to have him.
“Walk me through the plan again?” she asked, closing her book.
Van pressed a finger into his temple and loosed an irritated breath. “We go to the trial of Terra, we solve it, and we leave.”
“Okay, why are you acting like you’ve got a major wedgie?” Margot asked. “Mad I took away your suspenders?”
He didn’t look at her. “I couldn’t sleep, so I went back to the archives at the museum.”
The museum was totally closed by that time of night, but Margot decided it was best not to ask how he’d managed to get back inside. She’d seen him cheat and sneak and steal enough times to know he had his ways. And she’d take plausible deniability while she had it.
“And?” she prompted at the worried slant of his mouth.
He retrieved a sheet of paper from his pocket. It had been crinkled and clenched, indentions of Van’s fingers molded into the parchment. “The curse, it’s still spreading, and—”
His sentence ended abruptly, but like she had an atlas of his mind, she knew where his thoughts had led him. “And this is the longest you’ve been without one of the shards nearby, but you don’t know exactly how long it takes to turn you all the way back to stone.”
Van swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “There’s no guarantee that no one else discovered the last two shards in the hundred years I’ve been gone.”
“They’ll be there,” she said. “And they’ll lead us right to Enzo.”
“He might not come.”
“He will,” Margot said.
“You don’t know that!”
Margot reeled back, stunned. A few classmates swiveled in their seats to see the commotion. Van gulped down a breath that did little to flush the color that had risen to his cheeks. She wanted to press an affirming hand to his shoulder, but her hand hung halfway there. It wouldn’t have done much anyway. Van jerked upright and squeezed past Margot into the aisle.
She rushed after him. “Where are you going?”
Their stop wasn’t for another twenty minutes, fifteen at least.
Without glancing back, Van said, “It doesn’t matter.”
“Yes, it does,” Margot pushed.
“No, it doesn’t.”
“It does because we’re partners.” Margot reached toward him, this time refusing to shy away. He shook her hand off his arm like she was nothing more than an annoying fruit fly.
Stomping down the aisle, he jiggled the handle on the bathroom, despite the sign clearly indicating it was occupied, and kept marching when it wouldn’t open. One shoulder sagged, heavier than the other, and one leg lagged, throwing off his gait.
Van’s foot snagged against a man’s briefcase, and he stumbled forward. He caught himself against the armrest of the next seat—but not without startling a bottle-blonde twentysomething clearly on vacation. Her coffee-cart cappuccino spilled down the front of her white dress, leaving a brown Rorschach spot on the bodice.
The girl’s gasp was a shotgun start. Van muttered an apology before making a break for it down the aisle. Fortunately—or, unfortunately—his legs were slow, laden with stone. Each move he made was rigid.
“Stop, Van.” Margot caught up with him quickly, but it did nothing to deter him. “Stop. Stop.”