The Becoming of Noah Shaw (The Shaw Confessions #1)(20)

“Days ago?” Feels like weeks, years since my father’s funeral.

Jamie peeks over the couch, his face open, curious. “Heir to the Shaw estate?” The question perks up Daniel.

“Seems so.”

Each of them processes my answer differently. Daniel’s heartbeat intensifies when he moves over by the library, God love him.

Jamie’s mind . . . is a mystery. But he’s hanging on my words, turning them over. Calculating their meaning, for what purpose, I don’t know. The pendant he wears is nearly identical to the one Mara’s grandmother left her, the one my own mother left me. Half-sword, half-feather, cast in silver. It’s invisible beneath the collar of his T-shirt. But it’s there. Jamie got a letter from the professor as well and threw in his lot with the man—if he can even be called that, ancient as he claims to be—who serves no master but himself. I’ve no interest in being anyone’s tool. My own neck is bare. Mara’s, too.

“How many bedrooms?” Jamie asks.

“Six, I think.”

A hint of smugness. “Going to fill them with Dyer-Shaw babies?”

Mara’s already nodding as she twines our fingers together. “We’re thinking of a spring wedding—we’ll both be eighteen. Right, honey?”

“I don’t remember proposing.”

Mara takes my hand. “Noah Shaw, will you impregnate me immediately?”

Daniel’s shaking his head. “Ew.”

Jamie lifts a hand. “Seconded.”

Goose, from the kitchen. “Are they always like this?”

“The language of love,” I reply. “Actually,” I say to Jamie, “I bought the flat for all of us.”

Genuine shock from Daniel. Polite interest from Goose. Scepticism from Jamie.

“Catch?” he asks.

A shake of my head. “None. Truly.” Which is a bit of a lie, but. To Daniel and Goose, I say, “Goes for you as well. It’d be brilliant having everyone here.”

“The Never-ending Party,” Goose muses. “I’m into it.”

Jamie’s eyes follow him. “I could get into it . . .”

Daniel sighs. “Pass, but it’s really nice of you to offer.”

“Really?” There’s disappointment in Mara’s voice. “Are you sure?”

“NYU bribed me with housing I couldn’t refuse. Or I could, but, I’d like to be able to walk to class, since I actually plan to go to college this year.”

“Hey.” Mara’s offended, genuinely.

Her brother raises his hands. “You’re going next year. And everyone knows that your senior year of high school, which this is supposed to be, is pointless.”

“Exactly. We’re just skipping the classes we’d be skipping anyway,” Jamie says. “And eliminating the adult supervision.” Pointedly, to Mara: “I know how you love eliminating adult supervision.”

“Cheers, as Noah would say.”

Daniel ignores them. “You really deserve a break, Mara, after . . . everything. Seriously. It’s your moral obligation to have fun.”

“That’s me,” she says deliciously. “Moral.”

Goose glides out of the kitchen with glasses and a ￡700 bottle of Caol Ila. Well done.

“Shall we?”

“I shall,” I say, allowing him to pour. We all do, in point of fact.

Pride is not an emotion I’m much familiar with, but at that moment, I think I feel it. Watching my girl and my friends like this, knowing I’ve made this moment. Chose these people to fill it with: Goose, from my past; Jamie, my present; Daniel, the brother I wish I’d had. I feel a steady flickering of happiness, separate and apart from being with Mara. The world is shifting before my eyes into something else, fitting into outlines I want to remember for however long I’m supposed to live. We’re taking on the shape of something, newborn and primitive. There’s a lightness, strange and alien but welcome, as we drink and laugh. But beneath it, always, is a vein of . . . separateness. Daniel and Mara are family. Jamie and Mara are best friends, bound by an experience I was responsible for but not part of. And Goose, familiar though he is, is still farther removed from me than the rest of them.

Everyone’s toasting and laughing in the living room, and, as planned, I take my leave, heading up the steel-and-glass staircase leading to the second floor. I don’t want to turn on the lights, as I’m not quite sure what can be seen from downstairs and what can’t, so I wander blindly, not sure which room I’m looking for until I find it.

It’s chaotic in here, with unopened boxes piled up on the edge of a riveted metal desk. I step over and around trunks of different sizes and ages; some centuries old, probably. Everyone’s still talking downstairs, and loudly, so I close the door and turn on the light.

Not about to start with the boxes. They look like banker’s boxes and likely contain financials and other shite I’ve no interest in at the moment. And the trunks—I’m wary. I’ve already spent enough time in the company of my father’s ghost. I’d prefer someone else’s.

A small trunk stands out from the rest, edged in silver and gold with a host of names engraved on the front—all female, I can’t help but notice. I open it and discover what appear to be congratulatory letters from what appear to be former conquests of some former relative.