Inescapable (Talented Saga #7) (16 page)

The Privileged

Besançon, France

Four Days Before the Vote

Kev
Leon—
the
Kev
Leon, star of the highest-grossing movie franchise of all
time,
Tides of Fortune
—was alive. And not only alive, but also standing ten feet
from Cressa.

This. Was. Epic. The fact that he wasn’t
dead, but walking, talking, and attending the Institute was simply
unbelievable. It would’ve been, if Cressa hadn’t seen the A-lister
with her own eyes. Even as she stood beside Kev on the elevator to
the dorms, breathing the same air, Cressa had a hard time wrapping
her head around the sudden development.

Mr. and Mrs. Karmine had told Cressa that
most of the Institute’s students came from prestigious old
families, though there might also be well-known athletes, video
stars, or otherwise famous students. After all, they’d reminded
her, the best of the world’s best were selected for instruction at
the Institute. Of course, her parents had failed to mention that
those famous faces might belong to people the world presumed
deceased.

But Cressa wasn’t complaining.

“
Cadet Karmine is also a
brand-new 2P,” Gregor told Kev as the elevator zoomed northward.
“She also just received her light manipulation injection, so you
will be in lessons together.”

Kev’s empty gaze darted towards Cressa.
Blushing a deep crimson, she gave the teen idol a small, giddy
wave. An emotion too complex for Cressa to decipher in that
heart-stopping moment flitted briefly across Kev’s blue irises.
Cressa melted. Madame Gillis, the 1P initiator, had told her that
the Dame could make Cressa’s wildest dreams come true, but she’d
never imagined that included her daydreams about meeting Kev Leon.
Suddenly, Cressa wanted to take back every questioning thought
she’d ever had about her decision to come to the Institute. With
the introduction of Kev, the Dame’s program was instantly the
greatest thing to ever happen to Cressa.

“
Becoming acquainted with
your fellow 2Ps is very important,” Gregor continued when neither
of them replied to his introduction, a slight edge to his
tone.

Though she was starstruck,
and utterly unable to form coherent words, she realized it was odd
that Kev didn’t take the opening—he was known to be warm and
inviting, with a big personality. Fans waited for hours in the
rain, snow, or blood-boiling temperatures just to catch a glimpse
of the boy the press had dubbed
Midas
, and he never disappointed.
Kev spent more time visiting with fans, signing comms and posing
for pictures than any other actor on the planet.

Staring at Kev in the bright lights of the
elevator car, Cressa thought that maybe all the media hype was just
that—hype. Because Kev Leon wasn’t nearly what she thought he’d be,
both in manner and appearance. His golden hair had surpassed messy
and simply appeared unkempt. The rich, tanned skin that came from
the perfect blend of several diverse ethnicities was no longer
smooth and radiant. Instead, Kev suffered from the same blemishes
on his chin that Cressa did. In the life-size e-poster on Cressa’s
bedroom wall in Boston, the blue of Kev’s eyes was hypnotic, his
gaze as soulful as the deepest parts of the most beautiful ocean.
In real life, those eyes were more like shallow tide pools.

And still, Cressa thought Kev Leon was quite
possibly the most perfect male specimen alive, blemishes be
damned.

“
My name is Cressa, Cressa
Karmine,” Cressa said helpfully.

Kev stared at her blankly.

“
I know who you are, of
course. I mean, everyone knows who you are,” she rambled, hoping
for even a glimmer of a reaction.

“
2P male dormitory,” the
mechanical voice announced as the elevator came to a smooth stop on
Kev’s floor.

The doors slid soundlessly apart, giving
Cressa a glimpse of a beautiful glass atrium with colorful stained
glass tiles decorating one wall, and a large archway in the middle
of the space.

Gregor nudged Kev Leon in the ribs. The
actor shuffled forward, exiting the car without ever acknowledging
Cressa. Her heart sank. Gregor gave Cressa and Leslie a curt nod
before following.

“
Oh, Gregor?” Leslie
called after her classmate. The 8P boy turned. “Did you receive the
message from the Dame? She wants to meet with both of us in the
morning, directly after breakfast.”

Cressa’s gaze was still
locked on Kev, who was just about to pass through the archway on
the far wall. He paused and turned back, glancing quickly from
Gregor to Leslie. Finding their attention on each other, Kev Leon
smiled sadly at Cressa. Her heart pitter-pattered, leaping in to
her throat. It was the same look he’d given Alice, his girlfriend
in
Tides of Fortune
, as she lay dying in his arms after being blasted with a
Plutonian death pistol.

Julie is going to
freak,
Cressa thought, picturing the look
on her best friend’s face when Cressa told her about the encounter
with Kev Leon. Julie was even more obsessed with the young
heartthrob than Cressa, and still heartbroken over his death. At
least, Cressa assumed she was, since it had been a
month.

As a reward for being
accepted to the Institute, Cressa’s father had used his connections
to secure exclusive access tickets to the premier of
My Heart to Break
, Kev’s
last movie before his purported death. Julie and Cressa had spent
an entire day with Mrs. Karmine’s personal shopper, selecting the
perfect dresses for their big night out. On the day of the
premiere, just as the girls were finishing their appointments with
glamour specialists, Mr. Karmine had commed Cressa to say that the
event was unexpectedly canceled. She and Julie had been despondent,
and locked themselves away in Cressa’s room to cry over the fact
they might never meet their shared dreamboat.

Then, the news broke—Kev Leon had died of an
apparent drug overdose.

“
Thank you, I did receive
the order.” Gregor’s voice jolted Cressa from her memories. Kev was
still watching the older cadets intently, sparing Cressa another
look that she couldn’t decipher.

“
Very well. Good night,”
Leslie replied, removing her finger from the elevator’s Hold
button.

The doors slid shut on Kev and his sad
smile.

“
2P girl’s dormitory,”
Leslie commanded.

Cressa knew she should
keep her mouth shut. She
knew
she shouldn’t bring it up. But she was
practically choking on the questions lining up in her head like
rowdy fans waiting for entrance to a concert.

“
That…that was Kev Leon,”
Cressa finally said.

The older girl stared down her nose at
Cressa, her disapproval palpable in the small space.

“
No, he
was
Kev Leon,” Leslie
replied. “Now he is Cadet Kevin Leonard. Like you, he is in Phase
Two of the Privileged program. There are no celebrities at the
Institute, and I suggest you do not treat him as such. Do you
understand?”

“
Yes, ma’am. We are all
equals at the Institute,” Cressa replied absently, her thoughts
still on the movie star.

Leslie shook her head. “No, cadet, there are
no equals—not in life, and certainly not at the Institute. But
status must be earned here, entirely separate from whom you once
were. From the time you received your acceptance until your last
breath in service to the Dame, you are part of the greatest
competition in this world. Every person under the Dame is ranked,
based solely on your performance within the Institute. Technically,
all cadets can advance through the phases, but those at the top of
the classes will receive greater rewards than the bottom-dwellers.
Once the Dame’s word is spread to the masses and society comes
under Privileged-rule, her worthiest disciples will be the true
stars of the new galaxy.”

Cressa cringed at the rebuke. She’d been so
starstruck by Kev Leon that she’d forgotten one of her earliest
lessons. Leslie’s little speech was a close approximation of the
one Madame Gillis had given Cressa on her first day about the Dame
encouraging an adversarial environment. The Institute believed
pitting cadets against one another pushed them to do better, to be
better.

Life is a
competition,
Cressa reminded
herself.
Winning is up to me, no one
else.

It was her father’s
favorite and most repeated idiom. After all, the Karmine fortune
hadn’t been built on luck or generosity. It was
earned.
Through blood, sweat, and
tears, her ancestors had bested their competitors to make Karmine
Pharmaceuticals the largest drug company in the world. And it was
solely Cressa’s responsibility to continue the Karmine legacy of
greatness, through hard work, determination, and doing whatever it
took to be the best.

I’m still working on that
last bit
, Cressa thought wryly.

The elevator doors opened and Leslie stepped
into the dorm’s atrium, which appeared identical to the one on the
boy’s floor. The glass stones radiated a cool beauty that was
somehow both enticing and off-putting. Leslie stopped in the middle
of the space and pointed upwards. Cressa followed the direction of
Leslie’s finger and did a double take. The ceiling was rounded, the
highest point directly above where the two girls stood. Ivy
meandered across the glass roof, with small flowers in an array of
colors and patterns twined through the vines.

“
Every floor devoted to
housing those in Phase Two and above has one of these gardens,”
Leslie told her. “Each of the flowers represents a cadet who has
passed through these halls. Tomorrow, your flower will be added to
this collection. As you continue through the program, your
representative flower will change to reflect you as an individual.
Right now, as a 2P, your flower is white, because you are a blank
slate with little choice in any matters. With each Phase, you gain
more insight and more control. This is reflected in your flower. By
the time you complete Phase Eight, the petals may all be different
colors, or spotted, or striped—a representation of who you are as a
Privileged. You see those flowers?” Leslie pointed to the base of
the dome, where black flowers ringed the perimeter. Some were
withered and dying, while others were still blossoming, though dark
as a moonless midnight. “That is the graveyard. Every black flower
you see denotes an individual who has proven unworthy by failing to
achieve Privileged status.” She stared hard at Cressa. “See that
your flower remains in the garden above.”

Cressa swallowed around the lump in her
throat. The symbolism was not lost on her—a black flower meant
failure, while a withered one likely signified death. There was an
awful lot of black beneath the rainbow garden.

“
The common room is this
way, come now,” Leslie said, heading for the archway. Cressa
followed on her heels, unsteadied by the alien environment. “Your
belongings have already been relocated to your new quarters,”
Leslie continued.

“
Belongings?” Cressa
echoed, temporarily distracted from the morbid flower
garden.

Per Institute regulations, Cressa had been
allowed only a single personal item from home. She’d chosen a
one-eyed stuffed frog she called Frieda, given to Cressa by her
father on her fifth birthday. After her first day of instruction at
the Institute, she’d returned to her room to find Frieda gone.
Naturally, Cressa had asked Madame Gillis if she knew anything
about the frog’s disappearance.

“
Stuffed animals are for
babies,” the woman had replied.

And that was that. Cressa hadn’t seen so
much as a stray green thread from the frog since.

“
Your clothing and
toiletries,” Leslie clarified as the two girls entered the
commons.

The large room was
highbrow-meets-homey. Artwork from notable painters hung on walls
the color of butterscotch, each framed creation more expensive than
the one beside it. The couches and tables were also clearly made by
high-end designers, but the leather cushions looked soft and supple
and inviting. Cashmere afghans were folded over the backs of chairs
and on the arms of sofas. The material would be soft to the touch,
Cressa was positive, since her mother had similar ones sprinkled
throughout their home. Finally, motivational maxims were stenciled
in looping letters below the wainscoting—
Power is Strength; Privilege is for the Worthy; Destinies are
Made, not Inherited; Sacrifice in Service.

Each word made Cressa’s skin grow colder and
colder, until she felt as if she would shatter into a million
shards of ice. They were all sayings she’d heard before, either
from Madame Gillis or one of the senior cadets. Still, seeing them
written out brought a new level of clarity for Cressa; she began to
truly appreciate how high the stakes were.

Five girls, ranging in age from about ten to
approximately eighteen, were scattered throughout the commons. They
all looked up from what they were doing when Leslie and Cressa
entered.

“
This is your newest
classmate, Cadet Cressa Karmine,” Leslie announced. She pointed to
where two identical girls sat across from each other at a small
table in the corner, a chessboard set up between them. “Shyla and
Lyla Towers.”

The girls waved in unison, and Cressa
returned the gesture.