Coastal Ashes Chapter 14

I found him leaving the library, his collar turned up against a sudden, miserable rain that felt like the sky was spitting in my face. I grabbed his arm, my fingers digging into the expensive wool of his coat.

“Lyla? What’s wrong?” Caleb’s face, usually a study in careless perfection, was etched with concern. The sight of it only fueled my rage.

“What’s wrong?” My voice came out as a low, dangerous whisper. “Derek Watson. That’s what’s wrong.”

His name landed between us like a grenade. I saw a flicker of something in his eyes—recognition, maybe even fear—before his mask of confusion slammed back into place. “Who? Lyla, you’re not making any sense.”

“Don’t lie to me, Caleb.” The rain was plastering my hair to my forehead, cold water trickling down my neck. “Don’t you dare lie to me. Corporate security. Your father’s personal thug. He cornered Maya today. He threatened her scholarship. He knew her mother’s name. How did he know that, Caleb? How did he know to target her, unless someone on the inside gave him our names?”

He recoiled as if I’d slapped him. “You think I did that? You think I would put Maya in danger?”

“The database was locked within minutes of us getting the archive key,” I shot back, my voice breaking. “Admin-level lockout. Who else has that power? Who else’s name is Wentworth? You knew we were close, and you protected your family. You protected the money.”

“No!” His voice was raw, cutting through the sound of the downpour. He grabbed my shoulders, his grip desperate. “Lyla, I swear on my life, I didn’t do it. I would never—I’m on your side.”

“Your side?” I laughed, a bitter, broken sound. “There are no sides here. There’s just you and your father and your blood money, and then there’s us. The people you pave over. I saw it in your eyes the day we met. You’re afraid. You’re a coward, hiding behind your perfect life, and the second it was threatened, you threw us to the wolves.”

I tore myself from his grasp and started walking, not looking back.

“Lyla, wait!” he called after me, his voice ragged with a pain I couldn’t afford to believe. I just walked faster, the rain and my own hot tears blurring the streetlights into a meaningless smear.

***

The official email arrived the next morning. It was forwarded to me by a frantic Diego. An official summons from the Dean of Students. Maya Washington was to appear before the Disciplinary Committee in forty-eight hours to address a formal complaint regarding “violations of the university’s academic integrity and network usage policies.”

The anonymous tip had been legitimized. The threat was no longer a ghost in a coffee shop;

it was a guillotine being sharpened in a paneled office.

We met in Maya’s dorm room. It was starkly neat, a single suitcase open on her bed. She was folding a sweater with methodical precision, her face a mask of calm that was more terrifying than any tears.

“They’re fast,” she said without looking up. “You have to give them that.”

“We’ll fight it,” I said, my voice hoarse. “Stern will help. We can argue it’s a retaliatory action, a SLAPP tactic…”

“Lyla.” She stopped folding and finally met my eyes. Her own were clear, devoid of illusion. “They don’t need to win. They just need to drag me through it. My scholarship is conditional. An ‘academic integrity’ investigation, even a bogus one, is enough to suspend it. My sister’s tuition is due next month. My mom is counting on me.”

“So what are you saying?” Diego asked, his voice barely a whisper. “You’re just going to… let them?”

“No,” Maya said, a ghost of her usual sharp smile returning. “I’m not going to let them do anything. I’m taking control.” She walked over to her desk and picked up a printed form. “I filed for a voluntary leave of absence this afternoon. Citing personal family matters. Effective immediately.”

The air left the room. It felt like a confession of guilt, a surrender.

“Maya, no,” I pleaded. “That’s what they want.”

“What they want is for me to be scared,” she countered, her voice hardening with resolve. “What they want is for me to be silenced and discredited. But I’m not going to be either. I’m just going off the grid.” She looked at Diego. “I can be your ghost in the machine. From a public library in Queens, I’ll have more freedom to dig than I ever would here. No network monitoring. No paper trail.”

She was sacrificing her dream—the one her whole family had bet on—for mine. The weight of it was crushing.

Later that evening, we stood under the buzzing fluorescent lights of the Greyhound bus station. It smelled of disinfectant and despair, a world away from Harvard Yard. Maya hugged Diego, then turned to me.

“He’ll come back to you, you know,” she said quietly, for my ears only.

“I don’t care.”

“Liar.” She pulled back, her hands on my shoulders. “Find the proof, Lyla. Find it and burn them to the ground. You’re the only one who can.” She gave me a fierce, final hug. “Now go. And do me a favor.”

“Anything.”

“Send those bastards in suits to hell for me.”

I watched her walk through the gate, her backpack slung over her shoulder, not looking back. She was just a girl from Chicago, swallowed by the belly of a bus, and she was the bravest person I had ever known. A part of me left with her.

***

The next day, I felt adrift. The fight had lost its heart. I was wandering through the Boston Museum of Modern Art, trying to numb myself with abstract shapes and jarring colors, when a voice cut through my haze.

“Lyla Jones. I had a feeling I might find you communing with the tortured souls.”

I turned. A woman with razor-sharp black hair and an impossibly chic, all-black outfit stood there, a smirk playing on her crimson lips. She looked like she’d been sculpted from glass and disdain.

“Do I know you?” I asked.

“Isabella Rossi. Caleb’s cousin.” She gestured vaguely at a chaotic sculpture made of twisted metal. “My gallery is loaning this piece. Utter trash, but the artist is sleeping with a trustee.” She looked me up and down, her eyes analytical. “Caleb has dreadful taste in women, but you, at least, look like you could cause some real trouble. It’s refreshing.”

“I’m not really in the mood for small talk,” I said, turning to leave.

“I’m not here for small talk,” she said, her voice dropping. “I’m here because I can’t stand my uncle Lawrence. Or his smug, soulless son. But mostly, I can’t stand the family’s hypocrisy.”

I stopped. “What are you talking about?”

She stepped closer, the scent of expensive, esoteric perfume surrounding her. “You think Lawrence is the only Wentworth with a dark side? He’s just the one who’s good at it. The real cautionary tale is my other uncle. James.”

The name meant nothing to me.

“Exactly,” Isabella said, reading my expression. “The family ghost. The one they hide away in a dusty Beacon Hill apartment with his bottles of scotch. He was on the board, back at the beginning. An idealist, apparently. Fought with Lawrence over the ‘ethical expansion’ of the company.” She made air quotes, her disdain palpable. “He lost, of course. Drank himself into obscurity. They say he’s a tragic footnote.”

She leaned in, her voice a conspiratorial whisper. “But footnotes are where the most interesting secrets are buried. Lawrence may have shredded the archives, but my uncle James… he was always a sentimental fool. A hoarder of grievances. If anyone kept a record of the family’s original sins, it would be the drunk uncle they threw away.”

She straightened up, her work done. “He frequents a dive bar called The Last Drop, not far from here. Smells of regret and stale beer. It’ll remind you of home.”

With a final, pitying glance, she turned and disappeared into the gallery crowd, leaving me with a name. A ghost. A target.

Maya was gone. Caleb was a traitor. But a drunk uncle in a sad, old bar… he might just be the weapon I needed. A new, fragile thread of hope began to unspool in the wreckage.