Ana Mourns (The Clermont Coven Trilogy Book 2) Read online

  Ana Mourns

  The Clermont Coven Trilogy

  Alina Banks

  Copyright © 2020 by Alina Banks

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Cover design by Deranged Doctor Design www.derangeddoctordesign.com

  I would like to thank my friends and family for encouraging me to try something a little different.

  I would also like to thank all of my readers who enjoyed the first book.

  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

  Chapter 36

  Afterword

  Also by Alina Banks

  Chapter One

  Sabrina and I shared a look before turning our attention back to the new principal. As I studied him, I felt my senses prick the way they had done with Principal Woods. I tried to tell myself that everything was going to work out just fine. Only, I knew all too well that it was a lie. He looked out at us and gave us this smile that said all the right things. He was friendly and approachable, and he wasn’t going to turn out to be a serial killer like the last one.

  “It’s a pleasure to have this chance to talk with you all. Obviously, as I’m standing up here in a suit, I’m your new principal. My family and I are also new in town, so I’d like you to welcome my son, Damien, who would probably like it very much if I didn’t do this. Can you stand up for us, Damien?”

  With a look that made it obvious how much he didn’t like it, Damien stood and peered around the room. My eyes met his for a moment. Giving me a smile, he sat down. I looked at Sabrina again, and she shrugged before turning back to the stage.

  “I’m not Principal Woods, so there’s a chance I’m not going to do things the same way he did, but I hope that we can learn to work through those differences together.” He looked around the room again, his eyes meeting mine for a moment. It was all I could do to hide my shiver. Of course that was going to be how things would work out. “For those of you who don’t yet know, you are free to call me Principal Eason, or you can just go with Sir. Either works.” He shrugged. “Since today is your first day back after the holidays, I’m going to let you go get settled into your new classes, and I hope I will have a chance to get to know you all much better in the future.”

  As we left the room, Alex stepped over to join us, his hand taking mine. I looked at him with a smile.

  “Hey, Ana.”

  “Hey, Alex.” I smiled. “What do you think of our new principal?”

  “I wanted to wait until I had a chance to talk to you, so I could see what you thought of him.”

  Glancing back, I saw that Principal Eason was talking to Damien. I tried to find a way to put my thoughts into words. “I don’t really want to say this, but there’s something about him that’s not quite right.” I shook my head. “I have no idea if it’s because of what happened before. There’s no reason for me to think there’s anything wrong with Principal Eason, but I learned from Principal Woods to listen to my gut feeling when it comes to people, and the feelings I have right now are relatively similar to what I felt when I was around Woods.”

  “You think he might have some kind of connection to what happened before?”

  “Maybe.” I nibbled my lip. “I don’t know if this is linked to that, necessarily.” With Alex, I had never once mentioned we’d been dealing with a demon. I knew that if I did, he’d accept it, but it seemed to make more sense that we didn’t have that conversation. At least, not until I was certain he was ready for it. “I just know that I’m not entirely comfortable with him, but there is a chance this is nothing more than him being new.”

  “Really?” He shook his head. “I don’t think you’d get this kind of feeling purely because he’s new, Ana.” He squeezed my hand. “If you think there’s something off about him, you’re probably right. The best thing we can do is to keep an eye on him.”

  Nodding, I glanced back again to find that both Principal Eason and Damien were staring in my direction. I didn’t like that at all. I turned to face the direction I was walking, but I could still feel their eyes on me. They were still definitely staring at me.

  I gripped Alex’s hand tighter. “I’m okay.”

  “We both know that’s a lie, Ana. Whatever happens and however this works out, I’m going to be right by your side.” He squeezed my hand reassuringly. “Everything is going to be okay. We’ll find a way to make sure of it.”

  Like she had been so many times before, Alice was waiting for me when I stepped into the library. “Ana.” She nodded at me. “You’re worried.”

  “Do you know much about the new principal?”

  “Only what the students have been saying, and they honestly haven’t been talking all that much about him. Their focus is more on his son. Damien, I believe his name is. Apparently, he is good looking, so a lot of the girls have been wondering if he’s single, which is to be expected.”

  “Unfortunately.” I raked a hand through my hair. “There’s something about them that’s making me uncomfortable.”

  “You should pay attention to that feeling, because there is a reason for it. Granted, you might not always know what that reason is, at least, not to begin with, but you’ll work it out eventually, the same way you did with Principal Woods.” She studied me. “Principal Eason isn’t local. I do know that about him. Being from somewhere else doesn’t mean he’s not connected to the demon in some way, but it does make it far less likely, because the demon has always been obsessed with Clermont. He wants the power source more than he wants anything else.” She shrugged. “If he is connected to the demon, then he’s come here to do what all the others have done.”

  Sighing, I went to sit at the table we most often sat at. “Open a door.”

  “Freeing the demon is their priority, and it always will be.” She sat opposite me. “They believe what it tells them. They believe its lies, and you know as well as I do that it goes after people who are hurting. He goes after people who are vulnerable to that kind of manipulation. That’s always going to be the case. People always want something, and it’s easy enough for the demon to manipulate them into believing his lies.”

  Nodding, I looked at my hands. “I’m learning more as every day passes, but I just don’t think the demon is going to give me enough time to learn everything I need to know before it does something to force its way through.”

  “Knowing there are only the three of you here, because I’m certain it doesn’t know about me or the contact you have with your grandmother, it believes that now is the best time to work towards taking Clermont. I
t can take the three of you down one at a time, and then…” Alice’s eyes met mine. “You have to be ready for that. Now that it’s seen you, you’re in more danger than you ever were before, so you need to be more careful to combat that. You know the demon will do whatever it takes. It will try to convince you to join it. That’s its best option. Why would you want to fight against it when you could be on the winning team?” She smiled. “I remember it trying to convince me of that, back before I died. I never once wished I’d made a different choice. Being dead is better than giving it the power it wants.”

  Mom’s eyes met mine. “We have a new staff member at the hospital. Madeline Eason.” She shrugged. “Rebecca isn’t happy having her there because of certain things that have been said in recent times, but I don’t believe anyone will be able to wrest control of the hospital from her.”

  “Unless she’s unable to do the job.” I leaned against the counter. “That means we have Easons in two places we really don’t want them to be. It makes me wonder if they do have something to do with the demon.”

  “Logically, we can’t assume anything, but if you put the pieces together, I can’t help wondering if that is the case. Madeline, or Maddy, as she asked me to call her, is the current second in command. I’m just a nurse. I can’t do anything if something does happen that means someone needs to take over. She’s already done everything she could to make people like her. She keeps talking about how much she wants to get together outside of the hospital, in order to get to know one another better.”

  “Which is something you really don’t want to do.”

  “The moment I met her, I knew there was something…off. Like you do. I can’t put my finger on exactly what that is, but I know I shouldn’t be alone with her.”

  “How does Miss Cane feel about her?”

  “Rebecca hasn’t said much, but I didn’t really expect her to. Not yet. She likes to take her time to get to know people before she makes any decisions as to whether or not she should be worried.” Mom looked at me. “I think we should be worried. If we’ve both had that feeling, then there’s a reason for it, especially since we weren’t together when we met them. If we had been…actually, that might be why Becca’s taking her time with this. She knows that my feelings about someone could affect how she feels because of our proximity to each other, so when I told her about my initial perception of Madeline, Becca probably wanted to make sure that she could draw her own conclusions. I’ll let her know that you feel the same way about the other Easons.”

  “Damien has a sister, and she wasn’t gathered with the rest of us this morning. That worries me as well. There are four of them and only three of us. I’m still nowhere near where I should be at this point, and that’s definitely going to complicate things.”

  “Your skills are moving along rapidly, so I don’t think we have too much of a reason to worry, especially since we don’t know if there is anything to worry about yet. This could all be for nothing. Maybe we’re just on high alert because of what happened before. It’s possible that this will fade in time.”

  “I know you don’t really believe that, Mom.” I smiled. “I can understand why you’d want to think that might happen, but it’s not going to. You know it as well as I do.” I sighed. “We have a reason to be worried about the Easons. We might not know what that reason is yet, but we will soon enough, and that…maybe the most logical thing I can do is to start getting to know Damien. He has no reason to think I’m worried about him. I doubt the demon knows enough about witches, even if we are connected to the demon, to be able to warn them about our instincts.”

  “Just be careful doing that. I understand the choice, but it might complicate things more than you realize.” Mom’s eyes met mine, and I could see the worry in them. “I trust you to make the right choices. I always have. I have no reason to think you’re going to do anything to put us in danger, but there is a chance that by getting close to him, you’ll be putting yourself in danger. You’re my daughter, and I don’t want anything to happen to you.”

  Reaching out, I gently took Mom’s hand. We were closer than we had ever been before, even if I hadn’t entirely forgiven her for her choices. Part of that was because she was helping me learn what it meant to be who I was. “I’m always going to be careful, Mom. Please do the same. If Madeline thinks you’re the weak link, then she might focus on you.”

  Chapter Two

  Alex shook his head. “Ana…”

  “Finding out what’s happening has to be the priority right now. I have a chance to work things out, and that…I’m going to be careful. I don’t know if I’m going to be safe doing this, but this is the safest option. I don’t want to wait. In the past, I had no choice because I wasn’t here in the beginning, but I’m here this time. I’m not going to let anyone else die.”

  He looked down. “You know better than to think I’m going to try to stop you. I know you believe you’re doing what is best, and I’ll support you in that, but this…I can’t help worrying. Before, we were just dealing with Principal Woods, and that was hard enough. Now, we have a whole family.” Breathing in deeply, seeming more emotional than I expected, he looked back at me, and I could see true fear in his eyes. That really wasn’t what I’d been expecting. Then again, it wasn’t as though he really had any idea what might happen next. “I care about you. You know that. We might not have made things official, but that doesn’t change anything for me, and I…with everything that’s happened, I kind of wish things were different. I know you feel the weight of Clermont on your shoulders, for whatever reason, so I understand. At the same time…I hate to say this, Ana, but it could affect our relationship.”

  “Yeah, it could, and I’m sorry if it does.” I hated that I sounded so cold, but maybe it was better that he knew before we got too close. “I care about you too, Alex, and I want to see how things can go. That doesn’t mean I’m not going to put Clermont first if I believe that’s the right thing to do. I will always sacrifice my own happiness in order to do what’s best for the town.” I sighed. “My family has always made that choice in the past. I can’t be selfish. Mom could, but it was very different for her.” I ran my tongue over my dry lips. “I do feel the weight on me in a way she never did, and that means I’m a very different person than her, so Clermont is always going to be my home, no matter how complicated things get. I will spend the rest of my life doing what Mom couldn’t, because she was never meant to be the one to do this. She had no way of knowing that back when she felt like she should be the one taking that weight on her shoulders. We’ve never really gone into that much detail about why, and it’s still up to you whether you want to know everything or not. I’m not going to force what I know on you. I just need you to understand that my choices will be made with that knowledge.”

  Sabrina, James, and I sat at our usual table. I looked between the two of them, my eyes meeting with Sabrina’s for a moment. She already knew what I’d done, but James didn’t, so it was best if I told him before Damien walked up to the table. “This might not be something you were expecting, but I asked Damien to sit with us.” I studied him. “I thought it would be good for us to get to know him a little better.”

  James raised an eyebrow at me. “I take it that’s why Alex isn’t sitting with us.”

  “Probably. I did talk to him about this in advance, so please don’t think I’m that kind of person. He understands.” I smiled at James. “He understands this better than anyone else because he knows me, and he did tell me to be wary, but he was never going to stop me. He knows why I make these decisions.”

  That was when James nodded. “As long as you have been talking to him about this. Letting those kinds of choices come between the two of you…” He shrugged. “You work well together. I hope the two of you have a long and happy future.”

  “I do too. For now, though, we’re still young, and we have so much ahead of us.” Mom and Dad, I knew, were an anomaly. Most people didn’t get together in high school and stay to
gether for the rest of their lives. I didn’t have any reason to think things would play out the same way for me. “I want a chance to get to know other people, and Alex isn’t the kind of person to stop me from doing that.”

  “No, he’s not.” I heard footsteps coming toward us, and somehow, I knew it was Damien, so I looked over at him. “Hi.” I gave him a smile, even though his being so close sparked that same feeling I had before, but it was worse. Forcing myself to ignore that feeling was something I was going to have to get used to. “I wasn’t sure if you’d actually join us.”

  He smiled back. “I wanted a chance to get to know a few more people.” As he took the seat next to me, I studied him, trying to understand why I’d had such a reaction, but there was nothing outwardly unusual about him. When I first met Principal Woods, I hadn’t noticed anything outwardly suspicious either, apart from that feeling. Damien evoked the same uneasiness in me. “Being the principal’s son can make that complicated. I’ve found making real friends much harder because people mostly want to get close to me in the hope that I’ll be able to get them out of trouble in the future. I didn’t think you were going to be like that.”

  “We aren’t.” There were so many questions I wanted to ask, but I couldn’t. We weren’t meant to know what happened to Principal Woods, because we’d been told certain lies so the student body didn’t know he’d been killed due to his decision to work with a demon, so asking if he knew about that wasn’t the logical thing to do.