by Mae Doyle
Except Kelly.
Ignoring the way Amelia and Sara stared at us, I waved to Harper and Maggie and then joined my boys in getting food. By the time we made our way to the table, a lot of people had started talking again.
Except for the harpies.
“Did you hear?” Maggie leaned forward, the excitement thick in her voice. “I mean, I know you guys have been upstairs in your love nest all afternoon, but surely you heard?”
One glance at her eager face told me that something big had gone down and we’d missed it.
Taking a sip of water, I shook my head. “Haven’t heard a thing, Mags. What’s going on?”
This time it was Harper who leaned forward. She reached across the table and grabbed my hand, giving it a squeeze. “Kelly’s been expelled. Mr. Taylor is so pissed right now, and her parents are trying to get back the, uh, generous donation that they made to the school at the beginning of the year.”
Not to be left out, Maggie interrupted. “It’s insane, Rose! They got into a screaming match in his office and he told them that he simply didn’t allow cheaters to study at his prestigious university.”
It worked.
It not only worked, but it sounded like everything imploded for Kelly, and the thought that I’d been the one to take her down and get her kicked out of Taylor Prep made me shiver. It was no wonder that Amelia looked so pissed.
She finally realized that I was going to put up a good fight and that I was coming for her.
Honestly, I hadn’t realized that Kelly would get kicked out, but that was just the icing on the cake.
“Well, cheers to that,” I said finally, lifting up my glass of sparking water. My two friends and my rogues did the same and we all clinked glasses before I took a long sip. The water was cool and bubbly and I couldn’t help but grin as it slid down my throat.
It calmed the twisted feeling that I’d had in my stomach for months.
“So, do you think that she really cheated? I mean, I know that she wanted to win really badly, but wasn’t she super good at math?” Harper looked at Kaleb while talking, knowing that he was the math genius of the group.
To his benefit, he didn’t look at me before answering her. “I think,” he said slowly, trying really hard to carefully pick his words, “that sometimes when people are under a lot of pressure they make stupid decisions, even when those decisions will come back to bite them in the ass. She could have won, but she’s made choices that wouldn’t let her be successful. Does that make sense?”
Harper nodded and Maggie giggled. “I just can’t believe it.” She grinned at Harper but then turned to look at me, one eyebrow raised. “Can you, Rose?”
“Can I what?” I pushed my food around on my plate and didn’t look at her until she cleared her throat.
“Can you believe it? It’s kinda crazy that first Sara choked and now Kelly did. Unless, of course, someone was there to help it all along. Not that anyone would blame that person, of course. It would all make sense.” Harper was playing it cool, but she wasn’t stupid.
“Sometimes things need a push in the right direction,” I said finally. “And I guess that someone has to be willing to give that push.”
Harper nodded and winked at me. “Glad to know that I’m friends with someone who isn’t just going to lay down and take it any longer,” she said. “We were worried about you, Rose.”
Maggie grinned and reached across the table to squeeze my hand. “You have no idea how important you are to us, Rose. We’re glad that you’re back.”
The smile I gave them felt hollow. Even though knocking Kelly off of her podium and getting her kicked out of school had felt amazing, I couldn’t deny the fact that something was still missing.
My boys knew it. I knew it. It was Brett, and until I had him back in my arms where he belonged, there was no way that I could really revel in my victory.
Everything felt a little off without him. things weren’t as exciting as they could have been. If Brett were here…
I couldn’t think about how he would react. I just knew that I had to knock Amelia down off of her pedestal and then get my last rogue back. Without him, I didn’t think that we’d ever be whole.
If only I’d known when I was younger how important he would be to me…
But I didn’t. Now I did, though, and I was willing to go through hell to get him back.
Chapter 6
The next week was fairly quiet. Having two full days of voice with Amelia sucked, but at least she left me alone for the most part. I was beginning to think that maybe she was seeing me as some real competition and that maybe she was starting to get a little afraid of me.
I’ll admit, that made me a bit cocky.
Friday afternoon I walked across the quad by myself. I’d told my rogues and friends that I wanted to meet them for dinner because I needed to take a shower, but that was the real reason why I wanted to be alone.
The truth was that we weren’t any closer to finding any real answers about Brett. I’d stood in the shower, scalding water burning my skin and flowing in rivers down my body, and leaned against the wall of the shower while I sobbed.
My tears mixed with the water and washed away, but that didn’t make me feel any better.
The water couldn’t wash away my sins. It couldn’t bring Brett back to me. As hard as my boys were working to find out information about where he could be, they still hadn’t found anything. I had a sinking feeling that either we weren’t going to be able to uncover the truth before graduation or I’d have to dig deeper somehow.
Not that I knew exactly what that meant I would have to do, but I was worried. There were very few people I could trust at Taylor Prep, and everyone else had their lips sealed tight around me.
After my shower pity party, I quickly got changed. As much as I’d wanted to be alone, I didn’t want to be alone for very long. I still needed my boys and my friends.
Even though I’d just showered, my hair was already dry, which was one benefit of having it so short. My friends had given me long dangling earrings for Christmas, and I loved the way they made me feel more feminine. Now they swished back and forth by my neck as I walked across the quad.
“Hey, bitch.” Amelia’s voice broke into my thoughts. I was still wallowing in missing Brett, but I had to push those feelings down quickly when I saw her cutting across the quad to me.
It was so different to see her walking by herself, especially when she always had the harpies around her when we had first met. She looked angry, which wasn’t anything new for her now, and pinned me in place with her glare.
“Amelia. How are you? Walking the line? Staying good? Making sure that you don’t fuck up so you don’t get asked to leave like Kelly?” Keeping my voice light was the best way for me to show her that I wasn’t afraid of her. I turned to her and crossed my arms on my chest.
With Amelia, you had to be ready for anything. Fighting. Fleeing. I never really knew what I was going to get with her.
“I still don’t know how you did it. How in the hell did you sneak the notebook into the bathroom?” She stopped a few feet from me and waited for my response.
I wasn’t stupid. There wasn’t any way that I would admit to her what I’d done. It wasn’t that I thought she’d wear a wire – I didn’t think that she was sneaky enough for that. She preferred to do her dirty work out in the open where everyone could see it. No, I knew that if I ever admitted that I was the reason Kelly was kicked out of school, she’d make my life an absolute living hell.
Well, worse than she had in the past.
“Listen, Amelia, I know that you want to be able to blame someone after your friend made such a stupid decision, but I didn’t have anything to do with it. She messed up, big time, but it was her and nobody else. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m hungry.” I turned away from her, not wanting to stay and chat any longer than necessary.
That was where I made my big mistake.
“I know you’re lying.” Four words.
Just four, but they still stopped me in my tracks. My heart started to pound in my chest as I thought about whether or not she could possibly know that I wasn’t telling the truth.
“I’m not lying.”
I had to think through the mechanics of walking to manage to pick up one foot and put it in front of the other. If I stood here for much longer with her in the quad then I knew she would just heckle and push my buttons, and I might make a mistake and say something that I shouldn’t.
Getting away from her was the smartest thing that I could do.
“Fuck you.” She started running at me, even though we weren’t that far apart. I heard her feet pounding the ground behind me and I started to run, but I was too slow.
She had a head start on me and she was pissed. There’s something to be said for the driving power of anger when you’re faced with the person you hate.
Amelia launched herself at me, tackling me to the ground. Her legs immediately pinned me down and she grabbed at my head, trying to hold onto my hair, but it wasn’t long enough.
A flash of gratitude swept through me that she wasn’t able to get a handle on my hair, but it quickly disappeared when she grabbed something else.
My earrings.
“Fuck, Amelia! Let go!”
She had both of my earrings in her hands now and pulled them back, arching my back off of the ground. Straddling my torso, she had me pressed almost flat so that I couldn’t move, but she only yanked harder.
I was face down on the ground and I used my hands to push myself up, trying to relieve the pressure on my earlobes. The hooks through my ears were burning now and I could feel my skin stretching as she pulled.
If I stopped arching my back towards her, then they’d rip out of my lobes. If she pulled any harder, she’d rip them out.
“Please! Please stop!” I didn’t want to beg her, and I hated myself as soon as the words were out of my mouth, but I had to get her to quit. If she didn’t…well, I didn’t want to think about how bad it would hurt.
“Tell me the truth!” She screamed, her voice carrying across the quad. “Tell me that you’re the one who did this to Kelly! You made it look like she cheated so that she’d get kicked out, didn’t you? I hate you!”
“I didn’t!” There wasn’t any way that I was going to tell her the truth now. I knew her well enough to know that even if I told her that I was the reason Kelly was expelled that she’d still pull the earrings from my lobes. Amelia didn’t show mercy. It was why she’d gotten so far in life and at Taylor Prep.
“Fucking liar!” She yanked hard on my right earring and I felt the skin begin to give way. Pain shot through my ear and my body, making my skin feel like it was on fire. “You’re a fucking liar, Rose! I hate you!”
Taking a deep breath, I tried to clear my vision, but red was encroaching on the outside of it, making everything fuzzy. It hurt like hell to have her pulling on my earring like that, but I knew that it was only going to get worse.
“Everything okay?” The voice to my right sounded curious and concerned, and hope sprang up in me. If it were any student or teacher who wasn’t completely crazy then they’d help me. They’d get Amelia off of me. They’d…
It was Sara.
I recognized her shoes as she got closer. She dropped down to a squat to look in my face. “Looks like you caught yourself a little bitch, Amelia.” Her eyes were dark when she spoke and I felt a chill run through me.
Fuck. Fuckity fuck fuck.
“You wanna give me a hand?” Amelia sounded like she was getting tired. If Sara hadn’t shown up then I might have been able to outlast her. I might have been able to walk away with my earrings still intact. As she spoke, Amelia jerked back harder on my earrings.
I was pushing myself up off of the ground as far as I could, but I couldn’t buck her off of me. Amelia’s knees dug into my sides and pinned me to the ground from the waist down.
“It’s my pleasure.” Sara stood up and I twisted my head to look at her.
“Please help me,” I whispered, but that only made her scowl more.
“Your arms look tired, Rose. Let me give you a hand there.” Before I could think about what she might do, she kicked out, sweeping my arms out from under me.
I couldn’t stop myself from falling.
My earrings ripped through my lobes, the small bits of flesh and skin there giving way under the metal hooks and the pressure that Amelia put on them.
Screaming, I fell to the ground, my face hitting the dirt and all of my breath getting knocked out of me. I stayed there for a moment, trying to catch my breath, my lungs not cooperating, not letting me breathe anything in.
I couldn’t breathe.
My ears were on fire.
Finally, I sucked in a breath and Amelia climbed off of me. Screaming, I grabbed my ears. My lobes were shredded and bleeding. It hurt worse than anything I’d ever experienced. When I rolled over, Amelia put her heeled foot on my stomach, pressing down with the stiletto so that I couldn’t move.
“You deserve that, and more, you stupid fucking bitch. Don’t let me catch you alone again unless you want to find out what else I have planned for you.” She put more of her weight on her foot that was pressing into my stomach and I let go of my ears, grabbing at her shoe, trying to push her off.
“I can’t breathe,” I gasped out, sucking at snatches of air. My vision started getting black around the edges. “Let me go!”
After another moment, during which I was convinced that I wouldn’t ever be able to take a full breath again, she finally lifted her foot from my stomach. I rolled onto my side, sobbing and breathing, my ears streaming blood.
“You should be the one cold and dead in the ground, Rose. Remember that. Brett didn’t deserve what you did to him, and I will put you next to him when I have the first real chance.”
I looked up at her, but she was backlit by the sun, making it almost impossible for me to really see her face. For just a moment it sounded like she was going to cry, but that was crazy.
Amelia had one emotion: anger.
And it was all directed at me now.
She stomped off, Sara at her side. I watched them go, still clutching my stomach.
Never in my life did I think that she would really hurt me. Sure, she was happy to beat me up when she got the chance, and I didn’t put it past her to land me in the nurse’s office again, but to threaten to kill me?
That was something new.
The boys weren’t going to like that.
It took me a few minutes, but I managed to push myself up into a sitting position. My ears felt like they were on fire, but the bleeding had slowed down. Gently I reached up and touched one lobe, then yanked my hand back at the shooting pain.
I should probably go to the nurse now. Standing up made me dizzy, and I had to bend over to keep from passing out. There was blood all over my shirt and soaked down to my bra. If I went into the dining hall like this then it would cause a scene, and not necessarily a good one.
But Amelia and Sara had walked back to the dorm together. Even worse than walking into the dining hall with bleeding ears was going back to the dorm and running into them alone.
Luckily, my ears stopped bleeding by the time I made it to the dining hall. I still looked like shit, but I couldn’t be by myself. I didn’t want to be afraid of Amelia, but she scared me.
I had to get that feeling under control if I was going to be able to take her down.
As soon as I pushed open the double doors leading into the dining hall, everyone fell silent. The bleeding from my ears had stopped but they were still a few drips that fell onto my shoulders when I moved. I could feel the sticky of the blood on my skin as I walked, but I tried my best to ignore it.
I didn’t make it four steps into the dining hall before Jackie called out to me.
“Rosita! What happened? Are you okay?” He pushed back from the table where he was eating with Kaleb, and came running to me, Kaleb on his heels.
Jac
kie grabbed me and pulled me in to his chest, not paying any attention to the way my blood started soaking through his shirt. My ears hurt, a deep ache that made me want to touch them and hold them, but I knew that doing that would make the pain much worse.
I gasped as I leaned into his chest. “Amelia,” I managed, but I couldn’t bear to look up at him. The last thing that I wanted to see on his face was pity.
Or disgust.
“Amelia did this?” Kaleb wrapped his arms around me and turned me to him, giving me a chance to look up at Jackie.
It wasn’t pity on his face. Or disgust, like I had feared.
He was angry. His eyes were dark and his brow furrowed. As I watched, he worked his mouth, like he was trying to think of something to say but couldn’t come up with the words. The look on his face terrified me and I leaned into Kaleb’s chest, unsure of what I should say.
“My cousin?” The two words were bombs from his perfect mouth.
I nodded.
“Anyone else?”
Five minutes ago I’d been in the quad, my face pressed into the dirt while Amelia and Sara tortured me. I’d been scared, of course, but now I was even more terrified. Not of Jackie, because I knew that he would never hurt me, no matter what happened.
No, I was terrified of what he was going to do.
Knowing that I had to be honest with him, even though it was going to kill me, I nodded. “Sara.” Her name had barely passed my lips when he turned from me to the doors.
“I’ll kill them both.” His voice was low, a deep growl that came from deep in his chest, and it made me shiver. When I reached out to touch his arm, he turned to me, but it took a moment for his gaze to focus on my face. “Amelia. Sara. Anyone else who dares to touch you. I promise you, Rosita, I’ll kill them.”
Chapter 7
“You can’t kill her,” I told Jackie again. We were in his room, with Kaleb leaning against the door, his strong arms crossed casually on his chest. He looked relaxed, but I knew that he was wound as tight as I was and was ready to do anything necessary to stop Jackie from leaving the dorm.
