I hurl my stuff back into my bag, cringing at my handling of Howard Mason’s book when I wrap it in the plastic pouch rather than gently tuck it in—
A sharp force hits me in the arm, and I’m sent sprawling before I can secure the book. It goes flying, crunching against the ground, tattered pages drifting out.
My head bounces against the floor, my vision bursting with stars. I push to my hands and try to stand, but a boot to the middle of my back knocks me flat.
Lemony disinfectant fills my nostrils as my face mashes into the floor, but I pry my lips open. “Don’t—”
Another shoe kicks me in the mouth, and I cry out, my neck snapping back.
A coppery tang flows across my tongue at the same time a giggle sounds out, girlish and wrong.
“Shh!”
“Just get it—”
“—wasting time…”
The whispers swirl, but I don’t dare rise again. There’s too many of them, whoever they are, and they aren’t afraid to get mean.
I keep my eyes stretched wide enough to pick the moving shadows from the stagnant ones, shoes drifting in and out of my periphery, the hem of pale cloaks fluttering around the ankle.
It’s them.
My heart scrambles to keep up with the blood rush beneath my skin. “I know who you are!” I cry, and under the influence of such utter realization, I push up, sneering, “Virtues—”
Boom.
Another blow across the side of my head, and the sound of glass shattering soon follows.
RUN.
The gut-wrenching, internal warning spears its way to the base of my brain, the spot that’s instinctual, ancestral … reptilian. The part that’s telling me to survive and flee.
I scramble onto all fours, then push back on my haunches to sprint past these people—these girls—who were sent to hurt me.
“Hit her harder,” comes a whispery growl, but the tone uses the same cadence I heard before. In my classes. In the dining hall.
The certainty that they’re here for more than just a prank or a scare burrows to the core of my heart, and I fly forward, my hip banging against a lab desk and my palms smearing across the metal countertops, but I run. I do what I’m supposed to and flee.
An amused laugh comes from my left before an arm swings down with another beaker. I deflect it, but not enough. It slices across my cheek before crashing to the floor.
Something else hits me across my stomach, and I curl against the sudden pain before crumpling back to the ground, protecting my bandaged hand as much as I can.
“This is too much,” someone whispers. “Stop. Before this gets out of control.”
They’re all speaking in whispers, as if to disguise their voices, in addition to cloaking their faces, but I know who they are.
The tip of a shoe hits me in the kidney, and I curl on my side with a moan.
“Stop!” the same trembling, hesitant voice says.
“Not until she gets the message.” This time, a heavy, rubber-soled foot comes down on my throat. “And since she’s so stubborn, I’ll make it clear this time.”
Sputtering, I grab onto the ankle, as if my sheer panic alone can lift the pressure off my windpipe.
“Piper…” I gasp. “Piper was one of you. I want to know what happened to her. Why are—” I wince at the increase in pressure. “Why are you against that?”
The tallest Cloak leans down, the fabric a shimmering white against the fading moonlight streaking through the windows. “Because you’re not doing this for Piper.”
“Selfish bitch,” another hisses.
“Admit it,” the main Cloak—Falyn—says, and though I can’t see it through the shadows, I sense her sour smile. “You have some pathetic motivation to study a mystery that doesn’t need solving and get into our business, read our private writings, thinking that by revealing our secrets you’ll satisfy your own demons. But that’s not how it works, dear possum.”
Falyn straightens, waits a few beats, then spits out, “Because we’re the demons. And regardless of what you discover about us, you won’t solve shit. Your mom will still be dead.”
I force the tears back, but a few manage to leak out, even as I struggle for breath. Easy, languid footsteps sound out until they stop near the top of my head. Another Cloak looks down, cocking her velvet-lined head, her blue eyes glittering like sapphires.
Addisyn. Somehow, these bitches have decided “virtue” should be part of their names. Despite Rose Briar’s best efforts to create a society for good—and deep in my heart, I think her intentions were true—her creation has twisted and curled, tightening around the heart of the Virtues and strangling it until there are no virtuous beats left.
“You’ve done her no justice,” I grind out. “Rose Briar would be ashamed.”
Addisyn lets out a tinkling, full-voiced laugh. “You think we care what that ancient, dead bitch has to say? Welcome to our new world, Callie. Now get the fuck out.”
She lifts her leg for another blow, but I angle my head at the same time I pivot and twist the ankle pressing against my neck, until its owner screeches and loses her footing, falling alongside me.
“You want in?” Falyn bellows over my head to Addisyn. “Do it, now! Prove you’re worthy!”
I bolt upright, scanning the remaining three Cloaks scattered throughout the classroom, one running directly toward me with something metal glinting in her hand. Her hood slips past her hairline, but I have no time for the flutter of truth in my chest when I confirm Addisyn’s face. I take stock of the weapon and her manic determination for it to dent my skull. Falyn and I both stand at the same time, and more on instinct than forethought, I turn to Falyn and flip the bottom hem of her cloak well over her head until she’s blinded and shove her in Addisyn’s path. It’s enough for me to gather the distance I need to get to the door.
“Fuck!” Addisyn yells, fighting against Falyn’s body tripping into her.
It’d be funny, had they not already drawn blood from my face.
A smaller one near the door swipes at my arm as I glide by, but it was a lazy grab, meant to showcase to the others that she tried.
Violet. It has to be her.
I don’t want to wait around for Willow’s attempt.
Panting, throat swelling, I make it to the door, fling it open, and—
Run into someone whose arms pin mine to my sides.
And they don’t let go.
“Get off me!” I screech, but it doesn’t even sound like me.
I fight against the barricade, but these arms are stronger than mine, the muscles more sculpted, and the torso much broader and flatter.
The perfect canvas to incapacitate a girl against her will.
“No!”
My yell is so high-pitched, supernatural and deafening, that I don’t hear the voice tumbling out above my head until I stop to gulp in a breath.
“Callie! Hey, Callie! Stop!”
The arms don’t loosen their grip, but the less I struggle, the more steadying breaths I can take.
And finally, I process who’s speaking.
“Callie, calm down.”
I swat at the warm hands sliding back to grip my waist, but my fingers get caught on the taut cords of muscle in his forearms, with soft, downy hairs.
My brows scrunch the instant I look up. “Chase?”
“Goddammit, Callie, you scared the shit out of me. What the fuck?” His brown eyes narrow as he lifts a hand to my face. “You’re bleeding.”
His gaze sweeps over my face and body, taking stock of the stretched collar of my sweatshirt, the burning scratches on my neck, the warm blood on my cheek.
Chase asks, with destructive intent, “Who did this to you?”
I gape at the controlled rage in his expression, his eyes crazed with retribution, as my mind comes back online. “What are you doing here? You’re suspended.”
The wildfire in his gaze tempers slightly. “Suspension ended over the weekend. I have crew this morning an
d needed to get shit from my locker.”
Of course his punishment would coincide with his training schedule. Hell, I’m surprised he was slapped on the wrist at all, considering he assaulted Dr. Luke a few weeks ago and walked away smiling.
Granted, that teacher had an illegal thing for young girls, and we suspected him of murder, but…
“Don’t change the subject again,” he warns. “Why the fuck are you bleeding?”
I pull out of his hold, and he lets me. I spin to the chem lab, to the door that’s conveniently shut, my heart pounding at the same time my brain’s assuring me they won’t follow me out into the halls, not while Chase is here.
“There was … I had … an altercation,” I say, still focused on the classroom door.
“At five in the morning? With who?”
There’s little point in lying. Especially to him. “The Virtues.”
Chase holds his breath, tangible anger exuding off him in heated waves that curl against my back. What is he going to do with that information? Anything? I have the dull sense that he’ll keep this news to himself, like he does with all the other mysterious violence that happens to me.
Yet, a cold draft strokes across my cheek as he storms by, headed for the chem lab, his expression so murderous and absurdly angry, it can’t be solely because of me.
He throws the door open, and as I come up beside him, we both stare into a messy, deserted classroom.
“They’re gone?” My question comes out more confused than factual. How did those girls leave? We’ve been outside the door the entire time.
I look up at Chase in time to see him bare his teeth, like he wants to chomp this entire lab to shreds, so I round in front, placing shaking hands against his chest to urge him back. “They must’ve left when they heard you. I think I’m safe now.”
“No.” His voice is as gravelly as I’ve ever heard it. “They’re showing me you’re not.”
I stare at him at length before I say, “I was only there because I was reading the book you gave me.”
His forehead creases, then he blinks and looks down at me. “You actually read the fuckin’ fireball you clawed out of my hearth?”
I raise a brow, though it stings with swelling skin. “I cared enough to pull it out, and it needed special handling. Hence, the chem lab. It was an impulsive decision and no one knew I was here—”
Emma. I told Emma.
Carefully, I school my expression enough that Chase won’t sniff anything out, but I can’t help thinking, did she betray me?
He mirrors my expression. “And did you find the answers you were looking for? Or just draw more trouble to your idiot self?”
“Both.” I manage a haughty tone, but inside, I’m trembling.
Chase’s shoulders incline on a sigh. His eyes dart to my cheek. “Do you need to get that looked at?”
“It looks worse than it feels.” Lie. “You gave me Howard Mason’s writings knowing exactly what he said in them.”
“As a warning. It wasn’t meant to be fucking bait for the Virtues.” Banked fire breaks through his vision. “Do you think I set you up?”
I ignore the question, because I’m not sure I have the guts to answer it. “And was that your roundabout way of telling me, don’t end up like him?”
Instead of answering immediately, Chase gives me a long, silent assessment. The muscles in his jaw go rigid.
I tense under his stare, and though he eyes me like a lion would an elk, I don’t have the same flight or fight response I did in the chem lab. My core aches, empty and hollow, under his gaze. It pulses its need for him, despite my internal incantation that he can’t be good. He doesn’t have my best interests at heart.
He could be my enemy.
“Howard Mason doesn’t exist anymore,” Chase says over my unseen, shivering undulation. “Is that enough of a warning for you?”
“The more I’m beaten down,” I say, with tremulous conviction, “the more I want answers as to why.”
Chase scoffs. “You are so reckless, you’re bordering on stupid.”
“Is this what happened to your sister?”
That shuts him up. His eyes shoot to mine.
“Did they beat her up, too?”
“Don’t do this,” he warns.
“No, really, I’d like to know. Was she getting too rebellious as a Virtue? Was Piper? Did their discipline start like this, with surprise beat-downs while their supposed friends wore cloaks meant to signify their gentle nature?”
“Callie.” My name turns into a whip under his control.
“I’m starting to see the irony in all this.” I laugh with hollowed-out breaths. “You Nobles and Virtues are nothing like the names you stand for, are you?”
Chase lifts his head and backs away. “Since you insist you’re fine, I’m going to be late to practice.”
“You told me your sister lit the fire,” I persist. “What did she want destroyed?”
Chase freezes in the middle of the hallway, and his answering tone is gritty and rough. “Ask her yourself. Because I’m starting to think I can’t protect you anymore.”
I watch him pick up the duffel he must have tossed aside once he saw me running toward him. My fists are clenched and shaking at my sides.
But it’s when his echoing steps fade and he turns a corner that I experience real, true fear.
I can’t linger, alone in a dimly lit hallway, no matter how stubborn my head says I should be.
After one last look at the chem lab’s door, I sprint to the closest exit, my lungs spasming with each haggard breath.
19
Emma sits at our kitchenette’s high-top counter, her spoon of cereal pausing halfway to her mouth when I burst in.
“Yeesh,” she says after a brief once-over. “What happened to you?”
“Nothing you care to know about,” I snap, brushing past her.
She slips off her stool and stands. “Hey.”
I pause at my bedroom door, throwing my hands up. “What?”
“Need I remind you, I’m the only one with a first aid kit in here, so you might try being nice.”
“Nice?” I ask. “Nice? You lurk around this apartment pretending you don’t give a shit about anything, yet you’re so goddamn nosey, you know that? Did you tell them I was there? Did you?”
Emma jerks back in surprise.
I snarl, “Every single person I’ve come across in this school mopes around with their pissy attitudes and heavy burdens like the whole world revolves around keeping secrets for Briarcliff. But they’ll betray good people, nice people, for the tiniest entry into a dangerous cult. I’m fucking sick of it!”
Emma’s brows draw in. “Are we still talking about me here, or have we moved on to my brother?”
I heave out a breath. “The worst part is, the one person who’s shown me kindness and that maybe this school won’t be so bad if I just enjoy my life and look forward to Winter Formal or Prom—basic, regular, high school yearbook shit—I’ve ignored. I’ve shoved Ivy’s good intentions aside because I can’t control my need to understand you assholes better than I understand myself. God, I’m an idiot.”
My lips lift in shame, and I whirl into my room, uncaring of Emma’s response, if she even has one.
“I didn’t tell anyone anything,” Emma says through my panting breaths. “You lost the book, didn’t you?”
Emma’s question causes the air to freeze in my throat.
“If it’s any consolation, there wasn’t much in there to begin with,” she continues.
I slam my palm against my doorframe. “Really? Because my attempt to read it got me attacked.”
Emma makes an indecipherable sound in her throat. “That’s probably because they didn’t know Chase’s intentions of giving it to you the way I did.”
I stiffen in my doorway.
“It’s all about appearances, Callie. You should have figured that out by now.”
I hear her dishes clink in the sink, then the door
to our apartment opens and closes with Emma’s departure. It’s only when I lift my head and step all the way into my room that I see the single rose lying across my bed, in pristine, ink-dipped condition.
I unleash a warrior’s cry and hurl it against the wall.
On Monday morning at school, I’m told by a student prefect to head directly to the headmaster’s office instead of my first class.
Confused but compliant, I step away from my locker and do as I was told.
Paintings of previous alumni leer over my head as I turn into the professors’ hall, where all their offices are, trophy and other award cases shining under the lights, recently dusted and polished.
I glare at the hidden raven’s crest peeking out from behind a rowing trophy, its deja vu familiarity the sole reason why I started down this secret society’s wormhole in the first place.
And how you met Chase.
I flick that thought away when Marron’s door comes into view.
There’s no time to knock, because the door opens, and I’m greeted with the scowling face of the very person I’m trying not to think of.
“What’s going on?” I ask, but Chase cups my elbow and drags me in.
I stop the surprise rippling across my face as I take in the other students seated in the office, Marron holding court on the other side of his desk, his frown lines as deep as the crevices on the neighboring cliffs.
Falyn, Willow, Addisyn, Violet, and Tempest are either seated or standing near Marron. Chase takes up position against the far wall, folding his arms so comfortably, I assume that was the pose he took well before I entered into this bear trap.
“Miss Ryan, glad you could join us.”
Marron’s not glad. He looks about ready to explode.
I scan the room, gauging the temperature, but only Addisyn looks my way, her cheeks wet, eyes red-rimmed, but her expression sly.
“Girls, tell Miss Ryan what you were just finishing telling me,” Marron says.
Falyn is only too happy to oblige. “We saw Callie sneaking into school after hours over the weekend, and, concerned for her reasons for being there, we followed.”
Falyn peers over her shoulder at me, batting her lashes with innocence, but I note the cut on her temple, probably from when I tripped her up and caused her to fall on shattered glass.
Virtue (Briarcliff Secret Society Series Book 2) Page 12
