Ruined: A Dark Bully Reverse Harem Romance (Beautiful Tyrants Book 1)

by Vanessa Winters

  His hands continued closing around mine. “Because I was there that night, too, and I just wanted you to know that I wasn’t the one who killed her.”

  My mind started to race, and I felt my heartbeat pound against my ribs. Then, Adam spoke the words I had been dying for literally anyone else to say to me to confirm that I wasn’t crazy. “You think she was murdered too, don’t you?”

  I leaned forward so that our faces were as close as they could get from across the table. “You don’t believe it was suicide, do you?”

  “I didn’t say that,” he stumbled over his words. “I just meant that—”

  Adam let go of my hands and pushed the chair back quickly with his legs to stand up. “I need to get to class,” he said, suddenly in a big hurry. “I’ll see you soon, though.”

  “No!” I shouted as I ran to the door to block his way. “You know something about my mother’s death, don’t you? You have to tell me, Adam. Please!” I felt myself getting hysterical.

  Adam shook his head at me. “No, I don’t know anything. I need to get to class.”

  I wasn’t about to let him leave without giving me an answer. “If you don’t know anything, then why did you come back here to see me?”

  “I came back here to see you because I’ve wanted to see you again ever since the night that I left,” he said.

  And I was so completely stunned by what he said that I let him pass by me and leave. So, when I gained my wits about me again, I rushed out the door. I looked around, hoping and praying his conscience had talked him into staying.

  However, when I looked out the door again, he was gone.

  4

  I didn’t tell Julian about Adam. I wasn’t quite sure what to make of it yet, and I didn’t want to get him all fired-up and into protective mode unnecessarily.

  The next few days passed by uneventfully, though. I went to class, much to Julian’s surprise, and I then went to work. The rest of my time, I spent either hanging out with Julian or alone in my dorm room trying to piece together the fragmented thoughts in my mind. I had a journal that I wrote in sometimes, just to dump some of the thoughts out of my head and down onto a piece of paper where they would be safely stored away.

  And I found that journal calling my name as I gravitated toward it.

  I took the journal out from my dresser drawer and grabbed a pen out of my backpack. Then I plopped down on my bed and jotted down all the thoughts that I needed to get out. I must have fallen asleep with the journal in my hands, however, because when I woke up to the sound of something clattering at my window my fingers were still wrapped around the journal and the pen had leaked ink all over my jeans.

  Then, I heard that sound again.

  The sound of something clattering against the glass of my windowpane.

  I peeked out the window to see what had been knocking against it, but all I saw was the big tree outside my dorm building swaying in the gusty breeze.

  “Damn it,” I said out loud as I looked down at the giant ink spill on my pants. “These were my favorite jeans.”

  I slid my jeans off and let them fall to my ankles before kicking them toward the corner of the room. I was getting ready to put pajama pants on and change my academy T-shirt, but the sound of someone in my room made me scream and fall backward onto my dresser. A hand grabbed me just before I knocked my head against the dresser corner, and when I looked up, I saw Adam holding onto the side of my arm.

  “Easy,” he said as he helped me to my feet.

  “What are you doing here?!” I screamed at him. “Get the hell out of my room!”

  I grabbed the lamp off my dresser and pulled the cord from the wall, leaving only the light of the moon illuminating the room. I had no problem smashing his skull with the lamp if he tried to do anything to me.

  “Lisette,” he said with a look of apology on his face. “Calm down, please. I’m not here to hurt you or freak you out or anything. I’m sorry I scared you.”

  I lowered the lamp a little but still held tightly onto it, just in case.

  “Then what in the hell are you doing here?” I asked. “And why did you come through my window?”

  I wondered how he even got up there using only the single tree outside that didn’t have that many low-hanging branches.

  “Well, I couldn’t exactly walk through the front door,” he said.

  He was right. He was a Lineage student now, and he would get into serious trouble for being there at all. “Ands for why I’m here, I want to help you.”

  I lowered the lamp and went to go sit on my bed. “I’m listening.”

  He sighed. “I know who killed your mother.”

  I felt as if the entire world slowly spun to a halt when I heard those words.

  My mother was murdered, and this was the first and only other person in the world that knew it too.

  “You—you do?” I asked.

  Julian had always believed that I thought my mother was killed, and because I believed it, he supported me. But I had never actually been sure if he believed it to be true too. Lately, it seemed more like he bought into the idea that her suicide was a set-up, but he’d never actually said it out loud. Adam, on the other hand, just stood before me and said the words.

  He nodded. “Yes. Your mother was murdered, and I know who did it.”

  I didn’t know what to say because I had a million things that I felt like I needed to say all at once. I was so flooded by anger mixed with relief and sorrow that I couldn’t do anything during that moment, aside from breathing and trying not to cry. Adam came over to the bed and sat down next to me. He looked much more like I had remembered him: black, ripped jeans and a black T-shirt that had such a deep V-neck that it showed the tip of a tattoo on his chest.

  This was how I remembered him looking at the halfway house, without the Lineage jacket.

  “I’m sorry, Lisette. I’m sorry that I didn’t come tell you this sooner, and I’m sorry that your mother is dead,” he said as he placed his palm onto my bare thigh.

  I looked up at him through blurry eyes and tried to talk without my voice cracking.

  “Did you have anything to do with her death?” I asked.

  I was still able to reach that lamp and bash his skull in if he said yes. But instead, he shook his head vigorously.

  “No. I swear to you that I had nothing to do with it. I was just there that night at the halfway house, nothing more.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “Then how do you know who killed her? Who did it?”

  “I know because the person who did it told me.”

  My jaw dropped open. “Tell me who killed my mother.”

  “Lisette, you need to stop trying to figure it out. You have to stop poking around in this. There are powerful people at play here. Ones that won’t hesitate to kill you too before they risk exposing themselves.”

  Adam was being honest; I could see it in his eyes. He looked genuinely afraid for me and shook up. And it shook me up.

  Enough to stand up with my fists clenched and yell. “If you want to help me, then you need to tell me who murdered my mother!”

  “Be quiet, please!” he said. “You’re going to wake everyone in the dorms, and they’ll find me here.”

  “I don’t care!” I shrieked as I stood up and faced him. “Tell me!”

  Adam got to his feet and grabbed me by the waist, spinning me until my back was against him and his hand was clasped over my mouth. I tried to scream some more, but his hand was muffling the sound coming out of my mouth.

  “Lisette, please,” he said softly against my ear. “Nothing you do now is going to bring your mother back. I’m trying to protect you.”

  I stopped struggling against him and became quiet. He was stronger than me and fighting him in that position wasn’t going to do me any good. Once he saw that I had calmed down, he took his hand away from my mouth, but he still held his arm around my waist. I turned my head to the side until I felt his breath against my cheek.

  “Yo
u know,” I said quietly. “There seems to be a few people lately that want to protect me. But all I really want is to find my mother’s killer. I know it has something to do with Lineage, and I intend to find out who and what it is. I am going to dismantle whatever cover-up is going on in that school from the inside-out, and you can either tell me what you know or get the hell out of my room."

  Something strange happened then, as we stood there together. I felt Adam’s chest rise and fall against my back, and his hand clench around the front of my waist, bringing my shirt up into a wadded bunch of fabric that rose just above my thighs. His half-opened mouth dragged against my cheekbone, and for a moment, I didn’t think about anything besides the feeling of heat coming off his body.

  And wrapping around me like a weighted blanket.

  “I can’t tell you that now,” he whispered. “I want to, but I can’t. You just have to trust me.”

  I slowly turned my body around in his arm until I was facing him with no space between us. “Then get the hell away from me,” I hissed.

  Adam didn’t want to let go. He lingered there without taking his hand away that now sat in the small of my back. And to be honest, I wasn’t sure that I wanted him to let go either. I was overwhelmed with too many emotions that were all vying for control over my attention. But when he did let go, he took a step back and looked more hurt than angry. He walked back over to the window and threw one leg over the ledge as he got ready to reach for the tree branch.

  Then, he looked back at me.

  “Just don’t do anything stupid,” he said before he dropped down and out of sight.

  I huffed to myself as I closed and locked the window. “Everything I’ve done since mom’s death has been stupid.”

  All of this is stupid.

  That night I had another dream, except this time, my mother wasn’t in it. This time Julian was in it, and so was Adam. All three of us were sitting on separate branches of a tree. Neither of them was saying anything. They were both just staring at me and smiling. I heard the cracking sound of a branch and felt the tree start to shake. As the branch I was sitting on began to split and break, both of them reached out their hands to catch me. But instead of reaching back, I closed my eyes and let myself fall. It didn’t hurt when my back hit against the ground in my dream. The only thing I felt were the words that resonated in my head.

  I know who killed your mother.

  At classes the next day, I felt like I kept seeing Adam everywhere, which I knew was impossible. There was no way he could sneak around Goldshire all day without getting caught. But I started getting so freaked out and paranoid by it that Julian eventually picked up on me acting weird.

  So, I had to tell him what had happened.

  “Are you kidding me?” he asked. “Why didn’t you tell me about this sooner?”

  I shrugged. “I had to think about it first.”

  He threw his hands in the air, his voice a hushed whisper. “What was there to think about? Some strange guy sneaks into your bedroom, and you don’t think that’s important enough to tell anyone about?”

  “I don’t know, I just couldn’t think straight for a bit.” I realized that sounded like a really lame excuse.

  “You need to stay away from him,” Julian said. “That guy is bad news.”

  “You don’t know that,” I said. “He didn’t try to hurt me. If anything, he put himself at risk by coming to see me.”

  “Still, all those guys at Lineage are bad news. You should know that better than anyone.”

  “I do,” I agreed. “This is why I need to get inside and see what goes on there.”

  He scoffed. “There is no way you can pull that off. No chance that you can spy on that campus. Have you already forgotten about how poorly that went the last time?”

  He was right. We were lucky that we hadn’t gotten caught. It would be asking for trouble to attempt it again, especially when I didn’t even know what I was going there to look for.

  We sat down on one of the benches outside to get some fresh air between classes. I looked around at all the people walking across the campus, most of which didn’t have a care in the world considering that their families were all wealthy, and their college education was a completely unnecessary token since most of them would just end up inheriting old money and wasting their lives away with trivial pursuits.

  “Look!” I said to Julian as I pointed to a guy standing next to the corner of one of the buildings. He was wearing all black, no academy jacket, and a black beanie on his head.

  “What is it?” Julian asked as he strained to see what I was pointing at.

  I kept pointing. “Look at that guy over there.”

  He chuckled. “What about him? Lots of people don’t wear their Goldshire jackets on campus. I don’t think it’s an offense that they take too seriously in the Dean’s office.”

  But the lack of the jacket had nothing to do with it. The sunlight hit the guys face at just the right angle for me to see the reflective glare shining off his nose ring.

  It was him.

  Trouble or not, if Adam can manage to slink around the Goldshire’s campus, then I could figure out a way to do the same at Lineage.

  I turned to face Julian. “Remember when you said if I was going to do anything like that last stunt again, that you were coming with me?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “But I’m pretty sure I do not like where this is going.”

  “Suit up,” I said.

  Then, I drew in a deep breath and started in on my plan.

  5

  “Are you sure you want to do this?” Julian asked as we stood at the edge of Lineage’s campus.

  “Yes,” I said with confidence. “And now I know what we’re going to look for.”

  If Adam knew who killed my mother, then maybe something or someone he talked to could lead me to an answer. I waited until an exam day. I knew that Adam would have to be on his own campus during exams, and I decided to follow him and see where it led me.

  “I know you miss her,” Julian said as he held my hand down at his side and threaded his fingers in mine. “But even if we are able to find out who killed your mom, it’s not going to bring her back.”

  God, why does everyone keep saying that?

  I rolled my eyes. “I know it’s not going to bring her back, Julian, but my mother’s murder is more than just about her. My mother was a good woman, completely innocent and kind. No one had any reason to target her. Whoever did this is covering it up because it’s part of something bigger.”

  “Like what?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. But I’m going to find out. And then I’m going to have the revenge that I’ve been thinking about every single day since her death.”

  “That’s kind of dark, even for you,” he said.

  If Julian knew the lengths I was willing to go to avenge my mother, dark didn’t even come close to the word he would choose to use.

  I let go of his hand and the two of us, dressed in as much black as we owned with hoodies and sunglasses pulled down around our faces, crossed over to the Lineage campus for a second time.

  Only this time, we stuck to the shadows and corners.

  I asked around a bit at school. I knew that Michael got to stay in one of the lavish on-campus apartments that was next to the administration’s private quarters since his mother basically ran the entire school. I figured that if Adam was important enough for Michael to have convinced his mom to let Adam come to Lineage, then the two guys probably shared a place together, or at least had accommodations that were close to each other.

  I still wasn’t sure what kind of relationship those two could possibly have, though. Michael was a complete, womanizing asshole who thought of himself as a god and bent the rules to serve to his greater good for himself. Girls dropped at his feet, and every picture I’d ever seen of him looked like it had been photo-shopped to accentuate his athletic build, golden blonde hair, and blue eyes. But in fact, those perfect features really did b
elong to him. There was one thing that tended to give away a hint of his inner self, though, and that was the wicked smile he would get while he was doing something particularly cruel.

  The kind of smile a killer might wear.

  I couldn’t imagine him taking pity on Adam simply because he was homeless, and Michael definitely wasn’t gay. So, what was it that made him bring Adam into Lineage? If he needed a friend that badly, it would have been easier to just have his Headmistress mother force someone to befriend him.

  The whole thing was very strange.

  The campus was deserted for much of the day as we made our way around to find Michael’s apartment. Sneaking on here during an exam day was a brilliant idea because the security was slim, too, which made walking around that much easier. Many of the guards were repurposed during exam days to be proctors, and we utilized that to the fullest.

  Once we got inside, thanks to Julian’s excellent lockpicking skills which I avoided asking about, it wasn’t long before I was able to confirm that it was definitely Michael’s apartment. His Lineage jackets were all monogrammed with his name and hanging neatly in a row inside his bedroom closet like massive I.D. cards he proudly wore on his back.

  The second bedroom was a little harder to figure out, though. There were no monogrammed jackets and only a few ragged-edged photos of people that I didn’t recognize sitting inside one of the dresser drawers. But after some more searching around, I was able to find a textbook with a name in it.

  Adam.

  Julian and I had just started digging deeper into the contents of the apartment when we heard a key turn in the lock. It froze us in our tracks before we heard the click again, and it shocked me out of my trance. My eyes locked with Julian. I watched panic spread across his face. And as we shoved the book back into the drawer before closing it, I could’ve sworn I heard the creaky hinges of the front door opening.

  “Shit,” Julian said as he grabbed me and pulled me into one of the closets with him. “Be quiet. Don’t say a word.”

  He pushed a bunch of hanging clothes in front of us, which probably wouldn’t work to conceal us that well, considering our legs were still exposed. I reached out and slowly pulled the closet door shut, careful not to make any creaking sounds as it moved.