“You’re sick,” I growl. “I can’t believe I trusted you.”
“Honey, I told you, you were too naïve.”
“My mom chose this school because you said it was safe,” I reply. “But you were the one person making it unsafe here.”
“Boohoo,” she taunts. “Cry me a river.”
“So you’re gonna admit that you sent that goddamn picture?” I ask. “You wanna be ballsy, but you can’t even admit you were trying to push me away from him. Why? Why couldn’t you let me have this one good thing in my life?”
“Yours?” She scoffs. “He was mine before he was ever yours.”
Suddenly, she pulls a knife out from her pocket, and I step back in fear.
“What, scared now?” she muses. “Weird, because I recall him doing exactly the same thing to you.”
Í gasp. “How …?” But then it hits me. Michael.
He was there, and she had started dating him right after that whole ordeal. He must’ve told her what had happened after Cole told him what he had to do. An eye for an eye. Payment for my silence.
And now it’s come full circle.
“Yeah, I’m not an idiot. Cole tried to shut me out, but I have my ways,” she says.
“You were using Michael to get to him,” I hiss. “And now you’re using me.”
“I’m not doing anything.” She shrugs. “You brought this all on yourself.”
I glare at the knife she twirls in her hand. “What are you going to do then? Cut me up? I’m your cousin!”
“Do I look like I care?” she retorts.
No, she looks like a goddamn psycho bitch. “What the hell do you want, Ariane?”
She snorts. “I think you know exactly what I want.” Her eyes travel down to my phone, but I clutch it tightly in my hands.
Fuck no.
I immediately turn around and head for the door, but she immediately rushes past me and blocks it with her body, pointing the knife at me.
“Oh, no, you’re not getting out of here.”
“You’re not getting away with this,” I growl.
“Oh, yes, I am, and you’re giving me that phone.”
“Why? So you can erase the evidence?” I look her dead in the eyes. “Over my dead fucking body.”
“Don’t tempt me, Monica,” she says.
“Tempt you? Have you lost your fucking mind?” I yell. “I’m your fucking family!”
“Not anymore.” She shakes her head. “You lost that privilege the moment you tried to hook up with him.”
“But you’re the one getting him expelled. Right now. Don’t you want to keep him here?” I ask, trying to reason with her.
“He had his shot. He wasted it,” she replies. “I tried. Believe me. But if I can’t have him, you can’t either.” Her face darkens, and she beckons me. “Now give me that phone.”
“Or what?” I snarl, standing my ground.
“Don’t make me do this, Mo,” she says through gritted teeth.
“I’m not making you do anything. You can stop at any time. You can walk out there and tell Mr. D exactly what you did.”
She laughs. “And ruin my reputation? Never mind my entire fucking education?” She throws me a look and laughs some more. “Bitch, please. Hand me the goddamn phone, and you can go on your merry way to another fucking school. I’ll tell your mom just how badly you fit in.”
“She’ll never believe you,” I say, clenching my fists in rage.
“Oh, but she’ll believe you? The fucked-up, damaged goods over me, the pretty perfect princess?” she mocks. “Yeah, I don’t think so.”
She inches toward me with the knife still firmly clutched in her hand. What the hell is she thinking?
“C’mon, Mo. Last chance,” she says, pointing the knife right at me.
“Or what, you gonna stab me?” I growl. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”
She suddenly lashes out at me, and I jump back toward the door.
“What the hell!” I yell.
“Give me the fucking phone, Monica,” she barks.
If only I’d known she was a goddamn psychopath sooner.
Maybe I wouldn’t have gotten so deep into this shit.
“Fuck off,” I retort, trying to find anything I can use to defend myself—a plumbing tool, a toilet roll holder, or even a fucking soap dispenser—anything will do. So I pick up the nearest object in my vicinity, which happens to be a broken-off piece of the faucet.
She laughs. “What are you going to do with that? Hit me?”
“Stay away,” I hiss.
“I tried that, and it didn’t work. And you know? I don’t even care anymore,” she retorts.
She’s closing in on me, so I chuck the piece of faucet at her head, but she dodges just in time.
Fuck.
My eyes widen at the sight of the knife coming straight for me.
Suddenly, the door bursts open.
Cole
I storm inside after hearing the ruckus from down the hallway. I was just about to leave the school property after Mr. D kicked me out, but Monica’s distraught voice stopped me in my tracks and made me barge straight into the bathroom.
And when I find Ariane threatening her with a knife, I lose my shit.
“Get the fuck away from her!” I yell at Ariane.
Ariane turns toward me. “You ruined everything!” she squeals, turning the knife on me instead.
But I grab her arm and twist it until she drops the knife. “Ow! Stop! You’re hurting me!”
“Cole,” Monica mutters in complete shock.
“Get back,” I warn her.
Ariane’s off the rails and completely unhinged. If she gets close, maybe Ariane will try to hurt her again, and I don’t want to risk it. I’d rather have her focus on me.
“Get off me,” Ariane snarls at me, trying to free herself from my grip.
“Don’t you fucking dare,” I growl at her, fiercely protective of Monica. “You tried to fucking knife Mo?! She’s your own goddamn cousin!”
“Let go of me!” she yells, and she rips away from me in one go, falling back to the corner of the bathroom like a snake retreating to its shelter. “She deserved all of this. She brought it onto herself,” Ariane hisses. “She tried to take you from me. She doesn’t deserve you. Don’t you see?”
Take me from her?
I was never hers, not even when we were together. She didn’t want to be mine, yet now she decided she doesn’t want anyone else to be mine either.
My face contorts. “What the hell is wrong with you? You did all this just because you’re jealous?”
“You,” she replies, tears welling up in her eyes. “You did this to me.”
“You did this to yourself,” I spit back, and I beckon Mo to step aside so Ariane can’t suddenly twist around and try to hurt her.
Monica quickly passes by Ariane and stands behind me, grabbing my waist.
“Yeah, you run back to daddy,” Ariane hisses. “You’re pathetic. Both of you. I should’ve shared that picture with the whole goddamn school when I had the chance, but I wanted to be merciful and give you a chance to stop this from getting out of hand. Guess you chose the hard way.”
My jaw drops, and rage overcomes me. “So it was you? You stole that picture off my phone?”
She cocks her head. “You should really change your stupid code. It hasn’t changed since we dated.”
She’s really lost her marbles. All this time, I thought it was Michael who stole the picture and sent it when it was Ariane pulling the strings from behind the scenes all along.
“She tried to push me to end things with you,” Mo explains, “because she wants to keep you to herself.”
“You cheated on me!” I growl. “Fuck you for making everyone think it was me. You’ll pay for this,” I say. “You’re not gonna get away with any of this.”
She makes a disgustingly snooty face. “Who do you think they’ll believe? The attention junky and the poor little frightened victim or the most popu
lar and respected girl in school who was thrown away like some used-up doll by the school’s own boy band?”
“They’ll believe this,” Monica sneers, and she holds up her phone.
A recording of the entire conversation plays.
Ariane’s pupils dilate as she stares in disbelief.
“When … how …” she mutters.
“The moment I saw your initials, I knew it was you.” Mo scoffs, her head held high, even in the face of danger. “I don’t trust snakes, never have.”
Ariane’s face completely melts off like a goddamn fiery volcano just went off in front of her. “You pushed me to confess.”
“Yeah, and you were dumb enough to fall for it.” Monica presses the button and lowers her phone. “Your reign over this school is finished.”
Chapter 35
Cole
It took only minutes for Mr. D himself to come see what the ruckus was all about. Of course, Ariane denied every allegation we threw her way, but Monica had the proof. After we told Mr. D exactly what had happened and made him listen to the recording, he immediately had her restrained and called the cops.
It didn’t take long for them to arrive and haul them back to their police car in the full frontal view of the entire fucking school.
I guess in her words, you get what you deserve.
As for me, since Mr. D was provided with proof of Ariane’s misconduct, he agreed to put me on suspension for the fight in the hallway instead of completely kicking me out, which I accepted. Michael is still expelled for what he did to Monica in the forest, along with his two friends, so I’m glad I won’t ever have to come face-to-face with them again, or I might’ve ripped them all a new one.
The only thing that never managed to come back together, though, is TRIGGER.
And now I’m sitting here on the floor in front of my bed with that letter in my hand, wondering if I should throw it in the trash. I suppose it wasn’t all for nothing. I got a lot of fans, and maybe I can start up again someday. But I don’t think Tristan and Benji will be so easy to forgive me.
“Is that … an invitation?” Monica asks.
I look up. She’s lying right behind me on my bed. “You know snooping is against the rules.”
“What rules?” she taunts, winking. Then she snatches the paper from my hand. “Lemme see.”
“My rules,” I growl, and I turn around and try to steal it back, but she keeps jumping across the bed to get away from me. “Monica, give that back,” I say with a stern voice.
“An audition for TRIGGER?” she muses with raised brows. “And next week!”
“Doesn’t matter, just give it back,” I say, sighing.
“Why not? This is important! Why didn’t you tell me?” she asks.
“Because it doesn’t matter anymore,” I reply, lowering my head when she looks at me with the same pride I wish I could feel. “We’re not going.”
“What?” she gasps. “Why not?”
“We kinda broke up,” I say.
She snorts. “Broke up? You make it sound like a relationship.”
I shrug. “As a band, we’re married to the music.” I sit down on the bed. “Or we were. I haven’t actually talked with either of them since that whole thing with Michael went down.”
She stops running and lowers the paper. “Well, then go talk with them.” She sits down behind me and wraps her arms around me, the paper still in her hands. “This is worth it.” She sighs. “Besides, I don’t want to be the reason for your breakup. Can you imagine? Monica Romero, destroyer of TRIGGER. Your fans would kill me.”
I laugh. “It’s not your fault. It was my choice to kick Michael out.”
“Yeah, but if I hadn’t gone and walked out of the party, they wouldn’t have—”
I turn around and quickly place a finger on her lips. “I don’t wanna hear any of that shit. You hear me? None.”
She lowers her eyes at me, and I slide my hand to her cheek and give her a gentle but enticing kiss. And she smiles against my lips in appreciation.
“But what about TRIGGER? You’re just gonna give up?” she asks.
“I appreciate that you wanna fix things, but what’s done is done. I made a decision. And there is no way in hell I ever want Michael back in the band. And I simply don’t have a replacement that’s as good as him with a bass guitar,” I reply, leaning my forehead against hers. “But I have you. And that’s enough for me.”
I kiss her again, this time even slower than before because I wanna savor what I have.
Suddenly, she leans back, her eyes springing open like a light bulb just went off in her head.
“Wait,” she says. “I think I know someone.”
I frown. “What are you talking about?”
She jumps up from the bed and fishes her phone from her pocket. “Someone to replace Michael.”
“You know a bass player?” I raise my brows.
“Well … technically …” When I eye her hard, she starts backtracking. “Maybe.”
“Monica,” I murmur, giving her a stern look.
“Just let me do this, okay? It’s worth a shot, so let me try, please?” she begs with such a cutesy voice that I can’t say no.
God, if only I hadn’t fallen so hard for her, maybe I would’ve been able to resist.
I rub my eyes and groan. “Okay, fine.”
“So you’ll meet him?” she squeals. “Yes! I’ll set up a meeting for today.”
Shaking my head, I laugh. “Oh, brother.”
Monica
My nerves are killing me as I walk into Spark’s Curve Diner, which looks like it was designed by an older couple in the 1950s. Apparently, they have the best ice cream in the neighborhood, but more importantly, this is where Sam, Nate, and I agreed to meet.
Cole clears his throat and adjusts his hair while I look around until I find them sitting in a red booth in the back. When she looks up and spots me, she waves, and a beaming smile appears on my face.
“C’mon,” I tell Cole, and I walk toward them with pride.
Sam gets up from her seat and immediately runs to hug me, almost choking me with her strong grip. “I missed you!”
“I missed you too,” I reply. “But have you worked on your muscles or something? ’Cause damn girl, you’re squeezing me to death.”
She snorts and pulls back only to poke me in the belly. “Thought I’d give you some of your own medicine for a change.” She licks her lips and glances at Cole over my shoulder. “Who is …?” Then her eyes widen. “Wait a minute.”
Cole’s eyes flicker, and he taps his foot. “Here we go.”
“You’re that dude from TRIGGER, aren’t you?” Sam’s jaw slowly drops. “Oh my God, it really is you.”
She looks like she’s on the verge of squealing, but the sound never manages to slip from her tightly sealed lips.
“Yep, it’s me,” Cole replies, raising his brows.
“Oh my God, I can’t believe it,” Sam says, completely ignoring me. “But what are you doing here?”
Cole snorts. “I’m with her, actually.”
Sam looks mortified. “With … you?” She looks at me now, and my whole face turns red as a beet. “He’s the boy you’ve been talking about?”
Okay, I didn’t think I could get any redder, but here we are. Especially with Cole looking like he wants to laugh over my embarrassment.
I rub my lips together. “Yep.”
“Oh, my God,” she mutters, still in shock. She leans in closer. “Can I …?”
“Sure,” I say, and I look at him over my shoulder. “She wants an autograph.”
He snorts and grabs a pen from his pocket. “Hold out your arm.”
She does what he asks, and he scribbles his signature onto her skin.
A squeal escapes from her mouth. “Eek.” She can barely contain her excitement. “Thank you!”
“You’re welcome,” Cole replies, a bit embarrassed because everyone in this diner is looking at him. I’m pretty sure not ev
eryone knows who he is … yet. But most people of our age do, and that apparently includes my best friend.
Behind Sam, Nate stares at all of us. “Hey, Nate,” I say.
He throws up a hand without saying a word, so I guess we’ll get to that later. He was always the quiet type.
“I didn’t know you were a TRIGGER fan,” I say to Sam.
“Only since like a few months,” she says, rolling her eyes at me. “But we don’t talk about music that often.”
“Sorry about that.” I scratch the back of my head. “Been a little busy with my new school.”
She smirks. “Yeah, I can see that.” She leans in, and whispers in my ear, “Good catch.”
I almost choke on my own words. “Thanks.”
“I mean it, he’s hot. And famous,” she whispers. “How did you do it?”
Cole snorts.
So he could hear it. Damn.
“Long story,” I reply.
She grabs my hand and pulls me to the bench. “C’mon, tell me all about it.”
I sigh, and we all sit down so I can tell her everything that happened since I left school for Black Mountain Academy, but I leave out some of the details that put Cole in a bad light. I’ll tell her someday when we’re alone, but I just don’t want to make him feel bad.
When I’ve mentioned all there is to know, she’s still leaning in, barely having touched her ice cream. “That’s it?”
“That’s it.” I lean back against the seat, and Cole throws his arm around my shoulder.
“I still can’t believe you managed to get a fucking rock star for a boyfriend.”
“Hey,” Nate interrupts while throwing Sam a look. “This here is just as fine.”
She snorts and lowers her eyes at him. “Yeah, yeah, no need to get jealous.” She pecks him on the cheek. “I’m already yours.”
“Good,” Nate retorts, and he smiles when he sees Cole pulling me closer to him.
“I’m not the catch. She is,” Cole says, making my heart flutter. “I’m the lucky one here.”
I place a hand on his chest and give him a little kiss against the jaw. “That’s sweet.”
“Sweet?” He leans back, raising a brow at me. “Don’t start swearing at me now.”
Rowdy Boy (A High School Bully Romance): Black Mountain Academy Page 26
