Wrong Crowd (Kingsley Academy Book 1)

by Lisa Helen Gray

  WRONG CROWD

  BOOK ONE

  BY LISA HELEN GRAY

  ©

  Copyrights reserved

  2019

  Lisa Helen Gray

  Edited by Stephanie Farrant at Farrant Editing

  Cover Design by Cassy Roop at Pink Ink Designs

  No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system without the prior written consent from the publisher, except in the instance of quotes for reviews. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded, or distributed via the Internet without the publisher’s permission and is a violation of the international copyright law, which subjects the violator to severe fines and imprisonment.

  This book is licensed for your enjoyment. E-book copies may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share with a friend, please buy an extra copy. Thank you for respecting the author’s work.

  This is a work of fiction. Any names, characters, places and events are all products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business or establishments is purely coincidental.

  CONTENTS

  WRONG CROWD

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  Acknowledgements

  CHAPTER ONE

  My mum had been buried twenty-four hours, and before I could even let it really sink in, to mourn the mum I wish she was and the person she really was, I was being carted off into the unknown.

  I glance over to my aunt, Nova, my mum’s twin sister, someone I didn’t know about until two nights ago.

  I take a moment to appraise her appearance. She couldn’t be more different to my mum if she tried. In her fancy clothes—pink silk top, loose and flowing, and beige suit trousers—she reminds me of a teacher or someone official. Someone I didn’t like at my old school. I think it’s why I don’t trust her. The flashiest thing Cara Monroe had owned was her heels; her clothes screamed slut and were beyond tacky.

  Although the two had similar features, Mum had looked ten years older than her age. Her face had weathered and wrinkled from all of the drugs and alcohol she pumped into her body. Nova’s skin was smooth and looked soft to touch. It makes me wonder if Mum had been that pretty at one point.

  A lot of men would comment on her looks, giving her advice on what do with her hair, her makeup, her clothes. It never made a difference though. She had abused her body for far too long.

  Who knows why.

  Mum also had bleach-blonde hair, whereas Nova’s is dark, yet lighter than my jet-black hair, which almost looks like it has a blue tinge to it.

  The other thing that cuts the two apart is the fact my mum was dirt poor and Nova is clearly rich—if her handbags, car and clothes are anything to go by. She has this presence that screams money. My mum couldn’t even claim benefits; they cut her off after she refused to get another job last year—not that she could get a job most of the time. We’ve been squatting in our flat ever since, scrounging by, using food banks and homeless shelters to eat, and she’d always screw men to get her money or fix. They didn’t even know what they were in for before coming inside most of the time. Not until she had robbed them clean and threatened to tell loved ones what they got up to behind closed doors.

  Why did she make us scrounge for leftovers if she had a twin sister who was rich? It was the one thing that seriously bothered me. It made me hate her.

  “Ivy, I can hear you thinking. You can ask me anything, you know,” Nova says, her voice sweet, soft; nothing like my mum’s scratchy voice. I avoid her gaze and look back out of the windshield.

  “Why didn’t I know about you?”

  “Your mum didn’t want you to. We tried to see you as a baby, you know.”

  News to me. I didn’t even know we had any family, but according to this lady, I have an uncle and grandparents. None are here in England. Apparently, they’re in the States on business.

  When I don’t ask her anything else, she takes a deep breath. “I had my housekeeper go out and get you some more clothes.”

  My stomach bottoms out, and I look at her in horror. “I am not wearing your fancy as shit clothes,” I snap. I like my jeans, my tank tops, and my boots. They are the nicest things I own, and only because one of the ladies at the food bank took a liking to me and offered me help where I needed it.

  A small smile plays at her lips, but I don’t know what she finds funny. “There’s going to be rules.”

  “Let’s go back to the clothes,” I order. Fuck the rules. I’ve raised myself for as long as I can remember, and rules didn’t come into the equation. Mum never set any. She never cared enough about me to do it.

  “Don’t worry. I told her to get whatever she wanted with regards to underwear and pyjamas, but for clothes, I did inform her you liked jeans and jackets. I’m not saying there won’t be anything fancy when you get home, but there will be something you like.”

  “It’s not my home,” I snap defensively.

  “It is for as long as you want it to be.”

  “I turn eighteen in a month.”

  “I thought we had a deal,” she murmurs, and I sink further down in my chair.

  I hate my mum. I hate that she died and left me. She left me with a debt owed to a drug dealer and with no money to pay it, no home, and a bag with a few items of clothing. I’m stuck. And getting a job with the state my clothes are in would be impossible in our area. I had tried many times before, fed up of starving and freezing to death. They took one look at me and decided there and then that I wasn’t worth it. They probably thought I would steal from the cash register or bring trouble.

  When Nova found all of this out, she tried to talk me into going back with her, informing me I was family and she wanted to get to know me. I said no, not trusting her. But then she made me a deal. I could go live with her, get a part-time job so I could save my money up, and have somewhere warm and safe to sleep, as long as I agreed to try school for a year. If I made it the full year, she would give me ten thousand pounds to start my life with. And on top of all that, she would give me an allowance monthly.

  I wanted to say no at first, wondering where this woman got off on throwing her cash around. But I’m not stupid—far from it. If I want to get out of the life I’m in and away from the exact path my mum made, I need out. If she wants to waste her cash on me, go for it. I know I’d survive without it, but I’m tired of surviving. I want to finally live my life.

  “We have a deal,” I tell her. “But I told you, there is no way I’m getting into that fancy as fuck academy, college, or whatever it is.”

  “Language,” she scolds. “And you already have. It’s a private academy. It will give you choices, and it’s different from other colleges. And I’m good friends with the family who own it, so stop worrying.�
�

  “Whatever,” I mutter, looking back out the window.

  The dirty streets littered with rubbish and women hanging on corners left us hours ago. Now we’re driving down roads with houses bigger than my old school.

  When Nova pulls up outside a huge gate, I can’t help but freak out a little. She really is rich. Even though I knew it, seeing it is another matter altogether.

  She waves to the guy sitting in the small building beside the gate. He leans out the window. “Good evening, Nova.”

  “This is my niece, Ivy,” she tells him, her voice cheery. “She’s coming to live with me.”

  I watch the guy bend down to see into the car where I’m sitting, and I can see the surprise written on his face. I snort, looking back out my window.

  “Nice to meet you,” he says. Fake. All of them are fake.

  Nora ends their little chat. “Have a good night.”

  The gates open, and as we pull back off, I look at her. “You have your own security guard. Who are you?”

  She rolls her eyes. “No, I don’t. This is a gated community, Ivy. They are there for all of us.”

  “All of you?”

  “Yes. The two houses there at the top of the hill; one is Monroe Manor and the other is Kingsley Manor. Our families are the ones who bought this land and built on it. Over time, more people built and here we are. A small community for the rich.”

  The houses we pass are huge, yet when we weave up the curvy hill, two large houses, built side by side, come into view, and there is nothing to stop my eyes from bugging out.

  “Holy fuck!” I gasp.

  “Language,” she scolds.

  A lady in her fifties is waiting inside the garage. She’s wearing a grey polo shirt and black suit trousers. Her hair is pulled back in a tight bun. She steps forward the minute Nova shuts her car off, and I quickly get out, following her to the back of the car and snatching my backpack from the boot as she reaches for it.

  “I can take your bag, Miss Monroe,” the lady greets me.

  “No.” It’s all that I own. I’m not optimistic about this working out. I don’t belong in a place like this. I feel like dirt they trod in through the door.

  She goes to take my bag again. “It’s perfectly fine. I’ll take it straight to your room.”

  I take note of what is in my bag, and although none of it’s valuable, it’s all I have, and she’s not taking it away. The house feels like it’s getting bigger as I take another step closer. There is no way I am going to make it here. Nova might dress me up, but it will only take another of her kind to take one look at me and realise who I am.

  “Ivy, this is Annette, our housekeeper. She has her own home at the back of the property but is here from five a.m. until six p.m.”

  I don’t say anything, and when she sees that, she blows out another breath and gestures for me to follow her. I do, taking in everything as I go. I didn’t know what to expect when she told me I was going to live with her. I met her the day before yesterday and I still don’t know what to think.

  This house is really something though. She told me she lives alone, so why does she want all this space? I can’t believe just one person lives here.

  There are open rooms everywhere, all decorated in neutral colours, like something you’d see in a magazine.

  The room we walk past next has a grand fireplace, the beige marble gleaming. It doesn’t look like the fireplace is used though, only there for show. The sofas are grey, two two-seaters facing each other, with a glass coffee table in the middle. I don’t get a chance to look at anything else before we’re entering the kitchen, and my mouth opens with surprise. I marvel over how clean it looks, the white cupboards and white and grey marble gleaming.

  I bet there’s food in those cupboards too.

  If the outside doesn’t scream money, this kitchen does. I don’t need to be an expert to know it’s been decked out with all the finest furnishings.

  “Down there we have a cinema room and a games room. Feel free to check it out tomorrow,” Nova explains as she points to different doors. “We have an outdoor pool that’s heated throughout the year. You’ll find swimsuits in your bedroom. Living room, dining room, another living area and the conservatory,” she adds, and walks me to a set of stairs. “The other rooms down here don’t get used. “We have seven bedrooms. Mine is on the other side of the house, along with my office. I’ve kept you on this side to give you more privacy.”

  I have to stop her there. “More privacy? I could walk around this place naked and not even risk bumping into someone.”

  Her face scrunches up. “Do not walk around here undressed.”

  I smirk, hiking my bag up higher on my shoulder.

  She opens a door to the right, letting it swing open, and takes a step back. She looks at me, and when I don’t move, she rolls her eyes. “Go. This is your room.”

  I try to hide my nerves as I take a tentative step inside. Two lamps on either side of the bed have been left on, casting a warm glow around the room. I swallow, taking in the clean sheets and fluffy pillows. It’s also a king, something I’ve never seen before. Back home I had a single-sized bed that was held up by some old library books.

  The walls are cream, and Nova has kept them plain. There’s a huge window with a reading nook beneath it. The chaise will come in handy when it rains, which is meant to happen over the weekend. There’s a huge seating area to my right, and a table next to it with a vase of flowers on top.

  There’s a desk next to the window, and my eyes bug out at the laptop, mobile, and set of keys.

  “The mobile is under contract and my numbers are programmed into it. The laptop is all set up to the Wi-Fi and is yours to do schoolwork on. The keys are for the front door, garage door and backdoor. If you are ready to start your driving lessons, I do have someone who can teach you within a week so you can take your test.”

  This sounds too good to be true.

  I step back over to the bed, running my finger along the soft cotton sheets. When my gaze finds two doors on the other side of the room, I look at Nova over my shoulder questioningly. She takes her first step into the room, pointing to the first door. “That’s the bathroom. It’s yours and yours alone. Second door is your wardrobe. Would you like Annette to fix you something to eat before you go to sleep?”

  My stomach grumbles, but there’s no way I can eat right now. I’m too nervous, and if I’m honest, I miss my mum. No matter how shitty she was or however fucked up, she was still my mum. I knew what to expect and that was nothing. With Nova, she has the power to give me more than I ever dreamed of having, and then take it away in her next breath without a care in the world. We don’t know each other. We have no emotional ties. Yet even though I’m not completely convinced I won’t end up going through life alone, she’s here and she’s family. I might as well suck it up. The minute she shows me a different side to her, I will be gone and she’ll never see me again. I might not understand why she is doing this for me, someone she doesn’t know or has cared to know, but she is. I don’t ignore the hurt I see flash in her gaze when she’s watching me either. It’s there, even when she tries so hard to hide it. I just don’t know why.

  “No. I’m good, thank you.”

  “If you change your mind, head down to the kitchen and help yourself to anything. In fact, I’ll get her to make you a sandwich and pop it in the fridge.”

  I nod, not feeling my confident self right now. She must see it because she only nods. “All right. I’ll let you get some rest.”

  I hear her reach the door and let out a breath I didn’t realise I was holding. I feel tears gather in my eyes, but they don’t fall. I didn’t even cry when they announced my mum was dead. I didn’t feel much of anything. I did get a sense of relief, and with that followed guilt. Even at her funeral I didn’t cry. I couldn’t. I just felt helpless.

  Sighing, I look around the room once more. Even the carpet looks expensive. It kind of makes me angry, but I don’t know wh
o at. At Mum for knowing she could have this or an aunt who had it and didn’t share it. It’s just seems unfair that this was here. Hell, I would have been happy to sleep in the garage.

  I have so many questions, but I don’t know who to trust. Mum isn’t here to answer them, and there has to be a reason she lived in shit and didn’t come crawling back. She had no problem when it was one of her male friends, so why not her own twin sister? It wasn’t a pride thing. My mum never had any.

  There are secrets here. Secrets that can explain why I only found out I had an aunt two days ago. Nova hadn’t explained anything to me, just said Mum disappeared.

  So whether I can trust Nova or not, still has a big fat question mark around it.

  I can’t help but compare the room to our old home. It’s bigger than our entire flat, that’s for sure. However, it’s how clean and well-kept it is that makes me feel uncomfortable. I’m not used to it. And I guess a part of me is scared to in case it’s ripped away. You can’t miss something you never had, which is how I spent my whole life.

  Fuck it.

  I’m here and I don’t have anywhere to go. By now, the council have taken over the flat and are gutting the place. Nothing inside was worth saving, not even the bathroom tiles that were thick with grime because we couldn’t afford cleaning supplies.

  Heading over to the door, I quickly take a peek up and down the hallway to make sure she isn’t hovering before shutting the door quietly behind me. I survey the room in all its glory and drop my bag down by the end of the bed.

  The bathroom door is my first stop, peering inside and gawking at the magnificent marble. Everything shines, even the ceiling with its spotlights poking through. It has a huge walk-in glass shower that has a bench inside. Looking closer, there’s a box with a million buttons and dials inside. It’d better come with a simple hot or cold button, otherwise it will never get used. It has a huge white, cast iron bath to the left, not too far away from the his and hers sinks. Bottles of stuff are set in place on the countertop, along with fresh towels, and a dressing gown is hanging up on the back of the door.