The Pawn: A Reverse Harem Bully Revenge Romance (Coleridge Academy Elites Book 1)

by Lucy Auburn

  Open season isn't exactly how I wish she would've phrased it, but I came here to start something. I guess I just got it going sooner. Chrissy continues, "You're not the only person Cole has marked. Or the only person he hates around here—or who hates him. There's the Utilities Manager's son, for one thing. Cole hates him."

  "So there's you," I unfold a finger, "me," a second one, "and the son of the guy who... wait, do you mean Hector Sanchez?"

  "Yeah."

  "I met him already. He said to come to him if I needed help."

  "See? You will have friends." She beams up at me as we walk through the wrought iron gates around Rosalind Hall and head up the front steps. "Just try not to make any more enemies. This place isn't exactly known for its gentleness. No matter what they say around here, Coleridge isn't about academics. It's about money and power. And the rich spoiled kids here know how to use both."

  "Got it."

  I appreciate Chrissy's warning, but she's not telling me anything I don't already know. I learned the hard way what rich kids can do to easy targets. Nothing will ever come close to seeing my brother's body lowered into the ground in a casket before we got to our seventeenth birthday together.

  By the time we go through the front doors of Rosalind Hall, it's clear that we're late. There's a neat crowd gathered in the lobby, watching a girl pace back and forth on the steps, her hands animated as she gives a speech. I recognize her sleek ponytail immediately and have to bite back a groan; of course Holly Schneider is here giving yet another speech while outside her boyfriend bullies a girl.

  "And so, that's why if you need something—no matter how big or small—you should come to the Rosalinds, our group of student resident assistants." Her mouth curves into a prim, perfect little smile, lips glossy, her eyes perfectly lined. I can feel my shabbiness from climbing into the tree and want to hide even as Chrissy and I join the small crowd of girls and their parents. "I know it's a lot to take in, so if you have any questions or need help transitioning to a new living situation, I'm in room 101. That's the first door on the hallway to the left of the stairs—you can't miss it."

  The thought of going to Cole Masterson's girlfriend for help makes me cringe. She may seem like a nice, friendly girl, but there's no way that's real. No one can live in the shadow Cole casts and come out clean.

  "Oh! And one more thing before you all go." Clapping her hands together, she surveys all of us, her eyes distinctly landing on each girl. When I feel her gaze I lift my chin, meeting her eyes straight-on. "We're short one girl in the Rosalinds after a sudden off-campus move cut down our numbers."

  A murmur goes up among the crowd; like me, a lot of them clearly had no idea that girls could live off campus in the first place.

  "If you're interested in joining the Rosalinds," Holly continues, "then just see me tomorrow after class, during my RA hours. We need someone who's a real go getter: confident, capable, and most of all, a peacekeeper. The position pays twelve an hour, so it's not much, but you also get discounts on off-campus excursions and the occasional bonus."

  Twelve dollars an hour is more than any retail job in Wayborne pays. But of course, to a girl like Holly it's nothing; she probably made that much cleaning her room when she was five. My parents couldn't pay for an allowance and keep a roof up over our heads at the same time, so the thought of the money is appealing, even if the last thing I want is to work alongside Holly Schneider.

  Then again, maybe if I get close to her, she'll let something slip about Cole.

  "Do you think you'll apply?" I ask Chrissy. She gives me a puzzled look. "To be a Rosalind. I mean, if it pays and all.."

  "Oh, I don't have time for something like that. Studying is my priority." She shrugs. "Besides, my summer internship paid more, and it was actually fun. Who wants pocket change just to listen to all these girls whine about the size of their rooms? No thanks."

  I stare at her. When I saw Cole bullying her beneath that tree, I just assumed... but no, I didn't imagine it; she called all these kids rich and spoiled. "I didn't know high schoolers could get summer internships," I observe, trying to figure out more about her. "Where did you say you're from?"

  "New York, of course. Paris in the summers, and LA in the winters. My dad likes to keep an eye on all his branches." My mind conjures up trees for a moment before I realize she must mean branches of a company. "Like I said, I've known these kids forever. It's like that when all your parents rub shoulders all the time. You couldn't pay me to listen to them complain."

  Seeming to realize she might've put her foot in her mouth, she hastily adds, "You should apply, though. I mean, it's not like you've had to deal with their particular brand of bullshit before. Maybe it's all feel brand new to you."

  "Right," I say, souring on her already. I thought she was like me and Hector, but she's just a less popular one of them. "I can't exactly say no to the opportunity, so I'll apply. Even though I doubt I'll get it."

  "You never know. Holly is a pretty nice girl, all things considered. As long as you never cross her."

  Thing is, I'm going to cross her.

  And then some.

  Someone new has taken up position on the stairs where Holly was just giving her speech: an adult, maybe a teacher or a staff member. She's a tall woman in her late 40s with a rich dark brown complexion and sharp cheekbones. From the tight black bun of her hair to her perfectly pressed pantsuit, she looks in charge and in control.

  "I'm Mrs. Reynolds. I'm the Residence Director here on campus. I manage four dorm buildings and the staff rooms, so you'll have to share me. Go to the Rosalinds if you need something, and if it's important enough to bring to me, they'll tell you." She looks over all of us. "No drugs, no alcohol, and especially no e-cigarettes. I absolutely can't abide them, and they're just as addictive as the real deal. None of you should be smoking them, and if I find one I'll throw it in the trash."

  She seems to get extra incensed about the idea of e-cigarettes. I have to cough to cover up the laugh that wants to leave my mouth; a good tenth of the Coleridge hashtag on Instagram is kids with a Juul hanging out of their mouths. You'd sooner get them to stop listening to BTS or using Snapchat. I'm sure they'll just smoke in secret, post proof on their finstas, and completely avoid her notice.

  "Now that that's clear," she says, as if she's single-handedly threatened a generation out of rebelling, "your room assignments are ready. So come to me, Holly, or Piper to find out where you'll be living for the rest of the year and who you'll be living with. Before you ask, yes, your room requests were honored when possible, but many of you will be bunking with someone you've never met before. So get used to it."

  A whole year living with one of these struck-up, impossibly rich, and impeccably made up girls. It sounds like a nightmare. Based on the grumbles of the girls as we get into line for our assignments, they agree. The girl in front of me is threatening to call her dad if she doesn't get a room with her best friend.

  "I hope I don't wind up with one of the Rosalinds," Chrissy says. "I mean, imagine having a narc as a roommate. That can't be fun."

  I look at her askance. "What, are you planning on stuffing your mattress with a few kilos of cocaine or something?"

  She rolls her eyes. "No, of course. I mean for having boys over." Leaning in, she adds, "Everyone does it, and most of the time the RAs look away. But if you room with one of them, all bets are off. Last year my friend Leila got demerit points and two detentions because her boyfriend came to her room to return her keys, and her roommate told. She goes to Pembroke now—apparently they're not quite so anal about the rules."

  "Do you have a boyfriend?" I ask her, insatiable curiosity getting the best of me.

  "Not yet. But I plan to have one by the time sweater weather rolls around. And there's no way I'm going to chastely hold hands in the library, so I better get a cool roommate. Otherwise I'm seeing if my dad can get me a place off campus like that Mary Anne or Miriam or whatever girl."

  We reach the front of the
line before I have a response to that. I move down to the girl named Piper, who has names A-E at her table, and give her my name—or at least the name I go by here—to find a room.

  She frowns as she thumbs through her stapled papers. "No Brenna Cooke in here. Sure it's not under another name?"

  My heart leaps wildly. "It shouldn't be." There's no way I'm moving down to Holly and asking for "Brenna Wilder" since I'm sure she knows my brother's name. "Check again."

  "I'll look, but..." She shakes her head, pink lips pursing. "I don't see it. Cooke with a C, right?"

  "Yeah." My heart sinks. "I guess I'll go talk to someone."

  "No need, sweetie." Mrs. Reynolds waves me over. "You're that girl who registered last, right?"

  "Um, yeah, that's me."

  "Your room assignment didn't make it into the system in time, but no worries dear. You won't be homeless." She smiles up at me. "You'll be staying in room 101, with our very own Holly."

  Chapter 9

  My mouth goes dry. Nothing comes off my lips in response.

  Looking over at me from her own set of stapled papers, Holly says, "You're my roommate? Nice to meet you! I'll show you to our digs once I'm done with this."

  I feel like my heart has sunk into my stomach and is getting kicked around a bit. Chrissy gives me a sympathetic look, no doubt because I'm staying with one of the rule-enforcing Rosalinds, but all I can think is: Cole Masterson's girlfriend is going to be my roommate.

  Cole Masterson, who harassed my brother with a false accusation until he took his own life.

  Cole Masterson, who marked me just outside, and declared open season on me.

  The things Holly could do to me in my sleep, all because Cole says so...

  "Great." I force my lips to smile, since Mrs. Reynolds is giving me a funny look. "That's so great."

  "It's quite a privilege," the Residence Director says. "As head of the Rosalinds, Holly has the biggest room in the dorm, with an attached bathroom. You're lucky she agreed to have a roommate—otherwise you'd be in overflow housing in the Coleridge Center basement. And that place is under construction right now, so it isn't always pretty."

  I'd rather have broken pipes drip sewage water directly onto my head at night than live with Cole Masterson's girlfriend. "How lucky for me."

  "It's no problem," Holly says, in between helping girls get their own room assignments. "Us girls gotta stick together, right?"

  "Right," I echo, while inwardly I wonder just how far her stick together mantra goes.

  My guess is it goes as far as her boyfriend's little games, and stops right where he wants it to.

  There's no girl power in the middle of a fist fight.

  As the front lobby empties of girls, all of them wheeling their suitcases down the hallway or getting their parents to lug them up the stairs, I begin to feel an impending sense of doom.

  How long before Holly finds out from Cole that I crossed him and defied him?

  How long before she decides to show me that girls can fight just as hard as boys? Worse, even.

  I'm beginning to regret helping Chrissy out. She has the money to replace her bag, after all, and she doesn't seem too broken up about me getting on Cole's bad side. She barely even waved goodbye to me as she skipped off to her own, Rosalind-free dorm room, no doubt planning her future rule-breaking dalliances already. The temptation to snatch her purse and throw it over a tree branch is overwhelming.

  "Sorry for the delay." Holly gives me one of those kilowatt smiles as she finished off her last room assignment and saunters across the lobby towards me. "I'm Holly Schneider, but you probably already know that... I've introduced myself like five times today." Her eyes search all around me. "Did your parents go to the bathroom or something?"

  "They're not here." I stiffen at her curious expression. "It's a long trip home, and my mom has work in the morning."

  "Of course. Well, it's nice to meet you," she glances down at her papers, "Brenna... Cooke?"

  "That's my name," I say, maybe overemphasizing it a bit out of fear of being found out. "I guess I should thank you for the big room. Though you really don't have to do this, you know. I can always stay in the Coleridge Center or wherever else they put me up. It's not a problem."

  And planning my revenge would be easier without Holly constantly underfoot.

  "Oh, don't worry about it. You don't want to stay in that rat-infested mold haven anyway." She wrinkles her nose at me. "Pretty sure it's haunted."

  "That's what they said about the chapel, but I didn't see any ghosts."

  Holly raises her brows. "You went inside the chapel?"

  I realize my mistake too late. Already I'm fucking up—and in front of a 'narc' no less. "I know I shouldn't have. Someone kind of dared me to it."

  She laughs. "Don't worry about it. I was just surprised—the chapel is kind of known for being a hookup spot."

  "I didn't—"

  "I'm sure you didn't." I'm sputtering, red in the cheeks at the thought of hooking up with Tanner inside the chapel of all places. "Just don't go back when they put the fumigation tent up. Apparently there's a termite problem, and you don't want to inhale whatever they use to kill them."

  "Got it."

  "Let me show you to our room."

  I take note of the way she says 'our.' No doubt she's been told to welcome me with open arms, even if she doesn't want to. The Rosalinds are supposed to reflect the so-called warm community of Coleridge Academy. Founded shortly after the dorm opened, they were initially a social club for girls on campus, and eventually transitioned into RA roles as the dorm grew and its problems multiplied.

  But they still do social events. I got handed a calendar of them along with my student handbook and map of the campus. Whenever a social event is co-ed, there's a little C marked next to it, to indicate that the boys are coming along. Rock climbing, river rafting, an ice cream social, an all-night dance-a-thon, drive thru movies—it's like the weirdest hybrid between hardcore sports events and 1960s nostalgia.

  Curious, I ask her, "Do you like being a Rosalind? I mean, it must be a lot of work. All those social events, plus the stuff you do around here."

  "Well, the school year just started. I only got a little taste of it during orientation week," she reminds me. "But it's nice to have my finger on the pulse of what's going on around here. And I like getting girls together and fostering friendship. Especially at a school like this, where we weren't even allowed to attend for over a hundred years. The Rosalinds, along with our upperclass sisters the Lovelaces, have always been about building the social capital of the girls of this school. And it's worked—we have a sexual harassment policy now, and free tampons in the restroom... but I'm rambling." she shoots me an apologetic smile. "You probably think I'm some kind of hoo-rah social discourse enthusiast now."

  I surprise myself by smiling back at her—genuinely. "No, not at all. I mean, after I heard what happened to that Martha Hayes girl over at the chapel, all that seems like a better alternative. Although you couldn't pay me to go to an ice cream social."

  She laughs, and stops in front of a door with a brass plaque: Room 101. "Here we are. I have to warn you, I cleaned up as much as I could once I found out you'd be staying with me, but it's a little messy. We've only just got your mattress and desk set up, so if you want anything moved around just let me know."

  I'm about to respond that I don't really care about those things—I'm here for revenge, not interior design—when she unlocks the door with her ID and opens it wide.

  This isn't a dorm room.

  It's the master bedroom in a rich girl's house.

  Large bay windows that look out onto the rose garden, blue velvet drapes pulled to either side. A wardrobe made of dark mahogany wood in one corner. Two queen sized beds, one made up with a plush comforter and stylish vintage designer cushions, sitting on a large oriental rug. Two desks, one on each wall, made of more solid wood.

  And of course, opposite the drapes and next to what must b
e my bed, an exposed brick fireplace.

  Holly's eyes follow my gaze. "Oh, we probably shouldn't use that. It's a relic from before this place got central heat. But it's nice to look at, isn't it? You can put your stuff on the mantle." She glances down at my worn duffel bag and adds, "Once your stuff gets here."

  I'm too embarrassed to tell her that all my stuff is already here. This room is magnificent; I don't know what she had in here before my bed showed up. A sitting area, maybe, complete with a tea set and a driftwood coffee table. God knows that it looks like it should be photographed for a style magazine.

  To think my cruddy things are going to go on the other side of the room. I don't even have a sheet set—I'll have to use the standard school sheets, which are laid out on the bare mattress, the Coleridge Academy logo facing up. Holly will probably buy a fancy partition just to block out the sad sight of my stuff from her view.

  Shaking my moroseness off, I remind myself that I shouldn't give a fuck about Holly Schneider and what she has—or what I don't have. I'm here for the dead, not to covet the things of the living. A snake doesn't care about the richness of a blue blood when it sinks its fangs into their flesh.

  "I cleared off half the bookcase for you," she says, motioning to yet another piece of furniture I hadn't noticed, one positioned near the door. "There's room for your textbooks, once you get the chance to pick some up. Though most of our classes here use online sources instead."

  "Thanks," I tell her, helplessly wondering when she'll find out from Cole what I did—and how soon the welcome wagon will end. "I don't really have that much stuff, though. If you need the bookcase, you can just use it."

  I try to make myself feel ill will towards Holly Schneider, but it's hard. Of all the rich kids here, she's one whose name I've never seen on Silas's social media, harassing him—at least, as far as I know. She could be any of a number of anonymous accounts, despite the bright-eyed, cheery impression she gives off. Despite myself, I hope that she isn't. I want to believe no one can be this kind to my face and so cruel online.