These Vengeful Hearts

by Katherine Laurin

  My house was dark when I arrived, quiet in a familiar, peaceful way. As I put the car in Park, my regular phone chimed with a text message from Gideon. Then another. And another.

  I unlocked my phone and could barely read his messages before more streamed in.

  Gideon: Mrs. Martin and Mr. Hall?!?

  Gideon: WTF is happening???

  Gideon: At the school

  Gideon: Grosssssssss

  Gideon: I sit in that classroom every day

  Gideon: I don’t even know what to think

  And then a break in the barrage of texts before one final message came through.

  Gideon: Wait. Isn’t that Gigi’s mom? Was it you?

  I checked my email and found a message from “A Friend” that must have gone to the entire school. The subject was blank and the only thing in the body of the email was the photo Haley just took.

  “Dammit, Haley!” I threw my phone down in disgust.

  There was no way to explain over text to Gideon that this was and wasn’t me. I’d have to call him later.

  My Red Court phone vibrated in my bag with a message. Only one person would be texting me and her excuses didn’t deserve my attention. She promised me she’d wait until tomorrow. After the latest threat, my body was on high alert and the flash of anger only added fuel to fire that began as fear but had morphed into something uglier. I grabbed the phone to let her have it.

  Haley: i’m sorry

  Haley had never apologized for anything before. I didn’t think she had the word in her vocabulary. A simple apology could right a number of wrongs, but not this. I’d never forgive her.

  Haley: it wasn’t me

  Haley: i sent the pic as proof that the job was done but said the email to the school would go tomorrow

  Me: Who sent it out then?

  Haley: you know who

  The Queen of Hearts.

  Me: Why couldn’t it wait?

  Haley: it’s not like i get explanations for everything

  Haley: i wouldn’t have made that promise unless i thought i could keep it

  Haley: i’m sorry about your friend

  Me: Don’t pretend that you care about her or me. Leave me alone.

  I turned the phone off and threw it on the floor to join the other one.

  I looked up at the rearview mirror, catching a glimpse of my eyes. The furious, burning glint was startling. They were the eyes of the Red Court girl. She’d come out without me even noticing. I grabbed my journal, feeling reckless. There was one way to make sure the fear and anger left for good.

  November 19

  I’ve had enough of being a pawn. I’m ready to be the Queen.

  CHAPTER 35

  THE NEXT MORNING was cold and gray, just like my mood. I’d spent the night stewing, wavering between fury and fear. The Red Court had eyes, but I needed to be more careful than ever. My plan to draw out my admirer was working, but I couldn’t risk everything I’d worked for over it. I had to find out who was writing those notes. If they knew that April’s accident wasn’t accidental, perhaps they knew something about the Red Court or the Queen of Hearts.

  The only small mercy from yesterday was that April was still at her retreat. So much had happened in the last few days, and I didn’t have it in me to gracefully dodge any questions. She was due back this evening, so I had better find a way forward.

  I was the first car in the student parking lot, hoping to catch Gigi, if she was coming today at all. Other kids steadily poured into the school, jostling one another and laughing. Good-natured insults were volleyed and returned, gossip was passed in whispers, and I sat apart from all of it. I had never felt less like one of them. I finally understood why Haley had separated herself from everyone else. It was self-preservation. If you didn’t care about anyone, it didn’t matter if they were collateral damage in the Red Court’s schemes.

  When the first bell rang, I finally gave up and made my way inside.

  “Ember.”

  I jumped at the sound of my name and spun around.

  “Hi.” Gideon was stationed next to the main doors. “What are you doing lurking over there?”

  “I could ask you the same thing. Why were you sitting in your car by yourself?” The hunched set of his shoulders and fierce expression did not bode well for me.

  I kept my voice light and said, “I was just waiting for someone.”

  “Was that person your friend Gigi? You probably had to make sure your hard work hit the mark.”

  I never responded to Gideon’s messages and I couldn’t steady myself enough to call, either. He must have read my silence for what it was: guilt.

  “Don’t say it like that. I tried to stop it. I asked them—”

  “You asked? Is that what you do in the Red Court? Politely request that lives not be destroyed?”

  This wasn’t fair. He didn’t even know Gigi that well. Not like I did.

  “No, we don’t ask anything. I was risking a lot trying to stop the pictures from leaking. It’s suspicious that I even asked. No one else does that. If they knew what I really wanted, I’d be in serious trouble. I’m trying to help.”

  “And what about Matthew? Did you help him?”

  He knows about Matthew. That’s why he’s angry.

  “He just told me about your little ‘chat,’ and I thought he must have been mistaken. I thought, ‘No, Ember wouldn’t threaten him.’”

  “I didn’t threaten him! Not really. You don’t understand. It’s complicated.”

  Now was not the time to explain to Gideon that I saved his ass from social ruin. That if it wasn’t for me, he would be the one with grainy photos pasted all over the hallways or emailed to the entire school. The mercury of my temper was rising fast. If I didn’t defuse the situation, things were going to escalate quickly.

  “Then explain it to me.” His words were angry but pleading, too. He wanted me to give him a tidy explanation. I was fresh out.

  “I was stopping him from making a mistake. He almost did something that couldn’t be taken back. And when I talked to him about what he’d done, he realized he could undo it. Did he tell you that, too?”

  Perhaps my approach with Matthew hadn’t used a surgeon’s precision, but blunt-force honesty was my only option at the time. I hadn’t been as careful as I’d meant to be, and I didn’t bother to talk to Matthew about the source of his anger or the result of it. I was focused on protecting Gideon, not helping Matthew. That was my real mistake.

  “He mentioned something like that but seemed more terrified of you and what you would do to him if he didn’t do what you asked. What did you ask him to do?”

  The accusation in Gideon’s eyes eviscerated the last of my control. “Save you!”

  Gideon stumbled back. “Me?”

  “Yes, you. I followed him around for days last week, trying to find a way to get him to cancel the request he made to have us take you down.”

  I could practically see each piece of the puzzle snapping together in his mind.

  “He asked you to hurt me?”

  I nodded, meeting his eye so he could see every wretched, wretched thing I felt in that moment, how he’d turned my pride for helping him into shame at hurting Matthew. The inadequacy of everything I did to try to protect the people I cared about was overwhelming.

  “Why didn’t you say anything? And don’t say you were going to tell me.”

  Gideon’s voice dropped to a quiet murmur. That meant he didn’t trust himself to speak with any control. This was going in the wrong direction. There had to be a way to salvage this.

  “I was going to tell you. I wanted to have the problem solved before I said anything.”

  “And this was your way of solving it? Bullying someone who has enough to deal with?”

  I flinched at his words. “You know wh
y I’m doing this—”

  “Do I? Because I think it’s more than that. This isn’t even about stopping the Red Court. This is about you wanting to pull the strings.”

  “No. Yes. I did like some of what I did—”

  “Like breaking up Chase and his girlfriend?” Gideon may not have realized it, but he was dragging out the very parts of me I wanted to hide—just like the Red Court did.

  I dropped my bag to the floor and spread my hands in mock surrender.

  “Yes, I did. I liked it. Is that what you want to hear? I joined to take the Red Court down and discovered something ugly about myself. I liked the work I did. It was easy to manipulate others.” I thought of Alec. “Sometimes it was fun for me.”

  The confession seared my throat as the words left my mouth, as if I’d set the worst of myself loose.

  “But this thing with Matthew was different. I wanted to find a way to force his hand. And I was willing to use any means possible. But when I spoke with him, I found out that he wanted to take his request back. At the time, it was the best thing to do—tell him it wasn’t too late to stop this. All he had to do was ask, and then it would go away.”

  Gideon considered me with a critical eye. “What if you couldn’t find a way to make Matthew stop it?”

  I shook my head. “If he wouldn’t do it, I would have figured it out myself.”

  “And blown apart your grand plan?”

  “Yes, unequivocally, yes. I would have done it for you.”

  For some reason, this did not seem to make him happy. If anything, he seemed more disappointed.

  “I think I would have rather had you next to me when whatever they planned went down than on the other side trying to stop it.”

  I let out a frustrated cry. “That’s not fair. I can’t control everything. I made the best of the hand they dealt me, but it doesn’t have to be this way.” I paused. Maybe it was time to tell Gideon everything. “I can take over the Red Court and make it better. We won’t hurt innocent people.”

  He gaped at me, not having anything to say for once.

  I pushed on. “What if the Red Court could only do jobs for good reasons? It wouldn’t be so bad.”

  “And who makes the call as to what a good reason is to crush someone?” He’d regained his footing and was meeting my determination measure for measure. “You? It seems like you’re having a tough time finding the right side of things. For God’s sake, Em, you went after Matthew and then Gigi. You’re messing with the lives of actual people, people you know and claim to care about.”

  Gideon reached down into my bag and pulled out my journal. I fought the instinct that screamed at me to snatch it back. I didn’t think I could handle having any more of myself exposed.

  He opened it to the first page, the one where my four-step plan was written out in my neatest handwriting, and held it out to face me. “Have you forgotten why you began in the first place? I was worried when you started that this revenge plot would consume you. I never thought that it would go this way.”

  “You’re thinking about it all wrong. You could help me.”

  Why couldn’t Gideon see that things would be different, better?

  “Leave me out of it. As long as you’re part of the Red Court, you don’t know me.”

  My eyes nearly bugged out of my head. “You can’t mean that. We’re in this together.”

  His sorrow cascaded off him in waves that slammed against me, an unending barrage on my heart.

  He handed my journal back to me, the words on the page mocking me, reminding me of just how far I had fallen. He turned to go and said over his shoulder, “Not anymore. You’re on your own.”

  CHAPTER 36

  WHEN THE BELL RANG at the end of Lit class, I automatically stood to meet Gideon. His parting words came barreling at me like a punch to the gut and I sat back down. There was no one waiting for me.

  Chase came over from the other side of the room, ready with a smile. “Hey.”

  That smile disarmed me completely. “Hi.”

  My capacity to feel so many conflicting emotions at once was maddening. How could I be angry at the Red Court for Gigi, heartbroken over Gideon, and ridiculous about Chase all at once? I struggled to gain control over myself, but my body was fighting against me, flashing hot and cold.

  “Are you headed to meet Gideon? Maybe we could all grab coffee.”

  “No, not today.” I busied myself with my bag to hide how upset I was.

  Honestly, I had no clue what Gideon would be doing. Maybe he was running to Damien to tell him all about our argument. I didn’t even know if it qualified as an argument. It felt more like the breakup he’d joked about so long ago.

  “Ok, do you want to come hang out on the double H’s with me? I normally have some friends over there.”

  There was a lounge at one end of the school with benches shaped like two capital H’s for Heller High. It was notoriously frequented by the upper echelon of popular kids, not a place I ever dreamed I’d be invited to. Or one I really desired to go to, either.

  “Maybe the library?” I suggested. “I have a ton of work to do.”

  He smiled even wider. “Of course you do. No rest for the wicked, right?”

  If you only knew.

  * * *

  As I made my way to the track after school, I finally found Gigi leaving the main office. I pushed my way past a group of boys, murmuring apologies as I went.

  “Gigi!” I called.

  She turned, and her mouth lifted in a thin copy of her normal smile. “Hi.”

  I was not what people would call a “hugger,” but Gigi’s swollen eyes broke something in me and I pulled her into a hug. “I’m so, so sorry.”

  “It’s ok.” She pulled back, looking down as she blinked away tears. “Well, no, it’s not. I don’t know why I said that.”

  “Because you’re tough and being ok is probably a reflex.” I put force into the words, trying to get Gigi to believe them. She would get through this. She had to.

  “I’m just glad the school is letting me take some time away until everything calms down. Not that I’m allowed to take time off classes. I’ll just be completing assignments from home for a little while.”

  “How generous of our Hell High overlords.”

  Gigi snorted and wiped away a tear. She looked back up at me, resolve flashing in her eyes. “I wasn’t surprised, you know? I feel like I should tell someone that. About my mom, I mean. I wasn’t surprised.”

  “What?”

  Granted, I wasn’t her child, but the revelation that Mrs. Martin was having an affair shocked the hell out of me.

  “Things between my parents aren’t that great. Really haven’t been for a while. I’ve kind of gotten used to it, I guess. That’s why I was so happy to be on the debate team.” Her burst of emotion faded and she was left hollow-eyed, devoid of the spark that made her Gigi.

  I understood what she meant. I hadn’t been able to help April, and I had felt helpless until I harnessed my anger and shaped it into a plan for revenge. “Having something to focus on can help. What will you do now if you’re taking some time off?”

  Gigi shrugged. “My aunt and uncle live close by. I’ll probably stay with them and lie low.”

  “And your mom?” I couldn’t help but ask. Did the Red Court succeed in getting her fired? If not, would Haley and I have to do something worse?

  “She’s resigning right now. I’m going to wait in the car until she’s done packing up. Some friend, huh?”

  I blanched. Was she talking about me? “Excuse me?”

  “A Friend. That’s who sent the email out.”

  I weighed my question, examining it from all sides, before asking, “Do you know who did it?”

  “It could have been anyone. There are a lot of kids who would like to stick it to a teacher or c
ounselor. But who did it doesn’t matter. Not to me.”

  “How could it not? Aren’t you angry with the people—or person—who did this?”

  I was part of the group that did it and I was livid.

  “I’m mad at my mom. I’m so mad.” Her voice broke, and she swallowed hard. “I don’t think I can be anything else on top of that.”

  My heart shattered watching Gigi shake with the force of her anger. The Red Court destroyed Mrs. Martin’s career, her family, and Gigi’s relationship with her mom.

  Gigi shifted her bag on her back, pulling herself together. “I better get going. Bye, Ember.”

  I lifted a hand in a weak wave. “Bye.”

  I didn’t move as Gigi, head down and dark hair shielding her face, marched out to the parking lot. Haley had questioned if Mrs. Martin was innocent and she wasn’t. But Gigi was. So was Alec’s fiancée and that girl from the hallway whose boyfriend was cheating on her. It didn’t matter if we only took down people who deserved it. Everyone had someone who loved them who would suffer because of the pain the Red Court caused.

  It was—we were—toxic. I could almost hear Haley’s argument. The Red Court was only an instrument in the orchestra of lies and misery. The kids were the ones conducting the symphony, but how many of them lashed out in a moment of despair and used the tools we provided to turn their pain into action? Probably a lot of them. Just like Matthew.

  It was true that some of our requests, like Reece’s for Maura, were born out of something other than anger. But they shared a commonality with the calls for hits or grade fixing—desperation. Everyone was desperate for something, and we were the ones enabling them, feeding that need.

  When you gave people a shortcut, they’d take it. I was that shortcut. And everyone else in the Red Court was using it for their own ends—whether it was the favor Haley needed or the chance to be part of something that Gretchen was desperate for. Until this moment, I hadn’t thought of the work that way. The kids at school were using and being used in a vicious cycle that would only stop if I stopped it.