Ignited: a reverse harem bully romance (Kings of Miskatonic Prep Book 4)

by Steffanie Holmes

  “Good.” I handed her the leashes. “You and the dogs need to get out of here.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t want to leave you.”

  “You have to. You can’t come back to school with us, and I don’t know who else Vincent told about us and about you. They could come back to try and finish what they started.”

  “He won’t have told anyone,” Trey said. “That would be admitting he was wrong, that he let us get the better of him. In the eyes of the Eldritch Club, he’d be responsible for all their woes.”

  Deborah rubbed the welts on her wrists where Vincent had tied her up. “I don’t like the idea of going back to my house.”

  “Find my sister.” Ayaz touched his finger to the nazar pendant he wore – the ward against the evil eye that had protected Zehra for so many years. “Hazy can contact her. If anyone can protect you, it’s Zehra.”

  I handed my phone to Deborah. “Ayaz is right. Call her.”

  After a quick conversation with Zehra, Deborah climbed into her Jeep and Trey tossed her the keys. Leopold and Loeb settled onto their blankets, leaving a wide space for Roger. My heart ached to watch them look around for him. We’ve all lost someone. Deborah reached through the window and grasped my hand. “Thank you for saving me, Hazel.”

  Instinct propelled me forward. I leaned through the window and wrapped my arms around her. Our first hug as aunt and niece. I wished it could be the first of many, but it was probably our last. “You saved me first.”

  As she drove away, I raised my hand, palm facing to the sky, and drew up the dark things inside me, the things that Vincent Bloomberg never failed to draw to the surface. A minute later, smoke curled from beneath the windows of Deborah’s unit. Ayaz took my hand, pressing his warmth against the burning in my palm. The scar on my wrist blazed as flames licked up the motel walls. From inside, a smoke alarm blared – too late to save the building.

  Hotel staff rushed out with extinguishers. In the distance, a siren rang. We retreated into the woods, our steps silent against the chaos.

  Burn it all down.

  We trudged up the peninsula, one foot in front of the other. My legs felt leaden, weighed down with the weight of this – of all the deaths burning on my conscience. Greg might’ve felt responsible, but Damon’s death belonged to me. I got everyone into this mess. I made the plan. Another notch to add to the belt, another ghost to haunt my closed eyelids.

  Back at school, I left Greg with Loretta, Andre, and Sadie, and the four of us crawled into Trey’s cloud of a bed. I slept curled around Quinn, one arm over his shoulders, the other tucked around the bag of passports – our hard-won prize.

  Finals week blended together into one long string of anticipation. We studied. We sat exams. We told no one else about seeing Vincent, about Quinn’s father’s death. Every time there was a noise outside a window or a commotion in the corridors, I expected to see police storming the school with guns at the ready, coming for us… for me.

  They never showed up.

  Zehra texted me the headlines in the paper – ELECTRICAL FIRE DESTROYS HISTORIC HOTEL. They weren’t treating the fire as suspicious, not even with known arsonist and murderer Hazel Waite in the area.

  I sat at my desk in the converted dining hall and scribbled essays in the blue booklets, my mind a million miles away across the stars, where my body would soon join it. I didn’t remember a word I wrote.

  The god came to me only once – a faint shriek in the corner of a dream. His power had waned quickly since he agreed to help us. He needed me now more than ever.

  The final piece will be raised. You will be my fire, my light in the darkness, he whispered in the screams of his victims.

  I will.

  I woke from that dream with tears streaming down my face.

  And then, just like that, I handed in my last exam and my senior year was over. Miskatonic Prep was out for good, although no one knew that for a fact yet. Students and teachers wandered the halls in a daze, shuffling from here to there like zombies.

  The points tables went blank. No more points could be added or taken away. Students crowded into the atrium before breakfast to see the final class list. Trey squeezed my hand, his shoulders tensed, his ice eyes meeting mine with a hint of nerves no one else but I could discern. The King of Kings was a completely different person from the one who greeted me with a jeer on my first day at Derleth Academy. He’d let go of the need to please his father, and the desire to hurt others on his way to the top.

  Although not completely different. He still wanted to be first, to win.

  “Make way, move your ass, valedictorian coming through!” Quinn shoved his way through the crowd, parting the waters like Moses for me, Trey, Ayaz, Greg, Tillie, Andre, and Loretta.

  “You don’t know who the valedictorian is yet,” Courtney grumped.

  “Nope,” Quinn beamed. “But it’s going to be one of this lot.”

  The blank screen flicked to life. Students crowded forward, jostling each other for the best view. The list streamed past, starting at the bottom. Quinn’s name appeared quickly, and he hooted as if he’d won a grand prize. The screens kept flicking over, getting closer and closer to the top of the list. And still, my name didn’t appear. I held my breath as the final screen showed up, with the top five students listed in descending order.

  5. Greg Lambert

  4. Tillie Fairchild

  3. Ayaz Demir

  2. Trey Bloomberg

  At the top – me. Hazel Waite.

  Valedictorian of Miskatonic Prep.

  No fucking way.

  Trey’s eyes flicked over to me. Pride leaked through his voice. “You did it, Meat.”

  I couldn’t help the grin that spread across my face. “Not mad at me for beating you?”

  Trey shrugged. “I’ve realized there are more important things in life than being first.”

  Bodies tumbled against me, Greg and Ayaz and Quinn and Andre and Tillie hugged and yelled at once. I accepted their praise with a stiff smile plastered on my face. In reality, I didn’t give a shit. I wasn’t going to college, so what did it matter?

  I barely ate a mouthful at breakfast. The kitchen had put on a mountain of bacon especially for me, but it tasted like cardboard. All I could think about was graduation and what the parents might be planning. I kept coming back to Deborah’s warning about Honduran assassins.

  I think we’ve accounted for everything, but we’d be fools to underestimate Vincent.

  When I got sick of listening to ‘congratulations, Hazel!’ from students who’d done terrible things to me and my friends, I shoved the uneaten rolls and leftover cakes into my satchel. The boys did the same thing. We took them downstairs, where we had one last piece of our own plan to put in place.

  I swung open the door to my old room. The twin bed I’d slept in all those lonely nights rested against the wall, giving the room more floor space for our loot. Duffel bags and designer purses filled with cash were stacked in the corner nearly to the ceiling. A few random bills fluttered loose, settling across the floor.

  Our freedom stash. All the money the students would need to start their new lives.

  There was something else in the room, too – an old blackboard I’d had Trey and Quinn steal from one of the abandoned classrooms and bring here, along with a handful of chalk sticks. I hadn’t told them what I needed it for – I had a hunch, but I wasn’t sure it would work.

  I set my bag down in the middle of the floor and dumped out the food. The guys copied me. Bits of bacon and half-chewed bread slices rolled in the dust. I stood back to admire the pile, and behind it, the blackboard and stack of chalk we’d nicked from one of the abandoned classrooms.

  Scritch-scritch-scritch. The rats circled overhead, their curiosity piqued by the scent of food.

  I peered up at the ceiling. “You can come out. I’ve brought you a treat.”

  There was a rumble and a clatter, and the scritch of claws grew louder, more insistent. The rumble
became a chorus as more rats poured in from around the school, joining their brothers and sisters in a rapturous dance. One of the pipes crossing the ceiling jolted free, and an avalanche of rats toppled out. They fell upon the stack, tearing the napkins with their teeth to drag out the goodies inside, tiny brown bodies leaping and crawling over each other as they struggled for dominance.

  Quinn backed toward the door. I didn’t blame him – encountering all those rats in that tiny space was a bit disconcerting. But they’d been my friends and guardians ever since I arrived at school. I knew them. I knew their names. They wouldn’t hurt me.

  One of the rats stopped in front of me, its cheeks stuffed with cake. It clutched a piece of bacon between its claws and rose up on its haunches to present me with its treat.

  I laughed and patted its head. “That’s okay, I’ve had some already. I smuggled this out for you.”

  The rat king bowed graciously and nibbled on the meat.

  I held up a stick of chalk. “I got this for you, too. And a blackboard over there on the wall. I thought you might like to write something for me. But first, I’m going to tell you a story, and you can tell me if you think it’s any good.”

  The rat nodded, its little jaw working frantically at its bacon-y treat.

  “Okay, so a long long time ago, in a place called Salem, there were many innocent women and some men who were accused of being witches. It started with some young women desperate to avoid the wrath of their sanctimonious parents, and the fires of persecution, hysteria, and fanaticism turned their accusations into a travesty of justice. Nineteen were executed by hanging, all innocent, and their wretched souls were so angry they lingered on earth, terrifying the man who signed their death warrants. When the Reverend Parris succumbed to their torment and died, they moved on to punish his son for the sins of his father. They followed Parris from Salem to his new house on top of a wild peninsula, only instead of sending him quaking in terror, they ended up as sacrifices to his god.”

  The king rat stopped chewing. The bacon slid from its paws, clattering on the ground. Other rats turned toward me, ears and noses twitching. It was odd to see them reacting to my words, understanding English.

  They were never just rats.

  I continued. “When a witch named Rebecca cast her spell and killed Parris, the spirits became trapped here, unable to cross over and unable to leave the grounds. The sleeping god had no need of their energy, and so they lingered still, growing fainter and more sorrowful with every passing year. Parris’ home became a school, and after many more years, a young headmistress found the spirits lurking in the halls. Hungry for power and scientific discovery, she tried to turn these spirits into the god’s children. She sliced their souls into pieces and placed them inside the bodies of rats, thinking the rodents would go forth and multiply in great numbers, quickly overwhelming the earth with the god’s seed. But something happened when she tried to give the rats the final piece of the god’s soul. It didn’t work, because the god needed a certain type of vessel – a creature that related to his malevolence, and the rats knew nothing of this. So she found some other children, and left the spirits of the Salem witches trapped inside a colony of rats. And they’ve seen everything that’s gone on in this school. They’ve lived in the pipes and walls and watched as countless scholarship students cried themselves to sleep in this very room as the god’s children competed over who would break them first.

  “One day, a new girl comes along – she’s not like the others. She’s already broken, but she won’t give up. The rats think, ‘she’s our chance. If we can protect her, she might be able to free us.’ How’s the story so far?”

  The king rat held out his empty paws. I dropped a piece of chalk into them. He wrapped his arms around it and scrambled to the blackboard, where rats had already stacked themselves into a small tower. The king rat clambered over the bodies of his friends to stand in front of the blackboard. The chalk scratched as he dragged it over the surface, creating a message in shaky letters.

  YES

  WE ARE NOT RIGHT

  NOT REAL RATS

  BUT CAN’T PASS OVER

  SOULS BROKEN

  “Holy cosmic god,” Quinn whispered. “The souls of the Salem witches have been living in the walls of our school this whole time.”

  “You’re too clever for your own good, Ms. Valedictorian,” Ayaz added.

  The king rat’s nose twitched, begging me to continue.

  I knelt down beside the blackboard, so we were practically nose-to-nose. “We’re going to send the god back to his home. This will free the students of Miskatonic Prep, and I have an idea that I believe will free you, too. Your souls could cross over. But it’s not a guarantee. I’m not an expert at all this soul stuff. That’s why I wanted to talk to you. I want your consent. Do you understand?”

  The king rat nodded. Behind him, the rest of the rats copied the movement.

  Quinn giggled. “It looks like they’re all headbanging. Hey, Ayaz, put on your metal—”

  “Shhhh.” I extended a finger to the king rat. He placed his paw on top, a promise of his loyalty. “The senior Eldritch Club will show up at our graduation ceremony, and they’re planning to kill us all. If they succeed… well, let’s just say it’ll suck real bad. But we’ve got a plan. They’re expecting a fight, but they’re not expecting you.”

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  “Pass that comb, would you?” Quinn elbowed Trey in the ribs as he struggled in the mirror.

  Trey dumped the comb into Quinn’s hands. “Fine. I need to borrow your cologne.”

  “Why would you want his cologne?” Greg piped up, running gelled fingers through his hair. “Is the toilet water taken?”

  The boys laughed and joked as we got ready for graduation in Trey’s dorm. I could almost believe we were going to a normal school dance – at least, normal for fancy rich people. Dances at my old school were in the gymnasium with cheap fairy lights and music that was five years out of date.

  This dance was in a gym, sure, but Miskatonic Prep had spared no expense. With the god’s shadows and the rats gone from the gym, the smell had all but disappeared. Just to be safe, the decoration committee had been running the extractor fans full blast and doused the place in some chemical that neutralized the rotting flesh smell. Mostly. Unless you breathed in too deeply or stood in the same place too long.

  The decoration committee (headed by Courtney, because of course) were given an unlimited budget. Well, Courtney had commanded it, and Ms. West, now not showing her face in the school after what happened in the bathroom, had no choice but to obey. Students and maintenance staff worked together to tear out the old, rotting bleachers. Ayaz led a team of artists in dismantling old stage sets and repainting them with new scenes. I hadn’t seen the finished product yet, but I was told it looked amazing.

  And now, D-Day was upon us and we were going to look the part. Greg styled my hair to frame my face and dusted me with dramatic makeup. He made me close my eyes while he poked and prodded with pins and brushes. By the time he was done, I was so tenderized he could have served me with a nice pepper sauce. I had to admit, I looked damn fine.

  Trey slipped his arm in mine, his eyes drinking me in. The blush pink gown Greg found in the costume closet swirled around my ankles. Ayaz and Quinn made me a corsage from roses picked from the bushes lining the field, the pink perfectly matching my dress. Laughing, I lifted the hem to show them my knee-high striped socks and comfortable old Docs.

  “I’m finding it hard to believe that of all the possible choices, you wanted to wear those filthy shoes to the dance.” Trey looked as though he was trying hard not to laugh. He also looked fucking hot – his suit fit him to perfection, the sharp tailoring and long lapels accentuating his razor cheekbones and penetrating eyes. His green Miskatonic Prep tie matched my dress, and his dress shoes had been polished to a high shine. He’d never be caught dead in scuffed Docs.

  “These shoes are awesome,” I retorted. “If
they’ve been good enough to keep my feet warm and dry for three years, they’re good enough to dance in.”

  “Tell that to my ruined brogues.” Quinn lifted his foot to show the scuffs where I’d trod on his feet during our dance practice. Turns out ‘ballroom dancing’ was another lesson my year of prep school education had skipped over.

  “Not my fault if those things are so flimsy. I’m prepared for anything, including a small hurricane or a nuclear attack.” I whipped up my hem again to show them the knife down the side of my boot.

  “I’m prepared for anything, too.” Trey grinned as he whipped off his shoe to show me how he’d pre-bandaged his toes. “I figured, why wait until after you crushed them underfoot?”

  “You’re so fucking dicksome. Let’s go.” I grabbed my bag. Greg and Trey took one last look in the mirror while Ayaz twirled Tillie around the room and Quinn helped Loretta do up the laces on her dress. She’d chosen a red taffeta gown with a jeweled corset that made her look much older and more sophisticated. She beamed at me from across the room.

  I beamed back. Tonight was dangerous and things were likely to go down in a bad way. We had one shot to raise the pillar while all the parents were inside the sigil. Everything rode on my shoulders. But right now, I wasn’t thinking about it. I savored these moments with my Kings and my friends – committing each crude insult and silly dance move to memory. They were the last memories we’d ever share, and I intended to indulge every teenage fantasy I never knew I had.

  I was going to the dance with not one, but three hot dates.

  I held out my hands to my Kings. Trey took one arm, Quinn the other. Ayaz placed his warm fingers over my thigh. My Turk’s suit clung in all the right places, and with his dark hair and tattoos peeking out from his cuffs and collar, he looked less like a prep-school jerk and more like a brooding rockstar. His eyes bore into mine.

  In a white linen suit, with his sandy hair slicked back, Quinn looked like he’d be right at home on the deck of a private yacht in the Mediterranean. Not that I’d ever get to see the Mediterranean. But tonight, Quinn could transport me to places and nights I’d never dreamed of. If only he would smile that cheeky grin of his, my heart would soar.