by Ruby Vincent
“And one more thing. They’re not yours.” A smirk spread across my lips. “They’re mine.”
I got to bask in my glorious moment for another half of a second before Maverick grabbed my arm.
I yelped as I was unceremoniously thrown over his shoulder and carted out of the room.
“Uh, Maverick? I can walk.”
He ignored me. The other boys were right behind. I rode his shoulder all the way to the Knight Room where he dumped me on the couch.
“Explain,” Ryder demanded.
“Glady.” I told them everything. “Ace was pissed that I was with Ezra. They wanted to turn you all off of me for good.”
Jaxson came to my side. “Why didn’t you tell us?”
“What would you have done? I had two choices: strip or defy them. You couldn’t make it for me.”
“No,” Ezra spoke up. “You’re right, we couldn’t. But what do we do now? They are going to send the video to the police.”
“They might not release it.”
“How can you say that?” Ezra asked. “Why wouldn’t they?”
“Because you’re in it. All of you. They’ve only focused on me even though we’re all in that video. They want to keep us apart but I don’t believe they want to hurt you. They said you belong to them.”
“They said that because they’re insane,” Jaxson countered. “We don’t know who the hell that is or why they think they own us. We can’t predict what they will do.”
“What if it’s them.” Maverick drew my eye. “The Ace of Spades. The Spades believe they own everybody.”
I shook my head. “I don’t think you have a Spade on your tail. I think you have a stalker.”
“A stalker?”
“Yes. Someone followed you into the woods that day and was careful to keep themselves hidden. They won’t reveal who they are. They are creepily obsessed with keeping us a part. I don’t know what they will do now, but if this is about you, they won’t send that video to the police.”
“And what about you?” Ryder asked. He moved until he was directly in front of me. “If we have a stalker that is this determined, they will not be happy with what you did today. They could come up behind you and you wouldn’t know it was them.”
“Then let’s do something about that.” I got to my feet. “Yesterday, I took a picture of the phone box after I took mine out. The text from Ace was sent ten minutes before I got there. If Ace is a junior, their phone was locked in that box same as all of us, which means they have to be one of the people who took their phone before me. If we match the names to the student numbers; we’ll have a list of Ace suspects.”
Maverick goggled at me. “Val, that’s... brilliant.”
I smiled. “Yes, it is, and we can eliminate three people from the jump.”
“Airi, Natalie, and Isabella,” Ezra spoke up. “I broke their phones and none of them had time to replace it.”
“Exactly.”
Ryder sprang into action. “Val, get your phone. If Markham puts up a fuss, tell her that it’s Knight business. Jaxson, get the list of student numbers. Ezra, get Val some lunch. We’re ending this shit now.”
WHISPERS FOLLOWED ME the next day. I overheard Ace on the lips of everyone I passed by, but I was watching them as hard as they watched me. We had a list now. We were close to finding Ace. I could feel it.
Jaxson was waiting for me at my locker. There was no hiding now. Not after what I did.
I walked up and boldly kissed him on the lips. “You checking up on me?”
“You mean am I worried about you after you pissed off a psycho? Yes.”
“I didn’t have a choice.” I moved around him and reached for my lock. Arms snakes around my waist.
“I know you didn’t and I’m proud of you. No one gets to see that ass but me... and Maverick and Ezra and—”
I playfully bumped him. “I get it,” I said as I spun the dial.
“We don’t know what they’re going to do,” he said into my ear. “So I’ll be sticking close.”
“How close?”
“Very close.” His tongue darted out and licked me. “I should probably spend the night with you as well.”
“Good idea. Safety first.”
We giggled as I threw open my locker. I reached for my Chemistry textbook and something caught my eye. Time slowed down. Jaxson’s voice faded to a dull roar as I lifted my head and saw it.
Stuck to the top of my locker was a joker card.
“No...” he whispered. The horror in Jaxson’s voice didn’t scare me as much as his silence. He was speechless.
“Guys, look. She’s got the card.”
The words were a slap to the face. I sprung forward and ripped it down even though I knew it was too late.
No. No, please. Not again.
“Look at that.” Darren’s voice grated on my ears. “I guess we’re going in for round two. I wonder if you’ll survive—”
Jaxson moved so fast he blurred across my vision. One moment Darren was smirking at me and the next he was slammed against the locker.
“You listen up,” Jaxson snarled. “There is no round two. You or anyone else touches her; I’ll beat you so bad it’ll hurt to cry.”
Jaxson abruptly released him, letting him fall to the floor. “That goes for all of you! Consider it an order from the Knights! You got that?”
“Yes, Jaxson.”
The crowd broke apart, scurrying in every direction as they headed for class. I didn’t know what to do. The roaring was getting louder. A band constricted my chest—one I had not felt for a long time.
Eventually, I staggered to class. Jaxson was next to me but nothing he said was going in. It wasn’t until halfway through first period when Natalie shot me a triumphant smile that it hit me.
I was marked.
I made it through the rest of my morning classes by a miracle. My friends pounced on me the moment the bell rang for lunch. “You’re not going through this again, Val.” Sofia’s grip on my hand was tight. “If anyone tries to bully you, I’m kicking their ass.”
“Seconded.”
“Third.”
I shot the twins a smile over my shoulder. I think it was a smile anyway. It could have been a grimace. “Thanks, guys, but you should know right now that I’m not letting people hurt you because of me.”
“Fuck that,” said Kai.
That got another round of agreement.
I sighed. There was nothing I could do if they were determined to tell everyone they had my back, and part of me didn’t want to stop them. I could not go through this again.
Silence descended on the lunchroom when I stepped inside. I was really getting tired of that. But something that was different was the Knights all standing when I walked in.
“Listen up,” Jaxson bellowed although there was barely a sound. “By now you’ve heard about the card.”
Ezra stepped forward. “We did too and we want to make sure something is very clear.”
“Valentina Moon stays,” Maverick said. “No one touches her.”
Ryder’s voice carried through the room. “Because that card is a fake.”
“What?!”
That first shout broke the sound barrier and suddenly everyone was yelling. Through it all I didn’t look away from the Knights.
What are they doing?
“What do you mean the card is a fake?” Isabella demanded. “How do you know that?”
Ryder turned silver eyes on her. “A real mark is printed on special card stock. The joker is hand-painted and wearing the school colors. This card had none of that. It’s a fake most likely put out by the person blackmailing Valentina. They were relying on you idiots to not know the facts and go off at the sight of any joker card.”
Isabella flicked her hair over her shoulder. “If that’s true, show it to us. Let’s see if it’s fake.”
I saw the moment the light went out behind his eyes. Ryder stepped off the stage and advanced on Isabella. She took the ti
niest step back.
“Are you calling me a liar?”
I swear the temperature in the room plunged.
Isabella shook her head. “No, I— I just thought we could make sure this never happens again by showing people what a fake looks like.”
“You don’t need to know what a fake looks like. You just need to listen to me when I tell you it is.”
“Of course, Ryder.” She shrank under his gaze. “Sorry.”
He lifted his gaze and looked around at those watching. “Everyone got it?”
A chorus of yeses came back.
It took me a while to pick up my feet and join the lunch line. Was that it? Did the Knights truly end this nightmare before it could begin?
I gazed at them and as the line moved, I felt a rush of such powerful emotion that before I knew it, I was racing up the dais. Maverick stood to catch me as I threw myself in his arms.
“Thank you,” I whispered. “Thank you.”
His arms were strong, secure, and safe. “I’ll never let anyone hurt you again. I—”
“I love you.” The words spilled from my lips. I hadn’t known they were coming, but they felt right. They felt so right I said it again. “I love you, Maverick.”
The others watched us. I had words for them. I was going to tell and show each of them exactly how I felt. No more hiding. No more waiting for the right moment. No more being kept at arm’s length.
Ace had tried to take my Knights away from me. I would never let that happen. I would make them mine in every way.
THE ALARM CLOCK JOLTED me awake the next morning. My hand darted out of the covers and smacked the offending thing to the floor.
A laugh filled my ear as Maverick put his arm over my waist. “You can break my clock, but we still have to go to class.
“I don’t want to.” I twisted around and snuggled into his chest. “You’re a Knight. Get me out of classes today.”
“I wish I could.” He kissed my forehead. “But we’ve got a paper due.”
“Ugh. You’re a Knight. Get Coleman fired.”
The bed shook with his laugh. “Knights aren’t fairy godmothers. I can’t fix everything.”
“But you did fix one thing for me.” I tilted my head back to show him my smile. “We both know that card wasn’t a fake. I gambled and lost. Not only is Ace a psychopath and possibly a stalker; they are also a Spade.”
He pulled me closer. “I don’t care who the fuck they are. We’re not playing their game anymore. Getting people to doubt the mark was good, but I don’t think it ends here. Whatever happens next; this is war.”
Those words banged around in my head as we got dressed and left for homeroom. We walked hand in hand through the quad. I loved being public. Everything would change now.
As we went, my smile faded. I began to notice the looks we were getting.
“What’s going on?”
Maverick stopped dead, pulling me up short. “I don’t know,” he replied as one of the junior girls gave him a wide berth. “But something is up.”
We were a few feet away from Markham’s class when his phone went off.
“Yeah, Jaxson? What? Slow down. What are you talking about?” My alarm grew as his face went ashen. “But— But that’s not possible.”
“Maverick, what?” I grabbed his forearms. “What is it?”
Maverick pulled the phone away from his ear. I could still hear Jaxson’s voice coming through shouting unintelligibly about something.
“Val, we— We’ve been marked,” he forced out. “The Knights have all been marked.”
If you would like to get the final book, Unmasked, click here!
Unmasked
They are everything to me.
I love Jaxson, Ezra, Maverick, and Ryder the same and in vastly different ways all at once. It's a love that threatens to consume me. To take over every waking second of my final year...
...if only hidden enemies, ancient secret societies, and unsolved murders weren't also competing for my attention.
This will be my hardest term yet.
Not just for the horror of the present, but for the uncertainty of my future. How can I have a life with my knights when someone is determined that I don't survive my senior year at all?
But I will find them. I will expose them.
And by the end... only one will be left standing.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Ruby Vincent is a published author with many novels under her belt but now she's taking a fun foray into contemporary romance. She loves saucy heroines, bold alpha males, and weaving a tale where both get their happy ever after.
Copyright © 2019 by Ruby Vincent
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright holder.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.