We looked at each other for a long moment which acknowledged exactly how much we’d both wanted each other for that to happen. Needed each other. But that was over now. I didn’t screw girls twice and she was no different no matter how much my body wanted her to be.
“Well, Blake, that was fun,” Tatum said abruptly, giving me a smile which didn’t reach her eyes. “Thanks.”
She slapped my cheek twice in the most patronising gesture known to man but before I could get over my shock, she was gone.
I ground my teeth and fought against the urge to go after her as the door swung closed in my face but I managed to remain where I was.
Tatum Rivers had it coming anyway. And I could wait a little longer until she got it.
Blake Bowman had turned into the predictable fuckboy I’d been warned he was. For half a second I’d actually thought he was really into me. And as pitiful as it was to admit, I’d been into him for half a second too. It was stupid. I’d played around with boys like him before. I always stayed as unattached as they did. It was easy. I’d never once found myself hoping they might wanna see me again. But this time…shit. I was pretty sure I’d just been had by the number one player in the game.
How could he fake it so well? I’d practically felt his freaking soul connect to mine. But apparently that had all been in my head. It just hadn’t felt like it at the time…
I hurried out of Hazel House and walked along the path as quickly as I could.
Dammit, why couldn’t I be heading off to Louisiana, Texas or the middle of nowhere in Montana today? I was gonna have to front this out. Face Blake with as cold a front as he offered me. I was glad I’d clocked onto his royal dick routine before he’d kicked me out. My fast actions meant I’d left with my dignity intact at least. But my heart felt pretty busted up. Luckily, it was worn deep on the inside, so as long as I kept my mask firmly in place, no one was ever going to know that one of the Night Keepers had touched it.
Gah, why did he have to be so good in bed? My body was still humming from the throes of my last orgasm. I’d lost count of how many of them he’d given me, but I was certain it was a new PB.
I made it right up to the door of the girls’ accommodation before my luck ran out. A group of sophomores spilled out of Beech House, their eyes widening at the sight of me. I hadn’t looked in the mirror this morning, but I imagined I looked like Rapunzel if she’d been dragged behind a train for fifty miles then trampled by a horse.
I hitched on a smile, tipping an invisible hat to them as I swept through the middle of the group, my pulse rising.
“She disappeared with Blake Bowman last night,” one of them whispered and I lingered on the stairs as the door slowly swung closed, catching another one answering.
“That explains the I-survived-the-apocalypse look. At least he’ll be onto his next victim now, we’d better be ready girls!”
A twinge of jealousy tugged at my gut as I jogged upstairs. They were right. Blake was going to be onto his next conquest. Possibly as soon as tonight. I knew I was good in bed. Fucking mind-blowing in fact. So I had to wonder if it was just a power kick for Blake. Why settle with one girl when he could fuck his way through the entirety of campus and grow his sad little trophy display?
At least I was gonna sit at the top of it. Not that I wanted to be any kind of prize. But I wasn’t going to let this knock my confidence. In fact, give it a few days and I’d go hunting for new flesh myself. I wanted the taste of him off of me first though. Not to mention the smell of spiced cologne he’d imprinted me with, tangling with the lasting tones of the best sex of my life. Dammit, why did he have to be so good? How was I gonna find a guy to top him?
I made it to my room, slowly turning the key in the lock with the plan of not waking Mila so I could shower and slip back into bed for another half hour. I found the room empty and breathed a sigh of relief. She’d probably ended up in the boys’ accommodation too last night with Danny Harper. He was legit obsessed with her in the cutest way. Wherever she’d been at the party, he’d appeared, and that had made her light up like a Christmas tree.
I stripped off, pulling on a robe and grabbing a towel and my washbag before heading to the showers at the end of the hall. There were a few girls in there, but none of them paid me any attention as I stepped into a frosted glass shower unit and scrubbed Blake Bowman off of my body. There was an ache between my thighs which I didn’t think was gonna heal for days. The way he’d screwed me this morning had been brutal, the kind of rough that brought out the animal in me. And as soap slid over my body, I discovered his finger marks bruised into my hips. I released a sigh. It looked like he was gonna linger with me a while longer than I’d hoped. Dammit.
By the time I was back in my room, I had a headache the size of Utah setting in and I was dying for a bottle of full fat coke to take the edge off of my hangover.
Once my hair was dry and flowing down my back in soft waves and I’d hidden the bags under my eyes with concealer, I pulled on my uniform and checked the clock. I was late to breakfast, but there’d be enough time to eat. I’d make damn sure of that.
I opened up the app on my phone where I could order my meals and selected scrambled eggs on toast served with a large glass of coca cola. I wet my dry mouth as I salivated over that then headed out of the room.
I soon arrived outside the Redwood Dining Hall and felt myself slowing as I approached the double doors. This was it. I was gonna have to pull up my big girl panties and face down every whisper about me and Blake. He didn’t screw me anyway, I screwed him, so who cared?
The bigger deal was that I was gonna have to pretend like he meant nothing to me. That I was perfectly content to move on with my life and never speak to him again if I didn’t have to. The problem was, I could still feel his claws in me, sinking deeper. But hell if I was gonna let anyone in the world know that.
I lifted my chin, fixing on a casual expression and pushed through the door. A hushed silence fell over the dining hall as eyes turned my way. People actually elbowed their friends to point me out. It was a little extreme. Did everyone really care that much about Bowman’s sexcapades?
I located Mila across the room with her circle of friends and headed towards her, firmly keeping my gaze away from the Night Keepers’ table like it didn’t exist. I dropped into the empty seat beside her and a fishy smell wafted under my nose. I frowned as I looked at the weird red stew sitting in front of Mila then noticed everyone around the table had ordered the same thing.
Mila didn’t look up at me, instead stirring the stew with a tension in her posture that made concern inch into me.
“Are you alright? What’s with the stew? Is it fish Tuesdays or something?” It was about the last thing in the world I fancied eating even if I hadn’t been hanging. The smell was turning my stomach. It was gonna ruin my eggs and toast just by being present.
Mila turned to me while the rest of the table exchanged awkward glances and a sliver of ice slid down my spine. What the hell was going on?
“I’m so sorry, Tatum,” she breathed, barely loud enough for me to hear.
Before I could ask why, Saint Memphis’s voice boomed through the room. “Tatum Rivers, come up here,” he commanded.
I turned to look at him and the other two guys beside him. Blake’s expression was cold, distant and Kyan’s eyes were shadowed as he stared evenly back at me. Saint’s face was a picture of calm and that was somehow more frightening than the darkness seeping from the other two.
I didn’t move, my eyes skipping between them before I turned away from them and leaned back in my seat.
“I’m good,” I said offhandedly and I swear the whole room gasped. It was ridiculous. Had I broken some sacred Night Keeper vow by being late to breakfast or something?
“Come here, Tate,” Blake’s soft voice reached me and my heart leapt in my chest.
I turned to him again, his expression warmer now though I still sensed danger on the wind. Apparently everyone in this room had
turned to stone and I didn’t think they were gonna move again unless I played along with their leaders’ bullshit.
I huffed, pushing out of my seat and heading up to their table, my jaw grinding as I looked to Blake. The closer I got, the harder his features became and something in his eyes made my blood run cold.
Saint leaned forward in his seat, a cruel smile pulling at his mouth. Whatever was going on, he was in his element because of it. So I was sure it had to be something bad.
“Have I offended the mighty kings?” I asked dryly, but my heart juddered as the three of them stood up in unison.
My knees butted against the empty chair opposite Saint as I stopped moving, trying to keep my give-no-shits mask in place but hell, inside I was quaking. Something was wrong. Awfully, terribly wrong. And it had everything to do with me.
Saint lifted an iPad from beside his bowl of fish stew, flipping the black case open and twisting it around to show me something on the screen. A picture of my dad stared back at me. It was the one used on his lanyard for work, I’d seen it a thousand times.
My eyes tore across the headline above it and my whole world started cracking and splintering.
Virologist on the run after setting the Hades Virus loose around the world in unveiled conspiracy.
“What?” I shook my head in refusal as a laugh broke free of my chest. Was this some kind of stupid joke I didn’t get?
I reached for the iPad but Saint pocketed it before I could get close.
Confusion rattled through me as I tried to understand what was happening. The words of that headline sank in as the Night Keepers glared at me like I was their number one enemy. This wasn’t a joke. It was true. That article was real.
But Dad couldn’t have released that virus. He wouldn’t have. If they knew him at all, they’d never believe those lies.
My heart beat thundered in my ears and time seemed to slow as I stood in the wake of that news, fear blossoming in my gut. I needed to speak with him, to hear him deny it, swear he didn’t-
The cold, sickening splash of fish stew hit me square in the face and I gasped, stumbling back a step as I swiped it from my eyes in disgust. Blake sneered at me, tossing his now empty bowl onto the table with a clatter and my heart juddered in time with it.
“This bitch and her piece of shit father are responsible for the Hades Virus!” he bellowed to the room and I shook my head in horror.
“No!” I insisted but Saint threw his bowl next, the thick goop slapping against my chest and seeping down inside my uniform.
I backed up into a table as my heart collided with my throat and I desperately tried to find a way out of this nightmare.
The boy sitting in the seat I’d hit pushed out of his chair, knocking me back a few steps as he and the rest of his friends stood up with the disgusting stew in their hands.
“Don’t!” I tried to dodge it, but so much of the vile substance flew through the air I couldn’t avoid it. The backs of my legs hit the Night Keepers table and I heard Saint growling, “Do it,” before another bowl was poured straight over my head.
I cried out in horror, the stew stinging my eyes and making me gag and cough from the disgusting smell. I turned to find Kyan placing his empty bowl down. There was no light in his eyes, just a void. But it was nothing compared to the way Saint was looking at me. His eyes were burning with the fires of hell, his face illuminated by the cruelty, his lips turned up in the most evil of smiles.
I hunted for mercy in Blake’s eyes, but there was nothing but a hard wall of fury awaiting me in them. I wanted to beg and plead and force them to listen. But I knew no words could save me. They’d made up their minds. I was their enemy. The daughter of the man who’d unleashed a plague on the world. But it couldn’t be true. It just couldn’t be.
“Show her what you think of her!” Blake called to the room and a rush of movement made me flinch as bowl after bowl of cold stew was flung over me.
I started running, fleeing, my heart crashing against my chest as I fought to breathe through the suffocating odour. I could hardly see through the blinding red fog and my feet hooked over someone’s leg, tripping me so I fell sprawling to the ground. I did the only thing I could and curled up under the waterfall of fish chunks and sticky red sauce that washed over me, screaming and kicking as I tried to strike at anyone close enough to hit.
When the attack slowed, a new horror found me. My voice was being played through speakers all around the room, breathy and seductive. I recognised the words I’d spoken to Blake this morning when he’d come back from speaking with his father. But they’d been edited to make it sound like I was admitting something to him.
“Did you know about the things your father was doing?” Blake’s voice echoed out over the speakers.
“Daddy?... I knew.” It was my voice, but he’d edited the things I’d said to make it sound like I was answering questions which I’d never even heard him speak.
“And you knew he was going to do this to the world before you decided to hide away here at our school?” Blake asked angrily.
“Yeah. I knew the whole time.” I was practically panting as I said that and it was so fucking obvious to me that the whole thing had been put together, but the rest of the students didn’t seem to agree, booing and jeering as they swallowed the lies they were being fed. My heart felt like it was tearing down the middle and all I could see between the red stew which half blinded me was hate-filled faces and accusing glares.
That audio played over again to drive the lies home before the sound of me panting and crying out with an orgasm echoed off of the walls just to humiliate me more.
“You piece of trash!” someone shouted then a chorus of insults filled the room, drowning out the sounds of me and Blake having sex.
“Gutter whore!”
“Daddy fucker!”
“You worthless bitch!”
Worse than all of it was the icy laughter that carried from the Night Keepers’ table. I didn’t look their way as I pushed myself to my feet and stew slid off of my clothes, dripping onto the floor. I was shaking all over, my skin burning with embarrassment, shame, rage. I ran for the door again and this time I made it outside, dragging down the fresh air as I tried to fight the bile rising in my throat.
I raced for Beech House, not stopping for a second until I reached the showers on the third floor. I wrenched a door open to one of the units, tossing my phone out of my pocket before flipping the switch on and stepping under the powerful flow of water fully clothed.
By the time the pungent stew had washed from my eyes, I was crying, shock and dismay wracking through my body as I tried to process what had just happened.
I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think clearly, couldn’t process what the hell had just happened to me or how.
This can’t be real. It can’t be true.
I stripped out of my uniform and dropped to the bottom of the shower, hugging my legs to my chest as the water raced over my flesh and turned red as it washed away the stew before running down the drain. I ran my fingers over the rose-shaped scar on my forearm; if internal wounds left scars, I imagined my insides would be riddled with them soon.
I stayed there until the tears stopped flowing and the panic in my chest had started to ease. I was hated. Despised. The entire school were holding me responsible for the virus. But surely Dad didn’t do this? Why would he? We were well off, we didn’t need the money. The Apollo Company had paid him six figures a month.
My breathing finally started to slow and I pulled myself to my feet, the trembling of my body finally easing a fraction. I switched the shower off, wringing out my hair and abandoning my uniform as I stepped out of the unit and a cold resilience ran over me. I wouldn’t need it anymore. I wasn’t staying here. I hadn’t wanted to be here in the first place. If Dad really was on the run, I’d find him. Help him. He’d always been there for me and I wasn’t going to abandon him now when he was thrown to the wolves. There had to be an explanation for this. The n
ews had to be wrong.
I grabbed my phone and washed off the stew by the basin before heading to my room, having no towel to cover myself up. But no one was around and even if they had been, I didn’t think I could be any more humiliated than I already was.
I took a steadying breath as I headed into my room, hurriedly pulling on a pair of sweatpants and a sports bra before tugging a black hoodie over it. I threw all of my stuff into my suitcase as fast as I could then grabbed my backpack from where I’d stashed it under the bed and filled it with the last of my things. I took the letter I’d written to Jessica from my nightstand, tucking it carefully into the concealed pocket at the back of the pack to keep it safe, then shouldered the bag. I left my school books. I didn’t want any reminder of Everlake Preparatory and I could buy new ones for whatever school I ended up in next.
I tugged my suitcase along, heading out of the room and hurrying out of the building. I took my phone from my pocket as I walked in the direction of the main gate, bringing up the Uber app and tapping the button to get a lift. It started searching for rides as I upped my pace, making it past Aspen Halls and closing in on the gravel driveway that led out of this godforsaken place.
Screw all of them. I don’t need this shit. I just need my dad. That’s all I’ve ever needed.
The Uber app failed to find me a ride and I growled as I tried again, hunting the map for signs of any cars close by. There wasn’t one anywhere. I knew we were in the middle of nowhere, but this was taking the piss. I googled taxi services as I closed in on the gate, spotting Monroe standing by it talking to the guards beyond.
Just my damn luck.
Well he can’t do anything about me leaving. If I wanna go, I’ll go.
I clicked on the number for the top taxi firm and brought the phone to my ear. It went to an automated voicemail and I frowned as the woman spoke. “We’re sorry, but due to the new regulations enforced by the Governor of State, Troy Memphis, we can no longer provide our service. We value you as a customer and hope that-”
Kings of Quarantine: A Dark High School Bully Romance (Brutal Boys of Everlake Prep Book 1) Page 14