Grimmstead Academy: A Villainous Introduction

by Candace Wondrak

  Her body wasn’t warm, but still her touch ignited a fire deep within me that only she could put out. A hand moved to my face, turning my head so I stared into her dark eyes. Her lips parted, and the moment that mouth found mine, I gave in.

  There was no fighting it, no denying it.

  I tried to be strong, but in the end, I was as weak as the worst of them.

  Chapter Three – Felice

  I tried not to think about Lucien Grimmstead much after he left me in my room, mostly because he was my boss. Not sure if I would call him a headmaster since this place seemed to be an atypical academy, but for the lack of a better word, it’s kind of what he was.

  The intensity that man radiated…it was something else. I didn’t think I’d ever met anyone who made me both turned on and a bit fearful for my life. He seemed nice enough though, and that was all I could ask for.

  After he left, I heaved a sigh as I set my purse down on the bed. The room was bigger than my bedroom back home—and, I noticed, with further investigating—it had an attached bathroom. No shower, though, which was strange. Just a clawfoot tub and a vanity with a mirror set in the stone.

  Huh. Well, I supposed baths were relaxing, every once in a while. It was kind of weird to sit in your own filthy water, but I’d have to learn to ignore my first instincts when it came to baths. I’d have to learn to make do.

  The bedroom itself was stocked with wooden furniture, intricate carvings in each of them. It almost didn’t feel right, me taking this room, me sleeping in a bed that looked like it was taken straight out of whatever castle the rest of the building was from.

  You know what else was weird? I didn’t see any TVs. Since I’d be living here, that was…kind of a downer. Hmm. Maybe there was a TV in a common area or something. I still had yet to see the majority of the building, so who knew what else there’d be.

  I went to the bed, digging through my wet purse to pull out my phone. I was itching to change clothes, get out of these sopping wet ones, but I did agree to call my father and let him know I got here safely.

  My phone was in a waterproof case, so I wasn’t so much worried about that.

  I wiped its watery screen on the top comforter of the bed before unlocking it and scrolling through my contacts. I didn’t make it far when I noticed the teeny X in the top corner of the screen.

  There was no signal here? Not even a little bar? Huh. That was kind of weird, wasn’t it? I was almost certain I had signal while sitting in the back of the taxi.

  Lifting my phone in the air, I waved it around, as if trying to catch a stray wave; even half a bar would work. There’d be no internet connection, but all I needed to do was make a call, or even send a text. My father would hate the text, but if I couldn’t catch signal long enough to make the call, it would have to do.

  Darn. Even standing by the window didn’t help. This place was officially a dead zone, which kind of sucked. If there were no televisions around here, how was I supposed to occupy my time off if I couldn’t even log onto the internet through my phone? The days were going to be long and unbearable.

  I mean, it wasn’t like I had a bunch of friends I wanted to keep in touch with, but seeing the constant drama on Facebook was kind of fun.

  Another sigh left me as I set my phone down on the nightstand near the bed, a small wooden stand that had two tiny drawers and a lamp resting on top.

  The shirt clung to my chest, my pants dragging on the floor as I headed around the bed and went for my suitcases. Hopefully there were a few articles of clothing that hadn’t gotten soaked on my walk up to the building.

  That was probably hoping for too much, though. Today, luck just wasn’t on my side. For real, thank God for that black cat. If that cat hadn’t brought me to Lucien’s office, I probably would’ve wandered these halls forever. Getting lost was…not a concern before, but now that I was here, it was definitely going to be a problem.

  Most of the halls, from what I’d seen so far, looked the same.

  I laid the first suitcase flat on the floor, right beside the bed. Didn’t want to set it on top and have damp sheets to deal with on my first night here. There was enough space in the room anyways for both suitcases to lay on the floor near the bed and keep a large walkway around it to the bathroom.

  My fingers gripped the slick zipper, and I pulled it around, on my knees before the suitcases. Even my socks were wet, and there was nothing worse than wet socks. The moment I was able to throw back the top of the suitcase and stare at its contents, I froze.

  What I saw…

  What I saw wasn’t right.

  My suitcase was empty. Nothing at all was inside it, which I immediately thought was odd, because when I laid it down, it felt heavy, like it was full of my clothes…as it freaking should be.

  What? Who…it didn’t make sense.

  I reached a hand inside, feeling all around, for a moment hoping my eyes were playing tricks on me. I didn’t have a clue how my eyes would play such a realistic trick, but you never knew. The lighting in this place wasn’t the best.

  But there was nothing. I patted it down, all around, and found the suitcase was literally empty.

  “What the…” I trailed off before I swore—it was something I tried not to do. Father didn’t like it, not that he was here, but he was always in the back of my mind with his disapproving glares. I moved beside my other suitcase, hurriedly unzipping it only to find the exact same thing.

  It was gone. All gone.

  My jaw set. Was someone playing tricks on me? Was this some sort of hazing, a welcome to Grimmstead Academy thing? I would not have this. I didn’t play games. Plus, I was a bit annoyed being so soaked-through. Now was not the time to irritate me.

  Hoping I was wrong, and that whoever had moved my suitcases hadn’t stolen my clothes, I moved to the dresser, checking the drawers. Maybe they’d folded everything and put them away. I honestly didn’t think I’d been with Lucien that long, but maybe if they worked fast…

  The drawers had clothes in them all right—but they weren’t my clothes. Freshly-pressed socks and new pantyhose in one drawer, underwear and panties of all sorts in the next—the tags still on them, and even bras, new as well. And the weirdest part about it? The bras were my size, down to the cup and inch measurement.

  Okay, this all merited a what the hell, I thought.

  They were nice, too. Lacy. The kind of bras and underwear you could spend loads of money on accidentally. The kind of stuff you wore if you wanted to seduce someone.

  In the bottom drawer, there was even some new lingerie.

  I closed the drawer harshly, getting to my feet. This was not okay, not okay in the least. My feet drew me to the closet, and I yanked it open, expecting to see…well, at this point, I didn’t know. Something else. Something else that made me gasp in shock and wonder just what kind of mess I stepped into.

  But the closet, oddly, only had dresses in it. A muted grey color, long-sleeved, the fabric going down to the ankles. The same dress, over and over. Same size, too—mine. I took one out, holding the hanger and the dress as far from me as I could while studying it. Plain, modest. No cleavage would show. It would at least hide my black bra more than my wet shirt currently did.

  Yeah. No wet t-shirt contests for me, thanks.

  No one would take me seriously looking like a drowned rat, so I had to change. Apparently I’d be changing into this dress. My uniform, if I had to guess. My work clothes. And apparently my nightclothes too, since I didn’t see anything else in there besides that lingerie.

  Screw that.

  To say I was not happy as I tore off my wet clothes and left them on the floor would be an understatement. I didn’t know if Lucien had a hand in this, or if one of the academy’s students had done it under his nose, but either way, that man was getting an earful.

  Hopefully. If I didn’t wimp out before I found him. I wasn’t the type to often explode, I liked to think my patience was pretty good, but I was fuming now. Yes, I’d shown u
p unannounced, but surely they’d been expecting me. If this was how this was going to go, I didn’t know if I could take it.

  I peeled off everything that was wet, including my socks. My bra and panties…I kept on, hoping that the dress would help them dry. The dress seemed to be of a thicker material anyway, which was perfect for these cold halls, so I doubted the wetness would soak through. And if it did, there were like ten other dresses identical to this one still hanging in the closet.

  The dress was a bit tough for me to get on all by myself. The zipper was in the back, and it went from the waist to the back of my neck. It’d been a while since my arms got that kind of workout, and I was almost out of breath by the time I managed to zip it all the way up. Reaching from below to zip up, reaching over my shoulder, trying to nudge it further up…

  Yeah. Not something I looked forward to doing, especially if this was my uniform. Every single day. And then getting it off…just ugh. I’d rather not.

  Once the dress was on fully, I paused, glancing at myself in the full-length mirror in the corner of the room. The mirror sat in gilded wood, its surface flat and only a little bit dusty. My bare feet drew me closer, and I tilted my head, my wet hair falling over my eyes. Once the stray hair was tucked behind my ears, I studied myself.

  This dress looked super unflattering on the hanger, but…looking at it now, with a body in it, the dress was actually kind of nice. The color was still too muted, but there was an elegance to it I couldn’t deny. With my darker skin and eyes, I almost looked like a gothic princess, like this dress was made for me and me alone.

  My eyes dropped to study the bottom of the dress in the mirror. I blinked, and something in my peripherals changed. For a split-second there, just a quick, fleeting moment, I could’ve sworn the eyes of my reflection were all black. But when I lifted my gaze to stare at my face in the mirror, my normal eyes stared back at me, mimicking my expression.

  The small hairs on the back of my neck tingled. That was…weird. It was extra weird because those peculiarities never got to me. Some people believed in ghosts, in hauntings, but I didn’t. I watched all the horror and ghost movies that made my few friends not sleep at night without a problem.

  It was this place. Had to be. There was just some creep factor in the air. Maybe it was the weather outside, combined with my lack of a warm welcome. And then the thing with my clothes…

  Yeah. This place was weird.

  Definitely weird.

  I turned my back to the mirror, bending to get my boots back on. I felt too weird using the socks that were in the drawers, so for now I’d just go sockless. As I zipped them up, a chill swept over me, and I threw a look over my shoulder, expecting someone else to be there, watching me.

  Nothing but the mirror. Huh. Weird.

  I had the feeling that weird would soon be part of my normal vocabulary, if today was any indication of how the rest of my time here would go.

  Who knew if I could even take it? Who knew if I’d last long here? I sure as heck didn’t. All I wanted was to get away from my father and his knowing looks, to forget what I did…

  I might look like an innocent girl, but really, there was a darkness in me, just as there was in others. I did something no one could be proud of, but did I regret it? Yes and no. It was hard to regret something which I took so much glee in.

  But that was neither here nor there. First thing on my checklist was finding Lucien and demanding to know what happened to my clothes. I would wear this dress while working, but I wouldn’t be on the clock at all hours of the night—and if I was, that was not in the letter. He needed to be better about detailing his job descriptions.

  Once I was calm—as relatively calm as I could be, given the circumstances, and the lack of cellular connection here—I left my room. Lucien had told me to stay in it, but I was not a prisoner here. I was an employee. I deserved some respect, didn’t I?

  I marched right down the hall, leaving my door wide open. It wasn’t like I had much to steal, my clothes were already gone, and with no connection in this place, my phone was as useless to someone else as it was to me. I picked up the sides of my dress a bit as I headed down the grand staircase, rounding it to land on the first floor.

  I was pretty sure I remembered where his office was, but then again, in a maze like this, where every hall looked the same, I couldn’t be too sure.

  My feet took me to the left, and luckily enough for me, it was the right way. I went into his office, lifting my finger, about to accuse him of…well, something, but I never got the chance to speak the words, because Lucien wasn’t here.

  Right. He was gathering everyone else. I huffed, so not in the mood for these games.

  So far, I’d rank this place as one of the worst places to work. Not that I had many jobs to compare it to, but still. Pretty confident that this place sucked.

  Another sigh left me. Not even a full day here, and I was already sighing like a pro. This place might kill me.

  At least with the sigh, most of my annoyance went with it. As I gazed around the office, I was able to notice things I didn’t see before. For example, how old the books on his bookcases looked. Like, I’d known they were old, but I meant old old.

  And, yes, there was a difference.

  A lamp sat on his desk, the light on but low. Every few moments the world outside flashed with lightning, though I had yet to hear the thunder that accompanied it. An eerie atmosphere, but it didn’t particularly bother me. The cat was nowhere to be seen.

  I moved to the bookcase on my right, running a hand along the wood before the books on the shelf that was eye-level with me. Dusty, but beyond the dust, everything looked pretty clean. When I breathed in through my nose, I spelled the old leather of the books’ bindings, the old paper.

  I’d never seen a book older than myself before, and curiosity got the best of me. After all, this room was filled with them; what could all these ancient books possibly be about?

  My pointer finger rested on the spine of one, about to pull it out and see for myself, but an amused voice cut into the silent room like a knife, “I wouldn’t do that if I were you. Lucien is very particular when it comes to his things. He likes them a certain way.”

  Never had I torn my hand off something so fast; I felt like I was caught red-handed, about to do something really, really bad, when in reality I was only curious about a book. And not even that book in particular, just any book. Any freaking book here. It wasn’t like I was snooping or anything…

  All train of thought vanished the moment I turned to see the owner of the voice. A tall, slender fellow with a face made for portraits, handsome and beautiful at the same time. His blonde hair was messy and unkempt, a few inches long, the kind of hairdo someone had purposefully, trying to look rumpled and lazy. Crisp, clear blue eyes, the color of the waters in the Caribbean, the kind of color that warmed you up and made you think of hot summer days. His dark pants made his legs look even longer, his shirt untucked. Just a plain white shirt, though the sleeves were rolled up to his elbows.

  This man…was he a student here? He didn’t seem younger than me, and the way he sauntered over to my side with a swagger no one could match made me think he was a bit older.

  Once he stood less than two feet from me, his sapphire gaze dropped to my feet, slowly making their way up, taking in every curve my body had. Suddenly this dress didn’t feel like enough. Suddenly I felt like I stood there naked. Ridiculous, but…those eyes seemed to stare right through me.

  “So you’re the one they’re making such a big fuss about,” he spoke, his voice the kind of voice you could fall asleep to. The low, smooth confidence each word wavered in made me blush, even though what he said was nothing.

  This man was a stranger to me, and yet my body was heating up like he was my high school crush.

  This was definitely not a good sign.

  “You’re pretty,” he went on, unabashedly taking yet another step towards me, closing the distance between us as if we hadn’t
just met. Heck, I didn’t even know the guy’s name. He was very forward.

  Impossibly attractive, but very, very forward.

  His gaze traveled along my neck, landing on my mouth and staying there for a good long while. My cheeks flushed, and the blush only intensified when I noticed the top two buttons on his shirt were undone. He wore no shirt underneath, just his skin, which, by the look of it, was smooth and fit.

  “I like pretty things,” he added, slowly reaching up and touching a strand of my wet hair. “I wonder how much prettier you’ll be once you’re not soaked to the bone.” The man stood so close to me I could feel his breath on my face, and every urge in my body told me to move, to get out of the position I was in, but I couldn’t.

  This man…there was something entrancing about him, beyond his physical appearance. Something lyrical, almost tragic. He was handsome, almost too perfect-looking, and those eyes…those eyes stared right into my soul, pinning me to the bookcase behind me.

  I should’ve said I was not something to be had, that my prettiness did not automatically make me matter more than someone whose face wasn’t as attractive, but every single comeback I thought of died the moment his lips curled into a smirk.

  “Why don’t you and I skip dinner and get to know each other behind closed doors?” His arrogance knew no bounds apparently, to insist on such a forward thing, not to mention something vastly inappropriate.

  “You don’t even know my name,” I whispered, hating the fact that my body was responding to his in spite of my conscience telling me to push him away.

  The man cocked his head, and suddenly the hand that had touched my hair fell to my waist, touching my side gently, his fingers slow to curl around me and harden in their possessiveness. “I don’t need to. I told you I like pretty things.”

  Did this schtick work on other women? I was genuinely curious, and also slightly ashamed at myself for how a certain part of me burned.

  He leaned forward, and I was at least enough in control to turn my face away. The fingers on my waist tightened, gripping me almost too hard. His nose brushed against my ear as he whispered, “I don’t let pretty things walk by me anymore. I used to, but now there’s nothing stopping me from taking—”