by Katie May
“Do you want me to come with?” Mason peers down at me, nothing but worry in his gaze. He doesn’t demand to come with me like some of the others might. He trusts my judgement—sometimes even more than I trust it.
“Yes, please,” I whisper, stretching my neck to kiss the stubble on his jaw. “I don’t know if I can handle this alone.”
“You’re Violet Dracula,” he says immediately. “You can do anything.”
I press my face to his shirt to hide my smile, his faith in me staggering and quite humbling.
“I was also thinking…” Mason trails off, and I can’t help but glance up at him, surprised to see his cheeks crimson. When he catches me staring, his blush deepens.
“Yeah?”
“With everything that just happened…and now someone breaking into your room…”
“Mason, spit it out.” I poke his bicep, only to have my finger swatted away and then grabbed and nibbled on. With my free hand, I aim a punch at his chest, but he captures my fist and kisses the corner of my lips. Relationship bliss, I tell ya.
“There’s an extra room at our house…” Once more, he trails off with a sheepish smile.
“Mason.” I sit upright, instantly alert. “Are you asking me to move in with you guys?”
“Only if you want to!” he assures me quickly. When he holds open his arms, I immediately lie against him once more, basking in his warmth. He always makes me feel so safe and cherished, as if his body will protect me from the world’s anger and bigotry.
“I don’t know,” I begin timidly. “Do the others even want me there?”
Mason snorts once, amusement in his voice. “I’m pretty sure Hux already designed a bedroom for you in shades of pink and black.”
“Well, if you all agree…” I twist my face until my smile is hidden by his flannel shirt. “Then, yes.”
“Really? You’ll move in with us?” He’s practically thrumming with excitement, his knees bouncing with barely-contained energy. I press a tender kiss to the top of his chest.
“God, this is so weird. It feels as if I just met you, but at the same time—”
“It feels as if you’ve known us forever,” he finishes, brushing back a strand of my unruly blonde hair. “Obviously, we will all be on our best behavior. Even Hux. You don’t have to see us if you don’t want to.”
“Of course I’ll want to see you.” I roll my eyes at him. “You guys are my boyfriends.”
“Boyfriends?” His lips tentatively touch my scalp before lowering to my forehead, leaving a trail of fire in their wake. “Is that what we are?”
“Is that what you want to be?” I fire back, heat suffusing my cheeks. Fuck, why did I just use the b-word? They’re my friends with sexy benefits. We never talked about partaking in an actual relationship.
“Violet Dracula.” Mason grips my chin to stare intently into my eyes. “I would be honored to call you my girlfriend.”
Our lips meet in a soft kiss. It’s innocent and pure, but it causes lightning to zip through my veins and fireworks to explode behind my eyes.
I don’t know what the future will hold, but I know that with these men by my side, I can accomplish anything.
WE PULL up in front of a corrugated iron warehouse. There are at least a dozen others sprouting in all directions like the spindly branches of a tree. They seem to stem from an unassuming building directly in the center, with a large, tin roof and a long row of dirty windows. All of the warehouses are spread intermittently down a curving dirt road, some mere feet away from each other, others spanning the length of a football field.
“Are you sure this is the place?” Mason asks anxiously as he peers in both directions.
“This is the address Dad gave me,” I answer, though I’m confused by this location as well.
My dad…
He prefers the finer things in life. Elegant restaurants, gothic mansions, five-tiered cakes. He would never be caught dead at a location such as this. Even standing in front of Mason’s car, my gorgon boyfriend beside me, unease skates down my spine like an ice cube.
Instead of disclosing to Mason my fears, I lean against the side of his car and cross my arms over my chest. The air is frigid, and in the nearby distance, a forest sweeps up and away, canvasing the hills in skeletal trees.
“Your father is a strange man,” Mason muses, removing a joint from his pocket and lighting up. I eye the fairy weed with utter distaste but choose to remain silent. It’s his choice; if he wants to destroy his lungs, so be it. Though a part of me is tempted to sneak into his room and flush his entire stash.
Noticing my look, Mason smiles sheepishly, puts it out, and immediately shoves the joint back into his shirt pocket.
“My dad is pretty weird,” I concede. “He once hid underneath my bed for ten days to try and scare me.”
Mason snorts, flashing me a coy smile. “Pinkie, you know you just ruined the horrifying image I once had of Dracula, right?”
I pull my jacket tighter around me in an attempt to curb the growing chill. Mason immediately pulls me underneath his arm, holding me to him. “He’s my dad. I’m the one person he doesn’t have to hide his true self from. And honestly? Dracula’s a scary motherfucker and a hard-ass, but he’s also funny. And witty. And he always wants the best for me. Sure, he’s a stone-cold murderer, but what parent isn’t?” I shrug once before turning my face and nuzzling Mason’s neck. “He’s my dad.”
We’re both silent for a long moment, lost in an embrace capable of melting glaciers, when Mason removes his arm and rests it above my head. This new position has his lean, muscular body towering over mine, making me feel dainty and small. Vulnerable.
“Pinkie…”
I turn my head away instantly, careful to keep my face bereft of emotion.
“I don’t want to talk about it. I told you.”
“I know you don’t, baby girl. But I just want you to be okay.”
Those words…
They tumble around in my brain and rattle my skull. Those seemingly innocent words are like the slash of a whip against my back, each consecutive hit drawing more and more blood.
“How the fuck can I be okay, Mason?” I ask, mouth twisting in a rictus sneer. “You don’t know what it’s like to be hated.” My hands tremble by my sides, and I ball them into fists to hide it. The pain is painted on my heart like a mural I can never scrub clean. It’s a tattoo, etched across the surface forever. “Everyone hates me, and not just my classmates. The entire world hates me. Everybody keeps asking me if I’m okay, but honestly? I’m a fucking mess. I was just violated, Mason. They touched me. They carved words into my skin. How the fuck am I supposed to look at myself in the mirror anymore? All I see is a trembling, broken girl who cried when she was confronted. I’m not a monster, and I don’t know how to be one. I’m weak and pathetic, and maybe I deserve what those assholes did—”
“Don’t fucking say that!” Mason cuts in, his face contorted in rage. “What those pieces of shit did to you was not your fault.” His eyes soften exponentially as he leans forward, cupping my chin with a tenderness contradicting the feral rage in his eyes. “It’s okay to cry. Hell, I would still be crying if that was me. But you don’t have to fight this battle alone anymore. There are haters in this world, sure, but there are also people who care about you immensely. People who will lay down their lives for you.” Eyes still ensnaring mine, he rests his forehead against my own. “I promise you, Violet, that I won’t let them hurt you again. I would rather stab my own eyes out than watch you go through this pain a second time.”
I sniffle, the enormity of my emotions for this man taking me by surprise. My throat closes, and I have to swallow multiple times—almost as if I’m swallowing the words that want to spring free. Instead of divulging my soul, I whisper, “When did you become so romantic?”
A wry grin curls up his lush lips. “When a beautiful vampire tripped into my life.”
Snorting, I push at his shoulder until he reluctantly parts
from me. “I did not trip.”
“You were on the floor when I saw you,” he points out.
“Because Vin shoved me,” I counter.
His eyes darken momentarily. “And I still need to beat the shit out of him for that.”
“I already did. With a slimy green arm. We’re good now.”
Mason snorts and wraps his arm once more around me. “You’re such a freak, Violet. But you’re my freak. My beautiful, perfect freak.”
“We’re only freaks because society doesn’t understand normal,” I point out helpfully, pressing up onto my tiptoes to kiss his cheek. My smile fades, tightening into a grim line. “Mason, I’m going to take this seriously.”
“Huh?” He lifts a brow, twisting his head to stare down at me.
“The Roaring. I’m going to train, and I’m going to win. I’m not going to allow fear to dictate what I do anymore.” The strength of my resolve startles even me. I’m tired of hiding in the shadows when my body craves the light. What those monsters did to me bent me irrevocably, but I’m still standing. Maybe I no longer have as many pieces, but that doesn’t mean I’m broken. The fire lingering just beneath my surface is still raging, strengthening to become an inferno.
“I’ll help in whatever way I can,” Mason vows immediately. He doesn’t tell me it’s stupid or dangerous. He doesn’t try to placate me. He knows that this is what I need to do to overcome my trauma. I need to stare in the mirror and be proud of the monster looking back at me, not hiding away in fear. Winning the Roaring? There’s no greater accomplishment than that in the monster world.
It’s time to grow some fucking ovaries and let the world know what I’m made of.
A ping from my phone interrupts my internal monologue. Frowning, I pull out my device and stare at the blinking text message on the screen.
Dad (Dracula) (Papa Bear) (Psychotic Murderer): I have to cancel. Sorry.
“Fuck,” I curse, staring intently at the words and willing them to change. Canceling once, I understand, but canceling twice? Something doesn’t add up.
“What’s wrong?” Mason asks, instantly on alert.
“My dad.” I hold up my phone so he can read the text. “He canceled.”
“He canceled before,” Mason points out. “Why is this any different?”
“I don’t know.”
Maybe I’m wrong, maybe this is just my dad being his normal, flaky self, but I can’t ignore the sliver of unease that embeds itself in my heart.
“Let’s just go home,” I tell Mason at last, unable to tear my gaze away from the words on the screen. They rub me the wrong way, but I can’t put my finger on what it is exactly. With a sigh, I toss my phone into the backseat of the car and enter through the passenger door. I’ll call my dad tomorrow, and then the next day, and then the next day, and then the next day. I’ll call until my fingers bleed and my voice goes hoarse.
He’ll give me answers, dammit. I won’t accept anything else.
CHAPTER 22
VIOLET
I spend the next week extensively training for the Roaring. Kernels of excitement appear in my stomach, intermingled with the dread and worry already there. I can’t ignore how excited I actually am for the games to begin.
“You need to be careful, Violet,” Vin hisses in the early morning sunlight as I drop down to do another set of twenty push-ups. My arms are shaking, and sweat coats my body like a second skin. “You don’t want to hurt yourself trying to keep up with us.”
He’s on one side of me with Jack on the other. Both men move fluidly as they do push-up after push-up with the other fifty competitors.
“I’ll have you know I’m super athletic,” I huff out between pants. “I do all my own stunts…never intentionally. But still, I do them. So, ha.”
On the twentieth push-up, my arms give out and my face collides with the grass, wet with morning dew. Laughter rings out from farther down the line of students, and I don’t have to look to know it’ll be Gills and Alex.
Mummy releases us for the day, and my men immediately jump to their feet, prepared to shower away today’s sweat and dirt. I remain on the ground, attempting to do a few more push-ups. Every muscle aches, though I don’t know if it’s from the push-ups today or the five-mile run we did yesterday.
“Violet,” Jack says gently. “Vi.”
“Just a few more,” I pant.
“Vi…”
“A couple more.”
Abruptly, a hand grabs the back of my shirt and drags me to my feet. My legs wobble, threatening to give out, but the hand holds me steady, pulling me against a sculpted chest.
“You’re working yourself too hard,” Vin grumbles in my ear. “I don’t want you to get sick or hurt yourself.”
“News flash, I hurt myself all the time. Just last night, I hurt myself after I tripped down the staircase in my dorm and face-planted into a potted plant,” I point out. Despite the guys’ protest, I’m still living in my dorm room. For now. I have every intention of moving out…after the Roaring is completed. I can’t afford to be distracted, and these men? They’re the biggest kind.
“Be sensible,” Vin hisses. “You can’t win the competition if you’re dead.” He gives me a long, eloquent look that says more than a thousand words, but I merely roll my eyes.
“I also can’t win if I choose donuts over running every day…which I still do, make no mistake. But a push-up and salad usually evens it out.” I shoulder away from the men and bend down to grab my water bottle, topped full with Jack’s blood. The assholes at school are still refusing to allow us to eat in the cafeteria, so I have to be creative.
The warm liquid leaves tingles in its wake, eliciting full-body goosebumps. Fuck, he tastes good.
As I pull the bottle away from my lips, I catch the men staring intently at the words on my arm, still red and ragged from the week earlier. Frankie has been working tirelessly on a balm designed to eliminate the scars, but I’m honestly not sure I want them gone anymore. They’re a reminder of what I’ve endured and what I’m still fighting for. Whenever I see those crude words burned onto my skin, anger swirls low in my stomach like a whirlpool. That anger grows and grows, until it’s the size of a tsunami seconds from cresting the shoreline. All this rage needs is an outlet.
I know the guys went searching for the monsters who did this to me, but so far, they’re shit out of luck. It’s like the ghoul and his friends disappeared into thin air. No one has heard from them since that fateful night, when my life was forever altered.
“Violet,” a soft voice inquires from behind me. I turn with a heavy sigh, unsurprised to see Cal. The rest of the guys stand a short distance away, murmuring amongst each other.
Of course, they’d send the one person I can’t possibly get mad at. He’s too freaking adorable.
“What, Cal? Are you going to tell me that I’m being stupid? That I’m pushing myself too hard? That I should focus my anger on other things?” I bite out, tone scathing. His eyes flash with pain before he quickly masks it.
“Not at all, actually.” He takes a step closer until his body blocks out the others. “You might find this hard to believe, but I understand what you’re going through.”
I snort cynically, giving him a lingering once-over. “You had words carved into your skin as well?”
“No.” He shakes his head sadly. “But I know what it’s like to be feared and hated because of what type of monster you are.”
Guilt instantly suffuses me as I stare into his golden-flecked eyes. A century of sadness peers back at me, swallowing me whole.
“Fuck, I’m sorry,” I say instantly, ducking my head.
“I didn’t even understand what was happening,” he continues. “One second, everything was normal, and the next, I was here. In the upper levels. Unable to interact with the rest of the world.” His tone is laced with pain—so much pain, that my heart aches for him. When he moves to sit on the ground, long legs extended, I don’t hesitate before sitting next to him, wrap
ping my pinkie around his.
“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to,” I whisper, gauging his reaction carefully. His beautiful face is tightened in pain, the lines around his mouth harsh and unforgiving. When he catches me staring, he flashes me a half-hearted smile that doesn’t reach his eyes.
“It’s fine,” he assures me. “If you’re going to be friends with a monster, you might as well know his story.” He glances towards the others, who are congregated beside one of the larger tombstones, far enough away where they can’t overhear our conversation but still close enough they can keep an eye on me. “I won’t tell you Barret’s story—that’s his choice—but I will tell you mine. If you want to hear it, that is.”
“Yes.” When he begins to fidget, I brush my pinkie over his lightly, stilling his movements. “But the same goes for you. You don’t have to tell me anything, Cal, if you don’t want to.”
Heaving out a breath, Cal runs his fingers through his wispy pink hair, the strands sticking out in all directions.
“The rumors are true, you know. About Cupid.” He snorts once. “Not about being a baby who wears diapers and shoots arrows. As you can see, I’m very much a grown-ass man.” With a dramatic flourish, he gestures towards his sculpted body that exudes raw sex. “As an incubus, I need lust to survive, but I’m also part fairy, believe it or not.” He gestures towards his red wings sprouting from his back. “Of the Summer Court, actually. And they? They require love.”
We’re both silent for a minute, listening to the melodic wind rattle the tree branches and caress the gravestones.
“So you’re half fairy and half incubus?” I question, staring at Cal in a newfound light. That would explain the wings. The only other incubus I know is Dimitri Gray, and unless I’m missing something, that man doesn’t have any on his body.
Not that I’ve seen his body naked.
Not that I’ve imagined it naked.
Naked Dimitri. Nope. Not going there.
“Correct.” He bites down on his lower lip. “I discovered early on that I could survive on either one—lust or love. I didn’t need both.” I watch in rapt fascination as he grabs a blade of grass and rubs it between his fingers, the gesture absent-minded.