A sweet, floral scent filled the air from the flowerbeds that lined the inner courtyard walls. A knotty oak sat centrally in the space, reaching up toward the school in all directions.
I’d planned to head straight for the ladies in the group, but Susie and Mia were with Braiden halfway across the quad area. They had spread a large sheet of butcher paper on the cement path. All three of them had headphones on while coloring in letters that read “Mia Acosta for Senior Class Huntress.” The rest of the guys sat on a picnic bench, deep in conversation.
“Looking good,” I called over, but the three didn’t hear me over their headphones.
Everyone else looked up, seeming shocked to see me. I hesitated a moment, thinking that maybe it would be better if I headed over to offer Susie and Mia my help. But, if I planned to be a part of the Bad Boys Club, avoiding them wouldn’t help my case. My heart climbed into my throat as I set my coffee cup on the picnic table. After a tense moment where everyone stared, Zack and Lucas both stood.
“How was your first week, Blondie?” Zack asked as he enfolded me in a hug.
As soon as Zack let go, Lucas was there, wrapping me up in a tight embrace. “You’re actually here. That is awesome.”
“I know. I guess we have opposite schedules so I can be in freshman PE. ”
“Mia told us.” Lucas scooted over and placed my coffee cup between him and Zack, and as soon as I sat down, I was squished in a Baldwin brother sandwich with Lucas’ arm over my shoulder and Zack leaning in on my other side.
Zack took a deep drink of his soda and then said, “You, me, Lucas, Aunt Pam, and your grandmother all have a date over at the Baldwin house this Sunday for dinner. Your nana wanted me to ask you if it’s okay to switch locations, so consider yourself asked.”
“Sounds awesome,” I said with a smile, but in my head, I was wondering if Justin and I would be kidnapping Nana before then. When I looked up at the group, I realized that everyone else at the table had fallen silent. They’d been excitedly chatting when I stepped out here, and then their convo just dropped off.
Well, that sucked.
“Did you hear about the guards chasing the scion this morning? We were just driving up.” Lucas said in a loud voice. “People are saying he attacked a student.”
“Yeah.” I held up a finger as I finished my bite. “He tried, but Mitch fought him off.”
That got everyone’s attention. All down the table, the guys were staring at me.
“What happened?” Richard asked from the end of the table. “Were you there?”
“Yeah. I was walking my dog Bailey behind the dorms early this morning when, I guess, a vampire scion broke into the grounds, impersonating one of the guards. Anyway, he pulled out a knife and Mitch Holter fought him and scared him off.”
“Is Mitch Holter another one of your boyfriends?” Patrick asked. From the moment I met him, Patrick found one reason or another to dislike me. First, he didn’t like that I would have an advantage over others at the trial. As soon as it was clear that I would be at a disadvantage, he hated me because there was a ridiculous rumor that I was the one who made Justin act cruelly to them last year. It wasn’t even logical. Now, he probably hated me because I was five foot six, or because I had blond hair. It didn’t matter. Patrick was someone who would forever look for reasons to hate me, and therefore, he wasn’t worth a second of my energy. Instead of responding, I finished my cup of coffee, sipping the warm brew slowly, as if it needed all of my concentration.
“Patrick, are you really so without personality that a person can tell you that they almost were murdered an hour ago, and you’d use it against them?” Richard asked before he wheeled his chair around the table. “I’m glad you’re safe. Blackburn gave me several campus maps. If you drop by my room sometime, you can use them to plan out safe routes around the dorm and campus.”
I climbed out of my seat to give Richard a hug. “Thanks. I already owe you like a world of favors. And, your anatomy class—when does that start?”
“Two weeks. It’s online through the local junior college.” He shrugged. “It’s not a big deal.”
Richard had asked me if I could help him with his Independent Study Human Anatomy class a couple of weeks ago and not mentioned it again. From what he said, his acceptance into his choice of university was contingent on him taking human anatomy, and Blackburn only offered Anatomy of Supernatural Species. Richard hadn’t mentioned it again, and I was getting the distinct feeling that he was the kind of person who felt much more comfortable doing favors than asking for them—we would have that in common.
“Well, I insist on helping you.”
He smirked. “How about we talk about that when you drop by my room for the maps? You know, Susie knows campus better than I do. I’ll go talk to her about it now.”
I suppressed the urge to roll my eyes and shake my head. Clearly, they were still going to use me as an excuse to get time together. It was fine. I wasn’t going to whistleblow on them, but Zack would figure it out eventually.
“Okay,” I said. “That would be nice. The whole thing was weird.”
“You sure do seem to attract a lot of trouble,” Richard added with a smile before wheeling down the path toward Susie.
“Maybe Zack should have called you Trouble instead of Blondie,” Lucas teased.
“Damn,” Zack said on a sigh. “See, that’s the problem with giving people nicknames before you really know them. You guys rushed me into this.”
“So, Mia wants to join the hunt to kill a vampire?” I asked carefully.
“Yeah, we all do,” Michael said from across from me.
“We drew straws, and we’re putting our nomination behind Lucas,” Zack said with a smile. “With Susie’s vote, Mia has enough friends outside of the group to nominate her.”
After he spoke, silence again fell among the group. Clearly, I was at ground zero for the cold front.
“You’re planning to hunt a vampire,” I said, turning to Lucas. “Aren’t you scared?”
“A little,” he said with a grin. “Hey, I wanted to ask you a favor. The way that Blackburn does this is that one person nominates the hunter or huntress and ten seniors need to vote for them to get in. My vote will count for myself, but as Susie’s voting for Mia, I’m just under the ten I need.” He squinted one eye and held his fingers an inch apart. “Is there any way that I could convince you to vote for me?”
My stomach dropped, and I tried to come up with a response, but I was drawing a blank. After everything Lucas did for me, I wanted to support him, even if it was supporting him in something that didn’t quite sit right with me, but the Hawthorn Group snatched my choice away.
After I sat there in silence for just a little bit too long, Patrick leaned across the picnic table and glared. “The BBC are voting for Lucas.” His words held a sharp edge to them. “You can vote for whoever you want.”
I ignored Patrick and turned to Lucas. “If someone is nominated, can they vote for someone other than themselves?”
His brow furrowed, like the question confused him. “I’m pretty sure that if you’re nominated, your vote automatically counts toward yourself.”
Guilt washed through me. Even though I knew that none of this Senior Huntress stuff was my fault, it didn’t feel that way. I swallowed hard. “So, as you guys already know, I have an internship at the Hawthorn Group, and Sebastian Holter wants me to jump through all these hoops for him in and out of school. He blackmailed his brother Mitch into following me around, so I basically can’t escape Sebastian anywhere. You see …” I pointed to the window wall behind us. On the other side, the Elites and several of the legacy students gathered around the three tables nearest the outside. Mitch sat at the window, and seeing us all looking back, he pointed to his eyes and then back at us.
“You have to be kidding me?” Patrick said. “Are you screwing all of them now?”
Zack pointed across the table at Patrick. “Watch yourself, Patrick. You’re my frie
nd, man, but you’re crossing a line saying that to any girl, but especially January. A big red line.”
Michael tapped the table. “Seconded.”
Charlie whispered, “Thirded.”
Patrick stood. “Well, she’s in their penthouse floor. They’re throwing money and internships at her like she’s someone they’re dying to impress. She’s handed a scholarship no one has ever had before. I have to say, if she’s not their girlfriend, then she’s…” he trailed off as his brow wrinkled. Then he plopped back into his seat, his jaw sagging open. “You’re one of them, aren’t you? You’re an Elite.”
“No.”
“Mia was looking for you. She said you got pulled out of PE and never came back to class. You’re in their Mystical Arts class, aren’t you?” His voice had lost all inflection, and the anger that I’d so recently seen in his eyes was replaced with something much colder.
“It’s ... I …” I stumbled over my words before I realized that they were going to find out no matter what. “Yeah, I’m in that class.”
“Now it all makes sense,” Patrick said as he watched me, his brown eyes hard as flint. “You’re one of the founding family bastards. That explains the perfect score and the fact that scions are trying to kill you. That explains why the Hawthorn Group invented a scholarship for you.” From the sound of his tone, the fact that he found a logical explanation didn’t make him like me any more.
It wasn’t the truth, but it sounded extremely plausible even to my own ears, and I couldn’t clarify. I shook my head, but I knew no one would believe my denial. “Right now, Sebastian Holter is taking an interest in me, and no one seems to think this is a good thing. It doesn’t feel like a good thing. He told me that he’s going to work me until my breaking point. Part of that is torturing me at school, I guess. So, even though I can’t do a single pull-up …” I waved my hand through the air. “Sebastian is blackmailing Mitch to get the Elites to put me in the Senior Hunt.”
Zack leaned away from me. “You’re serious?”
“Oh, I wouldn’t joke about something like that. I’m dying a little inside from having my PE class see my pathetic struggle. No part of me wants to hunt a vampire along with the top athletes in the school. I don’t have a choice but join the hunt though. Mitch basically told me that if I don’t go along with what Sebastian wants, my gracious benefactor is going to bring down the pain and not necessarily on me.”
“Who’s nominating you?” Lucas asked, and I could hear a wince in his voice.
I turned toward him. “Justin insists that he’s going to nominate me before Mitch gets the chance, though—I’m still not exactly sure what that means.”
Lucas nodded slowly with his dark brows raised. “You should be glad Mitch isn’t the one nominating you. Very glad, Trouble.”
“Trouble?”
These guys and their nicknames.
“I would have to agree with my less attractive identical twin here.” Zack leaned in. “Whoever nominates you carries the button that immobilizes the vampire if they’re going to kill you. You get disqualified and taken out of the hunt if you immobilize the vampire, but you need someone you trust with your life to be in the arena with you.”
“If Mitch nominated you …” Zack whistled and shook his head. “Death sentence. I’d volunteer to do it myself, but we need every BBC vote to get Lucas onto that stage.”
“Justin is insisting on it, so I’m probably at more risk of him immobilizing the vampire too soon rather than too late. And Lucas, I’m going to try to vote for you instead of myself.”
Lucas squeezed me to his side. “Don’t sweat it. And Mia and I will be right there beside you during the hunt. We’ll have your back.”
That didn’t make me feel any better about the whole thing. When I was injured hunting a vampire, I didn’t exactly want my friends to be close enough for me to bite them. I reminded myself that this was all for show. I wasn’t actually going to join the hunt. So, I managed a smile and said, “That sounds good.”
Patrick threw up his hands. “Unless the Elites are again finding some way to cheat the system, and Sebastian Holter just stacks the odds, so January kills the vampire.”
“He’s right. Shit’s rigged.” This came from one of the three members of the Bad Boys Club that I only spoke to during my initial interview and would be hard-pressed to pick out in a crowd. “How else did she get a perfect score?”
Anger surged in my belly as I turned to the guy I didn’t even know. “There were over two hundred alumni in my trial. How many were in your trial?”
The guy said nothing, and after twenty seconds, Zack said, “About forty.”
“Like that matters with an Elite,” the random guy sniped.
“I don’t need your approval, whoever the fuck you are. I’m here to be with my friends. If that’s not you, then fine.” Heat was rising in my chest, and tears were prickling in my eyes. “So, those guys are calling me hobo because I grew up in a condemned house, and you guys are treating me like I had everything handed to me because I’m in the mystical whatever class, and I’m just here, dodging fucking bullets wherever I go.” A tear slipped onto my cheek, and I scrubbed it away.
Lucas’s arm squeezed around me. “Hey, January, let’s get out of here, yeah?”
I felt like a blithering idiot as I stood with Lucas. Shame filled me for losing my temper and getting emotional, but at the same time, warmth bubbled up in my chest that Lucas, Zack, and Richard genuinely cared that I was upset. I had friends at my old school, but, between my home life and a year-long stint as a secret dhampir, I had felt the need to keep people at an arm’s distance for a while now. These guys were slipping past my walls.
Zack turned to the group at the table and said, “Now, I want you six to think about what you did.”
Michael raised his hands. “For the record, I think you have every right to be given things that you didn’t ask for, even if the guys at this table would betray their mother to get them.”
“Seconded,” Charlie whispered.
Zack paused. “You had this one chance to prove you were better than the way they treated us, fellas. You blew it.”
With that, we all headed across the courtyard.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Hours later, my nerves were still a wreck. I stood beside Susie, holding up a sign that said, “Mia Acosta for Senior Class Huntress” in purple, sparkly letters.
I’d searched for Justin before the rally, and then called and texted him, but I got nothing.
The sun had just ducked behind the large red awnings that encircled the school stadium, but the air still felt oppressively hot, and my uniform and hair stuck to my sweaty skin.
Cheers rose up around the crowd as several teachers crossed the turf, heading for a stage.
The area was far too small to be used for any mundane sports like football or soccer. The stadium looked like a high school version of a miniature coliseum with bleachers for seats. Thinking about gladiators, I couldn’t help but compare the four students I knew were going to join the senior hunt to myself. Between Mia, Lucas, Amber, and Mark, two were Elites, two were my friends, and all of them were close to a head taller than me and twice my weight in pure muscle.
Students filled half of the bleachers, sitting by year. In the senior section, there were at least ten different signs for various senior class hunt candidates.
“Hey ladies,” Zack said while slipping between Susie and me. He threw an arm over my shoulder and leaned in. “January, has Justin contacted you?”
I spun, startled at Zack’s serious tone and the fact that he called me January, not Blondie. “What’s up?”
His brow was furrowed and eyes troubled. “He hasn’t called you?”
I pulled my phone from my pocket and checked the phone app before shaking my head. When I glanced back into Zack’s expression, he looked even more worried. “Zack, what’s going on?”
“His mother called me. Mrs. Roberts was under the impression that he and I
were still close. I guess there are Hawthorn Group agents at her house trying to find Justin. There are hundreds of agents combing the academy, too. I just dodged through—”
The buzzing feed from the speakers interrupted Zack. “Hello, students,” Principal Chambers called through the microphone. “We’re going to start our rally, but first, is Justin Roberts here in attendance? Justin Roberts, are you here? Does anyone know anything about Justin Roberts’ whereabouts?”
Everyone in the crowd peered around.
I started to lift my hand when Zack grabbed my wrist and pulled it down.
“I saw him right before he left,” I whispered as my heartbeat stampeded in my chest. “Is he in danger? I was probably the last one to see him—”
Zack covered my mouth, shocking the hell out of me. “Come on.” He pointed down, gesturing for me to duck behind Mia’s banner. He pulled his hand away and widened his eyes at me. “The Hawthorn Group went to the Roberts’ to arrest Justin.”
I sat there in stunned silence for probably thirty seconds as the crowd murmured around us. “Arrest Justin? Why?”
“I haven’t talked to him in almost a year. I was going to ask you what he got himself into.”
“As far as I know, he’s been doing medical stuff for the Hawthorn Group.” I looked away as my mind raced. “He told me that he discovered something last night —something bad about Sebastian Holter.”
“Shit,” Zack whispered. “Well, the best thing we can do now is pretend like we don’t know anything until we figure out what’s going on.”
“I don’t know anything.” I stumbled over my words. “Justin refused to tell me.”
“Good.” Zack nodded sharply. “When they call you in for questioning, say that. Yeah?” He squeezed my shoulder. “We’re going to figure this out, but we have to be careful.”
I fisted my hand, only to realize that I’d been crinkling Mia’s sign. I smoothed it out and tried to keep my breath even.
“Guys,” Susie whispered as she peered down at us. “What’s going on?” Her confused brown gaze landed on me. “Do you know where Justin is?”
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