Evergreen Academy - The Complete Series

by Ruby Vincent

  I wish that were true.

  Sofia pulled me up and queued the movie. I appreciated that we didn’t have to talk more because I didn’t know what to say. How did I tell her that I didn’t feel any better? How did I admit that Jaxson had been right? I thought that getting revenge would fix me, but if striking back at Ryder hadn’t done it, then how could I believe that Natalie or Isabella would?

  I’ll always feel this way. I rested my hand on my chest. Like I can’t breathe.

  THAT NIGHT I WENT TO the sports complex. I didn’t call Kane. I didn’t want him to know about my secret spot. I liked that it was a place that was just mine where no one could reach me.

  I sucked in a deep lungful of air as I stepped out onto the roof. The couch beckoned me and I spread myself on its cushions to look up at the stars.

  It’s crazy how beautiful it is up here. Don’t know how Sofia stumbled on this but I have no clue where I’d be without it.

  I don’t know how long I lay there, but it was long enough that I snapped out of my doze when I heard the creak of the door.

  “Oh, hey, Sofia.” I rubbed at my eyes. “I thought you said you had homework.”

  “How did you know?”

  I stilled, my hands pressed to my eyes as that voice slipped into my mind and wiped it blank with panic.

  “Ryder?” I lowered my hands, but my sight only confirmed what I didn’t want to be true. How did he find me?

  “Jaxson wasn’t good at it so I had Ezra follow you.”

  I hadn’t realized I had asked the question out loud. My lips were so numb I didn’t feel them move.

  “He told me you slipped in somewhere behind the gym... alone.” The door closed behind him with a click that reverberated in my soul. “I came back as quickly as I could.”

  “Why?”

  Ryder’s raven hair hung in clumps around his face and covered his eyes. He took a step and I swung my feet down and stood.

  “How did you know?” Ryder lifted his hand and I saw what he had been hiding behind his back. The paternity test stood stark between us. The thing that had started it all. “Tell me.”

  He took another step causing me to back up. This wasn’t good. Ryder’s voice was too calm. His movements too controlled. I didn’t know who this was.

  “Ryder, I get you’re upset, but—”

  “You knew about the will too.” He came closer. One, two, three steps, and me doing the same. “You knew it said that if a second heir stepped forward, they were entitled to everything. The homes, the business, the money, and not a cent left for me and Mom.

  “You knew.” Ryder moved into the light. It beat back the shadows on his face until I could see his eyes clearly. An unseen hand clamped my throat and squeezed. Dread surged through my veins. I always had the feeling that Ryder wanted to hurt me. In that moment, I knew that he did... I knew that he would. “Tell me how you knew.”

  “I’m not telling you.” I was proud of my voice for not shaking. “I’m especially not telling you on this roof while you’re having some kind of breakdown.” I steeled myself. “I’m leaving, Ryder. Move out of the way.”

  I took a step—just one—and his eyes flashed. I knew what he was going to do before he moved.

  “Ryder!”

  I tried to run but there was nowhere for me to go. Ryder was on me in seconds, grabbing my arms.

  “Get off!” I yanked out of his grasp and stumbled against the ledge. I fell down hard, and the momentum pushed me over. I screamed as gravity pulled at me until it was choked off by a gasp. Ryder’s fist closed on my collar.

  “P-pull me up! Pull me up!”

  My feet scrabbled for purchase. The tips of my shoes kicked against the roof, but couldn’t get footing. I clawed at Ryder, reaching for him.

  “Help me!”

  He didn’t move. All he had to do was open his hand and I would be gone. I wondered if he was thinking that as I looked into his eyes... and found nothing.

  No rage. No mercy. No fear. No sadness.

  The wind was blowing against my back, tugging and pushing me back over the side, but its strength wouldn’t be enough to carry me if he let go.

  I twisted my neck and peered down at the unforgiving drop. This was it. It would all end here.

  I guess I knew when I started this that it could only end one way. I wish I could say I would have done things differently, but the truth is, I wouldn’t have changed a thing.

  I swore they would all know my pain... and after this, I won’t know pain at all.

  Turning back, I let my eyes flutter shut and let go.

  “He raped me.”

  The hand on my collar twitched—only the slightest movement—but it spurred me on.

  “Benjamin Shea raped me... and not once.”

  “W-what?”

  I didn’t open my eyes. I couldn’t if I was going to do this. “He was having an affair with my mother. He’d come by the apartment at night to see her and after she f-f-fell asleep, he would c-come into my r-room.

  “He found out you weren’t his son and wanted a true heir. My mom was another in a long line of women he chose to make that happen, but after months she still wasn’t pregnant. None of them were.” Tears fell hot and fast down my cheeks. “He thought the problem was he was sleeping with old hags when what he really needed was fresh p-pussy. That’s what he said to me the first time he did it.”

  “V-Val... no.”

  “Yes!” I screeched. “He is how I knew. He told me e-e-everything.”

  I was gasping worse than ever. There was no air. All of it had been sucked from the night leaving me to die in a cold, empty vacuum. The grip on my throat squeezed and squeezed forcing the words back down. There was only one more thing I needed to say.

  “He told me... about the will,” I rasped. “He said... everything would go to his... biological son.” Chest heaving, I peeled my eyes open and met those silver-grays. “It was the last thing he s-said to me... before I killed him.”

  His eyes widened—fathomless orbs growing white around the edges, and then I was falling.

  Ryder disappeared as the stars filled my vision. At least their beauty would be the last thing I saw.

  Chapter Nine

  “Valentina!”

  I went swinging over the side. My legs flew up—

  —and were caught by two strong arms.

  The world blurred as I smacked into the side of the building. I hung upside down, screams ripping from my throat as I flailed desperately.

  “Ryder, help! Help!”

  A hard tug and I flew over the ledge. Ryder and I collapsed in a heap on the roof, both breathing so hard I could hear it over the roaring in my ears.

  The trouble breathing was part my own panic, but it could have also been due to Ryder. He clung to me so tightly, crushing me to his chest, I felt his pounding heart against my rib cage.

  “Are you okay? Are you okay?” I was not the only one panicking. “Fuck! Tell me you’re okay?”

  “I’m... okay.”

  Ryder put his hand on the back of my head. I panted against his neck as he pulled me closer. “I’m s-sorry. Fuck, I’m so sorry, Val.”

  I froze. He was what?

  I might have moved. Pulled away. Something. But overcooked noodles would have done a better job holding me up than my limbs would. I don’t know how long we lay there in the dark, but my breathing slowed by the time Ryder roused himself.

  Ryder pushed himself up and dragged us over to the couch. He propped me against it, then he fell back on my other side.

  “You almost killed me,” I stated. There was no heat or venom in the words. I said them as plainly as someone would say they had put butter on their toast.

  “You killed my father.” His tone matched mine.

  “I killed the man you thought was your father.”

  “How?”

  I kept my gaze fixed ahead. “You really want to know?”

  “Yes.”

  My brain couldn’t offer up a r
eason to lie to him, so I told him. “It wasn’t until after that I found out he was drugging my mom to keep her from stopping him. That night, he came over, and they had dinner. He poured her a glass of wine and looked at me while I did the dishes. I knew what he was going to do—knew it as my hand reached for the knife.”

  I took a shuddering breath and Ryder didn’t try to fill the silence. After a minute, I kept going. “I only wanted to scare him—make him leave me alone. I never thought I would use it.” The words were coming easier. “That night Mom was ripped out of a drugged sleep by stomach cramps. She heard what was going on and ran into my room. Mom pulled him off of me, but she was sick and he was too strong. He hit her. They struggled... and my lamp fell over and shattered. He held her down and reached for one of the shards, and before I knew it the knife was in my hand—”

  “That’s enough. You don’t have to say anymore.”

  That wasn’t what stopped me. What made the words die in my throat was the hand that reached across my lap and took mine.

  “You don’t have to say anymore,” he repeated.

  Looking down at our hands, I sighed. “Yes, I do. I opened this door. I can’t close it again.” I said that but it was a while before I continued. “Mom took me out of there after it happened. She bathed me and cleaned me up all the while saying ‘Everything is going to be okay. Mommy is going to make it okay. I promise.’

  “Then she put me in her bed. When I woke the next morning, the body was gone... and your mother was there.”

  Ryder jerked. The act went through our hands and shook me. “My mom?”

  “Yes, your mom.”

  “But that’s not—”

  “I wouldn’t start lying to you now,” I interrupted, and he fell silent. “She was sitting at the kitchen table with my mother like that was where she was meant to be. I don’t know what they talked about or what my mother said to get her there, but she told me she had taken care of the situation. Benjamin was gone, and she would see that I had everything I needed to have a normal life. A few weeks later, I found out I was pregnant.”

  I looked at him now. The fairy lights cast their glow on his sickly pale skin. Sick was the right word to use. Ryder clutched his stomach with the other hand like he was going to throw up. “P-pregnant?”

  “With Adam,” I finished. “Your mother came to me when she found out. She promised she would help me, she only wanted one thing.”

  He nodded—a slow, jerky movement. “The will.”

  “Growing in my belly was the baby that could destroy your entire lives. She said she would give me whatever I wanted if I never brought Adam forward as his son, which is something I would have agreed to for nothing at all.” My lips twisted. “I won’t have the world seeing him as Adam Shea—that bastard’s son. He is Adam Moon and that is who he will always be.

  “I told your mom as much, but she insisted. She said Benjamin had done so much evil, and that the best revenge was living happily in his wake. Only Adam and I would suffer as a teenage mom living in the projects. I still said no, but then she came back with that paternity test.”

  “My mom... gave you the test?”

  “She did. Caroline told me this wasn’t a bribe, it was trust. We were trusting each other to do what was best for our sons, and she was showing it by giving me the one thing that could ruin her. So she opened up a bank account and helped me get what I really wanted: entrance into this school. Kids from Wakefield go nowhere, but someone who graduates from here has their pick.”

  I looked hard at him as I said, “That’s why I’ll never leave. It was blood, and pain, and agony that brought me here, but it’s Adam that makes me stay. I’m going to give him the best life that I can.”

  “Okay.” He still wasn’t looking at me. I tried to pick out any sort of emotion on his face, but it was blank. What he was thinking, I couldn’t possibly begin to guess.

  “Don’t you want to say more than that?” I glanced down at our hands. “Ryder, I need you to say something.”

  He opened his mouth, and I braced myself for what was coming next.

  “My fa— Benjamin was a bastard anyway.”

  Ryder released my hand. I said nothing as he got to his feet and walked away, closing the door softly behind him.

  I’M NOT SURE WHAT I expected to happen after what Ryder and I went through on the roof, but whatever those hopes were, they were dashed. Weeks went by without him speaking to me, looking at me, breathing in my direction. I didn’t know how to feel about it except there was no edge to it. It didn’t seem like he was ignoring me, he simply didn’t know what to do any more than I did.

  That was fine at first, I was still reeling at having shared those things with him, but as one week became two, and then two became three, I accepted that I needed more than that. “My father was a bastard anyway,” was something I wholeheartedly agreed with, but I had to know how he felt. We had to talk.

  My revenge plan stalled as that thought consumed me. How was I going to get him to talk to me? I wish it was as simple as walking up to him, but no one got Ryder to do anything he didn’t want to do. I couldn’t make him be honest with me if he was determined this wall of silence remain.

  “There’s only one week left.”

  I tore myself out of my thoughts. “What?”

  Sofia grabbed my pillow and whacked me over the head. Getting away with visiting me the first time had made her bold, and she had taken to sneaking over after curfew. I told her not to risk it, but she’d ignore me and show up anyway.

  “You’ve been so out of it, Val. What’s up?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess I thought striking back against the Knights would feel better than this.”

  “Does that mean you want to forget about Isabella and Natalie?”

  “No, I— Ugh! I don’t know.” I smashed my face into the pillow, and soon felt Sofia’s hand on the back of my head.

  “I think rule number five can extend to this. Knowing when you’ve gone too far can also be knowing when you’ve had enough. Isabella and Natalie are sad little bullies obsessed with attention and they never deserved yours. Let them live their pathetic lives while we focus on who is really important—the Spades.”

  I lifted my head. “Who we will never find unless I can get Ryder to tell me what he knows. That’s just more reason why I need to talk to him.”

  “I wish you could.”

  “You know what... no.” I pushed myself up. “We can’t do this anymore. My life has been turned upside down and I’ve almost been killed twice. I’m going to make him talk to me.”

  “How are you going to do that?”

  I clambered off the bed. “I have no idea.”

  “At least you’ve thought it through.”

  Her sarcasm followed me into the closet but I waved it away. I grabbed the first thing I saw and pulled it on. I was going. I was doing this.

  “Do you want me to come with you?” she asked while I bent under the bed.

  “No, I have to do this myself.”

  I found my shoes, jammed them on my feet, and was out the door. I sped across campus, determination lighting a fire under me.

  He will talk to me. I’m not taking no for an answer. He will.

  I marched up to the sophomore dorms and burst through the doors.

  He will talk to me.

  The elevator dinged on the second floor... and that’s when reality hit me smack in the face. What the hell was I doing? Not only did I have no clue how I was going to get him to talk to me, I also didn’t know which room was his.

  I looked between 202 and 208 and chose at random. The door flew open a few minutes after my knock and Jaxson stood before me in nothing but a pair of boxers.

  “Valentina?” He looked as surprised to see me as I was to see him in his underwear.

  You’ve seen more than that. My cheeks heated up.

  “What are you doing here?” He gestured over his shoulder. “Did you want to come in?”

  “
No, I’m looking for Ryder. Which room is his?”

  He blinked. “Ryder? Ryder Eugene Shea? That Ryder?”

  “His middle name isn’t Eugene.”

  “Nah, but it pisses him off when I tell people it is.”

  I bit back a smile. How was he still making me laugh—even at a time like this?

  Jaxson pointed down the hall. “He’s 208.”

  “Thanks.” I turned to go.

  “Will you hit me up after? I wouldn’t mind another Saturday curled up in bed with you.”

  I stopped. “Jaxson, we talked about this.”

  “I can hold out hope that you’ve changed your mind.”

  “Not yet.” I picked up my feet and kept going.

  “Yet?” he called after me. “That means I have a chance.”

  Shaking my head, I hid another smile as I knocked on the right door. This wasn’t the time. I can’t think about my feelings for anyone else until I speak to—

  “Finally, Ezra.” A rush of steam came through the door as Ryder stepped into the entrance. A thick fluffy towel covered his head and face, matching perfectly with the one tied low on his waist. “I told you to bring my shaving cream back an hour ago.”

  —Ryder.

  “I don’t have shaving cream.” Ryder ripped the towel off his head. “But I hope I can still come in.”

  He gaped at me—face showing surprise like I had seen only once before. I stepped closer. “Can I come in?” I repeated.

  “Uh... yeah.” He quickly moved out of the way. “Go ahead.”

  I walked in, not stopping until I was in the middle of the room. Ryder’s room looked the same as my old one except where I had pictures of Adam and Mom, Ryder had photos of him and the Knights. My feet carried me to a frame on his nightstand. Ezra, Maverick, Jaxson, and Ryder smiled back at me. Their young faces fresh and adorable as they posed with their arms around each other, all in their junior prep school uniform.

  “One second.”

  I turned as Ryder disappeared into his bathroom. I’m really doing this. This is happening.

  I sat down in his desk chair and attempted to steady my nerves. I had told this guy I had been sexually assaulted, committed murder, and became a mother at fourteen. He knew every one of my deepest secrets, but deep down, I felt like I knew nothing about him.