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Chapter 7
Although Amelia kept her distance for the rest of the week, I always knew that she was close by, watching. Senior classes at Taylor Prep were significantly harder than they had been our junior year and I figured that everyone was trying to get into the swing of things before the shit really hit the fan.
Other people may have been more scared, but I was just planning ahead.
Once we made it to graduation I knew that I probably wouldn’t have to see any of these people ever again. For me, that was a gift, but it also meant that there was a timer on how long I had to handle everything with Amelia and the rest of the harpies.
I wasn’t about to let them graduate Taylor Prep without knowing what it felt like to be attacked. I didn’t tell the rogues or my two best friends what I was doing, but I made a list.
Amelia. Sara. Kelly.Those were the main ones, of course, but there were more.
Everyone who laughed when we were attacked by the harpies. Everyone who may have been working with the council to drive me out of school.
I wasn’t planning on leaving, and I sure as hell wasn’t okay with them making someone else pay the price so that I could get the education that I deserved. I just had to think, and that took time, but luckily I had plenty of it at night.
For a while, I stopped sleeping. It was easier for me to stretch out in bed and run through the list of people who had hurt me and had hurt my friends than it was for me to try to close my eyes and get some rest. While that meant that I was getting dark circles under my eyes, it also meant that I was awake when the shit really hit the fan in the middle of the night one night.
We’d been back at Taylor Prep for just one week. Boys weren’t allowed in the girls’ rooms, but Harper and Maggie had been hanging out until late. We all had huge projects to work on and sometimes just sharing space when studying made the whole ordeal less painful.
“You know,” Harper said, closing her laptop with a loud click, “chocolate cake sounds good, right? You girls want to get out of here next weekend and get some? I can have my mom make sure that we each have our own when we get to the house if you really want to indulge.”
Maggie sighed and threw herself back on her bed. “That sounds…amazing. Do you really think we could do it? I’ll get my parents to call in permission for me to go with you. Friday night.”
Harper nodded at her and then turned to me. I was stretched out on my bed, almost asleep but still trying to fight my way through a statistics problem. It was hopeless, and I tossed my notebook onto the floor. “I’m in. I’ll call my mom tomorrow, but now you guys have got to get out so we can all sleep.”
“You sure you’re getting any sleep, Rose?” Maggie looked concerned and leaned over me. “You’ve look exhausted since we all got back.” Reaching out, she ran her hand over my short hair. It felt good and I closed my eyes, then wrenched them back open before I could accidentally fall asleep without seeing them out.
I nodded at her and rolled over, pulling a blanket up my body. “I’m just having trouble sleeping,” I told them. “That’s all.”
Harper helped Maggie off of my bed. “Just be careful, Rose. You have to be refreshed if you’re going to make it through your classes and if you’re going to survive the harpies.”
Yeah, like they needed to tell me that. I waved at them as they left, locking the door behind themselves and turning off the light. I’d kept my curtains open so I could see the moonlight coming in my room. It played on the quad and made funny shadows, but at least it kept me entertained.
Except that night something wasn’t right. The shadows in the quad were moving, which is something that I hadn’t seen before.
“What in the world?” I sat up, pushing my blanket off of me and swung my legs out of bed. Trying to stay in the shadows, I crept to the window to look outside. Slowly I leaned over, peeking through the window, but I jerked my head back as quickly as possible when a huge rock came flying through the glass, splintering it and sending shards everywhere.
The sound of the glass shattering was so loud that I immediately gasped and covered my ears, shutting my eyes in fear. The glass shattered, huge chunks and tiny pieces flying into my room as the entire pane of glass slipped out of the frame and smashed to the floor.
The shards of glass flew all over my bed, some of them breaking apart so that they lodged into my arm. I screamed and jumped back, but not before hearing laughter and seeing two shadows run away.
It was Amelia. It had to be.
Before I could stop and think clearly, I knocked the rest of the glass out of my way and jumped out of the window. Since the window was so huge, there were only a few feet for me to jump to the ground, but I tumbled and fell, landing sideways on my ankle.
“Stop!” My voice echoed across the quad as I struggled back to my feet and started to chase after them. “Stop where you are! Who are you?” My ankle throbbed but I tried to run, hobbling after the people who had attacked me. I didn’t make it more than fifteen feet before I fell again, my ankle throbbing and hot under my touch.
“Shit, shit, shit.” I lightly touched it, jerking my fingers back with a hiss at the shooting pain. I glanced up but the two people running away were gone. “Shit. What do I do?”
A light in the room next to mine clicked on as I watched and I felt my stomach drop in horror as the curtains twitched open. Amelia stood there, backlit by her room, watching me. I knew that she could see me in the moonlight, and there wasn’t anything that I could do. I couldn’t get away from her and I couldn’t hide.
Even though I couldn’t see her eyes, I stared at her. I wasn’t afraid of her. In fact, I was coming for her.
* * *
“Iwas really hoping that you and I weren’t going to get to spend so much quality time together this year, Miss Bennett.” Mrs. Dimitri was examining my ankle and ignoring my gasps of pain. “Just thought that you’d go for a jog and ended up slipping? What in the world were you doing out of your bed so late last night?”
I’d managed to crawl back to my bedroom last night and haul myself up into the window without any help, but in the end, I’d texted Brett to let him know what had happened. I just wanted him to be aware, but all of the rogues ended up taking turns sitting in the quad outside my window last night to keep me safe. It should have made me feel better, but it actually made me a little more worried.
