I don’t let him.
“You fucking bitch,” he spits, and I let out a maniacal laugh.
“I warned you,” I sing, and jump to my feet, dusting off my leggings while I wait for him to stand. He seems dazed, and he staggers to his feet, swaying a little before he regains his balance.
“That all you got, pretty boy?”
He spits blood to the floor before he lunges for me, but I sidestep him before he can reach me and spin around to face him. He’s glowering at me now, and it sends a chill up my spine.
Huh.
That’s never happened in a fight before.
Before I can think too much of it, he pounces again, this time catching me off guard and sending me careening backwards to the floor before landing on top of me with a thud. I lift my knee, catching him right in the balls, and he winces before rolling off of me. I climb back on him once more, and he’s no longer the asshole of the school.
He’s no longer Cole Aston.
He’s just some dickhead who picked a fight with the wrong person.
I rain down hit after hit on him, barely even seeing him.
Barely seeing where I’m hitting.
Just feeling the flesh against flesh.
Just feeling the pain in my knuckles.
Just feeling the freedom that I feel whenever I get in this headspace.
But it’s over far too soon.
A hand locks around my waist and pulls me from the floor, making me blink back to the present, and I grunt, trying to figure out what the fuck is happening.
That is, until I see a bloody and bruised pretty boy staring at me.
No malice in his gaze, no anger, just understanding.
The foreign feeling of guilt stirs within me, a whirlwind of emotions bubbling close to the surface as I stare at him in silent apology.
And I think it makes me hate him even more.
SEVENTEEN
LANA
The days after my fight with Cole pass slowly. I barely leave my room, not wanting to see him or anyone else. Not even bothering to attend classes.
I don’t actually need classes, since I technically already completed my…degreelast year. These students think their private education is the best of the best, but it’s nothing compared to what I grew up around. Only, that isn’t my life anymore. I’m just expected to go on the run for now and cultivate myself to fit in with normal people, when I’m the furthest thing from normal you can get.
It’s been six months since everything went down and my dad ended up losing his life to protect my own. That was just my dad, though, always putting himself on the line and in danger for me. Ever since he laid eyes on me at the age of three, he looked out for me, took me under his wing and treated me like his own. We may not have shared blood, but we were family in all the ways that mattered.
And now, I’m alone in this godforsaken world with no one to turn to, no one to confide in, and it’s starting to take its toll.I have Uncle Dare, of course—sorry,the dean—but things aren’t the same anymore. Hell, I’ve never really had friends my own age, since everyone in the academy was older than me when I joined, and then I just became that anomaly that lived there. When everyone else would go home to their families on breaks, I was the one who stuck out. No one wanted to get too close to me out of fear of my father, and I really don’t blame them. And then there’s also the fact that I was the only girl… that didn’t exactly help things.
I’d always had my dad there to talk to when things got too much, but now I have to try and navigate it on my own. I’m still not even sure where I’m going to go when I’m done with Blackwater.
I always thought he was paranoid, like he was planning for doomsday. Only, doomsday actually came. Now I’m here, trying to claw my way out of the aftermath, and the longer I stay here, the less likely I am to make it out alive.
If I was a man, I wouldn’t be in this position, because I’d have my father’s men behind me, but our connections ended the moment my dad took his last breath. Fucking misogynistic assholes. There have only ever been two people who’ve ever seen me as an equal. One is dead, the other is the dean of my new hell.
