Come Out & Prey (Apex Academy Capers #1)
Just A Girl
Sighing, I look around my bedroom at the posters and decorations covering my walls. My obsession with pop music, musical theater, and high school rom-coms sickens my parents. They would prefer me to be into heavy metal and horror movies, like the other kids my age.
Being the only child in a family as prominent as mine is difficult when you don't fit the mold. My parents—like their parents and all my friends’ parents—are apex predators. Preds rule our world, and the division between us and prey is so severe that we regulate them to a completely different echelon of society. Prey shifters are weak and beneath our lofty abilities. The ruling class of elite predator families stretches back generations, and they’ve evolved into a bunch of assholes who only care about succession and greed.
My animal has not manifested yet, but it will soon enough. Luckily for me, none of my friends have manifested their inner animals, either. I'm part of the in-crowd at school, and my boyfriend, Todd, is the most popular guy in my class. While he and I aren’t officially engaged yet, we’ve talked about it enough that I know it’s only a matter of time before he puts a ring on my finger. I should be on top of the world, but I can't help but feel like my life just doesn't fit me the way it’s supposed to.
Every teenager wishes their life was different, but I dream of becoming an entirely different person. Not inside, mind, because I’m pretty comfortable with who I am. I don’t want to be part of this legacy, this society, or even this family. They are all focused on competing to be the richest, the deadliest, or the most powerful, and I want no part of it.
I walk over to my closet and pull out the outfit that I had chosen for my tour of Apex Academy. My mother hired her personal designers to create a custom school uniform for today and expects me to present the ‘appropriate’ image of the sole heir to a Council seat.
I hate having to pretend to be like them because I’m nothing like them.
Regardless, I pull on the short, pink pleated skirt, three quarter length sleeve blouse, knee socks, and Mary Janes that comprise the uniform for my exclusive private high school. Since I'm using a ‘college visit’ day to tour the Academy, I’m expected to represent Shifter Secondary as well.
Shifter Secondary is the most exclusive high school for unmanifested shifter teens on the East Coast. Unfortunately for me, it was not my parents’ first choice for my education. They hoped I'd follow in their footsteps by choosing to force my animal to emerge early. If I had done that, I could have attended Apex Academy Lower School .
I didn't have the stomach to use my body in that manner at fourteen.
Their heirs followed my lead, which made my mother and father furious and their hoity-toity council colleagues angry. My closest friends, the Heathers, also refused to force their animals to emerge, as did Todd and his friends. That was the first time the adults in our circle decided I was a bad influence. After that, I had to toe the line at every turn, ensuring that I followed all the strict rules and regulations that govern the heirs to council seats.
Everywhere I went, I had to dress in a manner befitting the next Drew to sit at the table. They forced me to take dance lessons, piano lessons, diction lessons, and other more humiliating tutorials to prepare for the day that I became a true predator. In our society, teenagers have no say in how we prepare for our animals to emerge.
Your parents make all the decisions, choose your friends, choose your mates, and decide every detail of your life down to what you eat every single day. At least, that's how it is in my family, because my mother is from the old world.
She came over from Slovenia when she was incredibly young and met my father on the society fundraiser circuit. Her idea of preparing her daughter for the future involves lessons in makeup, clothing, jewelry, and on how to keep your mate satisfied. Lucille is completely unconcerned about whether I end up happy, only that I attend to my council seat and my husband's needs .
Once I get dressed, I grab my vintage Vuitton bag and peek at the mirror for a last check before I head downstairs. I tuck my perfectly highlighted blonde tresses behind my ears, and the smokey eye and winged liner are on point with this year's fashion trends. I apply a quick swipe of cherry red lip gloss and open my mouth, inspecting my teeth to make sure they are pearly white. Even though once I develop threatening incisors or sharp fangs, something will inevitably cover them in blood, my parents want my smile to look like a toothpaste commercial.
It’s all such utter bullshit.
I take a deep breath and turn on my heel, heading for the door. I can already hear my parents yelling in a Scotch and vodka induced rage in the drawing room. It's only eleven thirty in the morning, for Hera’s sake.
Lucille and Bruno don't fuck around with cocktail hour. They are nicely sauced by ten a.m. every day, without exception. I can’t remember a time when my parents didn’t get drunk off their asses at an event or party, much less in our ‘home’. They liquor up and fight until they part for the day, and then start again once they arrive home from their daily commitments.
I brace for the barrage of criticism my mother will subject me to when I cross the threshold. Closing my eyes, I whisper words of encouragement to myself via lyrics to some of my favorite songs, desperately trying to hype myself up before she can tear me down.
“Delores! I hear you breathing at the top of the stairs, darling. Come down this instant and let your father and I inspect your presentation.”
My mother’s purr sounds friendly, but believe me, it’s not. I roll my eyes as I make my way down the stairs, knowing my mother won’t hesitate to send one of the staff if I don't acquiesce to her command. Most of their staff would gleefully jizz themselves with being chosen to drag me downstairs for inspection.
At this time of day, the only servant in the drawing room will be Matilda—my ex-nanny turned personal assistant—and that request would test her loyalties. As the only person in my household who has my back, I don't want to put her in that position, so I answer. “Yes, Lucille. I'm on my way.”
I’m not allowed to refer to her as ‘mother’ because it makes her feel old. ‘Lucille’ is always what I’ve called the woman who supposedly gave birth to me. I’d be tempted to disbelieve we shared any DNA at all if it weren’t for our similar bone structure. She’s about as nurturing as a rattlesnake, and if it weren’t for Matilda, I might have died as a child. If the kitchen staff whispers are accurate, I have to accept that my mother neglected to feed me much of the time.
“You coddle her far too much, Lucille,” my father growls. “As the heir to our family seat, Delores will come without being instructed to do so. We will not tolerate her insolence after her animal emerges. She will behave as I command or suffer the consequences.”
The last of Bruno’s rant echoes off the marble walls of the foyer as I step onto the hideously expensive, endangered teak floor. Schooling my features into the mask of indifference I wear whenever I have to deal with them, I enter their den of drunken fights with my spine steeled for an emotional assault.
“I apologize for my tardiness, Father. I only wished to perfect the image I will present during my tour of Apex Academy. I realize it is imperative I impress the Headmistress and her staff.”
The humanoid features of his face shift seamlessly, and the hungry crocodile inside of him gives me a toothy smirk. “You will impress them, daughter, or so help me… I’ll send you to Bloodstone Isle.”
My stomach drops like a stone as I barely suppress a shiver.
Bloodstone Isle is a reformatory school. It’s surrounded by spells and enchantments to prevent students from escaping—a feat that has only happened once in its one thousand years of existence. The most feared cat group in the shifter world—the Khan ambush—runs the school, and they’re rumored to consume errant students when the Council allows it.
It's the threat both rich and poor shifter parents used to keep their children in line. Wealthy parents like mine use it as a method of controlling any heirs that refuse to conform to the rigid structure of our society. Predators don’t value the lives of those who are weak, and they label heirs who refuse to take their rightful place at the top of the food chain weak. Everyone knows Bloodstone is full of criminals, miscreants, and psychos, and even they don’t seem to survive.
Bloodstone is a death sentence—pure and simple.
“Y-yes, Father. I understand,” I croak out. As if the pressure of touring my new school isn’t enough, now I worry the Dean will relay something to my parents that gets me shipped off to Death Island.
“Bruno, darling, if you scare her, she’ll frown. That causes wrinkles. Delores, chin up and smile for us.”
Swallowing the lump in my throat, I flash my mother my brightest smile. Her blood-red lips curve, and her leopard fangs burst free as she all but purrs. “I will not have you sullying the family name, Delores. It’s bad enough that your education gave you ideas about your value beyond breeding stock. You will take the seat on the Council when it is time, but the husband we select will control the business—as nature intended. Do you hear me?”
My eyes narrow briefly, and for what is possibly the millionth time this week alone, I nod at my mother to appease her temper. “Yes, Lucille.”
“Excellent!” The leopard fades as she claps her hands. “Matilda!”
The tiny woman steps up, her eyes wide behind her glasses. She’s a pred, but being the smaller size of hawk shifters puts her in the servant class. I believe she genuinely lives in fear of one or both of my parents deciding to eat her. “Yes, madam?”
“Fetch Bruiser. He will accompany Delores to the academy for her tour. Tell him to take the Escalade—it won’t do for her to arrive in a tiny car—it will draw attention to her extra weight. We must make an impression.”
Matilda nods, and I feel the fear radiating from her, and I don’t blame her. Bruiser is one of my parents’ bodyguards and our frequent chauffeur. He’s a Komodo dragon shifter and the house staff are terrified of him. It’s hard not to be, given that he prefers to play with his food, then eat it after it’s dead. The kitchen crew believes he ‘handled’ the gardener, who looked too long at my mother when I was ten. He disappeared without a trace.
Once Matilda scurries away, I watch my parents drink and bicker about their plans for the day. Bruno is going golfing with a congressman, and Lucille is going to the spa. We all know that both outings will include stops at the homes of their current pieces of ass for a quickie, but no one talks about it. The appearance of the loving couple has to be maintained, although neither of them has slept in the same room since I was a baby.
They don’t give a damn about fidelity; I learned that at an early age. Children often discover things they shouldn’t because adults discount their ability to understand the conversations happening around them.
I stopped keeping track of who they’re boning long ago, because I’d need an assistant to keep the affairs straight.
While my parents’ marriage is a sham, I remind myself that my boyfriend, Todd, isn’t like them. Yes, his parents only own half the live entertainment industry, but my father allows me to see Todd. The other parents will force the Heathers to accept an arranged betrothal, and I’m grateful I’m lucky enough to have found the perfect match on my own as my high school sweetheart.
“Delores, Bruiser is ready to escort you to Apex. He’s pulling the car around now,” the hawk shifter says softly.
Snapping out of my reverie, I smile at the trembling woman. Bruiser must have scared the living hell out of her. For no other reason than it amused him, I’m sure. He’s as much a brute as his name implies, and I don’t look forward to riding alone to the academy with him.
Something about that shifter gives me the creeps…