Chapter Twenty Four
“Damon Salvatore, for one!”
I shook my head at Kate, and rolled over onto my back staring up at my ceiling.
“Who’s he?
She turned onto her front looking at me with such an expression of shock and horror that I giggled.
“He’s in the Vampire Diaries! Brooding hot bad boy. He’s the one everyone swoons over.”
I rolled my eyes. “He”s fictional.”
“It doesn’t matter, Paige I’m telling you, bad boys are the ones every girl wants. And you have some major bad boy action going on here.”
I had confided in Kate as to what had happened the night of the ball, as she’d been in a panic the next day when I hadn’t turned up till ten in the morning, still dressed in my goddess costume. I’d told her it had been some initiation thing for the club, and I’d been taken to a secret party, and then fallen asleep in one of the spare rooms and been brought back to the dorms by Bast the next day. I’d left out the minor details of the five orgasms I’d had during that time, especially the public ones. There were things even girls didn’t need to talk about, and although I was sure she wouldn’t, a tiny part of me was worried she’d judge me for it, or the guys. I found myself feeling strangely protective of them. Having spent time with them, I was now convinced they hadn’t realised I was completely unaware of what was going on, and they’d all been trying to make it up to me since. There hadn’t been any more orgasms since then though, and I wasn’t sure whether I was glad about that or disappointed.
“They aren’t really bad boys though, are they?” I asked, toying with the picture of Snoopy on the front of my fleecy pyjama top. It was Saturday and we were having a lazy morning, so neither of us were dressed yet. Kate had brought orange juice and pastries the day before, so it had been a nice start to the morning.
“They definitely have the vibe,” Kate argued. “Though maybe not Tristan.”
“What vibe? They’re entitled rich boys, Kate. The only thing dark about them so far is the colour of their armani suits.”
”Armani suits and secrets, don”t forget those,” she quipped, reaching out for her cooling coffee on the bedside table. ”All those secret societies, secret parties, secret initiations. That”s pretty dark if you ask me.”
I sighed heavily, clutching my pillow closer to my chest. ”Yeah, I guess you”re right about the secrets. But that doesn”t make them bad. Just... mysterious.”
“I don’t know, Bast comes across like he could run the damn mafia single handed, and that mountain of muscle…Nate?” Kate shivered dramatically. “I mean, he’s hot, with all those tattoos and that brooding silence, but there’s rumours about him that don’t involve a board room, Paige.”
“Like what?”
“Like, how’s he’s into fighting, you know, like MMA and stuff.”
“Well, he likes to keep fit,” I said, not really sure why I was suddenly defending a guy I barely knew.
“Yes, but the rumour is that he’s into illegal cage fighting and that last year he put a guy in hospital for months.”
I didn’t respond to that. Although Nate had been caring and gentle with me, I had watched him when he was working out, and the guy was incredibly strong. Not only that, but he definitely had this tough guy aura about him. Most guys in the school never went anywhere near him and he was treated with respect bordering on deference. All the guys were, but with Nate I had definitely noticed an element of fear.
“I don’t know what to do, Kate. I agreed to play this role for the rest of the year, I can”t back out now. Plus, they’re paying me, it’s more of a job than anything else.” I didn”t mention that I wouldn”t be getting paid till the end of the year, if I agreed to this, and Bast hadn”t actually said how much it would be. I felt dirty asking him. Hey, how much do I get paid to fuck you and your friends all year and perform lewd rituals in front of your society members? Maybe not.
Kate looked serious. “Just keep your head, ok. All those rich boys and their promises, and remember something else - the rules don’t apply to them. They get caught doing something they shouldn’t, Daddy pays the big shot lawyer to get the charges dropped. If someone hurts you Paige, they won’t get punished for it.”
A knock sounded on the door, and I slid off the bed, shoving my feet into my fluffy duck feet slippers. “No one is going to hurt me, Kate. Tristan wouldn’t let them.”
“Oh, Tristan again?” Kate grinned up at me. “I think you like him a lot.”
“He’s very nice,” I conceded, unlocking the door and opening it. There was no one out there, just a cardboard box with my name on top. My heart fluttered a little. Tristan had sent me a few little gifts over the last couple of weeks, like a good quality paintbrush set I could use instead of the ones belonging to the art room, and a new sketchbook when I complained mine was filling up. I picked up the box and headed back into the room, sitting back on my bed. Kate sat up.
“What has he sent you now? Honestly, it must be hard having a rich boyfriend. Maybe I should join this club.”
“He’s not my boyfriend,” I said, smiling as I opened the top of the box. My smile faded as I took in what it held.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing, it’s just… I don’t think this is from Tristan.” I reached into the box and lifted out a cheap plastic doll. It was a toy, a man with brown hair dressed in a black hoodie, blue jeans and white trainers, and there was a knife sticking out of its chest. My fingers felt sticky and I dropped it back into the box, staring in horror at the red coating my fingers.
“What the fuck - Paige, is that blood?” Kate launched herself off the bed to grab at my wrist.
“No, it”s not, it’s…” I sniffed at my hand. “It”s just red paint. Why the fuck would someone send me this?”
“There’s a letter at the bottom,” Kate pointed out.
I fished it out, trying not to get more paint on my hands, and my chest tightened at the crimson colour of the envelope. “It’s from the person who puts the letters under the door, Kate.”
“What does it say?”
I opened it, my hands shaking. “It says… You’re mine. Be careful. I don’t like people touching what’s mine.”
“Who on earth would send you that?”
I shook my head. “I have no idea, but Kate… these are the clothes Tristan was wearing when we went out for pizza on Wednesday. What if whoever sent this, what if they try and hurt him?” Tristan’s easy smile and warm eyes flashed into my mind, and I felt cold and sick at the idea of him getting hurt because of me.
“I’m more worried about you,” Kate said. “Paige, you said there were three guys who were part of this role of yours - do you think maybe one of them is getting a little too into it?”
I thought about it for a moment. Bast would never do this. He was too direct, he wouldn’t send anonymous letters. He’d tell me to my face. But Nate? He hardly ever spoke and I barely knew him. Was he capable of this? If the rumours Kate had told me were true, he was certainly violent, but was he this sick and twisted? I didn’t think so, but I couldn’t know for sure. There was also the possibility that these letters were being sent by the person who’d set me up for persephone, but that didn’t make sense either, because that would lead to me being touched by someone else. Why set that up and then get angry at me for it?
“I don’t know, Kate,” I finally answered. ”I don”t think so, but you’re right, I don”t really know these guys at all. What if it was one of them?”
“Then we need to find out who,” answered Kate. She grabbed her laptop off the desk, and planted herself next to me again, opening it up.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Research,” she replied. “These guys might be able to get away with murder, but there’s still new stories and blogs and rumours online. They can’t hide everything. If there’s anything suspicious in their past, we’ll find it. Give me a girl researching her friend’s new boyfriend over a standard hacker any day.”
I watched as Kate”s fingers danced across the keyboard, the blueish glare from the screen illuminating her face. Her eyes flicked over page after page - news articles, social media posts, photographs. As we expected, there was a lot online about the three of them, but it was mainly general knowledge.
“Sebastian Blake, age 24, currently studying a PHD in International Business at Blackvellyn. Son of Edward Blake, billionaire business mogul,” said Kate. “There’s plenty about the business side, including how he’s being groomed to follow in his father’s footsteps, and then the normal social stuff… apparently he rarely takes the same girl to different events. likes to play the field…”
I looked at the picture of Bast at a recent film premiere in London, his arm around a striking brunette in a gold dress. She definitely looked more his type, tall, willowy, polished, and I wondered again why he’d picked me for the Persephone role when lots of other girls had applied, probably who looked a lot more like his date than me. Not for the first time did I seriously reconsider what I’d agreed to. I should call him and call it off, but even as I considered it, the memory of Bast in that bedroom with me, sitting at the vanity while he licked my pussy, had my body strongly against the idea of backing out. Ever since that night, I”d been unable to get the three of them out of my head, and some dark, wanton part of me I hadn’t even known existed, was less apprehensive and more impatient for the next trial I would have to face. I shoved the thought away and the excitement that sparked inside me at the thought of what Bast might have prepared for me.
“It’s not Tristan, cause why would he make a threat towards himself about himself taking me out for dinner,” I pointed out trying to distract myself. “So that leaves Nate. What can you find out about him?”
“Nathaniel Carver… he’s Lord Carver”s son, I think…”
“Yes, I heard that somewhere.”
She nodded. “Yeah, really old money, that family. I think there’s been a Carver in the House of Lords for about four hundred years. But Nate’s Dad rebelled a bit, he joined the army and worked his way up. He’s a four star general… I mean, he’s retired now. Surprised Nate didn’t follow in daddy’s footsteps, seeing as he loved working out and beating people up.”
“What does Nate do?” I asked, suddenly curious.
“Hmm… oh, here. He’s 24 as well, and studying in Criminal Psychology with a focus on… ohh….”
“On what?”
Kate looked up at me. “On serial killers. Paige, what if he’s our guy?”
Fear flickered inside me, but I pushed it away. “It’s a pretty big leap from studying serial killers to actually stalking someone.”
“So you admit you have a stalker,” Kate said, raising her eyebrows.
“Fine, I have a stalker. But it’s just the guys. They followed me everywhere, Tristan told me. It”s part of the act for the club. I just, I think they’re taking it too far with this.”
“You think it’s part of the club stuff?” Kate asked, closing the laptop down.
I nodded. “They’re pretty weird and freaky about all the club traditions. It does creep me out a bit, but Tristan assured me there’s nothing that would hurt me at all.”
“Yeah, because the hot guy with the charming smile is totally trustworthy,” said Kate.
“He feels genuine,” I argued.
“You like him, you fancy him…” Kate sang at me. “You want to kiss him, you want to fuck him…”
“Shut up, Kate,” I laughed, going bright red as I threw my pillow at her.
“Ohh, Tristan…” she warbled, grabbing my pillow and pretending to make out with it.
“You’re even crazier than they are,” I grinned. “I’ll leave you alone with my pillow. I’m going to have a shower, I’ve got that thing at the club tonight.”
“Will you be back?”
“I don’t know. There”s rooms in the club house. Nice ones, with hot showers that actually have water pressure.”
“Oh, you know how to talk dirty Paige. Definitely stay there, but shoot me a text so I know they haven’t murdered you.”
“Will do.” I reached down and picked up the box with the letter and the doll inside, dropping it on top of the rubbish bin as I headed for the bathroom.
“And make sure you tell them off about the freaky doll,”” Kate called as I closed the bathroom door behind me.
Oh, I was planning to. Even knowing it was probably from one of them, the thing had really freaked me out. I wasn’t sure, but even with Tristan walking me home each night, I still got this weird feeling I was being watched, and the letters hadn’t stopped either. In fact, they’d increased in frequency - I’d had four already this week, not counting the one in the box. Most were complimentary, praising my hair or eyes or clothing choice, each one designed to let me know that this person was watching me, following me around campus, and I was really starting to hate it. Kate was right, I decided, as I turned on the shower. Tonight I was letting them know that enough was enough, and if they didn’t pack it in with the weird scare tactics, I was walking.
I had just got under the water, when the door opened a little.
“Can I come in a sec?”
“Sure,” I said, reaching for the shampoo. Kate crossed the tiny room, putting the lid down and sitting on the toilet with her laptop perched on her knees.
“So I found out a couple of more things about the guys, less well known stuff.”
“Oh really?”
“Yeah, so the first thing is that Nate had an older brother who died when Nate was a kid.”
“Oh that’s awful,” I said.
“He drowned apparently. Some accident when the boys were out playing near the lake on their estate. Apparently Nate went a bit psycho afterwards and got sent to some psychiatric institute.”
“Wow, well, I guess it would be seriously traumatic losing your brother like that, especially as a kid. Poor guy.” I thought back to the night of the induction, the way he’d cared for me. He might be tough on the outside, but underneath he was as soft as anybody.
“Don’t poor guy him yet. There’s more.”
“More?”
“Yes, when the guys turned sixteen, the three of them were kidnapped.”
“What?” I froze.
“It was quite the scandal. Apparently all three of them were taken from a party at Nate’s house, and they were missing for five days. Something to do with a pissed off business rival, the newspapers said, but when they turned up, Nate had to go back to the psych hospital for two years.”
“That’s horrendous. All three of them? No wonder they’re so close, they went through something terrifying together. Tristan told me he considers them family. I bet that’s why.”
“Paige, I”m starting to get worried about you being around these guys. Even if they are completely harmless, tragedy seems to follow them around.”
“Kate, it happened when they were kids, not now.” I tried to keep the tension out of my voice. ”I understand you”re worried. But they”ve been nothing but nice to me. I can take care of myself, you know. I’m not completely helpless.” I shut off the water and stepped out of the shower, taking the towel she passed me. I wrapped it around myself and grabbed another for my hair.
”I never said you were,” she replied, closing her laptop and standing up. ”But these guys... they sound dangerous, Paige. And we don”t even know who sent the doll.”
I sighed, moving back into the bedroom, sitting down on the bed and running my hands through my damp hair. The boys were dark and edgy, but they weren”t evil.
”You didn’t see how Tristan was with me that night we went out,” I said, my voice soft. ”He”s a good guy, Kate. They all are.”
”Maybe,” she allowed after a pause. ”But you can”t deny that they”re involved in some pretty shady stuff.”
”But that doesn”t mean they”re bad people,” I argued.
Kate sighed. ”Alright, fine,” she agreed reluctantly. ”But promise me you”ll be careful around them.”
”I promise,” I replied, standing up to get dressed.
”And if anything weird happens,” she added, pointing a finger at me. ”You tell me immediately.”
”Cross my heart,” I promised. “But I think you”re overthinking this. They’re quirky, sure. And yes, they”ve been through some stuff, but aren”t we all damaged in some way?”
”Some more than others,” Kate replied softly. She reached over, grabbing my hand and squeezing it gently. ”Just be careful, okay? I don”t like this club or whatever it is - but I like you being scared even less.”
“I will be careful. Now, I need to get ready.”
“Fine, but take that doll and stick it in the outdoor bins,” said Kate, picking up her laptop and heading to the door. “It freaks me out just knowing it’s in the building.”
“You and me both,” I agreed.