Blaze
Finals are in two weeks, and all I can think about is how none of it really matters.
What am I going to do when this is all over? My grades weren’t supposed to mean anything to begin with, since I was going to join my father in the family business.
Provided my father doesn’t disown me completely.
I stare at my laptop and the notes for my marketing class. The project with Monica and Terence had gotten me a decent grade, so I could fail the final and still get by. It would be a shit grade, but again… what’s the point?
It doesn’t matter if I study at home or at the library or here in the business building, it all comes down to the same issue.
None of it is sticking in my mind. Even when Pandora isn’t around to distract me, the ROI formulas or marketing effectiveness crap is in one ear and out the other.
My phone buzzes with a new text. I immediately grab it, because I want any distraction from this hell.
Pandora
I can’t believe I still have to attend class this week.
Blaze
Classes run until the 18th.
Pandora
And it’s bullshit. Everybody knows you literally can’t study in December.
Blaze
Your brain literally doesn’t work in December?
Pandora
No, the amount of shits I give has frozen over.
I laugh, but the amusement dries up when I realize several people are approaching me.
It’s Holden, and Keegan, Brock, and several other of the frat brothers are with him. Even Declan is there, and I haven’t seen him since I’d threatened him into leaving Pandora alone.
Brock’s hand isn’t in the full cast anymore. No sign of Tate, which means he’s staying away like I suggested.
I’m more surprised to see Keegan. He’s mostly stayed away for the past few weeks. He’ll blame university for keeping him busy, but I suspect he’s been laying low to avoid disappearing like Zayden.
He’d been really, really pissed that I called him out during the stint in the gym with Pandora. He must be getting complacent now.
“Blaze,” Holden says, his voice quivering. “We need to talk.”
I tilt my head at them. “Here?” I look around the business building’s lounge. The few other people who had been in here earlier have cleared out, scared off by this whole troop of frat brothers.
“Yeah, here.” Holden folds his arms over himself. “You’re supposed to be in charge of Kappa Alpha Omega Sigma.”
“I am in charge,” I say as I sit up straighter. I’m regretting sitting in the armchair instead of taking a seat at one of the tables.
“You aren’t acting like it,” Brock says. The other frat brothers murmur in agreement. “You’re acting like some… some lovesick little bitch. Getting led around by your cock.”
I give them a large, brittle smile. “Who fed you those lines? You didn’t come up with them on your own.”
Internally, I’m screaming. They don’t get to talk about Pandora like that. She’s better than any of them, and choosing to help her isn’t me being ‘ordered around.’
It’s because I can see all the fraying edges of this fraternity, and all the ways my father’s empire will crumble.
“It’s obvious!” Declan says, stepping forward.
I smirk at him. “I’m impressed you can walk so well, after she took a chunk out of your leg.”
Declan’s face flushes red. “I knew something was wrong when you didn’t do anything about her even then.
What happened to brotherhood, Blaze? You kept harping on about it last year.
It doesn’t work if it’s only in one direction.
” He clenches his fists and straightens his shoulders.
“Unless you want us to spill your secrets.”
Fuck all of this.
I stand up and edge into Declan’s personal space. “Yeah? Be careful, Declan. I can destroy you a lot easier than you can even touch me.”
Declan’s bravado drops, and I think this might be the end of it. But the rest of the frat is murmuring to themselves.
Somebody in the corner of the room starts clapping. I turn to glare at him.
It’s Ezio.
It really was too much to ask for him to have died in the entire commotion. Even the stab wound he received from Pandora doesn’t appear to have done lasting damage.
My stomach tightens, but I refuse to show any emotion.
“It’s easy to play the big man when you’ve got Daddy’s support,” Ezio says, smirking. “Or when you’ve got your girlfriend to protect you. But where is she? Where’s Alvarado? Where’s Rivera?” He makes a show of looking around. “It’s just you here.”
“That’s funny, coming from you,” I say. “You’re still dependent on my father for everything. You’ve got nothing of your own,”
Ezio’s eyebrow twitches, but unlike the rest of my Kappa Alpha brothers, he doesn’t instantly react.
“We were talking about you!” Keegan growls. “You’re the one who’s hiding behind your psycho girlfriend.”
I clench my jaw. “Shut the fuck up, Keegan. You’re making yourself look stupider.”
Last year, I would have stood up for most of these guys.
This year—no, this month, after everything they did to Pandora—I can barely stand the sight of them.
Maybe it’s because I know, deep down, that it wasn’t only them. If I hadn’t been there to rile them up, if I had stopped them…
I can’t think about that. Pandora has forgiven me, probably, and I’ll have to live with my actions for the rest of my life.
Which means I’m going to do everything I can to make it up to her, even if it means destroying all ties I once had with these men I considered brothers.
It was all lies anyway. The only reason any of them joined Kappa Alpha is because of the benefits: the secret network that would ensure their success in the future and give them everything they could ever dream of, including willing—or unwilling—women.
“The thing about leadership, Blaze,” Ezio says as he approaches, “Is that it only works if there are people willing to follow you.” He motions toward the rest of the frat brothers. “Who of you still wants Blaze in charge of Kappa Alpha?”
I’m not surprised when not a single one of them is willing to raise their hand.
Ezio’s smile widens. “But maybe you should be grateful about that, Blaze. After all, we all know what happened to Zayden.”
The image of Zayden’s decapitated head rises in my mind.
“Do we know?” I ask, but even the question is a mistake.
“You killed him!” Keegan shouts. “You keep brushing us off when we ask about him! We’ve all seen how you get when Pandora is involved!”
Wait.
They think I killed him? I look at Ezio, who shrugs, but he doesn’t say anything to contradict them.
It’s helpful for him if they all think I was the one to do it.
I fold my arms over myself. “Why the fuck would I do that? How? I was with Asch and River the entire time after… After. And we still don’t know where Zayden actually is.
” I shake my head and smile at Keegan condescendingly.
“You really shouldn’t strain your brain too hard, Keegan. It’s not your strong suit.”
Holden steps in front of Keegan, almost shielding him. “You’re such a dick, Blaze. I used to look up to you. I don’t know if you killed Zayden or what, but you don’t even care that he’s missing. Shows how much you value us.”
I clench my fists. “You’re right, I don’t give a shit where he went because he’s the reason we’re in this mess in the first place. If he’d done even half his job properly…”
There’s more discontented murmuring.
I want to beat them up. I want to destroy all of them. They don’t get to betray me.
But no matter how strong I am, I know I can’t take all of them at once. If Asch and River were here, we’d have a chance.
If Pandora was here, the room would already be a bloody mess.
“You warned us to leave? Well, you’re the one who needs to get out,” Brock says. “You’re the one who got us involved with Pandora and all this bullshit and, and—”
I burst out laughing. “You want me out of Kappa Alpha? Sure. But don’t forget that I know every single one of your secrets. Not just Tate’s piss fetish or how Brock jerked off into his sister’s underwear.”
Brock turns bright red, and I don’t miss the side eyes he gets from some of the brothers who weren’t there during his hazing.
“I know what your parents’ secrets are too. I have a whole fucking cache of them.” I turn to Ezio. “You can lead these losers. I don’t need them. But you’d better watch yourself. I’m happy to finish wiping out the Romano family.”
Ezio’s sneer is a thing of beauty, equal parts anger and terror and anguish.
Yeah. He’s not over that whole family genocide thing.
“And don’t get ideas about killing me,” I add. “Because there are backups, and if anything happens to me, or anyone I care about, those backups are being sent out to people who would be very, very interested to learn about all the crimes you and your families have committed.”
I grab my laptop and bag, then head toward the stairs.
Keegan tries to block my path, but after a staredown, he makes a disgusted noise and steps aside.
That’s what I thought.
For all my bravado, my heart is pounding hard in my chest.
Ezio didn’t orchestrate this for shits and giggles.
He was openly declaring war—against me, and against Pandora.
And if he roped the other frat brothers into it, that means he must have at least some support from my father.
Once I’m out of the building, I check my phone again. One new message from Pandora from fifteen minutes ago.
Pandora
Blabe, I think the wallpaper in the library is bleeding. From boredom.
Blaze
Are you sure those aren’t just your eyes?
Pandora
You’re right, my eyes are bleeding too. Come save me from all the knives and needles boringly poking through my skin.
Knives poking through her skin? I wonder what that’s supposed to mean.
I do know that I desperately need a dose of Pandora right now. I make my way to the library, where I find Pandora sitting in a private study room, staring up at the non-bleeding walls.
Pandora smiles when I enter the room.
“Hey! You’ve come to rescue me from eternal boredom?” Pandora asks, reaching out for me.
I approach, bending down to kiss her before I take a seat beside her. “I was promised bleeding walls.”
She giggles and pushes my shoulder. “Gotta start hallucinating if you want those.” She sighs and points to her laptop. “I am so over biochem. So I switched to calculus, which I thought would at least be faster and require way less memorization, only it turns out I hate math right now too.”
I peer at the screen to see the examples of calculus. “I took that class last semester,” I say.
“So you can help me study?” Pandora asks.
I shake my head. “Nope. I got a C.”
Pandora laughs again. This is why I stood up to my frat brothers. This laugh is so much more important than any notion of brotherhood or promises of future riches.
After her laughter dies down, Pandora asks, “What happened?”
I tilt my head at her. “Why do you think something happened?”
She raises her hand and rubs it along my jaw. “You are really tense, right here. And I know I didn’t piss you off, and River and Asch are both doing their own thing, so…”
“I can handle it,” I say, clenching my jaw tighter.
Pandora pouts at me. “Didn’t you guys get on my case that I can’t handle everything alone? That we’re a team, or some trite BS like that?”
“It wasn’t trite,” I argue. “It was beautiful.”
“It really was.” Pandora scoots her chair closer to me. “So come on. What happened? Who do we need to stab?”
I shouldn’t tell her, if only because I don’t want to encourage her violent tendencies… but if I didn’t like violent tendencies, I wouldn’t be with Pandora.
“Ezio is back,” I say quietly. “He rallied up the other Kappa Alpha brothers and staged a mini coup. Like I care about them anymore.”
Pandora goes very still. “Oh. Well. Where are they? I just sharpened my knife, so I can stab at least six of them without it being too dull. Then I can stab the rest with the dull blade.”
I smile and shake my head. “No. Don’t cause a scene here, where there are witnesses. We’ll figure out Ezio later.”
“Boring! That’s not making the walls bleed less, Blaze.” Pandora drums her fingers against my thigh.
“It’ll make them bleed slightly less, since you aren’t adding Ezio’s blood.” I lift up her hand and kiss her fingers. “Want to come back to my place and fuck Asch?”
She smiles brightly. “You know I do! But he hasn’t answered any of my recent texts.”
“Yeah. He’s holed up in his room, ‘studying.’ Or wallowing in his sty of a room. You’ll have to lure him out because I don’t want to fuck in that mess.” I can’t believe it’s already gotten so messy even though we’ve only lived there for a bit over a month.
“Challenge accepted!” Pandora packs her laptop into her backpack. “Come on, what are you waiting for? It’s either sex or murder, and you said you didn’t want the murder.”
“I do want the murder!” I complain, getting up. “But not right now.”
We’ll save the murder for when we can take our time and really make Ezio suffer.