Reason and Romance (River Valley Book 1) Read online

  Lunch, however, was the real test. Her nerves thrummed when she entered the cafeteria. Silence didn’t ensue, nor did people throw tomatoes at her, but all the same, she knew they’d noticed her. It was there in the averted glances, the excited whispers. Some of them weren’t bothering to keep their voices down.

  The “Did you hear what she said to Mr. Melbourne?” and “Did you hear what she said to Mandy?” comments trailed after her as she stalked through the cafeteria.

  Head high, Adrian. Shoulders straight.

  There was a glass door in the back that led to the outside. This was the one she wanted, then. No way in hell was she going to embarrass herself by sitting with other students. She wasn’t that pathetic. And besides, if they all worshipped Alex, she wanted nothing to do with them anyway.

  The Arizona sun boiled her the second she stepped outside. Just yet another reason to hate this freaking state. She took her cell phone out of her bag and scrolled down to Jason’s number. He was still in class, so she texted him instead.

  CALL ME. PLEASE.

  She’d just finished sending the message when the One True Savior and Lord waltzed outside with his disciples and hangers-on. It was like a concentric circle, she reflected, with every succeeding circle larger than the previous.

  Mandy Fitzpatrick’s voice was louder than the rest. “So … sweetie, I was thinking we could have, like, this totally awesome party this weekend. Something different from the usual parties …”

  Adrian rooted through her bag. Once she’d found her earbuds, she jammed them in. Now that it was quiet, she poked at her lunch. She’d packed hers, but the sandwich was limp from the heat. Gross. She leaned against the brick wall. Maybe she should just go back inside—

  A shadow fell over her. She lifted her eyes, only to see Mandy pouting at her. The girl had a death grip on Alex’s arm, her lethal nails digging in, and for an irrelevant moment, Adrian wondered if he had body armor.

  Since Mandy wasn’t going anywhere, Adrian pulled an earbud out. “Yes?”

  “Don’t have any friends to sit with?” Mandy said. She nudged Adrian’s bag with her sandal. “Aw, isn’t that sad?”

  Adrian ignored her. She scanned the group behind the girl. They were watching her intently, as cats watch mouse-holes, but they were also watching Alex. His attitude toward her would decide her social position and subsequently their reactions. So far, Alex was just offering her an inscrutable tight-lipped smile.

  She could still hear his voice. “You’re on your own from here on out …”

  Mandy was saying something, but Adrian kept staring at him. None of his friends had showed her any respect today. A teacher had picked on her because of her association with him. Now Alex’s on-and-off girlfriend was harassing her. Hell, even the school undesirables were too scared to talk to her. Surely, it had to get better … no. She’d made herself too notorious on the first day of school. This would last until graduation.

  Nicky’s scared face peeped out from the crowd. Adrian stared at her in hurt amazement, but what did it matter? Her sister would never go against the majority, and already, it seemed like Alex had made Nicky one of his hangers-on. Somehow that made everything worse.

  She had nothing to lose.

  Adrian turned her face upward. Her smile was one of the sweetest ones she’d used yet, but inside, she was cold. “Why waste your time bitching at me, Mandy? Shouldn’t you practice being on your knees or something?”

  Mandy’s mouth dropped open. She shifted on her feet, clearly rocked. And maybe, just maybe, there was a suspicious shine to her eyes. Well, it wasn’t Adrian’s problem.

  Alex pulled the redhead to his chest. “Feeling cruel today, aren’t we?”

  Adrian let her eyes run over the other girl. “Mm-hmm. We’ll see how long you keep her.”

  Amusement lit up his eyes. “Oh, we’re good, me and Mandy,” he said easily as he patted Mandy’s back. “I forgot to congratulate you earlier. Melbourne hates you more than he hates me. That’s one hell of a job you pulled off. Couldn’t have done better, myself.”

  She jammed her earbud back in and stared at him haughtily. It was an unspoken dismissal, and from the twitch of his mouth, she knew he’d caught on. Was there anything that Alex Montgomery didn’t find funny?

  He led his flunkies away. A few of them were shooting troubled glances over their shoulders at Adrian. They just couldn’t wait to spread more gossip about her, she’d bet. By today’s end, she’d probably be known as the Wicked Bitch of Varner High. It was a prospect that should have dismayed her, except she had a one-hour detention to serve after school. Her boyfriend was currently ignoring her. And her sister had turned traitor.

  It wasn’t much of a hyperbole to say it was the worst Monday ever.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Not for the first time, Adrian thought they were all jackals. Everyone was watching her with a predatory anticipation that only heightened when Mr. Melbourne came out from behind his desk after he’d concluded the attendance roll.

  “Before we plunge into the depths of Dostoevsky, we have a preliminary matter to care of. Ms. Blake, I believe you owe me a ten-page essay,” he said with a beatific smile that clearly suggested he thought she hadn’t done it.

  Adrian pulled it from her binder. “Yes, sir,” she said, keeping her voice low and even. “Here it is.”

  Her eyes were gritty from lack of sleep. She’d gone home after detention and started looking up information right away. She’d even skipped dinner, just so she could write the damned thing. One or two pages she could have lived with. Ten pages about why insubordination wasn’t allowed? It was an abuse of teaching powers, and Mr. Melbourne knew it.

  He didn’t contain his pleasure when he gestured at her to rise from her seat. “Why don’t you read your paper aloud? I think it’ll be enlightening for your classmates.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  There was a podium in front of the whiteboard, so she stood behind it and laid her paper down. Oh, what she wouldn’t give to rest her head on her arms. The words seemed to swim before her eyes, but she’d be damned if she’d show weakness.

  Her gaze skimmed over her fellow classmates. She hadn’t learned all of their names yet, but she recognized faces here and there. Bri Latimer had her arms crossed as she slouched in her seat. Next to Bri was her twin brother Justin. He flashed a smile at Adrian, but she wasn’t sure what that smile meant. Was he actually being supportive? No, that couldn’t be. He was Alex’s friend, and that said it all.

  Quentin Maxwell caught her gaze and waggled his eyebrows. It was a gesture that just screamed arrogance. Even as Adrian smoothed out her first page, he leaned over to Alex’s desk and said something. Whatever it was, it made Alex laugh quietly.

  No, she didn’t think they were rooting for her.

  “Anytime now, Ms. Blake,” Mr. Melbourne said.

  She cleared her throat. “Insubordination is the willful disruption of an established social order, and when it happens, chaos arises. As evidenced by history, the resistance to the Nazi regime significantly affected Hitler’s planned consolidation of the world, and because of these misled people and their countries that rebelled, the world was deprived of a political genius in Hitler—”

  “Give me that!”

  The teacher’s lips moved soundlessly as he read the rest of the paragraph. He scanned the second page, then he flipped to the last page.

  “Ms. Blake, do I understand you correctly? You wrote about why it was a mistake to fight the Nazis?”

  Adrian locked her hands behind her back. “No sir. I wrote about a classical example of insubordination that turned out badly. I added footnotes and a two-page bibliography.”

  Gotcha, she thought.

  His mouth opened and closed like a goldfish. “Oh, you’re hilarious. You think you’re clever?” Color leapt into his face as he slammed his desk. Some coffee sloshed over the top of his cup. “I will not be mocked in my classroom!”

  “It’s hard not to fee
l clever when I have you for a teacher, sir.”

  There was a universal gasp from the students. They’d followed the exchange with a gleeful “did-she-just-say-that?” look on their faces. One blonde, in particular, seemed downright ecstatic as if Adrian had just given her the best present ever. She took her cell phone out and started texting.

  Not everyone seemed to share her enthusiasm. A few sat in their seats, frozen and stunned. The pretty Asian girl Adrian had glimpsed briefly was pursing her lips in evident disapproval. She didn’t join in with the braver ones laughing openly. Quentin Maxwell was leading the chorus. And even as Adrian watched, Alex did an exaggerated slow clap.

  Mr. Melbourne jerked as if he’d been hit. He suddenly seemed smaller, and Adrian wondered if she’d gone too far, but he stormed over to his desk and yanked a drawer open. He scrawled on a pad and tore the top half off.

  “Dean’s office again.” He held the note out to her. “Clearly you’ve had too much time on your hands. One additional week of detention should do it. A revised paper without any historical examples, on my desk tomorrow.”

  “Man, that’s some messed up shit,” Justin said.

  She didn’t spare him a glance as she took the note. Justin was one of Alex’s lieutenants, so his sympathy wasn’t welcome.

  “Until tomorrow then,” she said to the teacher. She hadn’t even lasted ten minutes this time.

  She sauntered out of class. She knew they were all watching her, but damned if she’d give them the satisfaction of breaking down in tears or begging the teacher’s forgiveness.

  Adrian Blake did not do forgiveness.

  Once she was safely out of sight, she let her shoulders sag. She rubbed the tight muscles in her neck. No need to ask where Dean Efken’s office was. She had the feeling she’d be walking this route whenever Mr. Melbourne could manage it.

  The same kid with three-inch spiky hair was hanging outside the office when she got there. Travis Cates, if she remembered right.

  “You’re that girl, aren’t you?” he said.

  “Yes. We met yesterday,” she said, not bothering to keep the fatigue out of her voice. With just Travis as the audience, it was tough not to feel sorry for herself.

  She slumped in the seat opposite from him. How the hell was she going to explain this to her father? She’d always brought straight A’s home, but for this semester, well, she didn’t know. Oh, her father had never demanded that she get all A’s, but it was implicitly understood that she would do her best.

  No, he wasn’t going to hear a word about this. Not if she could help it. Like it or not, Alex’s mother actually made him happy. For the first time in years Adrian could remember, he’d lost that careworn expression.

  She wouldn’t ruin that for him. Someone had to be happy around here.

  She slipped her hand into her backpack for her cell phone. Still no messages from Jason. She’d texted him three times and emailed him twice. They’d had only one hurried conversation before he’d said he had to leave for practice. She knew he hadn’t been lying since she’d clearly heard his coach shouting in the background, but he could have called her back.

  He hadn’t.

  There was a good explanation—only she didn’t have one yet, and it frightened her. He was one of the few people who knew her.

  If she lost him …

  “Talked back to your teacher again?” Travis said.

  She lifted her eyes from her phone. It sounded as if Travis was attempting a decent conversation, but that had to be wrong. Hadn’t he refused to talk to her yesterday, just because he’d found out who she was?

  “Yes. You do remember who I am?”

  “Well, yeah.” His smile was guileless. “But nobody’s here so … and I heard how you took that witch down.”

  “Which one? There are so many of them.”

  “Mandy Fitzpatrick. She always looks down at me and other kids.”

  She took another look at Travis. Back at home, she wouldn’t have talked to him, simply because they would have moved in different social circles, but her choices were limited here. Besides, it was nice talking to someone.

  “Is there anyone who doesn’t worship Alex?” she said.

  Even she could hear the bite to her voice. It wasn’t fair that Alex was the popular one here while she was the shunned one. She didn’t want to be the most popular girl here, but was it so much to ask for one or two girlfriends? So far, she’d seen only Bri Latimer and Mandy Fitzpatrick and a lot of other girls who seemed to be halfway in love with Alex.

  He was good-looking, she’d give him that. She’d heard something about how rare green eyes were, and that certainly helped him. And yeah, it helped that he had the body of an Adonis, something you just didn’t see too often in high school.

  But …

  “He clashed with Mr. Melbourne last year,” Travis said. “That’s why that prick hates you. Melbourne. That’s your English teacher, right?”

  She’d already suspected the teacher hated her because of Alex, but if Travis knew this piece of information, everyone else probably knew. Great. Just great. Now she had a permanent target painted on her back.

  “Does Alex have any other enemies I should know about?” she asked.

  Travis glanced around before answering. Even though they were the only ones in the vicinity, he lowered his voice as if they were engaged in espionage.

  “Oh yeah, some kids hate him. But they all want to be him.”

  It made Adrian want to roll her eyes. People seriously wanted to be like her future stepbrother? However, Travis was right. She’d certainly seen longing and envy in too many faces for her to dismiss what he’d just said.

  “You don’t like him, do you?” Travis said.

  “Excuse me?”

  “Montgomery.” He made a vague gesture. The arabesque occupied his attention for a few seconds, then his blue eyes fixed on her again. “Why don’t you like him?”

  “You want to know why I don’t like Alex? Oh, where do I even start?”

  “At the beginning?”

  Her lips curved before she could stop herself. “I guess that’s the right way to do it. He’s so arrogant.”

  That was the crux. She could have said any number of things, and they all would have been true, but nothing topped Alex’s so-called speech at his mother’s party. He’d acted as if he had her social status in the palm of his hand. What utter bullshit.

  Her lips firmed at the memory. He’d so blatantly checked her out at the airport that it had been downright insulting. He’d stood back and let his friends jump on her during the party. No, he didn’t have any decency.

  “He hasn’t been nice to me from the first moment we met,” she finished.

  Travis nodded thoughtfully. “Have you been nice to him?”

  A line creased her forehead. She didn’t have a mirror handy, but she could feel the frown setting in between her eyebrows. It was a question that disturbed her more than she cared to explain. As things stood now, she had two choices. She could either knuckle under to Alex’s social dominance, just like Nicky had done, or blaze her lonely path alone in the shark-infested waters here.

  Depressed, she leaned her head against the wall. In the end, there really was no choice to be made because it already had been made.

  Once again, the dean was too busy to see her, so when the bell rang for second period, she and Travis parted ways. Sad to say, he was probably the only friend she had right now. And even that was questionable.

  The next few classes were miserable. Word about her confrontation with Mr. Melbourne had gotten out because her classmates left an island of empty space all around her.

  Subtle, those kids.

  Lunch was even worse. She staked her spot on the grass outside the cafeteria. At this rate, she’d bake in the torrid heat, but dying from sunburn and dehydration actually seemed like appealing options. Anything would be better than sitting in the cafeteria utterly alone, with everyone else eyeing her like a fresh piece of meat.


  She checked her cell phone. Still no messages from Jason.

  Her shoulders slumped just for an instant before she remembered she was sitting in the open courtyard. Head high, shoulders straight. She wasn’t about to let those little monsters see any weaknesses, let alone one.

  They were all watching her. Every time she looked up from her phone or from her food, she could actually feel their gazes skittering away. Pity, fascination, cruelty, disdain—it was all there in their faces, and she felt every one of them. They weren’t even bothering to hide the fact they were talking about her because she could hear them just fine.

  “I heard Montgomery’s future stepsister wrote, like, this paper …”

  “She’s practically a pro-Nazi …”

  Justin Latimer fell into step with her when she got up to throw away her untouched lunch. She’d only picked at her sandwich, but at least she’d finished her water bottle. That had to count for something.

  “Yes?” she said.

  He flashed that quick smile she’d seen earlier in their AP English class. “Um, yeah, maybe you don’t remember me? We met at Alex’s mom’s party. My name’s Justin. I have a twin sister.” He turned and gestured at Bri.

  Since his sister was literally standing right behind him, tapping her foot and openly scowling, Adrian had the distinct feeling Bri wasn’t her biggest fan.

  “I know who you are,” Adrian said.

  Justin ran a hand through his hair. “Oh. Well, um, I just wanted to say I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry about what?”

  “Melbourne taking it out on you, I mean. So, yeah, you know, I feel bad and if there’s anything I can do …” He shifted his weight. “Look, I’m not saying this right. There’s this place near school. We always go there for burgers and fries. Milkshakes, that kind of thing. It’s a popular hangout. You want to come?”

  Much to her shame, her eyes began to burn. Yes, yes, yes.

  God, she wanted to throw her arms around him. How long had it been since someone had been friendly to her? Travis, yes, but he was only one person. She hadn’t seen him anywhere in the cafeteria; otherwise, she might have been tempted to talk to him some more. Her sister Nicky had abandoned her for greener pastures, so there was no real comfort forthcoming from that quarter. Justin, on the other hand … he’d waved at her yesterday, she remembered. He’d even smiled at her today. Maybe, just maybe.