Page 5 of Bleeding Hearts (Pine Valley College #3)

CHAPTER THREE

A fter showering and changing, I crashed and slept for hours, only to wake up to my phone vibrating.

I roll over and ignore it. My mouth still tastes like shit, and I’m hungover as hell, but the ringing starts again.

Fumbling through the covers, I grab my cell and put it to my ear without looking, unable to open my eyes due to the pounding in my head.

“What?” I snarl.

It’s my own fault for drinking so much, but it’s how my life is now. I drink to forget. Everyone else has moved on, leaving me at those stupid parties surrounded by strangers I don’t give a fuck about. It’s the only time I feel anything other than grief.

Why did she come for me?

Why does she always come for me?

She looks after me every time, even though I tell her not to. I’m cruel and unkind to her, but she never takes the hint. She doesn’t even show if it hurts her. Is she just stupid or too fucking kind?

I can’t remember much of last night, but that’s not unusual, and it’s probably better that way. I have enough regrets without remembering the mess I made.

“Is this Miss Laila Stewart?” a confused voice responds, bringing me from my thoughts.

I sit up, ignoring my aching head. “Lally,” I correct automatically. The only people who call me Laila are my family, and I don’t speak to them. Lally stuck in high school. “Who is this?”

“This is Ms. Derry, assistant to Dean Weaver. We request your presence in the administrative building today at three. We hope to see you there.” The phone goes dead, and I wince as I glance at the screen to see it’s already one.

Shit. I slept through all my morning classes, but this meeting worries me.

It’s never good to be called in. What have I done?

And what can I do to fix it?

I’m about as awake and respectable as I’m going to get.

My hair is clean and brushed, and my makeup is more low-key than normal.

I have on jeans and boots rather than my usual skirt and shitkickers.

I don’t own any normal shirts, however, so I wear the least offensive, which is my “I love to make boys cry” one.

I put on my oversized racing jacket to complete the look, and then I head into the administrative building with tentative steps just as a burly guy with a scowling face storms from it. I move past him, leaving him to his own troubles.

The foyer floor squeaks under my boots as I follow the signs up the big staircase to the third floor. I’m out of breath and sweating by the time I get there, but I head to the reception desk and notice the name.

Ms. Derry.

“Hi, I’m Lally, Laila Stewart. I was called in,” I say.

“Take a seat. He will be with you in a moment,” she replies without looking up from her computer, where she types with her two index fingers.

I nod and take a seat, crossing my legs nervously as I glance around the small waiting room. There are black-and-white photos of the campus on most of the dark wood walls and two double doors to my left. There isn’t much else because it’s meant to intimidate, not offer comfort.

Finally, the doors open, and Mr. Weaver, the dean of Pine Valley, stands there. “Laila, please come in.”

I stand and walk his way. “It’s Lally,” I remind, and he frowns, but I slip past him and sit hesitantly in one of the two chairs in front of his large desk.

His office is big, with a fireplace and a small library to the left, but I focus on him as he sits.

A moment later, the door opens and shuts again, and Ms. Derry sits in the chair next to me, a notepad held in hand.

“Laila—”

“Lally,” I correct forcefully, growing annoyed.

His eyes narrow. “Ms. Stewart, do you know why you were asked to see me today?”

“Because my tits are distracting your staff?” I joke before blinking. “Sorry, I make inappropriate jokes when I’m nervous. So sorry.”

“Indeed.” He leans back, eyeing me like he’s unsure what to do with me. It isn’t mean, but it isn’t welcoming either. There’s a reason he’s the dean. He runs a tight ship, and in the last ten years, he took Pine Valley to the top of its league, which is why we all come here.

It’s why I fought so hard for a scholarship just like Evan, because it’s the best.

I might have forgotten that down my path of self-destruction, but as I sit before him, I’m reminded of how badly I wanted this just a year ago. I cried when I got the acceptance letter.

It wasn’t just my ticket away from home, but it was also my ticket to freedom. As he stares at me now, though, I have a sinking feeling my future is going down the drain.

“This is not a joke, Ms. Stewart. Not only have you missed ninety percent of your classes in the last six months, but you have also been picked up by campus security ten times, reported by other students for abusive behavior, and have been caught more than once on film in derogatory situations. Like last night, for example, when a student captured you urinating in the school fountain as you shouted . . . What was it again, Ms. Derry?”

“I believe it was, ‘Fuck the patriarchy, drink my piss, you old farts,’” she supplies with a serious face, and I have to hold back my laugh.

“Yes, that. These actions breach the contract you signed when you accepted your scholarship, Ms. Stewart.”

My entire body goes cold. “What do you mean?”

“You signed a code of conduct. We offer scholarships to those who we believe are exceptional and will not only benefit from learning here, but also be an asset to this college. Your actions in the last six months don’t represent that.

You have breached your scholarship agreement, and I’m afraid we have to rescind it. ”

The words echo in my aching head as adrenaline pumps through me, alongside fear. I have been drifting, not really existing, but now everything comes to a screeching halt and I panic.

“Please give me another chance,” I plead. I’ve never begged for anything—not my parents’ love nor Tommy’s life, but I beg now. “Please, this is my home. I just got a little . . . lost.”

He frowns. “You have extenuating circumstances. The unfortunate events have been taken into consideration, and we gave you leeway, but you have not improved.”

“Unfortunate events?” I sneer. “Where your teacher stalked and killed my friend? Where a serial killer roamed campus killing students? I’m sorry if I didn’t just get over that in a few months like you wanted me to, but my friend fucking died. He’s dead. Do you understand that?”

“We do. We offered grief counseling?—”

“Fuck your counseling. Just don’t do this, please.” My voice turns desperate, not angry. “Please don’t take away the only thing I have left.”

“I’m sorry, Ms. Stewart, but it is out of my hands. You may come up with the money to pay your tuition and stay. That is all I can do. Your scholarship is gone. I really mean it. It’s out of my hands. I wish it weren’t. This was the board’s decision, not mine.”

Sitting back in the chair, I gape at him. “So that’s it? A student is struggling after she witnessed the brutal murder of her friend, and your response is to cut ties and abandon them?”

He winces. “Ms. Stewart, we tried to help. We sent letters, and everyone has been trying to help you?—”

“Whatever.” I stand. “How much are the fees, and how long do I have?”

He stares at me sadly then looks at a folder before him. “Fifty-two thousand, five hundred dollars. We will deduct your scholarship so far, so forty thousand. It’s due in twenty-eight days.”

Fuck me in the ass.

The amount overwhelms me, but I refuse to show that.

“Fine, I’ll be here in twenty-seven to pay it. This is my home and my future, and nobody gets to take that away from me. I don’t need anybody. I can do this alone.”

I storm from the room and make it into the corridor before the panic attack sets in.

I never had them before Tommy’s death, but they seem to happen often now. The hallway spins, my head rings, and my breathing grows faster. Everything is too hot and close.

I have twenty-seven days to come up with more money than I can earn in a lifetime. I try to focus my breathing like I saw online.

The first time I had a panic attack, I thought I was dying, but now it’s become second nature. I breathe through the quaking heart and tight muscles all while my mind spins.

How do I get that money?

I can’t in any legal way, that’s for sure, but I can’t lose this too. I just can’t. This is my home, it’s where I want to be, but more than that, it’s the only connection to Tommy I still have.

Climbing to my feet, I wander across campus, ignoring everyone until I find myself at Tommy’s memorial.

There are messages, pictures, flowers, and so much color it hurts my eyes, but not him. “I need you,” I whisper as I sink to my knees. “I’ve never needed you so much in my life. Why did you fucking do it? Why did you leave me?”

We were all best friends, but Evan always had this stubborn, independent streak that Tommy and I didn’t. We were stuck together, two halves of the same whole.

I never knew that love could be platonic until him. Everyone always talks of romantic soulmates, but I found mine in my best friend, and now he’s gone, and all that is left is anger and pain, and they want to take away the last connection I have to him too.

“I can’t do this without you,” I say as the tears fall.

“I’m so fucking lost, Tommy. I don’t know what I’m doing or how to stop it, and now I’m going to lose everything, and I can’t fucking breathe.

It feels like I’m still back there, fighting to survive.

My heart never stops racing, even when I’m asleep, and I’m bleeding from a thousand wounds and nobody even notices.

” My head bows as the sobs break free—ones I would never allow at any other time, but it’s all too much.

As I wrap my arms around myself for a moment, I swear I feel his as well, the roughness of his palms as he covers mine as he tells me that it’s okay.

But it’s not okay, and he isn’t here.

My eyes open, and I try to blink back the tears and swallow the pain like I have been. “What do I do?” I whisper. “I’d do anything. I can’t lose this place. I can’t lose you all over again.”

That’s what it comes down to. It feels like I’m losing him once more. It might be unhealthy and wrong, but I’d rather stay here, haunted by him and in pain, than move on and forget.

I can’t forget him, not like everyone else.

A door opens somewhere, and my head snaps up. I turn around to see who it is, but it’s just slamming open and shut in the wind. Sighing, I beg my heart to slow, even as I expect Mr. Ford to jump out and attack me. My eyes catch on something fluttering on the opposite wall.

It’s a poster, I realize. My eyes narrow, and I move closer, scanning the bold font across the front.

RISK.

My eyes widen as I look around. I’ve heard of their advertisement, but I never expected one to be here. I bet someone put it up before the cleaners came. It will soon be torn down. The school doesn’t want to speak of it or acknowledge it’s happening, but we all know it is.

Risk is a game, or so they say, for desperate or crazy people—just like me.

I go to ball it up when my eyes land on the print at the bottom.

Winner will receive one million dollars.

Everything in me goes cold as I reread those words. One million . . . It would be enough to pay my tuition.

Call it grief or desperation, but I rip the poster down, reading the information. I’ve heard of it at parties, and it seemed extreme, even for me, but I have no choice. The reward money will keep me here.

I glance back at Tommy’s memorial picture and swallow. “Okay, I got your message. It’s time to fight.”

I look at the poster once more.

Are you ready to risk it all?

I guess I am.