Page 69 of Her Dark Angel

I could’ve kept walking and left her to sit alone, thinking about whatever was on her mind, but I didn’t because curiosity got the best of me. She seemed cautious when I first approached her, but once we got to talking, we couldn’t stop.

Somehow in that moment, I knew she was the light that had been missing from my life.

Our conversation was cut short when her parents found her and demanded she return home. As she walked away from me, I knew I would never forget her. I couldn’t.

“She’s still a mystery to me too,” I say, fighting back a smile. “If I ever see her again, I will let you know.”

Heavy footsteps echo across the cafeteria, drawing our attention to Royce as he marches through the room, heading straight toward our table. His stupid black leather shoes squeak against the white linoleum floor. He’s flanked by his best friend Josh, who equally looks ready for a fight.

Oh no. Not this again.

Royce’s blonde hair is styled neatly and his crisp blue eyes find mine from across the room. I have never seen a hair out of place or a wrinkle in his button-up shirt since the first day of middle school when he shoved me into a locker and called me names. Unprovoked, of course. I was just minding my business. Ever since then, he has made it his mission to make my life more miserable than it already is. For what reason? I’m not sure.

“Well, what do we have here?” Royce’s slightly high-pitched voice makes me cringe. “Just a bunch of losers sitting together doing loser things.”

“Piss off, Royce,” Hudson spits, his gray eyes ablaze. He doesn’t get bullied by Royce as much as I do, but I appreciate him always willing to stick his neck out for me in times like these.

Everyone sitting at the tables surrounding ours falls silent. And soon, the rest of the cafeteria follows suit until we’re sitting in uncomfortable silence. You could hear a pin drop or someone's heartbeat if you listened close enough. There is nothing worse than an audience in this situation because Royce thrives off attention, always making sure his words dig a little deeper when eyes are on him.

I have a feeling this isn’t going to end well.

Royce snorts and bumps his shoulder against Josh. “Woah, he’s such a tough guy, right? Too bad he’s such a loser.”

Inhaling a deep, calming breath, I unfurl my hands and rest them palm down on my thighs. The sting from tiny shards of glass still lodged into the skin is a welcome distraction as I fight the storm threatening to brew deep inside my chest. It’s a sensation I fight against every time I encounter Royce. Which is a lot. I don’t want to show him that his words affect me. I don’t want him to think I’m weak.

“Just get lost, Royce,” I say as calmly as I can. My eyes meet his blue ones and I realize that my words were a mistake. I just made myself the bullseye for his next target.

“Excuse me,” he snarls, his features twisted in disgust. “I wasn’t speaking to you, was I?”

“We’re just trying to have lunch.” I feel Hudson, Luca, and Axel’s eyes on me as I gaze up at Royce. “There is no need to cause a scene.”

Royce snorts and chuckles, but there is no humor in it. “I wouldn’t talk if I were you, loser. With a whore mom and an alcoholic dad, there is no room for you to be making demands, you hear me?”

My blood runs cold. What is he talking about? I know my dad likes to drink, but why is he calling my mom a whore like Dad likes to call her?

When Royce sees the confusion behind my eyes, he bursts out laughing. I watch in silence as he and Josh slap their knees and cry with laughter.

Once he settles down, he tilts his head to the side. “Oh, of course you don’t know. I’m surprised, really. My dad told me he saw your mom getting in a car with a man who wasn’t your father a couple of nights ago in the parking lot beside the gas station near our house. He said the man handed over some money and then she sucked him off.”

“Shut up, Royce!” Hudson booms from across the table, but I barely register his voice.

The buzz of students whispering fades into static and my face grows hot as I stare at Royce. My fists clench tightly on my thighs and I want nothing more than to use them to knock the smile off his face. I’m not a violent person, but the string holding onto the calmness in my soul is beyond breaking point now. It’s so close to snapping that if he says one more thing?—

“Hey,” Royce says to Josh, nudging his ribs with his elbow. Josh turns to him with wide, eager eyes as he hangs onto his friend's every word. “Do you reckon I could pay his mom to suck me off? With how old she is, I doubt she would be any good anyway. Though she’s a whore, she can’t even do that right.”

I don’t remember much of what happened after my vision turned red and the frayed string in my soul snapped into tiny pieces.

At first, it was painful. I registered my hands connecting with Royce’s cheek and then his nose before he fell to the ground and I was on top of him. I felt the crunch of his bones as they splintered beneath the fury of my fists. I heard his cries of pain and other voices yelling and screaming for me to stop.

But I didn’t stop.

I couldn’t.

Once that string had snapped, I was too far gone.

When Hudson finally pulled me off Royce’s body, I saw the blood coating most of his face and my knuckles. It was thick, and hot, and smelled awful. It was all I could smell as Josh dragged his friend away from me.

Although my muscles and knuckles ached with a pain I had never felt before in my life, I couldn’t deny how freeing it felt to finally get the pent-up anger and frustration off my chest.

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