Page 39 of The Vipers and Their Vendetta

Who was I kidding? It could never work. Three of them with one of me? It wasn’t as though we ever had a real relationship forming. It was just sex.

I think of Mackenzie and her three men. They have a baby now, and they all live together in an apartment in South House. They seem happy.

Not that I want babies and apartments, or any of that shit. I want a career, and travel, like maybe to Europe one day, maybe France… with the twins on each arm as they show me around their city.

Fuck, no. That’s not what I want at all. Besides, I still have years here, if I want to get my degree, and I have to figure out how to make it through those years without getting kicked out. So far, that’s not looking good.

Should I believe them?

A part of me desperately wants to, but how well do I even know these men? I’ve given them my body, and I was getting perilously close to letting them into my heart as well, but do I really know them? Hell, no. They could still be screwing with me right now. It’s not as though they’d admit it, would they, if they were behind what happened to Reagan. Maybe they wouldn’t care what I thought, but they wouldn’t want Yarl Olsen coming after them.

Even if they are innocent, they’re still fucking bad news.

The sensible part of me says to go home. To run back to my dad and the MC, where I know I’ll be safe. But what then? Is that to be my future? To work doing the books for the club, and one day marry a biker and have babies? My heart sinks at the thought. I’d wanted more. I’d wanted to live some huge, vibrant life, to travel, and own a business, and be a boss bitch. Being with the Vipers had given me a tiny insight into that life. They’d made me feel like someone special. Saint and Lex had introduced me to a different culture, and I’d wondered if I mightexperience France for real one day. To sit outside in a street café and sip coffee, and gaze up at the Eifel Tower.

There’s something else that’s keeping me here.

If the Vipers weren’t the reason Reagan threw herself from the tower…what was?

It’s possible no one was to blame, and Reagan was simply depressed. She hadn’t had her mother in her life, and God only knows what sort of stories her father had fed her while she’d been growing up. My mother’s stories about Jarl Olsen made me believe he wouldn’t exactly have been a good father figure. Maybe he’d been the one who’d abused her, and the reason she’d jumped, and that was why he’d been so quick to take a payoff from Dean Rossi to not create a fuss about the death.

I get back to my room, eager to be able to shut myself off from the rest of the world, if only until my next class. I want to climb into bed and pull the covers over my head and hide away. I’d love to take a nap, but I don’t have time. Besides, the way my brain is turning everything over and over, I’m not sure I’ll be able to switch it off long enough to allow myself to sleep.

I open my bedroom door. The bottom of it scrapes against something on the other side, and I frown. Whatever it is, it isn’t heavy enough to create any pressure, but I heard the rustle.

I peep around the side of the door to see a note has been pushed through the gap beneath. Frowning, I stoop to pick it up. Who would have pushed a note under my door? It might be nothing—just an update on a class, or maybe notes I missed—but now my stomach is churning. The paper flutters in my grip, my hands shaking.

I unfold it.

Watch your back, whore.

My blood runs cold.

The letters are all in capitals and have been etched with such force into the paper that they’ve almost gone straight through it. Whoever wrote this clearly did so in anger.

My eyes well, and a tear runs down my nose and plops onto the paper. It pools in the ink and makes it run.

There’s only one person who springs to mind when I look at the word ‘whore.’ Only one person who has called me that in the past.

Saint.

Does he really hate me enough to write something like this? I did practically accuse his twin and his best friend of assaulting me. Would that be enough for him to hate me this much? Or maybe I got this all wrong, and it isn’t Saint behind the letter. I want to believe that, but no one else here is invested in me enough to bother.

There’s no name on the note, but it’s clearly meant for me.

I turn it over, searching for clues, and then bring it to my nose and inhale. Is that a man’s fragrance? Is it Saint’s or one of the others? Maybe Saint didn’t write it, and it was Zane instead. After all, he’s the one who’s always writing notes. Perhaps he wrote this one in capital letters to disguise his handwriting.

Is this their way of threatening me after I accused them of assaulting me? Not that I meant to accuse them… Maybe they want to keep me quiet, telling me to keep my mouth shut.

I’m not sure if this is really their style, but who else would have sent this to me?

Feeling as though I’m weighed down with grief, I go to my bed and sink down to sit on the edge, the horrible note still in my hand. I sit with my head bent, my breathing rapid. How has everything gone so wrong? Reagan is dead, and now the Vipers hate me.

I long to call my dad. I know all I have to do is say the word, and he and the rest of the club will be back here in an instant. They’ll drop everything to come and get me.

But I also remember how I told Dean Rossi I’m not a child anymore. I’m an adult, and adults must learn how to handle their own shit. I can’t go running back to the club every time something doesn’t work out for me.

I stare down at the letter again. Will this be the last of it? Is our relationship really over now?

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