Page 3 of The Vipers' Vow

I hold up a hand. “Wait, one minute. Go back. How the fuck do you know someone has been putting notes under my door if you weren’t the one who put them there? Because right now I’m thinking the fact you know about them proves you’re the one responsible, Saint. The language whoever is writing them uses…well, it’s more like you than anyone. Degrading and cruel.” I know I hit home when his jaw tenses. “Youarethe most likely culprit. And what the hell do you mean you were on the other side of the door?”

His blue eyes narrow to a glare. “Merde!It’s not me. For fuck’s sake, Vani. There’s a big difference between degradation while we’re fucking, to writing shit like that and spreading it all over school or shoving it beneath your door in the middle of the night.”

I wave the flier in his face.

“So how the fuck do you know? What do you mean when you say you were on the other side?” I demand the answer again, my stomach dropping because I know, don’t I? He was in my room. Without me being aware. That’s… Jesus. Talk about creepy.

“I was there!” he blurts. “I was in your room when someone slid the note through the gap under the door. I picked it up and read it, and then I realized I couldn’t say anything to you because then I’d have to admit I was in your room when it arrived, so I just left and slipped it back under the door again.”

My jaw has dropped, and, looking at Zane, my expression seems to be mirrored on his face perfectly. So, he didn’t know that his supposed blood brother of sorts was sneaking into my room.

I glare at Saint. “How many times?”

He shrugs and pouts, suddenly all boyish charm. “Only a handful.”

“A handful! A fucking handful. What does that even mean?”

I’m about to lose it at Saint, but Zane beats me to it.

He signs something to Saint that is quite clearly ‘What the fuck?’Then he shoves Saint’s shoulders, sending him stumbling backward. Saint grabs the handrail to stop himself from falling down the stairs. The violence between them crackles in the air. One of them is going to get seriously hurt if they don’t stop.

“Putain de sa mère!You already busted my lip. No need to break anything else, okay?”

Zane looks furious. The amber ring in his green eyes darkens, and the muscles in his square jaw flex. His massive shoulders round. He’s like a mythical beast, the Minotaur in the Labyrinth.

I look between them, confused and scared that this will spiral out of control and they’ll both end up dead at the foot of the stairs. Saint is a creeping creeper, but I can deal with that later. There are more important things right now. Like, if they weren’t the ones sending me all those horrible notes, then who the hell was? And if it wasn’t them, have I been the one doing them an injustice, instead of the other way around, by believing the worst of them?

“Anyway,” Saint says, staring at me with naked hostility, “you’re the one who’s been spying on us for Jarl Olsen. You’ve convinced him that we’re the ones responsible for your sister’s death.”

I jerk back. “What? No, I haven’t.”

“Liar!” He punctuates the word with a finger in my face.

I slap it out of the way. “I’m not a liar.”

“I saw you sitting in the bar with him, looking all cozy.”

“I’d never even spoken to him before the other day.” I think of something else. “I wasn’t the person to set up that meeting, either. It was Angelica. She thought she was doing me a favor because she knew how upset I was about finding out my sister died before I ever got the chance to meet her. She thought that getting to meet Reagan’s dad would give us both a bit of closure. It hadnothingto do with you.”

Saint shakes his head. “You say it had nothing to do with us, but then he’s on campus, and everyone knows what the rumors are, and now I can’t get ahold of Lex, and there’s been a security breach.”

Alarm jangles inside me. I should wash my hands of these men and walk away. I shouldn’t care, but I do. Damn me for my stupid, soft heart, but I do.

“What do you mean, you can’t get ahold of Lex?”

“Exactly that. He’s not answering his cell, and I have no idea where he is.”

I think of the mess I’d made of his car. “Shit.”

Guilt solidifies inside me, but not for the reasons Saint is accusing me of.

“Look, I might not have had anything to do with Jarl, but I did damage Lex’s car,” I admit. “I was furious with the three of you. I wanted to make you see that I wasn’t going to just lie down and take whatever shit you were going to deal out to me.”

Saint stares at me. “You think that’s what we were doing? Just dealing shit out to you?”

“Well, yeah, especially you, Saint. I mean, you pretended to be your brother to get into my bed, remember? And now I find out you’ve been sneaking into my room while I’ve been sleeping. I mean, what the fuck? That’s hardly normal behavior, is it?”

“The thing with me pretending to be Lex was only for fun. I wanted to test you, see if you could tell the difference between us, which you could.”

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