Page 13 of Swamp Princess

I turn to face the front and see Mr. Brooks now standing next to the woman who clasps her hands together, demanding everyone’s attention.

“Welcome to ballroom dancing. I’m Mrs. Lovett, and my goal is to get you all ready, every day we will cover dances and you will be paired with a counterpart. Most of you have done this, so this will be more of a refresher for polite conversation and manners. Without further ado, most of you know Mr. Brooks, he will be assisting me. Now, I will walk by and start pairing you. We are going to start with the waltz.”

I go numb. I can’t do this, but I have no fucking choice. The teacher pulls out what I am assuming is a class list and calls names and they step up and move to the side to wait. “Brinley and..” I watch the teacher look through the list of names and I start to sweat. “Loyal.” I want to sink into a hole in the fucking ground. Fate is not this cruel.

I move forward, a little stiffly and get even more stiff and angry when I see Loyal whispering to her frantically, but she just shakes her head, ignoring him. “Take your place, Loyal, please.” Before she can call me out, I move over to him and stand off to the side, hating that I have to allow him to touch me.

“This is fucking bullshit.” He sneers at me, showing me all the disgust in his face. “To be paired with swamp trash is unacceptable.”

“Fuck off, rich prick.” I snap at him. His eyes move to mine before he snarls, before we can start snapping at one another, the teacher calls attention again.

“Please move together and watch hand placement and try to follow us, and we will walk around adjusting you. Most of you know the waltz and the ones who are new have been paired with an experienced ballroom dancer.” She quickly looks at us and I know she means me. “Please start.”

Loyal moves as if on auto pilot now, and he yanks my right hand in a tight firm grasp. The shock his touch sends throughout my body to my toes is not what I was expecting, and it gets even worse when he puts his arm around my waist.

I look up at him and see how clean shaven his face is. His blond hair is slicked back, with only a strand falling out of place. His blue eyes are gorgeous, I can see flecks of what look like gray in them and I take a shuttering breath.

“Don’t step on my fucking toes!” He snaps and it knocks me out of staring at his pouty plush lips that I know would feel amazing.

“Fuckyou.” Loyal shuts me up by immediately swirling me around and into an unfamiliar dance. I am not good at giving people the lead and with him twirling me, I have no choice. I glide across the floor and because of my dance background, I am easy to pick up the steps.

Mr. Brooks I realize is watching and I smile at him. Loyal stiffens, but Mr. Brooks moves closer to us. “Loyal, great but not so stiff, here let me show you.” Mr. Brooks waits until Loyal releases me and steps in his place. His hold is a lot softer. He looks at me. “Brinley, you pick up the steps wonderfully and you glide which is how it is supposed to be.” I smile at him, but there is slight unease with him and I don’t know why.

“Thank you, Mr. Brooks.” He leads me through the waltz again as Loyal watches. I don’t know why but I stumble and step on Mr. Brooks’ feet. I don’t know why this feeling of being creeped out won’t go away but as he releases me, I almost sigh in relief.

Loyal steps back into place but this time, he doesn’t hold me so tightly as we spin around. For a moment, I get lost in his scent of honey and vanilla, which you would think would make him smell womanly but against his skin, it is most definitely manly.

We keep going through the waltz about five times before class is dismissed. Loyal moves away from me so fast that it looks like his hand caught fire. I watch him storm off like his ass is on fire. I sigh in relief myself. This day has come to an end, and it is time for me to go get ready.

Chapter Seven

I watch Loyal storm out of the gym like his ass is on fire and while it could be amusing, my eyes squint to the swamp bitch. Did she say something to him? I had begged my father, which I never do, to not do the scholarship this year. He promptly smacked me across the face like the bitch he is.

“Don’t beg, Kingston, you look pathetic.” He snarled before acting like I didn’t exist. I stormed out, slamming every door in my way outside, only glimpsing my mother with a fresh black and blue eye.

I calmly leave the gym after saying goodbye to Haven who is Rem's sister. She is still so sweet though, she has taken to talking to the swamp bitch. I walk to our dorm in the school using the private elevator and once I reach the top I can already tell that Loyal and Rem are there.

Stepping into the room, I look at Loyal. “Want to tell me what is causing this?” He knows that I am talking about the reason for his sour mood.

“You know I got paired with her.” He states as though it explains everything.

“Okay and? It didn’t seem like you were done talking.” In fact, for a moment, it looked like they couldn’t even keep their eyes off her.

He slams his mouth shut and huffs. Crossing his arms and long legs in front of him, ignoring me. Before I can interrupt him, Rem's phone goes off and he curses.

“Fucking Haven!” He gets up and storms into his room and I follow him. I hear Loyal not far behind. “She is going dancing in the swamps tonight and only told me so I wouldn’t have a search party out for her. I’m sure you can guess who she is going with.”

My eyebrows rise. Haven is really disobeying her brother and us. “We need to work on her getting kicked.” I need to think about how to do it. I already checked her records and had a background check done on her. She is as clean as a whistle and has an amazing GPA.

“We need to follow them. They already left.” Surprise hits me again, and I look down at my phone. It has only been a half hour. “They are grabbing food in the swamps first and then dancing.”

The thought of going over to the swamps irks me. They are a bunch of gangbangers and whores. The thought that Brin may not be filters in my mind before I shut it down. However, images of her riding her boyfriend’s cock in the car assault me, making me remember every little moan I was able to hear. The way she stared at him.

My phone ringing clears away my thoughts and I look down at Starla’s face across the screen. I frown as Loyal starts going through Rem’s clothing and Rem starts bitching. I don’t want to deal with her ass. She knows I am the one to call her and not the other way around.

Answering anyway, I snap, “What, Starla? You know better!”

A huff crosses the line before her sickly, overly polite voice responds. “Well, hello to you to my darling dotting fiancé.” She drags the word out, making me want to puke.

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