Page 9 of Vicious Intentions

Except for happiness.

I’d been lonely for almost all of my life. I’d had no siblings and no real friends until Kelly had bounded into my life. She’d taught me how to become more personable, dragging me from my protected shell, kicking and screaming. I was grateful for her friendship.

Once that had happened, I’d ventured out into the real world, pretending to be something I wasn’t: a professional singer. It was my foray into perfecting my stage presence while not being forced to feel the competition from my peers at school. At first, I’d been terrified. Now, I relished in pretending I was Lola or Tina Marie or Sasha. I’d learned about myself while dressing in provocative clothes.

I craved the darkness.

The only other outlet I had was writing, and I dared not do it on my laptop for fear of someone else seeing it. My thoughts drifted to the latest story I was in the middle of writing. My sexual cravings had always been dark, but I’d yet to explore all the juicy things I’d researched. My fantasies had fueled my stories since arriving at college. However, if my mother saw them, she would die.

“Hello!” Kelly said, jerking me out of my almost trance-like state.

“Oops. Sorry. Meaning what? Or dare I ask?”

She waltzed closer, giving me a pouty look. “I managed to secure an invitation for you to the greatest party of the year.”

I instantly tensed. I’d yet to attend a single party on campus. They were held frequently. Some were provided by the school administrators, but most catered by the elite groups that had formed long before I’d asked to enroll. The school had been around for at least four decades, the education top-notch, graduation ensuring a place in a doctoral program of choice. Considered a music prodigy, I was set to graduate in less than two weeks, only a single exam standing in my way of receiving a diploma. I’d combined two years into one since I’d arrived later than other kids. “I need to study.”

“Oh, come on. You’re brilliant and talented. You can take a Saturday night off.”

She was right, and I really wasn’t worried. I was a straight ‘A’ student with a 4.5 GPA.

While the City of Hope wasn’t Julliard, there were a half dozen Broadway and opera stars and one rock star who’d graduated over the last ten years. I had high hopes of being the next discovery one day. At least a girl could dream.

“Besides,” she added, pointing her index finger in my direction. “I know about your late-night forays into town.”

“What?” I tossed one of the pillows from the couch in her direction. I’d done everything in my power to keep that a secret from everyone.

“Yup. You aren’t the prim and proper shrinking flower everyone thinks you are.”

“You’re such a bitch!” I said playfully. Then we both giggled.

Singing offered peace of mind, a freedom that I’d never thought I’d achieve. I knew my behavior was risky. If discovered, my parents would force me to return home where I’d be followed on a daily basis by at least one brutal security man. My father had hired an entire army after the first threat made on his life. That had been when I was five or six. My mother had finally confided in me after I’d pushed so hard to be able to attend a regular high school. While it didn’t make any sense given what my father did for a living, I knew anything was possible.

I couldn’t stand the thought of returning to that life ever again.

“Which group?” I was almost afraid to ask. She had other friends given her popularity, but she never lorded it over me. I was a wallflower, preferring to remain alone with my music and writing. Thankfully, she’d never pushed me or made fun of me. When she hesitated, I groaned. “Don’t tell me.”

“Yes, girl. The Elite.”

Bullies. The school was full of them. The Elite made some of the college bully romance novels I’d read look like kids playing in sandboxes. The boys believed themselves to be men and were rich and powerful, their families akin to gods in the corporate and organized crime worlds. They were the most entitled people in the world. I was certain of it.

I shuddered violently at the thought of people forced to spend time in the same room with them. Kelly’s fascination with the boys who belonged to the club was ridiculous. Granted, the few boys I’d met were gorgeous, as if each one of them had sipped from the Adonis pool, but they were also rumored to be arrogant bastards.

I had a few in my regular classes. They insisted on being disruptive, and the professors always looked the other way. At least for the most part, none of them had ever paid me the time of day.

“Don’t you mean the Damned?” Even with disdain in my voice, I dragged my tongue across my lips. Several were objects of my fantasies, but no one would ever learn that. Nope. It was my secret.

Such a bad girl.

Kelly rolled her eyes. “Oh, come on. That’s just jealousy from other students who don’t have what it takes to become a member. They’re all smart, rich, powerful, and good-looking. Dreamy, if you ask me. I have my sights set on at least two of them.”

Of course she did.

Jealousy wasn’t the word I’d use. The boys who made it through the grueling initiations the older members forced them to endure became nothing more than bullies on steroids. They were some of the most entitled people I’d ever met in my life. I hated every one of them, although I had to admit more than one of them had appeared in my raunchy stories. If only they knew what the quiet girl could dream up in her imagination. “They wear all black, for God’s sake. Doesn’t that tell you something? I think they’re Devil worshippers.”

She rolled her eyes, flopping down on the couch beside me. “Don’t be childish. It’s a uniform of sorts.”

Uh-huh. I’d seen them walking in groups through campus, taking up the entire sidewalk, forcing students to move aside or be shoved. They were typical bullies in every sense of the word. “Demonic creatures,” I teased. “And I heard about their initiations. Brutal. I’m shocked a single boy ever considers joining their motley crew. Don’t they drink the blood of animals or something?”

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