Chloe's underclass mother is married to a billionaire, and she transfers to an elite school to become the first female werewolf warrior. But her origins make her a thorn in the side of the school's four ruling brothers. They have to take a little baby girl,...
Chapter 1 New Beginnings
“You lucky little bitch! Your mom actually married our city's billionaire! You're getting out of this shithole for good, aren't you?”
My best friend, Navis, sounded a little bitter. We grew up together in the slums until my rich new dad made me change schools.
“Don't be jealous, Navis. You know how beautiful my mom is.” I said with tears in my eyes. “I'm transferring to MoonRiver, so write to me often.”
Navis hugged me even though she pretended to be reluctant. She slipped something secretly into my hand.
"A gift for the beginning of the school year." She said. "Don't let anyone find out. Be safe."
It was a cloth-covered dagger?!
I smiled. Only I knew the significance of the dagger.
Moonriver Boarding School is one of the most elusive schools in the country. I’m hoping Moonriver will help accomplish my dream. I want to be the first female warrior.
I aspire to have status and dignity on my own. Becoming a warrior is the only thing I can fight for with my own hands. No woman has yet passed the warrior training test, but I believe I will be the first.
In our slums, there was crisis everywhere. In the past, my mom would bring home some messed up men. I hated them. They harassed me then, and I had to learn self-defense from an early age. This enhanced my love of warrior training. That's why I receive a dagger as a transfer gift.
Although I now have the opportunity to come to Moon River to study, who knows when my stepfather will change his mind. I must take advantage of this opportunity.
I look back at the car and see my stepbrother, Wyatt.
“Ready?” he says. I shrug. I guess I’m ready. He nods once then goes around the other side of the car.
There isn’t a handle. I wave my hand around the side of the car and nothing happens.
I slam the heel of my boot into the car. The driver sighs behind me and the door opens on it’s own. It’s followed by Wyatt’s cackles from inside the car.
“It's automatic,” Wyatt drawls. He pats my knee. “Here we go to Moonriver!”
……
“You’ll find your first day guide in the student center over there,” Wyatt says. His raises his eyebrows and his smile gets a bit more wolfish. “Good luck.”
I roll my eyes. “Thanks.”
I slam the door to the car shut the walk into the castle. There’s a tall, blonde woman standing smack in the middle of the hallway. I watch as her eyes skim over my entire body from my mud-caked boots to my vintage band tee. They widen slightly. I catch a tremor in her lip.
“Miss, are you sure you’re in the right place?” she says.
I look around and hold my hands out. “My brother said this is the student center.”
The woman’s eyes twitch ever-so slightly. She sticks out a perfectly-manicured hand. “Kathy,” she says. “And you are?”
I stick out my own hand, nails coated in chipped black nail polish.
“Chloe,” I say with all the fake sugary sweetness I can muster.
“Chloe,” she repeats like maple syrup laced with rat poison. “You’re from Greendale, right? I didn’t know fashion was so—” Another once over, lingering on the holes of my tee. “– Interesting there.”
My face heats up despite every bit of rage bubbling deep within me. I drop her hand.
“So how’d you end up at Moonriver?” she goes on.
“My step-father just enrolled me. Figured it’d help me get out of Greendale,” I cock my head. “Isaac Jones?”
Kathy’s eyebrow flies up. Her sneer drops into a malicious smirk. Fuck, this isn’t what I expected. “
“Oh, so you’re Camila’s daughter?” she says. “Camila Martin. Lowly caretaker to the rich’s kids? Tell me, did your mom drug Isaac? Is that why he got rid of his wife?”
She cocks her head in a mocking manor to the way I just did. “I heard he lost most of his fortune in the divorce. Surprised he can even afford to send two kids here.”
“He didn’t,” I snap. “And my mom didn’t give Isaac shit. He pursued her, well after he and the former Mrs. Jones split. They may have gotten quickly married but, I assure you, their relationship was all natural.”
“Interesting,” Kathy drawls. I’m two seconds away from bashing her perfectly white veneers into her skull. She waves a hand. “Well, I’m sure you’ll find your father to be a hot topic in town. Everyone loves the gossip associated with the billionaire and his gold-digging mistress.”
She brushes past me. Her heels click on the floor as she walks to the front door. I can’t help but see red. The dagger feels like a hot weight in my pocket.
But this was Moonriver. This was a whole new territory with new dynamics to learn. With a crack of my fingers, I turn and put on the fakest smile I can muster. Kathy’s waiting for me by the door. I turn to follow her.
She winds me around campus and blathers on about things I truthfully could not give a shit about. I’m about to speak up and tell her to skip all the bullshit when we pass a building so unlike the rest of them.
It’s a large pyramid, seeming like it was plucked out of Egypt and smacked in the middle of the forest. The only thing that makes it feel more of this century is the obsidian it’s made of. The light hits it and it shimmers slightly.
“What’s that?” I ask Kathy.
“Oh,” she laughs. “That’s the Hayes Pyramid. Home of the Hayes brothers.”
“Hayes brothers?” I say.
Kathy rolls her eyes. “Theodore Hayes runs the school,” she goes on. “He is in the running for the next Alpha King. The Hayes brothers are his sons. Four of them. They’re wickedly attractive and smart and funny. ”
“Sounds like they’re all winners,” I dead pan.
“The only winners,” Kathy corrects. She tips her head towards the pyramid. “Are whomever they choose as their mates.”
I look around the pyramid and see a bunch of women frolicking about. Some are singing, some are sparring. They all seem to trying to put on some sort of show. For fuck’s sake, one of the girls is doing splits in the lawn and throwing her head back as if she’s in some sort of pornographic films.
Suddenly, I hear a cry. All of the women in the yard, myself and Kathy all turn towards it. A girl comes out from the backside of the pyramid. Another group of girls immediately go up to console her. Kathy fakes concern in a coo.
“Poor girl,” she says. “Probably another reject for mother.”
“Mother?” I whip my head towards Kathy. “Aren’t we, like, under twenty?”
Kathy hums. “Yes, yes. The peak age of mating is twenty but sometimes strange things happen,” She says. “A baby was left on the front door of the pyramid yesterday. A girl. No one can seem to find her mother. The Hayes brothers, as generous as they were, took her into their house. Now, they’re trying to find a girl to help them raise her.”
“Raise her?!” I gasp. “We’re all students with full time class schedules. No one has the time to raise a baby!”
It seems that Moonriver is even more complicated than I anticipated.
Chapter 2 Into The Wolf Den
“So who’s the mom?”
“What?” Kathy says over her shoulder.
“Of the baby that the Hayes brothers have?” I add. “Seems like an angry mistress just dropped it there out of spite.”
Kathy stops and turns back to sneer at me. “She,” Kathy emphasizes. I resist the urge to roll my eyes. “Has unknown parentage. No one knows where or why she came to be. All we know is that she exists and has been adopted by the biggest, most powerful house on campus. Even the inner ring of the brothers knows nothing beyond that.”
I snort. “They don’t have girlfriends of their own to take care of her?”
“They do,” Kathy drawls. “But that seemed inappropriate. So they expanded the search to the whole school.” She stops and cocks her head, eyebrow flying into her blonde hair. “Though with your mother’s childcare history, maybe you’d be a good fit.”
“Isaac didn’t pay to tuition for me to babysit,” I say, sharply.
“Suit yourself,” Kathy says. “As lovely as it’s been showing you around, my own interview for caretaker is coming up. Too-da-loo.”
Without even a second glance, she turns on her heel and marches back towards the ominous looking pyramid and it’s gaggle of hysteric women. I watch in disbelief. This school is full of crazy people! I can’t imagine I will do anything else here besides study, train and try and become an even better candidate for warrior. Speaking of which, I should scope out the training facilities and see what they look like here. I start towards a building marked “Combat Center.”
I go for the doors then stop short when I realize I can’t get in. There’s a card reader. I frown and turn around to head back to the student center. I run into something wide and hard and “oof” slightly as my face collides with it.
“Sorry,” I mumble, swiping a hand over my face.
“No worries,” the voice chuckles. It’s low and deep and lights a sort of spark in my gut. I snap my eyes open.
In front of me is a tree of a man. He’s strikingly handsome, wavy brown hair and yellowed eyes. He rakes over my entire figure and I’m immediately self-conscious of the ratty shirt I put on that morning.
“I haven’t seen you before,” the man goes on. “Freshman?”
“Yeah,” I find my voice, lodged in my throat. I motion over my shoulder slightly. “Trying to check out the combat facilities but my guide didn’t give me my ID. Do you think you can let me in?”
The man’s eyes do another skim over me, lingering on my breasts and hips. His gaze feels like lightning and I’m immediately twitchy. I cross my arms over my chest. He snickers.
“You want to go to the combat facilities?” he says. “Shouldn’t someone like you be more interested in flirting with boys and making a home?”
“I have no interest in flirting,” I snap. I’m completely over this man’s shit and this fucking school’s nonsense. “I’m here to become a warrior.”
The man stares at me for a moment. He blinks a few more times, eyes locked with my mine before he arches an eyebrow and speaks, low and soft.
“You want to be a warrior?”
“As I just said, yes,” I say.
He looks over my shoulder then back to me. Another sweep of my body, this time lingering on my arms and legs. Finally, he pushes past me and taps his wrist against the card reader.
“Thanks,” I mumble.
We walk inside. He sticks a hand towards me.
“Archer.”
“Chloe,” I say slowly. I ignore his hand.
“Chloe,” he repeats. He pulls his hand back and clears his throat. “That name sounds familiar.”
I freeze. I close my eyes and breathe slowly. Here we go again. “Yeah,” I say. “My brother Wyatt goes here. I’m Isaac Jones’s stepdaughter.”
Archer raises an eyebrow. The rest of his face is set in a hardline. “Oh so I’ve just let the most infamous transfer into my gym?”
Fuck.
I bite my lip. I look up at Archer and see no malice, just curiosity.
“I’m sure you’ve heard about our campus’s new little bundle of joy,” he says. “Maybe you should try and apply for the mother role. Maybe those nanny skills of your whore mother are transferable. It’s be a far better use of time than coming here to train to be a warrior you’ll never become.”
Rage seethes across my body.
How dare he?!
“Fuck you!” I spit. I jab my finger at his chest. “Where do you get off?!”
He holds his hands up and laughs a little. “Ooh, what’re you going to do warrior girl? Poke me to death?”
I shove my palm against his chest. He barely moves, a hulking mass of dick-ish muscle. Instead, he looks shocked I touched him.
“Everyone at this goddamn school is obsessed with this stupid fucking baby!” I shove him again. “Just because my mother was a nanny does not mean I am one! Nor does it mean I should be the one to take care of the fucking brat!” I shove him once more. This time he steps back a bit. More shock comes across his face.
At the end of my tirade, we’re nose to nose. I’m heaving breaths that send my chest further up against his. The rubbing against each other is making my nipples pebble. That, coupled with the fact that Archer is looking at me like I’m prey is making my stomach feel like lightning has rippled through it. He tips his chin higher before he wraps his hands around my biceps.
In one second, he’s whipped us around and pinned my back to the wall. His leg slots between mine and he uses his hips to pin me into place. I try and fight back against him but I’m barely able to move against his grasp.
“Let me –” I wriggle again. “Go!”
“No,” he roars. “Listen to me, little girl.”
He pulls me away from the wall and slams me back against it. My head bounces and my vision goes slightly blurry. Archer shakes me and the two of him I’m seeing become one again. He looks enraged. His nostrils flare and the honey I saw in his eyes turns into a fire.
“You’re new, I get it,” he snaps. “But you have no idea who you’re dealing with. You have picked the wrong asshole to fuck with. I get what I want at this school and I do what I want. People like you don’t so it’s best you start to learn that.”
I get one arm free and shove his massive chest. He barely moves and continues to glare down at me before snatching my wrist in his massive hand. I whine as he twists his hand and the skin on skin burns.
“This school isn’t for little sluts like you who come in looking for someone’s money to spend,” Archer hisses. “I don’t know how your mother seduced Isaac but I do know I won’t let you get your claws into any of the people here. I’ll let you off with a warning, but if I ever see you in my gym again, I’ll tear you to shreds.”
He drops my wrist and pulls away from the way. My body staggered and I almost slide to the floor. Every cell in my body is aching. Archer glares down at me.
“Got it?” he snaps.
I nod once, trying hard to not whimper. My arm feels numb and I rub at my red wrist. I watch Archer storm off into the gym. His fists are balled at his sides and his spine is arched in contempt. I look down at my aching hand and flex my fingers. They’re stiff but nothing seems broken. I look back up and Archer is gone. I’m left in the entryway of the combat facilities with a throbbing wrist and a bruised ego. I let my head rest against the wall and close my eyes.
Maybe this wasn’t the best idea. Sure, life in Greendale wasn’t great. But at least rich assholes wouldn’t spend their days making my life miserable.
Chapter 3 Temple-tations
After being beat up by that Archer guy, I dart from the gym and try and find a place to shelter. I wind up in the dining hall eating something lavish called “ceviche.” It tastes like vinegar and feels like raw chicken. I’ve managed to down a few bites of it when my phone goes off. A message from Wyatt blinks on my screen.
Wyatt (1:45 PM) : Meet me at 450 E Peak Hwy @ 2:00 PM. Don’t b l8.
It’s ominous as ever but it’s also very Wyatt. He’s always been short with me. It may be his disdain towards my mother and I for ruining his daddy’s perfect marriage or maybe it’s just because that’s who he is. Despite how vague and odd the message is, I keep Isaac’s promise in the back of my mind. He told me that Wyatt would watch after me at Moonriver. Make sure I fit in and all that. So far, I’ve done anything but fit in. Then again, Wyatt and I parted ways the moment I stepped in this Gods-forsaken place. Maybe he genuinely would watch after me.
Or maybe this was a trap.
Regardless, I dump my ceviche and start across campus. My phone tells me it’s a ten minute walk meaning I’ll show up right on time if I don’t get lost.
The campus is gorgeous, I’ll give it that. The greenery is in full bloom at this point of year. Large willows arch and hug the pathways that weave through the buildings. The halls and dorms look like gothic castles, dark stone with looming black gargoyles hanging over the eaves of the roofs.
My phone directs me to a smaller building. It’s slightly off campus and looks nicer and newer than the other buildings. The black marble is much like that of the Hayes pyramid but seems to look more like a church than a misplaced Egyptian pyramid. I look around and seem to find that everyone has abandoned this part of campus.
I slowly edge toward the door. I try calling out for Wyatt but hear nothing. I step inside and call his name again.
“Wyatt? Hello?”
The door slams behind me. I hear a series of clicking and I immediately panic. I go to try and wrench the door open but it’s locked. Great. I continue to slowly walk through the church. It’s so dark inside that I can barely see where I’m walking. I hear muffled noises around a corner and tentatively poke my head around to see if it’s Wyatt.
A young couple is entangled against a wall. Her head is tossed back in ecstasy. Her long brown hair is cascading down her shoulders and draped over her chest. Her shirt is hike high up and bunched under her chin. The man’s hand is working at her tits with fervor, all while he sucks on her exposed next. His own shirt is tossed on the floor and his back muscles are rippling in the low candle light.
I am immediately embarrassed and pinned to my place, watching as his hand moves against her skin. He slides it lower and her full chest is bared to the wind. I feel heat flush my cheeks. His hand moves in between her legs and the girl lets out a wanton moan. I slap my hand over my mouth and stare at them, frozen. The man spins the girl around so his back is against the wall, all while keeping their lips locked together. She leans into him as his hand continues to work under her skirt. The leg closest to me is wraps around his hip. He moves from her mouth to suckle on her neck again and that’s when we make eye contact.
“What the fucks?” he hisses.
“Keep going,” the girl whines as she gyrates her hips against his hand. “Please, baby.”
“Who are you?” the man snaps. “This is a private building!”
The girl finally turns to face me. She yelps and immediately flies from the boy. She yanks her shirt down and darts out the other side of the room. The man, still shirtless, starts towards me.
I scrambled backwards. “I’m sorry – my – I – my brother—”
“I’m not asking again,” he snaps. “Who. The fuck. Are you?”
The man looks eerily familiar. He has honey gold eyes and wavy brown hair. It hits me like a bullet train that he looks exactly like Archer. I step back again, raising my hands in defense.
“I’m so sorry – I didn’t – “
“You must be new,” the man snaps. “This property is Hayes property. Exclusive to the Hayes brothers and Hayes brothers only.”
“Fuck,” I breathe. “I was told to come here. The door was open and—”
“By a brother?” he rakes his eyes over me and scoffs. “Don’t know which of my brothers would ever mess with someone as disgusting as you.”
“No, no!” I shout.
I immediately realize I’m utterly screwed. This man is a Hayes brother, an alpha king in training. And I have just barged in on his secret space and ruined his tryst with some girl. He seethes at me and I back up again. My back hits the wall and I’m cornered.
“Wyatt!” I yell. “My step brother Wyatt told me to come here!”
The man stops. He furrows his brow. “Wyatt? Wyatt Jones?”
“Y-yes!” I stutter. “He’s my step brother. I’m Chloe Jones!”
The man turns over his shoulder. “Jones!” he barks. My step-brother emerges from the shadows. He looks confused by my presence.
“Chloe?”
“Wyatt!” I shout. “Tell them you told me to come here. I didn’t – I didn’t mean to intrude!”
“What are you talking about?” Wyatt says slowly. He looks at the other man. “This is the Hayes temple. I’d never tell you to come here.”
I feel my stomach sink to my toes. It was a trick. I knew it.
“Beau, I’m so sorry,” Wyatt says and shakes his head. He looks back at me incredulously. “She’s not used to this sort of luxury. She must’ve come in here because it looked nice. I apologize.”
“Classic gold-digger, huh?” The Hayes brother, Beau, remarks with a chuckle. “Putting yourself in places you don’t belong.”
“Just like her mother, really,” Wyatt says still shaking his head. He pauses and looks back at me. I want to tear his eyes out. “I told my father it was a bad idea to send her here. She’d just make trouble.”
I whip my head to see Beau walking towards me. I’m utterly speechless as he takes my chin is his hands. His touch is gentle, despite the malice in which he spoke to me with. He turns my face towards the dim candlelight then turns it back to look him in the eyes. They’re the same honey-drenched fire as Archer’s. I swallow thickly.
“Now, now,” he tuts. “I love me a little trouble. Usually tastes the sweetest.”
His tongue darts out and wets his bottoms lip. Despite myself, I whimper. Beau’s mouth curls up like the Chesiree cat. I look over his shoulder at Wyatt, who’s lips are stretched into a smirk. My blood boils but I’m still frozen in place. Beau runs his thumb over my lips and my eyes jerk back to him.
“Boys,” he yells. “Come see the little rabbit I’ve caught us to play with.”
Three other figures emerge in the doorway.
