Page 10 of Crooked Crows (Boys of Briar Hall 1)

Rook had taken the seat behind me and to the right, but he wasn’t who I couldn’t seem to peel my eyes away from.

Directly behind the empty seat was a guy who was staring at me like he was contemplating murder.

If it weren’t for the scowl twisting his face, I might have said he was handsome. With a whisper of dark blond scruff on his jaw and menace in his bright baby blue eyes. The guy was big and thick through the shoulders, though not as big as his pal Rook, who was whispering something into his ear.

“Take your seat!”

I shot Mr. Jameson a glare before rushing to sit down. I didn’t have to turn around to find out that the guy behind me was still staring. I could feel his eyes on the back of my head as if he were leaning into me, making the hairs on my arms and neck stand on end and my hand twitch toward the blade strapped to my ankle beneath my bootcut jeans.

Mr. Jameson launched back into a lecture on something I had absolutely no hope of absorbing, but at least I could try to take notes for later. I dug into the desk, ignoring the whispers and stares all around me, but my hands came up empty. I thought…

I thought the handbook said I would be provided with textbooks and study materials and supplies on my first day. Entirely unwilling to raise my hand in this den of vipers, I resigned myself to just sitting still, which was a feat of its own.

As Mr. Jameson lifted a piece of chalk to scrawl something in unintelligible handwriting on the blackboard, someone tapped my shoulder.

I glanced back, finding the guy who I’d briefly seen sitting to the other side of the psycho-looking one. He was holding out a few sheets of paper and a pen.

“The fuck you doing Grey?” the one in the middle hissed to the one holding out the shit for me, his voice dripping venom.

“Umm,” I muttered, glancing back and forth between them. “I’m good. Thanks.”

“Just take them,” the one called Grey insisted, shoving them at me. He didn’t look like he belonged with the other two. Where they were all dark and edgy, he was an All-American stud. With one of those short on the sides and long on top haircuts in a brassy gold too shiny to be dyed.

A winning smile split his face, and he wielded it like a weapon, slashing away any hope of my being able to deny him.

“Okay then.” I cleared my throat as I spun around in my seat, paper and pen in hand. I caught the girl next to me glaring in my direction as I began to try and decipher what Mr. Whatshisface wrote on the board.

I gave her athe-fuck-do-you-wantlook, eyes bugging out of my skull in question until she finally looked away, her barbie pink upper lip curling in distaste. She had long blonde hair flowing in a perfect wave down her back with a solid gold pin keeping it tucked back behind her ear. Her outfit screamed money and her unblemished skin told me she hadn’t had to work for a damned thing in her entire life.

There was no way those tits were real, either.

Fake bitch.

She gasped, and I realized I’d muttered the words aloud and clamped my jaw shut, redoubling my efforts to focus on the lesson and not on all the eyes watching the new girl.

Once they got their eyeful and made their judgment, they’d move along.

“Are you just going to let her talk to me like that?” The girl hissed in a low voice. Unable to curb my curiosity, I tilted my head to the side to see her baring her pearly whites at Grey.

His eyes lifted to the ceiling as he leaned back in his chair, looking bored as hell.

“Chill, Bri. You’ll smudge your lipstick sneering like that,” Rook crooned and an angry flush rose to her cheeks, mostly concealed by the thick layer of makeup she wore. She spun back around, her hands curling into claws atop her desk, practically shaking with rage.

Wow. Bitch really needed to get a grip. It wasn’t like I’d called her a cunt or a whore, but judging by her reaction and the way she immediately looked to the nearest dick-bearing human for protection told me she was likely both of those things, too.

I studiously took notes for the next thirty minutes, droning out the whispered conversations around me and the way the asshat behind me kept ‘accidentally’ kicking my chair leg. Though, when the guy got up to use the bathroom I saw how gigantic he was so, maybe itwasan accident after all.

Where Rook was all wide shoulders and dense muscle, this guy was tall as fuck. Like, he had to be close to clearing seven feet. Six-five at a minimum. For all I knew he probably couldn’t help catching his size thirteens on my chair, but judging by the bitter look he gave me as he passed, he wouldn’t have given a shit either way.

The blonde next to me, Bri, had her phone open beneath her desk and a coy smile tugged at the corners of her lips as she thumbed a message. Not more than a few seconds after she sent it, an audible buzzing sounded behind me, and she passed something back to Angry Face

My immediate suspicion was drugs, but then I had to remind myself where I was and amend my suspicions. Not drugs—designer drugs. There would be no tic-tacs or cloudy crystal here. It was likely all blow and bath salts at hoity toity prep.

And no search dogs, bag checks, or metal detectors to catch them.

At least I could keep my blade on me in class now. Having it close by almost always settled my nerves, even if in most circumstances I wouldn’t need to use it.

Piggybacking on Dom’s private self-defense lessons for the last two years back home made me just as lethal without it. Speaking of, I wondered how long it would take her to notice I was gone. It hadn’t exactly been a priority to let anyone know I was leaving. Besides, she was sequestered up at her dad’s place for the next two weeks while he defended some crime lord in court. Being a lawyer for one of the bigger gangs in California came with certain...risks.

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