Sweet Like Revenge

02 - Laying Plans

My stepdad launched himself off a bench outside of Walsh's office as soon as my non-regulation heels hit the polished floor.

"How did it go?" he asked, wringing his hands nervously.

I smiled to myself, making sure the door was shut firmly behind me before sauntering over to join him. I'd convinced Richie to stay outside under the guise that talking to Walsh was something that I needed to do on my own. The truth, of course, was that I couldn't risk having my mother or stepfather anywhere near my teachers or peers. My mission relied on one thing—keeping my true identity a secret. And, to do that, I had to keep it from them.

"Fine." I nudged him playfully. "You didn't have to wait for me."

He nudged me back, then leaned over to peer at my class schedule. "Of course I did. I wasn't about to make you go through this alone."

Richie had only started dating my mother a few years after we left Irvine. Still, he was her childhood best friend and my godfather, so he'd been aware of the challenges I'd faced back when I was thirteen. While my mother's new job in television production forced us to make the move back home, both she and my stepfather had expressed concern about me returning to school. They'd even offered to let me be home-schooled.

I'd declined.

Because I had a score to settle. I had a job to do. I wasn't overly thrilled to be back, sure, but I did have a chance to do what many before me would kill to. I could finally channel my pain, my anger.

I could finally exact my revenge.

"You don't have to walk with me all the way," I said as Richie trailed me to my first-period classroom.

"Are you sure you know where you're going?"

"I'm sure," I replied without a second thought. Despite the time that had passed, my memories of Irvine were as ripe as ever, and my nightmares had seared the perfect map into my skull. I knew those long, narrow corridors like the back of my hand, and I was even more familiar with the demons that lurked there.

There was a very clear system at play at Irvine Academy; monarchical absolutism. But, while Walsh was the school's figurehead, he was far from the demon running the show.

As he'd just proven to me himself.

No, it wasn't the teachers who ran Irvine. It was the students. Or maybe it was their families—wealthy, privileged, the kinds of families whose name's headlined the front pages of glossy magazines and the Forbes Four Hundred. Their status and power were hereditary, meaning that every student in those halls had a role to play in them. They could all be placed into one of three categories, and categorizing them perfectly was essential if I was going to succeed in what I'd come back to do.

At the very bottom of the social ladder were those that could be likened to the third estate. The commoners were harmless, mostly. At their best, they were below average. At their worst, they were followers and wannabes. The third category was the one that I'd been sorted into my first time around, way back in seventh grade. And it was one which I was determined to never return to.

The second rung was reserved for those who I thought of as the nobility. Some served on the Queen's Counsel: redheaded she-demon Poppy Andrews, local pageant queen Kirsty-Lee Calloway, and whichever other gorgeous, bitchy she-wolves had managed to weasel their way up the ladder in the time that I'd been away. Then there were the football players, like Astor Black. With athletic prowess and impressive reputations throughout the school district, they were the equivalent to soldiers serving in the King's Army. The Counsel and the army played an essential role in keeping the lower class in check, and were protected from torment due to their loyalty to the crown.