Dead Girls Don't Run ✔️

05 | Promises, Promises

My eyes skim over the words, absorbing the information as much as I can as I take notes with one hand and pick up the sandwich with the other.

School is exhausting and I'd only been here less than a day. How anyone did years of this was beyond me.

But still, if I wanted to find out the truth, then I had to keep my scholarship and to do that I had to study, and succeed.

I scribble down a note for class. Teaching myself was a lot easier than listening to teachers drone on and on about a small detail that captured their attention then actually teach what they were meant to be teaching.

I quickly jot down another note before shutting the book and pulling my full attention to the sandwich, my stomach grumbling. My constant fight for food hadn't dimmed a bit it seemed in the week's I'd had free will to eat it whenever I wanted. Food was a rarity growing up, a commodity, a prize to be won rather than something needed for basic survival. He used to take me out for lavish dinners whenever I'd done something he deemed worthy but then would lock me in my room with Elijah at the door to keep watch for two days sometimes three without food when I'd lost a match or talked back. I'm too proud to not admit that I talked back quite a lot, especially within the past year. I mean what did he expect when he killed the only friend, I'd ever made for myself, the only other person that understood what it was like to be raised by that man.

But nobody touched his property, as we'd both learnt the hard way. Ethan more than I, since he was now buried in a shallow grave somewhere and I had spent the two weeks after his death trapped in his bed, his room, his company every waking hour.

My stomach rumbles again and I pull my attention away from my depressing thoughts and back to the sandwich, forcing the food that now taste like ash on my tongue down. But I'm not worried about a little taste of ash when the taste of starvation melting on your tongue is far worse.

My body is always hungry, almost ravenous and no matter how much I eat, it never seems filled.

I let my eyes roam the cafeteria, slipping past students and teachers alike with a calculative eye, picking apart the wolves from the sheep. It was an easy enough thing to accomplish, especially in my last line of work.

Which is why it's easy to notice the gazes that dart to me, looking at me as if I don't belong.

They'd be right.

Footsteps sound to my right and I lift my head, regarding the girl that stands in front of me. She's in a few of my classes and had talked to me in every single one - smiling kindly. It was weird.

She was nice, if not persistent. Kat is her name.

I raise a brow at her, and she fiddles with her fingers, looking over her shoulder slightly before back at me.

"You should stay away from Kinkade and his cousins." She says softly, as if speaking of them too loudly will summon them here in a cloud of smoke.

I don't reply straight away, gathering my thoughts for a moment but I don't need to reply, she continues on.

"Kade, Killian and Malachi are not good people. Everyone noticed the twins talking to you this morning. You should try and stay out of their way. It never ends well for the girls that caught in their trap."

This is the second person to hint that any girl stupid enough to involve herself with them disappears or at least, that what it seems.

I tilt my head at her, leaning forward. "Who are they?"

Her eyes widen and she shakes her head. "Just stay away from them, it'll make the next few years easier for you." Kat gives me a close-lipped smile as she takes a seat opposite me, sitting rigidly and refuses to glance at the eyes that look her way at the action.