MY STEPBROTHERS, MY MATES

CHEER CAPTAIN

CHAPTER TEN

VIOLETTA

The staring was worse after the first period.

Not the subtle kind from yesterday where people at least tried to be discreet about it. This was open. Heads turning as I walked down the corridor. Girls nudging each other. A group of boys near the water fountain went quiet when I passed and then immediately loud again once I was two steps further.

I found Petra at our usual table at lunch and dropped into the seat across from her.

She looked up from her food and looked around at the general direction of the stares and looked back at me. "Why are those girls looking at you like they want you dead?"

"Long story."

She picked up her phone, looked at the screen, and held it out toward my face. "You're trending on PackLink."

I frowned. "What's PackLink?"

Her eyes went wide behind her glasses. She leaned across the table and turned the phone so I could see the screen properly. "PackLink. It's the school's social platform. Everyone uses it... posting, stories, live updates, all of it. Think of it as a mix between a social feed and a school notice board, except nobody uses it for school notices."

I took the phone from her hand and scrolled.

There were pictures of me. Multiple pictures, from multiple angles, all from this morning in the car park. Me stepping out of Jace's car. Jace holding my hand and pulling me toward the entrance. One photo that had somehow caught his face mid-turn and my hand in his from a very specific angle that looked considerably more deliberate than it was.

The captions were various degrees of dramatic.

*The human is riding with Calloway now???*

*Wait, who is she again?

*Jace literally held her hand someone explain*

*This is rage bait it has to be*

I shook my head slowly and handed the phone back. "This is madness."

"Welcome to PackLink," Petra chuckled.

I stared at the table for a moment and heard Jace's voice in my head from the car this morning. *It'll piss people off.*

And honestly? That alone almost convinced me.

The teacher walked in and we both straightened, and I spent the rest of the period thinking about the gym.

I spent twenty minutes at lunch fighting with myself.

I paced the length of the corridor outside the gym and back again and thought: did I actually need to do this?

Was this necessary? My mother wanted me to join something and her husband agreed and Jace had said it twice now. But none of them were the ones who would be walking into that gym. I was. And I had seen the blonde girl's face this morning. I already knew what was waiting for me in there.

I just could not.

I could go back to the table, eat, go home and tell my mother I thought about it and decided against it. I'd deal with her disappointment, which was a known quantity and therefore manageable.

But then I thought about Jason's voice in the cafeteria yesterday and the way the room had laughed. The way I'd sat there with my hands flat on the table and stared at the wall and survived it.

I stopped pacing.

I pushed the gym door open and walked in.

The music hit me first. Something fast and rhythmic bouncing off the walls. Then the energy... girls mid-stretch, ponytails swinging, the whole room moving with the specific warm-up looseness of a squad that had been doing this together long enough to be comfortable.

I stood just inside the door and felt every cell in my body register that I did not belong here.

Several girls noticed me within seconds. The movement near me slowed. Heads turned.

"That's the human."

"Why is she here?"

"No way."

I kept my face neutral and stayed where I was.

Then the atmosphere shifted. Not from the whispers but from the door at the far end of the gym. The blonde girl walked in, and the room reorganized itself around her without anyone saying anything. That was the kind of entrance it was.

Up close, she was even more than she'd looked from across the car park this morning. Tall, with legs that went on forever, blonde hair swinging past her shoulder blades, hazel eyes that were already on me before she'd fully come through the door. Pale skin. The kind of face that knew exactly what it was and had made peace with the power of it a long time ago.

She walked toward me.

The gym went quieter.

She stopped a few feet away and tilted her head and smiled. "Violetta, right?" Her voice was sweet. Everything underneath the sweetness was not. "Rafael's new daughter."

"That's right," I nodded.

She looked me up and down, slowly, taking her time.

"And you're here for…?"

She already knew. The way she was looking at me, she already knew exactly why I was here and exactly what she was going to do about it. She just wanted me to say it out loud.

"Cheer tryouts," I finished off.

The squad burst into laughter.

Not all of them. But enough.

A girl to my left said, "Human reflexes doing wolf stunts? That's brave."

Another one beside her said, "Or suicidal."

A few more laughed at that.

The blonde girl raised one hand slightly, like she was calming them down. She was smiling while she did it.

"Cheerleading here is extremely competitive," she said, and her voice had taken on the patient tone of someone explaining something to a person who didn't quite understand the situation they were in. "Most of these girls have trained their whole lives." She paused and let that land. "Especially wolves."

The implication was clear.

She wasn't saying I couldn't join. She was just making sure I understood what I was walking into. Making sure I could hear the exit behind me and feel how much easier it would be to use it.

I stood there and looked at her and thought: she is very good at this.

And then something in my chest snapped shut.

I stepped forward. "Okay," I gave her my best possible real look . "I still want to join."

The gym went quiet.

Not the whisper-quiet from before. Actually quiet. Even the music seemed to drop a level.

The blonde girl's expression didn't change exactly, but something behind it did. A small adjustment. Like she had expected me to fold, and I hadn't, and now she needed a moment to recalculate.

A girl near the back muttered, "Jesus, she really doesn't get embarrassed."

I turned my head and looked at her directly. "Not enough to quit."

The girl blinked.

The gym stayed quiet.

The blonde girl opened her mouth.

The doors behind me swung open. I turned to see who came in. It's Jace. He was standing in the gym doorway with his hockey bag on his shoulder, looking at me in the middle of the room with the expression of someone who had walked into a situation he hadn't expected. His eyes moved around the gym once, taking it in: the silence, the circle of girls, the blonde girl standing opposite me with her mouth half open.

"Hey princess, why are you standing in the middle of the room like you're auditioning for a cast?" He paused and looked around again, "And why is the room so hostile and silent?"