Chapter 1 

Amber

“Sweetheart? Can you come down for a moment?” I stop scrolling my social media feed and look up from my cell toward my bedroom door. Granny is calling me so I tap off the screen and swing my legs off the bed. I leave my cell on the duvet beside my journal, flipping it shut and stepping into my bunny slippers. My pink sweatpants and tank top match my lip gloss and the lollipop I’m still sucking. My curly blonde hair bounces as I hurry down the stairs. On the walls are pictures of me in my cheerleader uniform with a big smile on my face and part of a feisty formation. I’m not the cheerleading captain or anything, nor am I in the running for it, which suits me fine. “Amber?”

“Yes Granny?” I speak around the lolly in my mouth and jump down the last step to smile at my Granny.

“Ah, good.” My sweet Granny, the only family I have ever known, walks up to cup my right cheek and smile at me. I have her brown eyes, she tells me, and her curly hair. Hers is white now but it used to be blonde in her heyday. I like that I look like Granny in her youth. Alice Matthews was a lovely old bird who didn’t think twice about taking me in and raising me as a baby. I absently notice the picture frame to the left of us in the doorway. A man and woman with brown hair, kind smiles, brown eyes, and an infant in their arms look out from a wooden frame. My parents, though I never knew them.

“What’s up Granny?” I pop the lolly from my mouth.

“We have new neighbours.” She said with excitement and took my hand to lead me to the living room window. “Look.” She turned the pole attached to the blinds to open them and giggled, like she was 17 like me, and not 62. Her excitement was infectious and I peered out of the blinds with her. The moving van was being unloaded by men in blue overalls and they carried boxes into the house next-door. A large black people carrier pulled up on the curb behind the moving van I put my lollipop back in my mouth just as the door opened. The people who got out looked like they were auditioning for the Addams family. “Oh my.” Granny gasped beside me and we both stared through the window at them.

A woman got out first. She had black heels, black tights, a long sleeved black dress with a square silver buckle belt around her waist. The dress flared out from her waist to her knees, and she wore a wide black summer hat. She had long black hair, and as she lowered her sunglasses to speak to one of the movers, I saw a glimpse of icy blue eyes. She was in her 40s, from the look of her, and her black lips formed her words with frosty precision. A man got out of the car next, similar in age to the woman, and he had short brown spiky hair. His eyes were hazel, he was clean shaven, and wore a satin purple waistcoat over a black shirt and jeans. His arm went around the woman’s waist and they spoke to the mover together. Another man got out the car and resembled the first man with brown hair, a little younger and more unkempt, with crystal blue eyes and a neatly trimmed beard. He looked like he belonged on the back of a Harley Davidson, with his black jeans, torn off sleeves and black leather jacket. He seems to be grumbling with another man, younger than him, with a brown quiff of hair and the sides trimmed short. He had hazel eyes, looking like the first man who got out of the car. He bumped his fist with biker boy one, and the pair of them started carrying suitcases out of the car. A second woman got out. She is in her late 20s to early 30s, with strawberry blonde hair, baby blue eyes, navy jeans and a dark blue blouse under a dark brown jacket. She looks relatively normal compared to the rest of them. “Oh, there’s more, look.” Granny points out as the back doors open and out come a pair of twins. They look similar in age to me. Both have long black hair, block fringes, and icy blue eyes. I have no doubt they are the daughters of the first woman who is giving the movers orders. They are a little creepy, actually. The twins are dressed like gothic Lolita dolls, in black lace dresses with dolly shoes and a ribbon bow in their hair. They walk hand in hand out of the people carrier to talk to the rest of their family. Still holding hands…creepy… “Well they seem…interesting?” I chuckle and pop my lolly from my pink glossy lips to comment on how ‘interesting’ they looked, when another person got out of the van.

Oh man. He was a bad boy if I ever saw one.

He stepped down from the back of the people carrier. He had converse shoes with off white laces. Baggy black cargo pants with strips of fabric hanging down the outsides of each leg. A chain connected each of the front to the back pockets. He wore a tight black t-shirt and black leather jacket with silver studding. He had hazel eyes surrounded by grungy guyliner, short black hair with a choppy fringe and feathered bangs. Wow. I could already see him skipping class and brooding in a dark corner somewhere with heavy metal music playing in his earphones. Scowling and writing a song in a tatty journal about how he hates everyone. “Oh, he looks more like your age. I wonder if he’ll go to school with you?”

“Maybe.” If he does, we will not come into contact with each other. I mean, come on? We are clearly going to move in different circles.

“We should go and introduce ourselves.”

“What?!” I fluster as Granny takes hold of my elbow and leads the way towards the front door. “Granny? We’re not seriously going out to talk to the Adams family, are we?”

“Oh, be nice Amber.” Granny chides me and I pout, shoving my lollipop back in my mouth. If anyone from school could see me talking to these rejects, I would be mocked something rotten. “They are our neighbours and new to the neighbourhood. We should say hello and offer to help. It’s the right thing to do.” It’s the right thing to do to be gossiped about. I look nervously around for any sign of anyone who might take a picture of me talking to these freaks and put it on social media. “Good morning.” Granny, way too kind for her own good, walks us right up to the Gothic weirdos and gives them her best southern charm. Oh no. Train wreck, here we come. I brace myself, smiling around my lollipop as we walk right up to who I assume are the mother and father of this freaky family. “Well good morning. I live at number 39, just there.” Granny throws a hand over her shoulder towards our house. “I am Alice-Ann Matthews, and this is my granddaughter Amber-Lee Matthews.” I wave. “We saw you pulling up to number 41 to move in. That makes you our new neighbours. We thought it would be nice and neighbourly to introduce ourselves and see if you need any help settling in?”

“How thoughtful.” The man with short spiky hair dusts off his purple waistcoat and then offers a hand to my Granny. “What a lovely welcome. Allow me to introduce my family to you. I am Magnus Beckford.” He grinned and his hazel eyes seemed way too light. “This is my wife Delila.” He held his wife’s hand, and she lowered her sunglasses to look at me and Granny in turn.

“Charmed.”

“My Brother Clyde.” He pointed to the eldest biker boy. “My wife’s sister Ivy.” The relatively normal strawberry blonde waved just before she dragged her suitcase into number 41. “Our eldest son Anton.” The younger biker boy grunted in response, carrying a suitcase on each shoulder as he headed towards the house. “Our middle children, the twins, Lucia and Luca.” I blink. Did he just say one of them was Luca? Isn’t that a boy’s name? Even so, the Lolita siblings both curtseyed to me and Granny, and I could not tell you which one was Luca. They both looked very pretty like dolls. “And my youngest son is-ah. Blair. Say hello to our new neighbours.”

“Hey.” He skulked over with his hands in his leather jacket pockets. “‘Sup.”

“A pleasure to meet you young man.” Granny engaged him politely. I smiled and his hazel eyes were just as freaky as his dad’s. Lord, I hope this was over soon. “I am Alice-Ann, but you can call me Alice, or Mrs Matthews if you prefer.” He nodded and then looked at me expectantly.

Whispers.

All around me. I blinked and turned to look for the source of the whispers. I couldn’t make out what was being said by the creepy soft voice, and I didn’t like how everyone else seemed to act like there wasn’t a strange voice whispering around my head. Magnus puts his hand firmly onto Blair’s shoulder and the whispers stop.

“Who are you?” Blair asks me and I gulp around my lollipop.

“This is my granddaughter Amber-Lee.”

“Amber.” I grumble around my lollipop and pop it out of my mouth. “Amber.” I say more clearly. Blair drops his hazel eyes down my pink tank top and sweat pants, and then back up to my face. He doesn’t seem impressed with me either.

“You know, Amber is in her senior year at the local high school.”

“Spring Hills Highschool?” Delila asks with a smile.

“That’s the one.” Granny happily answers.

“Well how about that?” Magnus chuckles and pats his son’s back. “I’ve enrolled Blair there. He’s a senior too. All my others have already graduated. The twins are 19, but Blair has only just turned 18.”

“Well how about that? Blair will be starting at your school.”

“Tomorrow.” Magnus added. Oh no. No no no. Granny don’t-

“You can show him around, can’t you dear?” I swallow a lump in my throat at the horror that my sweet Granny has just signed me up for. I wouldn’t be caught dead with a freak like him. He looks like the kind of guy to sneak out back to smoke weed and spray paint the bathroom walls with a massive dick. Not someone I should be hanging around with.

“Sure.” I answer at last and shove my lollipop back into my mouth. I’m already anxious about standing here on the street and talking to him. Showing him around school? Oh man. This is going to suck.

“Well then it’s settled. Blair can call on Amber in the morning and they can walk to school together.” I flash Granny an SOS look, but she’s not catch the ball I’m throwing. “Is there anything we can help you with right now?”

“No, thank you, but it’s a kind offer.” Magnus nodded with a big smile. “Now if you don’t mind, we have a lot to do.”

“Of course. Don’t be strangers.” Granny called out and finally signalled that we could leave. Oh my gosh. I politely smiled around my lollipop and hooked arms with my Granny as we walked back to our house. Once the door was shut I unleashed my panic on her. “Now don’t be ridiculous.” She chided me, and I followed her into the kitchen as she put the kettle on to boil.

“Granny, I’m not being ridiculous. I’m a cheerleader with above average grades, and he’s a delinquent. Our kind do not mix.”

“You do not know he’s a delinquent.”

“I have eyes Granny.”

“You can’t judge a book by his cover.” I deadpan her and she chuckles at me. “Just be a nice neighbour and walk him to school. Show him around. Good girl.” She pats my cheek like I’m six years old with pigtails and not wanting to go trick or treating with the neighbour’s kids. Not 18 and worried that my final months of high school are going to be destroyed because my Granny is way too kind to the freaks next door. All I want to do is not land on my ass at cheerleading practise or in front of the school at our games, and get my grades so I can go to college. I don’t know what I want to actually do yet, but I want the option. “I’m sure everything will be peaches and cream sweetheart.”

I am not convinced of that at all.

I go up to my room in a huff, about to pounce on my cell and message my friends about this totally unfair burden so they know this is not my idea, when I hear something. What was that? The whispering is back and I turn on my heels to try and locate the source. I check my cell, and no one is calling me. No music is playing.

“…Amber…” I gasp and snap my head to the left. I face my bedroom window and see that the window opposite has its curtains open too. Blair is stood there with his forearms and wrists braced on the window frame. I gasp, seeing he isn’t wearing a shirt. Oh…my goodness…look at those abs! Does the bad boy hit the gym when he skips class? Not only thank, but he is inked. Below his firm pecks and dominating his abdomen is the clear tattoo if an animal. It had wide eye sockets, a long snout, two nostril holes, and teeth. Lots of teeth. I blush, realising that I’m staring at him with his shirt off and posing in the window. I rush over to take hold of my curtains, and he pushes his window up with both hands. He slides the notch in place to hold the lower half of the window parallel to the top half, and braces his hands on the ledge to lean towards me. I don’t know why, but instead of thrusting the curtains closed and walking away…I do the same.

“Hey.”

“Hi?” I raise a brown and also lean my hands on the ledge of my bedroom window. I never noticed how close my house was to next door before. You could drag someone from the opposite bedroom into yours, if you wanted to. “What do you want?”

“You don’t seem all that thrilled at babysitting me tomorrow. Want a free pass?” He smirks at me and I sigh with relief.

“If you don’t mind, that would be great.”

“Sure.” I smile and reach for the window to lower it. “But it’s going to cost you.” I pause my hands, chuckle at how not funny this is, and fold my arms. “See, all I want to do is keep my head down, finish my senior year, and get my grades. I don’t want to draw attention to myself. ” He says whilst wearing guyliner, tattooed, with his shirt off, five minutes after meeting me? “Math.” He sighed. “I hate it, and it hates me.”

“What’s your point?” Blair smirks and licks his bottom lip and nods at me.

“I’ll tell your sweet Granny you took me to school and looked out for me, like a real pal, if you tutor me in math.”

“What makes you think I’m any good at math?”

“I don’t need to be perfect. I just need to pass. Are you passing?” Amber hesitated too long. “Then you can tutor me. In secret, of course. Shall we start tomorrow? Your place?”

“Oh, erm-”

“See you then, Amber.” He winks at me, the arrogant prick, and then shuts his window and closes his curtains. All before I can think of a coherent way to tell him to shove off. Oh, my, gosh. I just got played. I scream with my mouth shut and shut my window and curtains angrily. I storm over to my bed and throw myself at my pillow. On the one hand, now I don’t have to show the new freak around school and get laughed at by association. Social self destruct avoided. On the other hand, said freak will now expect me to tutor him in math. Great. Just great.

Note from the Author- 

Hello! Would you like to find out more? There are 6 books in the series and book 1 is well underway on Patreon. You could read on for £1.50 a month. ^_^ That, and many other books too! Check out the link below.