By the time lunch rolled around I'd managed to get myself really riled up. How dare he do this to me. He had to know that not showing up could have gotten me…well a lot of things: killed, stabbed, maimed, injured, stabbed, shanked - did I mention stabbed? - and worse if the wrong sort of people had put their minds to it.
Toni assured me that there would be an impromptu young serpents meeting over lunch, out by the bikes so we weren't overheard by too many people, or stopped too soon if it came to blows. Near the end of second period we'd all gotten a text from FP saying there would be a real club meeting today after school.
If I had to guess I'd say he was somehow tipped off and wanted to deal with this head on. The timing was just too perfect to be coincidental.
I barely heard the bell go, but my body knew exactly what to do and where to go. I stalked past the student body out towards the parking lot, passing ghoulies, serpents, junkies and everything in between on my way through. With how quickly they all parted before me I had to wonder just how much power I had acquired by taking that one scum bag down…or alternatively, what the look on my face must have been.
I barely registered Fangs trying to get my attention as I slammed through the school doors, whatever he needed to say could be said after I'd finished with Jones. If the little pussy even showed up. I'd bet all my money, what little I had left, that he had attempted to scare me out of the Serpents. Show me a taste of what I'd have to deal with and cause me to turn tail and run. But boy did it ever have the opposite effect.
I was so worked up by the time I got to the designated spot that I understood the saying "seeing red." It was like a haze, a force of anger tinting my vision and dictating my next actions. I would later learn that it was a trait my grandfather and I shared, one my mother also had, but I'd never seen it's full potential until now.
I could see him, that…that coward, as he slowly made his was over to our group, looking for all the world like any escape offered to him would be taken.
"Betts, just hear me out, okay? It wasn-" I cut him off swiftly with a well aimed right hook. My temper flared as he used his old nick name for me. Nothing he could have said after that would make me less angry than I was in this moment.
"What-" *punch to the face* "the FUCK-" *punch to the gut* "were you-" *knee to the stomach* "THINKING!?" I screamed, all my rage going into my limbs as I beat him, watching him fall to the tar mac.
I felt Sweet Pea put a hand on my shoulder, non-verbally telling me to back off for a minute and hear the president's kid out.
When Jughead saw him touch me he went from looking like a kicked puppy to a maniac hell bent on ripping my heart out.
"I didn't do shit, you loose whore," he spat out, while simultaneously spitting blood at my shoes.
I could feel my red haze of anger starting to take over, and judging from the look of fury on the people surrounding me, I wasn't the only one. When I went to step forward and give him a swift kick to the ribs, Toni gently grabbed my arm and held me back. I whipped my head around to give her a piece of my mind when she nodded her head in the direction of Fangs. He was standing a few people down from us to my right, his gaze focused intensely on something in his hand. When I looked down I noticed his phone and understood what she was trying to tell me. Let the Serpent Prince dig his own grave, we would have video evidence if we ever had need of it.
Taking a calming breath I looked back at the disgruntled man in front of me. He was slowly picking himself back up and had a crazed look in his eyes, whether from hate or desperation I didn't know.
"You used me to get in this gang didn't you? And then when you had the results you wanted you just started sleeping your way through my brothers, right? Sweet Pea is just the only one I know of so far, huh?" he said, his voice getting louder and louder the longer his little monologue went.
"You don't belong here, you're nothing but a groupie, a slut hell bent on being seen by more of the infamous South Side motorcycle club. I left you alone in that class room so you would see you don't belong here, on the south side, in this club, but maybe I'm wrong. Maybe you'd make the perfect sweet-butt, passed around to your sick little heart's content! Maybe you want in on all of the gangs in this town, huh? I'm sure Damien made great use of you in English, right? That's the only reason he didn't beat you senseless and why you didn't turn tail and run right back to your traitor, whore mother and your rich, privileged little north sider friends!"
Having gotten everything we needed on record, and honestly, being sick of listening to his shit, I just smirked and swung out again, hitting him square across the jaw. My knuckles hurt like a son of a bitch but it was worth it to shut him up for ten seconds.
As I shook out my hand and leveled my own glare at him, I finally spoke.
"No matter what happens at this club meeting tonight, you and me are through. You don't talk to me, you stay away from me and you never disrespect me like this again. I even catch of whiff of you trying to pull some shit I will have you brought in front of the club to be brought to their justice. And you know for a fact that they will be less lenient than I have been up until now. Now, toddle off Jones, I don't want to see your face until the meeting tonight, understand?"
As he went to reply with something I'm sure wasn't capitulating, the group around us closed rank and eyed him up. As he looked around he could see he didn't have any support in our group. The club was family, period. We didn't put each other in harms way for our own benefit.
With one final sneer he pushed his way past the ring of young bikers and stalked back towards the school, pushing people out of his way as he went.
With a deep, resigned sigh I looked around and took stock of our group. Tonight was going to be something I'd never seen before and based on the look on their faces, probably something they never had either.