The Mafia Princess In High School

Chapter 7

Emma POV
(After school, before the incident)

The car ride home is silent. The boys are pissed at Ryder and I'm pissed at them for hurting Ryder. When we get home, I storm out of the car and up the stairs to my room. I put my bag down and go straight to my bed. Then my door swings open and Lucas walks into my room.

"Ever heard of knocking?" I ask him sarcastically. "We need to talk to you, so you need to come downstairs," he says ignoring my previous statement. Great! I get to be lectured by all 8 of my brothers. I think to myself. I'm sure Luke and Logan have been filled in about the Ryder situation and I'm sure they overreacted the same as all my other brothers.

I get up slowly and trudge behind Lucas down the stairs and to the living room where the rest of my brothers are waiting with their arms crossed. I sit down on the couch waiting for them to start.

"Firstly, you rode the bus to school after we told you that you couldn't. That will never happen again. You will always be driven by one of the boys. Understand?" Luke says seriously. I don't like when they yell at me, so I just shyly nod. "Secondly, you were harassed by a boy and didn't tell us who he was, and then you were talking to him!" Xavier exclaims making me flinch a little. All my brothers are scary, but he is the scariest.

"He didn't mean to hurt me and he apologized. We were talking because he is my friend," I say back calmly trying not to break down. I don't handle being yelled at well. "He is not your friend!" Maddox and Jax both yell together. "You can't tell me who is and isn't my friend!" I yell back. "The h*ll we can't!" Xavier screams. I have never argued with my brothers like this before. I always just accepted what they said, but Ryder has been pretty nice aside from the first time and I like talking to him.

I stand up to walk away, shaking from my anger, but I am stopped by Alex and Dean. "We aren't done here young lady!" Logan tells me. Just then I get a notification on my phone. I look down at it and blush when I see a text from Ryder: "Hey beautiful"
He thinks I'm beautiful? I think happily. My brothers must've noticed my sudden mood change because my phone is snatched out of my hands by Alex. He gasps and starts fuming and he passes the phone around showing the text to all of them.

They are extremely mad and look like they could quite possibly kill Ryder. "We will hold on to this for a while," Luke says motioning to the phone and probably blocking Ryder. "What! That's not fair! I didn't do anything!" I exclaim trying to get it back, but he is too d*mn tall. "You gave Ryder your phone number!" Xavier explains. "Yeah, that's what friends do!" I reply sassily. "Watch your attitude," Logan says sternly. "Screw all of you!" I scream running around them and up to my room.

When I get to my room, I slam my door shut hoping the boys will understand not to talk to me anytime soon. They can't control me! I think angrily to myself. I decide that I need some fresh air, so I open my window and climb down the side of my house. I climb over the fence, avoiding the security guards, and start walk down the sidewalk.

I must've been walking for a couple of hours when I notice I'm lost. Fan-flipping-tastic! It's flipping freezing and I have no clue how to get home because my stupid brothers took my phone! I realize I'm in a sketchy part of town, and when I see a man leaning up against a wall up ahead I am reminded of my brothers word from this morning. My family has lots of enemies and now I'm walking down a street alone.

I turn into an alley, and when I hear someone following behind me, I speed up. Suddenly, I am slammed against the wall. The man from earlier is pushing my shoulders painfully against the wall. He is a bald man and probably around 6'.

"Hey, aren't you a pretty little thing," he says with a smirk, "how about we have some fun?" I start to panic. My brothers have taught me a little self defense, so I try to fight back. I raise my knee trying to hit him in his no-no square and scream as loudly as I can. Before I can hit anything, he slaps me across the face causing my cheek to burn and tears to stream down my face. I can't fight him off. I'm too weak! "Stop! Let me go!" I sob trying to get out of his painful grip. "Shut up girl!" the man says.

I start to sob harder, and he reaches down trying to take off my shirt, but before he can lift it up, he is thrown off of me. I look up to see Ryder with another guy holding the man. Ryder turns to me with a worried expression and asks, "Are you okay, Emma?" Immediately I wrap my arms around his hard torso and sob, "Thank you so much Ryder!"

I look up at him and see him checking to see if I was hurt. "I'm fine, he just slapped my face," I assure him. "Did he do anything else?" He asks looking angry. "No you stopped him before he could do anything like that," I tell him to which he lets out a relieved breath of air.

"What are you doing here?" Ryder asks me. "I got into a fight with my brothers and they took my phone, so when I ran away and got lost I couldn't call anyone," I explain to him to which he frowns.

"What are you doing here?" I ask him. "Umm... I had some work to do over here." He tells me. What kind of work does he do in this part of town? Oh yeah, I remember my brothers telling me he runs a gang. "Oh, gang work," I say. I notice his surprised look, so I tell him, "My brothers told me when they were trying to tell me to stay away from you."

He nods understanding and tells me to stay here for a second while he goes and talks to the guy holding the man that attacked me. They walk off and Ryder walks back up to me. When a cold breeze makes me shiver, Ryder slips off his leather jacket and puts it on me. I smile up at him in thanks and his face softens.

He walks me over to his car and starts to drive me home. We don't talk and I thought I would be freaking out after what just happened, but Ryder makes me feel safe and protected. When we pull up to the gate the security guards stop us, but when they see me they look relieved and let us in. He pulls up to the front door and helps me out of the car.

"Thank you again. I don't wanna think about what would've happened if you weren't there," I say hugging him. He hugs me back, and I hear the front door slam open. Ryder and I are pulled apart and Logan's arms wrap around me holding my back to his chest.

All my brothers look furious and start walking towards Ryder. "Wait! He helped me!" I say causing everyone to look at me. In the next moment I am being squished in a group hug. When they step back, they look at my face and I can practically see steam coming out of their ears. There must be a handprint from the slap.

"I swear to god if you did this..." Luke seethes turning to Ryder. "No! If it wasn't for Ryder, it would have been way worse!" I exclaim making all of them focus on me again."You better start explaining," Xavier says.

"After our fight, I snuck out and started walking, but I eventually got lost a couldn't use my phone to call anybody," I explain causing all of my brothers to have a guilty look, "When I was walking in a sketchy part of town, I noticed a guy up ahead, so I turned into an alley but he followed me and slammed me up against the wall. I tried to scream for help and fight him off, but he was too big. He slapped me in the face and told me to shut up. Then he started trying to take my shirt off, and that's when Ryder showed up and threw him off me. Ryder asked me if I was okay and then drove me back here." I finish explaining while crying again.

My brothers each give me a hug and double check to make sure I'm not hurt anywhere. Then they turn to Ryder and thank him for helping me. "Thank you, but don't think that this means you can talk to her. Stay away from her." Xavier says causing my brothers to nod in agreement and me to roll my eyes.

Logan picks me up bridal style and carries me to my room. It's pretty late, so I decide to take a shower and get ready for bed. I didn't have any homework tonight thankfully, so after I finish my night routine I lay down in my bed and fall fast asleep.