by Selena
That reminds me of Daddy’s earlier confession. “Did you know that Daddy grew up around here?” I ask Mom.
She sighs and rolls her eyes. “He didn’t grow up there. He went to school there for a few years in high school, and he likes to pretend that makes him belong there. You all belong in New York as much as I do. When is he going to get that silly idea out of his head and move back?”
“You want him back?” I ask, a lump forming in my throat.
“He’s the one who left me,” she says. “You all left me.”
I shake my head, refusing to be deterred. “So, that’s why he wanted to build a branch here? Because he went to high school here.”
She sighs again. “I assume so.”
“Did he ever talk about a family called the Darlings?” I ask. “That he knew back then?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” she says. “He talked about it sometimes, but it all sounded so deathly boring.”
“You’ve heard of them?” I ask. “Their son said Dad had tried to mess with them before.”
“Your father is a businessman,” Mom says. “Sometimes in a business, you have to make tough decisions.”
“So, it was business,” I say. “Not personal.”
I have to admit, I’m relieved. I was afraid it was something more scandalous, like an affair. Even though I get along better with Daddy than I do with Mom, I’d be devastated for her if he’d messed around.
“Yes,” Mom said with a sniff. “What else? With your father, it’s always business.”
“What did he do?” Lightning flickers on the horizon, and I glance at the driveway again, wondering where he is now. She’s right, though. Work always comes first. He probably forgot about our plans and stayed late at the office again.
“Who knows,” Mom says. “I think that Darling guy claimed that Dolce Drops were his idea. Which is ridiculous, of course. If they were his idea, they’d be Darling Drops.”
Some old business grudge, then. Nothing sensational at all. In fact, kind of a letdown. Not that I want drama between our families, but the Darlings obviously did fine for themselves without any help from Daddy. What I can’t figure out is why he wanted to move in right next door to a man who accused him of stealing his patent or whatever.
“Not everyone can win, Crystal,” Mom says, sipping her martini and checking her image in the corner of the screen. “There will always be losers. You have to accept that reality and not get caught up in the fate of the losers. You have to take care of yourself. We always tried to teach you kids that.”
“You did a great job,” I say. Mom always looks out for number one, that’s for sure.
“Good,” she says. “Dolce’s always win. Don’t forget that.”
“I won’t,” I say, glancing at the Darling house. I wonder if they tell Devlin that. If they preach to him about being a winner, about looking good and strong, about never showing the cracks in his armor. I wonder if he has a family motto, if he feels five times the pressure I do because he’s the only kid, the heir to their family name and fortune.
I wonder if there’s a way for the Dolces and the Darlings to both win. Right now, it doesn’t look like it.
thirteen
Who picks a girl to treat like a dog for the entire school year? Monsters, that’s who. Sick fucks. Sociopaths. If some part of me understands them, or wants to understand them, does that make me a sociopath, too?
On Monday, Royal pulls the Range Rover out of the garage and sits idling in the driveway while the rest of my brothers pile in. He hasn’t driven the car since the accident, and with good reason. It looks like a beater car.
“What are you doing?” I ask, peering suspiciously at the dented and scraped vehicle. One of the headlights is smashed, along with the side panel behind it, the passenger side door, and part of the rear door behind it.
“Driving to school,” Royal says. “Duke, take Crystal in your car.”
“No way,” Duke says. “I’m not missing the look on those assholes faces when we show up.”
“Why do I feel like you’re going to get arrested?” I ask.
“Because you worry too much,” Duke says, throwing an arm around me. “Now come on, if we follow right behind them, we’ll get to see it all go down.”
“Whatever’s going down, I don’t want to see it,” I say. But I get in the car with Duke, anyway. Maybe some part of me is still the nosy bitch I was in New York. Or maybe I just want to know what my brothers are doing. It’s definitely not because I want to see the Darlings, too, because I can’t help but be drawn to them like a voyeur looking in at their lives, trying to figure them out. Or so I tell myself.
I climb in the Hummer with Duke and Baron, and we follow the smaller car like a military escort. It sends a message for sure.
“Is this your way of telling the school ‘don’t fuck with us, or we’ll bring the big guns,’?” I ask.
Baron laughs from the passenger seat. “Sure.”
“Those ass-wipes are going down,” Duke sings, obviously high with the excitement of taking down the Darlings.
I remember Devlin’s words, and stomach flips. “You’re sure you can’t just call it even and move on? I mean, would it really be so bad to have an even bigger crew? One that wasn’t just our family. Think about it. There would be seven of you instead of four. You’d be almost twice as powerful.”
“You really don’t get how this works, do you?” Baron asks, twisting around to smile at me from behind his glasses. A dimple sinks into his cheek, and he’s still my adorable little brother, no matter what scheme he’s cooking up.
I open my mouth to tell him what Devlin said, but then I close it. If I tell my brothers that he threatened me, they’ll do a lot worse than whatever they’re planning as revenge for Royal’s car. I’m not about to stick my nose in the middle of this and make things worse. I’m just going to stay far away from the whole thing, watch what goes down from the sidelines, and let the boys work things out on their own. It’s not like they’d listen to me, anyway.
We pull into the parking lot early, as usual. During the past week, my brothers have played the stupid game with the Darlings where they each try to arrive earlier than the other so they can get the primo parking spot. But today, instead of cursing and glowering when the Darlings steal their spot, Baron cackles as he sets his phone on the dash in video mode. Duke pulls into the parking lot and circles around so we’re a row behind the Bel Air. He stops in the middle of the road, ignoring a car that pulls up behind him, waiting to turn down a row of parking spaces.
“What are you doing?” I ask again, my heart hammering in my ears so loudly I can barely hear my own words. “Because whatever it is, you need to stop.”
“I’m just capturing it on video,” Baron says. “This is going to get so many hits on my YouTube channel.”
I lean forward between the seats, anxiety churning inside me like a restless, storm-tossed sea. Royal cruises along the row of parking spaces in the Rover, not slowing as he moves toward his space. In fact, he seems to be speeding up. The dented door and broken light flash by, and I want to close my eyes, to cover them, but I can’t. I stare in shock as the battered Rover shoots toward the Bel Air.
Devlin and Preston look up from their usual spot leaning against the car. And Colt… Annoyingly charming Colt is glued to his phone as always. A scream catches in my throat, and my hand flies out, as if I can stop Royal, as if I can grab Colt and yank him out of the way.
Preston yells something, leaping away from the car. Fear slaps across his face like a hand, erasing his perfect mask of indifference. Devlin grabs Colt and hauls him across the pavement, faster than he should be able to move with his cousin stumbling and protesting with confusion. And then the Range Rover barrels into the Bel Air like a wrecking ball.
A squeal of metal and smashing glass reverberates through the parking lot. The Bel Air skids out of its space, turning a full one-eighty as it bounces down the tiny strip of grass that separates the parking l
ot from the building and slides into the ditch, slamming to a stop against the end of a culvert.
Silence falls over the parking lot. Everyone is too stunned to move. Only a dozen people are outside, all of them standing frozen as they watch the beautiful chariot that carries the kings of the school turn into a crumpled heap, like a smashed tin can.
Devlin moves first. He leaps at the Rover, which sits sideways across the coveted parking spot. Steam billows up from the crumpled hood, the whole front end smashed in. I scream, lurching for the door of the Hummer and spilling out onto the pavement. I scramble to my feet as Devlin jerks open the crumpled passenger door. King jumps out to meet him, grabbing Devlin by the front of his jacket.
“Guess we didn’t see you there,” King growls, shaking Devlin. “In our parking space.”
Devlin swings, his fist connecting with King’s jaw. He’s beyond words. His eyes are completely insane. Royal dives across the seat and leaps into the fight, smashing into Devlin and King. He goes for Devlin, who doesn’t seem to care who he’s punching. He slams a fist into Royal’s face, smashing his nose. Royal stumbles back, reaching for Devlin, but he’s too fast. He whirls like a dervish, fists raining down on my brothers. Blood sprays onto the pavement around them.
I scream and race toward them, blinded by panic. He’s going to kill my brother.
There’s no thought behind my urge to protect my twin, only instinct. Because if I could manage a thought, it would put me over the edge. If I could manage one thought, it would be that Devlin is completely insane. He fights with a recklessness that Royal doesn’t have, with a complete lack of self-preservation, as if he doesn’t care which one of them dies in this fight, but it’s going to the death.
Before I reach them, Royal looks up from where he’s throttling Devlin.
“Crystal, get the fuck away,” he yells.
And in his one moment of distraction, Devlin strikes. His fist connects with Royal’s head so hard I can hear the crack like a watermelon dropping to the ground. Royal crumples sideways, his body sprawling limp on the pavement.
I scream, diving for him. But Duke’s strong arms wrap around me from behind, lifting me off my feet. I kick and scream, blinded by panic.
Devlin jumps to his feet and starts kicking Royal savagely, completely out of control and apparently unaware that Royal’s no longer fighting.
“Stop,” I scream, but no one is listening in the chaos. Everyone is screaming.
King tackles Devlin, and they crash to the ground. Preston leaps onto them, his arm wrapping around King’s neck from behind. A second later, sirens blare in the lot, and a cop car jerks to a stop beside us. Two cops leap out and run over to break up the fight. Devlin’s still going, punching so wildly I don’t think he even knows that Preston’s one of the people on him, or that a cop is. Only when they start beating the fighters with their clubs do they get them apart.
They push Devlin face down to the pavement and snap a pair of cuffs on his wrists. Preston and King stand with their hands above their heads, waiting their turn to be handcuffed.
“Who called the fucking cops?” Duke asks, his arms still around me as the cop arrests my oldest brother and two Darlings.
An ambulance arrives, and EMTs jump out and come over to pick up Royal. My heart nearly stops, and I tear myself free of Duke’s grasp and run to my insane, fight-happy twin. All my brothers have their vices, their risky behaviors that make them feel alive, that put them so close to the edge that they can look over and stare death in the eyes. But Royal, my god. Why does he have to choose the most dangerous one of all?
I fall to my knees beside him, choking on a sob and ignoring the EMTs telling me to back off. He has to be okay. He fucking has to.
“Wake up,” I beg him, gripping his hand like it’s the only thing saving me from drowning. My voice drops to a whisper as tears stream down my face. “Please.”
Royal’s hand twitches a moment before his lids flutter open. His dark eyes lock on mine, and his fingers tighten. “Crystal.”
“I’m here,” I say, a hysterical laugh bubbling through my tears. “You big idiot. You were knocked out cold. You scared me to death.”
“Everyone’s okay?” he asks, struggling to sit up.
The EMTs push him back down, insisting he lie there while they get the stretcher ready.
“Fine,” I say, wiping my face. “King and the Darlings got arrested.”
Royal keeps saying he’s okay, but they still want to put him in the ambulance, check if he has a concussion, and make a fuss over him. Devlin, Preston and King are sitting on curbs while the cops talk to a few students. The headmaster and some other admin are out now, urging us all to get to class. More cops arrive, as well as a wrecker to haul away the smashed cars.
I refuse to leave Royal’s side. If he’s going to the hospital, I’m sure as hell going with him. I don’t want to give a statement about what happened. Baron has it all on video, anyway.
I accompany Royal to the hospital, where they tell him he has a concussion. Daddy comes in fuming mad, but after talking with Royal, he only nods and says, “Don’t let anyone push you around, son.”
Daddy drops us off at home that afternoon, leaves strict orders for me to take care of Royal, and goes off to deal with King. The house seems quiet without him. It’s so big, bigger than the brownstone by at least three or four times. There are rooms in this place I don’t even know the names for.
“I can’t believe you did that,” I say to Royal at last. “You could have gotten yourself killed.”
“He had it coming,” Royal says, laying back in a recliner. “He wrecked my car. I wrecked his.”
“You might think you’re even, but he won’t,” I point out. “What are you going to do? Just keep going until someone really does get killed?”
“I’m not going to let some asshole walk all over me,” Royal says.
I sit down on the cushy leather arm of the recliner. “I know,” I say with a sigh. That’s not the Dolce way.
“Who called the cops?” Royal asks after a minute.
“I don’t know,” I say honestly. I wasn’t exactly watching the crowd when it all went down.
“I guess it won’t hurt us any,” Royal says. “Them getting arrested. It might even make things easier on us.”
I groan and close my eyes. This is never going to end. I realize that now. Until someone really does wind up dead, they’re going to keep fighting. My brothers will never back down, and I have a feeling the Darlings are just as stubborn.
My phone is full of texts, so after Royal assures me he’s fine and begs me to quit hovering, I go upstairs and pull my chair out onto the balcony. Most of the texts are from Dixie, freaking out and dying to know the gossip. I call her anyway.
“Oh my god, are you okay?” she asks in lieu of a hello.
“I’m fine,” I say. “Royal’s fine. Everyone’s going to be okay.”
“Did you see what happened to Devlin Darling’s car?” she asks. “I don’t think anything will be fine ever again!”
I laugh at that. “Don’t you think that’s a tad over dramatic?”
“That’s not a car you can just go buy,” she says. “Even if insurance replaces the cost, you can’t replace that car.”
“I’m sure someone fixes up old cars to sell,” I say, my throat suddenly tight with nerves. I pick at a scab that’s formed on my knee from this morning.
“He didn’t buy that,” Dixie said. “He and his dad built it. Like, from scratch!”
“Not from scratch,” I say. “I mean, maybe they restored it, but it was already built.”
“I’m just saying, it’s irreplaceable. Devlin’s going to be out for blood.”
“What’s the deal with his family?” I ask, studying the house where Devlin’s pink-heeled mom and elusive dad live.
“His parents are divorced,” she says. “From what I know, it was pretty messy. Both his parents are remarried.”
I hear tires crunch on the
gravel drive next door, and I look down to see Mr. Darling’s car pulling into the garage around back. I can’t tell if Devlin’s in the passenger seat or not. He seemed pretty chummy with the woman who brought the pie, even calling her Mom. Now I wonder if the man of the house is not his dad after all.
“Which ones do we live next to?” I ask.
“His dad,” she says. “His mom lives outside town somewhere. I don’t know. It’s not like I’m invited to their parties. Can you imagine, though?”
“Pretty sure all we’ll ever do is imagine,” I say. “Considering I’m a dog to them.”
“Oh, sorry,” she says. “I wasn’t thinking. But you’re right. You’ll never get invited to a Darling party now.”
“Bummer.”
“I know,” she says. “I hear they’re, like, so epic. But like, scary, too. I heard that last year after homecoming, people were daring each other to do stuff, and some girl got dared to jump off the balcony into the pool. She broke her neck and died!”
“I’m sure that’s just a rumor,” I say automatically. I think of a dead girl, floating on top of a pool. I think of her parents finding her. I think of the messages they found on her phone, comments on her social media.
I squeeze my eyes closed and try to breathe.
Not a dead girl. She didn’t die.
“No, it’s true,” Dixie insists. “Homecoming is this weekend. That’s the anniversary. We should go see her grave. I know what cemetery she’s buried in.”
I shiver and wrap my arms around myself. I used to go to parties, but my brother kept me well guarded. Stuff happened, but it was more like someone got pregnant that night, or the twins switched out on a girl without telling her. Parties were fun. Not deadly.
“I won’t be going to any afterparties next weekend,” I tell Dixie.
“You have to go to the game, though,” Dixie says as if it’s a given.
“You’re going?” I ask, surprised. I didn’t peg Dixie for a football fan.
“Of course,” she says, and I can practically hear her eyes rolling. “Everyone in town goes to homecoming. There’s nothing else to do. Most of the stores even close. It would be a ghost town. It’s bad enough during a regular game, but homecoming?”
