Home.
Like that place has ever felt like home …
On Monday, Aaron wakes me up for school. I help him get the girls together, and he drives us all in the van, dropping them off first, then taking us to Prescott. The sign out front has seen better days. Prescott Senior High, Home of the Loggers has been adjusted to have an extra ‘F’ in front of the school mascot, announcing us as the floggers. Someone’s even drawn Ms. Keating with a whip in her hand. Nice touch.
Aaron parks across the street, and we head up the front walk together, enduring the metal detectors, K9 units, and pat downs before we’re released into what’s essentially a prison. Bars on the windows? Check. A rigid, airtight schedule? Check. Fellow inmates with grudges and chips on their shoulders? Check, check.
I can see Kali watching me while she pretends to be engrossed in her phone. When she catches me looking, our eyes meet, and she turns away, scurrying down the hall like a rat.
“It’s nice to see that your unscrupulous morals allow you to go after a mark that used to be a client,” I say when I run into Victor, forcing a tight smile to my lips, my hands curling into fists by my sides. As far as I can tell, Kali sent Havoc after me over a boy, a pageant, and a jealousy so bright it burns.
Pathetic.
“Unscrupulous? No, just business-minded. Kali paid her dues, we delivered her product,” Vic replies smoothly, but really he must know I was talking more to Aaron than anyone else. His dark eyes scan the halls, looking for trouble. Nobody meets his gaze; they know better than that. “She's nothing to us.” Victor looks right at me, but I can't catch whatever hidden meaning there is in that. You'll be nothing to us one day, too. Was that it? “Get to class, and let us know if anyone bugs you.”
He takes off down the hall in his boots, holey jeans, and black wifebeater. I'm not sure if I've ever seen a man so confident in himself. It's obvious with each step he takes, the way he slides his palm over his purple-black hair, the way he glances back at me with ebon eyes.
“You can pick your jaw up off the floor,” Aaron growls, pushing past me and storming off after his boss as Oscar chuckles and tucks his long fingers into the pockets of his slacks.
“Fancy the boss, do you?” he asks, and I shake my head.
“Not at all.”
Lie.
Never in the history of the universe has a lie that great ever crossed the lips of any liar. It was monstrous in its falsehood, the most untrue thing there ever was.
I lick my lips.
“Not at all,” I repeat, and then I head straight for my first period English class, the only one of the day I share with Kali. Wish I didn’t though. One time she stole my essay, and when I confronted her over it, she lied and spread the rumor that I’d been bullying her. Me. When in reality, it was the other way around. The thieving bitch watches me as I come in and take my usual spot at the back of the room, crossing my boots under the desk.
After a minute, she stands up and makes her way over to me.
“Hey Bernie,” she says, tucking green-streaked black hair behind her ear. Ironic, that, isn’t it? That her hair is the color of envy … Kali’s dark eyes flick to the door before she returns her attention to me. “Is it true, what everyone's saying?”
“What is everyone saying?” I ask, looking up at her. It won't do for her to play dumb here, not after everything she put me through during sophomore year.
Kali called Havoc to make my life a living hell for several reasons, all of them inane, all of them pointless.
One, she came for me over a boy.
Two, she came for me over a stupid pageant.
Three, she came for me because she couldn’t handle watching me get the things she felt should’ve been hers.
So I spent four months afraid to come to school, afraid to stay home. If anything, I can attest to the fact that Havoc is very good at their job. They delivered everything Kali asked for, and more.
And what did she pay them for it?
Even I don't know the answer to that question.
“That you're with Havoc now.” She pauses and sniffles. Clearly, she's afraid that I've sicced them on her the way she did me.
I mean, she isn't wrong about that.
My expression is hard when I meet her gaze.
“Not just that you hired them,” she continues, and I can tell she isn't the only one in the class that's listening. “But that you're actually one of them now, like a member of the gang or something.”
I smile as the bell rings, and our teacher—Mr. Darkwood—hustles in at the last second, dumping a stack of books on his desk. He's one of those tragically nice guys who got into teaching to help people. He's always trying to save souls here at Prescott. He’s also a literary snob. I kind of hate him.
“Kali, please take your seat,” he says, and she frowns hard at me, leaning over to put her palms on the surface of the desk. Our noses are a scant few inches apart, but unlike the last time we faced off, I'm not backing down.
Granted, last time I didn't have much of a choice, now did I? With the full weight of Havoc behind her, Kali was a force to be reckoned with.
“If you send them after me, I'll finish what I started sophomore year,” she whispers, and I laugh. I can't help it; the sound just slips past my lips.
“You can sure try,” I tell her, lifting a single brow. “But I have a feeling you won't get very far.”
Kali slams her palm onto the surface of the desk and sneers.
“Billie and her brothers have teamed up with the Ensbrook boys. They're out for blood after what your pimps did to Kyler the other day. Havoc used to be a powerhouse on campus, but not anymore. Prescott High is a different place today than it was two years ago. Watch your back, Bernadette.” Kali shoves back to her feet and moves over to her desk, sitting down just as Mr. Darkwood finishes writing today's itinerary on the board.
I ignore her and focus on my schoolwork about as much as I always do. That is, not at all. Instead, I hold my phone in my hand and debate telling the guys about Kali. If they were willing to beat Kyler to a pulp for looking in a window, what would they do to her?
Eventually, I decide against it and tuck my phone away for the rest of class. We're supposed to be writing poems today, so I put my pencil against the page and let myself bleed across it.
Token friendships between poor girls.
Both of us wanting so desperately for more, our screams drowned out by the wicked silence of the world.
Nobody listens when bad girls cry.
I decide after a good twenty minutes staring at the words in front of me that I hate poetry, that it hurts too much, that I suck at it, and that I'm not writing a damn word more. Mr. Darkwood doesn't stop me when I head into the hall five minutes early and lean against the wall outside my next class.
By lunch, word has already spread about my confrontation with Kali, and I find myself looking up and into the face of a very angry Vic.
“What did she say to you?” he demands, and I know this isn't a request for information. Nah, it's an order.
“She said the Ensbrook boys are teaming up with Billie and her brothers. They're all furious with you, and they're out for blood. She threatened to finish what she started sophomore year.”
Vic's jaw tightens, and he rises to his feet, just as Principal Vaughn and a few of his cronies enter the cafeteria and start toward us. Everyone is watching, the whole student body. Not that that's surprising. Vic made me wear my ring to school today; they're all dying to know what's up with that.
“Mr. Channing,” Principal Vaughn says to Vic, giving the rest of us a cursory scan. His eyes light on mine, and I glare right back. My only regret in going forward with my deal with Havoc is that my targets might not know why they're being punished or how bad they hurt me with their actions.
My jaw clenches, and I turn away.
“What?” Vic asks, rising to his full height. Even at seventeen and three quarters, he's bigger than Principal Vaughn, made of solid muscle
and youthful rage. He could kill the principal with his bare hands, if he wanted to.
“Come with me to my office, please.” Vaughn turns like that's that, but Vic doesn't move. Instead, he stays rooted to the spot, mouth turned down in a severe frown.
“What's all this about?” Callum whispers from his end of the table, pushing his hood back and studying the retreating backs of the employees.
“No idea,” Vic says, staring after the faculty members before he turns back to us. “Don't care. If I get kicked out of Prescott, it'll just be the inevitable coming to bite me in the ass. Boys, find Kali Rose-Kennedy for me after school. She's been having that rich boyfriend of hers pick her up out front. You'll have to be quick.”
“What are you going to do?” I ask, unsure why I care so much about it. This is what I asked for. This is what I'm paying for.
Vic doesn't bother to answer me, and I grit my teeth as he walks off, dismissing my question like it's nothing. Swear to fuck, I'm going to punch him one of these days.
“Don't worry about Kali,” Hael says, cracking his knuckles. He's got this shit-eating grin on his face that makes me want to slap him. “We've got it handled. You only have to help if you want to.”
“That wasn't what I asked,” I start, but then the bell rings again, and the boys rise to their feet. I'm not even sure why they all come to class anymore. They've clearly chosen their path in life, and it's not academics.
“Are you going to help or not?” Aaron asks, looking at me like I'm shit stuck to the bottom of his shoe. I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do after school today, go home with him or head back to my mom's place.
Neither sounds particularly appealing, to be honest.
But either way, I can’t leave Heather. Whatever I do, she has to be with me at all times.
“I'll be there,” I say, pushing up to my feet and taking my tray with me. Kali is watching us from across the room, like she knows we're discussing her eventual fate. I dump my tray and stack it with the others before I flip her off. As much as she claims not to be afraid of Havoc, she turns away pretty quick and takes off.
If she were smart, she’d run faster. And never look back.
After school, I get a text from Callum that they've cornered Kali on her way back from gym. I run as fast as I can, backpack slapping my shoulder as I jog toward the path that leads to the football field.
That's where the boys are, with Kali held between Callum and Hael. Facing off against them, I find the Charter brothers along with the Ensbrook boys.
Guess Kali was right.
“This is such bullshit,” Aaron says, standing at the front of the group, like a vice president while Vic is away. Nobody's seen him since lunch, and it's freaking me out. “What do you care what happens to this bitch?”
Whoa.
Still weirds me out, hearing Aaron talk like a thug.
I pause in the half circle behind Aaron, casting a glance in Oscar's direction. Do these other guys know how fucking crazy Oscar is? I just saw him put a bullet through some random dude's leg. What else is he capable of, I wonder?
Oscar turns his gray eyes over to mine and smiles, an awful sort of smile that promises he's not afraid of violence. He rubs his tattooed fingers over his equally inked-up throat, and I shiver.
“Because we're dating, you piece of shit,” Mitch Charter, one of Billie's brothers, says. She's standing not too far behind him, and off to one side, her glare dark and accusatory. Guess she's pissed that we beat the snot out of her new beau.
“Are you also aware that she’s dating a boy from Oak Valley Prep?” Oscar interjects, but nobody responds to his accusation.
“Kali knows better than to fuck with Havoc,” Aaron says, and then he nods in Hael and Callum's direction. “Besides, we're going to give her a choice here.” Aaron turns back around, his face dark and cold and empty. He's had to learn to be that way, to protect his family. The world isn't fair. How fucked is it that such a sweet boy could be turned into this, just for the simple act of keeping those he loves safe? He leans down and looks into Kali's face. “Choice one, we post your porn all over the web, and we send links to your parents, your colleges of choice, and that modeling agency that asked you to do a catalog shoot.” He stands back up and frowns. “Or we break your hands. It'll hurt, but the physical pain might be easier to stomach than the emotional.”
“If you touch a hair on her head, we will end you, Fadler.” Kyler's brother, Danny, takes a step forward, nostrils flared. He's a big guy, too, wider than any of the Havoc Boys, with tree trunks for arms. And he looks pissed.
Heart racing, I run my tongue over my lip and take a second to figure the odds. Five of them, five of us. Not sure if the guys realized it or not after my little tussle with Oscar, but I’m not a throwaway, a tagalong for their little group to fuck and push aside. No, I know how to kick some serious ass, too.
“I can take Kyler,” I start, because I think pairing each of us with an opponent of comparable size would be best. Oscar gives me a look and then pushes his glasses up his nose with his middle finger, a signature move of his.
“Does Billie not count?” he asks, and I shrug.
“I beat the crap out of her last year without breaking a sweat; she doesn’t even factor into this.”
“You go straight to hell, you fucking whore,” Billie growls, tossing her teal and black hair over her shoulder. “We all knew you’d be spreading your legs for the Havoc crew sooner or later. But getting them to fight your battles for you in exchange for free pussy? Now that’s pathetic.”
There’s a moment there where I don’t think. I’ve trained myself not to. Instead, I just react. I go for Billie without thinking, that pesky fight or fight harder response kicking in. I’m going to beat her flat face into the fucking pavement, I tell myself, jerking to a stop as a hard, warm arm wraps my waist and knocks the air out of me.
“No fighting on school grounds,” Vic murmurs around a cigarette. It hangs loosely from his full lips, unlit and flopping around as he talks. “We hang our dirty laundry elsewhere.” He nods his chin in Hael and Callum’s direction. “Let the bitch go.”
“Seriously?” Hael snaps, his cheeks coloring with frustration. “This cocksucking idiot had the audacity to threaten our girl, and you’re going to let her walk?”
I might be aching for violence, growling low in my throat, but I don’t miss the words he says. Our girl. It’s surreal as hell, but I should’ve known that the Havoc Boys don’t play around. As soon as I said yes, it was on. It’s all on.
“Get lost, Kali,” Vic says as Hael snarls colorful curses under his breath, obeying his boss whether he likes it or not. “And the rest of you, fuck off.”
“Screw you, Channing,” Mitch snaps as Kali throws herself into his arms, ever the whimpering, simpering little victim. I should never have trusted her, spilled my dark secrets to her during our sleepovers. All she ever did was turn my own words against me, from my stolen essay to my nightmare with Havoc. Kali Rose-Kennedy is a backstabber, and a nightmare, and I swear if the guys don’t take action soon, I will. “Touch my girl again, and we’ll find out who’s really in charge here.”
Vic smiles.
It’s not a pretty smile, the way he does it, this ironic, bemused twist of lips.
“Counting on it,” he says, and then he scoops me into his arms and takes my breath away.
“Where have you been?” I ask, but his eyes darken, and his face goes cold.
“Later,” he murmurs, and then he carries me down the hall for the whole school to see, the engagement ring on my finger sparkling in the sunlight.
It’s disgusting, how much I enjoy that.
On Friday when Victor invites me back to his place, I take my backpack, but I leave my sleeping bag. As usual, when I get there, he's sitting outside in a lawn chair, a cigarette in one hand, watching the sunset.
“Where is everybody else?” I ask, tossing my bag to the ground as I pause near him. He turns those dark eyes over to me,
clearly pissed about something.
“Not here yet.” Vic ashes his cig out on the metal ashtray and then reaches for my wrist, yanking me onto his lap. A small sound escapes me as I stumble into him, and fire burns through me in a fierce wave, promising that it’ll feel oh-so-warm before it hurts, before it burns so bad that I go numb and never feel again.
He stares ahead, at the overgrown foliage that creates a sort of natural fence around his front yard, and glowers. All week, he’s been touchy as hell and pissed off about whatever happened on Monday. But when Victor Channing says later, apparently he gets to decide when and where he tells us all what happened in Principal Vaughn’s office.
“Do you always get together for sleepovers on Fridays?” I ask, and he shrugs, the muscles in his big shoulders moving like well-oiled pistons, taut and ready to fight at the drop of a hat. I recognize that alertness in him, that readiness, even when he’s at rest, because I have it, too. Deep down inside of me, a jungle cat paces, waiting to unleash her claws, her fangs, knowing that she has to because it’s a wild, wild world out there. One wrong step, one wrong move, and everything comes crashing down.
“Been doing it for years. Keeps us focused. We get most of our work done on the weekends anyway.” Victor turns to look at me, the wind ruffling his dark hair and making my heart do strange things inside my chest. “Where’s your sister?”
I feel my throat get tight. We haven’t talked much about Heather or what she means to me, or what I have to do to keep her safe. But somehow, it feels like Victor already knows. Reaching up, I trace a finger along the hard edge of his stubbled jaw, just to see if he’ll let me. I’ve never actually seen him with a girl, but clearly, he has them. Loads of them, probably. Something dark slithers around inside of me, and I clamp down on the emotion before it can rear its ugly head.
“At a friend’s house. But to be honest with you, she’s starting to run out of friends and favors.” A dry laugh escapes me as I slide my palm down my face. Tired. So damn tired. That’s the story of my life. I feel like I haven’t had a proper night’s sleep in years. Those two nights at Aaron’s were like a dream, an almost painful reminder that I don’t often get much rest, not even when I fall into one of my light, fitful little spells of sleep. “And my mom, Pamela, she doesn’t like us being gone so much. Eventually, she’s going to snap.”
Havoc at Prescott High Page 9
