by Lucy Auburn
"What is he saying?"
Looking away, Lukas says, "Probably anything to get you kicked out of Coleridge forever so you leave instead of digging into more things that aren't your business."
My voice is hoarse and angry as I point out, "What happened to Silas is my business."
"That may be," Lukas states calmly, "but it's not safe for you here."
"So you're turning me in to the police?"
"I'm sure you'll get off with a misdemeanor," the European bastard says dismissively. "You're still a juvenile. The worst they'll do is assign you community service."
"And kick me out of Coleridge."
Tanner snarkily points out, "You didn't earn your spot, so what do you care if you lose it? It wasn't yours to begin with."
Maybe it wasn't. Maybe I used a false name and fake transcripts to get in, and barely managed to stay in by the skin of my teeth. But I did stay in, without even cheating, and now my spot at Coleridge feels like it belongs to me—stolen or not. I've suffered at the school, lost my naïveté and my purpose, betrayed myself and my brother's ghost with kisses that never should've happened, and sinned a dozen times over.
The school is mine to stay in.
I suffered hard enough for it.
And I'm not through finding the truth that I can only find here, where my brother's path took a terrible turn in the wrong direction.
It isn't fair—the Elites have done plenty that could've gotten them kicked out of school, save maybe for Lukas. They've drunk on school grounds and had girls in their boys-only residence halls. Blake has stolen student work—my work—as a TA, and Cole breaks the school codes against bullying. But no one in the administration will dare to even suggest suspending them as long as their families run so much of this privileged world with their money and influence. They won't be fined by the police for drunkenness or public nudity. Theirs is a life above the law.
Of course, I can't pretend I'm not a sinner.
I know I've done things that no one would approve of.
Things that, if my father found out about, might make him angry enough to start hitting me the way he used to hit Silas. That is, if he were around to find out.
Somehow that makes me want to stay at the school even more.
It's hard to explain any of this to the two Elite boys staring at me now. My best friend, Jade, would say that I'm stubborn as a mule and then some, and she's not wrong about that.
But if Cole is getting me kicked out of school right now, it might not matter how stubborn I am. There are no second chances for fucked up girls like me. They save those for boys with white teeth and long names. I don't get to be bad and loved. Only discarded for my sins.
"I guess this is it, then." I find myself pinching the sheet that covers me and fussing with the threads as if they might unravel between my fingertips. "Last night really was my last night at Coleridge."
Lukas's mouth thins into a line. "It's for the best."
Wicked, wicked Tanner says, "If you'd like one more last night, you're always welcome in my sheets. Not like you can get expelled twice."
To think, his father is running for President. You wouldn't know it from the way he acts. Maybe that's the point for him—the kind of rebellion that will cost his absent father everything. He certainly seems to enjoy pushing the line so far that it's practically curved into a circle at his insistence.
"I'll decline your offer," I tell him, pushing my voice until the words drip with sarcasm. "From what I've seen—and heard—you probably have something."
"Oof." Tanner places his hand over his heart in mock pain. "An allegation of venereal diseases? You wound me. It's a good thing you won't be going to Coleridge much further, or I might throw myself into the wolf enclosure in despair."
His words send suspicion through me. Earlier this semester a group of girls put a bag over my head and dragged me into the wolf enclosure at night, leaving me there, the gate locked behind me and the groundskeeper nowhere to be found.
Before I can ask him if he had something to do with that—not that I think he's bad enough at lying that I'd be able to see through him if he feigned innocence—someone new walks through the door.
Someone new and very, very familiar to me.
"I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but Brenna won't be leaving Coleridge." Those dusky green eyes unique to Cole Masterson seem to be brimming with secrets and mysteries. "I decided she was better off staying."
Chapter 4
"You decided? And here I thought the administration got a say in that."
"Yeah, well, I was the one who found your falsified records. So I massaged things a bit."
"Massaged?"
"As far as they're concerned, you're enrolled as Brenna Wilder and always have been. Anyone who saw or believes otherwise has had their memory corrected for them." He cocks a brow at me, and I suck in a breath, wondering what this favor will cost me. "You're welcome."
"Why?" Lukas asks, voice low and horrified. "Cole, we all agreed that she shouldn't be here."
I can't help it; his words are a blow. To my ego, maybe, or the part of me that thought he was the kindest of the four brutal Elites. He kissed me so softly, and seemed wounded about what I did. I thought, foolishly, that Lukas DuPont cared for me. But he's made it clear more than once now that he wants me nowhere near the academy, so clearly I was completely wrong.
"Wanting her gone is in the past now," Cole says, like he didn't just spends months of his life devoted to tormenting me, and sic a bully of a redhead named Georgia on me. "I changed my mind."
I'm the one who asks, "Why?"
"That's what I'd like to now." Blake Lee, the Hollywood slash Seoul celebrity progeny himself, slips into the room. "You said some bullshit about being whimsical and prone to flights of fancy, Cole, but we both know that's not the real reason you changed your mind on Brenna sticking around Coleridge. When you make a decision like this, it affects all of us. So I want to know why."
Cole looks to me, and I can't stop myself from briefly, embarrassingly, licking my lips. It's foolish to think that a kiss from a girl like me, raised in Wayborne Virginia, could possibly change Cole's mind. He doesn't like me—I'm the one who instigated the foolish kiss, for one thing, but for another it was a hate-filled thing, brief as a lightning bolt and just as destructive.
He's kissed girls like Holly, had every socialite on both coasts on his arm, and could snap his fingers and have a model delivered to his door—even after the scandals he's been embroiled in. Maybe even because of them. No girl thinks she'll be the body in the trunk, after all. Not when a boy like Cole looks at her.
It twists me up inside to know that he'll be forgiven for his DUI, and for untold things besides that night, when no one will ever forgive me for being who and what I am: poor, bitter, angry, and driven to immoral lengths by revenge. Holly Schneider will probably forgive Cole Masterson and break up with her new boyfriend for him before she'll forgive me for what I did to her, and I did it not knowing she was truly kind, a girl set apart from the rest who genuinely offered me her friendship.
I'll only be able to go back to Coleridge because of Cole. Because of whatever "massaging" he claims he did with my student records. And I don't understand why he would do it, when he couldn't possibly want to be with me any more than he wants to throw me.
"Do I need a reason why?" Cole asks, aggressively staring down Blake. "Last I checked it was my decision to mark her, and it'll be my decision to change my mind."
Tanner drawls, "What're you, the president of a club I don't remember forming?"
"You don't get to make decisions for all of us," Lukas argues.
Frustration shoots through me, and I snap out, "None of you get to make decisions for me. Especially after everything you've done to me."
"Oh?" Cole stares me down. "So you're saying that you don't want to be allowed back into Coleridge? Because we both know your life has never been this good before, and never will be again if you're expelled from scho
ol. But if you'd like to return to the trailer park you came from, be my guest."
In a low voice Lukas warns, "Cole."
"Sorry, sorry." Biting smile on his face, Cole waves his hand through the air dismissively, as if erasing his own words. "The respectable mid-to-lower class residence in which you were raised. Or is that a pile of sticks now? I forget which of your homes was destroyed."
I loathe him. But as I clench my fists and he watches the movement, his eyes flickering, I get the sense that's the point. He wants me to hate him. He says these terrible, biting things to my face so that I'll despise everything about him. Why he would do that after ensuring my place at Coleridge, I have no idea. Maybe it's just a game for when he's bored, like a cat biting the tails off mice. Or maybe he's playing some other, deeper game I can't quite see yet. Either way it's working—I feel sick just thinking about the kiss we shared.
Cole continues, "It wasn't much of a loss, though, was it? Losing your house in that tornado. A piece of plywood and two nails could replace it."
Even Tanner and Blake are looking at Cole as if he's gone too far this time. Lukas has an expression on his face that I've never seen before: pure, unadulterated rage. It transforms his model good looks, pale perfect skin, blue eyes and soft blond hair. Suddenly he looks less like a painting and more like a Nordic soldier about to roar into battle wielding an ax.
"Get out." He aims his words at Cole, his voice devoid of all warmth or emotion. "Go take a walk around the block and don't come back until you've grown a soul."
Flicking his eyes to Lukas, Cole looks him up and down dismissively. "You're one to talk. No one wants her gone more than you. She should thank me for what I've done for her." This is the moment when he looks at me with nothing but contempt in his eyes. "Thank me, Brenna, and you'll get to stay at Coleridge—for a little while."
I swallow, irritated with myself for being intimidated and afraid. I'm the fire and Cole should burn. He should be afraid of me. "Why?"
"Because you interest me. Because I want to see what you do next." Taking a step towards the bed, he adds, "And because when you decide to leave, it should be because of me. Not some two bit low rate mafia wannabes with a little bit of chloroform. I want my name on your lips when you run out of this place for good."
Tanner shoots him an incredulous look. "Laying it on a little thick there, aren't ya Masterson?"
"He's been practicing his sociopathy," Blake notes dryly. "If you ask me it's a little heavy on the sadism and light on the coherency. Work on your flirting, Cole."
I find myself turning red; though I can't see my blush, I can feel it, from my collarbones all to way up to my hairline. It's like my heart is beating just beneath the surface of my skin. "He's not flirting," I protest, "he's toying with me because he's sick. If you want to get rid of me, get rid of me already. Cut out the back-and-forth bullshit."
"So you do want to leave Coleridge. Not even a fight to stay in?"
"I'll fight you," I warn him, but the words come out weak considering my current position in a hospital bed. "It's not you I want the most, though. I want to take down the people who did this to my brother. I want his murderers to suffer. And everyone else who stood by while he was suffering."
"To do that, you have to stay at Coleridge," the sadistic fucker points out. "So again, you're welcome. Just know that you have to leave when I tell you to, and I'll make you suffer if you don't."
"Not if I have anything to say about it." Lukas's growl of a sentence jolts me, and I find myself staring at him in wonder. He's glaring angrily at Cole. "We were supposed to get Brenna to leave Coleridge for her own safety. Not as some kind of sick game. Bring her back if you intend to do something to protect her, but these half-measures will just put her in danger."
I tilt my chin up towards him, ego still bruised at the discovery that he doesn't want me around. "I can handle whatever it is."
"Can you? Because you would've died if the cops hadn't shown up tonight. From what I hear, Hass found you, not that that makes much sense. Unless you fought off your attackers and failed to mention?"
My pride is ticked further, and I have to look down and away, embarrassed—and more than a little afraid—to admit that he's right. When those men came for me I was completely helpless. For all my grand plans about revenge and the fire that I swore would burn the Elites to the ground, all it took was a little struggle and I was almost done fighting permanently.
If I go back to Coleridge, those men will know. They were waiting for me inside the school's gates. My face was familiar to them. And I already suspect that they're working with Hass or connected to him in some way.
But I want to go back anyway. "Who's to say I'll be in any less danger back in Wayborne? Besides, Lukas, it's not your choice to make."
He looks away at this, his jaw setting. "Fine. I just wish there was something we could do or say to convince you to leave—of your own free will, not because of some kind of torture plan."
Tanner offers, "I can get you pregnant and kicked out of school if you'd like. Dad would hate the optics of that—and I'm sure you'd love a piece of my trust fund."
I roll my eyes, because despite the insult in his words there's a mirth to them that makes it clear he's not serious. "I'm not leaving Coleridge until I get what I want."
Blake asks, "And what is that?"
"Revenge. Just like before. Only this time, it's Hass I want to take down—and those two men. And if you get in my way," I warn them, heart beating fast, "I'll keep digging until I find enough dirt to really take you down. Especially you, Cole, you heartless bastard."
He smirks, throwing his hand over the left side of his chest. "Be still my beating heart. I think she loves me."
"We can help you take down Hass." The offer startles me, because it comes, of all people, from Blake. "Ferdinand Von Hassell should be rotting in prison. I don't mind helping make that happen if it gets you out of here faster."
"Seriously?"
"I doubt I look like I'm kidding."
His face is so serious, cut into severe lines just like his father starring in an action film, but somehow twice as intimidating. Looking at him, though, all I can think about is the memory of our kiss in the haunted house—and how it set me on fire more thoroughly than my own destructive anger.
The deal he offers is one I have to tread lightly with. His help—the help of all the Elites–could be what I need to get Hass arrested. Especially if there isn't information on my brother's laptop that could take him down. I know there are secrets they share with the other boy, secrets that might very well be the reason Lukas is getting their shared tattoo lasered off his ankle. One of those secrets could take Hass down for good.
But I don't dare to accept Blake's offer of help unless it comes with support. My eyes flick to Tanner, the wildest of the Elites and most likely to say yes to this just to rebel against Cole's missive. If I can get half of them to make a deal with me, even a tentative deal, the others might very well crumble.
Trusting them is impossible.
Using them would be a gift.
I'll have to tread lightly if I do this. Even the snake, curled in a ball beneath the long grass, knows better than to bite the wolf's paw when the pack is together. Divide and conquer—that's the only way forward for the small predator turning carnivores into prey.
"How would you like to send a rich boy to jail?" I ask Tanner, tilting my head at him curiously. "I mean, it can't compare to getting a blowjob from—"
"I'll do it," he says, interrupting me but somehow doing it casually and slowly, as if he just didn't care to listen to the rest of what I have to say. I can see through him; he doesn't want Cole to know he's been fucking his little sister's tormentor, even if he claims to have done it as a type of revenge. "I like games, and you know that. Just tell me who to seduce and I'll take care of it."
Cole frowns. "I don't like this. What if—"
"And you?" I interrupt him by looking directly at Lukas, letting my eyes
flick meaningfully to his ankle and back up to his face. "Do you want me gone so badly that you won't let me stick around long enough to lay this final demon to rest? It's what he deserves, after all. Unless you're still so loyal to your former best friend that you wouldn't—"
"No." Stiffening, Lukas stares me down. "You won't baselessly smear me a second time."
I feel the real prickle of shame deep inside me, traveling up my throat and freezing my tongue. It takes me a long, tense moment of silence to say, "I shouldn't have said that."
We lock eyes for a moment, both of us tense. Finally, Lukas breathes out slowly. "I guess that's as close to an apology as you're capable of now."
"Remember, Lukas, she almost died. So we're supposed to be nice to her," Cole taunts. "Or isn't that what you said?"
Lukas ignores his best friend, and I wonder how it even is that they are friends, given how incredibly different they are from each other. Even oil and vinegar mix when shaken hard enough, but these two are more like cars facing in opposite directions, hurtling towards each other on a one-way highway.
Blue eyes meet mine steadily, and slowly the anger drains from Lukas's expression. "I want to take down Hass as much as you. Maybe even more."
"I doubt that."
"You have no idea," he says, the words encapsulating everything I don't know about the four of them. "I'll rest easy as soon as he's put away, and do anything I can to help you. As long as you promise that you'll leave Coleridge of your own free will the instant he's arrested."
I consider his offer. "People like Hass get arrested and released all the time. I'm only leaving when the job is done. He has to be sentenced to prison before I'll leave."
"That could take ages," Lukas protests. "The justice system doesn't run smoothly."
"I can probably help speed it up." Tanner's offer is surprising, but he just shrugs. "From what I've accidentally learned by being a member of my unfortunate family is that everyone is quite up in arms about what the Governor did to get his son out of trouble. Prosecutors are looking for a rich young asshole they can make an example of to show that the state really is tough on crime. Since Yates only got a slap on the wrist, they want the next one to get a tough sentence. Or so I hear."
