Riot House (Crooked Sinners Book 1)

by Callie Hart

  “Don’t wander too far, Jacobi. I need you back here in ten.”

  Smiling thinly, I sketch a mock bow. “Back in five.”

  Outside, the night air is brittle in my lungs. The chatter from inside still rings in my ears as I become accustomed to the deafening silence. The manor house is on a hundred acres, which might not be a lot of land in the grand scheme of things—even Wolf Hall sits on three times that—but it’s as though the dense woodland stretches on forever into the dark, and it feels like we’re the only living things for a thousand miles. Right on cue, an owl screeches in the distance, and the sound is eerie and piercing, as if the creature’s indignant that I forgot about him.

  Grim as an undertaker, I pull out my phone and power it on, waiting for the screen to light up. I could fidget and tap at the display to hurry the process along, but that’d be ridiculous. Technology can’t be expedited by willful human impatience. So I stare at the phone instead, grinding my teeth together as I wait for the illuminated Apple logo to blink out and the home screen to appear.

  There.

  Finally.

  Working quickly to avoid the inundation of texts and notifications that begin to pour in, I open up a blank message and tap out a quick message.

  +1 (819) 3328 6582

  Did you get it?

  Niceties aren’t required here. Even if they were, the recipient of this text wouldn’t be getting any. I place the phone down on the flat railing that skirts the balcony, and I turn back to face the building, blankly observing the people through the windows, wondering what they could all possibly be so happy about.

  The woman in the gold, sparkling dress has so much credit card debt, she’s about to lose her house.

  The guy with three fingers of whiskey in his cut glass tumbler, even though it’s only seven thirty and we haven’t even sat down to our four-course dinner yet, has just been diagnosed with prostate cancer.

  At the back, near the bar, the couple fawning over each other and making a show of their affection as they talk to an elderly gentleman wearing a smoking jacket have just filed for divorce.

  The dude by the piano fantasizes about touching his wife’s twelve-year-old daughter from her previous marriage.

  The bartender, smiling so professionally, so politely, as he makes cocktail after cocktail with flare, has been considering suicide for months.

  Vrrrrrn vrrrrnnnnnn. Vrrrrrn vrrrrnnnnnn.

  I glare at the lying, deceptive degenerates, despising everything that they are and everything they stand for. I could be wrong about the people I’ve just picked apart—it was all blind conjecture at best—but I know this set. They’re expert fabricators and masters of their craft. The shiny veneers they present to the world are wafer thin and disintegrate like wet paper when inspected up close.

  Revolted, I turn back to my phone.

  Incoming Message:

  +1 (819) 3328 6582

  Yes.

  ME: Operational?

  +1 (819) 3328 6582

  Yes. What should I do with it?

  ME: Leave it where we discussed.

  “Well, well, well. What’s this? Do my eyes deceive me? Wren Jacobi, alive and in the flesh.”

  Oh, for fuck’s sake.

  Exhaling sharply down my nose, I turn the phone off and pocket it before I turn around. The girl emerging from the doorway isn’t really a girl anymore. She’s all woman, with her exaggerated curves and the seductive sway to her hips as she walks toward me. Her jet-black hair’s long and wavy, fixed in place like some sort of forties Hollywood starlet. The crimson color of her lipstick suits her perfectly. She looks like a pale, porcelain-skinned vampire, who’s just had her mouth clamped around someone’s jugular and spilled her main course.

  In every way, she’s perfect. In every way, I hate her.

  Detestable creature.

  “Mercy. If I’d have known you were gonna be here, I’d have torched the building to the ground and fled to Europe.”

  “Charming, as always,” she purrs, sauntering to the balustrade. There’s a fifteen-foot stretch of open space to my right, but of course the bitch comes and stands as close to me as humanly possible. The subtle scent of her perfume makes my stomach roll. “I saw your illiterate friend inside. The one who looks like a murderer. I spent all of three seconds trying to calculate where you’d be before I came up with the answer.”

  “Yeah. You know me so well, Mercy. Excuse me. I have to get back inside.”

  She doesn’t listen, or else chooses not to hear me, talking over me as I step away. “Can’t I bum a smoke?”

  Halting, I roll my eyes up at the clear night sky, resenting the moment I ever agreed to come to this fucking party. Under normal circumstances, I’d pin her up against the side of the building by her throat and tell her to go fuck herself, but the consequences would be disastrous. Mercy’s the queen of theater, a lauded actress whose ability to cry on cue has already landed her three reasonably large speaking parts on Broadway. I lay a finger on her here, at Lord Lovett’s Charity Benefit for Battered Women, and she’ll undertake the role of a lifetime. After a flood of tears and some smeared mascara, I’ll be carted off in fucking handcuffs.

  No, thanks.

  Grudgingly, I offer her the pack of smokes I had in my pocket, resigning myself to the fact that I’m gonna be out here with her until she’s finished with me.

  She places the cigarette against her lips, smiling knowingly as she snaps the catch on the small silver lighter she always carries around with her, lighting up. A thick fog of smoke spills down her nose, curling off into the chilly February air.

  “You weren’t in the city at Christmas. I drove all the way to the Upper East Side only to find out you were off galivanting without me in the Czech Republic.”

  I give her an icy grin. “Yeah, well. It’s the only place that I’m safe from you. I know how much you loathe Prague. Sorry you had a wasted journey. Driving yourself has always made you feel poor, hasn’t it?”

  A vicious light sparks in her green eyes. “We could have gone somewhere together, y’know. The fireworks over Sydney Harbor on New Years’ Eve were epic. You said you wanted to go there last year.”

  Hah. Last year. Many things have changed in the past 12 months. “I’m sure you had a great time without me, Merce. You’re milking that cigarette for all its worth. Get it finished so I can go.”

  Her smile morphs into a mirthless slash across her face. “No need to be so belligerent all the time, Wren. Is it so bad that I might wanna spend a couple of minutes with you? Am I really that awful? All that frowning and pouting’s gonna prematurely age you. And then what?”

  “And then I’ll be hideous, and people will see me for who I truly I am,” I spit, sarcasm dripping from each word as I storm toward the door. I thought I could handle being out here with her, but I was wrong. She asked if she’s really all that bad? Hell fucking yes, she is. She shouldn’t even fucking be here. There’s no way Dash’s father sent her an invite, which means…

  No.

  You’ve got to be kidding me.

  I’m going to fucking kill him.

  “You can’t just keep storming off,” Mercy calls after me. “I always know where you are, Wren. Always. We’ll be spending plenty of time together soon enough.”

  I almost hesitate. I almost ask what the fuck that was supposed to mean, but I refuse to give her the satisfaction. Knowing Mercy as well as I do, she’s fully explained her intentions with that carefully delivered, off-the-cuff remark: she’s coming back to Wolf Hall.

  I find Dashiell talking to a balding man by the overloaded buffet table. Manners dictate that I should wait until he’s finished his conversation, but I’m too steaming mad to observe social etiquette. “Mercy? You invited Mercy?”

  Dashiell stops talking, his mouth hanging open. He closes it, then opens it again, groping for something to say.

  “Excuse me. I see my wife beckoning me,” the old bald guy says, making a sharp exit.

  Dash l
ooks like he’d do the same if he could. “Look, I just think that this thing with this new girl…You’re not seeing things straight, Jacobi, and you seem to reset whenever Mercy’s around, so I thought—”

  “So you thought, I know what I’ll do. I’ll drag the poisonous cunt who ruined Wren’s life across state lines. She’s bound to make everything better.”

  “Goddamn it. You’re whispering. I don’t like when you whisper. Means you’re about to start smashing things. Can we—can we please just talk about this later? Avoid her if you have to, but maybe the four of us can sit down after—”

  “Intentionally allowing that girl within a two-hundred-mile radius of any of us is folly and you know it. I am not sitting down with her.”

  As if magnetically drawn from the other side of the room by the promise of an argument, Pax appears with a napkin full of grilled shrimp in his hand. He looks devilish. “Guess who I just ran into.”

  “I’ve already seen her,” I snarl.

  Pax tosses a shrimp into his mouth, tail and all. “Mercy got hot, dude. And I’m talking hot.”

  This must be payback for kicking his headrest this morning. “Be very, very careful,” I hiss.

  “What? It’s just an observation. No need to get so bent out of shape.”

  Amused, he chews with his mouth open, watching me intently. I think he’s waiting for me to throw a fist at him. Between his blatant attempt to rile me and Dash’s utterly thoughtless attempt to smooth over troubled waters, I want to break both their goddamn necks. “Fuck this. I’m outta here.”

  “You can’t leave. We came in one car,” Dash says smugly. Obviously, he thought about that; he knew I wasn’t going to be able to jump in my own vehicle and bail if Pax brought the Charger. Dash’s trouble is that he isn’t an immediate problem solver, though. I pat my phone, fury sizzling underneath my skin. “Don’t worry. I’ll Uber.”

  “For god’s sake, Jacobi! Don’t be so melodramatic. Stay! Have a drink. Enjoy yourself!” Why he even bothers is a mystery. Dash knows that once my mind’s made up, it’s made up. He calls after me as I barge my way through the crowd, toward the exit.

  “Come on, Jacobi! I thought twins were supposed to get on better than this!”

  14

  ELODIE

  “Come on, girl. You know you want to.”

  I don’t want to. I really don’t, but Carina has a pleading look on her face that’s making it hard to say no to her. “I’m sorry, I’m just so tired. And a party? I won’t know anyone apart from you.”

  “You’ll know me,” Pres sings, as she flies past my door, her hands full of a hot pink dress that will, one hundred percent, clash horribly with her auburn hair.

  “See.” Carina crosses her arms, acting like she’s already won this battle. “And Rashida’s gonna be there.”

  “Rashida’s barely said more than three words to me since I got here.” I burrow deeper into my covers, pulling my duvet up underneath my chin. “It’s so nice and warm in here. And anyway, I’m already in my pajamas.”

  “Don’t lie, Stillwater. You’re fully dressed under there, aren’t you?”

  “Urgh. Having to spend hours at a party, mocked and ridiculed by Riot House boys, does not sound like a good time, okay?”

  “Hah! They don’t attend parties in town. They’re too pretentious and stuck up their own asses to mingle with Mountain Lakes kids. And anyway, I heard Pax telling Damiana that all three of them were heading to Boston for the weekend. Dash’s father’s hosting some kind of charity thing. So you can forget about using them as an excuse right now.”

  I scowl, sticking out my bottom lip. “Look. I’m horrible in large social gatherings. I don’t know how to talk to people. I’ll only embarrass you, and then you won’t wanna be friends anymore.”

  “Garbage. We’re cooped up here all week long and you wanna stay here all weekend, too? Sorry. Can’t allow it. Come on. Let’s blow this pop stand.”

  I am not gonna be able to get out of this, I can tell. She is right, though. It doesn’t make sense to cloister myself up in my room all weekend, when we’re forbidden from leaving during the week. Seems like some form of barbaric self-inflicted punishment that I’m not entirely sure I deserve.

  “Who’s throwing this party again?”

  She jumps up and down, clapping her hands together. “Yay!”

  “Carina, nooooo, I didn’t agree to anything. You gotta tell me who’s throwing the party!”

  She shrugs her denim jacket off one shoulder, posing dramatically, grinning like a fiend. “Does it even matter? There’ll be booze. There’ll be boys. There’ll be music. Come on, Elle. Throw on your shortest skirt and let’s GO!”

  The mansion—a sleek masterpiece perched on a cliff edge overlooking the town’s largest lake—is big enough to house an entire football team. And the guy who’s throwing this party, Oscar, is the son of an ex NFL player, so that kind of makes sense.

  It takes the entire drive down the mountain to figure out who knows Oscar and if we’ve actually even been invited to this thing, by which time I’ve stopped caring and I’m ready for a beer.

  The party’s in full swing when we walk through the front door—people dancing and whooping along to the loud, hectic bassline that’s pumping through the professional speakers; shots being thrown back; not one but two beer pong games underway; and so many people I recognize that I immediately relax. Half of Wolf Hall is here. I might not be on first name terms with most of these guys, but I recognize them, and if they’re allowed to be here, then I’m sure I am too.

  “We need a bathroom pitstop,” Carina declares, dragging me through the swell of dancing bodies. I apologize to people as I bump into them, but I’m met with friendly faces. No one seems to mind a little jostling. When Carina tracks down a restroom, she pulls me inside and slams the door, spinning around excitedly and leaning against it, laying her palms flat against the wood. “So. I might not have mentioned this. But there’s a guy.”

  I hoist myself up to sit on the marble counter by the sink, pulling up my pantyhose, careful not to catch my fingernails on the sparkly, thin material. “Of course there’s a guy,” I agree. “Who is he? What’s his name? Does he go to the academy?”

  “He’s a freshman at the University of Albany. His name’s Andre, and he’s beautiful. He’s friends with Oscar’s older brother, and he promised he was gonna be here tonight.”

  “And we like this Andre guy?”

  Carina nods enthusiastically. “We like him a lot. He’s smart. Kind. Funny. Asks permission before he kisses me, which is actually kind of weird, but it’s better than the alternative. And he looks like a young Andy Samberg, so there’s also that.”

  “Andy Samberg?”

  “I have a very unique sense of taste, my friend. Haven’t you already figured that out from the clothes?”

  In fairness, she’s wearing a pair of purple corduroy dungarees with four leaf clover patches sewn all over them. The t-shirt she’s wearing beneath the overalls has a deranged-looking cat printed across the front of it.

  “Okay. I get it, I get it,” I say, laughing. “But the only other guy I’ve known you to be interested in is…well, you know who, and he looks like a classic Greek statue. There’s nothing quirky or weird about him at all. He’s like…vanilla ice cream. But the most expensive, most decadent, luxurious vanilla ice cream money can buy.”

  Carina snorts, regarding herself in the mirror. She runs the tap, wetting her fingers and smoothing down her hair, which she’s wearing au naturel tonight: big, and beautiful, and bouncy. “That’s the thing, though, isn’t it? Everyone likes vanilla ice cream. You could be into pistachio, or licorice, or…I don’t know,” she laughs, “fucking wasabi flavored ice cream, but when a to-die-for vanilla ice cream comes along, you’re still gonna want to give it a try. Because vanilla ice cream looks so good, and it tastes so good, and you think you know what you’re getting. But then you realize that the milk’s actually turned and you’ve been poisoned,
and…” She runs out of steam, shaking her head. “I don’t know. Vanilla ice cream turned out to be disgusting.”

  “What kind of ice cream do you think Andre is?” I ask, watching her as she applies some lip balm.

  “Easy. He’s a cilantro-lime ice cream sandwich.” She grins, biting down on her tongue playfully. “A little off-beat. A little kooky. A little strange. But all of his weird parts somehow all work together. I like that about him.”

  It’s nice that she’s this excited about a guy. I thought after her tears at the diner last weekend that it’d be a long time before she found anyone she might like to swoon over. And yet here she is, swooning away.

  “What kind of ice cream do you think Wren is?” she asks, fluttering her eyelashes at me.

  “That’s a messed-up question to ask. Why would I be thinking about what kind of ice cream that boy is?”

  “I don’t know. You tell me…” She sounds airy and unaffected, but I’m looking right at her face in the mirror. I can see the cautious expression she’s trying to stave off. “You look at him a lot. He looks at you a lot. I figured, what with all the negative tension floating around in the air, that something might be going on…”

  “Wren Jacobi is not ice cream. He’s a lump of stale cheese smothered in rat poison, and I have absolutely no interest in sampling him.”

  Carina laughs good-naturedly, clicking the lid onto her lip balm and dropping it back into her purse. “All right. I’ll believe you, girl. But just so you know…millions wouldn’t.”

  Oscar looks like a linebacker. He’s six foot three and almost as wide, and when he moves, everyone at the party moves with him, gravitating toward him like they’re trapped in his orbit. You can hear him laugh—a rich, warm, booming sound—over the driving beat of the music, which he changes every minute or so, unable to commit to one song without having to switch it over to something else.