Riot House (Crooked Sinners Book 1)

by Callie Hart

Carina sags with relief when her hand closes around the journal and I let go. Guilt hides in her eyes, though. She feels bad that she’s strong-armed me into doing this now that she’s got her way. “Thank you, Elle. Really. I mean it. I’m grateful that you’re trusting me. I know…I know how it must look…”

  “You do?” I’m sharper than the point of a blade. “Really?”

  She sighs, hugging the journal tightly to her chest, like I might make a grab for it and run out of the room. “Mara was really troubled, Elodie. She was so much fun, and it was hard not to love her, but she was allergic to the truth a lot of the time. Just didn’t want to hear it. Occasionally, reality and the way she wanted things to be sometimes got a little blurred around the edges. I’m sure this journal’s full of things she half-fantasized about. Daydreams that could do a lot of damage if the wrong person read them.” She huffs, exasperation on her face. “Can we just forget about it and move on with the day please? I just want things to be normal again.”

  Her last statement seems so loaded now. I suspect that she’s not just talking about the chilled out, relaxing afternoon we had planned for ourselves; I think she’s talking about life at Wolf Hall in general, and the fact that nothing will ever be normal again here if people keep on bringing up Mara’s mysterious vanishing act. I suck in a deep breath through my nose, trying to release the tension that’s built up inside of me. “Okay. Fine. I won’t bring it up again. But you need to answer one question first.”

  She chews on her lip, anxious, but nods. “What do you want to know?”

  “Did Wren or any of the other Riot House boys have something to do with Mara’s disappearance?”

  She stiffens. Shakes her head. “No. I’d love to be able to pin something on them, but they were inside the house all night. The three of them. I saw them with my own eyes. Dashiell…” she winces. “Dashiell was with me. All of us were in the kitchen, playing drinking games. We were all so fucked, none of us left the house until the next morning. Wren passed out in front of the fireplace and slept there ‘til dawn. Pax was making cocktails all night. Whatever happened to Mara…it had nothing to do with them.”

  I parse this inside my head, letting it take root. Wren wasn’t involved in the girl’s mysterious vanishing act. He’s innocent of any possible crime that took place that night. “Okay. Well. Fine. I suppose that’s an end to it, then.”

  Carina gives me a relieved smile. “Great. You’re the best, Elle. Anyone ever told you that?”

  “All the time.” I smile tightly, but no matter how hard I force it, I know it doesn’t reach my eyes. I watch as she puts the journal into the backpack full of beauty products she brought with her to my room, zipping the bag up tight once the book’s hidden out of sight.

  “I’m done with the braids,” she says. “You want me to give you a manicure? I have a gel light. I can do a proper job.”

  I register the stiffness in her voice; she’s trying hard to wipe away the memory of what just happened, but it’s going to take more than a gel manicure to erase this awkwardness. If she was one of my friends back in Tel Aviv, I’d call her out on her shit immediately and demand to know what the fuck was going on. That kind of pushing isn’t appropriate here, though. Best just to forget about the journal, and Mercy’s obvious meddling. Best just to forget about Mara, and the dark cloud that I can now feel hanging over the academy.

  I replace the piece of wood, forming the windowsill again, and I amp up the wattage on my smile, trying to make it look real this time. “Sure thing. But only if you promise not to paint my nails bright yellow.”

  In The Dark…

  I am nameless.

  Lost.

  Forgotten.

  The air feels like shards of glass, bristling inside my lungs.

  My throat’s raw from screaming.

  When the straw appears through the hole this time, I have no option but to drink.

  I’m prolonging this torture by gulping down the tepid, foul water that flows through the plastic and into my mouth, but I’m not as strong as I thought I was.

  If I die, it’ll be because I was trapped here, and no one thought to come looking.

  But I’m too weak to give up yet.

  25

  WREN

  “I don’t give a shit, fuck face. I bought a bowler hat and I need to wear it. End of story.” Pax throws back the remains of his beer and tosses the bottle so that it spins in the air, spraying amber liquid from its mouth as it flies end over end toward the trash can. Dashiell visually reprimands him with a trademarked Lovett family frown of disapproval. Pax ignores the look, smirking like a bastard when the bottle finds it mark and clatters loudly into the receptacle on the other side of the kitchen.

  “Alex has hair in A Clockwork Orange. You’re gonna look nothing like him.” Holding his own beer bottle to his lips, Dashiell drinks, his throat working. I sit on the stool by the breakfast bar, saying nothing, brooding, glowering at each of them in turn to make it perfectly clear how little I’m enjoying this.

  “Oh, ye of little imagination. If I can get a bowler hat, you don’t think I can find a fucking wig?”

  “It’s ‘Oh ye of little faith,’ you heathen. And all I’m saying is, costume parties are for kids. And Halloween. At no other time should people on the verge of adulthood voluntarily want to play dress up.”

  “Come on. Don’t be a prick. Girls always wear the sluttiest outfit they can find at a costume party. Aren’t you jonesing for a little T & A? It must have been, what, five years since you got your dick sucked?”

  “Funny.” Dash grins sourly at him. “Wren, we’re at odds here. You have the deciding vote, mate. What do you say? Should we have an adult party, where the attendees can wear their normal clothes like big boys and girls, or should we have an infantile fancy dress party?”

  I glance up from the laptop screen in front of me, waiting for him to see just how annoyed I am by this whole thing. He just stands there, waiting patiently for me to offer him my opinion, though, and I know the fucker. He’s not gonna leave it be until I’ve made some sort of decree. “I don’t give a flying fuck about this party, boys. If it were up to me, we wouldn’t even be having it. So wear a fucking bowler hat and a tutu,” I tell Pax. “And you can wear a cravat and a three-piece fucking suit if you like. And I’ll wear what I’m wearing right now, and I’ll drink myself into oblivion until it’s all over, and then we can all move on with our lives.”

  Pax’s eyes narrow, and narrow, and then narrow some more. I can’t even tell if they’re still open when he says, “You’re master of this hunt this time, Jacobi. I wouldn’t go getting too shit faced if I were you.”

  God fucking damn it. I knew this was gonna happen. I fucking knew it. “I’m not master of the hunt. I was master last time. Which means one of you fuckers are up to bat.”

  In unison, Dashiell and Pax shake their heads. They disagree, bicker, fight and squabble about everything, but it looks like they’re of one mind about this. So typical. “Things went badly last time, so Pax and I made an executive decision. You need to get back into the saddle. You’re all over the place, and frankly we’re tired of living with an imposter.”

  “An imposter. Right.”

  “Yes.” Dash drops a couple of dry roasted peanuts into his mouth. “You’re currently not yourself, and we’ve decided we want the old you back. So, you get to be master, and we get to revel in whatever sick, fucked up party game you arrange for us to play, and everything goes back to normal. Sound good?”

  No, this does not sound good. None of it does. As master of the hunt, I’ll be expected to do certain things. I used to revel in those arcane delights, but things have changed now. There’s Elodie to consider. I haven’t been able to shake the image of her, naked and beautiful, straddling me, the sweet sound of her panting in my ear, since last night. I’ll die an old man in my bed, all of my other memories eaten away by the ravages of time, but that memory will still be burning fiercely behind my eyelids when I go.


  Elodie is mine, and I’m not fucking letting her go. And I can’t be master of the hunt and keep Elodie. There’s no way in hell.

  “Do what you gotta do,” Pax says, snapping open another beer. He flicks the cap across the living room. “But this is happening, Wren. You’re gonna have to man up. Dash and I have never balked when you’ve thrown us a gig. We sure as shit didn’t kick up a fuss when you bundled us onto that plane last weekend. And that was some fucked up shit.”

  He’s right. I’ve put both of them in really compromising situations before, for the sheer hell of it, because it made me laugh and watching them squirm was ten different kinds of entertaining. And my most recent ask of them could have ended in disaster for all three of us if something had gone wrong. I can’t back out of this. If I refuse to play ball with them, it’ll cause a rift in the house like nothing else. I chug from my beer to stop myself from cursing the motherfuckers out.

  “In the meantime,” Dash says, eyeing me sternly. He looks like my fucking father. “Mercy’s asked if she can move in here.”

  I spray IPA across the kitchen counter. “What the fuck did you just say?”

  “No need to overreact. I told her it was up to you, and your word would be final on the matter. She said you were never gonna let her stay here, and I didn’t give her any reason to believe she was wrong. At which point, she called me and Pax cunting little bitches for not standing up to you, and then put a scratch in the Charger.”

  “I haven’t put a single scratch on that car,” Pax growls darkly. “Not one. And I take terrible care of my things. You’ll be pleased to know that your sister is now on my shit list.”

  I don’t like that Mercy’s been talking to these guys behind my back. She thinks she fucking walks on water, that girl. At least one of them is beginning to see things from my perspective, though. Dash...Dash, not so much. “Personally, I think she’d be a great addition to the house, but I know how little my opinion counts for these days. You’re lucky you have a sister y’know, Jacobi. Some of us had to grow up all alone, in a big, drafty house—”

  “Oh, cry me a river. I’ve seen that sprawling mansion you call a house and it’s fucking beautiful. You were raised in the lap of luxury with a silver spoon sticking out of your mouth. Having a sister’s like having an annoying case of hemorrhoids that won’t fucking go away.”

  “Little young for hemorrhoids, aren’t you?”

  I roll my eyes.

  “I agree with him,” Pax mutters. “I fucking hate both of my sisters. And my brother. They’re the cunting little bitches. The dynamic of the house would be fucked if a girl moved in here. Mercy’s blossomed quite spectacularly since she left last year, she’s the hottest little fuckhole at the academy, but she’s also fucking insane. I don’t have time to be installing eight new locks on my bedroom door, and she could whoa—WHOA! What the fuck are you doing? Take your hand off me, Jacobi, or I’ll fucking snap it off.”

  I have him by the collar of his t-shirt. I’m ready to lay the fucker out. We’ve gone four months without any of us hitting each other, though, so I shake him hard enough to make his teeth rattle instead. “She is fucking insane. She’s the bane of my fucking existence. But she’s still my fucking sister. Say something like that again and I’ll take a pair of pliers to your front teeth. Get it?”

  Pax slaps me away, eyes furious, his cheeks turning red. Fuck, he wants to land a right hook on my jaw so fucking bad. He won’t, though. He’s still thinking about Corsica and The Contessa. “All right. All right. Point made,” he seethes. “Jesus. You take everything so fucking personally.”

  “I’ll drive over to DC and finger bang your mom then, shall I? See how personally you take that?”

  “Enough. Enough. God, it’s a miracle you guys haven’t given me a nervous breakdown by now. Let’s all cool our jets and gather our composure, shall we? Pax won’t say anything weird about your sister anymore. Mercy isn’t moving into the house. And you will be master of the hunt,” he reaffirms. “Come hell or high water, you, Wren Jacobi, will have something truly devious and perfect planned for us the night of the party, I just know you will.” He pauses, his expression hard and judging as he gives me a meaningful look. “You haven’t let us down yet.”

  26

  ELODIE

  Monday mornings were so much easier at Mary Magdalene’s. The weekends were my own in Tel Aviv. My father’s schedule meant he was always away from the house on Saturdays and Sundays, and I was free to do my own thing. Go shopping with Ayala and Levi. Go to the movies. Do my homework and putter around the house in peace. He was around more during the beginning of the week, so going to school was an actual blessing. It saved me from his ire, walking the halls of the international school. I stretch out every single class I had, making the time away from Colonel Stillwater count. I signed up for as many after-school activities as I could. Anything to avoid going home, when I knew he’d be there, waiting for me, his never-ending anger rolling off him in waves, just waiting for me to do something or say something that warranted an explosion of epic proportions.

  At Wolf Hall, there’s no escape from my studies. I’m only ever three floors away from a classroom, and that fact in itself makes the beginning of the academic week more depressing than it should be. I don’t really get to leave, so it never feels as though I’ve had a break.

  It’s gloomy again, rain slashing at the windows as I make my way down the stairs, dreading this morning’s English class. When I reach the hallway, there are students everywhere, chattering loudly and joking with one another as they make their way to their first lesson of the day. I should feel lighter than I do. I get to see Wren soon, but this isn’t some sweet high school romance that I can let myself feel giddy over. It’s a secret. Wren didn’t tell me to keep what happened with him the other night quiet, but it’s there all the same, an unspoken agreement between the two of us: it would be bad for both of us if anyone knew we’d torn each other’s clothes off and fucked in his bedroom.

  My heart shoots up into my throat as I see Dashiell enter through the academy’s entrance, shaking his head like a wet dog, sending droplets of water flying from the ends of his dark blond hair. Pax appears after him, a broad smile spread across his face, laughing at the top of his lungs at some private joke.

  And then there’s Wren.

  My breath stills in my chest.

  He enters the school, dressed head to toe in black, the shoulders of his hoody darkened by the rain, the hood pulled up over his head, his eyes already searching, searching, searching...

  He finds me, standing on the bottom step of the stairs, and the lights overhead dim. I step down, sliding along the edge of the hallway, my back against the wall, and the Riot House boys shove their way through the crowds, still caught up in whatever conversation they were having when they arrived. Two of them are, at least. Wren stills on the other side of the hall, coming to a stop opposite me. A tense moment passes where we stare at each other across the sea of bustling bodies, our line of sight clear, then obscured, clear, then obscured by the flow of students as they pass us by,

  How is no one else reacting to this? How can they not feel the electricity in the air? How is everyone else so blind, and deaf and dumb to the pressure that’s building around them as Wren Jacobi and I share this blisteringly surreal moment?

  “Forgotten the way?”

  I glance up and Carina’s there, clutching her school bag to her chest, wearing a pristine white t-shirt and a tartan skirt that should be illegal, it’s so short.

  “Sorry?”

  “What are you doing, just standing there? You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” she says, laughing.

  “Oh. Uh, nothing. Sorry.”

  “I thought you were gonna go save us a seat. Come on. If we don’t hurry, someone else will grab our sofa.”

  I look up and Wren’s gone.

  Doctor Fitzpatrick’s already at the front of his room when Carina and I enter. “Come on, girls. You know the punishmen
t if you’re late,” he says, grinning.

  “What’s the punishment for being late?” I hiss.

  Carina grabs my arm and pulls me toward the sofa. “You don’t want to know.”

  Once we’re sitting down, I grab my notepad out of my bag, twisting a pen over in my fingers nervously, surveying the room. I look at every other student in the class before I give in and allow my gaze to drift (as casually as I can manage) over to the battered leather sofa on the opposite side of the room.

  Wren’s right where he’s supposed to be...but he’s not sprawled out, lying on his back, staring angrily at the ceiling today. He’s sitting up like a normal person, eyes locked on his hands, his hair falling into his face, a tiny frown pulling at his dark brows. Dashiell and Pax are sitting on the floor, underneath the window, but they’re not sniping at one another today. They both seem to be covertly watching Wren, muttering to each other under their breath. Dash must feel me looking at him. His head whips up and he looks right at me.

  Wait. No. Not at me. At Carina.

  “Asshole,” she grouses. “What kind of sick fuck do you need to be to lead someone on, take their fucking virginity, humiliate them in the worst way imaginable, and then stare at them every available opportunity you get afterward? Like, what is he even trying to accomplish, looking at me like that?”

  He’s not trying to accomplish anything. He’s reliving something. Replaying it over in his head, savoring every second as he remembers stripping Carina out of her clothes and fucking her senseless. I know, because I know that look. That same dazed, distant expression has appeared on my face at least ten times since Saturday night.

  I didn’t text him.

  He didn’t text me.

  What does that mean? Were we both waiting for the other person to reach out first? Have we both been stubborn and stupid, too caught up in our own pride to even communicate with each other? Or have I gotten this wrong? Is he just content, now that he’s had me? Have I given him the one thing he wanted, and now I can expect never to speak to him again?