by Mina Thorne
"Yeah, thanks, I kinda got that," I replied and then laughed again. I didn't know why I was feeling so uptight, probably nerves from my fight with Whitt earlier combined with not drinking that much. It turned out I was the kind of person who needed to get drunk in order to relax around a big crowd, but not tonight.
"This is going to be sooooo lit!" Agnes yelled and both girls literally, 'wooed' in my ears.
"I'm hanging out with the woo girls," I told Whitt. "I don't know if they're going to let me go."
"I'll meet you down on the beach, okay? The guys want to play another round of beer pong before we head down there,“ he said and kissed me as Agnes and Marie dragged me away. "Take care of my girlfriend," he called to them as we left.
"We will, we promise!" Agnes giggled.
"So you're his girlfriend now, that's new," Marie said and we walked arm in arm down the steps to one of the many vehicles lined up to take drunk kids from Sienna's place to the beach bonfire.
"It kind of is," I replied. "It's good though, I like him."
"Whitt's one of the good ones," Agnes said, slurring her words. "Don't ever let anyone tell you differently, he's a good guy."
"Have either of you slept with him?" I asked, and immediately I hated myself for being curious. Why couldn't I just let well enough alone?"
They looked at each other as we all climbed into the backseat of a black SUV. Once we settled they burst out giggled and yelled, "Yes!" at the same time.
"How about Barrett?" I asked, once again dreading the answer.
"Oh yeah!" they both giggled like mad.
"We all fuck each other around here, it's kind of weird when you think about it," Agnes said drunkenly.
"We sport fuck. Did you guys do that in Cali?" Marie asked, also very drunkenly.
I was getting quite the education on Harrisburg tonight, and as much as I liked having information I hated the subject matter.
"Of course, but I wasn't into it," I replied.
"That's because you're weeeeird," Marie laughed and Agnes joined her.
I wasn't nearly drunk enough to be conversing with these two, and I missed Whitt already.
I went to text him and realized I didn't have my phone on me.
"Can we go back? I left my phone at Sienna's place…or maybe in Whitt's car."
"It doesn't matter, we get no cell service up here anyways," Marie said. "Just wait until Whitt comes and you can ask him."
"Okay," I replied, but a growing sense of unease was building in the back of my head and I didn't know what it was from. I think I just missed Whitt. Or Barrett. Or both.
Or maybe I had a sense of nostalgia for something that I'd never had. I'd spent so many years on the outside looking in at parties like this, that I'd always imagined they'd be a certain way.
Now that I was here, it was a little disappointing. They were just more boring drunk kids trying to have a good time and fight off the creeping dread of graduating and starting their lives soon...like the rest of us.
Perhaps being careful what you wished for wasn't a cautionary tale of the horrible things that could go wrong, maybe it was more of a warning that once you got what you thought you wanted, reality tarnished it and then you were left with nothing to want.
The absence of desire was boredom, and to a teenaged girl, boredom was tantamount to death.
Or maybe I just needed to do a couple shots when we got to the fire and stop being such a serious weirdo. I might have been channeling some Barrett brooding vibes or something.
The driver pulled the SUV up to a long, white sand beach area stretched out along the lake.
There weren't that many kids there, but there was a huge bonfire in the middle of it with wood piled up over six feet and flames leaping higher.
Marie, Agnes and I got out and headed to the fire, they handed me a bottle of tequila and Agnes said, "Drink up, bitches!"
We drank, I downed a couple choking, burning swallows of it and handed the bottle back to Agnes.
We stood around for a bit, talking and drinking and discussing which celebrity we'd like to fuck, when I realized there were even fewer people at the fire.
"What time is it?" I asked. I felt naked without my phone.
"I don't know, does it even matter?" Agnes told me.
"Where's Whitt?" I asked. "Can you guys call him and find out?"
"I told you, no cell service here. Just chill out," Marie said.
I heard a car before I saw it, so I turned around to see who was driving up so close to the bonfire.
It was Whitt's red Range Rover, he drove it right onto the sand though and parked it facing us with the lights on.
The headlights flashed on and off a couple times and kids scattered, leaving me alone with Marie and Agnes.
The passenger door opened and Becca jumped out, a wide and terrible grin on her face as she yelled, "It's time, bitches!"
Marie and Agnes began to laugh and circle around me. Becca took a few steps towards us on the sand and stood watching, her hands on her waist in a power pose as she laughed maniacally.
"What's going on?" I asked, but I already knew. I just couldn't believe that Whitt would do this to me, that he would have played such a big part in setting me up.
I was just glad I hadn't slept with him.
Agnes turned and looked at me, laughed in my face and said, "Did you really think we'd dump our best friend, the girl we've known since kindergarten, for some trailer trash Cali skank?"
"Like seriously, bitch, we aren't stupid. We know you were only hanging out with us to make Becca look bad," Marie said with a laugh. "Nice try, bitch. Go back to the trailer park, trash!"
"Whitt!" I yelled at the Range Rover but nothing happened other than Becca laughing harder at me.
"Whitt! Why are you doing this?" I screamed.
Agnes and Marie stopped circling me and each shoved me as hard as they could.
I lost my balance and stumbled backwards on the sand and fell onto my ass.
"You stupid slut," Becca laughed even harder. "Maybe I'll send some of the college guys down later and they can run a train on you. You can earn a ride home."
"I'm sure she'd fuck them as quickly as she fucked Taylor Dennis," Agnes sneered.
"My mom said you almost got him fired!" Marie yelled and kicked sand at me. "Your nasty skank ass almost got the best tennis instructor at the club fired. How sad is that?"
"She was totally begging him for it too," Becca said sagely, as if she was giving them great knowledge.
Rage flared inside of me for her, rage that almost scared me with its intensity.
"Whitt!" I screamed and tried to scramble to my feet as Marie, Agnes and Becca walked away. "Get out of your car, you fucking coward! Come talk to me!"
I heard the girls laughing at me all the way back to the Range Rover. They got in, but not before Becca turned around, flipped me the middle finger and laughed again.
The Range Rover did a donut and sprayed sand all over me as I sat on my ass and sobbed like my heart had broken.
Because it had.
They'd done it. These bitches had broken me.
Whitt had broken me.
I wasn't afraid to admit it just then, alone in the cold next to the bonfire.
I was broken.
And I wanted to go home.
I wanted California.
They'd get their wish, I was leaving Harrisburg and I would never return.
I sobbed harder and pulled my arms around myself, trying to get warmer by the fire.
I was so alone, I was so devastated.
I should have never wished for this, because I'd gotten exactly what I wanted.
And it had destroyed me.
Read Tyrant Academy, Boys of Westview Academy, book three!
Part III
Tyrant Academy
Chapter 40
As the lights of the car faded into the night, the full weight of my predicament sunk in and I started to scream.
"Come back!
Whitt, don't leave me here! You fucking bastard!"
I ran after them down the road, my heart pounding in my chest as I made it a hundred feet or so before the lights disappeared and the night became pitch black.
I realized that I had no idea where I was.
Or how to get back to the lake house to gather my things.
Or even how to call somebody, Kit maybe, and get a ride out of here.
My breath started to come in huge, wracking sobs and I couldn't get enough air as I realized I was alone out here in the dark on a beach in the middle of nowhere.
I bent over and began to draw in deep, sucking lungfuls of air and forced myself to calm down. To focus and slow my breathing.
I stood up again on shaky legs and headed back to the bonfire, the only point of light anywhere in the darkness that engulfed me.
The fire warmed me, but every time I stood up, brushed the sand off my legs and started to walk away, the cold air cut through to my bones, and I was shivering within a few steps.
Sienna hadn't lied about the beach, at least.
It was brilliantly amazing out here. I found a discarded beach blanket and wrapped myself in it next to the fire and laid on the sand, looking up at the stars.
Once the lights of the flames died down a little, about a million stars appeared in the black velvet of the night sky. I couldn't remember a time when I'd seen so many, I hadn't ever really been out of the city before.
Camping and lake houses and vacations were always things my friends and their families did. Other than a few school trips for band or spelling competitions here and there, I'd done none of them. My summers and spring breaks had been spent either at the elderly neighbor's house when I was younger, or as a latchkey kid on my own when I was a little older.
Maddy and Brie would come back telling me stories about Italian villas and tropical getaways...all I had to offer up were tales from my favorite daily soap operas.
And yet, here I was years later on a private beach just a couple miles from my family's vacation home. I was finally somebody; I was Stephanie Montgomery of the Montgomery Holdings family...one of the wealthiest girls in one of the most affluent towns in the nations with anything I could ask for at my fingertips...and I was alone.
And not just alone, I'd been betrayed by the boy I'd been falling for and people who I actually thought were my friends. Tears continued to leak from my eyes continually as I watched the sky and thought about everything that had just happened.
I really had thought I had gotten one over on Becca and Mason and the other kids at Westview Academy. I'd honestly convinced myself that stupid, naive me had managed to become some bad bitch at school and shaken up the social order of an established group.
That I'd wandered in off the streets and been such a hardass that I had conquered them all.
What a fool I'd been and knowing they'd played me so badly brought yet another round of fresh tears welling from my eyes.
I squeezed them shut, and even though the heat from the dying fire was still warming me, my teeth began to chatter uncontrollably.
I opened my eyes again and pulled the blanket tighter around me and stared again into the night sky.
I saw a bright light streak across the velvety darkness, and then another.
I couldn't help myself, I drew in a breath and held it as I watched another falling star, another and a few more.
I supposed it would be an excellent time to make a wish.
I exhaled loudly and laughed to myself before I said, "I wish my life would go back to being normal. I wish...I wish I could be loved as much as I love."
I had initially been tempted to wish for Becca to get terminal herpes or Whitt to get dick cancer or something, but I remember reading somewhere online that everything you put into the universe came back to you sevenfold.
I didn't need seven times that bad energy returning to me. I was already dealing with so much negativity, if I got that much piled on top of me, I'd end up dead from dry vag like Elaine or slip-on Becca's tampon and break my neck.
I reflexively reached for my phone to check the time and cursed yet again when I realized it was gone. I was so used to being connected at all times that it felt scary to be without it.
I stood up and walked around the perimeter of the bonfire, using the light to check the ground for anything left behind that might be useful or some more wood to keep me warm.
I found a bunch of empty, crushed beer cans...stay classy, Westview Academy...a couple condom packages but thankfully no used condoms, and some cardboard beer cases.
I picked them up and tossed them on the fire to give me a few more minutes of heat and light and in the dancing flames; I saw the reflection of something across from me.
I jogged around and found an abandoned beach chair. The metal kind that unfolded into a sort of chaise that let you sit just above the sand. At least I wouldn't be laying right on the ground with the cold leaching the warmth from my body.
I thanked whoever had left their pink striped cloth chair, dropped it to the ground facing the fire, and lowered myself onto it.
Usually, I would have been lounging in the bright summer sun, a drink in hand, and the laughter of my friends all around me when I sat in something like this. That had been the plan anyway, maybe coming out tomorrow after having a wild night of passion with Whitt, and seeing my new friends here on the beach.
Look how things had turned out though. I was a ball of misery wrapped in despair and slathered with thick depression sauce.
I sighed, and my breath quivered, but I was no longer crying. I was beginning to rally and gather my wits again.
I might not fight back, I might not even go back to Westview at this point, but things could be worse.
Like Mom said, things could always be worse.
I'd still have my family support, and I'd always have my friends back in California, and I'd still have the wealth and privilege that came with being a Montgomery.
I closed my eyes and let the crackle of the fire sooth my aching heart. I shivered, but in spite of the chill in the air, I slowed my breathing and relaxed my body.
There was no point trying to walk until the morning light, so I let myself fall into sleep and escaped the misery of my situation for just a few hours.
Chapter 41
I was dreaming about something, Barrett was there and he brought another man with him. A man with a deep voice and a cocky demeanor that piqued my interest, even in the fog of my mind.
I was frozen, trapped in a glacier, and they were shining lights through the ice trying to get me out.
"Come on, Steph, talk to me," Barrett said and I felt as if I was cradled in somebody's arms.
"Give her to me. I'll warm her up. You're doing it wrong," another voice said and I warmed just listening to it. It was deeper than Barrett’s and it was rich with a slight accent. It flowed like thick hot chocolate, sweet and heat and rich.
I felt like I’d met an instant best friend and I hadn’t even opened my eyes yet.
The ice began to melt away and I felt lifted higher, like I was even lighter. My body stopped aching and I started to relax as blood returned to my extremities.
And that's when I felt them, strong hands rubbing my arms and legs.
Four strong hands.
I forced my eyes open, and they fluttered with the effort, but finally I managed to wake up and take in the scene.
We were bathed in the bright light of a vehicle where I was sitting in Barrett's lap, his legs were crossed and his face was deep in concentration as he rubbed my arms.
On the other side, his knees close to Barrett's, was a stunning man. A Greek god come to life with the lights from the car making him glow as if with otherworldly magic. His face was similar to Barrett's but somehow more masculine, filled out.
He had the same angular plains along his cheeks, the same full lips and thick black hair, but he also had a rugged look to him with thicker facial hair and even a tattoo poking out of the top of h
is V neck tee shirt.
He stopped rubbing my legs as if he sensed me looking at him. His eyes met mine and he smiled, a dazzling smile that caught my breath.
"There she is, she's awake."
"I'm awake," I croaked and didn't look away from him. "Who are you?"
"I'm Roland, Barrett's older brother," he said in that deep, incredible voice. "Or should I say your older brother too?"
His eyes sparkled with mirth and I immediately liked him. I felt as if I already knew him. He was the instant friend I had dreamed about, and I still felt it. I wanted him to like me.
“Steph, my god...are you alright?" Barrett asked and leaned over me, his breath showing in the air as he panted his anxiety. "I thought…fuck, I didn't want to think about what could have happened."
"Where’s Whitt? Did he really leave me here?” I asked in a quivering voice.
I struggled to get up, but I was so weak and the blanket had caught underneath me, holding me down.
Barrett shifted and released it, Roland helped me sit up on Barrett's lap and I melted back against his body's warmth as he wrapped his arms around me.
“Whitt isn’t here, Steph,” Barrett said and his voice was deep with anger as it rumbled in his chest.
"How did you get here? How did you find me?" I asked as I realized I was no longer in the beach chair and the bonfire had died down to mere embers a few feet away from me.
"Whitt called me. He’s a fucking coward and he helped them set this up, but he got cold feet and called me at the last minute,” Barrett said. “I’m going to fucking kill him when I see him.”
"Whitt left me…” My voice trailed off as the full weight of his words hit me. Whitt, the boy I was falling for, had left me on the beach. I had been so cold and so alone, he had helped engineer one of the worst things that had ever happened to me.
And to think I almost loved him. I almost let myself fall in love with him.
Tears stung my eyes again as a new type of pain rolled over me, threatening to drown me in sorrow at Whitt’s betrayal.
“I’m here, babe,” Barrett said and kissed the top of my head. “I’ve got you, I’ll never leave you again I promise.”
