The Campus Jock: A College Bad Boy Romance

by Serena Silver

  “You can come look now.”

  “Already?” Adeline’s eyes glittered in the shifting sunlight from the windows.

  The canvas showed Adeline in the center of a garden. Flowers seemed to bloom simply to try and make her smile. Strands of color swirled and curled away from her body in a burst of beauty. The paint seemed alive and richer. Adeline’s hand found Tiffany’s. The girls stood there in silence, admiring the work.

  Adeline turned to the other girl. Her face glowed with pride and wonderment. “I think I might be speechless for the first time in my life.” She gave Tiffany’s hand a tight squeeze.

  A scream echoed from somewhere else in the house. Adeline’s hand fell away. The two of them walked to the door and poked their heads out into the hall. Luke bolted up the stairs and ran towards the sound.

  “Stay back.” His stern command kept them from venturing any further.

  Alaric followed his brother up the stairs but stopped when he saw Adeline. “What’s going on?”

  “I don’t know. We were looking at the painting, and then we heard the scream.”

  Alaric hugged his sister to comfort her. His eyes followed Luke as he disappeared into a room further down the hall. Muffled voices drifted down to them. Tiffany’s pulse roared in her ears. What was going on? Was everyone ok?

  After a few minutes, the maid who had opened the door for Tiffany the other day wandered out into the hall. Her face was ashen. Her eyes were darting distractedly through the hall. She pressed the cross necklace around her throat to her lips, muttering a prayer.

  “Isabella?” Adeline pulled gently out of Alaric’s arms and reached out for the maid’s hand. “What happened?” Her voice was soft and full of concern. It reminded Tiffany of Luke. She glanced down the hall. He still hadn’t come out of the room.

  “You poor, poor children,” Isabella engulfed both of the twins in her arms as tears began to stain her cheeks. Her eyes searched the heavens for an answer as she continued mumbling her prayer.

  Fear filled Adeline’s eyes where only joy had been earlier. A door closed down the hallway. Everyone’s eyes turned towards the sound. Luke walked slowly towards them. Red stains clung to his shirt and hands.

  “Isabella, could you take everyone downstairs and make some tea? I need to call father.”

  Tiffany looked at the stains, “Is that blood?” She whispered so the twins couldn’t hear her as they walked down the staircase.

  “There’s been an accident.” His face was pale. He looked down at his hands as if they belonged to a stranger.

  “Here, come in here.” She pushed the door open wider and held it for him.

  Luke entered the studio, being careful not to touch anything. Tiffany led him to the sink at the back of the room and turned on the water. She pumped some soap into her hands and took one of his in hers. Lathering up his hand, she watched as the dark red water running off of his hand slowly cleared. She pulled his other hand under the faucet once the first was scrubbed clean.

  Grabbing a towel that had been tossed beside the sink, he dried off his hands. “Thank you.”

  “Do you want me to leave?”

  “If you could just step out into the hall, I need to make a phone call. I’ll have Sergei drive you home when I’m done.

  There was a stone in the bottom of Tiffany’s stomach as she stood in the hallway and closed the door behind her. Luke’s deep voice resonated through the door, but she couldn’t make out what he was saying. Her eyes were drawn down the hallway to the room where both he and the maid had come out of. No one else was nearby. She could walk down there to see what had happened. Her foot took a tentative step in that direction. No one would have to know if she was fast enough. Her body felt cold. She was drawn to whatever was down there like a passerby who couldn’t avoid gaping at a car wreck. Luke had had blood on him. She had just washed someone’s blood off of another man’s hands. Her foot took another frightened step. What was down there?

  Luke opened the door behind her. Tiffany froze. “Ok, let’s get you home.”

  Tiffany turned towards him and nodded. She hoped he would chalk up her startled reaction to being uncertain about the current circumstances. Now was not the time to lose his trust. She was lucky she hadn’t made it further down the hallway before she had gotten caught. He seemed preoccupied.

  “Luke, are you going to tell me what’s going on?” Saying his first name suddenly felt too familiar.

  “I will fill you in tomorrow, Miss Page. For now, I have others that need attending to.” His eyes wandered towards the kitchen where a very shook up Adeline was sipping tea from a cup. Alaric had his head in his hands. Luke opened the front door for her. Sergei was already waiting. “And Miss Paige, don’t forget, you still have a job to do. Make sure you’re ready tomorrow morning.”

  Tiffany nodded. She hadn’t even thought about the final portrait. If there had been an accident involving that much blood, she had assumed that the family would need some time to deal with whatever had happened. There was only one left: Luke.

  Chapter Seven: Luke

  Tiffany hadn’t slept at all the night after the accident. Her mind had run rampant with possibilities of what might have happened in that room down the hall. She drug herself out of bed, bleary-eyed. Her fingers felt weak as she stretched them. Today was the last day. It was the portrait she had been looking forward to the most, but now a dark cloud shrouded her previous excitement. Circles creased their way under her coffee-colored eyes. She threw her hair up into a messy ponytail and headed for the door.

  “Time for you to go already?” Hannah was perusing the morning paper. She glanced up at her roommate, “Oh, honey. No. You can’t go out like that.” Hannah went to the refrigerator and pulled out a plate with two used tea bags sitting on it. “Lay down.”

  “Hannah, I really have to go.” Tiffany protested even as her legs carried her over to the couch.

  “That Butler or driver or whatever he is can wait a few minutes. It’ll be fine.” Hanna placed the cooled tea bags over Tiffany’s closed eyes.

  She sighed and let out a stale breath she had been holding in, “This actually feels really nice.”

  Hannah massaged Tiffany’s temples, “This will help with those circles under your eyes. Now, typically I would say leave them on for like twenty minutes, but I know you won’t wait that long. Let’s give it five minutes, and then you can hurry off to your job.”

  After a few minutes, Tiffany felt relaxed. She was on the verge of sleep when Hannah removed the tea bags, “Ugh.” She didn’t want to get up.

  “Up you get,” Hannah slid her hands under Tiffany’s arms to help her sit up. “Hang on. Let me fix that rat’s nest you’ve got going on.” She pulled out the ponytail holder and combed through Tiffany’s hair with her fingers. Her slender fingers moved deftly to tidy the flyaway strands and smooth down her roommate’s dark hair.

  “Thank you.” Tiffany leaned her forehead against Hannah’s shoulder before struggling to her feet and stumbling out of their apartment.

  The black car was waiting for her like usual. The tinted glass lit up with her reflection as she climbed in the backseat. The tea bags had actually helped.

  “Hello, Miss Page.” Tiffany looked at the driver’s seat. Luke was behind the wheel.

  “What’s going on? Where’s Sergei?”

  “Sergei had somewhere else to be today, but we had to keep up appearances as if everything were normal. Fasten your seatbelt, please.”

  “I don’t understand.” Her belt clicked into place. She met his eyes in the rearview mirror.

  “I said I would fill you in today, didn’t I? What happened yesterday was an unfortunate accident. Isabella found Margarite’s body in her room.”

  “What?! She’s dead?” No. Tiffany had just seen her—just painted her—a few days ago. How could this happen?

  “It looked as if she had been dead for a day or two. Father insisted the family maintain their appearances, which for the time bein
g includes having you over to the house to finish your portrait series.” Tiffany noticed his eyes were red and little puffy. He was in mourning and still keeping himself focused on business.

  “If you need some time to process, I can wait to do the last portrait. It’s the least I can do.”

  “No need. We will finish up the series, and you can be on your way.”

  Tiffany sat in the backseat in shock. Margarite was dead, and no one had noticed until the maid went into her room? She couldn’t imagine living in the same house with someone and no one noticing that they were dead. The rest of the ride was silent. Luke parked the car in front of the house.

  The two of them walked up the stairs to the studio. The room was silent. Luke pulled a wicker chair away from the wall and positioned it in front of the easel. He stood erect behind the chair. His hands rested gently on the curve of its back.

  “Is that where you want to be?” Tiffany tilted her head.

  “Is that alright?”

  She studied him for a moment, “Luke, can I ask you something?”

  “You may ask, Miss Page, but I won’t guarantee you an answer.”

  “Why did you get up and leave the other day? At the picnic?” Tiffany busied herself with paints and brushes, so she didn’t have to look him in the eye as she asked.

  Luke let out a sigh, but to her surprise, he answered her, “I have spent my entire life trying to be recognized as something more than a man living in my father’s shadow. When you insinuated that I was only focused on my work, so I wouldn't defile his legacy, it struck a chord. I work hard to be seen as worthy on my own apart from him. Not so I’ll protect his name.”

  “Oh,” Tiffany’s voice was soft. “You know, the best way to move out of the shadows is to stop hiding.” She gestured to the chair with the end of her paintbrush. “You’re the one putting yourself in the shadows right now.”

  Luke raised an eyebrow and then slowly moved in front of the chair. “Better?”

  “Much.” Tiffany smiled at him. Her thoughts fell back to what Charles had said to her during his portrait session. He had told me she was a pawn. “Luke, are you using me to get back at your father?”

  “What gave you that idea?”

  “Well, when I was painting Charles, he mentioned that your father may not like my style. He made it seem like you choosing me to do to the portraits was a way for you to be rebellious towards your dad.”

  A chuckle escaped his lips, “Sounds like something he would say. Do you really want to know why I chose you?”

  “Yes,” her voice was little more than a whisper.

  “I chose you because you were out when everyone else wasn’t. You were out in the rain trying to make a living. Your pieces were good, but it was your commitment to your work that caught my attention the most. Going off of the work you’ve done here so far, I think I made a good decision. I didn’t take the more traditional route of choosing a painter, and while dad may not like my approach, he can’t argue with the results. The paintings on the wall out there,” he pointed towards the door, “they show how his children grew up physically, but your portraits do more than that. They show how his children have grown as people. When he looks back on that wall out there, I think your pieces will be the ones he comes to treasure the most. You didn’t just capture the passage of time; you captured their innermost selves.”

  “I bet Charles would disagree with that.”

  “Let him. Do you know why he was so pissed the other day? Because the truth hurts. You exposed that scared little boy who still feels like if he were just a little bit better, then maybe his daddy wouldn’t have left his mommy for another woman. When he finally lets go of that hurt and realizes it was dad’s fault and no one else’s, then maybe he can start to grow, but for now, you nailed it.”

  Tiffany felt a pang inside of her. Charles blamed himself for his parents’ failed marriage. That made sense. She wished she hadn’t painted what she had, now. Maybe he would let her try another time again.

  Thoughts swirled in her head. Luke thought she had captured something special about his siblings. She hoped she could do the same for him. The canvas didn’t speak to her the way it had for the others. Her mind was blank. He stood there looking at her from in front of the chair, waiting for her to begin. Her brush was loaded with paint, but her hands hesitated. Eventually, she just started to paint without much of an idea in mind. When she finished, she stepped away. Luke stood up and approached the painting. He looked at it without saying a word.

  Feeling the need to explain her choices, Tiffany began rambling, “I couldn’t stop thinking about how much you seem to hold your family together, so I added elements from their portraits to yours.” Luke’s painting showed him standing in front of the wicker chair, but his face with lit with the same sunlight as Alaric’s had been. A flower in his buttonhole was reminiscent of Adeline. The darkness of the background called back to Charles’s portrait as well as the shadows that Luke was trying to escape from. Beside him on a table, she had painted a ceramic vase lined with tiny veins of gold in honor of Margarite. The painting was dignified and expressive. His blue eyes shone out at them from the canvas, and a small smile played across his lips.

  “Tiffany, this is—” Luke’s praise was cut short.

  A woman’s scream echoed up to them. Luke turned on his heel and stormed down the stairs. Tiffany followed him. Her apron flapped as she ran. Luke spun down a corridor that Tiffany had not been down yet. He stopped outside of another room

  Tiffany could hear Adeline’s voice, “No, no, no.”

  Slowly, Luke walked into the room and pulled Adeline away from Alaric. He looked like he was sleeping. The only thing that made it seem like anything other than sleep was his lips. They were tinged blue, and even from the hallway, Tiffany could see that his chest was no longer rising and falling. She turned away from the room and pressed her back against the wall. Adeline fought Luke for a moment before clinging to him. Luke carried her to the room next door and placed her on the bed.

  Adeline rocked back and forth. Her large blue eyes were endless pools, “Why is this happening? How can he be gone?” The joy she usually carried with her was replaced with devastation at the loss of her twin. It was like seeing a coin where one side had been ripped away to become a black hole. How could the other side struggle to exist at that point?

  “Isabella!” Luke yelled for the maid.

  In a flurry of black and white skirts, Isabella rushed into the room, “What happened?”

  Luke shoved his hand into Isabella’s pocketed apron and pulled out an orange pill bottle. He shook two tiny, white pills into his hand and laid them in Adeline’s palm. Isabella grabbed the glass of water from the nightstand and passed it to the hysterical girl who quickly took the pills.

  “Shh, it’ll be ok. These will kick in, and you’ll sleep for a bit.” Isabella sat by Adeline’s side and stroked her hair as Adeline cried herself into a sedated state.

  “What did you give her?” Tiffany hissed at Luke as he pulled his sister’s door closed.

  “It was a sedative. The family doctor sent us some to deal with Margarite’s death. Adeline was distraught enough over Margie’s passing. She couldn’t handle Alaric, too.”

  “Two deaths in one week? What is going on?”

  “I don’t know! Okay?” Luke turned on her angrily. He marched into the living room. Charles was pouring himself a cup of lemonade in the kitchen. “Charles! Study. Now.” Luke stormed into a room lined with rows of books. Charles sauntered in after him.

  Through a gap between the door and the doorway, Tiffany could see Luke and Charles. Another pair of hands could be seen resting on top of a desk, but Tiffany couldn’t see the third man’s face. She leaned in closer to hear what they were saying.

  “Alaric is dead now too. That’s two of us in the span of just a few days.” Luke was resting his hands on the edge of the desk.

  “How did they die?” The person Tiffany couldn’t see spoke up.
/>
  “Margarite had her wrists sliced up like a piece of salami, and Alaric looks like he was suffocated.” Luke’s knuckles turned white from the force of his grip.

  “Isn’t it obvious what’s happening?” Charles sipped his lemonade. “It’s got to be the painter he dragged in off the street.” Tiffany’s heart jumped to her throat. What?! Charles tossed a brown paper sack on the desk. “Sergei found this in Margarite’s bedroom. If he did things your way, father, the painter would have been a properly vetted candidate with a reasonable portfolio.”

  “You can’t be serious!” Luke slammed his fist on the table. “That girl couldn’t hurt a fly.” He spun on his brother, “She is not a threat to you.”

  “Well someone here is! If you haven’t noticed, they are dying in the order they were painted in. Considering that Margarite went first, and now Alaric, it’s my head that’s going to be on the chopping block next. So if you don’t mind, I would like to get to the bottom of this.”

  “Father, you can’t possibly—”

  “Enough!” Ian Krieger’s voice boomed from the study. “No one leaves this house until we know more. Now, what is this? Some kind of drug?” Ian poured some of the contents on his desk. Tiffany recognized the bag immediately: it was the tea she had given Margarite after their session. “Have Sergei test it.”

  “What do you want me to do about Miss Page?” Luke crossed his arms over his chest.

  “You brought her into this house. You take care of it.” Ian waved his eldest son away.

  Luke stormed out of the Study. Tiffany had just enough time to bolt away from the door before he came out. He narrowed his eyes at her, but put on a smile, “My father would like for you to stay with us for a while as we try to get everything sorted out. Come on. Let’s go set you up a room.”