by E. M. Snow
To my annoyance, a chuckle passes through her pursed lips. “Oh, sweetie, you misunderstood. I’m not the one who’s going to break you.”
I cock my head. “What the hell does that mean?”
She grins, and it’s pearly white and evil. “You’ll see.”
Without another word, she and her posse make their way out of the locker room, leaving me alone and more confused than ever.
It’s not until I emerge from the locker room that I understand what Laurel meant. As soon as I step into the gym, I understand who it was she was talking about when she said she wouldn’t be the one who would break me.
Saint Angelle.
In my fucking gym class.
“I’m being punished,” I murmur under my breath, tucking a strand of hair back into my slowly unraveling braid. “God is punishing me.”
Gabe is with him, but I’m not as concerned about Archie Andrews’ muscle-bound twin at present. Saint’s eyes find me immediately, and he stares at me with glacial coldness. I keep my expression neutral, trying hard to hide the fact that I’m shivering with dread.
What fresh hell does he have in store for me?
Laurel and her friends are gathered near Saint and Gabe, though the boys don’t pay them much attention. They don’t seem to mind though, as they fire me looks of sadistic delight and giggle behind their hands to each other. When the gym teacher appears and whistles for us to begin running laps, I huff out a breath of relief. They wouldn’t try something in front of an adult.
Even they couldn’t be that arrogant.
Once we finish our laps, Mr. Norris splits us into teams and tells us we’re playing basketball today. The boys will be on one half of the court, and the girls on the other half. Despite my height, I’m a fan of the sport, so I try to have some fun with it, telling myself over and over again that I’m safe until the bell. Nothing can happen to me, especially with Saint and Gabe securely on the opposite end of the gym.
I end up guarding one of Laurel’s friends—a tall brunette named Nadia who’s rolled up her gym shorts until her ass cheeks hang out—as the game begins. She’s being overly aggressive right away, and my hope that I’ll get out of this class unscathed quickly diminishes. This bitch is out for blood, and when I step in her way to block her from driving the ball to the hoop, she lowers her shoulder and knocks me over. My elbow slams into the floor as I fall.
Mr. Norris blows his whistle and shouts at her to ease up, and Nadia bats her eyelashes and sneers an apology down at me. Pain radiates up my arm from my elbow, but I bite my lip and push to my feet. When the teacher asks if I’m all right, I shake his concern away and reposition myself to start playing again.
I don’t see the ball coming, but I suppose that’s the point.
It slams into my face, knocking me back to the ground with a painful thud.
I hear Laurel’s distinct cackle as stars burst into my vision. Mr. Norris blows his whistle again, it’s shrill sound pinging around in my skull.
“Ellis, you good?” he barks.
“She probably just got some sense knocked into her, Mr. Norris,” Laurel replies in a baby voice that might be oddly amusing under any other circumstance.
Something in me snaps. The pressure that’s been building up all day becomes too much, and I lose it. I leap to my feet and whirl on her, red spots blurring my vision.
“You got a problem with me, Laurel?” I bark. “Why don’t grow a pair and say whatever you want to say to my face instead of sicing your collagen stuffed airheads on me?”
The gym goes quiet, but I can sense the excited tension mounting around us. Laurel’s eyes tighten into slits and she takes a step toward me.
“You know what I want to say to you, you hick piece of shit?” she hisses, low enough that Mr. Norris won’t possibly hear her. “Go back to whatever cousin-fucking town you came from. No one wants you here. You don’t belong here.”
That much is obvious, but I’m not about to be chased away by some entitled Princess with fake tits and a bad nose job. I tell her as much, and her eyes go wide with shock as the crowd around us “ooooohs”. Out of the corner of my eye, I see the boys have begun migrating to our side of the gym to catch a peek at the show.
“Ladies, that’s enough,” Mr. Norris shouts, but he’s blocked by the other students and can’t get to us right away.
It’s enough time for Laurel to charge me, her expression wild. I dodge her easily and my hands come up instinctively as I slip into my boxing stance. Laurel tries to attack me again, but I slip out of her way, staying light on my toes as I dance around her.
“Fucking hold still!” she shrieks as she dives headfirst at me. I let her catch me around the middle, but I wrap my arms around her torso and lock her in a bent over position. She struggles to break my hold on her, but I’m too strong.
Suddenly, Mr. Norris breaks through the crowd and grabs me by the arm. He gets a hold of Laurel’s shoulder and yanks her away from me.
“Vanderpick, Headmaster Aldridge’s office, now!” he orders.
She gives him a shocked look. “B-but, sir! Mallory started it!”
“Not from where I was standing, she didn’t,” he snaps. “Now get going.”
She shoots me a glare, and I try not to look overly smug as she storms to the locker room. Mr. Norris isn’t quite done, though, as he turns to glare down at me.
“Ellis, I’m giving you a pass because Vanderpick clearly provoked you and you’re new here, but you pull this crap in my class again, it’ll be a month’s worth of detention at best. Got it?”
I gulp and nod. “Got it. Sorry, sir.”
He lets me go and turns to the rest of the class, barking at them to get back to their games. I take a moment to catch my breath and let my nerves calm before I rejoin the girls. As if they have a mind of their own, my eyes stray to the other side of the gym, and I meet Saint’s gaze. He’s gazing at me, his face an unreadable mask, though his eyes still burn like blue fire.
After gym, when I return to the locker room to change, I find that someone has exacted Laurel’s revenge and destroyed my school uniform. I stare at the shreds of fabric scattered in front of my locker for several long minutes as the other girls move around me as though nothing has happened.
I’m tired. So, so tired. I don’t even have the energy to be properly enraged about this, even though the uniform is going to be expensive to replace. I don’t say anything to anyone, just grab my backpack and walk out of the room with my gym clothes still on, my white t-shirt with its Angelview Academy crest sticking uncomfortably to my chest.
The bell hasn’t rung yet, and the halls are blissfully quiet as I make my way from the gym. I’m not a quitter and am determined to stick it out here until the worst of this hate passes, but I just want to go to my room and hide out for the rest of the day. Soon enough, all these people will realize I’m not worth all the effort and leave me alone because they’ll forget about what happened this morning. They have to.
They just … have to.
Rounding a corner, I come to an abrupt halt and my heart stops. I hadn’t expected to run into anyone as I made my quick escape, but he’s standing up ahead, leaning against the wall as if waiting for me.
Saint.
He doesn’t even look like he’s just left a gym, with every blond hair in place and his uniform hugging his ripped frame. He’s also alone. Gabe’s nowhere in sight.
His gaze finds mine and he doesn’t say a word, just stares at me and I realize he expects me to come to him. To willingly walk up to him like a lamb to the slaughter. I briefly consider turning around and going back the way I came, but my pride won’t allow it. If I run from him now, I’ll always be running from him. I’ll solidify him as my own personal boogey-man and will spend the rest of my time at Angelview peeking around corners, afraid he’ll be there waiting for me.
No. I won’t let him bully me into submission.
Raising my chin, I march right up to the bastard, knowing this confrontat
ion was coming sooner or later.
May as well get it over with.
“Sorry for the apple,” I snap when I reach him, silently adding, but you deserved it and more.
He doesn’t look surprised by my vehemence. No. The sonofabitch looks amused, his stunning eyes flashing with dark delight.
“I don’t think we’ve officially met,” he replies. His voice is deep. Too deep. Someone his age shouldn’t have a voice like that. It makes me think of starless nights, when the sky is so black, it’s suffocating to look at. “Mallory, was it? I’m Saint Angelle.”
“I know who you are,” I hiss. “Obviously, I know who you are. Everyone knows who you are, and they clearly don’t have any problem doing your bidding.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” His smirk tells me he knows exactly what I’m talking about.
“Just tell them all to stop, okay?” My voice wavers just a bit, and it’s mortifying that I can’t stop the show of weakness in front of him. I know he doesn’t miss it either, because his grin widens. “Call off your dogs and leave me alone because I’m sorry. I mean that.”
“No, and I definitely mean that.” He says the words so easily, it shocks me. My anger spikes, my temper breaking free, and when I open my mouth, I can’t stop the words that roll from my tongue.
“Look, I get it. I humiliated you in front of the whole school. Is this twisted revenge really what you need to restore your fragile ego?”
“Do you really think it’s that simple? That you get to say sorry and then it’s just over?” He moves so fast I don’t have time to process his intent, and before I know it, he’s in front of me, his hands splayed on the wall on either side of my head. I’m trapped, cold stone at my back, hot furious boy at my front. My breath leaves my lungs in a rush as I stare up into his face, dumbstruck. “It’s not, Mallory.”
“What do you—”
“Listen to me very carefully,” he growls, lowering his face so it’s even with mine. “You have a choice here. Make it easy on yourself and go home or stay and suffer. There is no in-between for you now. You threw that away this morning, so walk away before I fuck up your entire world.”
I’m so aware of him, it’s overwhelming. The heat of his large body. The way his biceps tense beneath his uniform blazer as he leans closer. His scent wraps around me like a straitjacket, confining me. He smells like smoke and weed, but there’s an underlying aroma that’s warm and intense and uniquely his. I don’t want to breath it in because it feels like I’m taking a part of him inside me, but I have no choice. He’s too close.
Far too close.
“Not an option,” I manage to answer at last, my voice hardly louder than a whisper. “I’m here to stay, so you just need to deal with it.”
He stares at me for several moments in silence, studying me intently, as though searching for cracks in my armor. One of his hands drops from the wall and he’s suddenly tangling his fingers in the hair at the nape of my neck, completely decimating what’s left of my braid. He pulls me closer, not enough to hurt me, but enough to let me know that I’m not in control of this situation. His fingers are big and rough, and I can’t remember anyone ever touching me like this.
He’s touching me like he owns me.
“You’ll regret staying,” he promises in a murmur. “I swear to God you will.”
Before I can think of a response—before I can think at all—he steps away from me, unraveling his fingers from my hair. Without a word or a backwards glance, he turns and walks down the hall and away from me. I watch him go, helpless to do anything else but stare at his retreating back.
6
My days fall into a regular pattern of taunts and abuse. The hope I’d had that everything would die down dwindles as the weeks pass and there’s no relief from my torment. I’m teased and bullied every day, and while Laurel and her minions are my main antagonists, I get called names by total strangers as I’m going to and from class, mocked about my accent, and told to go home constantly. The harassment doesn’t stop with the verbal abuse, however.
Oh, no. My classmates get much more creative than that.
The Friday of the first week of classes, I come back to my dorm to find HOEBILLY SLUT painted in red on my door, with opened condoms taped all around it. Luckily, they’re unused.
The Monday of the second week, someone trips me in the dining hall, and I go tumbling to the floor, my plate of roast beef and potatoes splattering everywhere. That shit earns me a round of applause and the nickname “Beef Curtain” from a few artistically challenged sophomores who are obsessed with Saint and crew.
That Wednesday, I get shoved into a utility closet and have to wait until a janitor comes along to let me out.
Saturday, I wake up to find bags of trash dumped outside my dorm room with—surprise, surprise—more condoms and feminine hygiene products.
This time, I’m not so fortunate in the used versus unused department.
If it weren’t for Alondra and her friend Henry, I don’t think I’d be able to bear the abuse. Loni proves herself a truly good person, though. She eats just about every meal with me, and even started walking with me to some of my classes. She’s like a human shield, willingly putting herself between me and the bullshit flying my way.
Henry turns out to be a pretty decent guy, too.
He’s kind of quiet and doesn’t say too much about himself. He’s good-looking enough that I think he should be among the popular group, namely Saint and those he deems worthy, but he tells me that he hates those guys’ fucking guts. He won’t tell me why, and I can’t get the reason out of Alondra either.
She’s surprisingly tight-lipped when it comes to Henry, which makes her even more of a badass in my eyes.
The girl is fiercely loyal.
At the end of my second week of hell, the three of us are sitting out in the courtyard, soaking up what we can of the late summer sun before the chill of fall sets in. Friday afternoons are quiet on campus, I’ve found. A ton of our classmates have beach houses nearby—or at least their families do—that they flee to over the weekends for wild parties that I’ll probably never be invited to.
Not that I’d have any interest in attending because who knew what fresh torture awaited me off-campus. Instead, I revel in the peace I find on the weekends, when my tormentors are too busy living their fabulous lives to give two shits about me.
“You sticking around this weekend, Loni?” Henry asks from where he’s spread out on his back in the grass. He tilts his head to look at her but doesn’t bother to ask me the same question. I don’t mind, though. It’s not a secret that I have nowhere else to go.
Squinting over at him, she shakes her head. “Nope. I figure I’d stay here and force Mal to study with me.” She turns her head slightly, casting me a pleading look. “I’ll beg if I have to. My dad’ll kill me if I bring home anything less than a B.”
Swallowing hard, I nod.
I love her. I truly do. At first, I was afraid that she’d be putting herself at risk of similar treatment by associating with me, but to my surprise, her popularity hasn’t appeared to have taken a hit. People still seek her out to gush about her dad, and she still gets invited to hang out with the other popular kids, even though she never accepts.
“Yeah, I’m probably staying on campus too,” Henry says with a nod. “Not that I’m getting a lot of invites lately to the Douche Squad’s orgies.”
While I’m almost certain he’s joking, I can’t help but blurt out, “Orgies? Really?”
He shakes his head and laughs. “No—I mean, none that I can confirm, anyway. There’s always rumors, and those guys screw enough that I wouldn’t be surprised if they’ve really happened.”
“Well they can fuck each other for all I care,” I spit out. “So long as it keeps them busy.”
Loni and Henry both laugh but I’m dead serious. Saint, Liam, and Gabe can all go fuck off and I don’t really care how they choose to go about the fuckening or who they do i
t with.
“Who’d top, do you think?” she asks with a giggle.
“Saint, for sure,” he replies. “That dude’s ego wouldn’t stand for it being any other way.”
I grin and close my eyes, feeling light and almost content.
Almost.
It’s been hard finding any peace of mind ever since Saint’s threat that first day. He haunts my thoughts, like an annoying song I just can’t get out of my head. I replay his words again and again, as if there’s some hidden meaning behind them, even though what he said was pretty damn clear.
You’ll regret staying. I swear to God you will.
I later found out that the weekend after he made that promise, he’d declared me “Open Season” at a party at Liam’s beach house. Open-fucking-season, like I was an animal, where anyone could go after me without repercussions because their lord and master had dubbed it so.
Astonishingly, though, he hasn’t breathed a word to me since that first day. None of them have. While their friends and admirers have terrorized me nonstop, none of Angelview’s gods have approached me. I can’t understand why, because it’s obvious Saint enjoys watching me suffer. I’ve caught him in the periphery of my vision, smirking as my self-esteem takes hit after brutal hit. He likes it. Likes watching me crack. Is probably hoping to see me shatter completely.
The other two don’t seem nearly as invested in my misery. After a few days, Gabe appeared to lose interest completely and doesn’t even really look at me anymore. Meanwhile, I’ve learned that Liam’s pissed off glare is his permanent expression for everyone. I take a strange amount of comfort in that—knowing I’m not really that special in his eyes.
But Saint … Saint is fixated on me, and ultimately it didn’t matter if the other two cared or not. Like Loni had told me two weeks ago, this is his world, and we’re just living in it.
