by C. Morgan
My appetite for risk was generally pretty insatiable, but those threats about the consequences had made me hesitate. Somehow, I doubted it was me who’d be suffering those consequences. There wasn’t much they could do except to cut me off financially, but even that would suit me down to the ground once my trust fund fell open. Which was still two years away, unfortunately. I didn’t think they’d go that far, though.
It was my sister I was worried about. Emily was my father’s green-eyed girl. He spoiled the shit out of her and she’d always gotten away with more than I had, but since she was only sixteen, she was stuck with our parental unit for at least a couple more years. There was plenty they could do to make life difficult for her if I refused them now.
Grabbing another crystal flute of some undoubtedly expensive champagne, I took a long swig, grimaced, and plopped the glass back on the tray of a passing waiter. The man I’d been talking to chuckled indulgently.
“I’m not a fan of the bubbly stuff myself,” he said, leaning forward like he was sharing classified level intelligence with me. “Personally, I prefer something a little harder. When in Rome though, huh?”
I shrugged. “I prefer beer, but Tommy says it’s swill designed for consumption by the lower classes.”
The man looked taken aback for a second, but he recovered fast and chuckled again. “Speaking of Tommy, do you think he’ll be coming around again soon?”
“Fucked if I know.” It was the truth, but it also wasn’t what he’d wanted to hear. Particularly not in those words.
At these events, people were always waiting for their chance to speak to my parents. They wanted to pick my father’s brain about the stock market and investments and my mother’s about getting into the most exclusive circles society had to offer. When they couldn’t get our parents, they settled for their offspring.
Little did they know that Emily knew about as much about how to get into my mother’s clubs as I did about the markets, which was jack shit. People automatically assumed that I was just like my sperm donor, especially since I was at Edgewater now too, but I wasn’t anything like him. It was the same with Emily. She had our mother’s looks, but she was far from the beautiful, educated, exceptional young woman with class my mother wanted her to be.
Well, she was beautiful, educated, and exceptional as far as I was concerned, but she wasn’t the perfect little princess drone that Alison Burke had tried to turn her into. Thank God for that.
Unfortunately, the man who’d sought me out to speak to when he saw he wouldn’t be getting to my father anytime soon wasn’t deterred by my previous comment. As soon as his surprise faded from his expression, he shot me another smile.
“Well, if Tommy’s not available, maybe you can tell me how you’d play the market going into the new year,” he said. “How’s it going at school? I suppose with your studies at the moment as well as hearing all of your father’s advice, it might even be better to ask you right now than him.”
It might’ve been, but he was assuming I paid any attention whatsoever in class. Hell, most of the time, I didn’t even make it to class—never mind paying attention. But, as my father loved pointing out, I was a little shit.
If the guy wanted financial advice, I’d give it to him. Even if it was terrible. It was nothing less than what he deserved for trying to corner me just because he couldn’t get some free time with dear ol’ Dad.
After spewing off some bullshit for a minute, I spotted some of my friends from school coming in with their parents. I wasn’t surprised to see that I wasn’t the only one being punished by being forced to attend this thing. Our parents had managed to wrangle us into the private school of their choice for the first eighteen years of our lives, after all. Getting us to fall in line for one more night was probably child’s play for them.
Tristan gave me a small nod, motioning for me to follow them out to the grounds. Fuck yes.
Abruptly cutting the man off halfway into whatever he was saying, I gave him a curt wave and started backing away.
“I’ve got to go, man,” I said. “Be sure to tell Tommy you spoke to me when you see him.”
There. Proof positive for the old man that I’d mingled with their guests.
Tristan and Drew met me right off the balcony from the living room where the bar had been set up. Drew smirked and flashed me a bottle of vodka he’d obviously swiped and hidden inside his jacket.
“What’s up, Bry?” he said when I got close enough that we wouldn’t be overheard. “I didn’t even know you were home.”
I grunted in response. “It’s not by choice.”
Tristan laughed, already high as fuck judging by his darting, red-rimmed eyes and lopsided smile. “Yeah, man. I spoke to Chase. He told me Tommy fucked up your roadtrip.”
Shrugging like I didn’t care about my failed plans, I pointed toward a more dimly lit corner of the manicured garden around the house. “Please tell me one of you brought a joint.”
“I’ve got you, man,” Drew said, almost tripping over his own feet to follow me when I turned and started walking.
Once we were out of sight, we sparked the joint and I took a deep drag, filling my lungs with bitter smoke before releasing it slowly. We passed it around, and I dropped my head back to look at the sky as I blew out, wondering what Chase was getting up to in California.
Probably not sneaking a smoke. I sighed, taking the joint from Tristan and watching the red cherry light up when I took another drag.
“How’s school going?” Tristan asked, hands in his pockets as he waited for me to finish before passing the joint back to Drew.
A cloud of smoke billowed out of me when I sighed again. “Fuck school. Fuck the profs. Fuck the Dean. Fuck it all.”
Everyone at Edgewater was just as pretentious as my family. I felt like I was suffocating out there, but I was stuck. For at least the next three years, I was trapped in that place.
Drew snickered, nudging Tristan before he pulled the bottle of vodka out of his jacket. “Poor little rich boy. You should’ve stuck with us, man. Our campus is a buffet of never-ending pussy, classes are a fucking joke, and we’re heading up to Colorado next week for the snowboarding season.”
“You’re not going back for classes to start back up again?” I asked, and both of them scoffed and shook their heads.
“We’ll catch up,” Tristan said, shrugging when he met my gaze. “It’s only the first few weeks.”
Jealousy wasn’t an emotion I was overly familiar with, but I recognized it for what it was as it tore through me. Their parents traveled in the same circles as mine, but they were living the life while I was on lockdown.
A door slamming caught our attention, and Tristan swore under his breath when he caught sight of Tommy marching our way. Drew hurried to put out the joint, dropping it and snuffing it out under his shoe before stashing the unopened bottle of vodka behind his leg.
“What the fuck is this?” Tommy growled when he reached us, giving each of us a pointed glare before his pissed off, narrowed gaze landed on mine. “I could smell this shit all the way from inside. There are important people at this party. What the hell do you think you’re doing smoking out here like some fucking loser?”
I rolled my eyes at him. “It’s just a joint, Dad. Don’t I deserve to blow off some steam after finishing my semester? It’s New Year’s. Live a little.”
Clearly not wanting to take my advice about living a little, his nostrils flared and a tic started up in his jaw just before he grabbed the back of my shirt and hauled me away from my friends. Fury was rolling off him in tense waves while I stumbled to keep up.
“Don’t make a fool of this family, Brysen,” he warned in a low voice as he suddenly let go of me and spun around so I could see that same warning flashing in his eyes. “You’re already on thin ice. After the shit semester you had, you have nothing to celebrate. The only reason you haven’t gotten kicked out yet is because of me.”
“Let them kick me out.” I squared off with him. “I didn
’t want to fucking go there.”
With my grades, they never even should’ve let me see the fucking doors. I’d thought I was safe, but Tommy pulled some strings and lo and behold, my acceptance letter came.
He put his hand on my shoulder and to anyone watching, it would’ve looked like we were just having a serious father-son conversation. In reality, his fingers gripped me so hard that I could feel the bruises forming under my jacket.
“First thing in the morning, we’re sitting down and talking about my expectations of you before you return for next semester.” His eyes were hard and cold on mine. “Trust me, Brysen. You don’t want to fuck with me on this. You may not have wanted to go there, but you’re there now and you will make a success of it. You’re a Burke, and it’s time you started acting like one.”
Chapter 3
RUBY
Just like every other morning, I was up bright and early on the first day of the new year. One of the advantages about not having gone out partying was that I woke up clearheaded, not hungover, and excited for what lay ahead instead of regretting anything I did last night.
After rolling out of bed and finishing my morning routine, I put on my clothes and got ready for a run. There was no better way to get my heart pumping and my blood flowing than that.
As soon as I got back, I’d help my mom clean up but for now, I was looking forward to the sting of cold air on my face and to listening to the rhythmic pounding of my feet on the sidewalk. I went out every morning, but I still left a note for my parents telling them what route I planned on taking today.
It felt a bit like they’d been smothering me since I’d been back, but I knew it came from a good place. They loved me, and I knew it was safer if they knew where I was heading.
With that done, I shut the front door silently behind me and took off. They’d be up soon anyway, but they deserved to sleep in a little after how hard they’d worked to put on yet another memorable party for the family.
The streets were still quiet at this hour, and I made the most of it by taking the long way around the park to my favorite smoothie shop. Technically, it was only about two miles from my parents’ place, but I’d doubled the distance at least with the route I’d taken to get here.
The tinkling of a small bell rang out when I popped in to grab a protein smoothie. It alerted Mrs. Moss, the owner, to my presence, and she came out the back with a huge smile on her face and a pale pink apron around her neck.
“I should’ve known it was you,” she said when she saw me. “Happy new year, Ruby. I hope it’s a good one.”
“Same to you.” I smiled and reached into my pocket to pull out a bill. After paying, I made small talk with her until my smoothie was ready, then I carried it over to my preferred table at the front of the shop.
It was bathed in a pool of soft morning light, and I relaxed the instant my ass hit the seat. If only I could convince Mrs. Moss to open a shop at Edgewater, my life there would be pretty darn perfect.
As I stuck the thick, biodegradable straw between my lips, I took out my phone and scrolled through the various campus websites and student chat forums. I’d already downloaded all the new course information that had been loaded and soon, I was cruising through some of the more gossipy threads.
Campus gossip wasn’t really my thing, but I liked feeling like I was in the loop. Plus, sometimes study groups were formed on these forums and I was definitely interested in those. As much as I wasn’t a social butterfly, I made an effort to mingle with the people in my program. It helped for certain things to know those who were in the trenches with me.
Since most students were still enjoying the last days of the winter break, there wasn’t much talk about study groups or anything academic just yet. Instead, the chats were filled with recaps of some of the more exciting things that had happened on campus last semester, as well as predictions for the year ahead.
One of the students in the spotlight was one I knew all about but didn’t know personally. Brysen Burke.
It wasn’t a surprise to see people speculating about what he was getting up to for the break and what kind of mayhem he would be causing on campus when he got back. He was a freshman, like me, but he was already infamous among the student population.
His father was some or other big shot businessman and apparently, that meant that Brysen was interesting. People had been curious about him from the start and as the semester had progressed, he’d made a name for himself that had nothing to do with his father’s.
In my opinion, the guy was a menace. He was the exact kind of person I did my best to avoid, and I didn’t really understand people’s obsession with him. He caused more problems than he was worth, as far as I was concerned.
If there was a fight on campus, it was a fair bet he’d have been involved. He was disruptive, a rebel without a cause who seemed to enjoy spending his days causing trouble and thinking he looked cool while doing it.
There were some pictures of him posted along with the speculation. I hadn’t run into him in person just yet—thank God—but I’d seen enough photos to know what he looked like. In the shot at the top of my screen now, he was looking directly at the camera. Or perhaps more accurately, scowling directly at the camera.
Brysen had that rock-’n-roll type bad boy look with messy black hair that hung slightly into his eyes, leather jackets, and faded jeans. He was tall at about six-two, with a lean but fit body that was just unfair considering that he definitely wasn’t a fitness junkie. It was unlikely he’d gotten any actual exercise this decade, yet he had that natural, effortless toned muscle thing going for him.
The eyes that glared at the camera from underneath his thick, pitch-black hair were a bright, poison green. When I thought back to the smoke rising from cauldrons in cartoons I watched when I was a kid, his eyes were that exact color. Which seemed to fit perfectly with what I knew about him. He was poison.
The closest I’d ever come to him in real life had been one afternoon in late October. While I’d been studying on the lawn next to the river before it’d gotten too cold, a brawl had broken out. From what I’d heard later, he’d been the one who’d started it.
It’d been a nasty fight that had ended with several guys in the hospital. Anyone else would’ve had their asses handed to them by the university, but not Brysen. He’d been let off with a warning, and that had been that.
Must be nice to have a rich daddy. That was the only reason the guy was even at Edgewater. Everyone knew Tommy Burke had gotten his son in. The man was a legend at the school and was still plenty involved with it even though he’d graduated years and years ago. While I had no proof, it was the only explanation that made sense under the circumstances and it was the one that’d been circulating since the start of the semester.
People like Brysen Burke didn’t belong at a university like Edgewater. Maybe it made me a snob in my own right, but I really felt like his attendance there was an affront to those of us who’d worked our butts off to get in.
Even Dax was better than Brysen, and there was no love lost between me and my roommate’s boyfriend. While I’d gotten to know him better in the last few months and even I could admire how far he’d come since I’d met him, I still wasn’t convinced he had what it took to make it in a program as competitive as his.
At least Daxton was trying, though. He’d grown by leaps and bounds, thanks in no small part to his involvement with Hadley, but Brysen? They were probably just going to hand him a degree that’d been bought and paid for when he graduated. It was disgusting.
“Ruby?” a familiar voice interrupted my thoughts, and I jerked my head up to see if there was still any possibility of escape before she came closer.
Crap. No such luck.
Abigail Adams, a girl I’d gone to high school with, was advancing on me. Fast. She had a smoothie in one hand and a purse with so many charms on it that they jingled with each step she took in the other.
A radiant smile spread across her face when she lowe
red herself—uninvited—into the chair across from mine. “Ruby Sprite. I can’t believe it. Didn’t you go off to Harvard or somewhere like that? What are you doing home?”
“Edgewater, and it’s winter break,” I said tightly, but resigned myself to having a conversation with her. She was just one of those people you couldn’t get away from once she decided she wanted to talk to you. “How are you, Abigail? How’s Pierce?”
“He’s perfect.” Her smile got even brighter. Setting down her smoothie, she thrust her left hand out to flash a giant engagement ring at me. “We’re getting married in the spring. Can you believe it? It’s like a fairy tale. High school sweethearts who will be together forever.”
“Wow.” I stared at the rock on her finger, blinking back my surprise over the size of the thing. I had no idea how two kids fresh out of high school could’ve afforded it, but I guessed it had nothing to do with me. “Congratulations to both of you.”
Marriage at such a young age was bogus, but I wasn’t about to rain on her parade. If I even tried, she’d probably just accuse me of having a crush on her fiancé. She was like that.
Searching for a way to escape now that she’d gotten what she’d probably wanted by showing off her bling, I cleared my throat. “I’m really happy for you, but I should get going.”
“Nonsense.” She giggled and shook her head at me. “I only just sat down. Tell me about you. Edgewater, huh? There must be plenty of eligible men there. Have you met anyone?”
Have I met anyone? That’s what she wants to know about the place? “Nope. I’m just focusing on my studies for now.”
She tutted her tongue and shot me a sympathetic look for some reason. “You should get on it, Ruby. The best ones get snapped up fast. Look at me and Pierce. I saw him for the catch he was when he was only fifteen years old. You don’t want to get stuck with what gets left behind.”
My brows rose, but I decided against arguing with her. A relationship definitely wasn’t a priority for me right now, and it shouldn’t have been to her either. At least Hadley and Daxton both put school first, which was great. The way things should be at our age.
