SAINT (Boston Underworld Book 4)

by A. Zavarelli

  Or anything other than the truth.

  He hates me. Has always hated me. But he hid it well. The only thing I could never understand is why.

  My voice is scratchy, my head still fuzzy, but I’m not that girl anymore, and he needs to know that.

  “I’m surprised the FBI let you in,” I tell him. “Given your father’s giant clusterfuck of a Ponzi scheme. I suppose that’s the reason for the shiny new name, huh? I can only imagine how well that went over back home.”

  His lips pucker and I’ve left a bad taste in his mouth, and it feels good. So, I go on. Because I never could fall in line.

  “I bet you haven’t been able to show your face on the Upper East Side again. Tragic, really. That you’ve had to resort to a blue-collar job. I know it was always your dream to take over your father’s legacy. But I guess prison isn’t quite as glamorous as fortune 500.”

  His vicious reaction shouldn’t come as a surprise to me, but some things never change. He backhands me twice and then seizes me by the throat, choking the air from me as he leans down into my face.

  “You were the one who couldn’t show your face again,” he snarls. “My perfect little whore girlfriend. The cum dumpster for Marquardt Prep’s finest. Did you like having those cocks inside of you, princess? Because I’m sure it’d be no trouble to get the gang together again. For old times’ sake.”

  I claw at his fingers until he shoves me away in disgust.

  He knocks back the rest of his scotch while I catch my breath and imagine plunging my knife between his eyes. There’s no question in my mind now.

  I was right all along.

  He isn’t sorry. None of them are sorry and they are all assholes and they all need to die.

  “I’ve been watching you for a while now, Ten,” he tells me once he’s calmed down. “Watching the way you operate.”

  I don’t want to believe him. Because that would mean that I’ve been remiss in my number one priority. Looking out for predators.

  And this man is the worst kind of predator.

  The same boy who led me to my doom that night. I was the fool who walked hand in hand with him.

  The years haven’t changed him. He’s not playing by bureau rules, FBI agent or not. And I don’t have to be a psychic to know this is bad. Really bad.

  He retrieves a file from the table and yanks out a photo, dangling it between his fingers. It’s me. Last week. Following Storm and my target into the hotel room where she tortured and tattooed him.

  I swallow, but the lump in my throat doesn’t budge.

  “I don’t suppose I need to tell you how many felonies you committed that night,” he says. “Do I?”

  There is no negotiating with terrorists. But he leaves me little choice at this point.

  “What do you want?”

  “That man was the son of a senator,” he answers. “Did you know that?”

  I didn’t know that.

  Fucking hell.

  “You’re an intelligent girl, Ten. Or do you really prefer Scarlett now? It suits you. It suits the street whore you’ve become.”

  He pauses, and smirks, and waits for a reaction. But fuck him and his dirty file and I need to get the hell out of this room. He grabs another piece of paper from the file and scans it with his eyes, reading off the information as he goes.

  “The media would have a field day with this one. Given your family’s name, your affluent background and social status. The best prep school that mommy and daddy could buy. The girl on the fast track to Harvard, by all accounts. An unblemished academic record- until your disappearance. Your extracurricular activities make Mother Teresa look like a slacker. So, you can just imagine how many circulars would love to splash that headline across their front pages. Missing Deb turning tricks in Boston’s seedy underground. They’d probably call you an addict, for dramatic effect. Speculate on your family and your childhood and tear your world apart.”

  He smiles, and his teeth are so white it’s creepy. Probably at least twenty grand in that mouth alone.

  “What do you want?” I repeat.

  He sighs and discards the paper beside him, leaning back to examine me.

  “I’ll tell you what I don’t want, Ten. I really don’t want to tell Senator Winslowe that you’re the girl he has numerous PI’s sniffing around for right now. Because we both know what would happen then. Between him and the Praetorians … I’m honestly not sure which is worse.”

  My mouth is dry and my heart’s beating too fast, and I know now, the direction he is heading with all of this.

  “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,” he quotes Robert Frost, because he’s a fucking asshole and he knows I used to like that poem and he wants to ruin it for me like he ruined everything else.

  “Which one will you take, Scarlett?”

  “Tell me what my options are.”

  There is victory in his eyes and his smile, but he hasn’t won yet.

  “Ethan, Trip, Quinn, and Duke. You remember them, right?”

  “How could I ever forget them?”

  There is the tiniest of ticks in his jaw, and it’s not quite regret, but something else.

  Jealousy?

  “I’m sure they want the past to stay buried just as much as you do,” he tells me. “Now that they are well and truly successful members of society. So, here’s the deal. You walk out on me today, and each of them, along with Senator Winslowe gets your name and address hand delivered by the end of the day. Should you be lucky enough to survive the week, I take you in on the numerous felonies the DA will happily indict you with based on my investigation into your activities.”

  There are no words left in my mouth or in my head. Only questions. A frantic search for answers. But there is no time for Q&A because he’s not done yet.

  “Option two. I think you’re going to like option two better, Scarlett. See in this one… you get to live.”

  “And let me guess what you get out of it,” I scoff.

  Alexander’s jaw ticks again. His eyes are bottomless pits and he is vacant. There is nothing inside of him but darkness and I want to scream at him because he infected me with it too.

  “You destroyed me,” he says. “You were mine, Scarlett. MINE.”

  “Is that supposed to be a joke?” I ask. “Because you didn’t see it that way when you let all of your buddies have a go at me.”

  He shrugs it off, and he’s back to casual again. Unruffled.

  “Give me a fucking break,” he says. “You knew there were sacrifices to be made. I only did what needed to be done. And it worked. I got into the Praetorians and you got into Birds of a Feather. And had you stayed the fucking course like you were supposed to, you’d be a Harvard grad by now with a belly full of my first child. Instead, you’re nothing more than a common street whore.”

  He gets up and paces as he rants, and he’s even more fucking deluded than I ever could have imagined.

  “Surely you don’t think I’m still going to have a life with you.”

  He pauses, a slick smile spreading across his lips.

  “What I think,” he answers. “Is that you’re going to do whatever I tell you to. Because what other option do you have?”

  There is no argument to be had. He’s a federal fucking agent. Which I don’t doubt for a second was not a strategic move on his part. He’s been planning this for years. A decade, even. And there is nothing I can do right now but get out of here and figure out my options.

  “How did you know?” I ask.

  He’s quiet for a moment, thoughtful. Unsure how much he wants to reveal. But I need to understand his motives before I can plan a counterattack.

  “I went back,” he says. “A few days later. I couldn’t…”

  His voice is softer now, and for a second he almost seems human again.

  “I couldn’t think of you lying there like that. In that pile of leaves and dirt while the animals picked over you.”

  “Then I guess you shouldn’t have left me t
here.”

  The mask falls back over his face and his eyes are blank when they meet mine again. “The boys and I agreed, for our own protection, that you needed to be buried. But you weren’t there.”

  I grind my toes into the carpet to calm my nerves. If they knew I was alive, then there’s a good chance they’ve been preparing for my return.

  “I couldn’t tell them,” Alexander answers my unspoken thought. “I wanted to keep it to myself. Just the idea that you were out there somewhere… I liked that. So, I told them that I buried you. And nobody would ever find you again.”

  “Except for you,” I whisper.

  “Except for me,” he agrees.

  “Tell me what you want.”

  “Despite what I said earlier, I do want you to come out of hiding. To reveal to the world that Tenly Albright is not dead, but alive and well. And you will do it on my arm. As my fiancé. We’ll hire a publicist to spin the story. We will make all of this go away.”

  He makes a gesture with his arm as if to encompass the entire city of Boston. And it all makes sense now. His insane request. This pathetic attempt at a reunion. His stalking me and his blackmail and the dying ember of hope in his eyes.

  He isn’t here to redeem himself.

  He thinks I am his redemption.

  “You want back in,” I murmur.

  And then I laugh. I laugh too hard because it’s so fucking pathetic, and I can’t help myself and he’s angry and I really need to stop… but what the actual fuck?

  “You think this will win them back over,” I say. “Because of what your father did. You are an outcast. You’ve been an outcast for all these years and you are still trying to worm your way back in?”

  “Fuck you,” he spits. “You have no idea what happened because you couldn’t hack that world. You ran off and fucked me up in the head and abandoned everyone who ever cared about you.”

  “And now you want to ride my coattails on the way back in. Using the Albright name and the publicity to polish your shiny new reputation.”

  He lunges at me again, and it’s not pretty, his rage. He yanks my hair and shoves my head back and squeezes my face in his hand. And I can see it now. That he would crush me if he could. If he wasn’t planning to use my name as his way back in, he would do it right this time.

  I would stay dead.

  “I will tell you how it’s going to be, you little bitch. You’re going to earn this small mercy from me, and you’re going to do it on your hands and knees. You will be my wife, or you will die. Those are your only options.”

  He waits for me to respond. Expecting me to argue, probably. When I don’t say anything, he shakes me.

  “Do you fucking understand me?”

  “I understand you just fine,” I snap at him.

  He closes his eyes and rubs his nose in my hair, inhaling me. My stomach roils because he’s hard and his trousers are right there, and I know he has no intention of leaving here unsatisfied. This is a man who gets off on violence. A man in a position of power. A dangerous combination.

  “Just between you and me, Ten,” he lowers his voice. “You altered me in a way I can’t ever get back. Ever since that night, it’s all I can think about. Your face in the dirt, the sounds of all those cocks inside of you. I get off on fucking dirty, filthy whores. And it’s always your face I see when I defile them.”

  “Fuck off.”

  I spit in his face, and he smashes his palm into the bridge of my nose. The pain is instant, and the blood is a fountain down my face and over my lips.

  My body is still sluggish, flopping around like a limp doll when he lifts me up by the hair and slams me into the wall. His hands move over my dress, raising it up over my hips and grinding himself against me while he squeezes the flesh of my ass in his hand.

  “You stupid fucking cunt,” he growls. “You have no idea who you’re messing with. Do you honestly think anyone would ever believe a word you have to say against me? You, the worthless street whore, and me… the upstanding agent. I could fuck you bloody and they wouldn’t even blink twice at your sob story. So, it would do you well to remember that from this point forward. When I say jump, you ask how high. When I tell you to get on your knees and suck my cock, you’ll give me the best fucking blowjob I’ve ever had in my life.”

  He grips my hair at the nape of my neck and claws his fingers down my throat.

  “Are we understood?”

  I say nothing, so he slams my face into the wall. Everything is black and I’m on the verge of passing out and I have no choice because I can’t allow that to happen again.

  “Yes,” I tell him. “I understand.”

  He lets me go, and I crumple to the floor. His breathing is harsh, and his eyes are excited. Alive.

  His zipper comes down and my stomach roils.

  He grabs my hair again and tries to pull me up onto my knees. When my knees don’t cooperate, he kicks me in the calf to make sure that they do.

  And then he’s got his cock out, rubbing it in my face. It’s happening all over again, and I want to kill him but I’m too weak and when I try to hurt him he hits me again.

  There is no hesitation. He just keeps coming at me. And he gets off on my pain and now I know he is the monster that fucked up Kylie.

  I need to get away from him.

  But I’m dizzy and weak and I can barely form a coherent thought. When he squeezes my jaw and tries to shove himself in my mouth, acid lurches up my throat. And my body supplies its own defense mechanism. By vomiting all over him.

  There’s a sound of utter revulsion followed by a harsh shove.

  “God, you’re fucking disgusting.”

  And yet all the while, he’s stroking himself in his palm. Getting off on the filth of it all. The revulsion he feels when he looks down at me.

  It isn’t long before he tips his head back and lets out a groan, spurting his come all over my dress.

  “Filthy whore.” He zips himself back up and straightens out his clothing. “Don’t think for a second those tricks are going to work for you. Next time, I’ll fuck you face down in your own vomit.”

  He moves towards the door, only pausing to give me one last instruction.

  “You have a week to make your decision,” he says. “Death or marriage.”

  Six

  Scarlett

  Hell is empty and all the devils are here- Shakespeare

  “Tonight’s initiation night,” Hanna whispers from the other end of the line.

  “How do you know?” I feign ignorance.

  “I got a note in my locker after school. It said I have to meet outside campus just after midnight.”

  “Cool,” I tell her. “I hope you get in.”

  “You’re going to get a note too,” she insists. “There’s no way with your family’s alumni that you wouldn’t.”

  I don’t tell her that I already got a note, and I have no desire to follow up on it.

  “I wouldn’t go anyway,” I say. “The whole thing is so archaic.”

  “Are you kidding?” Hanna hisses as if it’s the worst thing I could ever say. “Ten, you HAVE to go. It’s complete social suicide if you don’t. Besides, what would your mother say if she knew?”

  My eyes dart across the kitchen to the woman in question and I know exactly what my mother would say. She’d blow a gasket if she knew I didn’t go.

  Every woman in my family for the last three generations has been a member of Birds of a Feather. Being a Birdie is an Albright birthright, my mother says. An honor and a tradition that I need to take seriously.

  I wish I cared as much as her, but it seems so stupid. It’s not like these ‘secret’ societies are even secret anymore. Everyone knows who’s in them and who runs the school. And regardless if I’m a Birdie or not, my social status is not going to change at Marquardt Prep. I’m a nobody, and that’s exactly how I prefer it.

  “Look,” Hanna says, and she’s irritated and it makes me feel guilty that I’m not like her. That I’m
not like any of them. “Just think about your college applications. You want Harvard, right? Well guess what, Ten, so do a million other people. If you want your application to have any chance of not being buried at the bottom of the pile, then you need these extracurriculars. And besides, Alexander is being initiated tonight too. You know that Praetorians can only date Birdies.”

  My chest hurts at the thought of Alexander dumping me. I didn’t always like him, especially when my mother was hell bent on pushing us together, but over the last year, I’ve really warmed up to him.

  When he’s not around his friends, he can actually be kind of sweet.

  “Hellooooo?” Hanna snaps. “Are you even listening to me?”

  “I’ll think about it,” I tell her.

  “Well if you don’t,” she growls, “then you can really kiss Alexander goodbye. He won’t ever forgive you for this.”

  She slams the phone shut and I’m left with a dial tone as my mother examines me. Her eyes are always moving over me as though she’s cataloging ways for me to improve. And then she’ll bring them up, one by one, at the nightly family dinners.

  “Everything okay at school?” she asks.

  “Everything’s fine,” I tell her.

  She’s quiet for a moment, glancing over her shoulder to make sure nobody else is around to hear her next question.

  “How are your symptoms?”

  “They aren’t symptoms, mother,” I sigh. “They are personality traits.”

  “Yes, well… regardless of what you’d like to call them, I need to know you’re still working on them. That you’re doing what you promised.”

  “I am,” I say. “I’m doing everything you want.”

  “Good,” she answers. “That’s good, Tenly.”

  The kitchen is quiet, and the conversation is effectively over when she leaves without another word.

  * * *

  Later that night, I sneak out of the house and wait at the end of the block like I’ve been instructed to do.