by Ruby Scott
I flashed the hundred and fifty dollar Pennsylvania I.D. at them, and Darren laughed. He ruffled my hair, completely destroying any semblance of the sexy curls I had been aiming for, but I found that I didn’t mind. Maybe messy would look better. “I like you,” he said. “You’re a lot more fun than any of these old farts.”
“Woah, boy,” another, the pierced-and-tattooed senior Anita said. I looked over at her, and then at the arm that was around her waist. That tattoo of the Chinese dragon was chillingly familiar. As I followed the arm to the owner, I took in a deep breath and ducked out of Darren’s arm.
Peter grinned at me. I hadn’t noticed before, but he had ditched the leather and death metal band t-shirts. He wore a black button-up shirt that had pearl buttons and was accentuated with a red bowtie. His trousers were freshly pressed and looked sharp enough to cut someone when they got too close. I frowned at him.
“What the hell are you doing here?” I asked.
Cat looked back at me in surprise, and then when she glanced at Peter, understanding flashed across her face. “We were talking about the same guy,” she said, almost thoughtfully as we began walking.
“Sights to see, girls to screw,” Peter said offhandedly.
I turned my face away from him and caught up to Cat. “I didn’t know that he’d be here or I would have never agreed to this,” I hissed at her. Cat looked over at me, frowning.
“I didn’t know that he was the same Peter. He’s certainly changed from the last time you saw him.”
Was it possible that she was right? Peter had pretended before. After his first arrest for breaking and entering, he’d pretended to stop everything. He’d make up elaborate study date lies and call the school to mark himself absent so that neither parent would receive any calls about him being gone from all of his classes multiple times a week. He’d even managed to bring his grades back up for the time being though I didn’t know how. We had all thought that he was going back to being normal and that we could take a breath and get the break we deserved.
But it had all fallen apart when I’d found him selling drugs on campus. It hadn’t been anything too lethal, just Vicodin, but the simple fact that he was doing such a thing would have everyone freaking out. He’d shut me up by threatening to tell Mom that he’d seen me kissing Robert Landon, resident bookish nerd. At the time, the thought had completely mortified me, so I’d kept silent. I realized now that it wouldn’t have made a bit of difference if he told Mom or not, because she didn’t care, not anymore.
I shook my head. Peter couldn’t have changed. It was impossible. He loved trouble too much and the thrill that the adrenaline that came with it brought. I completely understood that, now, but I always stuck to things that were legal. Well, mostly legal. But, I reminded myself quickly, there’s a world of difference between breaking into a house and lying about your age.
We walked down the street and I hardly looked at any of the storefronts as we passed; I was so deeply engrossed in my own thoughts. I almost ran into Cat as we stopped at the line, and I blinked myself back into the present time.
The air was chilly enough that I was glad I’d brought my jacket, even if it did disturb the complete look of my outfit and the line was long enough that I was debating the wisdom of my choice of shoes. The club itself was in a low, black building with blacked-out windows that looked plain except for the one wall that was completely covered in graffiti art. A neon sign had an abstract figure of a girl leaned back in rapturous song, violin clenched tight between her chin and shoulder. Her hair spiraled back and became the word virtuosity. I glanced over at Cat. It looked fair enough, but like nothing special. I’d been to clubs all over the different states and I knew a good club when I saw one. This one wasn’t peaking my interest. Of course, it could have been partially due to the burning black hole of Peter the misery-bringer that was standing directly behind me and a bit to my left. I refused to glance back at him, even when I heard him laugh softly or when my name was mentioned in the group. Even when he said my name, I kept my gaze trained firmly on a man’s broad pair of shoulders in front of me.
I couldn’t help but think that no matter what kind of demon Peter was, he was a damn good-looking one. In his elegant attire, he looked like someone who made a lot of money just by sitting there; like a famous singer or actor. Probably the latter; he was too beautiful to be anything but. Too bad he couldn’t act unless he was lying about something.
The line moved forward, and I shuffled my feet forward. A touch on my shoulder caused me to look back. Peter leaned towards me and I flinched away from him. “How are you going to get in?”
“Fake I.D?” I asked. “Duh.” I waved it in front of his face. He snatched it from my fingers and I made a quick grab for it, straining my hands upwards. He held it out of reach easily. Even with my extra four inches, Peter still managed to tower over me quite annoyingly. I put my hands on my hips. “Give it back.”
“I will not,” he said, reading it over. “This is an ugly picture of you, April.”
“Give it.” I held out my hand and narrowed my eyes at him. He looked up at me, and though his lips were only slightly tilted up, I could just see his eyes laughing. I grimaced and wiggled my fingers. “Now.”
“Nope.”
I sighed and crossed my arms, tapping my fingers along my biceps while I waited for him to get over his glee at stealing my I.D. from me. “Are you going to give it back?” I prodded.
“Maybe,” he said.
God, he was so infuriating. We were almost at the door and I was beginning to panic. What if I didn’t have my I.D.? Would he tell the bouncer that I wasn’t of age yet? None of us technically were, but out of all of us—save maybe Cat—I looked the youngest with my boyish body and lack of a decent rack.
Just when the bouncer was about two feet away and I was truly starting to panic, Peter reached out and poked my nose with my license before shoving it into my palm and taking out his own. I let out a huff of a breath that let him know that I was incredibly irritated with him. I turned to see Anita watching us.
“You two fight like an old married couple,” she observed. I scowled.
“Do we now?” I asked, jabbing Peter in the arm. Hard muscle didn’t yield around my finger, and I drew back with a frown. Had he been lifting weights?
Before I could contemplate why that made my lower stomach warm suddenly, the bouncer was asking me for my I.D. Distractedly, I handed it to him, too concentrated on what was wrong with me to even be truly worried that my I.D. might look fake. I passed inside with no trouble, however, and Cat pulled me alongside her as people streamed by chattering and laughing, buzzing with only the type of energy that comes from a club.
“What’s with you two?” she asked, jerking her head towards Peter.
“We don’t like each other,” I said.
“Oh, he likes you plenty,” Cat said, grinning a bit. “He’s just one of the guys that never grew out of the teasing stage of flirting.”
“Flirting?” I asked, half horrified and half intrigued. Nope, not intrigued. “You do know we’re step-siblings, right?”
She grinned at me again. “Key word in that sentence: step. You aren’t related by blood, so I don’t see the big issue here.” I gaped at her, unable to think of any good words to say back. Before I could fully comprehend and process everything, she was pulling me away and towards the buzzing commotion that was the dance floor.
Now that we were inside, I could see why she liked it. The club was chic and polished, but retro and funky at the same time. The dance floor was sunk into the ground a few steps, and the tables were separated by the walking space by another set of three or four steps. It was private and just the kind of place that would make someone who wasn’t used to coming to clubs feel welcome. Good thing I was plenty used to it by now.
We all chose a table and sat around it, talking for several minutes before a waiter came by. I was sandwiched between Cat and Peter—how the hell had this happened?—and consta
ntly tried to keep my knee from brushing his. As I sipped my strawberry daiquiri, I attempted to discern what about Peter was different. His hair was the same messily I-just-had-sex sort of look and he still had the same face. Even his expressions were the same, as he looked over at me and poked me in my ribs when I least expected it just to hear the squeak that was wrenched out of me each and every time.
Nothing appeared to be different about him, except that he talked about school instead of what kind of drug he’d gotten or which house he’d stolen from last night. He sounded polished, nearly professional, and it made me wonder what exactly had happened to him, and why I was feeling this tingling feeling as his leg brushed against mine.
When Cat suggested that we go to dance, I gladly accepted, nearly leaping out of my seat the instant she was up. I needed to get away from Peter, away from his smile—the only thing that I could find different about his expressions—so that I could clear my head and remind myself of all of the terrible things he had done to me and my family.
The music was slow and sensuous, moving my body in fluid ways. I lost myself in it, so much so that I hardly noticed when a pair of hands slipped around my hips.
As they moved forward, skating along the sequined front of my skirt, I startled from my trance and jerked myself away. I looked back—it was no one that I knew; some random drunk guy who was looking to find someone easy. Well, I wasn’t easy. I pulled my hips from his grip and spun around to face him.
“Excuse you,” I spat, and attempted to look around for Cat. Where had she gone off to? I had seen her to my left the last time I’d closed my eyes, but now there wasn’t a blond in sight.
The man didn’t leave. He tried to reach around my waist again, and I put my hand out against his chest, keeping him at that distance. “Dance with me?” he asked, and I could smell the reek of whiskey from my position a few feet away.
That simple statement brought it all back. That’s what he had said at the first dance. The nameless, faceless man who had tried to back me into a corner and molest me, going as far as yanking my shirt down and hiking my skirt up around my waist. That was before I had truly known how to be bad, and it had scared me shitless. Though Cassie had saved me, backhanding the man with a vigor I hadn’t seen since, I hadn’t been able to get over it.
When I had gone to Peter to ask for a ride home, shaking and in tears, he had refused, grinding himself against some girl whose name he probably didn’t know and saying that he was having too much fun. Cassie had been too drunk to drive, and I didn’t trust myself at the wheel, though I’d only had a beer and margarita. I’d had to call Mom and ask her to come get me.
That had been the first time she’d looked at me with that disappointed look that she always gave Peter when he was still around to receive it. That was also the first time I realized that I couldn’t rely on Peter for anything. In my one moment of need and desperation, he’d left me with nothing. He’d left me to resorting to call the very person who would ground me and put me on dishes duty for six weeks.
He hadn’t even cared that I had almost gotten raped against the wall of some club downtown. I hated him for every single day because of that.
The man was still there as I blinked away the memories, my heart pounding wildly. I felt a kind of panic I hadn’t felt in years start to build in my chest. No, no, no. This wasn’t happening again. It couldn’t be happening again. What kind of cruel fate would shove this very same situation into my hands the moment I was with Peter again?
“I—I don’t think so,” I managed to stammer out, attempting to look over the heads of all of the people to find Cat. Damn her for being so short.
“You don’t sound so sure.” He resisted my hand, and it collapsed like an easel underneath the weight. Why hadn’t I taken Cassie up on going to self-defense training with her?
“I’m quite sure,” I said, a bit more firmly, though the fear was only making me feel weaker. My knees began to wobble, and my breath came in short pants. “Go away?” It was more of a question than anything else, and I hated myself for this weakness.
This wasn’t who I was anymore, was it? I’d toughened myself up just so that this kind of thing wouldn’t happen again. “Just one dance?” the man pleaded. His blue eyes looked almost dead in this strange light.
“No,” I said. “No.”
Still, he pressed forward. His arms encircled my hips once again, cupping my ass. I ground my teeth and considered slamming his foot with my heel. But that would only bring attention from the bouncers, who were probably already suspicious of our ages. His lips found my neck, and I felt dirty as his tongue slid up my shoulder to where my hair began. I needed to wash every inch of my body.
I fisted my hand against his chest and shoved him away once more. “You’re drunk,” I said, and my voice sounded two octaves too high. “I don’t want this and neither do you.” It sounded pathetic, even to my ears. Stupid, stupid, stupid, my mind chanted at me. Why couldn’t I gather my wits and make up some excuse that would get me out of here?
He didn’t let me go, only gripped my ass tighter, his fingers digging painfully into the soft flesh. I jerked at the sudden change in pressure, and my heart, which hadn’t calmed down in the least, picked up pace again. “Let me the fuck go,” I growled, pushing at his chest again. I was done being nice. I just needed to get away.
Just when he opened his mouth to say something else, I felt another pair of hands on my shoulders. “Get your hands off of my girlfriend.”
Peter? Was that really Peter behind me? I could feel the slight electrical tingle as his fingers brushed against my clammy, sweaty skin, thumbs resting on my shoulder blades.
The guy finally backed up. “My bad,” he mumbled, bumbling through the crowd once more. I stood there for several moments, still feeling the phantom of his digging fingers, and then the shaking began. I tried to move away from Peter, tried to turn around, but I couldn’t even lift a finger, even if I had wanted to. All I could do was sit there and shake like a leaf in the wind.
Peter must have felt the tremors running through me because he took his hands off of my shoulders and slid them around my waist, pulling me so that I was leaning against him. He didn’t move, as everyone else around us did, simply stood there with his arms pressed around me, hot and reassuring.
I closed my eyes, pretending for a moment that I trusted him. I needed something or someone to help me stave off this sudden invasion that had completely toppled my world and my sense of safety. Even if it was my worst enemy-who-may-have-changed.
When I could move again, I stepped away from the comfort of peter’s arms. I turned around, expecting to find him grinning at my plight, but his face was dark and unreadable amid the strobes and flashing lights.
“Are you okay?” he had to nearly shout over the sound of the deep bass, but I read his lips perfectly. Never once in his life had Peter Cavanaugh asked me if I was alright. He had always been too much of a self-centered bastard for that.
“No.” My lips formed the words before I gave them permission. Peter reached out and touched my cheek. I flinched away, wondering what he was doing, and when he drew back, I saw the shine of a tear trailing down his finger. Shit, I was crying.
“Let’s get you home,” he murmured, drawing me close once again. I didn’t question him, didn’t even think of resisting as he drew me to the entrance of the club. He had his arm snug around me, keeping me from falling or wandering off, though it probably would have been more of the former than the latter.
The walk home was completely silent, and not once did he shift or change his position around me. It must have been pretty uncomfortable with my head hitting the underside of his arm with every step that he took, but he made no movement to change his grip.
When we got to my dorm, he took the keys from my shaking fingers and opened the door for me, pushing me inside.
I sat down on my bed and watched him go to the bathroom to find a washcloth. He wet it under the sink and wrung it out. The so
und of water was the only sound besides the flutter of my heartbeat in my ears. It was a painful silence that begged to be broken. I couldn’t find the words at first. I was still trying to figure out what elaborate scheme Peter was planning. He wouldn’t do this out of the kindness of his heart; that was for certain. Peter didn’t have a kind heart.
I finally gave up. “Why are you doing this?” I asked in a low tone.
Peter brought the washcloth over to me and pressed it to my forehead. The cool water was blissful against my burning skin. He shrugged. “Would you believe me if I said that I wanted to?”
“No, you don’t do things like this.”
“People change, April. They grow and go in different directions.” He swiped the cloth down the bridge of my nose. “If you can believe that.” There it was, a bit of the old humor that he so loved directing towards me at every possible moment.
“But why now? Why this?” I asked. “The last time I needed your help in a situation like that, you told me to fuck off and mind my own business so that you could keep dancing with that stupid girl.” I couldn’t help the flare of anger that sprung up in my words.
“Did you not just hear what I said?” he asked, drawing back and sitting down on his haunches. I didn’t break his gaze as he lowered himself, looking into the beautiful turquoise depths for some sort of deceit. I found no trace; only a deep, lingering sadness. “I regret what I did to you that night, and this is a second chance for me to redeem myself.”
“Redeem yourself?” I asked, clenching my fists in my lap. “You want to redeem yourself? Try taking away the last nine years of torture you have put me through. Or better yet—”
I never got to finish. He was on me in a flash, lips pressed against mine; hot, eager.
Holy mother of all that is good, I thought distractedly as he kissed me. Damn, he was amazing at this. His hands slid over my shoulders, pushing me down into the mattress. I felt the rough fabric of my quilt underneath my bare back a strange but not unpleasant sensation.
