by S. Massery
I could’ve been an actor in another life.
Noah glowers at me, and the girl gasps.
Blackmail. I don’t have to spell it out for him: he could go to jail for this. Lose more than just this cushy job.
I’d take everything from him.
“I’ll be in touch.” I stride out the door and cross the street.
My truck is right where I left it this morning, parked inconspicuously two blocks down.
My face is already throbbing. I slide into the driver’s seat and pat the steering wheel. I flip the visor and examine my jaw.
Well, then. It’s already a mottled blue, getting angrier by the second. I prod the inside of my cheek with my tongue, finding where my teeth sliced the skin open.
Seeing him through the window the other night, I had assumed most of the muscle he’d packed on in high school had been lost. I’ll cheerfully admit that I was wrong.
Oh, this is going to be a brilliant shiner.
The truck roars to life, and I grin.
It’s finally happening. Six months of planning, and the scales are tipping back in my direction. It wasn’t just Riley—it was her whole goddamn family. They’re all going to pay, one at a time. They’re all going to be under my thumb by the time I’m done with them.
One down, three to go.
5
Riley
I hover by the door. Noah should be home soon—his shift at the tattoo parlor was supposed to end twenty minutes ago.
Dad is working late again.
Mom is locked in her room.
Finally, it swings open, and I jump forward.
Noah throws his hands up, yelling.
I scream at the sudden noise, my heart rate skyrocketing.
“What are you doing?” he hollers.
“I was waiting for you.” I press my hand over my chest and try to catch my breath. “Why are you so jumpy?”
“Because you’re lurking.” He tosses his keys on the mail table and kicks off his shoes. “Why were you waiting?”
I glance outside. I’ve been working up the courage to go search for my water bottle, but I’ve only made it so far as putting on running gear. My left shoe has a spot of blood on it that I haven’t been able to scrub out, and my knees… I could say I rubbed them with a cheese grater and it would be believable.
Noah gestures to the stairs.
He’s got a point—a wordless, silent point.
In the old days, a scream would’ve brought Mom running.
This house creaks in the wind, but right now it’s deathly silent.
“Is she okay?” he asks me.
“I’m sure she’s fine. I need your help.”
His eyebrow tics.
“I had a weird sort of accidental thing happen on the trail to the state park this morning,” I blurt out. “And I lost my water bottle. Will you come with me to look for it?”
His attention focuses back on me. “Accidental thing?”
When he spots the scrapes, he lets out a hiss of breath.
“I know, I know,” I say. “It’s fine. I’m fine. Just freaked out, and you used to like running.”
What I don’t add is that he never much liked running with me. My pace was always too slow for him—but I was a cross-country runner, working on marathon speeds, while he enjoyed the quicker sprints. A mile or two as fast as he could go.
I just wanted something sustainable.
He grimaces, but the longer I stare at him, the more I feel it: he’s going to crack.
He.
He already cracked four months ago. But this new wall he’s put up? The ice he’s managed to form around his heart?
Yeah, that’s thawing.
“Fine,” he says, sighing. “Give me a minute to change.”
I clap.
He comes back downstairs in shorts and an old t-shirt. It used to be fitted. I remember it from his senior year, because one of his girlfriends almost didn’t give it back.
It hangs on him now.
“Ready?” He snaps his fingers in front of my face. “How far is this, exactly?”
I wink. “You should’ve asked that before agreeing.”
It’s easier to take the first few steps out of the house with Noah behind me. The back of my neck prickles, but I shove the sensation away. Now I’m being paranoid.
We get to the end of the street, then pick up a slow jog. I don’t want to kill my brother—especially when he finds out that it’s about a five-mile round trip.
“Stop,” he calls, just two minutes later.
I circle back. He’s doubled over, his elbows on his thighs.
“I can’t do this,” he says. “If you want me to go, we’re driving.”
“Probably should’ve done that in the first place,” I murmur.
We walk back to the house, and he nudges me.
“I have something bad to tell you,” he says.
I glance at him. Immediately, a million thoughts race through my head. He’s had a rough few years, but he hasn’t been especially forthcoming about it. Maybe he’s going to admit—
“Eli’s back.”
My whole world screeches to a halt.
Here I was, relieved that Rose Hill felt lighter without Eli Black in it, and he’s been back? What happened to college? What happened to all our talks about escaping this damn town?
It doesn’t matter.
I throw back my shoulders and refuse to let the surprise show on my face. “I don’t know what you want me to do with that.”
He grimaces. “It’s a warning. Be careful, okay?”
My past with Eli is complicated. He was my bully, my friend, my love. He shattered my heart, and I wanted to make sure that bridge could never be crossed again. I burned it to the fucking ground.
“Why are you warning me?”
He’s never liked Eli—it probably has to do with the bully part of the equation—and he’s never had a problem showing that disdain.
“And,” I grab his arm, “how do you even know?”
He scowls. “Because he’s an asshole and let me know he was back. In typical Eli fashion.”
Uh-oh.
“Are you okay?” We round the corner back onto our street. “I mean, he didn’t do anything…”
“He’s just a provoking little shit,” he says under his breath. “I handled it.”
For some reason, that statement worries me more than the fact that my ex-boyfriend is back in town. After all, I managed to avoid him when we were in the same school, even with our best friends dating. Everyone adapted.
Though, that was before.
I don’t know what our after looks like. I avoided him for a year, but it’s only been six months since I put the final nail in our coffin, and even then, he didn’t know until it was too late.
“Riley,” Noah says.
His voice drags me out of my thoughts, and we both grind to a halt on the sidewalk in front of our house.
Noah glances around, and I approach the porch slowly. My eyes are playing tricks on me. They must be.
Yet the closer I get, the more my stomach twists.
My black water bottle sits on the top step. The watercolor Chicago skyline sticker faces us.
I cringe and spin, ready to book it, and Noah catches me with both hands on my arms.
“You said you lost that, right? That’s what we were going to find?”
I meet his gaze. “I dropped it when I fell.”
He nods curtly. “Someone must’ve recognized it. You have regular running buddies, don’t you?”
I shift on my feet. The urge to flee creeps up my spine.
“So it could’ve been one of them. We probably just missed them.” He makes a show of looking up and down the street.
He releases me and grabs the bottle, tossing it to me. It’s weirdly heavy in my hands, and I have another urge: to chuck it into the bushes. I try to latch on to his reasoning, even though he doesn’t know the full story. He wasn’t there.
“It could’ve been Skylar,” I admit. We’re not that close, especially after I abandoned the cheerleading team my sophomore year. She quit soon after and joined the track team.
Our running schedules occasionally lined up, and that’s how she talked me into joining the cross-country team this year.
Cross-country.
My very first friend at Emery-Rose made sure I didn’t do that sport. She stuck her claws in me, claimed me—that’s in her words, by the way. Amelie Page was a force to be reckoned with, even at fifteen years old.
Maybe she meant to keep me away from Eli.
It didn’t work.
“Honey, why are you outside?” Mom stands in the doorway.
Fuzzy gray slippers, her threadbare robe wrapped tightly around her. She squints in the sunlight, raising a hand to block her eyes.
“I…” don’t have a good excuse. I slip past her, into the house, and let out a small breath when she closes and locks the door. “Are you hungry?”
She smiles. “I had some soup while you were at school. How was cheer practice?”
Noah appears over her shoulder, scowling. “Mom, Riley—”
“They don’t start until next week,” I lie.
She nods and touches my cheek. “The running is good, but I’m worried it’ll make you too skinny. Boys prefer a girl with curves nowadays.”
“Mom,” Noah says again.
She drifts in his direction.
Sometimes I think she’s become a ghost, and none of us realized until it was too late. Now she haunts the house, half in this world and half in the next.
The same old question bounces around in my head. How do I get her back?
She passes him, pressing a faint kiss to his cheek, and heads to the stairs. She moves silently, her robe now loose and trailing behind her.
Going, going…
Gone.
My brother and I trade a look.
“Pizza,” he says at the same time I do.
I nod. “Yell when it gets here.”
I follow Mom upstairs. She’s back in her room, shut away tight, and I slip into mine. I examine the water bottle in my hand. Dirt smudges the bottom, but otherwise it’s exactly the same.
It’s not a bomb. Before I lose my nerve—again resisting the instinct to throw it—I set it on my desk and turn away.
As soon as I’m dressed, I go find Noah. He’s on the couch in the living room, feet propped up on the coffee table and phone in his face. I flop next to him, and he drops the phone on his chest.
“How was cheer practice?”
I flick his ear. “Don’t be a jackass.”
He swats at my hand. “Don’t let Mom get away with that shit. She should know that you quit the cheerleading team two years ago.”
I raise my eyebrow. Up until two months ago, I don’t think Noah even knew. He was in his own little world. We all have been.
“Cross-country was okay.” It’s better to change the subject than go down that path. “We’re just doing a lot of drills to get in shape. Shorter runs as a whole team. I think Coach is trying to determine where everyone is.”
Our first meet is next weekend, and maybe it’s just me, but I feel like we’re vastly unprepared. I keep telling myself it’s only Monday… there’s a full week of practices ahead of us…
But my pragmatism is showing.
Whatever. In the end, it’s a solo sport. There’s team scoring, but each point depends on the individual. We’re not tied together like lacrosse—
My lips twist.
Here we are, circling back around to Eli.
“I requested the day off,” Noah says. “For your meet. It’s at Lion’s Head, right?”
“Yeah.” I make a show of checking my watch. “And on that note, I need to go do homework. Yell when food arrives.”
He nods and lifts his phone.
There’s only so much sibling interaction we can manage before things start to crumble.
I lock myself in my room and take a deep breath.
Eli’s back in town. Mom’s lost touch with reality. Dad’s absent.
Everything is fine. What a way to kick off senior year, huh?
6
Eli
My first instinct was to go to Riley. The jig is up, anyway. I knew it the moment I stepped into the tattoo shop—even before then. I’m impressed with my self-control, because I stayed home.
Mom took the news better than expected, and she agreed with Dad about a job. Her eyes were already lit up, thinking of the great connections I could make working in a law office or something.
Dumb shit.
I’m not going to waste my year of freedom filing papers in an office.
“Dad gave me the week,” I told her. “I’ll find something.”
I have a few things in mind, but that can wait.
Today… today we’re on a mission.
I catch a ride with Dad into the city in the guise of applying for jobs in person. Instead, I hop in a taxi and head to Caleb’s apartment.
It’s still early. There’s fog again, but the sun already peeks through when I arrive. I can appreciate how hard Dad works—he gets to the office as the sun is rising and doesn’t head home until the evening. Plus an hour commute…
We had a little get-together here before Theo, Liam, and I went off to college—clearly it only stuck for those two. That was the first and last time I was at his place, but it’s fine: I remember the way.
I bang on their door.
Nothing.
My phone reads seven a.m., which I suppose is a bit early.
I hammer on the door harder, continuously.
It swings open mid-knock, and a scowling Margo glares up at me.
She really came into her own against Caleb’s siege. It was impressive, if a bit daunting. Her whole relationship—the beginning of it, anyway—brought back memories of Riley my sophomore year.
Her scowl fades, and puzzlement overtakes her. “What are you doing here?”
I stride into the apartment, and she moves out of my way.
Good thing, too, because I’m not in any sort of mood to slow down. “Where’s Caleb?”
“Sleeping,” she grumbles. “Like I was just a few minutes ago—”
I shake my head. “Sleep is for the weak.”
Caleb opens the bedroom door. As soon as he sees me, he rolls his eyes. “The fuck, dude?”
“I dropped out,” I announce. I fall onto their couch.
The apartment really is quite cozy. It’s a blend of their styles, and it feels like they both have equal footing here. An interesting change to Emery-Rose’s halls.
“I’m going back to bed,” Margo grumbles. “You deal with him.”
Caleb sits. His gaze is fastened to me, and he waits.
The bastard is good at waiting me out.
“I just couldn’t do it,” I say. “It was too much.”
“Was your dad pissed?”
“He wants me to get a job.” I cross my arms. “I’m rethinking everything. And now that I’m back in Rose Hill…”
“Riley?” Caleb asks.
“I can’t scrub her out of my mind.” And it’s pissing me off. Only a small part of me wants to forget about her—the part that applied to college in Maine and actually went there—but the rest of me hums with electricity around her.
Not that she knows I’ve been around her, per se.
He sighs. “Me telling you what to do has never ended well. So… what are you going to do?”
I avoid his gaze. “Find a job. Figure out what the hell I want to do with my life. And… Yeah, maybe I want to see Riley suffer a bit after what she did.”
He snickers. “Maybe, huh?”
Is that my main reason for coming home?
“I hate that she betrayed my whole fucking family right under my nose, and we didn’t find out for months. What kind of fuckery is that?”
“Maybe she wanted to hurt you,” Margo offers from the door. “Since you hurt her first.”
/>
“I didn’t hurt her.” I scowl. “Is that what she said?”
“That’s what I know,” she says. “She wouldn’t tell me what happened.”
I raise my eyebrow. “Even now? You have no idea. I’m supposed to accept that?”
Caleb makes a noise in the back of his throat. “Easy, man.”
Margo narrows her eyes. “What did she even do?”
I stand, not ready to admit Riley’s treachery to her best friend. I am coping with a weird combination of emotions, and they twist like fighting snakes in my stomach. I need to get home and work out this anxious energy.
“I need to talk to you privately,” I say to Caleb. I eye Margo. “Don’t you have class or something?”
She snorts. “Not at seven. And if you want private, keep your voice down.”
The door slams behind her, and Caleb grins.
“She’s cute when she’s mad,” he murmurs.
“Okay, great. Moving on…”
He leans forward, putting his elbows on his knees. “What’s up?”
“I need you to keep an eye on my dad.”
He snorts, then seems to realize I’m serious. “Wait. Why?”
I lift one shoulder. Years of being a defense attorney’s son has instilled a sense of confidentiality in me. No speaking about clients—even alluding to them has been forbidden. When Caleb moved in, Dad’s business moved totally to the office. They didn’t want to give his uncle any reason to revoke their guardianship.
Before that, though, it was less clear. The line between personal time and work was blurry. And he made sure to know I couldn’t talk about those late-night visitors.
So now, as I’m trying to speak into existence the gravity of Riley’s betrayal, my mouth is dry. I can’t get it out.
“You’re worried,” he says.
I nod.
There are things Caleb won’t tell Margo—not because he doesn’t want to, but because they’re not his secrets to tell. I made sure of that. He motions for me to follow him out the door. We go to the stairwell at the end of the hall and up, all the way to the roof.
It brings flashbacks, but I push them away.
