by Jenni Sloane
“Playing ball is my job,” he muttered. “What, you think flipping pizza is so much more important?”
“I don’t make pizza. I clean bathrooms.”
He laughed. “Really? Baker put you on bathrooms? He must really hate you.”
My face and neck burned a little. “Actually, I don’t think he does.”
Silence.
“I don’t think it was Kemp,” Cole said after a while. “For what it’s worth.”
“It’s not worth much,” I told him.
“Yeah, I know. But Kemp loves talented musicians. He’d never sabotage someone’s, like, musical performance.”
“Maybe his brother would.”
“Nah. Archer does what Ian says.”
“Not always.” I thought of Archer letting me eat pizza.
“My money’s on the ex-girlfriend.”
“Ainslie? Yeah, I figure she must have trashed the costume.” And now that I thought about it, she could had taken the bike. She was in town today for her job. She could have been pissed about Archer refusing to have lunch with her, come over to Peppino’s… Had I been too hasty in blaming Archer? Or was I being a fool again, wanting to believe the best in him? I swallowed. “But did Ian tell her to? That’s my question. You think he wouldn’t. But I say you all are capable of anything.”
“Us all?”
“You. Bennett. Ian. And Archer.”
“Don’t lump me in with those amateurs.”
“You’re acting like this is a joke.” I said it mildly, but I let a very real undercurrent of anger run through each word. “But you guys have ruined my life.”
He was silent for an obnoxiously long time. “I know,” he eventually said.
The fact that he wasn’t fighting spurred me on. “I didn’t put you here. You know that damn well. You put yourself here, and you helped put me here. You’re the reason you’re away from your brothers right now. You—”
“Shut up,” he ordered.
“I won’t. You need to take some fucking responsibility for your life. For the people you hurt. Because I am not going to be your plaything anymore.”
Another pause. I was getting sick of them.
“Say something,” I ordered.
“I’ve never heard you swear like that before, TT,” he said.
“I resisted the urge to slam my fist down on his twisted ankle. I settled for wrapping my hand loosely around it. He yelped and jerked.
“Say that you understand what I’m telling you.” I tightened my grip.
“Ow! Ow, okay, okay, okay. I understand. Let go, please.”
“Oh, I’m not letting go. Because you’re going to call off your dog, Bennett, too. Neither of you is going to bother me again. Got it?” Another squeeze.
“Ow! Yes. Yes yes yes.”
I relaxed my hand. “And you’re going to tell me, right here and now, that you are responsible for what happened on Halloween night.”
“But I—”
“Knock it off.” I squeezed, much harder this time.
“I’m responsible! I’m responsible. TT, please…”
I eased off, but only slightly. “Asshole,” I muttered.
“I know, okay.” He spoke softly. “I know.” He took a few deep breaths to recover. Then shot me a look. “Were you trying to escape too?”
“None of your business.”
He laughed. “Now that would have made a good Strathmore Challenge Insta post. Once they’d caught you, of course. So they could do a before and after: your empty bunk, and then you chained to the bed or something.”
“You like imagining me chained to the bed?” I fired back, not thinking.
The silence was absolute. Even the night critters seemed to stop their chirping. I saw Cole’s white teeth flash in the moonlight.
“Forget I said that,” I muttered, knowing he wouldn’t. I wasn’t scared of him. Not out here, just the two of us. Not with my hand clasped around his injured ankle.
“I won’t be able to.” I could hear the grin still in his voice.
I tightened my grip. He hissed.
“Okay, hey, not fair…”
“You know what’s not fair?” I removed my hand and glanced up at the stars. “My eighteenth birthday is in a few days. And this is where I’m gonna begin my adult life.”
“You’re eighteenth?” He sat up straighter. “TT, you could leave, if you wanted.”
“And have Strathmore sabotage the rest of my life?”
He shrugged. “Sometimes I think it would be worth it.”
“You’re eighteen. Why did you even come here in the first place, when you could have just said no to your parents? Then you wouldn’t have had to worry about pissing Strathmore off and them sabotaging things for you or your brothers.”
He adjusted his position, wincing. He was close to me now. Our shoulders almost touched as he leaned against the iron gate. He smelled like expensive aftershave and just a hint of sweat and booze. My stomach fluttered, and there was that pull between my legs again, followed by a flood of heat in my core. I had an insane urge to brush the dark curls back from his temple.
“Baseball,” he said simply.
“Baseball.” I frowned.
“I couldn’t play at Monroe, once I got in trouble. Here, as long as my stepdad cut a big enough check, they’d take me on. Fuck, they even made me captain.”
“You like baseball enough to…imprison yourself?”
“There was the money factor too. If I didn’t go here, my parents were going to cut me off. And it seemed safer to come here and keep collecting an allowance. Then maybe someday I can afford to get my brothers the hell out of that house.”
“I didn’t even know you got in trouble, until I saw you here that first day,” I said softly. “I told the cops it was you who smashed the bird baths, but I just assumed you’d get away with it.”
He snorted bitterly. “I was surprised to. Reed hates anything that fucks with his reputation. I assumed he’d want to keep it quiet. But he went the other way. Made an example of me.” He rubbed his nose. “My mom didn’t want to send me here. But she does whatever he says.”
“That sucks.”
He glanced at me. “Come on, TT. You think I deserve to be here.”
“Yeah, it just sucks that she’s under his thumb.”
He nodded and sighed. “The baseball thing…Strathmore has connections. You know that. If I hadn’t fucked up, they probably would have helped me play professionally. And then I’d have a real salary. It wouldn’t matter if I got cut off.”
I didn’t want to tell him how sad it sounded. This man-boy believing he had any clue how to live an independent life. He was just going to waltz onto a pro baseball team and support his little brothers, somewhere safe from his wicked stepfather…
But it was sweet too. In a way.
“But you were ready to jeopardize all that tonight?”
“Temporary insanity,” he muttered. “Or the most sane I’ve ever been. Can’t tell.”
“I’m not going to leave on my birthday,” I told him. Not adding that Callahan had told me I could graduate in June, if I behaved.
“Good.” He gazed up at the night sky. “It would get kind of lonely here without you.”
I didn’t respond to that. He still had no idea how much he’d hurt me. It was like he believed this little heart-to-heart under the stars could erase the past. Just like he believed his mediocre baseball playing could secure his future.
He tipped his head toward me. “Why have I been telling you so much, TT? The other night, after detention, I kept thinking…I don’t tell anyone that shit. Not about my brothers.”
I felt a stab of guilt, but I forced myself to shrug. “I don’t know why I’m talking to you either. I know anything I say can and will be used against me.”
“Nah. Let’s not…” he hesitated. Then slowly lifted his hand. “Truce, TT?”
I stared at his hand.
“It’s not a trick,” he said softly. A
nd the gentle rasp of his voice nearly undid me.
“Why should I believe you?” I murmured.
“I don’t know.” The response was so honest, it tugged something deep within me. “But I mean it.”
I took his hand. I’d proved myself to be a fool time and time again where these men were concerned. But the electric jolt I got touching him was enough to make me want to be that fool. At least right now. In this moment.
He sighed out, a sharp sound, almost one of pain. He didn’t let go of my hand. I didn’t let go of his. He leaned slightly closer to me then stopped. I held my breath. Somewhere in me was the scared girl I’d been when I came here. She wasn’t gone. She never would be. But she now lived in the protective shadow of her grown-up sister. A woman who’d been through hell and had started to grow a skin like armor, resistant to the flames. As I leaned in to meet Cole’s lips with my own, the only fire I felt came from within. It was pleasure, it was rage, it was power.
And it was mine.
Chapter Fifteen
“You aren’t using your brain.” Bennett stared at me with ice-blue eyes. “Try again.”
“Actually,” I said cheerfully, “I think you’re the one whose brain has, uh…missed something.” I erased some of his work on the notebook page and replaced it with my own. “There. Once we fix your mistake farther up, the answer I got down here makes perfect sense.”
Bennett glowered down at the page. His lip was busted—bruised and swollen, with a split that kept threatening to crack open. I didn’t ask how. But my guess was that Cole was angry at himself for kissing me. For letting me help him back into the school. For letting me see more of him than he’d wanted to show. And he’d had to take it out on someone.
I didn’t know if the truce was for real. But last night, under those stars, I had taken what I wanted. I had kissed Cole Heller until he whimpered into my mouth. Until he was at my absolute mercy.
Bennett looked at me again, his expression as cold as I’d ever seen it. “What happened to your lip?” I asked casually. “Cole do that to you?”
He slammed his fist down onto the desk. I didn’t even flinch. “If you don’t focus on this, I’m going to tell Callahan you’re not ready to take entrance exams.”
“Awww. You’d tell Callahan on me?” I placed a finger on his arm and rubbed lightly. He jerked away like he’d been burned. He clearly had no idea what to make of the new Amma Reiter. I wasn’t too sure what to make of her either. I just knew that because my suspicions about Cole had been proven right, I was increasingly confident that I was right about Bennett too. Which was why I had a little vial of serum in my pocket. And was just waiting for Bennett to turn away from his coffee cup.
“I am focused on this,” I replied coolly. “You’re the one who seems to be struggling.”
A muscle twitched in his jaw. His cheeks flushed. At first, I thought it was just anger. Then, on a hunch, I pushed.
“Why is it so hard for you to deal with me being right?” I taunted. “Is it embarrassing when a piece of trailer trash shows you up? And I’m a girl to boot. That must be tough.”
For a second, I thought I’d gone too far. I thought he was going to hit me. But he didn’t. There was something in his eyes that I didn’t entirely understand, but that made heat twist like a coil of flaming rope inside me. I glanced down at the front of his pants—only for a second, but it was long enough to confirm a suspicion I’d had. I suddenly felt nervous. Mousy, church-blouse Amma returned. I was way out of my depth. Last night had been my first kiss. My first opportunity to connect those strange surges of heat and desire I’d been experiencing with something tangible. And now here was Bennett, flushed and…
And hard.
I’d done that.
I, with my newfound power.
I banished church-blouse Amma. And I grinned at Bennett with every ounce of wickedness I hadn’t known I possessed.
“What’s that big brain of yours compensating for?” I whispered.
“Fuck you!” He was on his feet, leaning over me, his face inches from mine.
“Is that what you want?” I asked. Maybe I wouldn’t need the serum after all.
“You’re disgusting,” he hissed, with such contempt that it actually hurt. But I couldn’t let him see that.
“You’re bleeding,” I told him.
He was. A thin trickle of blood ran from the split in his lip. He pressed the back of his hand to the spot. Stared at the blood on his skin.
“Don’t move,” he snarled. Then he stormed out of the room.
I didn’t hesitate. I took out the vial and unscrewed the top. It stuck a little bit, but I finally got the stopper out. I reached for Bennett’s coffee cup and dumped the contents in.
There, I thought, shaking the last drops out of the vial. Let’s see how this goes for you, Mr. Baker.
I let out a cry as a large hand closed over my wrist. “What the fuck are you doing?”
I hadn’t heard him come back in. He couldn’t have gone all the way to the bathroom and then come back in that amount of time. He must have lingered. He must have watched me.
The grip on my wrist hurt, but it was sending little pulses of pleasure through me as well. And the way he was breathing—it wasn’t just anger making him draw quick, sharp breaths right next to my ear. There wasn’t much I could tell him that would mitigate the situation. So I went with the truth. “It’s a serum,” I told him. “It encourages people to…to express how they really feel.”
His forehead wrinkled in confusion. “What?”
“It’s not dangerous. But it…frees you. To tell the truth.”
“A truth serum?”
I grinned, remembering Kayle’s words. “Sort of. It can’t make you tell the truth. It just—”
“Loosens your tongue,” he interrupted. “Like sodium pentothal Or Sodium thiopental. Or opium. Or any number of psychoactive drugs. Are you insane, Amma? That is so illegal, I can’t even begin to tell you.”
It did sound kind of horrible when he said it like that. What I’d done was morally reprehensible, that I knew. But they’d pushed me to it. They’d pushed and pushed and pushed…until I wasn’t sorry if I took some of their control away. Until I’d needed to take their control away. And with the memory of Cole’s lips on mine sending flames roaring up my spine…I felt good. I felt dangerous.
“You deserve it,” I whispered, in the same slow, mocking way I’d asked him what his brain was compensating for. “You deserve it so fucking bad.”
His pupils dilated. His chin dropped slightly, and I watched him, fascinated. The bulge in the front of his pants had grown.
Suddenly, his gaze snapped up to meet mine again. “That’s an anesthetic,” he said. His eyes were flashing, but his voice was strangely calm. “How do you know you won’t kill me?”
“I was careful,” I said defensively. “It’s the right dosage.”
“You’re sure?” He suddenly sounded just the slightest bit scared. Like he wanted my reassurance. Craved it.
I smiled at him. “Yes.” I leaned back in my seat, waiting. Waiting for him to call Callahan. For Callahan to call the police. For Amma Reiter to be declared irreformable.
He took the cup I’d just emptied the vial into, and knocked it back.
I stared in shock. What the hell…
He held out his arms. “What did you want to ask me?” he demanded, leaning back as well. “I’m all ears.”
“You drank it.”
He leaned forward, his voice sharp and hard, whizzing at me like an onslaught of arrows. “Yes, I fucking drank it. What do you want to know? Come on. Now’s your chance. What deep, dark secrets do you want to know?“
I hesitated. Then that same languid smile crept onto my face again. This was fun. In some sick, twisted way, I was happier than I’d ever been.
“I want to know what you feel when you look at me.”
He laughed. “I don’t know whether that’s sweet, or pathetic.” He pursed his lips and spok
e in an ugly, mocking, baby voice. “You want to know if I have a wittle crush on you?”
“Yes.” My voice was even, but the mockery in his tone made my blood electric, made me want to destroy him.
He sneered. “You wish.” But then a bubble of laughter came to the surface. I could tell he hadn’t expected it. He looked like he wanted to clap a hand over his mouth. The serum must be putting a wrecking ball through his inhibitions.
“Go on then,” I said impassively, trying to keep the satisfaction from my tone. “Tell me how much you hate me.”
“I—” A burble of laughter, followed by a hiccup. “I…”
“You can’t even say it, can you?”
His giggle this time was high and manic. “You’re mean.”
“I know. So tell me how much you hate me.”
He got control of himself and hauled me out of my seat by the collar. I barely had time to yelp before he slammed me up against the wall. I gasped sharply, but met his eyes with equal fire. “I hate you,” he seethed, teeth clenched.
I was once again surprised by how much the words hurt.
“Really?” I tried to keep my tone steady. But his hand twisted in the collar of my sweater, making my voice rough with fear and lust.
“Yes.” His response was instant. But his eyes were losing focus again.
“You don’t want to fuck me?” I hit the –ck in fuck, taunting him a little.
His nose was nearly touching mine. “I don’t.”
“Say it.” I whispered, laughing. “Say ‘I don’t want to fuck you.’”
He was breathing hard, flecks of spit hitting my face. I could feel his warmth, feel the fire within him that matched my own. He wanted me. He wanted me so much, the weight of his longing was suffocating us both. But he forced the words out. “I don’t want to fuck you.”
Each word was a separate dagger in my heart.
And each one was a lie.
But if Bennett couldn’t admit the lies, there was nothing I could do.
“Now get out of my office,” he seethed, letting me go with a little shove.
I slid down the wall, feeling strangely hollow as the adrenaline rushed out of me. My legs were like jelly as I walked toward the door.
