Brutal Prince: A Dark Bully High School Romance

by Fox, Logan

  “Pick up, pick up.” I push the words through gritted teeth.

  He answers on the next ring. “Yeah?”

  “You at home?”

  “The fuck else would I be?”

  He’s pissed off, but I can’t blame him. “Listen, I need you to do something for me.”

  There’s silence on the other end of the line. It could have gone so many ways — he could have laughed in my ear and put down the phone. He could have cursed me to the nth generation.

  But Marcus was, and always will be, my closest friend.

  “Tell me what you need, bro.”

  * * *

  As I’m waiting for the golf estate’s boom to rise, I re-read the message my father sent last night. Judging from the time stamp, and if I remember correctly, I was probably on my third game of pool and my sixth beer. No wonder I didn’t hear it come through.

  We need to talk.

  11:45am

  Angel Falls Cemetery

  Don’t be late.

  I lock my phone and toss it on the passenger seat. My eyes slide to the clock on my dash. I thought I would have more time, but I woke up late, and it took me a while to get my head straight.

  I push down harder on the gas, opening up the Mustang’s engine. It tears down the freeway as my heart starts a slow th-thump in my chest.

  We need to talk? Well that suits me just fine, because I have some questions for him.

  * * *

  Angel Falls Cemetery, poetically, is set in the small valley of Devil’s Creek. At the entrance to the cemetery, you can see a few yards of the wispy waterfall that gives this area its name. However, the craggy creek it plummets into is hidden — accessible only by hiking down a steep ravine lined in pitch black rock.

  Massive oak trees litter the cemetery, throwing dappled shade over the paved road my Mustang skims over as I head deeper inside.

  I only come here once a year with Dad, and nothing much has changed since the last time. The leaves have only just started changing color, and it’s a mess of green and orange out here.

  And gray, of course.

  Row upon row of concrete slabs and sad, pouting angels.

  I park behind my father’s pearl-white Mercedes and take a second to drag myself together before climbing out.

  “You’re late,” he says, as soon as I’m in earshot, but with his back still facing me.

  “Was busy.”

  I expect a reprimand, but he says nothing. He’s wearing a black-on-black suit, his hair slicked back, hands clasped behind his back. This could have been a replay from last year’s visit, until he turns to face me.

  His blue eyes pierce through me like a spear, rooting me to the spot.

  “What?” I ask, my voice too soft, too unsteady.

  “Do I not give you enough, son?” There’s open contempt on his words when his sneer could have sufficed to convey his disgust.

  “I…what are you talking about?” I’d been gearing up for some of his usual sentimental drivel about my mother, not a full-on confrontation.

  “Is it drugs?” He steps closer. I wish I could move back, because I’ve never felt such venomous anger flowing from him before.

  “Dad, I don’t know what you’re—”

  “Did you think I wouldn’t notice? That I’m that fucking obtuse?” He doesn’t raise his voice, not even a little, because he doesn’t have to. I’m fucking terrified, and I still don’t know why he’s angry with me.

  I lift my hands, palms facing him. That, at least, stops his slow advance. But it does nothing to the set of his mouth or the righteous indignation glaring in his eyes.

  “Couldn’t figure it out, even when I did it right in front of you, could you?”

  Finally, my scrambling brain finds purchase. “The safe?” I blurt out. I wave my hands. “Dad, no, I have the money. All of it.” I stab a thumb over my shoulder. “It’s in my—”

  “Did he promise you a cut?” My father lifts his chin, hands still clasped behind his back for all the world like he’s having an idle chat with his son.

  If you didn’t take into account his eyes, of course.

  “Who?”

  “That Baker boy. And don’t tell me he didn’t have anything to do with this. I know it’s him. It’s always been him!”

  Now my head’s fucking spinning again. “Dad, please. I have the money from the safe. I can give it to you right now.”

  My father cocks his head. “And the files? All my clients’s information? Do you also happen to have that in your car?” Sarcasm drips from every word. His face contorts into mock concern. “I’m assuming you haven’t made any copies, of course?”

  I gape openly at him.

  His clients’s…?

  Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.

  Four digits.

  I thought it was the front door, that night.

  It wasn’t.

  It was the entry code for my father’s study.

  Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.

  How many times had he tried a different combination over the years? I know he never asked me about it, and I’ve never once been inside with him there. Dumb luck, or years and years of patient determination?

  I stagger back shaking my head, doing my best to reign in a thousand abrupt thoughts tumbling over themselves in their rush to be acknowledged.

  That’s why Marcus chose that room. It’s closest to the study.

  Was that why he was okay living with me? Why he was so pissed off when I said my Dad had said no?

  He must have accessed my father’s computer. Copied his files.

  But when? Why? What use—?

  “Dad, do you keep their addresses on file?” I bark out, my eyes wide and my hands already curling into fists.

  Dad lets out a rough bark of a laugh, shaking his head. “Just admit you’ve fucked up, Son. Admit it, and we—”

  “No, you don’t—” I cut off, grabbing my lips and twisting them in an effort to work through my thoughts before my father thinks I’ve lost my fucking mind.

  But then something else trips me up.

  “How did you know it was him?” I step closer to my dad, lifting my hands when his eyes narrow to wary slits. “Marcus. And you called him a deviant. Why?” I spit out the words as fast as I can, and my father’s suspicious glare slowly changes into a confused frown.

  “The cat,” he says. “He killed the cat.”

  I shake my head, laugh. “What fucking cat?”

  “When you were six,” Dad says, staring at me like I’ve just told him the sky is green and we’re standing on air. “He killed your mother’s cat.”

  I can’t even. Blood sings through my ears, and my heart’s pounding along to a 155 BPM track as I try to understand what the fuck my father’s telling me.

  Then I remember.

  It’s just a fragment of a faded memory, but it’s there.

  Natalie’s white Persian, the one I always thought looked like it had run headfirst into a wall. Ugly as sin, but she loved that thing to death.

  “You told me it ran away.”

  Father shakes his head. “Because that’s what I thought. But when Baker tendered for one of my client’s security upgrades, I went to his house for a meeting.” Father waves his hand. “Brandon Baker, Marcus’s dad.”

  I nod, but it’s not with understanding. I’m not getting any of this shit.

  “I saw its collar. That—” he snaps his fingers. “Diana? Deena? Can’t remember what your mother called the thing. I designed it a collar.” My father brings a hand to his throat as if he’s about to strangle himself. “Beautiful thing. Put me on the map for pet couture.”

  “Where did you see it?”

  “In Baker’s house. That kid was looking at it. I only saw a glimpse, but I know my own work when I see it.”

  “How do you know he stole—”

  “That whole family’s rotten as a barrel of week-old fish.” Father shakes his head, teeth flashing. “I told you back then I didn’t want you seeing that
boy.” He stabs a finger at me. “I told you!”

  We were so young. I thought we played in the woods because what fucking kid wouldn’t if they had the chance?

  But now I remember.

  We played there because else I would get into trouble. And I only brought Marcus over when I knew my father would be out of town.

  Over the years, I must have forgotten the real reason. So much has happened since then, I mean, fuck. Junior high, high school, Jessica.

  Indi.

  “I’m sorry,” I say. “Dad…I…forgot.”

  My father shakes his head, but I can see there’s a touch of doubt in his eyes now. “What were you going to use it for?”

  I shrug. My father’s mouth twists.

  “The money! What was it for?”

  “A loan, that’s it.”

  “Like the bracelet?” Dad’s eyebrow quirks up. “Is that in your car too?”

  I shake my head. “No. I have to… I still have to get it back.”

  “Then get it back. Meanwhile…” Dad tugs at the hem of his suit jacket, twisting his neck. “The police are busy fingerprinting my computer and study. I already know what they’ll find.”

  Because of course my fingerprints will be all over that shit.

  But not his computer. I’ve never touched it. I knew it was off-limits.

  “You’re wrong about Marcus,” I say. “He’s never done anything—” I cut off, aware of the bald-faced lie I’m about to lay on my father. “He’s a good guy.”

  Father lets out a soft laugh. “No, son. You’re a good guy. Marcus? He takes advantage of good guys like you.”

  * * *

  Dad’s words play on end in my mind as I head home. I zone out so badly that the car behind me at the traffic light honks before I realize the light is green.

  I coast down the freeway.

  It doesn’t matter which way I twist things, I can’t fit the pieces together.

  Of course, it doesn’t help that my mind keeps going back to Indi. How vengeful she looked. How hard she pretended that she’d actually be able to hurt me with that little blade if she tried.

  Liar.

  When could she possibly have overheard me and Marcus speaking about Jess? We know better than to run our mouths where anyone can hear us.

  The church.

  Was she there? Was that what I saw before I got so caught up in Marcus that I forgot?

  What the fuck was she even doing there?

  My hands tighten on the steering wheel. I lick dry lips and take a deep lungful of air.

  No…what was Marcus doing there?

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Indi

  I stand at the threshold to the Davis house and my shoulders sag as if there’s a ton of weights strapped to my back, not just a backpack.

  There wasn’t much to say to Addy after we’d both calmed down. She swears she doesn’t know what Briar was talking about, and I so badly want to believe her.

  When I asked, she said she was supposed to leave with the moving men, but she wanted to spend a few minutes saying goodbye to her childhood home.

  I still don’t know what shit her parents were involved in that made them a target for the IRS. She didn’t elaborate, and I didn’t ask her to. Right now, I just want to climb into bed and forget the past two weeks of my life ever happened.

  Which is what I would have done if I hadn’t run into Marigold.

  She’s waiting for me in the entrance hall, skinny arms crossed over her chest. The lecture begins before I’ve even let out my first long-suffering sigh.

  “How far do you think you’ll get in this world, young lady?”

  “Quite far,” I snap back. “Starting with moving fuck far away from this hell hole.”

  “And then what?” Marigold says, following me relentlessly up the stairs. “You get a job, your boss gives you an order, you throw it back in their face?”

  Well, at least she’s not expecting my boss to be male. That’s gotta count for something, right?

  “I dunno, granny,” I say. “But let me think it over while I remain grounded for the rest of my life, yeah?”

  I turn to close my bedroom door in her face, but she sticks out a hand before I get there. I scowl at her, and she glares back at me.

  “This isn’t the life your mother wanted for you,” she says quietly.

  “Don’t you dare,” I say, lifting a finger at her and wishing it was my knife instead. “Don’t you dare!”

  “She put me in charge of you, Indigo. Me.” Marigold presses her fingers to her chest. “I’m responsible for her daughter. This—” she flicks her hand at me “This excuse of a child.”

  My mouth drops open. “What?”

  “I never wanted kids,” she goes on with barely a pause. “Did your mother ever tell you that? Not one. Until I had your mother, of course.”

  She shakes her head.

  “That’s when it all changes, you know. That one moment, when you’re holding your baby in your arms. The burden you’ve carried for nine long months. The thing that made you throw up every morning, that made you spoil your bedsheets more times than you’d care to remember. That thing…”

  Marigold blinks a few times, and I realize she’s keeping back tears. “That thing consumed my life. She was everything to me. Everything!”

  I start misting up. That’s how I felt about Mom too, especially after Dad died. She was my world.

  I like to think I was hers.

  “But then I lost her.” Marigold holds up a hand and extends two fingers. “Not once. Twice.”

  “I don’t—”

  “Your father took her away from me.” Marigold flicks her hand, shakes her head. “Dragged her thousands of miles to that nowhere town. He kept us apart.”

  I open my mouth, but she doesn’t let a word get out.

  “And then someone killed her.”

  Those two fingers lift, trembling ever so slightly. “Twice, I’ve lost her. I’m not losing you too, even if it means you hate me. Because at least you’re here to hate me. At least you’re here.”

  She drops her arms to her sides, swallows visibly, and takes a step back. “Now think about what you’ve done.” She nods, and a single tear breaks free to race down her wrinkled cheek. “You think about your life, Indi. And you don’t come out of this room until you’re ready to tell me how you plan to spend it.”

  Marigold grabs the door handle and shuts the door in my face. I stare at the wood for the longest time, and then slowly turn around and collapse on my bed.

  I wish there were a way I could dump everything that’s happened to me in the past two weeks onto Marigold. Maybe she can handle that shit better than I can. After all, she’s still standing, and barely looks worse for wear.

  Me? I feel like two-day-old roadkill left to bake in the sun. I’m a withered husk of who I used to be, and it feels like the only thing keeping me alive is my anger and my hate and my desperation.

  Anger at Briar for lying to me.

  Hate for the man who destroyed my life so wantonly.

  And oh, how desperate I am to make them all pay for their crimes.

  * * *

  Briar

  It’s just after one when I get to the burned-out church. Empty, blackened, cast in deep shadow.

  I haven’t seen Marcus here in years. So why? Why did he track all the way over here from his house? It’s further than mine — an extra fifteen, twenty minutes. Doesn’t make sense, not if it was just to reminisce.

  So why then?

  I scan the building, trying to find anything that might be out of place. Some glaring sign that will point me in the right direction.

  But it looks the same as it always does.

  I head to the back where I thought I saw a flicker of light the night Marcus and I were here. There’s a tangled nest of brambles back here. I crouch, take out my phone, and shine the torch on the ground.

  There are a few scrapes through the dirt, some indistinct marks. A thorn rippe
d from the bramble. Was this where Indi was hiding?

  I turn, crouch, and scan the church from my new perspective. The entrance is straight ahead, the pulpit a little to the left. She would have had a clear line of sight to both of us coming and going.

  She must have seen what Marcus was doing. My finger hovers over my phone, but who the fuck do I call?

  I try Dylan first. He’s the one that sent Indi the video his girlfriend had taken of her on her knees in front of me in Veroza’s class.

  No answer.

  I try Zak next, but his phone’s off.

  I know Marcus doesn’t have her number, and the last thing I want is to potentially tip him off to my amateur investigation.

  Instead, I wander around the church. Spot the difference, Briar.

  My eyes are drawn to the mess of footprints coming and going. I follow them a few times, trying to decipher which ones are mine, which are Indi’s, which could possibly be his. On the fourth circuit, I notice a pair of tracks detouring. It could be mine from the night I first followed Indi into this place…but it doesn’t feel right.

  For one, they’re too perfect. Each precisely placed in front of the other.

  I follow them down a row of pews, and stare at a scuff mark on the dusty tiles.

  Crouching, I brush my fingers over the tile. It’s not flush with the others. No surprise — almost nothing in this church is straight or narrow anymore. I heard that the church burned down in the early sixties, cause unknown. Apparently, no one was injured in the fire, but it was never reconstructed.

  I wedge my fingernail under the lip of the tile. Reluctantly, it starts lifting. I put it down to one side and frown down at the dark rectangle of empty space it was obscuring.

  I reach inside. The air in that small space is arctic. I grab the bundle of fabric inside and draw it out as goosebumps break out over my arms.

  Did you get rid of everything?

  Of course.

  As soon as that blue fabric catches the light, I recognize it.

  Jessica’s hoody. The one she was wearing when she left Marcus’s house the next day.