“Whatever. We know all we need to know anyway.” Victor stands up and comes around the table. I stand up, too, and he ends up coming so close to me that I can feel his breath stir my hair. “We'll get back to you on Friday. Remember, though, if you accept our price: you will pay up.”
Victor takes off, Hael following close behind him. Oscar and Cal share a look over the top of Aaron's wavy chestnut hair.
He, on the other hand, is still staring at me like he's seen a ghost.
“Of all people, I never expected you,” he says, almost like he's disgusted. He stands up and storms off, shoving chairs out of his way as he goes. I barely recognize him as he makes his exit, that sweet boy I once knew covered in tattoos, his body hard and taut with muscle. The only parts of him that are the same are the lips that gave me my first kiss, and that loose, mussy hair.
“He's going to have to learn to play nice,” Oscar murmurs as he flips open the cover on his iPad. I’m surprised he even has one. Other schools, nice schools, they have iPads and laptops. At Prescott High, we're stuck in the nineties. Or, rather, our funding is. We use lined paper, binders, and pencils. Lucky us. More than likely, Oscar probably stole the one he’s got in his inked hands.
“Yeah, we don't treat clients like that.” Callum pauses and then smirks at me. “Only marks. You know that, though, don't you, Bernie?”
I stand up and spin away in a whirl of white-blond and pink, storming out the door only to be snatched around the bicep by Victor. He pushes me into the brick wall and then puts a palm next to my face, leaning in.
“Is the first name on your list Principal Vaughn?” he whispers, and when I look away, Vic laughs in my face, his breath hot against my mouth. He pushes up off the wall, stalks toward the edge of the brick patio, and lights up a cigarette.
One of the math teachers—Miss Addie or something—sees us, but then puts her head down and keeps on walking. Pretty sure Hael’s fucked her. I walked in on them once. Well, I walked in on him with one of the teachers, her clothes disheveled, her lipstick smeared. I can't remember which of the blond math teachers it was.
“Principal Vaughn.” Victor laughs, and the sound is so twisted and full of malice, it makes my ears bleed. “Go home, Bernadette, and we'll see you in the morning. It's still 193 44th Street, isn't it?”
“Don't ever come to my house again,” I growl at him, and then I take off for home.My home life is worse than my school life. I’ve tried to make it better on more than one occasion. I’ve called social services, but my foster family was even worse. I’ve tried running away, but then the cops dragged me back and put me on house arrest, and then I was just … trapped in hell.
Once upon a time, my family was wealthy. But then my father killed himself, and my mother lost the house, and well, I can barely remember what it’s like to feel safe and secure, to know there’ll be food on the table and a roof over my head.
Pamela, she still lives that old fantasy of having money.
“Bernadette,” she calls, trotting down the stairs in pearls and a designer dress. She probably charged them to one of the dozen stolen credit cards she keeps in her purse. My backpack is literally falling apart, and my little sister doesn’t have any shoes that don’t have holes in them, but sure. Buy yourself a nice dress and some fancy jewelry.
The thing about my mother is, she doesn’t do drugs, she only drinks at parties, and she paints a very pretty picture with her blond hair and bright green eyes. I’m almost certain that she’s a psychopath. Once, when I spilled a cup of juice on the last of her fancy rugs, she locked me in the bathroom after filling the tub with bleach. The fumes made me so sick that I passed out.
“What?” I stand there in the front entry with my backpack on one shoulder, hating her with every breath and wishing she’d move out of the way, so I could retreat upstairs to my room. Heather will be at the after-school program I signed her up for, so at least for an hour or two, I don’t have to worry about my little sister.
Besides, the thing I call my stepfather won’t be home for hours yet. He works the swing shift at the police station, an on-duty cop with a taste for depravity. And he has so many friends, so, so many. It’s terrifying. I don’t feel safe anywhere.
