CHAPTER FIVE ARSÈNE, FIFTEEN

CHAPTER FIVE

ARSèNE, FIFTEEN

My taxi stopped in front of the Corbin mansion. I hopped out, a duffel bag dangling from each of my shoulders. I squinted up at the arches of the manor that I used to call home. At the closed door. The empty driveway.

I didn’t know why I hoped someone would be waiting for me here. Hadn’t I learned anything in my years at Andrew Dexter Academy?

Summer vacation was going to be long, lonely, and full of tension. I should’ve stayed back.

I dragged my ass to the entrance and raised my fist to knock on the door before remembering, Fuck it, this place is going to be mine one day.

I pushed it open all the way. Servants were rushing back and forth. No sign of Dad, Miranda, and Gracelynn.

“Welcome home, Arsène. Your father asked me to tell you that he, your stepsister, and your stepmother went to the country club. There’s a golf tournament.” Bernard halted in front of me, a manila file under his arm. “They should be back soon. Do you need help settling in? Some refreshments, maybe?”

I shook my head.

I went upstairs to my room and dumped the bags onto the floor. I glanced around, and it didn’t take a genius to see what had happened here. Gracelynn had taken over my space. It wasn’t pink central or anything, but my closet was open and full of glittery sneakers. The desk was littered with her textbooks, pastel Sharpies, and heart-shaped Post-it Notes. There were scrunchies on my unmade bed.

What the fuck?This place had dozens of rooms. She could’ve picked any one of them as her second room. But this was not accidental. She was trying to send a message—I was no longer a part of this household.

Defiant, I flung myself on the bed and rubbed my unwashed self over the linen, just to be a dick. Then I stared at the ceiling. The bed still smelled of Gracelynn. Her shampoo and French perfume and expensive nail polish. Why’d she sleep here? It seemed like such a weird thing to do.

The entrance door downstairs opened and shut. Laughter filled the foyer. Dad. Miranda. Gracelynn. They were talking animatedly. My gut twisted with anger.

How fucking lovely: they’d managed to become one happy family the minute I became “manageable.”

“He’s here,” I heard one of the servants announce, and I knew she was talking about me. But as I waited—ten, fifteen, twenty minutes—no one from my so-called family knocked on my door.

This was how it remained for the next few hours. A battle of wills and ego. Who was going to approach who first? Dad or me. Only I was a goddamn fifteen-year-old and he was the grown-ass man who chose his wife over his son.

Skipping dinner was a no-brainer. My stomach grumbled with hunger, but I’d rather die before losing this ego game with Dad. When everyone went to bed, I tiptoed my way down to the kitchen and ate three plates of leftovers. Then I went upstairs to the roof through the laundry-room window, and stargazed.

I spotted Mercury, Saturn, Venus, Mars, and Jupiter. If I squinted real hard, I could even pretend to see the rings on Saturn. Stars calmed me down. Their existence. The knowledge there were universes out there that were so much bigger than my shitty existence.

Proportions.Yeah, that’s the reason I liked astronomy so much. It put everything in proportion.

The next morning, I was a no-show at breakfast. Conversation was tense as it drifted up to my room. Doug was cracking, knowing his sole heir would rather drink his own piss than share a dining table with him.

By noon, Dad and Miranda sent Gracelynn to knock on my door.

“Come in,” I said, after letting her wait outside my room for nine full minutes, and even gritted out in frustration, “Come on now, I know you’re there.”

She pushed the door open. She’d gotten taller. There were pimples on her chin, and she had colorful braces. She didn’t look good, and that made me happy.

I’d filled out during our time apart. I knew I looked handsome because I got hit on all the time. And I knew Gracelynn figured as much, because she couldn’t stop staring at me.

She gnawed on her inner cheek, clenching the doorknob tightly. “We’re going to the movies. Mom and Dad asked if you wanna tag along.”

“She’s not my mom, and he’s not your dad,” I said matter-of-factly, bouncing a tennis ball onto the ceiling and back to me repeatedly. “And pass.”

“You don’t even know what we’re watching.” She sounded whiny and a little stressed. She didn’t want to disappoint Doug and Miranda. After all, being the favorite child was her full-time job.

“Unless it’s a live show of you getting wedgied by every single person we went to school with, I remain uninterested.”

“I see you haven’t changed at all.” Her pimply chin quivered.

“Of course I did.” I smirked, my gaze still hard on the bouncing ball. “I no longer care for you. Not in the slightest.”

“I’m your stepsister!”

“You’re a liar.”

She turned away and slammed the door behind her.

The days passed slowly, but as they did, the determination inside me grew.

Doug broke first. He knocked on my door five days into our cold war, inviting me to go golfing with his friends. Saying no was no hardship—I hated golf and pretty much despised him.

The nights were much more pleasant. Quieter and less hot. I got on the roof with a flashlight and an astronomy book and a telescope I’d bought after working odd jobs between classes over the year. Doug had given me a credit card to use, but I never touched it, out of principle.

I read about dwarf galaxies and black holes and Higgs boson. I ate a whole day’s worth of food on the roof, not bothering to clean the leftovers, knowing I’d attract all kinds of animals. I lay flat on my back, hands tucked under my head, and wondered. Wondered about what the girl I’d end up marrying would look like. I liked dark-haired women, so I guessed she’d be a brunette. I thought she’d be serious and smart. A scientist, maybe. And she’d have great tits. And she’d let me touch them all the time.

She’d be nothing like Miranda, like Gracelynn, or even like Patrice.

We’d get married, me and this hypothetical girl. And my “family” would attend the ceremony; I’d be cold and distant with them. And they’d know I didn’t need them anymore. That I had my own family now.

This girl, my dream girl, she was going to come from a big, happy family. We’d spend all our holidays with them. We’d have traditions and matching ugly Christmas sweaters and holidays.

It was the dreams that kept me going. Because where there were dreams—there was hope.

After three weeks of solitude, Doug managed to drag me to the tennis court. He knew I liked to play and bribed me with a promise of Korean barbecue and beer afterward.

Dad tried in his own backward way. In the upcoming days, he let me drink beer with his hotshot friends at the country club after my tennis matches (I won them all). And he didn’t force me to spend time with Miranda and Gracelynn.

In fact, I managed to avoid the duo for six whole weeks. Almost the entire duration of my summer vacation. Until one night, when I was on the roof, reading about quantum mechanics, I heard a noise coming from the opposite side of the chimney. I sat up, glancing behind my shoulder. I found Gracelynn standing on the ridge in her pale-yellow pajamas, fists on her hips.

She was just a foot from me, staring at me from above.

“In case you’re wondering, things are perfect without you.” She tried to force a smug grin, but I could tell she was nervous. Her eyes were wide and desperate.

“I wasn’t, but thanks for the update,” I said indifferently. “You can have both of them and this ugly-ass mansion. Life here is boring. I’m having fun at school.”

Lies, lies, and more lies. Andrew Dexter Academy was strict and full of bullies and abusive staff, but I wasn’t going to give her the pleasure of telling her that.

“You know.” She tapped her chin thoughtfully. “I think about that night every day. How come you didn’t try to tell your dad the truth? You just .?.?. dropped it.”

I did try. He didn’t listen.

I dog-eared a page in my book and put it aside. “Whatever for? I got what I wanted. Not seeing your ugly face every day.”

“Did you really mean what you said? About not caring for me anymore?” Her facade dropped, and with it, her taunting smile.

“With every fiber of my body.”

“Well, for your information, I hate you too!”

“Is this the useless-fun-fact awards?” I looked around us in wonder before reaching for my book with a yawn. “Why the hell do you think I care?”

The next part happened very fast. Gracelynn let out a growl and crouched down, trying to push me down the shingles. I stumbled, still a step away, before managing to grab the vent pipe. I was still a few feet away from the edge. Gracelynn groaned in frustration, using her legs to kick me down. She wanted to kill me. Straight-up break my neck. The girl was a psycho.

“Fall! Oh, die already!” She kicked her legs desperately, trying to reach my body. I curled one hand around the vent pipe and grabbed one of her feet with the other, then tugged her down to me. She gasped, turning flat on her stomach, trying to claw her way back up like a wet cat in a tub.

I didn’t let go of her ankle, but I did climb up the ledge with her. When we got to the ridge, I flipped her flat on her back and straddled her waist. I couldn’t take any chances that she’d try to kill me again.

She raised her fists in the air, attempting to catch my nose, my cheek, my neck. I grabbed both her wrists and slammed them down on either side of her head. She moaned in pain. It took everything in me not to hit her.

“What’s your problem? Huh?” I screamed.

She panted underneath me. Her chest rising and falling. She wasn’t wearing a bra. I swallowed, feeling weird and tingly and not half as furious as I should be. And it sucked, because even though I hated her, I didn’t hate her body.

“Kiss me.” She licked her lips, her dark gaze dropping to my mouth.

“What?”I asked, confused.

She tried to wiggle free, laughing. “Kiss me, you dumbass. I want you to be my first.”

She hadn’t been kissed before? She was almost my age. I was still a virgin, but I’d kissed plenty, made out, and even finger-banged two girls at a ski tournament last winter.

Plus, and more importantly—why me?

“You hate me,” I spit out.

“‘Hate and love are the same mistresses under a different mask.’ I once heard this phrase somewhere, and it made me think of you.” She smiled up at me, batting her lashes. And that’s when I realized what was happening. She liked the struggle. The fight. The games. She saw Doug and Miranda’s relationship and wanted to reenact it. What I saw as abuse, she viewed as passion.

My hand slid from her wrist to her neck. I put a little pressure on it. Not so much as to hurt her but enough to tell her I wasn’t messing around. I lowered my face to hers. Her eyelids fluttered; her breath hitched. Her stupid body caved in, muscles going slack, as she readied herself for a kiss. I leaned forward. My lips were a hair away from hers when I stopped moving, letting that last inch between us feel like an entire mile.

“You foolish, foolish girl. If you ever try to kill me again .?.?.” My grip on her neck tightened. “I’m going to break your pretty little neck, even if I’ll get locked up for it. Next time, you won’t be crying wolf—you’ll be eaten by it. Bones and all.”

Before I could straighten my spine and get the fuck out of there, she leaped forward, and her lips touched mine. She stole a kiss. It was sloppy and full of tongue and metal. It tasted like venom. Like alcoholic mouthwash and a girl I had no business wanting, but I wanted all the same.

“You taste like poison,” I whispered into her mouth.

She grinned, biting my lower lip real hard, until the metallic taste of blood exploded in both our mouths. “Maybe that’s how I’ll end up killing you.” She licked the blood off my mouth. “With kindness.”