“I’m not doing this. I don’t want to join the Junior Debutant’s League.”
At my words, my mother’s face went bright red with anger, but before she could berate me, Bonham interrupted.
“Mrs. Livingston, if I may?” Bonham asked, before pulling his phone out and typing something. “Maybe I could convince her?”
Mama looked between us for a moment, wondering if she should send Bonham away and make me run til I puked. But his boyish charm and influential last name won in the end. “Yes, of course. Please talk some sense into her,” she huffed before leaving the room.
Once she was out of sight, Bonham turned around and headed for the front door. “Where are you going? I thought you were going to convince me?” I asked in disbelief, but still, Bonham didn’t respond. Something wasn’t right.
Then, he opened the front door, revealing an angry Rogue waiting on my doorstep. “Her mom’s gone. Do your worst,” Bonham said with a grin before going outside.
I stood there with my arms crossed over my body as I stared at Rogue. It had been a long couple of days, but I liked knowing that I’d seen him more this weekend than I had for the past several months.
“You giving Bonham trouble, Scar?” he asked, before coming inside.
He looked around my house with the same familiarity on his face that I’d had when I walked into the Kelly Estate last night. I wondered if he was looking at the hutch in my mama’s sitting room and remembering how we used to hide behind it.
I replied with a shrug. “Not anymore than usual.”
Rogue walked into my kitchen and opened the fridge, cringing when he saw the various bottles of juice. Mama was doing a cleanse again, which meant I was suffering alongside her. “Do you have anything edible here?”
“Nothing you’d like,” I replied. “What are we doing Rogue? Why all the games? You have me where you want me. You have the…” I lowered my voice after watching to make sure Mama wasn’t listening. “...evidence you need. I know it was you. I know you told Bonham to get his mama to invite me to be a Junior Debutante. What I can’t figure out, is why? You should want me to leave.”
He just shrugged unapologetically. “I want you close. I want to make sure you don’t get any funny ideas,” he said, before pulling carrot juice from the fridge and unscrewing the cap. After sniffing it, he wrinkled up his nose and went to pour the orange liquid down the drain. Mama spent forty-five dollars on that shit. It felt kind of good to see it go to waste.
“And exactly how close do you want me, Rogue?” I asked, keeping my voice light, but giving him a look that meant more than my words could convey.
“Stop looking at me like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like you have the upper hand.”
I smiled at that. I was making him uncomfortable. Good. I stepped closer and he braced his back against the kitchen counter. “I’ll stay. But I have some conditions.”
At that, Rogue Kelly laughed. His face was full of humor and the chuckles resonating through his muscular chest were so hard that his shoulders bounced. “Conditions?”
Tilting my head to the side, I pressed closer, just enough so that my hips were against his, and my chest lay on his stomach as I looked up at him. That familiar heat warmed me from within, and I knew that if he shifted his knee between my thighs, he’d feel how wet I was. “I want back in. You want me here? Fine. But I’m in with you guys again.”
A look of surprise, then fury, crossed his features. “I told you, you’re done.”
“That’s fine. I can be done behind closed doors. I’m not going to beg to be your friend for real, when it’s clear you don’t want me. But these fights are starting to really inconvenience me. I’m tired of being Smith Academy’s punching bag. I want the Heir’s protection. Out of school, you can go back to thinking I’m a nobody. You can push me away. Pretend I don’t exist. But the bullying stops now. It’s looking bad for my mama, and I’m not going to keeping holding back.”
“You can’t be in,” Rogue replied, a genuine look of disappointment on his face before he grew angry again. He grabbed my hips so he could have the upper hand, and pulled me forward before bending over to whisper in my ear. “I don’t think I could pretend to like you, Scar. It would be too difficult.”
Twist that knife, Rogue. Make me bleed.
“But,” he began, while pulling away. “I can work behind the scenes to make things a little easier on you. No one will mess with you. Just...stay. Do this stupid Junior Debutante thing. I get to keep my eye on you, and you don’t have to move to fucking Switzerland. We both win.”
“Fine,” I choked out, hating the distance between us. I was getting lost in his dark eyes, and it made me sick. Bonham was right. I was just like the other Heir Chasers.
“Cotillion classes start tomorrow afternoon,” Rogue said, before leaning in once more to whisper his threat across my skin, “see you there, Trash.”
Chapter Sixteen
“And then I got a picture of her dressed to impress.”
I heard Stephanie’s nasally voice before I rounded the corner to get to my locker. There she was with her group of Heir Chasers, her back perched against my locker. Of course.
She flashed her phone to show the screen to her little friends, and they giggled and gave each other knowing glances. I already knew it was about me before I approached. Stephanie wasn’t exactly subtle. She liked her jabs to be obvious.
When she noticed me, she perked up and elbowed the girl next to her. “Look who it is! Trash Whore herself.”
I rolled my eyes and stopped right in front of her. “Get away from my locker, or I’ll punch you again, and this time, Rogue Kelly won’t be here to save you.”
Her cocky expression faltered for a second, and this close, I could see the concealer caked over her eyes and cheeks, covering up the bruises that my fist left. A satisfied smirk came over me.
“You can’t touch me,” she spat. “Besides, I’m just showing everyone how good you looked Friday night after the Heirs dealt with you.”
She showed me her phone triumphantly, and on the screen, I saw a picture of me heading down the stairs, the trash bag still on my body. She must’ve been waiting for me, taking it before I had the chance to rip it off my body.
“Don’t worry. I already posted it. You’ve already got over a thousand comments,” she said, smirking like a little shithead.
My blood boiled and a good dose of shame was mixed in, but before I could decide if I wanted to kick her in the cunt, I heard a masculine voice behind me.
“Stephanie.”
She looked over my shoulder, and her eyes lit up. “Bonham!” She pushed past me to walk over to him, but when she tried to touch his arm, he shrugged her off.
“Your phone,” he said, holding his hand out.
With a frown, she handed it over.
Bonham started tapping on the screen in silence, and Stephanie watched, more and more anxiety bleeding into her. When he finally passed it back to her, she frowned. “What did you just do?”
“That photo was taken at an Heir party. You know I control the rumors in this school,” he said, making her cheeks go pink. “This shit could look bad on us. We don’t want people knowing trash came to our party.”