“Say it, O,” I challenge, widening my stance as my fists clench by my sides. “I. Dare. You.”
The last time we went at each other, my older brother, Owen, packed around a black eye for a solid two weeks. It was dark and garish looking, never once turned into a putrid yellowish-green, and the girls in Golden Oaks wouldn’t even come close enough to sniff around his junk.
News travels fast in a place like Golden Oaks, so by lunchtime, after he’d told me what had happened, everyone freaking knew the events that happened surrounding my and Harloe’s elusive breakup.
No one would give him the time of day, let alone jump in the sack with him. He ribbed me about it for weeks about it and tends to bring it up every now and then now like he’s trying to play on my conscience.
News flash: you have to give a shit before you can have a conscience.
Plus … fuck him. He deserves a hell of a lot more than what I gave him.
A commotion down the hall captures our attention. Our youngest brother waltzes into the kitchen with a cigarette stuck between his teeth—well, a marijuana cigarette—and nearly rips the fridge door off its hinges. “What’s good, motherfuckers?”
“Mom will shit kittens if she sees you smoking, let alone doing it in the house.” Owen dismisses me altogether. Good. Wasting my time on a piece of shit wasn’t exactly in my plans for the day.
There’s a reason for that, too. Owen dropped our conversation like a hot potato because he knows how fucked I get over the topic. He knows nothing good will ever come of opening that can of worms again.
We may tease around the edges, possibly flirt with the idea of more.
Hell, we may even get off within spitting distance.
But we never, ever flick that lid all the way open. That shit is like Pandora’s fucking box, and we all know what happened there.
Complete and total chaos.
Emmerson’s lips tug up at the sides as he flashes us both a mischievous look. “All the more reason to do it.”
There’s something about Emmerson that most people don’t know. Actually, I’m almost certain no one—except little con, of course—knows about.
Emmerson isn’t really our blood brother. I know, I know—how can he be a Prince, right? Well, long story short, our aunt—mother’s side—had a little accident and went to heaven. She’d been trying to get clean for a while, and nothing was doing the trick. Not even the thousands of dollars my dad wasted trying to get her sober, it just never took. After her death, Emmerson’s biological dad didn’t want him. Said he didn’t need the reminder that his love—the woman he cheated on every chance he got, so obviously, she must be his true love—was no longer here, and he couldn’t bear looking at the child they made together. And the rest, as they say, is history.
We got a new brother, and Emmerson was surrounded by people that love him. But, on the other hand, he has his genetics—he loves pissing our mom off, just like his mom did.
Shaking my head, I push off the wall and start toward my room. “Rebellion isn’t your style, Emmer.”
I hear him squawk behind me, probably about to say something stupid, and it causes a chuckle to fall from my lips as I climb the stairs. It’s never boring when Emmerson is around, I’ll tell you that. He’s the life of the party. Even with the starting of his life being as ominous and dreary as it was, he never let that get him down. He’s a true survivor in all aspects of the word.
When I get to the top of the steps, I heave out a sigh and make my way to my room. Shoving open the door, I slam it with a jerk and cringe at the mess laying in front of me. All over the room, there are clothes, dirty and clean, strewn across any available surface.
Usually, I’m a neat freak—a person in need of control in all things that matter in his life. But since I’ve been spending most of my time this summer either getting high, drunk, or lost between Cassandra’s thighs—sometimes, all three—I haven’t been home much. Maybe to shower, and then toss on some new clothes before I’m gone again.
Moving. Nonstop. That’s what I’ve been doing. And I can’t put it on pause or bring myself to try. Distraction is what I’ve needed since sophomore year, and while I’ve been doing a surprisingly good job up until now, something tells me that nothing will be able to be enough again. Especially if she decides to stay at Golden Oaks Uni.
No. She can’t stay. Don’t give a damn what her situation is, she needs to leave. Stay gone just how she has for the last three years.
Yes, I may have pushed her to leave by my actions, but in hindsight, she shattered me first. While it may have been petty to retaliate the way I did, I couldn’t let her know her actions broke me as tremendously as they did.
I’m a hollow shell filled with rage and hurt, and she’s the motivation for my beautiful façade.
Fake, flirty, and profoundly fucked up.
That’s exactly what I am, and the game I have to play in order to survive without hurting.
Harloe will never see underneath the hatred. She will never know that, while she was within arm’s length today, my very cracked soul bled as it yearned to be pieced back together by the one who hurt it the most. That I thought about what she’d feel like pressed up against me with her luscious new curves as I wrapped her thick, wavy locks around my fist.
Seeing her for the first time after three years nearly unmanned me. Harloe has been the only girl to evoke such raw, animalistic feelings. No other girl could ever compare to her. Not even the girl who’s been under me, in more ways than one, since that night.
I lost myself a long time ago, and never really wanted to find my way back. Harloe was my guide, my anchor, and for the past three years, I’ve been drifting around in a sea of lust, confusion, and a deep-seated need to make her pay for her actions.
Closing my eyes tightly, I can’t help it when the fake, conjured images reappear behind my eyelids. For every image, a knife pierces my black heart. Over and over, I do this to remind myself that nothing is perfect. No person is ever exempt from betrayal.
A knock at my door pulls me from my reverie. Turning, I watch as Emmerson opens the door, taking one look at me, then steps inside and shuts the door behind him. He shakes his head sadly while leaning back against the door.
“Even after all this time, you can’t let that girl go.”
“Stuff it, Emmer,” I growl out, then resume what I came in here to do.
Trudging my way toward the closet, I toss the doors open and grab my duffel. It’s not like I need anything since I can travel back and forth on the weekends. Just some clothes, my school supplies, and a little of this and that, then I’ll be golden to get the fuck out of this house and away from the ghosts that haunt me.
“Bro, we’ve been over this a thousand times. She was playing you. She played the family. After what she did, you shouldn’t want anything to do with her.”
I shake my head, grunting, “I don’t.”
Grabbing a pair of jeans I haven’t seen in years, I tug them toward me. But something else falls out and drops to the ground, causing me to stop. My brow furrows as I toss the jeans in my bag and then bend down to retrieve the fallen object. Upon closer inspection, my blood runs cold.
The small, threadbare bracelet practically melts in my hands when I run my fingers over the strands. It’s the same homeless-looking bracelet that she made me our ninth-grade year—for our first anniversary because she had no money to buy me a present. I remember telling her that all I wanted was her and I’d be the happiest man alive. But she came carrying a bracelet with five beads on it.