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He pauses just before his heavy boots hit the outside. “To be clear, I didn’t want you here. This is Bishop’s plan to have you be a part of this.”
“Part of what?” I ask, keeping my eyes locked on his as I pass, my shoulder brushing against his chest. The patio is long and wide, stretching out far enough to hold multiple tables and chairs.
“The cafeteria for Riverside Prep,” Brantley says.
The chairs and tables are made from white marble, all carefully placed around the room. Something tells me there’s a certain pattern as to why they are placed the way they are. There are emblems on each tabletop, but I can’t make out the pattern or what it is. People are scattered down on the field that’s behind the patio, around a roaring bonfire that looks to be hovering dangerously close to being illegal. Music is playing from somewhere, a temporary bar set up to the side. How’d they manage to set all of this up while Tillie and I were in the classroom?
Brantley follows my line of sight to one of the tables. His mouth kicks up, his finger tracing the pattern. “This? Is so everyone at the school knows their family lineage. You know.” Brantley leans on a chair. “So no one fucks their cousin or anything.”
“What is this school?” I ask, my eyes finally coming back to his. I’m locked into him. He refuses to let me go, his grasp so strong I’m willing to be crushed by it. I find myself wondering if there has always been a forbidden intensity between him and me and I had just never pegged it. The stirring in my belly starts any time he looks at me, and that feeling doesn’t happen when I’m simply looking at anyone else.
Why Brantley?
Why someone so dark and illicit? To touch him in any way other than what is considered platonic would be a complete betrayal of my own soul. Brantley Vitiosis was not put on this world for anything soft, and that includes me.
He doesn’t get a chance to answer, because Bishop is jogging up the stairs, his focus on me. “You right?”
I turn just as he offers me a drink. “It’s juice.”
My fingers wrap around the Solo cup. “I don’t mind champagne.”
Brantley’s head jerks back, his mouth in a snarl. “And how the fuck would you know what champagne tastes like?”
“Tillie gave me some.” I shrug, sipping on the cold juice and licking the residue off the edge of my lips.
“Of course she fucking did,” Brantley growls, shaking his head.
Bishop laughs, pulling out one of the chairs tucked beneath the table and slowly lowering himself down, while his focus never wanes. “You wanna ask me anything?”
“Um.” My lips curl around my teeth, as if I’m afraid that if they’re free, my words will be as well.
He seems at ease. His legs are spread wide, his shoulders loose. I take this time to slip into one of the other chairs around the table, resting my cup on the top of my thighs with both hands around the cold plastic.
“How?”
Brantley is between us, leaning backward on the table. His arms momentarily distract me every time the veins pop from him squeezing the tabletop. The air among all three of us is tense, the angst potent enough to poison our hearts if we’re not careful.
Bishop leans back in his chair, swirling honey-colored liquid around in his glass. “My father, Hector, is your father. Your mother is Tillie’s mom.”
Walking into information you don’t know about is a little like walking into a room with no lights, and when people keep secrets from you, it’s a little like figuring out the lights don’t work. Then you’re in this dark room, with no vision, and you don’t know how to find your way back to where there was light. I don’t want to be in a dark room with no lights.
“There’s a lot you will come to learn about Hector and Katsia, none of which I think you will particularly like.” He shakes his head, taking out a pack of smokes from his pocket and placing one between his lips. He gazes up at Brantley. “Go grab her a bottle of champagne for this conversation.”
Brantley tilts his head back, the muscles in his neck tightening. “Fuck no.”
“She’s here with us, what the fuck you think is going to happen, and you damn well know that everything I tell her is going to be heavy.”
Brantley presses his thumb and index finger into his mouth, whistling out loudly.
Bishop laughs, shaking his head while flicking the ash off the tip of his cigarette. A young boy around my age jogs up the few steps to us. “You need something?”
Bishop grins. “Yeah. Abel, this is Saint. Saint, Abel.” Bishop turns his head to face Abel. “My half-sister, which makes her your half-sister.”