Page 20

This chapter takes place before Duke goes to help her get ready for her date.

Baron is back the next day, and the next. He’s back with his brothers, and hyacinths and violets, and one Friday morning, a request. I listen for their footsteps now, dawdling at my locker if they’re not there when I arrive. I’m waiting, even if I don’t want to be. Anticipation increases my heartrate, as impossible as that seems.

He appears in the hallway with his brothers like usual that Friday. Instead of tucking a flower behind my ear, he whips a tulip from behind his back and holds it out with both hands, his thumbs like leaves on either side of the stem, his eyes luminous behind his glasses, his smile making him look bashful and hopeful and like he’s as full of this stupid fluttering feeling as I am.

“Go out with me.”

He asks me right there, in front of all three of his brothers. How can I say no with an audience? They’re all watching, waiting.

I duck my head and turn back to my locker. “People are staring.”

“So go out with me,” Baron says, leaning against the locker next to mine, his statuesque body draped against the wooden doors like a piece of art. “There won’t be anyone to stare when we’re not at school.”

“People will still stare,” I point out. “Unlike yours, my name is a burden I don’t just carry at school.”

“Oh, damn,” Duke says, pressing a fist to his heart. “Did we just get burned?”

I hide my smile as I reach into my locker. The next second, I’m yanked backwards. I yelp in surprise. My back collides with a wall of muscle, warm but hard as granite compared to any body I’ve touched before. I lose my breath. His arms snake around me, his chin angling against my neck. He’s tall enough that he has to stoop, so he’s not pressing his groin against me or anything sexual. It’s a playful hold, but his lips are hot as embers against the side of my throat.

“I’m not too proud to beg.”

I try to recoil, to shrink away to nothing, willing my body to turn to dust and collapse in a heap at his feet. “Carmen likes you,” I blurt out, struggling to form a thought and not scream and shed my skin to get him off me. “She’ll target me with her bully squad.”

“Already taken care of,” King assures me.

“How?” I ask, my throat tightening when I remember what she said.

Did Baron sleep with her to get her off his back?

“I’ll ask her out,” Duke says easily. “She won’t know the difference.”

“She just wants some Dolce dick,” Baron agrees, not bitter but matter-of-fact. “She doesn’t care which one of us gives it to her.”

“You’re too young,” I say, but there’s no conviction in my voice. I’m coming unglued, edging closer and closer to erupting like a volcano.

If I don’t freak out, he won’t know I’m a freak.

If I don’t panic, no one will know.

They won’t even look.

“Two years,” Baron says, swaying back and forth, his arms still around me. “When you’re seventy-five, I’ll be seventy-three, and our grandkids will think we’re both equally ancient.”

“We’re not having grandkids.”

“We might have grandkids.”

“We haven’t even been on a date.”

“I’m trying to remedy that.”

Finally, I can’t bear it another moment. Every cell in my skin is screaming in agony and revulsion, and he can’t even hear them. “Let me go.”

“Not until you agree to go out with me.”

“Our families would never allow it.”

“We’ll allow it,” King says.

“Mine won’t.”

“What they don’t know won’t hurt them,” Duke says.

“It could,” I whisper, thinking about that day Grampa sent me to his house to “water the new plant,” but when I got there, the plant was a boy tied to a chair, his eyes sunken and his lips cracked. A boy who looked just like all the other Dolce boys, indistinguishable to me then.

Now I’ve watched them for months, can tell even the identical twins apart, and when I look into this flirty boy’s face, I see that other boy’s face, the haunted eyes, the desperation. I imagine it was his voice turned ghostlike, a rasp on hot desert wind when he asked for water. I gave it to him because that’s what I was supposed to do, but when he begged me to untie him, I didn’t do that.

I didn’t do it because that’s not what Grampa told me to do, and he sent me for a reason.

I’m a girl who obeys, a girl who gets the job done. A girl who never tells.

Would it hurt Baron to know what I did, what I didn’t do? Or do they all already know? If they don’t, why hasn’t Royal said anything? If they do, why haven’t they said anything to me?

Baron’s lips are suddenly on my neck, jerking me out of my fantasy. His tongue is startling, hot and wet and alive against my skin. I almost scream. My shoulder rises like a blow, and I try to push him away, starting to struggle despite my determination not to draw attention. There’s a tug, a sharp sting, and then he pulls away.

I clap a hand to my neck, wheeling on him. “What’d you do that for?” I whisper-shout.

“You won’t be wearing my flower in your hair today,” he says, laying the tulip inside my locker. “You’ll wear my mark on your neck instead.”

“You bit me,” I hiss.

“A love bite,” he says with a smirk so adorable I have to fight to stay mad. “That way everyone knows you’re mine.”

“But I’m not yours,” I point out.

“Not yet.”

“You can’t just… Just…”

“Just what?” he asks, quirking a brow. “Claim a girl?”

“Yes,” I say, widening my eyes at him, my heartbeat still skipping and faltering.

“Except I did,” he says with a smile that says he knows he’s getting away with something.

“You don’t own me, Baron.”

“Except I do.”

“We haven’t even been on a date.”

“Tonight, eight o’clock,” he says. “I’ll pick you up.”

“No, you won’t.”

He just grins and shakes his head. “You’re mine now, Mabel Darling, and everyone knows it. Get used to it.”

He turns and ambles off with his brothers, humming a cheerful tune under his breath. As I look around, my heart begins to sink. He’s right. Even though I kept it together, everyone is looking. A few of them probably peeked between his brothers and saw him kiss me—rather, bite me. And they’ve been crowding around me at my locker every day. Everyone probably already thinks I’m with one of them, even if I’m not. And there’s not a damn thing I can do about it.

That’s how things work at this school—the perception of the general public is their reality. I’ve always worked hard to make sure it was never mine. But as I walk to class, I think maybe I’m not so different from everyone else. Maybe I’m not so special.

Because for once, their reality seems to have collided with mine. We are all in agreement. I was just claimed by Baron Dolce, and now I’m his.

Which might not be a problem if it weren’t for Royal. He’s already tried to murder my brother for nothing more than his name. A name I share.

But I share something more with Royal, something even Colt doesn’t know about.

I never tell, and I’m beginning to think Royal Dolce doesn’t either. But every time they show up at my locker, Royal looks bigger than the last time, harder, meaner. When he beats up my brother, I know the blows he deals are meant for me. I know that he remembers, even if he was delirious from thirst, even if what happened to him after I left is much, much worse, so horrible that he could have forgotten that morning visit altogether.

But he didn’t. I know, even though I drop my head in shame when he looks at me, so our eyes never meet anymore, so I never see that haunted look again, never have to see how much worse it is now.

I already see those eyes far too often. Not in his three brothers, who look so much alike, who have the same eyes as Royal, as inky dark as the depths of the deepest pit in hell. It’s the haunting that I’ve seen elsewhere, in my aunt, in my cousin who changed as much as Royal after that week. The same one I see every time I look in a mirror. The one I never, ever want to put in someone else’s eyes, especially not a boy as sweet and smiling as Baron Dolce.

i

This chapter takes place after Mabel & Baron have been on a few dates.

At lunch, I go straight to my table after filling my plate. Duke promised he wouldn’t embarrass me in the café if I went out with Baron again, and so far, he’s kept his word. But I notice more than a few glances cast my way as I slide into my usual spot. Ignoring them, I pick up my gyro.

“Hey, Mabel,” says Vanessa, the traitor.

“Hi.”

“I heard you’re with Baron Dolce now,” she says, watching me cautiously.

I don’t say anything because it wasn’t a question, and what she hears has no bearing on me.

She forks through her spring mix, glancing at me from the corner of her eye. “So, are y’all going out?”

“Right now, I’m eating lunch.”

“But are y’all dating?”

I think that over for a minute. How many dates qualifies as dating?

At last, I shrug. “I don’t know.”

She sighs like she’s running out of patience, like she ran out of patience for being my friend. “Is he your boyfriend?”

I think that over too. Again, I’m not sure how to answer her question.

“How would I know?” I ask.

She and Natalie exchange glances. Natalie goes here because her mom is a teacher, so I don’t think she’s technically a scholarship student, but she fits better at our table than with the rich kids. I’m pretty sure we’re related, but I can’t tell if she knows. It’s probably for the best if she doesn’t. I don’t like her.

I can tell Natalie thinks I’m stupid for my question, but Vanessa was my friend long enough to read my tone and know that I’m genuinely curious.

“Has he said it’s exclusive?” she asks. “Has he ever called you his girlfriend?”

I glance over at the empty Dolce table. “No.”

My eyes scan the café, since Baron delivered a crocus this morning, so I know he’s here. From my vantage point, I can see the four Dolce boys standing together in the food line, forming a little circle and shutting out the rest of the world. King has his back to me, and he’s blocking my view of Duke, but I get a side profile of Baron, his wire-rimmed glasses perched on his nose, his strong jawline and neat hair. I can also see Royal, who’s listening to something Duke is saying, while simultaneously scanning the crowded room, as if he’s expecting his next attacker to approach at any moment.

Instead, the slope-shouldered freshman who claims she’s Colt’s girlfriend makes her way up to the group. She brushes her hair out of her eyes and then taps on Baron’s shoulder. Royal knew she was coming, but I can’t tell if he tipped off his brothers. Instead of stepping aside and absorbing her into their circle, Baron does a one-eighty degree turn to face her. I picture myself in her shoes, imagine what it would feel like to be facing Baron Dolce with his three brothers at his back, in formation, as if they’re flanking him for an attack.

For a moment, I’m impressed. Then, as she talks, she touches Baron’s arm, nodding her head and tilting it slightly. I’ve observed enough people to guess she’s offering sympathy. He’s giving short answers, sometimes one word, but she keeps going. She touches his arm again.

And again.

My opinion about her begins to shift, as if against my will. I don’t recognize the feeling rising inside me like a boulder being pushed up a hill, threatening to crest the peak and roll down the far side, crushing me into dust. Or her. Or Baron. I can’t tell.

I don’t like all this emotion. Feelings this strong cloud judgment, make people do things they wouldn’t normally do, like they’re under the influence of alcohol or another drug. It’s the same way I feel about Natalie, but a thousand times more powerful. Natalie makes me feel things that have no basis in reality, as if she sabotaged my relationship with Vanessa so she could take my place. In truth, it was Vanessa who decided the pointy-faced redhead was a better choice of friend than me.

What if Baron decides Colt’s girlfriend is a better choice of girlfriend than me?

I want her away from him.

Why isn’t she walking away from him?

Why isn’t he telling her to?

I’m growing impatient. I clench my fist, imagine strolling casually across the room to join them. I’d sink my fork into the back of her neck, cracking apart her vertebrae, severing her spinal cord with the sharp tines.

If she’s Colt’s girlfriend, why is she touching his enemy anyway? What if Baron steals her from my brother to hurt him and shatter me, a stone that crushes the two remaining Darling siblings in its path in one fell swoop?

Dixie is nodding her head again, responding to something he said.

I don’t like it. I don’t like what she’s doing, or what he’s doing, or how it’s making my insides twist up into angry, hurt, complicated tangles. I try to talk myself out of it, the way I always do when I have irrational emotions, but it keeps brewing, the restless ocean churning in my guts, ugly as nausea. I picture Dixie turning around, slipping on some water on the tile floor. I picture her lurching forward, her head hitting the edge of a table. Her skull cracks and—

“You okay?”

I look down at the piece of celery in my hand I just snapped in two, then up at the girl who asked me. Natalie Fox, whose name fits her as if she were born from the union of a human and her animal namesake, something out of a fairytale.

I smile. “Yeah, fine.”

I drop the mangled celery stick and scoop some hummus onto a carrot chip. I wish we had spaghetti. I could picture winding Dixie’s guts around my fork, mopping up the saucy blood with them. Instead, I sneak a glance from the corner of my eye, over to where Dixie’s getting food now.

She’s probably never eaten a gyro before. Maybe she’s allergic to lamb, and she’ll swell up like a balloon, and when she walks by me, I’ll hold out my fork. Pop! She’ll go off like a bomb, splattering the whole café with gore.

She’ll never talk to Baron Dolce again.

I’m still picking at my food when someone plops down in the seat beside me. “I talked to Baron about your date,” Dixie says, her face flushed with excitement, her whole body perfectly intact.

I keep smiling to myself, picturing Royal walking up behind her, wrapping his hands around her neck, squeezing with all the fury I see in his eyes every day, until the red in her cheeks turns to purple, then blue. I wouldn’t watch her face change colors, though. I would hold Royal’s gaze the whole time, knowing his violence was meant for me.

“Okay, be mysterious,” Dixie says, laughing. “But he told me all about it. Are you excited to be going out with him again this weekend?”

I take a bite and chew. She keeps rambling on like we’re friends. Maybe she thinks we are. She said we’re like sisters, since she’s dating my brother. She must be the one who wrote that blog Carmen was talking about. Now she’s spreading more lies, this time to the girls at my table, who are quiet as they listen to the freshman chatter away.

I realize my smile gave her the wrong impression. She doesn’t know I hate her. That I’m smiling because I’m picturing her dead.

I don’t say anything.

I never tell.

But one day, she’ll find out.