Letter Fourteen #3
“Because of the terrible thing I did to Michael Harris at my birthday party.” I avoided his gaze by peering at a picture of him and his parents on the bookcase. “Sometimes, I also get the feeling he thinks I’m a little too much like my mom.”
“What was she like?” Willoughby asked softly, walking closer. “She disappeared when you were little, right?”
“Yeah.” I stroked my finger down one of his lacrosse trophies. “She left when I was a baby. My dad says she was horrible and cruel, and we’re better off without her.”
“I don’t think you’re horrible or cruel.”
I turned my gaze in his direction. “Even though I attacked Greer with my serves and got him kicked off the tennis team?”
“I’m sure Greer did something to deserve that.”
“He won’t leave me alone.” I shivered, thinking of the way he’d grabbed my arm. “He creeps me out.”
“Want me to make him leave?”
“No, that’s okay. He’s already pretty mad. That would only make it worse.”
Willoughby moved closer, dipping his head to meet my gaze. “You know I like you, right?”
“I like you, too.”
“Oh, I remember. I’m nice,” he deadpanned.
“You are nice, and I like that. You don’t ignore me or treat me like a freak like the rest of our school—but you did hurt my feelings over the summer when you rejected me.”
Willoughby reached out to stroke one braid. “I didn’t mean to reject you—just the way you approached me. I felt like we had a connection, but in the moment, it felt like…you were only there to get something from me and leave. I didn’t mean to hurt you. I’m sorry.”
I shrugged. “It’s okay.”
“I heard you left with Michael Harris that night.”
I lifted an eyebrow. “So?”
“So what’s the deal with you two?”
“I don’t know what you mean,” I said, but I knew exactly what he meant.
“Everyone at school thinks something’s going on there—or they used to, anyway, back when Michael was at school with us and you two hung out in the library all the time. They figure a guy wouldn’t stick so close to the girl who stabbed him unless he was in love with her.”
“We’re friends.”
“What about all those ugly notes you slipped into his girlfriend’s locker?”
“Wasn’t me,” I said.
Willoughby laughed. “Elliot, multiple people said they saw you.”
I laughed, too. “You shouldn’t believe every rumor you hear at school, Willoughby.”
“Well, if I believed the rumors I’m hearing right now, I’d believe Casey’s in love with you.”
I laughed again, but on the inside, my heart had leapt into my throat. “That’s ridiculous.”
“Is it? Everyone talks about it. How close he sits next to you at tennis practice? How he watches you? How he looks at you in general?”
“That’s his job—to keep an eye on me. To keep me in line.”
“I don’t know. I’ve seen him picking you up from school and dropping you off. I think maybe he’d also like to keep you for himself.”
My chest crackled with excitement, but I forced myself to tamp it down. “Why do you throw so many parties?”
Willoughby stared past me. “I hate how quiet it is here when my parents are gone.”
“Are they gone a lot?”
He nodded. “Practically every weekend—most weekdays, too. They don’t care what I do.
As long as I keep my grades up, they don’t give a shit.
So I fill the house with people and loud music.
I spend their money on booze. Having the house full of people makes me feel less alone, even if I only stay in my room. ”
Don’t be mad at me for thinking this, Casey, but I wanted to tuck this cute boy in my pocket and hold him there forever. Don’t pretend you wouldn’t have felt the same way if the circumstances had been different.
“You stay in here by yourself?” I asked. “While everyone else parties?”
“Not the whole time. Rory and some of the other guys hang out in here, too.”
Willoughby’s life sounded lonely and sad. As much as I hated how overbearing my dad could be, I’d hate it way more if Nic stayed gone most of the time and barely paid attention to me at all.
I stepped close, then raked my hands down Willoughby’s chest. He captured my mouth with his.
And before long, he shuffled us back to the bed, where I pushed him against his headboard and straddled him.
While we groped at each other (ha!) and kissed, all I could think about was Michael, hurt so badly he couldn’t face either one of us.
And you—the things people were saying about you at school.
Impossible things.
Willoughby and the others had it wrong. They weren’t seeing a guy in love.
They were seeing the type of guy who watched a sport he hated because it made his brother happy.
Who made celery snails for the sole purpose of making a sick girl smile.
Who couldn’t stand the thought of someone feeling trapped or snubbed or hurt.
They didn’t know you well enough to realize: that’s just the way you were. A good guy who cared deeply about the welfare and happiness of others. Too good, that is, to ever fall in love with someone like me.
Later, I snatched my phone off Willoughby’s nightstand and checked the time. 10:36. We talked a bit longer before I shoved my way downstairs to find Tinsley, bodies bumping against mine from all sides.
When I couldn’t find her downstairs, I shoved my way up to the second floor again—past a werewolf and a dead cheerleader making out, past Harley Quinn and a slutty Snow White, past a sexy red devil and Donald Trump—and checked the bathrooms next.
I walked in on some guy snorting something up his nose, but Tinsley wasn’t there, either.
I’d paused on the third floor landing to text her when Greer approached me. “You looking for Tinsley?”
I drew back. “Yes. Have you seen her?”
“Sure have.” Greer pointed to a closed door past the landing, right across from Willoughby’s room. “She’s in there.”
“Doing what?”
Greer leaned close. “Come and see.”
Something in his pale blue eyes caused a chill to race up my spine, but I slipped past him and went to that room, anyway, only to discover that the door was locked. Greer knocked three times, and Rory answered. That should’ve been the first red flag.
To the left of Rory’s arm, I spotted a neon yellow heel dangling off the bed. Without thinking, I shoved him out of the way.
Tinsley’s corkscrew curls covered her beautiful face.
She lay curled on top of a white duvet, fast asleep.
I brushed the hair from her eyes, shook her shoulder, and told her to wake up.
She responded by mumbling something incoherent, eyelashes fluttering against her warm brown skin, her head lolling to the side in a way that made it clear: she wasn’t just asleep.
She was fucked up. I swiveled to face the boys.
“What the hell, Rory? Did she get into the punch?”
My heart dropped as Greer turned the lock on the door. I gripped my phone.
Rory lowered himself onto the edge of the bed. “She’s had more than punch.”
“I don’t understand,” I said. “What else did she have?”
Greer walked toward me, both hands casually stuffed in his pockets. “Don’t worry. We just slipped her a roofie. She’ll sleep it off in a few hours.”
Fear sliced through me. I slowly moved toward the door. All I could think was: I needed to get help. Needed to open that door and scream.
But Greer caught me with his arm, wrapping it across my chest. He twisted me around, my back to his front, his hot breath tickling my ear. “Don’t run off. Where’s the fun in that?”
“Let me go,” I said, digging my fingernails into his arm. “Let me go, or you are so screwed.”
I felt the rumble of Greer’s laughter against my back. “No, you’re screwed. And you owe me an apology.”
I kept clawing at him—to no avail. He was too strong. Too big. “I’ll never apologize to you.”
“We’ll see about that,” he whispered in my ear.
Desperate, I lowered my head and clamped down my teeth on his arm. Even through his shirt, it must’ve hurt like hell, because he yelped and threw me to the floor.
My phone went flying as I landed on my hands and knees.
A second later, he yanked me up by the collar of that bodysuit and slammed his fist against my face, the blow rattling my teeth.
Everything went fuzzy-black as I knelt low to the floor and moaned without thinking.
Sadly enough, this was exactly the level of pain I’d craved since hurting Michael.
Greer squatted down next to me, his elbows on knees, his hands dangling. “What are those sounds you’re making, Bancroft? Do you like that?”
I slowly lifted up to meet his gaze, and what I found there unnerved me. His pale blue eyes, burning bright with the terrible knowledge.
Of me.
My secret.
That dark flame, deep inside me.
He saw it. Wanted to play with it. Wanted to see how much tampering it could take.
“Interesting,” he said darkly.
I inched back, trying to get away.
Greer grabbed me by the back of the head, his fingers twisting in my hair, and I gasped. “You weren’t lying, were you? You really are fucked up. This is dangerous.”
“Let go,” I said through clenched teeth.
“Okay.” He dropped me—but so roughly I landed on my forearm. He stood and stepped back. “Get up.”
I stared at him, deliberating. How successful would I be at kneeing him in the balls on the first try?
“Get up, Bancroft. Show me what you’re capable of.”
But fear paralyzed me. What if I tried getting past him and he knocked me out? What, then?
What was he capable of with me unconscious?
“What’s wrong?” he asked, taunting me. “You’re tough, right? Or is that only when there are people around and you have a weapon at your disposal?”
My nails pushed into the rug beneath me.
Greer jutted his chin at me. “Rory, get her up.”
Rory slid off the bed and grabbed me by the arm, but I reached out with my free hand, clawing the shit out of the bare skin above his shirt sleeve.
“Fuck!” Rory yelled. He released me and sprang back, eyes flashing as he came at me again, and I cowered—I cowered, Casey, how pathetic is that?—but he didn’t hit me like Greer had. He kicked me instead, the toe of his sneaker colliding with my ribs, knocking me into the nightstand.