19. Mackenzie
It’s onlyat the last minute that I remember my coffee date with Camile.
“Shit,” I cry, leaping off the couch, where I’d been lying with the guys in a tangle of arms and legs. My head had been on Tino’s lap, my torso on Kirill’s, while Dom played with my feet. I remember how he was with those pumps he’d bought me and wonder how much he’s into that kink.
“What’s wrong?” Tino asks with a frown.
“I promised I’d meet Camile for coffee.” I check my phone. “I need to be there in ten minutes, and I still have to change. I can’t go like this.”
I gesture at my little ‘fuck-me’ outfit of the short skirt and heels. I knew exactly what I was doing when I chose these clothes. I’m sure the guys appreciated them, but I doubt Camile will feel the same.
“Want us to walk you back to your room?” Kirill offers.
I flap a hand, telling him to stay. “No, I’ll be fine. I just have to hurry.”
Dom gets to his feet, his expression serious. “Don’t rush. She’ll understand if you’re a few minutes late.”
I really don’t think she will, but I appreciate Dom seeming concerned for me. Is this going to be a new side of him? The protective side? I hope so.
“I’ll be fine, but I have to go.”
Tino pouts. “We’ll miss you. Will you come back after you’re done?”
“I don’t think so. I don’t know how long I’m going to be, and I really need an early night. I’m beat.” I also don’t want Camile to feel as though I’ve got my mind on something—one someone—else, wanting to be somewhere other than with her.
“Maybe we’ll have to watch that film Tino took of the two of you together while you’re gone,” Kirill suggest.
I poke a finger at him. “Don’t you dare. That only gets watched on my say-so from now on.”
He winks at me. “You are being a spoilsport. It makes me hard.”
I can’t help myself. Laughter bursts from my lips. “I’m not sure many others would find that a turn-on.”
He keeps his gaze on me. “When you are involved, everything is a turn-on.”
I let out a groan, so close to saying ‘fuck it’ and climbing back on the couch with them all. I know they’ll give me a good time, even if I am still sore from earlier. I picture myself dropping to my knees and taking turns sucking each of them for only a few seconds each time, moving between them like a taster at a lollipop stand.
I shake the thought from my head. What the hell are these men doing to me?
“I have to go.”
I spin on my heel, not giving them another opportunity to convince me to stay as I’m pretty sure they’ll win. Their shouts of ‘no, Mackenzie, stay’ chase me down the corridor, and I press a smile between my lips.
I clip-clop down the corridor and up into the main part of the school, and then to my room. I tear off the slutty clothes, heels included, and throw on a pair of sweatpants and some sneakers. I yank my hair up into a high ponytail. I look far more presentable now. Realizing that I must smell of sex, I rush into the bathroom and liberally apply some perfume and a touch of neutral lipstick to try to disguise my swollen, red lips.
It only takes me a few minutes to get down to the cafeteria. There’re a few people around, and I force myself to keep my chin up but don’t make eye contact. Camile is already waiting for me, and I experience a pang of guilt for considering dumping her for the guys. I really am a shitty friend.
“Hey,” I say. “I’m not late, am I?”
She smiles. “No, I just got here early.” She gestures to a couple of takeout cups on the table. “I got our drinks to go. I hope that’s okay. I thought we could take a walk. It’s a lovely evening.”
“Sure, that sounds good.”
I pick up my coffee and sip. Hazelnut latte. She got my favorite. I shoot her a smile, feeling affectionate toward her, and together we head outside. She was right—it is a beautiful evening. The sun is just starting to set, casting the sky in a watercolor of orange and red. It highlights the beauty of the trees around us. The fall leaves are almost at the end of their turning, some already having lost their grip on the branches and falling to the ground. I can’t imagine what it’ll be like out here during the winter months.
Instinctively, we put as much distance between ourselves and the gothic building of Verona Falls as we can. We reach the perimeter, a tall chain link fence running as far as the eye can see to our right, and walk slowly, companionably. I’m grateful to the heat of the coffee to keep my hands warm.
“How’s things between you and your mom?” Camile asks.
I shrug. “I guess as good as they can be.” I try not to think about her threat to set Nataniele on me. “I can’t see us ever getting back to the way we were, though.”
A wave of sorrow sweeps through me. I’ve lost so much over the past twelve months. My mind instantly bounces to the Devils. Have I gained something, too? No, this…thing…has no potential to last. We’re just having fun; that’s all. Using each other to our own gain.
She gives a small smile. “You’ll find your way back to each other. Maybe it won’t be exactly the same, but you may find yourselves with a new kind of respect for one another.”
“When did you get so wise?” I ask.
“I’ve been there, remember? I think I was about twelve when I realized my father’s”—she makes little quotation marks in the air with her fingers—“import and export business wasn’t the same as other people’s parents’ jobs. There were always strange men in and out of the house, and my mother would get anxious when these men had meetings with my father. We kids would get hustled into the living room and told to be quiet, or else. I kind of thought that was how everyone lived, but then the government started taking interest in my dad and his business, and all of a sudden it was all over the news. Kids at school were talking about how he’s a gangster, and then my friends’ parents suddenly wouldn’t let me play with them or allow them to come over to my house. I had no idea what was going on, and I asked one of my brothers. He laughed at me and said the men who were in our house all the time were criminals, and that Dad was one too. I called him a liar, and he told me to Google some of the names of the men, and ours, too. I did, and that’s when I realized he was telling the truth.”
“Shit, Camile, that must have been hard.”
She shrugs. “I felt humiliated. I hated that everyone else already knew, and I didn’t. They said they were trying to protect me, because I was young, and a girl, but it didn’t feel that way.”
I offer her a consolatory smile. “I know exactly what you mean.”
She continues to walk and talk. “But I get it now. I’m an adult. I wouldn’t want little kids to know the ins and outs of this business either.”
I guess that’s the difference between us—I’m an adult, but no one had trusted me with the truth.
I take a sip of my coffee, appreciating the warmth and the caffeine. I probably shouldn’t be drinking it this late in the day, but I haven’t been sleeping great anyway, so I can’t see what harm it’ll do.
“And how have you been feeling?” she asks. “No more seizures?”
“No, I’ve got everything under control.” Is that really the truth? “I’m feeling much better.”
“Good. Let’s keep it that way.”
I clear my throat, trying to work up the courage to ask the question that’s been burning away at me ever since I saw her with the Vipers in the hall.
“How about you?” I ask. “How’re things?”
“Same as usual. Nothing too exciting goes on in my life.”
“You sure? I thought I saw you earlier with those twins from West House.”
Her cheeks flare pink. “Yeah, Louis and Mattheo Laurant. They were just giving me shit. They do it to everyone.”
I cock an eyebrow. “They stick their hands up everyone’s skirts?”
“You know what I mean.”
“Have they been hassling you in particular, though? Do you want me to see if Dom and the others will talk to them?”
Her head snaps toward me. “God, no. The last thing I want is to become some little tug toy between all of them.”
The thought of being a toy makes me think about how the Devils keep referring to me as their doll, and now it’s my turn for my cheeks to color.
“Okay, I understand. It was just an offer. But you’ll say something if anything gets worse, won’t you? Dom’s the dean’s son, after all. He does have some sway in this place.”
She gives me a half smile. “That’s cute, Mackenzie. Like he’s going to be able to tell the Vipers what to do. You think the Devils are bad…well, let’s just say no one wants to mess with these guys either. You know the type of people who come to Verona Falls. Everyone here comes from some kind of criminal background. None of them take kindly to being told what to do.”
Her words fall around me like leaves.
On the other side of the chain link fencing, something moves.
My heart jolts, and I draw to a halt. “Did you see that?”
Camile stops with me. “See what?”
I’m sure I caught sight of a figure stepping behind the trees.
It’s almost dark now, and I peer into the expanse of woodland beyond the university’s perimeter. It seems endless, and I have a sudden strange sense of claustrophobia, as though the trees are all pressing in on me. My pulse is too fast, and my palms have grown sweaty, though they have nothing to do with the cup I’m holding.
“I—I’m not sure.”
I’d swear I sense the weight of someone else’s gaze on me.
“It was probably deer,” she says. “Or even a bear, but don’t worry, they can’t get through the fencing.”
I draw a breath and nod. “Sure, of course. Just my imagination playing tricks on me.”
We keep walking, but I can’t get the thought of the shape of the person slipping behind one of the trees out of my mind. Though I should be focusing on Camile, I find my head turning in the direction of the fence, studying the rapidly darkening forest behind. Do careful footsteps echo ours?
There are guards who patrol this place with dogs, but the perimeter goes for miles. They’re probably right across the other side of the grounds right now. If anyone is out there, the dogs will scent them, won’t they? A person would have to be an idiot to go up against big, scary dogs.
A part of me wants to move away from the outskirts and head deeper into the sanctuary of Verona Falls, but I’m worried if I do that, I’ll miss something important. Maybe another glimpse of the figure. Or a sound. I want to run, but I also am desperately trying to find the bravery to stay and keep on peeking into those dark trees in a vain attempt to see something.
“Are you okay?” Camile asks. “You’ve gone quiet.”
I can’t tell Camile my true fears. She doesn’t know I tried to kill a man, and that now there’s a good chance he’s out there somewhere, looking to take his revenge on me. Maybe I should confess. She’s my friend, isn’t she? Don’t friends share things? I think how upset she would be if she found out that the Devils knew and she didn’t. Our friendship might not come back from that.
I draw to a halt once more, and then turn to face her and take her free hand in mine. “I have something I need to tell you.”
Her expression drops, and she lets out a groan. “It’s not about them again, is it?”
I know exactly who she means by ‘them.’
I shake my head. “No, it’s not. It’s about something that happened before I even got to Verona Falls.”
She raises her eyebrows. “Tell me.”
I know doing so is a huge risk, but Camile is from a criminal family. I doubt she’d go running to law enforcement with this information. So, I fill her in on all the sordid, twisted details of my life before I came here, watching her expression morph and warp with each new turn of the story. I imagine she’ll see me in a new light after hearing all this. I’m not some innocent princess the Devils decided to corrupt. I had a history before I came here. I’d conducted an affair with an older man for a year, and then, when he tried to push me too far, I stabbed him in the neck. Maybe I’d been na?ve to a lot of things, but I’m not completely innocent either. Like Mom pointed out, I’d been lying to everyone for a very long time.
Camile’s dark eyes are round. “Oh, my God, Zee. I can’t believe you’ve never told me this before.”
I scuff my foot on the ground. “It’s hardly something you lead with when you’re meeting new people. Besides, I’d been hoping it was all in my past, and I could leave it there. Now that I know Paxton is still alive, he’s very much in my present.”
She peers over my shoulder, toward the fence line. “Is that why you were so jumpy just now? You thought it might have been him?”
I shrug. “I guess. I was just overreacting. There’s no way he can find me here, and besides…” I pause and take a deep breath. She’s going to hate what I say next, but if I am laying my cards on the table, I have to be fully honest. “I’ve got the Devils protecting me.”
She stares at me, her lips pinching in that way she does when she disapproves of something, particularly related to them. “Is that what they’ve promised you? That they’ll protect you? They put you in the hospital.”
“They didn’t mean to. That was an accident, and it was partly my fault for not telling them the truth about my condition. You told me I should tell more people, and you were right.”
Her expression is still mutinous.
I sigh. “Look, Camile. I know they aren’t nice men.”
She scoffs. “To say the least.”
“I get they’re bad people, and emotionally, they may not be the healthiest choice, but I promise you, I can handle them. I think I’m figuring out ways to deal with them, and in the meantime, if they offer me protection, I have to take it. My choices are to stay here or leave. Staying means they won’t leave me alone. I can’t leave. So why not … why not turn it to my advantage? But knowing they aren’t nice guys who are going to give me a picket fence, a Labrador, and two kids.” I straighten my shoulders and lift my chin to show I mean business. “I’ve got my eyes wide open, Camile. I’m using them as much as they are using me.”
This seems to placate her, and we start walking again.
On the other side of the fence comes the crack of a foot hitting a twig. Despite what I’ve said, my heartrate skyrockets, and I suck in a breath.
It’s nothing, it’s nothing, it’s nothing.
“You okay?” Camile asks again.
She clearly hasn’t heard anything. I’m overthinking things, my ears straining for unusual sounds, reading things into nothing. I’m paranoid, understandably.
I shiver. “Yeah, just getting a bit cold.”
“Let’s go inside. I could murder a cheeseburger.”
She catches my expression and winces.
“Sorry,” she says. “Bad choice of words.”
I laugh and loop my arm through hers. “Let’s go eat.”