Chapter 9 Yara
YARA
In the sea of bad ideas, this one might have been the worst one I have ever had.
My heart crawled into my throat the moment we started approaching the clearing where several different cars sat, surrounded by people I didn't know.
Some of them I have seen at school, but most of them would've never spared a glance my way, and I liked it that way.
I liked the fact I was invisible most days, unless Xavier and his goons tried to bring attention to me.
But mostly I was left alone.
I was hoping I'd be able to maybe see Violet or Noah, since they were the ones who told me about this thing, but in the myriad of faces staring now at the approaching car—at us—I couldn't see them.
I should've insisted on going back home when Xavier showed up at the club. I should've ignored him, instead of coming here with him.
Xavier was the guy everyone wanted. Hell, he was the guy most of these people wanted to be, and I felt like a lamb walking into the slaughterhouse, ready to offer my neck to all these vipers.
Some craned their necks from where they stood, further away from us, trying to see who it was that dared to drive with Xavier motherfucking Thornton.
I was putting a target on my back and judging by the sneers appearing on the faces of a couple of girls we passed when they saw me in the passenger seat, there would be hell to pay first thing in the morning.
I just hoped I'd be able to play this off as a fluke, another way for Xavier to humiliate me.
Easier said than done, especially because he still held my hand in his as if he was afraid I would somehow jump out of the car. I could feel him glancing my way every now and then, but I didn't dare looking in his direction.
I had a feeling if I even glanced his way I would forget why all of this was such a bad idea.
True, we didn't grow up together, but our parents were married.
We were living in the same house, for fuck's sake.
We were step siblings in the eyes of the law.
I shouldn't even be entertaining the idea of Xavier being hot, not to mention everything else we already did.
But one look at him, one touch, that was all it took for me to forget all the reasons why we shouldn't be doing any of this.
Deep down I knew Xavier wouldn't be harmed by this.
His family would be safe, but what about me?
I was a nobody here. Just a daughter of a woman that snatched one of the most eligible bachelors in town.
I kept my head down because I knew what these people thought of me, not that they mattered.
The first chance I got to get out of here, I would be taking it, but I didn't want the stain on my name.
Most of all, I didn't want my heart broken. I didn't want to fall for the one man I shouldn't even be looking at.
"Breathe, Yara," Xavier said, squeezing his hand around mine, but it was easy for him to say. He grew up around these people. He knew how to play the game.
He knew what to say, what to do, how to get them to fall in line. Me? I had nothing.
I didn't want to play any games. I didn't want sneers directed at me because the golden boy of St. Bipal's decided he wanted me. I wasn't a fool. I saw what happened to women who dared to even think of fitting into the world of rich and powerful.
My mother was one of those women. Hell, I was one of those women purely because I was related to her, and because my father belonged to one of the most powerful families in America.
They didn't want me. They wanted nothing to do with my mother, and when my father realized he wouldn't be getting a cent of his inheritance if he stayed with us, he abandoned us, leaving me with an unstable woman who was already far too bitter at the world and who already blamed me for his disinterest.
Thank God I didn't have any siblings. I had enough of my plate trying to figure out the way for me to get out.
"It's gonna be okay."
"I know," I said, letting the lie roll over my tongue with ease I didn't know I possessed.
"I'm just your stepsister." I looked at him, noting the furrowed brows and the thunderstorm rolling through those eyes.
"I'm no one, Xavier. You brought me because we live in the same house. That's it, right?"
Oh, he didn't like that. He didn't like that one bit.
He pulled me closer to him, pressing his forehead to mine while my neck burned from the grip he had on me as he wrapped his long fingers there, squeezing, punishing me for the words I pushed out.
His nostrils kept flaring as if he was trying to compose himself, but I needed him angry.
I needed him to lash out at me. I needed him to protect me, but I knew he would never understand where I was coming from.
He thought that the world revolved around him, because he never had to stand on the sidelines, watching as life passed by.
"Are you trying to piss me off?"
No. I wanted nothing more than to wrap my arms around him, to show him how much I wanted him, how much his words earlier affected me, but since he stopped on the side of the road less than half an hour ago, I couldn't stop thinking about the consequences.
He was the forbidden fruit, and I didn't want to recreate the story of Eve and an apple. He was the thing I could never have, and the sooner I put a stop on this madness, the better it would be. Not just for me, but for him as well.
I shook my head, trying to pull back, but he wasn't letting me. "They're watching, Xavier."
"Let them." His eyes opened and the hand on my neck moved toward my throat, caressing me as if he wanted them to assume the worst. As if he wanted them to see he wanted me. "I want them to know who you belong to."
"No." I shook my head again. "You say that now, but trust me—" I took a deep breath, "—you don't mean it."
He opened his mouth, no doubt ready to fight me on this, when the knock on his side of the car came from the window, effectively breaking us apart.
Xavier turned around in his seat and looked up right at the grinning Caleb whose eyes danced with mischief and lips moved rapidly as he was saying something neither one of us could hear.
The moment Xavier let go of me, I knew I had to get out of here. I had to get out of this car, from him, from the possibilities I saw in his eyes. From the future I could already picture, because Xavier wasn't mine. No matter what he said, he would never be mine.
Fairytales rarely happen for people like me, especially with someone like him. Someone who shone brighter than a supernova and someone who would one day marry one of these girls glaring at me as I exited the car, ready to attack me for even daring to breathe the same air as him.
"Yara!" Xavier called out for me, but I shut him out as I closed the doors of his car, stalking away from him, from the heartache waiting for me in his arms.
I had to stick to my plan, and figure out the way to get out of this town faster.
No matter what she said, I knew that my mother would never let me have even a cent of the money my father had left me.
I had to take care of myself. God knew no one has ever deemed it necessary to actually ask me what I wanted, what I loved, what I needed, and Xavier Thornton would be just another person in the long line of people who thought they wanted me, only to realize that there was something better, something shinier waiting on the other side.
I could hear him talking with Caleb, but I ignored the anger lacing his words. I ignored the stares on my back, or the girls smirking as I passed them. I ignored the whistles and the catcalls as I walked further into the crowd, toward the two cars parked not too far from me, and kept walking.
The tears I wouldn't dare shed gathered in my eyes, but I pulled them back, locking them tight into that little chest I kept for these things.
I locked them together with my hopes and dreams. I locked them with the tears of the little girl who only ever wanted her dad to call her, to love her, to show her she mattered.
I locked them with the grief of a ten year old Yara when her mother told her no one would ever love her because she was nothing.
I was breaking my own heart, but I would rather break it now than later when I wouldn't be able to walk away from him.
Xavier maybe thought he knew what he was talking about. Right now, he might even think that he really wanted me, but in reality, he only wanted what he couldn't have. Hell, maybe this was his way of punishing his father, and I was too tired of life to be a part of yet another game.
A hand wrapped around my upper arm, stopping me immediately, and just as I turned around, ready to fight whoever it was, I was met with the green pair of eyes and the concerned look on her face.
"Violet," I barely breathed out when she wrapped her arms around me, squeezing me tightly as if she knew that this was exactly what I needed. "I thought you weren't here."
"I'm here, babe. I'm here."
The need to break apart was there, but not in front of these people. Not in the middle of the viper's nest where they all waited for me to do something that could have them laughing even harder behind my back.
I lifted my head, looking over her shoulder, my eyes clashing with Xavier's.
There were a thousand questions written there on his face.
There were a thousand reasons why he wanted to come to me, to hold me, to show me off, but I shook my head just as he took the step forward, halting him immediately.
This wasn't his fault, not really. I was the one who sat in that car.
I was the one who wanted to push his buttons.
I was the one who invited Ryder right in front of him, because I knew he wouldn't be able to resist.
Now that I had him, now that I got what I wanted, I was running, because I was a coward. I was a motherfucking coward whose heart and mind warred daily, with neither one of them prevailing no matter which tools they used.