Chapter Forty-One
One week passes;another begins.
No change.
I’m nothing and nobody. A ghost. In my dorm, across the campus, even in my classes—my teachers avoid my eyes, ignore my questions. I stop bothering to attend dance after my first attempt, which ends in me running back to my dorm still dressed in my leotard, driven nearly to tears by the icy silence in the once-cheery dressing room. The only time I find any semblance of peace is during my morning jogs along the tree line, before the rest of the campus is awake.
Harper tries to help, but there’s only so much she can do. No matter how much she insists otherwise, I can’t stop feeling like a burden—I know my presence brings her mood down, even though I save the worst of my tears for my little stuffed lamb.
I just wanted to be normal.
How could I mess it up this badly?
Is it all because of Ryker? It has to be—there’s no one else who could be at the center of all this. It crosses my mind once or twice that the Order is somehow responsible—that they found out I stole the invitation, and this is their demented way of punishing me—but that doesn’t make sense with the whole campus being involved. And besides, social isolation seems pretty mild for their tastes. Never mind the fact that I would rather undergo physical torture at this point.
But I won’t give in. Even without the mortal threat of the Order, I wouldn’t leave the school—wouldn’t give Ryker and the rest of them the satisfaction. I’m here for a reason beyond the desire to fit in. Not even Ryker can take the Order away from me.
Yes, I want to be normal—but the truth is that I’m not. I’m a lot tougher than anyone could possibly expect. I’m going to survive this.
No matter what.
“Here’s what I’ve decided,” Harper declares from my bed late Wednesday, contemplating a piece of candy corn. Her mother sent her a whole family-sized bag—I tried a piece when she offered it, but can’t get myself to understand the appeal of what seems to be clumps of sugared wax. Maybe I would have liked them as a kid, but candy of any type never factored into my father’s way of raising me.
“What have you decided?” My books and laptop are open on my desk, but I haven’t really been working since Harper invited herself in. She’s distracting me, and I don’t really mind it all that much. Her loyalty to me has been unwavering, even when it earned her the disdain of some of her fellow sorority sisters. Not all of them—she claims that Rashel, at least, is taking no part in “Ryker’s bullshit,” though I haven’t seen any proof.
She pops the candy corn into her mouth, chews, swallows, and immediately takes another piece from the bag. “I’ve decided that we’re going to the GODs’ Halloween party.”
No. Absolutely not. “Harper?—”
“I know, I know, but hear me out. At this point, he thinks he can control you. He thinks he’s won his stupid little game.”
“Maybe he has.” I’m exhausted at this point, barely more than an empty shell. I just want to make it through the semester.
“Nope. You and I both know damn well that you’ve got fight left in you, so don’t even try to deny it.”
I twirl my hair around a fingertip, and Harper laughs triumphantly.
“See! That’s the thing you do when you don’t know what to say. No talking your way out of this. Look—it’s a win-win scenario. Either people ignore you and the two of us just have fun on our own—while taking advantage of their booze, obviously—or they make a fuss out of it and derail one of the year’s biggest parties for your sake—thusly earning your revenge.”
“I don’t know whether ‘revenge’ or ‘thusly’ is the worst part of that sentence.”
“Okay, not revenge, maybe. But, you know… a little satisfaction, at least.”
She’s making a decent point, even if I’m reluctant to admit it. The whole situation seems like a recipe for disaster, but when I really think about it, I’m not sure exactly what frightens me about it. I don’t really need any company other than Harper’s to have a good time. And it’ll send a message—show Ryker that he can’t beat me down. That nobody can force me back into the isolation where I spent the first eighteen years of my life.
The loneliness that’s engulfed me over the past week and a half has been a thousand times more crushing than my father’s neglect, but it can’t go on forever, right? If I just keep up my usual routines, ignore them and continue to exist with some semblance of normalcy, maybe they’ll lose interest. I can’t fix whatever’s happened with Ryker, but the rest of this has got to blow over eventually.
“Okay,” I say.
Harper squeals with delight, almost spilling her candy corn as she scrambles off of my bed and rushes over to give me a hug. “Fuck yes! That’s what I like to hear!”
“You’re crushing me,” I protest, but I can’t keep myself from smiling. Her earnest enthusiasm is one of the sweetest things I’ve ever witnessed. It’s not like she needs me—if anything, being seen with Crimson Elite’s most infamous student might put her own reputation in danger, not to mention her position with Omega Phi. But that’s not stopping her.
“No time to waste!” she declares when she pulls away. “Party’s on Friday, which means we only have two days to plan our outfits.”
“Only you would need two days to plan a single outfit,” I say with a giggle.
“As if! Y’know prom, that big dance at the end of high school?”
“I’ve… heard of it.” I guess I didn’t know it was a dance, strictly speaking. “I thought it was more of a party.”
“Dance, party, same thing.” She waves a hand in dismissal. “In high school, they’re both just excuses to make out and get drunk. But prom’s, like, the big one. It’s super special, and girls will plan their outfits months and months in advance. I had a—friend—who knew what she wanted to wear since sophomore year.”
I don’t miss the way that her voice catches on the word friend. Considering how much better than me she is at all of this social stuff, it’s easy to forget what she told me when we first met—how she was never especially popular at her old school. It makes her willingness to be seen with me all the more generous.
“This may not be prom,” she continues, “but it’s a GODs party, so like, close enough. Halloween is when things get a little more risqué, so showing more skin is totally an option.”
That doesn’t sound like any Halloween that I’ve imagined. “People dress up in costumes, right?”
“Kids dress up in costumes. Adults… just dress up.” She wiggles her eyebrows suggestively. “I mean, sure, you can always throw on a pair of cat ears or something if you want to have fun with it. But trust me—sexy is the name of the game.”
Trust me.
Those words land more heavily on my ears than they once did. In my months at Crimson Elite, I’ve learned that trusting the wrong person is one of the most dangerous things you can do.
But I do trust Harper. More than anyone.
“Okay.” I stand up, cross over to my closet, and throw open the doors. “Where do I start?”
It takes some trial and error, but Harper’s wisdom doesn’t let me down. When Friday night rolls around, she’s worked her magic to a whole new level.
I feel hot.
My reflection in Harper’s full-length mirror is nothing short of stunning. “A smokeshow,” as Harper dreamily describes it. Dark, glittering eyeshadow. Sharply penciled brows. Metallic wine-colored lipstick that gives me a slight perpetual pout. My usually straight hair sits atop my head in a pile of golden curls, exposing my neck and throat.
But the star of the show is my dress.
It took a while for us to settle on red. At first, I worried that it would be too close to the color of our uniforms, but Harper promised to make it work—and, after a trip to Willow’s Boutique, she proved herself absolutely correct.
The lace of my dress is dark and luxurious, almost black when it’s out of the light—but when the light does catch it, it gleams with a deep, sensual scarlet. The back is open, showing off my toned shoulders, and a triangular window cut into the bosom flatters my breasts like nothing I’ve ever worn before. Its skirt is long, almost ankle-length, but with a generous slit that makes it easy to expose a long bare leg.
“You’re literally so hot,” Harper groans. “That is the perfect revenge dress. I look like a total wannabe next to you.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. You look amazing.”
She really does, though I have trouble looking at her; the skimpy pink getup, accentuating all of her generous curves, reminds me a bit too much of the waitress outfits from the Diamond Court. Thankfully, she’s also sporting a headband with a pair of rabbit ears, which makes the association a bit less unsettling.
“Well,” she says, twirling around, “it’s good to know that we like our looks. Who cares if anyone else does? We’re doing this for us, damn it. Fuck ’em all.”
“Fuck ’em all,” I repeat, and immediately bring a hand to my lips. I’ve never said that word before in my life… but when I’m looking like this, it just feels right.
“You dropped an F-bomb!” Harper cheers, pumping her fist. “I never thought I’d see the day! Now I know tonight’s going to be great. Okay, okay—vodka shots first, and then let’s get out of here.”
I take two shots, swallowing them one after another, and reach for a third before Harper’s hand closes over mine.
“You don’t want to go too fast,” she warns me.
“I had five that other time…”
“Over the course of two hours. Toss them back all in a row, and you’ll just throw them right back up—which feels like shit, ruins your makeup, and wastes perfectly good alcohol.”
I give the bottle a yearning glance; she tugs at my wrist.
“Come on, there’ll be more booze at the party—let’s go!”
Within a couple of minutes, I decide that she definitely made the right call—my head spins a tiny bit when the elevator descends, and I have to press a hand against the wall to stay steady. Maybe I should have eaten more today. My stomach has shrunk over the past few weeks, since Harper only has the time to bring me meals once or twice a day—but my alcohol tolerance hasn’t adjusted, even if my appetite has.
As a matter of fact, I feel a little sick… though I’m not sure whether I can blame that on the vodka.
Ryker’s going to see me like this. Before everything changed, I would have been euphoric at the thought. Now, though? I don’t know. I don’t dare to hope that I’ll win him back just by looking good—and I hate the fact that I even want him back, after everything he’s put me through. I don’t—can’t—shouldn’t still have feelings for him. Feelings aside from disgust and revulsion, anyway.
Whatever. It’s like Harper said. Fuck ’em.
That thought sustains me as we leave the dorm and cross the field, Harper chattering away all the while… but when we reach the threshold of the GODs house, the nausea returns with a vengeance.
“You okay?” Her hand tightens on mine as she darts me an anxious look, lips pressed tightly together.
“I’m… fine.”
The old carriage house is even bigger than I remember it, pulsing with music. Orange and white lights strung across its front give it an eerie glow that I don’t like very much.
“It’s okay to not be fine, you know.”
I shake my head. Okay for her, maybe—but I need this.
“I’m good. Let’s do this.”
Half of me expects something to shift as soon as we step inside—a sudden silence, all the partygoers freezing in place to cast their revolted eyes in my direction—but nobody seems to notice me at all. It’s not that they’re pointedly ignoring me, either—just wrapped up in their own conversations, their own dances and drinks. I’m part of the crowd. Nothing special in a good way or a bad one. I almost want to stay here in the entry hall, just soaking up the atmosphere, but Harper’s tugging me into the common room?—
And there he is.
Draped across his leather throne, just as he was the first time we ever made eye contact. Wreathed in smoke, his features harsher than usual under the flashing party lights that line the walls. His legs are spread, his knuckles white where he grasps the arms of the chair…
And there, sitting in his lap, is Marissa.
Wearing the most revealing black dress I’ve ever seen in my life.
Calling it a dress doesn’t even feel right. More like a tangle of silk ribbon that barely keeps her from being nude, as insubstantial as a spiderweb—and just as repulsive. One of her arms hooks around his shoulder, and she leans in to murmur something in his ear, making an all-too-obvious effort to keep her nearly bare breasts in his line of sight.
I’m—stunned. Speechless. My face prickles, lips numb, and I have to remind myself to keep breathing—my lungs are suddenly full of rusty nails.
How? Why?
Why?
He must feel my eyes on him, because he looks up?—
—Locks his stare with mine?—
—And goes very, very still.
Ryker…
Marissa, sensing his distraction, follows his gaze, and her expression sours as though she’s swallowed a tablespoon of straight vinegar.
“What the hell,” she shouts, her voice overwhelming the music and the crowd, “is that whore doing here?”
She’s calling me a whore? Dressed like that? The sudden, wild urge to laugh builds in my throat—but the sound that comes out is closer to a sob.
He’ll say something. He has to. He can’t let her talk to me like that…
Someone switches off the music, and I realize that all the conversation has stopped.
Everyone is looking at me.
Come on, Ryker, say something…
“Get the fuck out,” he growls, his arm tightening around Marissa’s waist. He doesn’t need to raise his voice; it’s silent enough to hear a pin drop in here. “You aren’t fucking welcome here.”
“Stop.” My voice cracks. I can feel Harper tugging at me, can hear her whispering in my ear that the two of us need to get the hell out of here—but I’m rooted to the ground. Heart pounding. Mind blank. “Ryker, please. Stop this.”
“Your mother,” he says—calmly, evenly, without a trace of passion—“is lucky that she died before she could see you like this.”
No words. No thoughts. I’m in free fall.
“Standing there,” he continues, “dressed like the slut that you are. Acting like this… sleeping around, groveling at the feet of people who you don’t even deserve to speak to. Nobody wants you here. You disgust me, you disgust all of us—and if your mother is watching from beyond the grave, I’m sure that you fucking disgust her as well.”
No more. Please, no more. Every word from his lips is poison, and it’s building in my blood, overwhelming me, growing lethal. I wish I had never put on this stupid dress—I must look like an idiot, like a little girl who got into her mother’s makeup drawer.
He doesn’t speak again?—
But Marissa does.
“So your mother’s dead? No fucking wonder.” She pulls herself closer to Ryker, threading her leg between his thighs. “With a daughter like you, who could blame her? I bet she did it to herself. Just so that she wouldn’t have to spend another day looking at the mistake she created.”
My vision flashes white.
“Lia,” Harper half-sobs in my ear, “please, let’s go, let’s get out of here?—”
Something snaps inside of me, and I run.
To the hall, out the door, across the field. Hot, furious tears burning down my face; lungs spasming in breathless sobs.
Followed all the way by Marissa’s horrible, gloating laughter.