Chapter 5
FIVE
HARPER
So, Hot Boy Scout is my new stepbrother, and now I’m sitting side by side with him at the dining room table, with Silas and a grinning Helen opposite us.
The cat’s stashed upstairs in the closet. If she pees on the carpet in there, all the better. At least Sox has the right idea—hide until this nightmare is over. I left her with water and my hoodie to sleep on. The little monster seems to like fabric that smells like me.
“Want some more salmon?” Helen reaches out to gesture at the cooked fish. The table is full of food. “Or couscous?” There’s salad, too.
I just stare at her.
I’m officially in hell.
If only I’d gotten away with my little snatch and grab, I could be halfway to Selbyville on a bus by morning.
Why did I run like that? So stupid.
I just panicked, and the next thing I knew, I was eating grass with Silas pulling my hands behind my back like he’s the po-po. The nerve of his ex-con ass of all people treating me that way.
“I’d love some more, Mom,” Caleb says from beside me, holding his plate forward even though, like me, he’s still got most of the original serving of salmon intact on his plate.
He taps the edge of his plate four times before extending it—weird—and I notice his fork and knife are arranged in a perfect parallel line, exactly an inch from the plate’s edge.
God, even his table manners are uptight.
Caleb. That’s Hot Boy Scout’s name.
No, I pinch my thigh. It’s my stepbrother’s name.
My stepbrother, whom I am completely ambivalent toward and completely, one-hundred percent not attracted to.
I totally do not want to turn and lick up his neck because he smells so goddamn good.
What is that? It’s not the gallons of cologne most guys his age douse themselves in.
He just smells… masculine and lickable, dammit.
I only kissed him to snatch his wallet. I was only thinking about getting back to Z—I swear. As soon as he walked up, I couldn’t help thinking: easy mark.
Okay, that’s not exactly true.
When he walked up, I thought: shit, that boy’s even sexier up close. And he looks like an easy mark.
“So!” Helen claps her hands with the enthusiasm of a talk show host. “How was your first day, Harper? I can only imagine that starting at a new school senior year must be challenging.”
I shrug, focusing on the pattern in the tablecloth. “It was fine.”
“Just fine?” She’s still smiling with all her teeth. God, she’s trying so hard it’s physically painful to watch. I use my fork to poke at the fish. “Caleb said you’re in his AP English class. That’s wonderful! You two will have something to study together.”
Oh, we already studied together, all right.
I bite my bottom lip, remembering how his lips felt against mine.
I didn’t have to kiss him to lift the wallet. I’d wanted to. It was just a little harmless fun.
But then he kissed me like he was giving instead of taking, and his hands grabbed my waist in this desperate, worshipful way.
I already had his wallet in my hand. I should have been pulling away. Instead, I leaned in and started kissing him back.
I’ve never been kissed like that.
He made me feel like I was flying. I still feel light-headed.
Seriously, what the hell is it about how good he smells? I can’t help taking another deep inhale. Is this just a pheromone thing? Or am I close to my period? What the fuck?
I shift in my chair to grab my napkin.
And our knees bump.
Immediately, our gazes lock, and my stomach does two somersaults before I yank my gaze away. What in the actual fuck?
Was that—?
Did he actually just make me feel butterflies?
I glare at my plate and shove a forkful of couscous in my mouth. Little balls of grain bounce off my fork and past the edge of my plate.
I catch Caleb’s eyes tracking each piece that falls—three on his side, two on mine. His jaw tightens like he’s in physical pain, his hand already moving toward his napkin before I even register the mess.
Caleb and I reach out at the same time.
It’s like a little bolt of lightning going from his fingertips into mine.
My chair jolts back from the table, and I shoot to my feet, all the confused, explosive feelings in my chest erupting.
“Oh!” Helen immediately stands up, too. “Is there something you need, honey? I’m happy to get it. I hope you know how happy your father and I are that you’re here—”
“Is that why he waited until I was almost eighteen to remember I existed?” I bark in my father’s direction. “Because he was so excited to have me?”
Caleb stiffens beside me. I can hear his breathing—it’s gone weird. Controlled. Like he’s counting. Three counts in, hold, three counts out. His hand grips the edge of the table, knuckles white.
I’m immediately humiliated at my outburst, but this is who I am, isn’t it? The girl who can’t hold her temper. Just like Darlene. I know the truth; I’m doomed to repeat my mother’s mistakes in life, to a one. She had shit taste in men, too.
“Harper, that’s enough,” Dad snaps, and there it is. The edge in his voice that used to make my stomach go sour when I was young, because I knew it meant he and Mom were about to have another blow-up. She could scream so loud, I always swore it’d peel the tin right off the roof of the trailer.
“Enough?” I laugh, and it sounds harsh even to me.
“I’m just getting started. You want to talk about family?
Let’s talk about how you abandoned me with Darlene and her parade of handsy boyfriends.
Let’s talk about how I learned to make mac and cheese when I was seven because there was no one else to feed me.
Or when I was twelve and you got thrown back behind bars instead of—”
“I said enough!”
Dad’s voice explodes across the dining room, loud enough to rattle the china. Helen flinches. Caleb goes completely still beside me, and I can feel the tension radiating off him in waves.
For a second, I’m eight years old again, watching Dad scream at Mom while she tries to explain why she just snorted all the rent money up her nose.
Helen makes a small, wounded sound.
Caleb stands up, forehead creased like he’s in pain as he looks at his mother. His hands open and close at his sides—twice, three times, like he’s trying to reset something.
“Harper, please—”
But I’m already moving, snatching the fish up in the fancy cloth napkin and storming out of the dining room. I take the stairs two at a time, and my face burns as humiliated tears burn down my cheeks.
I feed Sox tiny bites of leftover salmon on the floor with my back to my bedroom door. She purrs so loud I can feel the vibration against my palm.
“We’ll have a beautiful life one day,” I coo to her. “We’ll fly away from here and have a beautiful life, I swear it.”
Sox headbutts my chin, and I laugh despite the tears still wet on my face. At least somebody’s glad I’m here.