Feigning boredom, I crossed my arms and leaned one hip on his doorframe. I stared out his window, knowing tears would appear in my eyes if I looked directly at him or Georgia.

“His league?” I mocked. “I’m not even playing the same game. I don’t play dirty.”

“You will, once I push you far enough,” Vicious snapped, his tone flat and humorless. It felt like he clawed my guts out and threw them on his pristine ironwood floor.

I blinked slowly, trying to look blasé. “Textbook?” I asked for the two-hundredth time.

He must’ve concluded he’d tortured me enough for one day. He cocked his head sideways to a backpack sitting under his desk. The window above it overlooked the servants’ apartment where I lived, allowing him a perfect view directly into my room. So far, I’d caught him staring at me twice through the window, and I always wondered why.

Why, why, why?

He hated me so much. The intensity of his glare burned my face every time he looked at me, which wasn’t as often as I’d like him to. But being the sensible girl that I was, I never allowed myself to dwell on it.

I marched to the Givenchy rubber-coated backpack he took to school every day and blew out air as I flipped it open, rummaging noisily through his things. I was glad my back was to them, and I tried to block out the moans and sucking noises.

The second my hand touched the familiar white-and-blue calc book, I stilled. I stared at the cherry blossom I’d doodled on the spine. Rage tingled up my spine, coursing through my veins, making my fists clench and unclench. Blood whooshed in my ears, and my breathing quickened.

He broke into my friggin’ locker.

With shaking fingers, I pulled the book out of Vicious’s backpack. “You stole my textbook?” I turned to face him, every muscle in my face tense.

This was an escalation. Blunt aggression. Vicious always taunted me, but he’d never humiliated me like this before. He’d stolen my things and stuffed my locker full of condoms and used toilet paper, for Christ’s sake.

Our eyes met and tangled. He pushed Georgia off his lap, like she was an eager puppy he was done playing with, and stood up. I took a step forward. We were nose to nose now.

“Why are you doing this to me?” I hissed out, searching his blank, stony face.

“Because I can,” he offered with a smirk to hide all the pain in his eyes.

What’s eating you, Baron Spencer?

“Because it’s fun?” he added, chuckling while throwing Georgia’s jacket at her. Without a glance her way, he motioned for her to leave.

She was clearly nothing more than a prop. A means to an end. He’d wanted to hurt me.

And he succeeded.

I shouldn’t care about why he acted this way. It made no difference at all. The bottom line was I hated him. I hated him so much it made me sick to my stomach that I loved the way he looked, on and off the field. Hated my shallowness, my foolishness, at loving the way his square, hard jaw ticked when he fought a smile. I hated that I loved the smart, witty things that came out of his mouth when he spoke in class. Hated that he was a cynical realist while I was a hopeless idealist, and still, I loved every thought he uttered aloud. And I hated that once a week, every week, my heart did crazy things in my chest because I suspected he might be him.

I hated him, and it was clear that he hated me back.

I hated him, but I hated Georgia more because she was the one he’d kissed.

Knowing full well I couldn’t fight him—my parents worked here—I bit my tongue and stormed toward the door. I only made it to the threshold before his callused hand wrapped around my elbow, spinning me in place and throwing my body into his steel chest. I swallowed back a whimper.

“Fight me, Help,” he snarled into my face, his nostrils flaring like a wild beast. His lips were close, so close. Still swollen from kissing another girl, red against his fair skin. “For once in your life, stand your fucking ground.”

I shook out of his touch, clutching my textbook to my chest like it was my shield. I rushed out of his room and didn’t stop to take a breath until I reached the servants’ apartment. Swinging the door open, I bolted to my room and locked the door, plopping down on the bed with a heavy sigh.

I didn’t cry. He didn’t deserve my tears. But I was angry, upset and yes, a little broken.

In the distance, I heard music blasting from his room, getting louder by the second as he turned the volume up to the max. It took me a few beats to recognize the song. “Stop Crying Your Heart Out” by Oasis.

A few minutes later, I heard Georgia’s red automatic Camaro—the one Vicious constantly made fun of because, Who the fuck buys an automatic Camaro?—gun down the tree-lined driveway of the estate. She sounded angry too.

Vicious was vicious. It was too bad that my hate for him was dipped in a thin shell of something that felt like love. But I promised myself I’d crack it, break it, and unleash pure hatred in its place before he got to me. He, I promised myself, will never break me.

Ten Years Ago

IT WAS THE SAME OLD shit, different weekend, at my house. I was throwing another balls-out party and didn’t even bother to leave the media/gaming room to hang out with the assholes I’d invited.

I knew what kind of chaos was teeming outside the room. The snickering and screaming girls in the kidney-shaped pool at the back of the house. The gurgles of the artificial waterfalls pouring out of the Greek arches into the water and the slap of rubber, inflated mattresses against bare, wet skin. The groans of couples fucking in nearby rooms. The mean-ass gossip of cliques crashing on the plush loveseats and sofas downstairs.

I heard music—Limp Bizkit—and who the fuck had the balls to play Lame Bizkit at my party?

I could’ve heard all the rest too if I wanted to, but I didn’t listen. Sprawled out on my Wing Lounge chair in front of the TV, thighs open wide, I smoked a blunt and watched some anime Japanese porno.

There was a beer to my right, but I didn’t touch it.

There was a chick on her knees below my seat, on the carpet, massaging my thighs, but I didn’t touch her either.

“Vicious,” she purred, inching closer to my groin. She slowly climbed up, straddling my lap.

A tan nameless brunette in a come-fuck-me dress. She looked like an Alicia or Lucia, maybe. Tried to get onto the cheerleading squad last spring. Failed. My guess was this party was her first taste of popularity. Hooking up with me, or anyone else in this room, was her shortcut to celebrity status at school.

For that reason alone, she was of no interest to me.

“Your media room is rad. Think we can go somewhere quieter, though?”

I tapped the head of my blunt, the ash falling to an ashtray on the arm of my chair like a flake of dirty snow. My jaw twitched. “No.”

“But I like you.”

Bullshit. Nobody liked me, and for good reason.

“I don’t do relationships,” I said on auto-pilot.

“Like, d’uh. I know that, silly. No harm in having some fun, though.” She snorted, an unattractive laugh that made me hate her for trying so hard.

Self-respect went a long way in my book.

My eyes narrowed as I mulled over her offer. Sure, I could let her suck my dick, but I knew better than to believe her indifferent act. They all wanted something more.

“You should get out of here,” I said, for the first and last time. I wasn’t her dad. It wasn’t my responsibility to warn her about guys like me.

She pouted, linking her arms behind my neck and scooting up my thigh. Her exposed cleavage pressed against my chest and her eyes burned with determination. “I’m not leaving here without one of you HotHoles.”

I arched one eyebrow, exhaling smoke through my nose, my eyes hooded with boredom. “Then you better try Trent or Dean, ’cause I ain’t fucking you tonight, sweetheart.”

Alicia-Lucia pulled away, finally getting the hint. She sashayed to the bar with a fake smile, that crumpled with every step she took in those high heels, and fixed herself a bullshit cocktail without checking what liquor she poured into the tall glass. Her eyes were shiny as she scanned the room, trying to figure out which one of my friends—we were the Four HotHoles of All Saints High—was willing to be her ticket to popularity.

Trent was slouched on the couch to my right, half-sitting, half-lying as a random chick grinding on his cock, straddling him with her shirt pulled down to her waist and her bare tits bouncing almost comically. He put the beer bottle to his mouth and dicked around on his phone, jaded. Dean and Jaime sat on a loveseat on the other side, arguing about next week’s football game. Neither of them had touched the girls we’d summoned into the room.

Jaime, I understood. He was obsessing over our English teacher, Ms. Greene. I didn’t approve of his new, fucked-up fascination, but I’d never say a word about it to him. Dean, on the other hand? I had no idea what his problem was. Why hadn’t he grabbed an ass and sprung into action like he normally did.

“Dean, dude, where’s your piece of pussy for the night?” Trent echoed my thoughts, scrolling his thumb over the wheel on his iPod, surfing his playlist, looking desperately uninterested in the chick he was fucking.

Before Dean could answer him, Trent pushed the girl on top of him away mid-thrust, patting her head gently as she tumbled onto the sofa. Her mouth was still open, half in pleasure, half in shock.