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“Well the bar is stocked.” I nod to the kitchen. “Help yourself.”
She slides both hands behind her back and arches it, sticking out her chest. “Looks like you could use one, too. Come with me?”
I scan the sea of guests gathered in the entry. There’s even more people here now, and the house looks like it’s going to bust at the seams. “I’m good.”
“Are you looking for someone?” she asks casually. “Little sister, perhaps?”
The skin on the back of my neck pricks as I turn back around. “What was that?”
“Oh come on.” She rolls her eyes. “You were the cock block of the century to that girl when we were in school.”
I like the nerve of this chick. I haven’t seen her since we were in high school and she’s going to start with me about how I treated Ellery back then?
Now I remember why she was forgettable. She was nosey as fuck, and always making snide comments. “I’m not looking for anyone.”
She pushes up from the wall and places a hand on my chest. “Want to change that?”
I look down at her hand, wondering when she got the impression it was okay to touch me, and when I look back up, find her eyeing me with a suggestive smile.
“Not gonna happen,” I give her a cocky smirk and grab her hand, yanking it off me. I did my time with her type in high school and don’t plan to ever again.
“You know,” her eyes harden, “if you had eased up on your sister in school she wouldn’t be such a wild card now.”
I shake my head and let out a dry laugh. Here we go. From vixen to viper. They were all the same when they didn’t get their way.
“The only thing I ever did to Ellery was keep the sharks away. And I don’t think being a fan of grunge classifies one as wild.”
“Sharks?” She arches a curious brow.
“Sure,” I reply as casually as I can, while looking at her pointedly. “Elitist assholes and entitled snobs threatened by a girl that was younger, and better than them in every way.”
While the guys at Elmhurst sniffed around Ellery, the girls were another story. They were ruthless to any that was richer or prettier. Seeing as Ellery ticked both of those boxes, there was no telling what they would’ve done had I not been there.
“You mean your friends?” Miriam laughs. “Because if memory serves, you were at the center of that power clique.”
She’s right. I was. At first it was to get what I needed. But when I saw the way things worked at Elmhurst, it had a largerpurpose—to keep the focus on me and away from Ellery.
It was hard work, keeping the guys away and the girls at bay. I had to go on dates that thrilled me about as much as a cardboard box and pretend to be into that rich boy bro bullshit. Popularity was not something I’d ever cared about, but I immersed myself in it, just to keep all of them from sinking their claws into her.
“I get it.” Madeline sticks out one hand and examines her perfectly manicured nails. “I mean, with her father gone Ellery needed someone to look after her. And with her mother too busy searching for her next husband, who better to do that than her swarthy new stepbrother.”
She flashes me a smile that is vicious and conniving and tells me who she was back in school, is exactly who she still is.
Well, if that’s how she wanted to play this, then game on. No one talks about my family and gets away with it. And for better or worse, that is what Ellery and her mom were.
Saffron had been good to my dad and me, and Ellery and I may not be together now, but that didn’t mean I stopped caring about her. I would always have her back, whether she wanted me to or not.
“You know, Madeline…” I place my hand on the wall next to her head and lean in.
“Miriam,” she corrects.
“I don’t fucking care.” Her eyes narrow as I lean in closer. “It seems to me there is something you want to say. So why don’t you save us both the time and just say it.”
“Well, all right.” She licks her lips as her eyes dart back and forth. “I guess I’m curious.”
I place my other hand on the side of her head and she flattens her back against the wall as I cage her in. “About?”
“Well…” She lifts her chin so she can look me in the eyes. “How you would feel if I told you that sweet princess you wereso keen on protecting when we were at Elmhurst, is anything but that now?”
