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After drying off and getting dressed in a pair of jeans and a Henley style shirt, I pick up my phone, and my heart skips a beat.
From Grigoriy:
Fuck. He’s not coming here, which I take as a bad sign. If he was happy, he could come here and tell me, no? Meeting me off campus makes me think he’s going to break my face and doesn’t want to have to deal with Nataniele.
I try to surf the wave of anxiety, but it’s getting so bad I need something to take it away.
Weak.
The word my father used to spit at me echoes in my mind.
Scared.
Weirdo.
Cuckold. That’s what Verity said.
Do Dom and Tino think of me as weak? The way my father does? Is that why they think they can fuck around with Mackenzie whenever they damn well please? Does she feel the same way?
I’m so angry, I’m at risk of smashing up my room if I don’t get out of here.
I don’t intend to find my way to Mackenzie’s room, or so I tell myself, but I end up there. Pausing with my fist half raised to knock on her door, I consider if this is the best thing. The mood I’m in, this could go south so easily.
She might not even be in. Then I hear it. A faint sound. A sneeze. That’s a cute sneeze. She’s in there. Studying, maybe? I glance at my watch. It’s another hour, I think, before her next class. Sue me if I have her schedule memorized.
I bang on the door.
A moment later, it swings open, and there she is. My pretty, perfect kukla. She isn’t the Duchess Mackenzie today. No, in her cute outfit of relaxed joggers and a cropped t-shirt, she’s definitely the doll version of Mackenzie.
“Oh, hey.” She beams at me as if she’s glad to see me.
Maybe she is? It’s not her fault, after all, that Tino made sure he went alone to bring her back and then went off grid. No, that was all Tino, though my father played his part in that too by making sure I was too busy dealing with his shit to go with Tino.
I bet last night was all Dom, too. He sneaks into people’s rooms like a fucking creeper, and he won’t be any different with our doll. He even did it to me once. I woke up to find him sitting on the floor in the corner. I asked him what the fuck he was doing, and he’d said he didn’t feel like being alone. As if letting himself into his friend’s dorm and snoozing in the corner on the floor was totally normal.
No, this isn’t my doll’s fault. My kukla is not to blame. I reach out and stroke her pretty hair. It’s all soft and shiny. I bring a strand to my face and inhale.
She steps back, a frown on her face. “Are you okay?” she asks.
“Yes. Of course. Why not?”
“Erm, you seem … off.”
“I am fine. How about you?” I step into her room, even though she didn’t invite me. I glance around and note all the little feminine touches.
My room is like a monk’s dwellings, I think, compared to this. There are hair bands on some of the shelves. Ornaments. Perfume bottles on the window ledge.
“You shouldn’t leave perfume there,” I say. “It will ruin it. The sun, you know.”
She shrugs. Mackenzie is watching me as if I’m a wild boar in her space. I won’t hurt her. I’m not Dom. I don’t like to hurt pretty things. I just like to play with them and mark them as mine.
“I’m fine, too,” she says eventually.
“Did you sleep well?”
She frowns, and as I hold her gaze, a slow, pink flush spreads up her throat. “Yes. Thank you.”
“I suppose having another warm body next to you helped.”
