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Reaching for the bottle, she refills her glass. “It’s complicated, but I didn’t have a choice. I needed something…”
“It was bribery, wasn’t it?” I ask when she trails off, clearly not willing to talk about it.
“He wanted to make sure Abigail is looked after when he’s gone and I… well, I needed him to make something go away.”
It all starts to click into place. “A case,” I spit, anger flooding my veins. “You signed my life away for a fucking case? Unbelievable.”
“In the world we live in, Reese, people don’t always play by the rules. Sometimes you have to fight fire with fire.”
“That’s not an excuse,” I mutter, disbelief coursing through me.
“One day, Reese, you’ll have kids of your own, and you’ll understand the lengths you’d go to protect them. To give them the life they deserve.”
Pushing the stool out behind me, I take a step back. “You know, I really, really hope I don’t.” I can’t imagine I would ever understand why any parent would want to force their child into something they didn’t want.
“I’m going back to bed,” I say quietly, half hoping she doesn’t hear me.
“Your bed, I assume.”
“We’ll see,” I mutter under my breath before taking the stairs two at a time to get back to my girl.
The TV is still illuminating the room when I slip back inside, but when I turn the corner, I find Liv is no longer watching it and is instead slumped down, fast asleep.
Finding the remote in the sheets, I turn it off, plunging us into darkness, drop my sweats and slip in beside her.
She moans as the heat of my body presses up against hers, aligning myself with her and wrapping my arm around her waist, holding her tight.
Dropping my lips to her shoulder, I whisper, “I love you, Olivia.”
“Love you too, Reese,” she says sleepily, snuggling back into me. “Everything okay with your mum?” she asks, telling me that she snuck out to see what was keeping me.
“Yeah, everything is good, sweet cheeks.”
* * *
Walking into All Hallows’ the next morning with my fingers intertwined with Liv’s and Oak, Theo, and Elliot following us is surreal.
I thought Elliot was going to shit a cactus when I turned up with her in tow for breakfast at the Chapel this morning. But if he thinks I’m going to be hanging out there without my girl, then he should really reconsider giving me my key, because we come as a package deal now.
With every step we take, more and more eyes land on us. Students whisper to their friends, pointing us out. And by the time we get into the building, I’ve heard the words stepbrother, wrong, and off-limits more than I ever thought I would.
But fuck their judgement. The only person’s opinion I care about now is the girl at my side, and Liv continues to walk through the crowd with her head held high, letting all their opinions roll off her. Pride for my girl swells within me, just like it did the day I watched her and Abigail soak up the praise for their stunt that got Darcie Porter suspended.
Her absence is only temporary, unlike that fucker Starling, who has been shipped off to some private school up north for troubled kids, which apparently has a reputation for its military-style treatment of its more-than-deserving students. That motherfucker is in for a world of pain. Couldn’t happen to a more deserving person, if you ask me.
“Liv,” a female voice calls before Abigail’s red hair flashes in the crowd before she and Tally bounce toward us.
“It’s too early for fucking Barbie and her playmate,” Oak complains behind us.
“Shut up,” Liv snaps before greeting her friends with a wide smile.
“So the rumours are true then?” Tally asks sceptically.
She’s happy for Liv, that much is obvious. But their new friendship means that she’s going to be hanging around us more. And I’m not sure there’s anything on Earth that Tally Darlington hates more than the Heirs, or more specifically, Oakley Beckworth.
The Darlington and Beckworth rivalry isn’t anything new. They’ve been battling in the courtrooms for years, and since we all started school, Oak and Tally seem to have followed in the footsteps of their fathers by rubbing each other up the wrong way at every possible opportunity.
She’s done everything she can to strip us of power over the years, but seeing as she doesn’t have all that much sway, even now she’s been elected Head Girl, she’s never really succeeded at anything.
