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I don’t even think.
I slam my fist into Alec LeMarque’s nose.
Mackenzie
I’ve been at Stonehurst Prep less than five hours and I’m already in the principal’s office.
I stare at the wall behind Mrs. Foster’s face as she drones on about responsibility and solving my problems without violence. It’s weird – the adults in my life have never tried to dissuade me from violence before. Violence has always been part of my world.
Not at Stonehurst, it appears.
I rub my sore knuckles, feeling the satisfying jolt of pain from where my fist connected with the cartilage in Alec’s nose. I wonder if he’ll get a lecture about not sleazing onto girls who aren’t interested. He got carried out of the cafeteria in an ambulance, screaming something to me about a lawsuit. Which I definitely need to ask Antony about, but it has to wait until Mrs. Foster’s tirade is over.
I itch to touch the locket hidden under my collar, but I don’t want to give Mrs. Foster a reason to prolong this torture.
“I know you’ve had it tough, Mackenzie.” She steeples her fingers together, and there’s this look on her face like she’s trying to pretend she gives a fuck. “These past few years can’t have been easy on you. What with your parents… But that’s no excuse for antisocial behavior. If you need to talk about what you’ve been through, we have a guidance counselor available any time you need, and my door is always open if you want to talk.”
The question hangs in the air between us, unasked and unanswered. She doesn’t give a shit about getting me to talk about my feelings, she just wants the scoop like the rest of them. What happened to your parents, Mackenzie? Why are you suddenly back at school? Where have you been the last four years?
By the time she dismisses me with a month of detentions and an order to write a note of apology to Alec LeMarque, I’ve got one class left – Political Science.
The eyes follow me as I take the only available seat, near the windows. Only instead of curious, they’re hostile. I hurt their leader, their king. I made a big ugly bloodstain on the pristine white tablecloth.
I don’t belong.
My seat is next to the dark-haired hottie, the one with the eyes like coals fresh from a fire. The one who could be an MMA fighter for all his bulk and the danger rolling off him in waves, but he’s too pressed and neat in his tailored uniform to last a round in the ring.
“Mackenzie.” He rasps my name under his breath, quiet enough only I can hear. There’s a finality to his tone, like a wizard speaking a curse.
(I also watched Harry Potter this weekend, just in case Stonehurst turned out to be a wizarding school. Can’t deal with any surprises this year.)
I glare at Coal-Eyed Wizard. “What do you want?”
“You should have stayed hidden. You should never have come back.”
His shoulders square, and the hatred in his eyes is so deep, so dark, that a shiver of fear runs down my spine.
“An eye for an eye, Mackenzie Malloy,” he hisses, and my blood turns cold. “You took something special from me. I’ll take everything from you.”
Mackenzie
That was a day.
I trudge through the small wood running between my house and the neighbors’ perimeter wall to my secret entrance. I keep the front gates locked (and will continue to do so, now the police paid to replace the broken gate) to continue my ghost facade. The longer we can hold off on the press getting ahold of my story, the better. My house contains a ten-car garage on the first floor, with a car lift that can drop a vehicle into the basement where they exit down a concrete tunnel under the garden onto a private road at the rear of the property. The maintenance shed for the lift, the security gates, and the house’s extensive electronics and networking has an external door to allow staff and repairmen to come and go. It’s this door I unlock now and duck inside.
I hurry between the racks of switches and into the tunnel. It’s pitch black inside, but I can find my way in my sleep so I don’t bother with a light. The clop-clop of my heels echoes along the length, rising with the slope so it almost sounds as if I’m chasing myself. Mrs. Foster expects me to be in regulation shoes by the end of the week, but Mackenzie Malloy doesn’t give a shit about the rules when an extra three inches of height are involved.
I clamber up the spiral staircase into the garage, cross between the rows of dusty vehicles, and reach for the door that connects the garage to the house. I kick off my heels with such force they hit the wall and leave a black scuff against the pristine white paint. My right big toe stings from the stiff leather pinching them all day. One must suffer for beauty.
Queen Boudica sits on the rug, her black fur gleaming from the shadows, her head cocked to the side as if she’s been waiting there for me all day.
“Meow.” She stomps one foot on the rug, demanding to know where I’ve been.
“Don’t give me that shit. I’ve had a bad day.” Too tired to drag myself upstairs to the media room or across the house to the ballroom, I flop into one of the uncomfortable chairs by the French doors that look out over the pool.
Big mistake. A black paw jabs me in the ribcage as Queen Boudica – sensing a lap has been created – climbs up and settles in. Cat gravity officially in effect. Now I can’t move. And I have homework to do.
Homework. What the fuck? I thought rich people didn’t have to do homework. Isn’t that the point of being a rich asshole – you get to make the rules, and the rules never include algebra.
