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They wouldn’t care anyway. The only thing that matters is what the world sees. Like Mom always says, it’s the outside that counts.
She gave me instructions on the first day of sophomore year, ones that have kept women alive for centuries under their oppressors.
Look pretty. Be useful. Smile.
My sisters are watching me for direction, but we can’t talk here. We’ll talk strategy in the bathroom at school. Right now, it takes all I have not to scream out the unfairness of it all. The only thing that stops me is knowing that if I argue with the Dolce boys, they might claim one of my sisters instead. After two years of terror, El and Ev are finally free. They can date normal guys—if they can find one to put up with their fucked up pasts. My sisters are as traumatized by the D-boys as I am.
This is their chance to get out, though, and I’m not going to do anything to mess that up.
I’m happy for them.
And I’ll be fine. It’s just one more year. The twins may not be Rylan, or even Royal, but they’re not so bad. They only call every month or so now. Duke likes to prove his prowess, and unlike his brothers, he’ll even go down. If it’s just him, it can be fun after a few drinks. I decided last year I was all in, that there was no other way, so there’s no use complaining. I’m the queen of Willow Heights, after all. I’ve got the kings of the school—hell, of the town—to stay interested for two years, and they show no signs of ditching me, even after their brother did.
I’m the luckiest girl in school.
Our mother will be pleased to find out Royal’s brothers are keeping us on their roster, in their inner circle, even after he dumped me. I hold my chin up, my poise in place, so they’ll never question whether I’m pleased as well. I never let them see beneath the surface, to the real girl underneath—or the decaying ruins of that girl.
When I told Mom about the breakup, she told me I was a fool to lose Royal. He’s inheriting the biggest business in this town. He was the JFK to my Jackie, and I let him walk away.
As if I could have stopped him.
I didn’t confide all the ugly truths to any of them. We don’t talk about things like that in our family. We talk about how to keep looking our best, about skincare routines and waist training and what we can wear to convince people we belong. We talk about TV shows, and who’s going out with who this year. We don’t talk about what goes on behind the curtain, or what Daddy did, or how it feels to be destroyed on the inside.
For a moment, though, I let myself imagine what would happen if Royal told his brothers not to talk to me. If I were shunned, and we were truly free of them.
I never let myself hope, though. Hope is for the weak.
We pull up at Willow Heights, and it’s show time. All eyes on us.
The walk into school is a big deal for the Dolce boys, especially on the first day. This year, the stakes are higher than ever. Royal’s gone, leaving a power vacuum. The twins will fill it, but it’s impossible for things to stay exactly the same without their brother. He was the perfect king—imposing, devastatingly gorgeous, and always in control. Now we’ve got the executioner and the jester stepping into his place. If Duke has his way, senior year will be one big drunken orgy.
If Baron has his way…
Dixie waves, interrupting my thoughts. I wave back, then continue inside. Everyone is watching, whispering, wondering. I hold my head high, basking in the attention. I’d be lying if I said this part doesn’t feel good. Being admired, coveted, and envied. I want to blow them kisses like I do in the Homecoming parade. Even though the amount of attention everyone pays is quite frankly ridiculous, it’s addictive too.
All of them think I’m theIt Girl. That I’m somehow special, that I must have a golden pussy to keep the Dolce boys interested for so long. It has nothing to do with that, of course. It has to do with the fact that they groomed me to be their female counterpart, pushed me until I snapped, then glued my pieces back together in the image of their perfect girl. Sometimes I think it’s funny how people must see me—hot, untouchable, and cruel.
And yet, I know I’m not any of these things.
Or am I?
I stop at my locker, and the Dolce boys move on. They like to leave a little mystery, not make it too obvious where they stand. They would never tie themselves down with one girl, not even me. My job is to act like I don’t care, like I’m above it all.
Just like Jackie.
I’m almost to my first class when I spot Dixie hovering like a mosquito. She waves and drags her companion toward me. It takes me a second to realize who it is—someone I never expected to see again.
I have one second to slap a smile on my face, to play the part I’ve practiced until the mask falls into place without instruction or effort. To hide the fact that one look from his bored, smoky blue eyes has incinerated everything left alive inside me.
“Hey,” Dixie says, sidling over to me, her eyes alive with excitement, her curly red hair already escaping the scrunchy she’s wearing on top of her head. “Sooo, how was your summer? Looks like it must have been pretty exciting.”
She wiggles her brows at me, and I fight the urge to tell her she should worry about her hair more than who I’m fucking. But no one cares about her hair, and everyone cares who the D-boys are fucking. They all want to know their chances.
It’s my job to feed Dixie the info the Dolces want her to have. It’s her job to spread it through the school via her gossip blog.
We all have our roles to play, not just me.
“Summer was fine,” I say. “We went to the beach. What about you? You look pretty happy, considering you’re towing around a piece of human excrement.”
