In the meantime, Vaughn had decided to burn the days until graduation by spiraling out of control. It was as if getting what he wanted—the internship—had destroyed whatever was left of his joy, instead of giving him something to look forward to. He seemed utterly miserable, even more than his usual morbid self, and he’d started skipping school for three and four days at a time, perhaps giving up on his high school diploma altogether.
One day I caught a glimpse of his father prowling the corridor of All Saints High like a demon. Clad in a sleek, black suit and a scowl that made no room for error, the man left no doubt that Vaughn was his flesh and blood. His gaze could wound you from across the hall, and heat spread across my cheeks when I remembered how I’d told Vaughn I was going to call the police on him, and he’d said his father owned everyone in this town.
It wasn’t a figure of speech, I’d later realized.
The principal had invited Vaughn’s parents for a discussion, but when Baron Spencer left the premises an hour later, a triumphant smile on his face, I didn’t think he was the one who’d gotten the third degree.
It made me so frustrated, I bit my inner cheek until warm, salty blood swirled inside my mouth. Vaughn did nothing to earn the unabashed love and support his parents offered him.
When Vaughn did attend school, he looked like he’d been dragged through every section of hell—bruised, beaten, with cut lips and black eyes. I’d heard he’d gotten into plenty of fights, and his face confirmed that. His welts opened if he spoke or moved the wrong way.
He’d stopped talking to people, attending parties, and, according to his friends, responding to text messages and phone calls. There were no more rumors about him getting blowies on school grounds or elsewhere, and the only people he seemed to still be communicating with were Knight Cole and Hunter Fitzpatrick.
I wanted to ask him if he was planning to offer me the assistant’s position anytime soon—or at all. Just because Papa said he’d discussed it with Vaughn didn’t mean he would follow through with the plan. But my pride, mixed with the fact that I really didn’t want to draw his attention to me when he seemed to have finally forgotten about my existence, held me back from asking.
All that changed the last week of school.
I came home after classes with the intention of swimming, then trying to work on the sketch for my next piece, which just wouldn’t come. It drove me nuts that I couldn’t nail down the way I wanted the assemblage to look. I was beginning to suspect Vaughn had not only messed with my head, but also with my creativity.
I dropped my backpack by the stairway, kicking the door shut behind me and double-locking it for good measure. I wanted to swim naked—not because of the stupid tan lines, as Vaughn said—but because I’d read somewhere that swimming naked reminded people what it felt like to be in the womb, and I desperately longed to feel that, a sort of connection with Mum.
I tugged at my shirt, advancing toward the glass doors, when I heard it.
Drip.
Drip.
Drip.
I spun sharply. The leak came from upstairs. Broken faucet? Bollocks. There went my afternoon. I’d be glaring at the back of a frustrated, grunting plumber.
I took the stairs and stopped dead when my boot slipped over the marbled surface. I looked down. Blood. There were drops of blood trickling down from the second floor.
Shit.
“Papa?” I called, gripping the bannisters so I wouldn’t slip again, taking the stairs two at a time. “Are you all right?”
It wasn’t just drops. The stairs were smeared with blood, with traces of bloodied fingertips crawling up the white granite, like in a horror movie. It occurred to me that maybe I should call the police, but I was too panicked with the prospect that something had happened to Dad or Poppy.
I climbed up to the second floor and realized the blood prints led to the bathroom closest to my room. I flung the door open and immediately had to suck in a breath. The entire expanse of crème ceramic was painted red. Nearly every inch of it. Vaughn Spencer was sprawled in my bathtub, clothed in a black V-neck shirt and black skinny jeans, dangling one army boot over the edge and smoking a joint. He bobbed his head back and forth, his face covered in cuts—like he’d just fought a rabid housecat—and that’s when I realized he was listening to my CD player. I yanked the earbuds from his ears, my heart beating so fast and wild I felt nauseous with adrenaline.
“Spencer!” I cried.
He looked up, finished the remainder of his joint, and tossed it to the floor. The blood killed the ember with a vicious hiss. Vaughn exhaled a ribbon of twisted smoke into my face, slow and deliberate, forever a connoisseur of cruelty.
“Lenora.”
“Forgive me for being so dense, but could you please enlighten me as to what you are doing in my bathtub, bleeding to death?” I exhaled slowly, shaking with anger and, yes, fear, too. His dark shirt was soaked with blood, reminding me that he was human, after all. Something worse than the scratches on his face lay under there.
He needed to go to the hospital. Immediately. I yanked my phone out of my leather jacket’s pocket, but he shook his head.
“Stitch me up, Buttercup.”
“What?”
“I’ve seen your Tree in Fall piece. You know your way around a needle.”
My Tree in Fall assemblage was a lone tree I’d found in a Hampstead Heath park. It had been completely naked of leaves. It looked cold. I’d stitched a garment on it from scratch, then hung clothing items, like leaves, on its thin, bare branches. By the time I was done, the tree looked a bit like a ghost. I loved that it went from looking weak and helpless to fearsome and Goth-like.
I wondered how Vaughn had seen it, since I’d only posted it on my Instagram, and he didn’t have any social media accounts. But now wasn’t the time to ponder this question.
At any rate, Vaughn was right. Mum had taught me how to sew, stitch, and crochet.
That didn’t mean I was going to play the role of his devoted nurse, though.
I started dialing. Screw him. I wasn’t helping him beyond what the law required: tossing his ass into an ambulance.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” he said calmly.
I stopped, looked up, waiting for the other shoe to drop.
The first words we’d spoken to each other in weeks, and he was already getting on my nerves. Vaughn Spencer had the uncanny ability to make me feel twisty, like if he didn’t touch me with his icy fingers, I’d burn. But I was also repelled by his behavior.
“I came here to offer you the assistant’s job, and I just might withdraw if you’re already being such a bad sport,” he drawled.
Wanker.
He’d left me hanging for weeks, and in that time I’d come to terms with my bitter loss to him. I found myself waiting to be approached. His plan had worked. Now he dangled it in my face, asking favors in return.
“Don’t make decisions with your ego.” My father’s voice pierced the red fog of my fury.
“I don’t want to be your anything,” I croaked.
It was the naked truth and most terrible lie I’d ever told anyone. I didn’t want to explore what I thought or felt toward Vaughn. I wanted to serve him a nice dose of pain, as he had me.
“Liar,” he said.
“Congrats on using your last name to get the gig.”