Coach Roake follows me into his office, closing the door behind him. The window that looks out into the hallway won’t shield the fact that we’re meeting, but it will stop the passersby from eavesdropping.
“What’s this about, Coach?”
I stay standing in front of the chair. I don’t plan on being here long—I’ve got a paper due for my biology class tomorrow, and I don’t plan on being in the library until midnight. Practice ended about twenty minutes ago, and he called into the locker room that he needed to see me. It gave me enough warning to finish showering and get dressed. My hair is wet, my shirt sticking slightly to my skin.
All’s been quiet on the Aspen front. She’s been keeping to herself the past few days, dealing with the repercussions of the video and waiting for the storm of attention to pass. The room she shared with Thalia in our house was cleared out yesterday while we were at dinner, which means she obviously knows I was behind drugging her.
I thought posting it would make me feel better. But instead, I feel worse. Like I betrayed her by sharing a vulnerable moment. Except, it was a vulnerable moment I created specifically to embarrass her.
Anyway, practice tonight was fine. We did drills and learned a new play, and Miles and the other goalie worked separately on stops. Not out of the ordinary, although all of us were exhausted by the end of it.
I’ve racked my brain for reasons why Coach would summon me, but I keep coming up empty.
He folds his arms over his chest, leaning against the wall. “You didn’t mention you have a half-sister attending CPU.”
“What?” I shake my head in disgust. “Stepsister, Coach. I barely know her.”
Lie. It tastes like ash on my tongue. I know her in all the ways that matter. The way she squirms, how fast to get her to come, her expression when she’s cross, afraid, or in pain. I know exactly how to make her shiver or moan. And I know how to destroy her, piece by piece.
Coach clearly believes me as much as I believe myself, because he grunts at my answer. He sits at his desk and types something out on his computer. He swivels the monitor toward me, and the video that’s been circulating of Aspen plays on the screen. It’s muted, but I can still picture the words she mumbles.
There was more that I didn’t film. Her helpless cries, her pleading with the shadows not to take her. The way her eyes went wide as tears poured down her cheeks, her sobs almost choking her.
My gaze stays glued to the screen, although I hate every second of it.
“Explain this, O’Brien.”
I shake my head, suppressing my anger.
I took it down last night, and I told everyone else to, as well. Obviously, I can’t control everyone. The video was more for my father than anything, but it spread like wildfire. That’ll be the last time I underestimate the allure of Aspen Monroe.
Option 1: bluff my way out of it.
Option 2: own up to my part in this.
Yeah, right. “Not sure what you want to hear, sir.”
Coach sighs and shuts it down, leaning back. “Listen. This is your senior year. Do you really want to go down for something petty like this?”
“I didn’t—”
“Don’t fucking lie to me, O’Brien,” Coach snaps. “I’m not sure what you wanted to gain from exposing this poor girl’s mental illness…”
I open and close my mouth, but ultimately, what the fuck can I say to that?
He seems disappointed.
I dig my nails into my palms.
But Coach is already done with me. He points to the door, his face redder than I’ve seen it. And it occurs to me that this may be taken as some sort of psychotic break, not drugs. Why would anyone think drugs when all the scary things our brain can make us see or do can be caused by malfunctions? By some deficiency of a chemical, or overabundance of another.
Shit.
“I’ve already told people to take it down,” I say suddenly.
Coach waves me off and turns back to his computer. I leave quickly, striding toward the end of the hall. I make it without running into anyone else, then dial my father.
He needs to open his eyes and actually see who he let into our family.
“What are you doing, Steele?” He doesn’t even say hello. Always business with him, never pleasure.
I clench my jaw. “I’m trying to protect our family.”
He’s silent for a long moment.
“Okay,” he finally agrees. “She’s coming home—”
“I don’t give a fuck whether she stays or goes,” I interrupt, my stomach twisting. “It may be better that I keep an eye on her, don’t you think? Instead of using a stranger to spy on your son. But as far as the rest of her family…”
“I love her mother.” His voice is a bucket of ice water dropped over my head. “Do you want me to abandon her?”
Like you abandoned Mom? Why yes, yes I do. Drop this gold digger and protect our family better. Simple.
“I just want you to see—”
“Enough.” Dad sighs. “If you had come home over the summer, you would’ve met them. You would know them like I do.”
I don’t want to see what he sees. That’s the problem. I want things to go back to the way they were when I was a kid. And maybe Dad can tell, because he doesn’t push for once. We just stay on the line in silence until one of us figures out what to talk about next—or how to break past this.
In the end, it’s my father who does both.
“We’ll be at your hockey game in New York next week,” he says. “Make sure Aspen comes, too.”
I bite back my laugh. If she lets me anywhere near her, sure. And even if not…
A thrill goes through me.
Why am I so fucking obsessed with her?
I get home and head straight upstairs. It’s a bit weird now that Erik’s not our basement dweller and Greyson’s living on his own with Violet. Erik used to always be around, in the kitchen or hanging out in the living room. Knox and Miles must be elsewhere, because the whole house is unusually silent.
On one hand, I’m glad we got the extra bedroom free. It certainly helped out when the girls were staying here, although I was pissed that Aspen wouldn’t stay in my room after that first night. Now that they’re gone, though, it’s right back to how it was at the start of the semester: depressingly empty.
Willow occasionally sleeps in Knox’s room, although it seems like she might not be as into it lately. Or he goes to her… who the fuck knows what’s up with them anyway. Knox just wants Willow to admit that she loves him. It goes back to a stupid, offhand comment that Greyson made, which devolved into a bet… which Knox won’t let go of. He wants to win, and I guess he’s fine with one pussy. For now.
All at once, I register that I’m lonely. Like a fucking loser.
I open my phone and flip through my contacts, but no one stands out. I open my bedroom door and drop my bag on the floor. I strip off my shirt, then toe off my shoes. Change of wardrobe, get my laptop, and I’ll just go with my original plan: suffer at the library to finish that paper.
It’s better than failing it and putting hockey at risk anyway.
I’m dragging a hoodie over my head when movement catches my attention. I pull it the rest of the way on and try to find the source, but there’s nothing against that wall. Just my desk, which is painfully cluttered with papers. The chair is pushed all the way in so I don’t try and cover it in half-dirty clothes.
Looking around the rest of the room, my gaze snags on a card on my nightstand.
I snatch it up and stare down at the front of it.
A little thanks from me to you… is printed on the front. It’s one of those thank you cards you can buy at the on-campus store. I flip it open, and my gaze skips to the feminine print at the bottom.
Dear Steele,
Once a snake, always a snake. Enjoy your new roommate.
Love,
Viper
I stare at it, not comprehending the words—until something brushes my foot. I snap the card closed and look down, almost unsurprised to see a literal, actual snake making its way over the top of my foot toward my bed.
Holy shit.
I don’t move until it’s not touching me anymore, although my stomach is in my fucking throat. I hurry out of the bedroom and slam the door shut behind me, and I get all the way downstairs before I realize I should’ve put my stupid shoes back on.
The only saving grace is that my phone is still in my pocket and the card clutched in my hand.
She put a snake in my room?
Where did she even get a snake?
I grit my teeth and yank my phone out, calling Knox. He’s the single most connected fucker at school—if he doesn’t know someone who can catch a snake, I’d be shocked.
An hour later, Knox and a girl whose name I missed stand in front of me, the door to my room open. She has a bucket and a long stick with a hook on the end in her hands, and she steps in carefully.
Knox glances over his shoulder at me, then shrugs. Like he doesn’t know what she plans on doing either.
And yet, in less than five minutes, she’s got the snake in the bucket—lid screwed into place—and steps past us.
“Can I see that card?” she asks.
I hand it to her.
She reads it and laughs. “Yeah, okay. I know whose snake this is.”
“It’s a pet?” Knox asks.
“Yep. I’ll take care of it.” She smiles at him, like she wouldn’t mind if he just leaned forward and pressed his lips to hers—
Instead, he pushes a hundred dollar bill into her palm.
Her fingers curl around it, shock opening her expression. But then she nods and slips past us, leaving us alone in the hallway.
“So, was it Aspen or not?” Knox asks.
“Who else would refer to themselves as Viper?”
He frowns. I snag my shoes and bookbag from my room and follow him. I should just give up on the paper, but I refuse to do that to myself. I’m on thin ice with my father as it is, and I know he watches my grades. Waiting for a single slipup.
“I’m going back to campus,” I tell him.
“Have fun,” he calls. “And give her hell!”
Oh, I definitely will.
