Chapter 2

Of course those words had been purely platonic.

Tess didn’t know if she was more crestfallen or relieved. They touched on everything that’d gone down in the last few months. She leeched off his every word, not only because it was him, but because she hungered for the details of a world so far removed from her own.

“I’ll take you there,” he proposed. After grabbing a bite to eat, he’d angled his silver Audi near the edge of a scarp. They perched on the hood, stomachs full and windshield cradling their backs. Below, the ocean contracted with obsidian swells. A soupy haze of light smeared the horizon. “You’d love it. The history, the music, the food,” he groaned. “Authentic Indian, there’s nothing like it. Even in the city.”

It took Tess a moment to recover from the single-most sexiest sound ever. "I don’t know, Cam.” As much as her heart longed to embrace the high-rolling lifestyle, her brain knew better. She’d spent the bulk of her summer holding down odd jobs to meet the cost of living expenses and textbooks.

“You won’t have to pay for anything,” he said, plucking the misgivings from her mind.

“I’ll think about it.”

Cameron knew her well enough not to push. Sighing, he allowed his head to fall back against the car’s roof. “I wish you would’ve come with us.”

“Is that your subtle way of telling me you missed me?” she cooed, curling into his side.

“Do you even have to ask?” Her breath caught as his lips hovered close. Anticipation segued into dismay as he planted a chaste kiss on her forehead.

Stupid. She should be used to deflating the air from hope by now. “So, you ready for class on Monday?” Tess chirped a decibel too high.

“At least I’m already packed,” Cameron remarked dryly. “I bet you haven’t even started.”

“Of course I have!” Not.

“I call bullshit.” His husked laughter rumbled through her midsection. “What time do you want me to pick you up tomorrow?”

“Around two is fine.” It only took an hour and some change to reach their school. She had plenty of time to stuff her closet into a few suitcases. “Isn’t your family upset you didn’t spend any time with them this summer?”

“They’ll be alright,” Cameron drawled without warmth. “They’re just glad I did that internship at my grandfather’s law firm before doing my own thing.”

Tess failed to get his family. Their place in Nassau was more like a mausoleum than a home. Cold and polished with everything in its proper place, Tess had visited homier cemeteries. His parents, while nice, were polite to the point of painfulness. Not once had she seen them display affection toward their son or each another.

No wonder Cameron feared giving away his heart. Apparently the Reynolds considered love a bad four-letter word.

“Have you decided on a major yet?” he asked.

“I was leaning toward pre-med.”

“Really? I didn’t peg you for the physician type.”

“And why not?” she struggled to bar defense from her tone.

“Do you remember Bio when we had to dissect that pig?”

Tess remembered all right. She'd projectile vomited all over the cadaver and her teacher. Luckily she hadn't been the only one to regurgitate her overpriced lunch, thus saving her from a failing grade. “Ok, so I won’t be a surgeon.”

“And that time you babysat your neighbor’s kids?” he pointed out.

The spoiled brats had done nothing but whine and cry and pitch tantrums. One hour into it and she’d been ready to lock them in the dog crate. “I don’t have the patience for pediatrics anyway.”

“I'm not saying that to discourage you.” He linked their fingers. “I'm just saying don't rush into a major. Explore your options first.”

“I don't need options. I know what I want.” She didn’t have the luxury of time or resources to be taken by flights of fancy. Logically people would always get sick and die, so she would always have a job and financial security. What more was there to consider?

“Alright, just know med school’s not cheap. My cousin went to Stanford and by the end of his residency, he owed close to three hundred grand.”

Although she’d done the math, the figures still induced a mini anxiety attack. She was already waist-deep in debt. And that was with a grant covering half of her tuition. “Most likely I’ll take a year or two off and save up. I might rent a room somewhere cheap so I can claim myself come tax season and score more financial aid.”

“You’ve given this a lot of thought,” he said, amused.

“Trust me. I’ve got this covered. I didn’t graduate third in our class for nothing.” Tess tapped her chin. “What were you again? Eighth? Tenth?”

She laughed as Cameron dragged her into a headlock and noogied her head. “Something you’ll never let me live down.” He slid off the hood and offered his hand. “Come on. Let’s roll.”

He didn’t have to ask her twice.

They spent the remainder of the night orbiting Long Island before submitting to the hypnotic tow of the city. Although nothing important came to pass, Tess relished her time with him nonetheless. There was something so effortless about their relationship. Easy. They could talk for hours about everything and nothing.

She didn’t drag herself out of bed until eleven the next morning. Gritty-eyed and empty-stomached, Tess gnawed on a granola bar while picking through belongings that merited transportation to her dorm room.

Four hours of flattening her wardrobe into too small suitcases, Tess wheeled them two at a time to the foyer.

Her brother stuck his head out from the kitchen as she walked past, a roll of deli meat hanging from his mouth. “Yo, you need some help, little T?”

He towered over her by one measly inch and never tired of rubbing it in her face. “I’ve got it. And close your mouth when you’re chewing.” Dumping everything in the foyer, she returned to her room for the last trip.

Tony followed her anyway. He picked up a scrap of material and snickered. “What the hell is this?”

Tess snatched it from his grasp and stuffed it into her bag. “It’s called a shawl.”

“I know what it is. Why do you own one?”

“Unlike some people I can’t just show up anywhere dressed however,” she said, sensitive about her wardrobe. He didn’t know the laborious hours she’d put into cultivating her look.

There were few things she and her brother didn’t share. Commonly mistaken for twins despite the two-year age gap, both had been graced with their mother’s fair complexion, a handful of freckles, a mop of auburn locks, and hazel-green eyes.

Personality-wise, they couldn’t have been further apart. While Tess endeavored to keep their impoverished roots buried, Antonio embraced their ‘heritage’. In prep school, she spent hours facing the mirror until her rounded vowels blended seamlessly with her classmates’ clipped, Upper East Side enunciation. After a crash course in fashion courtesy of the style network, she spent months scouring thrift stores and flea markets for pieces that best aligned with her new, vintage look.

Tony chose the opposite. He wore whatever he wanted, spoke however he wanted—at times exaggerating the stigmatized Brooklyn accent—and became all the more popular for it.

She guessed social acceptability wavered at the gender line.

“Whatever.” Her brother sifted through the outfits she’d laid out for the first week of class. “I don’t get why you wear shit you don’t like.”

“What are you talking about? I’m fine with my wardrobe,” she said impatiently.

He snorted his disbelief. “Don’t lie. You know you’d rather be crushing skulls with your Docs in the middle of a mosh pit than pretending to be an heiress.”

She hated being reminded of what she’d given up. She’d by no means subscribed to the stereotyped classifications of metalhead, emo, and the like. Tess merely enjoyed being a part of a subculture that cared nothing for fads or commercialized tastes; where the only important thing was the music.

But that was a long time ago. She had bigger fish to fry and Tess would be damned if she returned to squalor because she didn’t know how to set childish things aside. “That was a phase, Tones. This is who I am now. Now are you going to help me with these or what?” She shoved the rest her clothes into a duffel bag and hitched it onto his shoulder without asking.

He grunted. “What do you have in here? Bodies?”

“Maybe if you actually completed your coach’s workout regimen instead of bullshitting, you’d be in better shape,” she said sweetly.

“Maybe if you joined me you'd lose that flabby stomach.” Snickering, he dodged her fist.

She hit the elevator’s down button and double checked her belongings. “Crap. I forgot my purse. Take these down to Cam, will you?”

“So now I'm your bellhop.”

“Love you.” Tess doubled back. She opened the door and almost collided into her mother.

“Were you trying to sneak out of here without saying goodbye?” Maia inquired, arms crossed.

In no mood to argue, Tess skirted the woman en route for her room. “Not at all.”

To her everlasting dismay, Maia trailed after her. “You can’t hold the past over me forever, Tess,” she said, her voice one part earnestness, another irritation.

“Oh, don’t worry, Mom.” She spread her arms with a flourish. “This totally makes up for a decade and a half of parental negligence.”

“How many more times do I have to apologize for something that was out of my control?”

Tess rolled her eyes.

“Criticize me all you want, but I was depressed. You don’t understand what it was like not having the energy to get out of bed every morning,” she said, bitterness threading her tone.

“That wasn’t depression. That was a perpetual hangover.”

“Tess-”

“I don’t want to do this right now.” Tess angrily stuffed her keys and wallet into her purse.

“If not now, then when?” Exasperation colored her words. “We can’t go on like this.”

“You’re right. Lucky for both of us I’ll be gone for the next few months. Take care.” She maneuvered around her mother and out the door.

It wasn’t that Tess hated her mother. On the contrary, had Tess dropped out of school to run away with a businessman she’d known for all of four months at the tender age of seventeen, Tess would’ve probably faired the same. Too bad said businessman turned out to be a married father of three, who’d wanted nothing to do with his bastard spawn, and relocated his legitimate family to the West Coast.

As a consequence, Maia spent the majority of Tess’s formative years either declaiming her woe-is-me soliloquy, ad nauseam, ordrinking until she could barely pick herself up off the floor. Tess credited the woman for supplying a roof, shitty as it was, over their heads and throwing them a few dollars as needed.

Thankfully her mother didn’t try to run interference again. But her stepfather waited for her in the foyer.

Jesus, why couldn't they just leave her be?

Ray offered her a tentative smile and held up a container. “I made extra chicken parm last night, if you want to take the leftovers with you.”

As far as investment bankers went, Raymond Calloway defied expectation.

In a manner of speaking, anyway. Laidback with a weakness for dungarees, he was completely unlike the paste-colored, stiff suit-wearing yuppies that inundated Wall Street.

But that was where the dissimilarities ended. Still a decade off from middle age, he scored precious few points in the looks department. A less than redeeming waistline didn’t help. Ruddy complexioned and plagued with a case of acne that had rolled over from adolescence, Tess knew exactly why her mother had fallen into ‘love’ with him.

Or rather, with his piggy bank.

Her mother, however, wasn’t the only one with ulterior motives. The years of destitution hadn’t detracted from her beauty. Even glammed in her Goodwill garb, Maia was a looker. So Ray, wanting a trophy wife who wouldn’t think twice about signing a prenup, eagerly agreed to tie the knot.

Besides, there was nothing like the fear of poverty to keep her in her place. In the end, everyone got what they wanted. Her mother didn’t have to scrub another toilet in her life and Ray got to tote around the faux belle of the ball.

At the wedding, Tess hadn’t known whether to burst out laughing or wish them luck.

But since everyone seemed determined to pretend that they genuinely cared about one another, Tess went along with the charade.

She plastered a smile. “I’ll be ok.”

His face fell. “Oh. Are you sure?”

“Yeah. I’ll probably eat out for dinner tonight with my friends. Take care of Maia.” She ducked out of the door before he could shove any more well-meaning at her.

Half-jogging through the lobby, Tess saw her brother outside leaned against Cameron’s Audi. He revved the engine as the doorman allowed her passage.

“Pussy ass car,” Tony sneered.

Cameron arched a brow. “How about you talk to me when you get a license.”

Tony folded his arms. “Real New Yorkers don’t need licenses.”

“That’s right, Tones. Don’t listen to him.” She pecked his cheek.

He hurriedly gave her a quick, one-armed hug. “Peace out. And tell dickface to drive safe.”

Sprawled in the driver’s seat, Cameron shot her a crooked smile behind expensive Ray Bans as she settled in. “Aw, that was sweet.”

Tess flipped him off.

An hour and half later they cruised onto campus. The familiarity of the place buoyed her spirits. As much as she bitched about the backcountry locale, the peculiarities of the townies residing at the bottom of the hill, and the overall lack of anything to do, this place had been home for the last year and would be for next three.

Tess directed him to her dorm. After checking in and receiving her key card and checkpoint from the front desk, she texted Cameron her room number and went to scope out her new digs.

“Tess!” She didn’t make it a foot into the room when she fell under attack.

“Jade!”

Her roommate and best friend since freshman year bound her in a hug worthy of any grizzly. “I missed you.” Skin a coppery gold owing to a mixed heritage, downy brown hair that fell mid-back and a heart-shaped face, Jade Wolfe was sex on legs.

Tess pulled away first. “Why didn’t you come visit me?”

“Oh, like you couldn’t hop on a bus to Virginia.”

“What? There’s intelligent life outside of the city?”

They glanced up as Cameron practically tripped into the room, the straps from her duffel bags crisscrossing his torso, a roll-on suitcase in each hand. “Don’t worry, I don’t need any help.”

“Cam!” Instead of lending a helping hand, Jade flung her arms around his neck. “I missed your face.”

“Jade, sweetie, can’t breathe,” he wheezed.

She bounced back. “I can’t believe you scored off-campus housing. You do realize that your place is going to be jumping 24/7?”

“Don’t worry. We got you, post-party clean up wise,” Tess said innocently.

“Why do I have the feeling that’s the first and last time I’ll hear that?”

That was probably because he was right.

Smartly switching tactics, Tess and Jade relieved him of her luggage. “Come on. I’ll help you bring the rest of your stuff in,” Jade said. “Then Cameron can give us a tour of his place and we can meet up with the guys at The Grill.”

After several trips, they dumped her things into the room and piled into the Audi.

Tess tilted her head back as the wind fingered her tresses. Absent of clouds, the stark azure sky promised good behavior. On the quad, those already finished moving in lay on blankets, soaking up sun or playing ultimate Frisbee.

Damn, it was good to be back.

Lined with quaint, two-story row houses, Cameron’s street depicted a neighborhood imported straight from Pleasantville. Tess knew better than to believe the illusion. Most of the houses were college-owned and utilized as off-campus property for upperclassmen. In less than a week the neatly trimmed hedges would become stuffed with abandoned articles of clothing, manicured lawns trashed with broken beer bottles and empty kegs.

Cam parallel parked alongside the curb.

“Wow. Your neighbor has a sweet set of wheels.” Jade pointed out the matte black Ferrari across the street.

He muttered a few choice expletives under his breath and pushed his sunglasses on top of his head. “Tess, there’s something I need to tell you.”

“You’re gay,” Jade beat him to the punch.

He slid her an exasperated look. “Really, J?”

She rotated a shoulder. “Can’t blame a girl for trying. This college is severely undermanned in the gay bff department.”

Before Tess could inquire, the slap of a screen door ushered her gaze to the porch.

No.

No fucking way.

Hands casually tucked in the pockets of dark wash jeans, Adonis stood in the doorway.

Tess vaguely heard Jade say something but all was lost beneath the hot tide of blood crashing between her ears. “What is he doing here?”

“It was a last minute arrangement,” Cameron said, daggering the other male with an irritated glance.

Anger elbowed past shock as the lie registered. Her fingertips bored accusingly into Cameron’s arm. “A last minute arrangement?”

He winced and she was too mad to care whether it stemmed from physical discomfort or otherwise. “It honestly just slipped my mind.”

“How does something like this slip your mind?” she hissed.

“He doesn’t have to explain anything to you,” Adonis interjected acidly. “It’s none of your business.”

“I don’t believe I was talking to you!”

Annoyance flashed within surprisingly clear amber eyes. “Get over it sweetheart, because I’m not going anywhere.” His gaze swung to Cameron. “Isn’t that right, roomie?”

“Roomie!” She choked out. “And he’s living with you?”

“I know I should’ve told you sooner.” Cameron spoke in a low voice. “He wasn’t supposed to get here until tomorrow. He transferred so I can keep an eye on him.”

“So he doesn’t drown in his own vomit?” Tess inferredmonotonously. Too bad. She would’ve been more than happy to see his demise. One less ignorant asshole on the planet wasn’t a bad thing.

Cameron sandwiched her face between his palms. “Hey, do you think I would’ve agreed to this if I didn’t think you could handle him?”

She tried to look away, but he wouldn’t allow it. “After everything you’ve been through you’re telling me you can’t handle one overgrown dick?” he teased.

The nerve in her jaw began pulsating. After two years of maltreatment, did he really expect her to be ok with her tormentor joining their brood? The earnest plea in his eyes only spurred her anger. But she clung to composure, resolved not to give Adonis the satisfaction of seeing her flustered. “Fine,” she bristled, in no way, shape, or form comfortable with the arrangement. “Just keep him away from me.”

“Aw, and here I was thinking we'd all be one big happy family,” Adonis drawled, not bothering to pretend he hadn’t overheard. His eyes wandered to Jade. “And who might this be?”

Tess stepped in front of her. “Off limits.”

“Don't be rude.” She nimbly darted around Tess and thrust out a hand with a winsome smile. “Jade Wolfe. And you are?”

He took her proffered hand and hit her with his trademark, panty-melting smile. “Adonis Benoit. I suppose we'll be seeing more of each other.”

She had never seen her friend blush, but sure enough Jade’s brown cheeks lit up like the fourth of July. “Don't bet on it. He'll be too busy infecting half the campus with chlamydia,” Tess said sourly.

“Enough, Tess,” Cameron cut in before the conversation escalated. “Why don’t you two go on without me? I’ll meet up with you in a few.”

“Gladly.” She snared Jade’s wrist and set off. “I need something cheesy and calorific. Now.”

“So I guess we’re not taking a tour of the house?” Jade asked, prying her gaze from the sexy hunk of man candy.

“I’ve seen enough.”

___________________

Adonis watched her strut away, friend in tow, like a peacock with a stick wedged up its ass.

Tessandra Scarlatti.

He’d hoped in his absence, she’d fallen off the planet or died. Preferably both.

But no, she was too alive and still attached to his friend like a blood-sucking parasite. He thought after so many years Cameron would’ve gotten wise to her act, but he was content to leave the wool flapping over his eyes, the softhearted idiot.

Fuck, he couldn’t stand the bitch. He hated her then, he hated her now, perhaps more. There was something…repellant about her. And it was a shame. He was never one for letting a great pair of tits go unnoticed.

But Adonis knew her type.

She was a cobra posing as a house kitten. There was only one thing she wanted out of that relationship and it began with Cameron and ended with money.

He longed to strip away that fake veneer and expose her true colors. In prep school, he’d done his part to make her feel unwelcome—hoping she’d get the hint and slink back to whatever gutter from which she’d crawled out.

But no, she persisted and stuck around like a stubborn weed that returned no matter how hard he yanked at the roots. He tried turning their class against her. For every success, another two would rise to her defense.

As if taken by some exotic species, his friends fell prey to her poison. Beguiled by her looks and her lack of a romantic interest in anyone but Cameron, the guys tripped over themselves to impress her. Charmed by her lack of overall social grace, conceit, and etiquette, the girls embraced their new pet project.

By graduation, she’d successfully wormed her way into his clique and Cameron’s life. Hardly a conversation went by where he wasn’t singing her praises, something that became disturbingly obvious during their trip to India.

His friend was falling fast, if he hadn’t already. Adonis would have to act quickly to curtail the avoidable.

It was the least he could do for a friend.

He removed the cigarette tucked behind his ear. “You want me to play nice,” he said with bland insouciance.

“Would it kill you?”

Cupping a hand against the breeze, Adonis lit its end. “And if it did?”

“Then maybe transferring here was a bad idea.”

Fury baked the back of his neck. “So you’re choosing her over nineteen years of friendship?”

“This isn’t about choosing sides. It’s about you learning to treat someone I care about with respect,” Cameron said, blue eyes diamond-hard. “Wasn’t that part of the reason why you moved back?”

“Wasn’t like I had a choice.”

He rolled his eyes. “You always have a choice, so stop crying.”

Smoke tunneled from his nostrils. “As you wish, mother goose.”

Cameron opened and then subsequently closed his mouth. “You know what, forget it.” He began walking off.

“What?” he snapped out.

“I was going to take you to meet some friends, but if you insist on being an asshole, maybe I’ll save my breath.”

“Maybe you should, considering the company you like to keep.”

“Have it your way.” Cameron didn’t look back.

Tremors stitched down his arm, stinging his palms with needle-thin pricks. The itch was still there, stroking his insides. How easy it would be to say fuck it all and fall back on old habits.

Agitated, Adonis chucked the half-smoked cigarette into the yard. This was not how he envisioned his first day back.

So much for turning over a new leaf. He owed the guy more than he could possibly repay in one lifetime. The trip to Dubai had done more than his eight weeks of rehab and eighty grand. It’d given him a chance to mend bridges burned long ago. Adonis couldn’t remember a time he’d spent time with his best friend while not under the influence.

And he’d been good—no hard drugs, no impulsive behavior, and no flying off the handle.

But two days back in the states and he was already backsliding. He didn’t know if it was the new environment or stress. Whatever it was, he wanted to keep it separate from himself for as long as possible. He didn’t want to be that person any more.

Lighting the blunt he’d rolled for such an occasion, he texted Cameron for directions to their gathering. He’d go, even if he did have to tolerate her presence.

His ‘success coach’ from rehab would be proud. Adonis took a pull and examined the blunt, allowing the cherry-soaked smoke to inflate his lungs.

Well, almost.

He had to start somewhere.

_________________

The noise level in the pizzeria buzzed to a fever pitch. For once, Tess didn’t need to fake affability as she received amorous greetings from those she hadn’t seen since last school year. But try as she might, she couldn’t strike the encounter with Adonis from her mind. It clung to her like a foul odor, eroding and pervasive.

“Tessa bear, how was your summer?” Lance grinned. He was adorable and one of the few preppy black guys she knew. With latte-colored skin and a face made for breaking hearts, she didn’t know why Jade was so on-again, off-again with him.

“Painfully short,” she said absolutely.

“Damn. That bad?”

“It’s not what happened over the summer that’s got her twisted up in knots,” Jade spoke for her. “One of her old enemies from high school transferred here. You could use their hostility as an alternative fuel source.”

“So that’s our elusive flatmate,” Riley said, the smooth lilt of his Irish cream accent like a warm caress.

Tess gaped at him. “You’re living there too? Did I not get a memo?”

“Yeah, apparently I didn’t get one either,” Lance said, feigning indignation. “What if I wanted to be the third roommate?”

Jade skewered him with a disbelieving look. “Because you would’ve totally given up your room in the frat house.”

His smile sharpened. “I worked hard for that room as a pledge last semester.”

“You worked hard to score with random ass sorority skanks.”

Riley nudged her attention away from their friends’ redundant bickering. “If you need me to put him in his place, all you have to do is ask.”

“I’ll be fine. He’s just a spoiled prick.” A spoiled prick who never missed a chance to ridicule everything about her. Pride kept her admitting the extent of his malevolence. She was Tess, take-no-shit, tough-as-nails Scarlatti. What would they think if they caught her acting any less than such?

Faking a smile, Tess pinched Riley’s stubble-roughened cheek. “You worry too much.”

He pulled her chair closer and draped his arm along its metal spine. “Someone has to.” Out of everyone, Riley was the only person who really related to her. He emigrated from Ireland at sixteen. Eventually, he snagged a diploma and, with the aid of more jobs than Tess could tally, was supporting himself through college. If Tess hadn’t already given her heart to Cameron, she could see herself with Riley. He was charming and attractive with a crown of wild, rusty brown hair and eyes the color of the Antiguan seas.

“What would I do without you?”

He tousled her hair. “I’ll keep him in check if Cameron can’t find his bollocks.”

“I knew there was a reason I kept you around.” She planted a juicy, smacking kiss on his cheek.

“About time you showed up Cam!”

Tess broke away just in time to catch blue eyes narrowed in her direction. She didn’t have time to compute the fleeting pass of jealousy. Tension clumped behind her sternum at the person standing by his side. She vaguely heard him introduce Adonis to everyone.

He was infiltrating every aspect of her life. First roommates with Cameron and now befriending her crew?

When would she wake from this nightmare?

Дата добавления: 2015-10-16