I feel like I’m going to be sick and I can’t face further embarrassment right now, so I turn on my heel and make my way out of the cafeteria as quickly as I can without running. My insides are so restless and unsettled. I can’t go back in there. I can’t sit through the class after recess, knowing by then the juicy gossip he just created will have spread and everyone who isn’t talking about him will be talking about me.
Before I entirely know what I’m doing, I head to my locker, collect all my things, and flee the building.
I want to walk straight home so I can curl up alone in my bed, but I don’t. Mom hasn’t left for work yet, so she’d want to know why I’m home from school early. I can’t explain, because I can’t tell her what just happened.
I stop at the bridge instead. I sit down and dangle my feet over the edge, staring down at the water until I feel calm again.
After a little time passes, I open my backpack and take out my homework. I might as well get started on it. Maybe by the time I finish, Mom will be gone and I can walk the rest of the way home.
I get carried away in my work. It’s a great escape, but more time passes than I intended. I don’t realize it until I hear footsteps on the bridge. Until they stop and Hunter laughs a little.
“Wow. You’re still here after all that.”
I start to put my things back in my book bag, casting a guarded look at him over my shoulder. “I’m not here for you. I didn’t realize school had already let out. I was just killing time until I could go home.”
“Maybe you should suck my dick first since everyone thinks you have been anyway,” he says, apparently amused by the destruction he caused.
I don’t bother to dignify that with a response. “Did that make you feel better? You completely ruined my reputation. Every single person we go to school with will have heard about this by the time I get to school tomorrow.”
“I know. But hey, this makes me look better than the other things they could be saying about me,” he states.
I shake my head, zipping my bag back up and standing. “That is without question the most selfish statement I have ever heard.”
“You brought it on yourself,” he says, completely remorseless. “All you had to do was keep your mouth shut, Riley. All you had to do was keep your word.”
Dropping my backpack and pivoting angrily, I fling back, “I was afraid he’d kill you, Hunter. I was terrified that the next time you disappeared, it would be for good. I was trying to protect you.”
I’m so overcome with hurt and anger that I can’t keep my composure, but Hunter stands there looking cool and unaffected as he tucks his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “I didn’t need your protection.”
I draw a shuddering breath, angry at my own emotions for being so out of control. “What I did may have hurt you, but it wasn’t malicious. What you did today… that was just cruel.”
Hunter shrugs. “Never claimed to be a nice guy.”
I shake my head, looking down at the footbridge. “Well, not like you care, but for the record? I’m extremely disappointed in you.”
I expect him to shoot back something cruel at worst, casually indifferent at best, but he falls silent. The silence lasts for so long that I finally look up at him.
He’s looking off at the woods that lead to his house. “Well, you won’t have to be disappointed for very long,” he tells me, his tone more grounded, but a little hollow. Not hollow like he doesn’t care, but… something else. Something more serious.
I shouldn’t care. After what he just did to intentionally hurt me, I should walk away without another word, but it’s not in my nature. “What do you mean?”
“All the shit you kicked up caused a lot of trouble for my mom.”
I cock my head, glancing past him and narrowing my eyes in consideration. “I think it was allowing her husband to beat the shit out of you that caused trouble for your mom, but… go on.”
“Apparently, while my existence wasn’t enough of a draw for my father to ever come here, a potential public scandal is.”
I straighten at the mention of his father. I thought the girls in history were just peddling slush from the gossip mill. I didn’t think there was any truth to it. “Your dad’s here? I thought you guys didn’t even talk.”
“We don’t,” he says, bending to pick up an errant stick on the bridge, then throwing it as hard as he can into the woods. “We’re strangers, but his name’s on my birth certificate. I guess he’s some kind of big deal, and there’s already been so much scandal in his family that he won’t tolerate a bastard in America who ends up a ward of the state because his mom’s been ruled an unfit parent until she completes some bullshit parenting classes.”
“In America?” I question, eyes wide.
Hunter finally looks at me. “He’s European.”
“Don’t tell me he lives in a chateau in Paris,” I say, thinking of the gossip from earlier.
Hunter shakes his head. “Not a chateau, but he does have an apartment there. A place in Geneva, too, where his wife—who hates me—and two daughters—who don’t even know I exist—live in their family home. I guess my dad works in Italy though, so he has a house in Umbria where they won’t have to deal with me on the regular. Apparently… I’m being shipped off to Italy.”
My heart sinks and I feel a little light on my feet. “What?”
He clears his throat and nods, looking down at the footbridge. “Don’t speak a word of Italian so I’m not sure how that’s gonna work, but… I guess I’ll learn.”
“But… your mom only has to take parenting classes, right? And keep Dennis away. And then she can still parent you. Can’t she explain that to him? Why would he take you all the way to Italy—?”
“Because he said so, Riley. You’ve met my mom. Did you not notice she’s not very good at standing up to men she has feelings for on my behalf? He’s decreed that I’m going to be hidden away like a dirty secret in some fucking mansion in the Italian countryside, so that’s what’s going to happen.”
I don’t know what to say. My mind is racing nearly as fast as my heart, trying to absorb all this new information. Trying to find a way around it. Hunter may have been a real jerk today, but I don’t want him to leave. I especially don’t want him to be sent off to live with people who don’t even like him in a country he’s probably never been to.
“Maybe… maybe we can figure out a way around this. I can talk to my mom. Maybe she can talk to your dad. Your mom might not be able to stand her ground with him but my mom won’t have the same problem. No one intimidates my mom. Even if he is some ex-prince of Italy, she won’t care. My mom’s unstoppable. I’ll explain the situation to her, I’ll—I’ll—”
Hunter shakes his head. “It won’t change anything.”
“You won’t have to go in the system, though,” I blurt, thinking as quickly as I can. “You could come live with us. If your dad’s whole thing is how it would look if you were put into foster care, then we’ll find a way around that. I’m sure there is something your mom could do to give my mom temporary emergency custody, or… something like that. That sounds like a real thing, right? I know there’s something like that, I don’t know the details, but we can figure it out. There won’t be a scandal. You’ll have somewhere safe to live and your dad can go back to pretending you don’t exist; everybody wins.”
Scowling at me with distrust I haven’t seen in his eyes since that first day I encountered him on this bridge, he says, “Why would you even be willing to do that after what I just did to you at lunch today?”
“I don’t care about that. I mean, I do…” I look down, sighing. “I do, but… not enough that I want you gone.”
For a moment, there’s silence aside from the natural noise of being in the woods. There’s something almost like regret in his voice when he finally speaks. “You might not, but your mom will. Even if she would have agreed to that before, she won’t now.”
“I won’t tell her.”
“She’ll find out. If you don’t crack—which you probably will—she’ll find out some other way. Be realistic, Riley. You know your mom better than I do, and just from what you’ve told me and what I’ve seen for myself… there’s no way.”
He’s right. I want him to be wrong, but he’s not. I might have the capacity to forgive him for intentionally hurting me, but my mom wouldn’t. She was skeptical of him when she had nothing to go on but a bad feeling, disliked him for failing to show up on time to a date. If she finds out he told the whole school he had sex with me just to get back at me for telling his secret, she’ll loathe him for the rest of her natural life—and into the next, if reincarnation is a thing.
“There has to be some other way around this,” I say.
“There’s not.”
“You don’t have grandparents or an aunt or uncle—?”
“Riley,” he says, raising his voice to get my attention.
I look up at him.
“Just stop,” he says, like it’s that easy. “It’s over. It’s done.”
I take a shallow breath and then another. I can’t accept that. I can’t accept that he’s going away because of me and there’s nothing I can do to fix it.
Hunter already has, though. Hands still shoved into his pockets, he starts making his way across the bridge. He pauses when he gets to me and leans a little closer. “See? I may have ruined your reputation, but you ruined my life.”
I draw on every ounce of strength within me to keep standing when all I want to do is collapse. Tears burn behind my eyes, but I don’t let them fall. It’s a good thing he’s standing close, because I can’t get out much beyond a whisper. “I’m so sorry.”
With a knowing little nod, he says, “Not sorry enough, though. Don’t worry. You will be.”
A chill travels down my spine and my gaze snaps to his. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“They may be able to ship me out of the country for now, but in a few years, I’ll be 18.” Hunter bends down and picks up the backpack he bought me. He holds it out for me to take and I do, a bit woodenly. Then he smiles, and it’s one of his not-so-nice smiles. “I’ll be back for you, Riley.”
“Hunter…”
He reaches out to touch my face, but this time the chill in his eye makes the touch unbearable.
I turn my face away, looking at the water instead of at him. Like cornered prey hoping if I avoid eye contact, the predator hunting me will get bored and wander away.
He’s going away, all right, but my predator isn’t easily distracted. He has a long memory and an axe to grind, and as he speaks again, dread gathers in the pit of my stomach.
“You ruined my life. It’s only fair I return the favor.”
I don’t say anything to that. He doesn’t expect me to.
Dropping his hand, he looks at me one last time, then he crosses the bridge and heads off in the direction of his house.
Even now, in this moment, I still don’t want him to go. I don’t know if I’m more worried that he’ll start a new life there and completely forget about me, or he’ll be true to his word and come back for me when he’s old enough and nobody can stop him.
I don’t know what the future holds for us, but I do have a sinking feeling that if I ever see Hunter Maxwell again… he’ll make me wish I hadn’t.
Hunter and Riley’s story continues in The Boy on the Bridge, coming soon!
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About the Author
SAM MARIANO is the author of the bestselling bully romance Untouchable as well as many other love stories featuring dark and damaged heroes. Sam loves to write edgy, twisty romantic reads with complicated characters you’re left thinking about long after you turn the last page. Her favorite thing about indie publishing is the ability to play by your own rules! If she isn’t chatting with her readers, reading one of the thousands of books on her to-read list, writing her next book, or playing with her fantastic daughter… actually, that’s about all she has time for these days.
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Prologue
THE CABLE TIE around my wrists was so tight my fingers were going numb. The pole they’d tied me to dug into my back, the cold metal and the evening breeze making me shiver.
Or maybe I was shivering from fear.
They’d never gone this far before, never hurt me this badly.
I sobbed, the flood of tears stinging my sore cheek.
The knife was small—just a little switchblade thing—but it looked sharp. A shudder raced down my spine as the tip was dragged gently down my throat, the middle of my chest, my belly.
For the first time, I wondered if I would actually survive this night. Were they really about to kill me? Did their hatred really run that deep?
Movement in the distance caught my attention. Someone was sprinting toward us across the football field.
My heart soared . . . then I recognized him, and it plummeted again.
He stopped just a few feet away, breathing hard, his wide eyes taking in the whole fucked-up scene. He couldn’t hide his reaction; his beautiful face gave it all away—surprise, horror, disbelief, disgust . . . was that anger I saw next?
I couldn’t be sure of anything anymore. My soul was being torn to shreds, and my mind was going with it. I had no idea what he’d do next.
Would he join in and help them destroy me?
Would he stand by and do nothing, let it happen?
Would he walk away, like a coward, so he wouldn’t have to watch?
Or would he defend me? Save me?
Knowing what I’d just learned, what it would mean, what it would cost, did I even want him to?
He took a step forward, and I braced myself to find out if the boy I loved would be my salvation . . . or if my heart would be torn to shreds right along with my mind and soul.
Chapter 1
THE TENNIS BALL thunked rhythmically as my cousins got into a lengthy rally. It wasn’t even midday yet, but the sun was already unbearable, reflecting brightly off the blue of the tennis court.
Donna and Harlow were in pristine tennis whites right down to their shoes, their skirts swishing around their tanned thighs as they lunged for balls as though competing at a world-class tournament. I was in shorts and a tank top, my flip-flops abandoned under the chair—nothing pristine about any of it. I didn’t know the first thing about holding a tennis racket, let alone hitting the ball.
My cousins lived on a property big enough to hold a tennis court and a pool. I lived in an apartment off a hallway that always smelled like curry. This was not my world, but these girls were the closest thing I had to friends.
The rally broke, and Donna grunted a “yes” as she pumped her fist.
“Are you two nearly done?” Amaya yelled from the chair next to me before taking a sip of her watermelon juice. She went to Fulton Academy with my cousins and lived on the next street. They’d been friends since preschool, so she was always around when I was around. Not that I minded. I liked her confidence—if only some of it would rub off on me . . .
“Yeah, some of us would like to get in the pool,” I added.
“We need to finish this,” Harlow ground out before crouching down, waiting for her sister to serve.
Amaya and I both groaned and slumped down in our chairs. We were in the shade of a massive umbrella, but it felt as if the sun was b
eating right through it onto the top of my head. I drank the rest of my own watermelon juice, loudly slurping up the last dregs of the sweet liquid through my straw.
Amaya finished hers too, dropped the empty glass on the table between us, and reached for her phone. She changed the song, the new beat thumping out of the little portable speaker, then stretched her arms up over her head. Her perfectly straight, almost black hair hung down the back of the chair, shining like silk. Her long brown legs were toned and perfect.
I wished I had her beautiful skin. I wished I had anyone’s skin but my own, especially the skin on my face.
“How was your summer, Mena?” Amaya asked, giving me a genuine, friendly smile. It was the question I’d been dreading all morning.
The three of them had spent most of the summer at some camp with their other rich friends. I’d spent the summer on the cramped little balcony of my apartment, doing elaborate makeup looks and then wiping them off again—when I wasn’t working at the diner.
“Pretty chill.” I shrugged and hoped she’d drop it.
“Did you do anything fun with your friends?”
Your friends. Not your other friends or your friends from school. Did she not consider me a friend?
I pushed the choking feeling down and worked hard to keep my expression neutral. “Nothing worth mentioning.” Please drop it. “I can’t stand this heat anymore.” I groaned. “I don’t know how those two aren’t melting.”
My cousins were still whacking the tennis ball, sprinting up and down the court.
“Ugh, I know. They’re gonna get heatstroke.” Amaya took a cigarette out of her pack and lit it.
Seizing the opportunity to avoid the topic of my nonexistent friends, I slipped into my flip-flops. “I’m gonna go get another drink and jump in the pool.”
Bully Me: Class of 2020 Page 42