“None of your business.”
He reached for me, but I stepped out of range. “You know why I want you with me even though you’re a scary little girl who claims not to like me?” he asked, his voice controlled and casual.
“No,” I said emphatically. “Mason, I don’t know. Why can’t you just leave me alone?”
He stood upright, pressing his palms against the counter. He looked down. “Because you’re me. Because I see you. I see the part of you that you like to pretend doesn’t exist.”
“You see that, huh?” I scoffed. “And what part is that?”
He smiled a bittersweet smile. “You’re a destroyer of worlds. You just started with your own.” I drew in a sharp breath. “You realize, of course, that you could have crawled back to Audrey Khalil. You knew what you had to do. You had the skill set. You could have groveled, and you would have gotten most of your life back. But you didn’t do that. And that’s not even mentioning how you deliberately blew it all up in the first place.” My head shot up, and again he smiled. “Come on, Kendall. Grant Powers? Grant Powers? If you really wanted to protect your world, Grant Powers would never have been incentive enough to risk it all. You know that. You always knew that. In more ways than one, he was a tool. You used him as an improvised explosive device.”
I absorbed every word. They sank into my skin like fat, slow raindrops. Every one of them was true.
I looked at Mason and saw him for what he was. He was a skinny kid, only a few years older than me, and he was all alone.
Of course, that wasn’t all he was. He was also a criminal—a blackmailer and an accessory to rape. He was cruel and callous. He was lacking in empathy. He had done immense damage and felt no remorse about any of it. He was ruthless.
Give me another couple of years. I bet I could become that ruthless. I could become cold.
Mason must have sensed a weakness, a softening of the tension, because he moved closer to me. “I blew up my world, too,” he said. “And I don’t regret it any more than you do. It doesn’t mean I don’t want any company.”
The air between us, too narrow to be an effective perimeter, crackled. I angled my head backward and remembered something I had forgotten the moment Mason pulled out that gun.
I had a knife in my bra. And, of course, a wire—of dubious functionality so far from the city—a few inches below that. If I used the former to escape, hopefully I could use the latter to finish my job.
Leon walked into the kitchen, stopping in the doorway at the sight of the two of us, locked in whatever it was we were locked in: embrace, challenge, war? I wasn’t sure.
He cleared his throat. “The helicopter will be here within the hour. Do you have enough cash on you?”
The spell broke. Mason straightened up and turned back to the mac and cheese. “I need to gather some basics together, but I’ve got things set up in Saint Lucia. It will be good enough for me anyway.” He pulled out his phone and made a few quick maneuvers with his spindly fingers. “I’ll go get them now. Stay with her, will you? Make sure she doesn’t use the phone.”
Leon nodded but seemed unwilling to look at me. Mason brushed past his brother into the hall and then doubled back, turning to me. “Kendall?” he asked.
“What?”
“Just so you know, what I just did on this burner? That was me sending out the video of Simone. I’ve had it set up as a draft e-mail for weeks, for just this occasion.”
Even though I knew Simone would be fine, my fingers itched for the knife. I forced them down, curving them around a kitchen stool. “Why did you have to do that? I can’t hurt you anymore.”
“Because we had a deal.” He tapped his very utilitarian phone. “I don’t break my word, even for you.” He turned around.
Still gripping the stool, I craned my neck, watching as he returned to the wall safe. He unlocked it and retrieved the gun before bounding up the stairs.
Leon coughed. “I’m sorry about my brother. I’m sorry you’re here.”
I looked away. “Not sorry enough,” I told him through clenched teeth. “Or else I wouldn’t be here.”
Now that Mason was out of the room, Leon seemed to find it easier to make eye contact with me. He stepped closer and stretched out a sympathetic hand. “Believe me, if there was anything I could do—”
“Save it. You’re a coward, and I’m not interested in you. Just lock me in a room without a telephone and leave me alone.”
He sighed. “I’m not going to do that.”
“Why not? You’re going to put me on a helicopter against my will, without any ID or money, without telling my parents. Do you know how old I am, Leon?”
He cracked a sad smile. “Younger than you look, you said. But smarter than you seem.”
Frustratingly, I felt myself softening at his smile. “How did you let yourself get mixed up in this?” I asked him. “Did you get so in the red with gambling debts that this was your only choice? Really?”
His eyes widened with surprise, but, to his minor credit, he didn’t bother to deny it. “Yes,” he said simply. “I used the corporate account to pay off a debt—one of a few. I embezzled, but I made the withdrawal in my father’s name. Somehow Mason found out who else I owed and bought out my debt. I don’t know how he found it, how he did it, but the kid seems to be good at this.”
“He is,” I told him. “Although I don’t know that he would appreciate being called ‘the kid’ by his big brother.” Leon looked at me sharply. “When did you find out?” I asked.
“In our first meeting,” he said. “He told me after I had already agreed to put my—our—dad’s money into his business. But if I’m being honest, I knew the second I saw him. He looks so much like Dad. He is Dad.”
“So then why did Mason want so badly to fuck him over?” I asked, not even meaning to say it out loud. Because of course I knew the answer.
I looked at Leon. “Your father’s kind of a shit, isn’t he?”
Leon stiffened. “You don’t know anything about him. He was a good dad to me.”
I laughed. “I’m sure he was,” I told him. “To you.”
Leon took a step away and looked at me closely, as if I was a picture that was coming into focus for the first time. And he didn’t like what he saw.
“You’re taking his side?” he asked, revulsion lining the pleasant timbre of his voice.
“You mean your brother’s side?” I answered sharply. “No. But I’m not taking Rodney’s side either. Now put me in a place without a telephone and leave me alone.”
He sighed again. “There’s no need for you to be alone. You’re just a kid—”
“No, I’m serious,” I said, cutting him off. “That’s what I want.” I looked at him and forced my face to go soft. “Please? I’m so nervous. It would be kind.” I let my lower lip quiver a little. “Please, understand.”
Leon’s whole body seemed to yield like Silly Putty. He still looked at me suspiciously, but he also nodded and said, “Follow me.”
I took his hand and let him lead me into a leathery study. “Thank you,” I whispered.
Leon seemed to have cheered up a little, clearly relieved to have the opportunity to be nice to me. “Of course. I’ll give you a minute.”
I swayed a little and smiled a thin, watery smile. “I appreciate it,” I said meekly.
He smiled and shut the door slowly, looking at me sympathetically the whole time.
As soon as I heard the lock turn in the door, I dropped my smile. I went into a corner in the back of the room, far from view of anyone who might be lurking outside the windows, and swiftly unbuttoned my shirt.
I got the knife out first. I checked the mechanism, flipping the blade out and in and out again, before setting it on a nearby shelf. Then I untangled the wire and looked at it.
I knew that once we had left the city, we were out of range of Rockford’s receiver, but the red light was still on, so it seemed possible that it was still recording, even now. But what to do w
ith it? It was sheer luck that Mason hadn’t searched me yet. I couldn’t leave it in my shirt. Mason wouldn’t scruple to pat down my stomach or chest, and he would feel the wire.
Was there anywhere he wouldn’t search? I considered putting it in my underwear, but my pants were too tight. It would show through my jeans.
I couldn’t let Mason destroy anything that might be evidence.
I scanned the room, looking for something to transport it in, but there was nothing I could credibly take with me. No bags or even hats to hide it under.
The lock started to turn.
I thrust my arms behind me and backed away toward the open window. The door opened, and Mason poked his head in, a duffel bag slung across his shoulder.
“What are you up to?” he asked. “What are you doing all the way back there?”
I opened my fist behind my back and dropped the wire into the rosebush under the ledge.
“Nothing,” I said.
CHAPTER THIRTY
Mason did search me after that. It was just a pat down, but there’s not a place on my body I could have hidden that wire where he wouldn’t have found it.
As Mason bent over my calves, my eye wandered to the bookshelf where I had set the knife.
“You almost done?” I asked, still eyeing the knife. He stopped, and I looked down at him. If I could just distract him . . .
“Why don’t you just make me take my clothes off again?” I sneered. “Wouldn’t that be easier?”
He stood up. “I never made you take your clothes off.”
I raised my eyebrow. “No? When you bought me that dress before James Greenberger’s party? I didn’t realize it was so forgettable. And here I thought you liked me.”
He laughed, this time for real. “I didn’t make you take your clothes off. I handed you the dress and told you to try it on. You could have gone into the supply closet. Or just said no. You did that all by yourself.”
“I did that because you were being an asshole,” I said hotly. I wasn’t going to back down in front of you.
“You did that because you weren’t about to back down,” he said, echoing the voice in my head. “And you liked it.”
I didn’t answer. Mason looked disappointed. He checked his watch. “It’s time for us to head out, little girl. Our grand adventure begins.”
He picked up his bag and reached out for my hand. I pulled back. This was happening too fast. It couldn’t be happening this fast.
“Wait,” I said, planting my feet, scrambling for any delay. “I don’t have any clothes. I don’t have my passport.”
Mason just tightened his grasp on my hand. “You won’t need one. My father will have taken care of all of that. We just need to be on that helicopter. Now.”
I wrenched my hand away and backed up to the window.
Mason looked at me thoughtfully and dropped his bag. He stepped closer and closer to me, but I had nowhere to retreat to, so eventually he reached me.
He lifted a hand and smoothed back my hair. “Come on, Barbie,” he said softly. “Be a good girl.”
My trembling stopped. It was like someone had replaced a cracked screen on a laptop. I could see clearly. Mason continued to brush back my hair. I stared straight ahead and saw things. I saw the duffel bag that was Mason’s only luggage. I saw the globe on a polished wooden floor stand. I saw the file cabinet with its shiny brass knobs. I saw the desk to my right: blotter pad, laptop, wooden box full of paper clips. And I looked to the left, and I saw Rockford’s knife waiting for me on the bookshelf.
I looked at Mason. His bright blue eyes had never been closer. He had never been closer. “Why did you call me that?” I asked him.
“Barbie?”
“Yes. Only one other person has ever called me that.”
“I called you Barbie for the same reason he called you Barbie. Because you’re pretty, blond, and adaptable. But I also called you that because I know you’re a survivor. You’ll live through anything, you’ll see. You’re like a cockroach.”
I smiled for real then. Mason noticed it and pulled his head back a centimeter. “What? What did I say?”
I put my hand on his cheek. I had never touched him for nonutilitarian purposes before. His bones impressed themselves onto my skin, and I felt a moment of gratitude and recognition, mingled with the customary disgust.
I looked at him hard. Whatever happened, this would be the last time I felt anything about him at all. I should try to remember it.
“What?” he asked again. His fingers tightened around my hair. “Are you ready to admit that I’m right? That this is the best way?”
I stroked his skin, smooth and supple, down to his collarbone. I held my palm there. “I’ve been called a lot of things over the past few months,” I told him. “I’ve been called a good girl, a bad girl, a little girl, Ken Doll, Skipper, Ken, and Barbie. I’ve never been called a cockroach. And it’s my absolute favorite.”
I reached out my free hand to the desk, flipped the laptop up, and smashed it into Mason’s head.
Wailing, he careened into the bookshelf, shaking it and knocking the knife to the ground. I dodged as he fell to the floor and dipped to pick up the knife.
Mason was down. Still brandishing the laptop, I stepped around him and grabbed the duffel bag. Whatever evidence there was to salvage against Mason would be in it.
Mason was still down. He looked unconscious. I put down the laptop and peered out the window. He started to groan.
I jumped.
We were on the first floor, but the window was still several feet off the ground. I got tangled up in the rosebush, scratching my arms, and fell heavily on the damp grass.
The wire was in front of me. I grabbed it and clambered to my feet.
I instantly fell again. I had twisted my ankle.
Mason’s groans got louder, so I ran anyway, wincing with every step.
It was cold and dark. The frost hit me like a punch, raising all the little hairs on my arms, and I couldn’t see my feet as they grappled with the dying foliage littering the lawn.
I followed the line of the house until I got to the driveway, and then I sprinted to the car, wincing through the pain in my ankle, trying to ignore the crashes and yells coming from the house. I made it onto gravel and was feet away from the car when I heard a shattering of glass and a bang behind me.
I stretched my arm out for the driver’s side door and wrenched it open, falling over my injured ankle. I scrambled to maneuver my body into the car, but there was a pulse of footsteps behind me, like a racing heartbeat, and Mason suddenly had his arms around me, almost like an embrace.
The momentum knocked me into the car, facedown on the upholstery, and I lost hold of the knife. Mason’s wrists were under my torso, pinned down by my hipbones. I pressed into them, trying to use them as leverage to twist my body around and free my legs. He growled.
“I was there that night, you know,” he whispered in my ear. “With your friend.”
I writhed and thrashed but couldn’t escape. He only tightened his grasp and dug his fingernails into my shoulder.
“While Simone was lying in your boyfriend’s bed, naked, I was standing over her, watching her,” he continued, hissing like a snake.
“How?” It came out sounding like a sob.
“Powers fucked up,” he sneered. “He let those little pricks snag the dose. It wasn’t ready to be out yet, and, of course, he panicked and called me. I had to scare him into line and get those other two out of there.” He lifted a hand and ran his fingertip across my collarbone. “I didn’t mean for that to happen, but it brought me to you, so I’m grateful.”
I flinched at the freedom from his grip. I slowly flexed and leaned back into him, laying the line of my arm down his abdomen, fist clenched. His cell phone was in his pocket.
Mason pulled my hair back, wrenching up my face, twisting it so I was forced to look at him. “You don’t have anything to say?”
I did what he wanted and looked hi
m in the eyes. “We’re not the same, Mason,” I said, my breathing labored, as I struggled to maneuver. My arm was splayed out in front of me, Mason’s entire weight pressing on my shoulder blades: I couldn’t move them.
He put his mouth right up against the crease where my jaw met my throat. “You enjoy power. You scheme for it. You feel the urge to destroy, to wreck, to dominate. And you’re mean and selfish. It’s close enough for me. As close as I’ve gotten.”
“I’m not a rapist,” I hissed. I shifted, trying to reach the knife. “I’m not like you.”
He laughed, manic. A drop of blood splattered onto my collarbone, and I saw that he was bleeding from the head. “I’m not a rapist either. I’m a scientist. I’m like you. I like to make things. Look at what I accomplished with you.”
It was my turn to growl. “You didn’t make me into anything.”
He pulled my hair again. “No, I didn’t. I gave you a way to be more yourself. And I made that drug because it’s there to make. They’re just chemicals. They’re not choices or actions. It’s just a set of chemicals that I put together a certain way. Whatever happens after that has nothing to do with me.”
I moved my one free hand, experimenting with its range of motion. “And you like people to be afraid of you.”
“Irrelevant. That’s just human nature. We seek power. This was the power available to me.”
I smiled. “And that’s how we’re different, Mason.”
“How’s that?”
I moved the hand down to rest over my heart. “Because I am more than one thing, more than the thing I am in the eyes of whomever I’m with,” I told him. “I am a bad girl. I’m mean and I’m a liar and a schemer. I can be insensitive to the feelings of others, mostly because I can count the number of people I actually like on one hand. But that’s not all I am. That’s not all I can do. They’re just tools in the toolbox.”
He drew in a breath, and his grip relaxed. I darted my hand into his pocket for his phone, wrenching it out. He began to swear, but before he had time to move I tightened my fist and slammed it backward into his groin.
The Accidental Bad Girl Page 25