by Lyla Payne
Be My Downfall
Lyla Payne
Other books in the Whitman University series:
Broken at Love
By Referral Only
To all of the people who have searched for a reason to hope, and to the people who have been strong enough to give it to them.
Four Years Ago
It was hard to find boys willing to do the things she needed. It was to help her feel, not because she liked it, but the distinction was lost on teenagers. The boys thought she was weird, and the other girls called her a slut. The rumors got back to her grandmother and the girl spent a weekend locked in the closet, starved in case the Devil needed to eat. Grandmother was batshit crazy, but she and the girl had one very important belief in common—that the girl should not have been the one to survive the accident.
When Grandmother let her out to go to school, the girl went across the train tracks instead, where she was forbidden to visit. She stopped at a trailer and knocked on the door, and the boy with the messy black hair, the boy who had hit her the first time, answered with a grunt.
He let her inside, and there were other people there, too—older than her, but not by much. Someone handed the girl a bottle of Jim Beam and she took a swig, reveling in the burning sensation that ate her esophagus and landed in her stomach. She drank more, and the group of kids sat outside the trailer in the autumn sunshine, killing fifths of bourbon and vodka and laughing. It got dark and someone lit a fire, and the girl realized that the buzz in her head turned the solid curtain that separated her from her emotions into something like a sheer gauze. They were real feelings in the pleasant buzz—not as accessible as they were through the pain, but close enough to be reassuring. She drank more, then more still, wondering if she could get drunk enough to touch them.
The girl woke up in the hospital, a sour, metallic taste in her mouth and Grandmother staring through the window on her door. Her head was clear and the numbness in her soul had returned, the iron curtain firmly in place. She knew there was something beyond it. The truth about how she could live here alone, what her parents would have wanted for their daughter, and a way to let go of the pain, but the girl just couldn’t reach it. The rough sex unlocked her ability to feel. The alcohol dried up her defense mechanisms. But neither lasted.
And that was okay. She didn’t want to hold that truth in the palm of her hand.
Grandmother never came to visit, but a hospital shrink did, and a social worker, too. They told Grandmother they wouldn’t release the girl unless she agreed to regular counseling sessions. So, they both agreed, but neither of them believed it would work.
When the girl talked, it was just words. They didn’t mean anything. They didn’t even make sense.
Grandmother said the Devil wouldn’t be run off by a coddling headshrinker.
But fighting DFS would bring nothing but attention, and neither of them wanted that.
Chapter 1
We’d been in Switzerland for two days, and I still couldn’t sleep past 4:00 a.m. At this rate, my internal clock would barely catch up by the end of spring break. Just in time to go back to Florida.
I tried to get back to sleep, tossing and turning until the sky began to lighten, then gave up, deciding to get a couple hours of work in on my contest screenplay. My bare feet hit the cold floor and went numb. As beautiful as St. Moritz was, South Florida didn’t sound bad at the moment.
I hopped over to the dresser and found a pair of thick socks nestled in a drawer—the only bad thing about having someone unpack for me was not being able to find my crap when I needed it. Once my feet were taken care of, I threw the warm down covers back over the bed and left the bedroom, heading downstairs to scare up some coffee. The plush carpet on the massive staircase silenced my footsteps. The view of the mountains through the floor-to-ceiling windows that made up the front wall of our vacation house didn’t get any less impressive, no matter how many times I saw it. I’d almost tripped and broken my neck admiring it the first time I’d visited with my folks.
The main floor of the house spread out before me, the huge living room to the right, dining room to the left, all ornately decorated by someone who didn’t have to sit on the uncomfortable-as-shit furniture. My parents spent an average of one week per year at the multi-million dollar house, and if I hadn’t brought my friends for spring break, no one else but the deer in the woods would have ever seen it.
The kitchen was situated at the rear of the house, but as I rounded the staircase through the living room, a slender figure by the front windows caught my eye.
She stood staring out at the mountains as day broke over Switzerland, thin legs poking out from beneath a man’s dress shirt. Her hair looked blond in the darkness, but as I stepped closer, I saw it had a red tinge. The sight of her, barely dressed, was at least as stunning as the view.
It didn’t explain who she was or what she was doing in my house, since the trip included only a group of my frat brothers and some of their friends. I’d thought. Maybe she was a local grabbed from the bar last night.
“I can hear you breathing, creeper.” Her voice scratched out, throaty and sleepy.
The quality of it twitched my lust to life. It had been weeks since I’d woken up with a girl in my bed. “Sorry.”
I stepped to her side and risked a glance at her face, and let out a breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding. She looked slightly familiar, though I couldn’t put my finger on why. Her pale face, with its smattering of pale freckles and slightly upturned nose situated above full lips, intrigued me as much as her backside. The gaze she flicked my direction was blue and green and gold all at once.
It shouldn’t matter whether I found her attractive since one of my friends had obviously boned her last night, and sloppy seconds had never really appealed to me. Emilie going to bed with Quinn had cured me of my crush on her pretty quickly.
“I’m Toby.”
She winced, reminding me of Katharine Hepburn the morning after her crazy party in The Philadelphia Story, then rolled her eyes and looked back out the window. “I know. We’ve met.”
“When?”
“Could you not talk so loud? Or at all? That would be better.”
I snorted. “Hungover?”
“Boy, you don’t miss a thing. Not the brightest bulb in the SEA house, are you? Not that it would say much if you were.”
Her ribbing tickled the corners of my mouth with a smile. “This is my house, and I don’t recall inviting you. So…your name is?”
“Kennedy. And Sebastian invited me.” Her voice hitched over his name, shaking a little and showing me the first, tiny crack in her stoic façade.
Gross. Even though I’d learned the hard way last year to respect what Sebastian considered his, the guy didn’t deserve any other kind of leeway. If the light bruises on her neck were any indication, he hadn’t changed much. He’d tagged along on this trip because Sebastian did what he liked, and because I followed Whitman’s path of least resistance.
And Kennedy Gilbert? I hadn’t recognized her for a couple reasons, the first being that I’d never seen her sober or really standing upright and awake. The second, that I hadn’t realized any other Whitman students had come to St. Moritz for spring break.
We’d been at the same parties and tailgates, things like that, but never actually spoken. Here, bathed in the fresh sunshine and dressed in nothing but an enormous shirt, she looked more like a skittish filly than Whitman’s most notorious party girl. It muddled my brain, and as much as I knew she wasn’t the girl to break my dry spell, something about her intrigued me.
“What are you doing here?”
Kennedy smirked, but it didn’t reach her eyes. Her fingers, tipped with cracked pink polish, went to the dark spots on her
neck. “Isn’t it obvious?”
The thought of Sebastian doing anything at all to this girl, never mind treating her roughly in my house, left a sour taste in my mouth. But if the rumors about her were true, she liked it that way. Then again, if all of the rumors about Kennedy Gilbert were true, there was no way she could still be alive.
“No, I mean what are you doing in St. Moritz?”
My lust spiked again as she moved, the shirt gaping and revealing nothing but creamy skin underneath. All of the whispers about her, the things she liked and had done, tried to give me morning wood that would be impossible to hide. I groped for something to ward it off, and the mental image of her rolling around with Sebastian did the trick.
“My roommate invited me. We’re staying over at the Palace and ran into some of your friends at the hotel bar last night.” She slid onto the back of the sofa, pale legs dangling. Her hand swiped at her eyes, but it was impossible to tell if she smudged away a tear or attempted to soothe her hangover.
The Hepburn-style snark she’d tossed my way a few minutes ago leeched away, leaving her washed out and looking woozy. The slump of her shoulders made me wonder if I was going to have to catch her, but she straightened them after a second and looked me in the eye.
“Do you think you could take me back to the hotel?”
“Sure. Do you want to put on some pants or something?”
“No. I’m not going back in that room.” A shudder worked through her delicate shoulders. “It’s early. And I don’t give a shit what the front desk clerk thinks.”
She didn’t give a shit what anyone thought—I’d give her that. Before we could move for the door, Quinn Rowland landed at the bottom of the stairs and dropped his duffel bag on the floor with a thump. He didn’t look much better than Kennedy—all bloodshot eyes and messy black hair—but at least he had on pants. Thank goodness for small favors.
His sharp blue eyes flicked from Kennedy to me, then back again before he raised an eyebrow. “You two are up early. Didn’t get much sleep, I gather?”
“What are you doing up?” I asked in an attempt to change the subject.
Quinn and I hadn’t suffered many aftereffects of our disagreement over Emilie last year. He’d changed so much since he’d first come to Whitman he barely seemed like the same person, but still, we would never be close. He protected his relationship with Em with the ferocity of a Doberman promised a heap of steaks if no one broke into his junkyard, and the fact that I’d ever been interested in her kept me firmly outside the chain links.
She and I had patched things up, though, and he tolerated our casual friendship. I had kept my nose cleaner than most Whitman students before landing in the middle of his sick game, and I had no intention of crossing him again, no matter how hot his girlfriend was.
“I’m meeting Emilie in Paris for the rest of break. I’ve got to work out logistics for the French Open, and she’s dragging me around to stare at paintings.” He paused to send a message on his phone. The smile on his face made it clear he didn’t mind being “dragged around” one bit. “You’re okay with Sam staying, right?”
I waved a hand, which Quinn missed because he’d already turned his back. His friend Sam, a pro tennis player, had met us here. He’d injured his obliques at the Aussie Open and been ordered on at least a six-week rest before rejoining the tour, so Quinn had invited him to St. Moritz to take his mind off everything. So far, he’d taken his mind off things with a different girl each night—I didn’t think he’d even stayed overnight in the house yet.
“There’s my car. See you back at Whitman.” He glanced at Kennedy, then shook his head. “Good luck with that one.”
“What?”
I turned to find her snuggled into the corner of the couch, fast asleep. The front door banged shut, signaling Quinn’s exit.
“Helpful as ever, Rowland,” I muttered.
In spite of everything—including the fact that I needed a project like the world needed another poorly adapted superhero movie—I took a moment to stare at her. Sleep stole the wry façade, and the warming sun fell across her pale face and reddened her hair. It left little spots of light here and there, reminding me of the strawberry patch my grandparents’ neighbors had in Texas.
Kennedy looked like the kind of perfect dolls my brother Trent played with as a boy. Before my father took them away, before he hit high school and—
I stopped. Trent was off limits, even in my head. If anything, the brief memory steeled my determination to get rid of Kennedy as soon as possible. The fact that I wanted to know more about her was reason enough. She was on a downward spiral, and letting Sebastian bang her might not even be rock bottom. It couldn’t be my problem.
She slept while I made us both a cup of coffee and changed into jeans, a long-sleeved Whitman T-shirt, and my trusty North Face fleece. The rest of the house didn’t stir. There were six of us in St. Moritz—well, five since Quinn split, four not including me. Sebastian had obviously had a strenuous night, and Sam hadn’t come in before I’d passed out. A couple of pledges, Finn and Jax, had come along, basically to wait on the rest of us in between trips down the mountain.
The smell of the coffee didn’t wake Kennedy. I sank down in the chair next to the couch, setting both cups on the table and reaching over to get her moving. I pretended it wasn’t my sparked interest that bothered me, reminding myself she’d wanted to go home—presumably before Sebastian made an appearance. It seemed like a good idea, to get rid of her before the morning got even more awkward.
I put out a gentle hand, resting it on her shoulder. Kennedy rolled toward me, sandwiching my hand between both of her palms and resting her cheek on top.
That didn’t exactly work.
“Psst. Kennedy.”
Her blue-green eyes flew open before her name left my lips. She dropped my hand like it dripped with troll semen and scrambled to the other end of the couch, her knees drawn into her chest. It heaved and panic filled her eyes, widening them as her rasping breath filled the room.
“Christ, you’re fine. Calm down.”
She clutched Sebastian’s button-down tight across her chest. “What am I doing here? Where am I?”
What the fuck? “What are you talking about? We just had a whole conversation, like, fifteen minutes ago.”
“Did we fuck?”
“What?” Red veins spiderwebbed her eyes, more prominent than they’d been before she lay down. “I came downstairs and found you staring out the window, you asked if I would take you back to the hotel, then you passed out on the couch. End of story.”
Instead of calming her, the truth twisted her full lips in disdain. “Liar.”
Anger tightened my jaw, but I told myself to chill. She was a drunk, and a junkie, and maybe still wasted from last night. Patience. “I don’t have any reason to lie to you, Kennedy. We didn’t have sex. You told me you came back here with Sebastian Blair—this is my fucking house, by the way—and I’m guessing you had a pretty crazy night judging by the finger bruises all over your neck. I’m sure you’re tired.”
“I don’t fall asleep unless I’m alone. Ever,” she accused.
It was a ridiculous thing to say, but she obviously didn’t think so. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen someone look so desperate to be right. It seemed mean to argue, so I kept my mouth shut, ignoring my urge to soothe her.
We stared at each other until her breathing returned to normal. The fiery challenge in her gaze held me captive, and I wondered how this girl who seemed so out of control had so much determination inside her. Finally Kennedy looked away. She struggled to her feet and stretched, then picked up the coffee I’d made for myself—black—and gave me a tired smile. “Can you just take me back to the hotel now?”
“Sure thing, strawberry. Sure thing.”
Chapter 2
My ringing phone woke me from a late afternoon, pre-trip-to-Bern nap. My sleep-muddled brain registered a Swiss number on the caller ID, which baffled me further.
My dad used a US phone when he was overseas. “’Lo?”
“Do you fucking have her?”
“Have who? Who is this?” I struggled to kick free of the blankets, squinting in the beam of dusty sunlight that hit me in the face.
“Geezus, you’re an idiot. Kennedy Goddamn Gilbert.”
“Why would I have her? And who is this?”
I felt like Cary Grant when he woke up after being drugged in North by Northwest: totally confused and possibly living someone else’s life.
“Dammit. This is worse than hauling a two-year-old halfway around the world. It’s Blair, her roommate. Someone saw you drop her off this morning, but we haven’t seen her all day. Call me back if you find her, yeah?”
Blair hung up before I could answer. Christ. If I’d known Kennedy and Blair Paddington were roommates, I’d forgotten. Blair, with her mischievous brown eyes and hot little ass. Too bad she was getting her B.A. in ball busting.
It wasn’t my problem where Kennedy had gotten off to—I should have never been involved in the first place. Sebastian needed to handle his own shit. I’d planned to tell him as much, but he hadn’t gone skiing with the rest of us earlier. Neither had Sam, since he couldn’t risk another injury. He’d gone over to the slopes and bummed around the lodge instead, charming the ski pants off every woman within a six-mile radius.
My own charm didn’t work nearly as well. I’d always been a little envious of guys like Sam and Quinn—even Sebastian had something going on, even if it was born of the devil. Then again, I had great parents, a 4.0 G.P.A., a clean arrest record, and a job waiting for me after graduation. Pretty much no other guy in SEA could say all of those things. And I didn’t have too much trouble finding girls when I could make the time.
I checked my phone, deducing from the low position of the sun outside that I needed to get my ass to the airport. My parents were in Bern for a long weekend—my father had spent years serving as the U.S. Ambassador to Switzerland and Lichtenstein—and insisted we have at least one dinner in exchange for my use of the house. At least he’d sent the private plane. I could be back in time to hit the bars with the guys.