Savage Love
Penelope Bloom
Contents
1. Charli
2. Cassian
3. Charli
4. Cassian
5. Charli
6. Charli
7. Cassian
8. Cassian
9. Charli
10. Cassian
11. Charli
12. Cassian
13. Cassian
14. Charli
15. Cassian
16. Charli
17. Cassian
18. Charli
19. Cassian
20. Charli
21. Cassian
22. Charli
23. Cassian
24. Charli
25. Cassian
26. Charli
27. Cassian
28. Charli
29. Cassian
30. Charli
31. Cassian
32. Charli
33. Cassian
34. Charli
35. Cassian
36. Charli
37. Cassian
38. Charli
39. Cassian
40. Charli
41. Cassian
42. Charli
43. Epilogue - Charli
44. Epilogue - Cassian
1
Charli
I held the broomstick like a sword, inching closer to the pantry while making as little noise as I could.
Deep breaths. You can do this.
With a war cry, I yanked the door open and jumped back a step. My eyes darted around every darkened corner of the pantry until I spotted it. The mouse was about the size of my foot, and it was just sitting there… staring.
“If you just walk out of here, nobody has to get hurt!” I meant to speak in a calm, reassuring voice, but it all came out in a high-pitched squeal.
The mouse stared back at me with its little black eyes.
I took a steadying breath, then took off my shoe. I tossed it into the center of the pantry. The sound seemed to spook the mouse, who took off at a run toward me.
I screeched but had the presence of mind to still use my broom to guide it. I planted it down, creating a wall the mouse swerved to avoid. Except it ran the wrong way—toward my bedroom and deeper into the house.
In a burst of panic, my brain turned the broom into a hockey stick and the mouse into a puck. I flicked my wrists and sent it cartwheeling through the air and into the trashcan. The lid made two comical spins before settling closed. I stared in wide-eyed disbelief.
Hurrying, I picked up the can, which was vibrating from the mouse’s attempts to escape and hurled it—along with half a bag worth of trash—into the backyard.
I had time to dust my hands and breathe a sigh of relief before I saw the mouse head back toward the house and slip in through a hole in the siding. A few moments later, I heard the sound of its little feet scurrying across the floor inside.
Shit.
I went back inside to finish unpacking. The mouse, I decided, had won. I’d just have to hope it wasn’t going to creep around and crawl on me in my sleep.
I had my first day at Parker High tomorrow, and to make matters worse, I was starting in the middle of the year. It wouldn’t be the first time I’d transferred to a new school, and it was never easy. People already had circles of friends and routines. It also didn’t help that my scar had a way of making me a hot topic of gossip everywhere I went.
Kids loved making up stories about how I’d got it. I’d heard everything, from a motorcycle accident to being tortured by a crazy kidnapper. It was all ridiculous, and if they’d get their heads out of their asses for even a minute, they’d probably be able to recognize burn scars.
My hand reflexively went to be sure my hair was laying properly over the side of my forehead that was scarred. But dad had made me cut my hair before we moved, and he’d made me cut it short. He’d purposely made the stylist take enough away that I wouldn’t be able to cover the scar.
The memory made my face burn hot.
I made a very un-girly grunting noise as I hefted a box full of metallic stuff that clanged and clattered. I brought it to the kitchen counter and set it down with a thud. Our countertop was… interesting. Fancy houses got granite, quartz, or maybe even marble. Then a step down and you had stuff like wood or linoleum style surfaces. But our house? We had particle board with glossy paper glued to it. The worst part was they hadn’t even bothered to put a high-resolution picture on the paper, so the picture of stone was blurred. It was also peeling up at the corners.
I noticed the box, then. On the side, “Kitchen” was written in neat, feminine handwriting. Then my dad had drawn a red line of marker through it and scribbled “X-MAS SHIT” below.
I ran my fingertip over the letters my mom had written, wondering when she’d written them. But the exercise started bringing up the scary kinds of sadness I’d learned to run from, so I shut it down. Instead, I started unpacking. Better to keep my body busy enough that my mind wasn’t able to start running off again.
I had a solid sheen of sweat going by the time my dad came home.
He had this way of shoving the door open, almost violently. It slammed into the wall and bounced back as he loomed in the doorway. He locked eyes with me, then saw me look down at the bottle he still held in his hand.
My features went tight, and I didn’t look away.
With a grunt of annoyance, he slung it over his shoulder where it collided with a tree outside and shattered, from the sounds of it. He spread his hands mockingly. “May I come in, now?”
I bit down the urge to shake my head or roll my eyes. I’d known the drunk version of my dad longer than the sober version, and that meant I knew how to avoid trouble—for the most part. “It’s your house, dad,” I said quietly.
“Damn right.” He walked in, leaving the door open despite the bits of snow and cold that were blowing in.
I moved past him, closing it softly.
He was in the kitchen now, and I heard him scoff. “All fucking day and this is what you accomplished? A few boxes unpacked and the place is still a goddamn mess?”
A few dozen comments sprouted to my mind. I had to fight with myself to keep from saying any of them. “I’ll finish tomorrow,” I said instead.
“You will,” he agreed. If it wasn’t for the way his eyes seemed to have trouble focusing and the faint smell of whiskey, nobody would ever guess he was drunk. Drinking didn’t make him violent or silly or anything like that. It just made him mean. It brought out the part of him that still blamed me for what happened—the part of him that wanted nothing more than for me to feel like it was my fault.
He walked to the stove and made a show of checking that the burners and the oven were off. “You left these alone, right?”
“Yes.” My voice was dry. He knew I did. He always knew. But he still asked because he liked reminding me.
I endured another ten minutes of his attempts to provoke me into saying something he’d have an excuse to get pissed about and do something cruel. When he grew tired of it, he passed out on the couch with a lit cigarette between his fingers.
Once I was sure he was asleep, I put out the cigarette. I was about to go to my room and sleep, but dad hadn’t paid the gas company to turn the heat on yet, and our house was freezing. I grabbed a couple blankets and set them over his snoring form.
Sometimes, I tried to see past what was on the surface with him. I’d learned a long time ago that parents were just people. They weren’t superheroes and they weren’t perfect. In fact, most of them were far from it. My dad had been a good guy when things were going right. He’d always treated me well. But our world had fallen apart when we lost mom, and he hadn’t been strong enough to move on. Neither of us
were, but we handled it our own ways.
I didn’t blame him for the way he was, but I didn’t forgive him, either. That’s why I was going to be gone as soon as I graduated high school this year. There was probably a good guy buried under all that hatred and bitterness somewhere, but I wasn’t going to be his emotional punching bag while he figured himself out.
I thought about going to sleep, but an idea stuck itself in my brain and wouldn’t quite let go.
Cassian Stone.
We’d only been back in Silver Falls, Maine, for two days. It had been over ten years since I’d seen him, and I wasn’t even sure he still lived here. If he did, there was no guarantee he’d remember me.
I threw a scarf around my neck and laced up my boots. There was only one way to find out.
I set off in the snow toward where his house had been. Coincidentally, that meant I was going to be heading toward the house next door, too. Our old house.
Silver Falls was mostly a small town, but there was a picturesque section of the area that bordered a lake with rolling hills. There were about twenty mansions scattered along the lake’s shore, and mostly everything else was old log cabins, crumbling trailers, and everything in between. It all circled the main town of Silver Falls, which had grown some over the past ten years, but not much.
I cut my way across a few roads and snowy embankments until I was on our old road. It was getting dark out, but I’d spent enough time roaming the area as a kid that I thought I could’ve navigated it blindfolded.
The space where our old house had been was empty now except for a few young trees that had started to grow. I stared at it for a little while before moving on toward Cassian’s house.
It was a small cabin style home, and I could still remember how it had smelled inside. Like fresh wood smoke and the chili his dad always seemed to be cooking. I waited outside the door for a few seconds and then finally decided to knock. It was a wasted effort, but I tried to arrange my frustratingly short hair in a way that would cover most of my scar.
The door opened to reveal an old man I didn’t recognize. He was bearded and wrinkled. He squinted at me in confusion. “You okay?”
I smiled quickly. “Yes. I was actually hoping to talk to Cassian. Is he around?”
“Cassian? You mean that mean little fucker who lives by the lake?”
I scraped my memory. Cassian did have a mean streak at times. But Cassian’s family had always been poor. There was no way they lived by the lake. “Cassian Stone?”
The old man opened the door a little wider, letting some of the light from inside reach my face. His eyes darted to my forehead, and then a look of understanding washed over his features. “Charli Rhodes?”
I nodded.
“It’s good to see you’re back home. But Cassian and his mother moved years ago. She remarried after…” he trailed off, smiling tightly. “Anyway, he lives by the lake now. But I hope you won’t mind me saying I think you’d do better to leave things with him alone. You look like a good girl, and he’s not—” The man paused, searching for the right words. “Cassian has lost his way since you two were kids.”
I thought about asking how the old man knew Cassian, except I decided it didn’t matter. I also knew I wasn’t planning to take his advice and leave Cassian alone. If anything, his words of warning only made me more determined to find him.
2
Cassian
The world was on fire. Orange flame flowed up the walls like water. The ceiling seemed alive as smoke burrowed under the flames, making them pulse with a monstrous heartbeat. The air itself was pain—like every particle against my skin made me want to scream and run back outside.
But I went deeper into the house. I fought past curtains that were dripping bits of fabric that disintegrated into ash before they hit the ground. I shouldered through crumbling doors, coughing so hard from the smoke that I thought I was going to throw up my insides.
Then the wall beside me caved in. I put my arms up to shield myself, but the falling pillar caught me and pinned me to the ground.
“Cassian!”
I stirred, sucking in a surprised breath. For a moment, I thought I smelled smoke and burning skin, but it was just a remnant of my dream. I blinked, realizing where I was.
Class. Mrs. Peterson’s psychology class.
Mrs. Peterson was still glaring at me. She was thirty something, easy on the eyes, and had made it pretty clear that she was a certifiable cougar. A few guys from the football team claimed they’d hooked up with her, though I wasn’t sure I believed half of it.
I flashed a quick smile. “I was having a nice dream about you, Mrs. P. You stopped it right before the good part.”
Her cheeks reddened. A few of my braver classmates chuckled, but most looked like they wanted to hide.
“If you need more motivation to stay awake, maybe you could consider that you’re well on your way to failing. This isn’t rocket science, Cassian. It’s psychology. An elective class. The only kids who fail this are the ones who don’t try.”
“I’m not failing. I have a ‘D.’”
She crossed her arms. “And do you consider that a success?”
I was a lot of things. But I always thought it was a bitch move to make life hell for my teachers. I decided to stop being an ass and answer her honestly. “No,” I said.
She seemed satisfied with my response, which got her to lift her focus from me and direct it to the rest of the class. She went on about our test that was coming up, but my thoughts slid away and went back to what I’d been thinking of before I dozed off.
Charli Rhodes was back in Silver Falls.
The thought had sent ripples of fire through me every time it skidded across my brain. Logan said she was in his first period English class, too, so I knew the rumors were true.
I gripped the edge of my desk tight enough to make my fingers ache and my knee bounced restlessly.
She was back.
The bell finally rang, and we all filed out of class. Mrs. Peterson stopped me on my way out. “Cassian,” she said. “Hold on a sec.”
I waited by the door. Once we were by ourselves, she got up and moved to stand in front of me. She smelled like apple-scented shampoo, and it occurred to me that if I wanted, I probably could screw around with her.
Nah.
I waited, keeping my eyes on hers and not on her cleavage, even though she was short enough that it was on full display for me.
“I wanted to tell you that I know a little bit about your past. I completely understand how traumatic childhood events can shape individuals, and if you ever want to talk ab—”
I raised a finger toward her, icy cold rage pounding through me. I could have shoved her clear across the room and into her desk. I almost did. Instead, I clenched my teeth and grated out the words. “You don’t know a fucking thing about me.”
I was about to say more, but I turned and slammed the door behind me.
Gage was waiting for me outside. He saw the look on my face, squinted a little, then grinned. “What? Did you take personality tests and you got ‘rock?’”
“Funny.” Methodically, I took all the anger I felt threatening to consume me and shoved it into every corner of my mind I could find until I felt calm. Sometimes, I could tap into all of it on the football field, like background heat that I could make boil over. Most times, it just made it feel like I was always on the brink of exploding.
Gage had short, dirty blond hair and always wore a look on his face like he was thinking about something deeply troubling. He also played linebacker for the defense and was a hell of a backup QB when our starter, Tristan Blackwood, was getting himself into trouble.
Gage hooked his thumbs in his backpack straps as we walked. “I heard the party is at your place tonight.”
“Congratulations.”
He shook his head. “Do you have to try to be an asshole, or does it come naturally? I’ve always wondered.”
I gave his question some serious though
t. “Does a rock try to be heavy?”
He chuckled. “See? You can be funny when you try. Sort of,” he muttered.
Gage was saying something about this girl he was planning to hook up with at the party, but I barely heard him.
We were between classes and the hallways were jammed from shoulder to shoulder with kids. But I stood at least half a head taller than almost all of them, which meant I had a clear view of her.
Charli.
It had been almost ten years, but there was no doubt in my mind it was her. She had short, raven black hair that barely made it past her lips. She was the one I used to sneak around the woods with. We’d climb up to the top of the cliffs over the lake and fish for hours without catching a thing. For a while, we’d been inseparable.
“You good?” Gage was frowning at me, eyes narrowed.
I realized I’d stopped walking to stare at her. She had just disappeared into a classroom. “Just my imagination.” My voice was distracted, though. Part of me almost thought it really must’ve been my imagination. That all the rumors were false, too.
Charli wouldn’t dare to come back after what happened, would she?
Gage laughed softly. “Okay, then.”
With a shrug, I started walking again. I couldn’t think about anything else. I kept seeing her face. It was a pretty face, too. She’d had soft lips and sad eyes, like a perfect billboard model for the tragic teen meant to tug at your heartstrings. Good thing my heartstrings, if I had such a thing, were about as immovable as a brick wall.
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