Good for you. Now come greet me like a proper fucking girlfriend.
A typing bubble popped up. Disappeared. Popped up again only to vanish once more. I assumed she was fighting the urge to tell me to go fuck myself.
Maybe I’d been rude, but I didn’t see the point in trying to play nice, especially given the circumstances. There was no way in hell I was walking into the party on my own. Knowing my luck, I’d get lost. Or stumble into one of Stella’s parents and be forced to introduce myself without her.
I could do it, but I’d rather have Stella by my side. Her presence alone would lend me an air of belonging that would make it easier for others to accept me. Without her, I’d draw more focus, maybe enough for people to smell fresh blood and come circling like sharks. And yes, I’d spent plenty of time around wealthy assholes, but there was a vast difference between millionaires and the deep-pocketed generational wealth rubbing elbows at this party.
From everything I knew about the ultra-rich, they were some of the most predatory, cold-blooded people on the planet. Less than one percent of the population held the wealth needed to change the world, better the lives of the rest of us, and what did they do with it instead? Use it to fund space tourism for their friends, build a five-hundred-foot clock inside a mountain only they got to see, or research immortality, while all around them, humans continued to die of preventable diseases.
God only knew what else they got up to that the public didn’t know about. Most of the rumors I discounted as conspiracy theory bullshit, but there were other facts that were harder to deny. Like how we’d had our very own monster hiding in this city for years: Bradley Bluhm. He’d been a predator his whole life, with his billionaire family continuously covering for him or bailing him out. Just like Stella’s parents had for her. Unlike Stella, Brad grew up to be a serial killer, and there were still federal agents digging up bodies in his backyard just a few streets away. And where was Brad, to answer for his crimes? Most likely in Europe, according to the latest news reports, spirited away by his parents.
I stared up at the towering stone house through my window, wondering what the fuck I was so nervous about. I might have been a nobody, but I still held the moral high ground over these motherfuckers.
You’re nervous becausehemight be here,a small voice reminded me.
Right. There was that. The likelihood that I might run into my father at any of the events I attended with Stella was high, and that was the root cause of my hesitancy. Because as much as I was prepared to face him, had promised myself that I would keep my cool when we eventually met, I still worried my anger might boil over and ruin years of planning in one explosive instant.
I took a deep breath, reminding myself that he probably wasn’t even in town. The last I’d heard, he was somewhere in Italy. Which meant there was no reason for me to be preoccupied with him.
I threw the door open and got out of the car. The surrounding forest dampened the noise of the nearby streets, so the house stood within its own quiet little bubble. Crickets chirped in the grass. Birds trilled overhead. A swell of laughter rose from somewhere close, just out of sight around the corner of the house. It was nice, borderline bucolic.
The front door opened, and I could tell from the look on Stella’s face that the peace was about to be shattered. She caught sight of me and marched forward, fists clenched at her sides.
Oh, yeah. I’d definitely pissed her off.
I leaned back against the car, sliding my hands into the pockets of my linen shorts while I tried not to grin. I’d never really gotten off on antagonizing people—that was more Josh’s forte—but I was starting to wonder if maybe I’d spent so much time around my best friend that some of his personality had rubbed off on me. I had no other way of explaining the small thrill that shot through me, knowing I’d managed to get under Stella’s skin again.
Brat.
I curbstomped that thought as she neared. Instead of the monochromatic look I’d come to expect from her, she wore a white babydoll dress with black polka dots, white knee socks, and black Mary Janes. The hemline of the dress swished upward with every stride of those ridiculously long legs, and I couldn’t keep my gaze from dropping, hoping it’d swish just high enough that I might get a glimpse of what she had on underneath it.
Only when Stella got closer did I realize the “dots” on her dress were miniature skulls. Because of course they were.
Unlike me, she wasn’t wearing shades, so I had an unobscured view of the fury in her eyes when she stopped a foot away to glare up at me. Because of said glare, the smile she forced onto her face looked deranged. “Hi. So glad you could make it.” Her tone said otherwise. “The party is out back, so if you’ll please follow me.”
With that, she turned and started to walk away. I snagged her wrist and spun her back around. She crashed into my chest with an “Oof.”
“Stay still,” I said.
She tried to push free. “There’s no one here to perform for.”
“Someone’s watching from the house,” I growled through my smile. I could see them just on the edge of my periphery, standing framed within a window on the third floor as they stared down at us.
Stella went stiffer than a board. “What do they look like?”
I wrapped my arms around her waist and widened my legs, pulling her between them. In an infuriating turn of events, she fit perfectly.
Keeping my face slightly turned toward her, I shot a quick glance upward. “There must be a light on behind them, because all I can see is a shadowy outline.”
Her mouth turned down. “Fucking creep.”
“Me, or our mysterious voyeur?”
“Yes,” she said, taking the bait just like I knew she would.
I squeezed her waist in warning. “Behave. We’re in public, and the rule is, you’re nice to me in public.”
Her eyes blazed with annoyance, but she stayed quiet. Good girl.
