Chapter One: Tamara
There she was, at the fringes of his group like a little wet puppy.
Laughing at something one of the other girls was saying.
She couldn’t possibly find them funny.
He remembered she existed, for the first time in the whole recess break. He put an arm around her and dragged her into him, and she went all limp. She was like a doll just waiting to be arranged.
“Tamara,” said Aileen at my ear. “Can we just go now?”
“I need to keep an eye on her,” I said.
“I sort of think it’s called stalking at this point,” said Aileen. “You’ve been doing this for three days and he hasn’t so much as looked at her in an angry way.”
“Look, are you on my side or hers?”
“So if she’s on the opposite side to you, how can you say you’re doing this for her?” Aileen protested.
I didn’t bother giving her an answer. If she was going to be like that, what was the point?
After a while, I realised Aileen wasn’t next to me any more. Well, good for her if she wanted to ditch me and do her own thing for a while. I was used to that now, wasn’t I?
Then I heard a footstep behind me. I felt a little bad suddenly, or maybe just a little scared. Aileen was the only person I’d talked to at school in the past three days who hadn’t been forced to talk to me for schoolwork reasons.
“Look, I promise at lunch time we’ll—”
There was a grip around the back of my neck from a hand too powerful to be Aileen’s. It hurt. I tried to shout but only managed a little gasp, tried to get my hand up to fight the person off but I was spinning, and then my back was slammed hard against the brick wall I’d been sheltering behind, thrusting what little breath I had left out of me.
When my vision cleared there was Steven Dillon standing in front of me, his big arms looking even bigger with his hands placed on his hips. I should have been more suspicious when I didn’t see him with the rest of the group. Had Lucas sent Steven after me?
“Right, you little sneak,” Steven said, “you can do whatever the fuck you want if it’s just once or twice but you’ve been at this three days now. What the fuck are you doing?”
“I’m just keeping an eye on my friend.” I stared him right between the eyes. He might be a big sexy brute, but that didn’t mean I had to be afraid of him.
“What, fucking Calista?” Steven glanced over at Callie, still there tucked under Lucas Starling’s arm like a purse. “What do you think we’re going to do, bend her over and take turns?”
“You were pretty rough with me just now.” I rubbed the back of my neck. “I should report you.”
“Yeah, you do that,” Steven said. “Tell the playground monitor I tried to stop you harassing your ex-friend and hurt your feelings.”
That was exactly the sort of fact-rewriting bullshit I expected from someone in Lucas’s group. I’d suspected all along that Callie was getting bamboozled by that arsehole, and here was one of his friends trying to do the exact same thing to me.
“I’m being here for her for when she needs me,” I told him. “Whenever that is.”
“Yeah,” Steven said, “that’s what every stalker says. I’m just going to wait until she understands I’m doing this for her. What the fuck are you on, anyway?”