Page 4 of Dahlias, Sapphires, and Cool Autumn Dusk
With a groan, Jeremy hit Barrett’s arm. “You just made hermorenervous.”
“You didn’t mention that yet, dipshit?”
“No,” he shouted back but then shrugged with one careless shoulder. “I’ll find a way to see her. Julian will find a way, too. Phoenix will be with her constantly. They even have a class together, first one every day.”
He wasn’t wrong. I stepped toward the door. Due to being placed in remedial study skills class together, we would have one class together. I snorted to myself, thinking we both fit there, since it was where they put any students they feared might not be able to keep up with their studies due to past academic performance. Apparently, it was his fourth time in the class, though it would be my first. People graduated out of it, but not Phoenix. He didn’t give a shit, in his words. I probably wouldn’t get out of it, either. In addition to being dyslexic, I honestly wasn’t very smart when it came to school stuff.
After I turned my key in the lock, the grandfather clock ticked in welcome.
No one greeted us, and I took a deep breath in relief.Maybe we can just get in and out.
“Alatheia,” my aunt said, making ice skate through my veins and freeze me like a statue. “I wondered when you would get around to gracing my doorstep. I see you brought the Lents with you. Two of them? You’re home, so do you intend to ruin lives here again?”
A martini glass clinked with ice in her hand, and she took a gulp as if the noise reminded her she held the drink. I bit my lip, sinceof course a martini in the middle of the day. Why not?
“Aunt Tricia.” I kept my gaze down, my head slightly bowed. It went better for me when I pretended obedience and subservience, at least. “How have you been? I came home to get my uniforms, if you don’t mind me picking them up.”
“Whereexactlywill you be taking them?” She sloshed some of her gin onto the floor, gesturing as she spoke, then taking another hearty gulp. I could smell it from across the room, the scent biting at my nose with memories.
I cleared my throat, trying to resist the bile rising there with my anxiety. “I’ll be staying elsewhere.”
“Ohno, dear. No, you are not.” She laughed. “You aremineto deal with. You’ll be staying here. You live with me, your legal guardian.”
I think my heart stopped, since all of my fears came true in that moment.
2
“No, Tricia, she’s actually not.” Barrett strode past me toward my bedroom as if he belonged there. “Unless you want me to get my granny up here? If you would like, we can have her explain to you all the reasons you’re going to do exactly what we told you to do. She is coming home with us, as per the plan. You’re going to continue to pay for her credit card, which she hardly uses anyway, and provide anything else she needs to ask you for. If you don’t agree, we can look into things a bit closer. . .” He paused. “We wouldn’t want that, would we?”
Barrett used to be polite to her, but apparently those days were over. My family had tried to ruin me in his home. Rumors would likely circulate due to her sister’s actions at that party. Maybe the people who heard them would know Ted was an accused serial rapist before they heard my aunt’s other version—where I seduced her boyfriend.
But rumors still would persist.
My aunt’s face twisted, derision not pretty on her features, so like my mother’s. “You Lents. You think you control everything? You don’t. I’ve got news for you. She is here by my good gracesalone. You havenoidea how much worse things could’ve been for her.” She almost sounded hysterical. “The second I can, she’ll be sent to boarding school—a far kinder fate than my sister wanted for her.”
She shouted the words, and half the remaining martini ended up covering my shirt. I didn’t drink it myself, and the smell brought back memories so fast and hard, I finally unfroze. I shouted in surprise, and Barrett turned around quickly to protect me. I obeyed my reflex, tugging the fabric away from my body and trying to squeeze it out as if the chill burned.
Way too dramatic. I forced myself to calm, adjusting my shirt back as best as I could.She’s not going for death by martini.
“I’m okay.” I said for my sake as much as Barrett’s, since his laser focus on me when I gasped seemed to be awaiting a target.
Jeremy wasn’t deterred at all. As Barrett rushed into my bedroom, Jeremy stormed past my aunt into the kitchen and returned with a soft blue towel. He began patting at the martini covered fabric, his voice intentionally calming as he said, “Let’s get you dried off.”
“You let him touch you like that? On your breasts!” she shrieked. “You little slut.”
Whack.I didn’t anticipate her slap, so I didn’t see it coming. I cried out, bending over in shock.
“Hey, don’t you touch her.” Jeremy’s voice became frighteningly low. He yanked her arm back, jerking her two steps away from me. “Back off. Younevertouch her again, do you hear me? Your daughter in London? Does she like her life? Her husband works for a subsidiary of a company my uncle owns. Do you understand what I’m telling you? Alatheia iswith usnow. And if I’m being totally honest, if you weren’t a woman, you’d be on the ground right now for what you just did.”
Barrett rushed out of the room, carrying hangers. “Did she justhither?”
I turned away from them all, facing the wall, because I couldn’t resist the urge to cry. I couldn’t stop myself, even though I hadn’t been hit since Chicago. I never saw it coming then, either, but I should have expected it. Violence hung in the air of the apartment from the day they moved me into it. I always knew, it was only a matter of time.
Is it going to leave a mark?I didn’t want to start school with a black eye, but I once had one last for almost a month after a PI accidentally punched me.
Fuck.I put my fist in my mouth, trying to keep the tears at bay. I bit down hard, the pain a sharp distraction from the way my face throbbed and my memories crashed into one another.
“Take these.” Barrett said to Jeremy, passing him the clothing. “I’ll grab the rest. You’re going to regret that, lady.”
