twenty-three
Royal Dolce
“So let me get this straight,” Duke says on the way home from school on Wednesday. “You’re going to ruin Harper all by yourself? We don’t get to help at all?”
“If I need help, I’ll let you know.”
“She’s getting to you, man,” Baron says, shaking his head. “You almost fucked up with the scouts because she wore some slutty outfit. You missed a game because of her.”
“So did you,” I point out.
“Because you almost fucking died,” Duke says. “That could have waited until Sunday.”
“No,” I say. “It couldn’t.”
“Fine,” Baron says. “But just know you can’t keep her. She’s not your Darling Doll.”
“I know that,” I snap. “Let it go.”
He and Duke do that twin exchange of glances. I want to fucking murder them every time they do it. If I hadn’t already murdered my own twin, we’d be looking at each other, knowing what the twins don’t.
I want to be left alone, but the moment I walk in the door, the fucking maid is on my dick.
“Mr. Dolce,” she says, fluttering her invisible blonde lashes at me and twisting her hands in front of her like something out of a cartoon. “Do you require food?”
“I require some fucking peace in my own house,” I snap. “And I’m not Mr. Dolce. That’s my father.”
“Some water, then?” she asks, looking so hopeful I give in with a sigh, and she scurries away.
Duke slugs my shoulder. “Throw poor Helga a bone,” he says, stifling laughter. “She gets her twat in a twist every time she sees you.”
“Does Dad require her to wear that ridiculous uniform?” I ask. “She looks like she’s auditioning for a St. Pauli Girl ad.”
“And we all benefit,” Duke says, throwing an arm over Baron’s shoulder. “What do you say? Want to put in your contacts and pull the old switcheroo on her? Or the double-team?”
If Dad would stop hiring hot foreigners under twenty to work in our house, he’d have lower turnover. With these two around, none of them last long. But then, I’m sure he’s fucked as many of them as the twins have. Hell, it’s probably part of the interview process.
After getting the water from Helga, I go upstairs, kick my shoes under the bed, and stretch out. I’ve been off my game all week. Fucking Harper. Even though everyone knows to leave her alone now, and they know she’s mine, I still have to think about what she does when she leaves school. Who has seen the video? Who knows it’s her? Are people fucking with her, the way they did at that party?
It’s my fucking fault. That’s the worst of it. I fucked up, and now I’m paying.
And if I’m paying, she’s paying ten times worse.
I press my thumb and finger into my eye sockets, trying not to think about the shitty thing I did to her. The thing is, I’m supposed to do shitty things to her. It’s all part of the plan.
I pick up a pillow and bury my face in it, searching for the scent she left on it on Saturday. I’m not even going to think about how fucked up it is that it calms me. This is not part of the plan. I pull back the blankets and crawl around looking for her scent like a dog sniffing after a bitch in heat. I need her like a fix. It won’t stop me from destroying her, but it means I’ll love every moment of the destruction, even if it destroys me, too. I fucking hope it does.
I bunch the sheet so I can bury my nose in it, trying to find a trace of her. Yeah, I’m the fucking creep who didn’t let the maid wash my sheets after sex because I wanted to keep her on them as long as I could. But she’s gone.
I thumb through my phone, opening OnlyWords.
I start typing: Come over. I stare at it for five fucking minutes, like I just wrote a sonnet and I’m not sure it’s perfect. Then I backspace, deleting all the letters. I’m not supposed to want her like this. I’m not supposed to care that I’m lying here thinking about her, and she’s probably off doing whatever the fuck poor people do on Wednesday afternoon after football practice is over.
Royal: What r u doing?
My thumbs punch in the words before I think about it. Then I erase those, too.
Royal: What’s up?