* * *
“What happened to you?” Max said when I entered the kitchen the next morning.
“I didn’t sleep well,” I murmured, making a beeline for the coffee machine. “You weren’t in when I got home.”
“I was out.” He shrugged.
“At Buster’s?” My brow arched, and he rolled his eyes.
“So what if I was?”
“Max…”
Buster’s was a gym in Darling Row. The last place on earth my parents would want him hanging out. Which was probably why he hadn’t told them about his newhobby.
“I don’t want you to get hurt.”
“Don’t worry about me, Sis, I can look after myself. How’s Mulligan?” He changed the subject. Not that I was in the mood to talk about Miles.
“It’s complicated.”
Awkward silence descended over us. Max and I had a strained relationship. He was sixteen going on twenty-one, and out of the two of us, he was the one who constantly rebelled against our parents’ expectations.
He was moody, arrogant, and at times, downright cruel. But there was also something different about him the last few months. Something darker.
Maybe it was a good thing he was training at Buster’s, keeping whatever demons haunted him at bay. But I wasn’t so sure.
He was just a boy still.
My kid brother.
I didn’t want him to lose himself completely. But if I’d learned anything over the last year, it was that you couldn’t push people to see your point of view. You had to let them arrive at it in their own time.
“If it’s any consolation, I didn’t see the two of you going the distance anyway.” He shrugged, and that was that.
“He’s still my best friend, Max.”
“Was… hewasyour best friend. But you dumped him and now he’s your ex.”
“That’s not…” Oh, who was I kidding. That was entirely true.
I’d ruined one of the only friendships I valued, and now everything was a mess. Miles hated me. Harleigh had left Darling Academy and transferred back to Darling Hill High, and I spent long days at school all alone.
Zane had said I didn’t belong in The Row, but part of me—the part of me who yearned for something more—didn’t belong in Old Darling Hill either.
“Good morning,” Dad breezed into the kitchen, looking immaculate in a charcoal suit. “How are we all?”
“Fine, Dad,” Max grumbled, shoving another spoonful of cereal in his mouth.
“Celeste?”
“Morning, Dad,” I said.
“How was last night with the girls?”
“It was fine.” The half-lie rolled off my tongue.
“You know, you can invite them over anytime, sweetheart. I know things with your mother and Harleigh are still strained”—understatement of the century—“but she’s always welcome here.”