Crown of Thorns by E.M. Snow
7
For the next45 minutes of my life, that question dangles over my head, sucking the air out of the room and slowly, excruciatingly, suffocating me.
What role did you play in fucking over my family?
He’s gone eerily quiet since asking me that. Though I never responded, his demand crashes around inside my skull, threatening to send into a nervous breakdown right in the middle of class. It’s like there’s a countdown running, and I can’t focus on a single thing Mrs. De León says. All I can think about is how I can get away from Phoenix once this is all over because his presence is everywhere. The heat of his breath against the nape of my neck. His cologne invading my nostrils. The hatred in his stare.
That’s what screws with me the most because I can feel his green eyes burning through layers of clothing—my uniform sweater and white blouse and bra—and branding my skin.
When the bell finally rings, it hits me like a cannon. I spring into action, jumping to my feet and grabbing my things before speed-walking out the door ahead of everyone else. For a brief moment, I think I’ve successfully evaded him.
Of course, I can’t be that lucky because I was wrong this morning—the universe hasn’t reset itself. It’s reared its ugly head and now the king himself has singled me out because he believes I’ve somehow wronged him and his family.
“You actually think you can get away from me?” Phoenix’s voice wraps around me like a noose, causing me to gasp and stumble. He’s not even yelling. That’s the scariest part. His voice is calm and even, barely loud enough for anyone else to hear him, but it’s still like a deafening roar in my ears.
“There’s not a fucking thing you can do to get away from me now, Luna.”
I try my best to ignore him and continue forward, but his taunts only intensify as he stalks after me, his long strides bringing him closer and closer. “Is that how you afford to come here? Ripping off people you shouldn’t fuck with? Come on, Luna. Bold enough to fuck me over but not to face me? Turn around when I’m talking to you.”
I swallow hard, gulping down the pressure in the back of my throat. Still, I don’t give in to his bait. I can’t. He wants me to react so he can escalate things, I know it. He really is a sociopath. Some of the people we pass turn to gape at us with wide eyes and open mouths, but no one bothers to step in to help me.
And why would they?
He’s their king and I’m—
I’m ten feet from one of the exits when strong fingers bite into my wrist. He yanks me to a stop before dragging me into the empty classroom right next to us. My instinct is to scream, but I’m so scared that I go numb as he slams the door shut behind him. He shoves me up against the wall, and my hands instantly go up to protect myself.
This must amuse him because his full lips twitch. He pushes my arms by my sides and cages me in, splaying one hand on the side of my head and tangling the other hand in the hair at the nape of my neck. I wince, but that only seems to fuel him even more. He tilts my head far back so that we’re eye-to-eye.
“Stop moving,” he orders.
But I thrash against him, and he responds by closing the space between our bodies. He’s so much taller than me. Before, I never quite grasped how much bigger he is, but I’m easily seven or eight inches shorter. And with his body melted against mine, I feel every inch of him.
“Stop. Fucking. Moving. You’re not strong enough, bitch, so it’s a waste of your time.” His eyes are emerald fire as they roam over my earrings. “Where’s the rest of it?”
The earrings. The stupid earrings my brother left for me that Gideon had directly mentioned this morning. I should have taken them out right then. Should have known they were a mistake. Should have figured Jasper might have stolen them or at least the money to buy them, but this is a situation I never could have predicted. My brother deals with small-time druggies and car thieves, not people who live in fifty-million-dollar mansions in the heart of Bel Air.
That’s why Phoenix has to be confused, there’s no other explanation. Jasper would never steal from the Townsend family. Even he’s not that recklessly stupid. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I say on a wispy breath that trembles and breaks. “Please, I—”
“Save your goddamn tears. They don’t work on me.” I’m finally able to exhale when he loosens his grip on my hair, but then his fingertips close around my left earlobe. Even though it doesn’t hurt, I cry out like he’s just ripped tiny rose from my flesh. “Where the fuck did you get these?”
“Pawnshop,” I slur, the lie tumbling from my lips with surprising ease.
As if I’ve made some sort of horrible joke, he laughs at me, his minty breath fanning my face. This must be what death smells like—wintermint and caramel, both scents rolling off a beautiful, terrible beast. “They’re worth more than your whole family makes in a fucking year, you lying cunt, so let’s try this again. Where did you get these?”
My fear makes me bold. I duck under his arms and make a dash for the door, but he’s faster than me. And just as he warned, he’s stronger. So much stronger. He snags me around the waist, dragging me back to him and slamming me into the first empty desk he reaches. This time, real pain shoots through my body, but my wince doesn’t stop him from leaning over me, rage contorting every line of his face.
“Take them,” I blurt out, reaching clumsily for my ears.
He catches both my wrists and holds my hands hostage high above my head. “I don’t give a fuck about the earrings anymore,” he says, and my stomach clenches with dread. “I want everything else you took.”
Everything else you took.
Those four words swirl around my brain like a tornado, tightening my chest and sprinkling spots throughout my vision. I don’t know what Phoenix is capable of, but there’s something more than just fury in the way he grips my wrists. Something I can’t identify, which only makes it more frightening.
He will hurt me.
He will hurt me and not feel a single ounce of remorse.
To my shock, though, he lets go of me. I almost sob in relief as I scramble out of the seat. The second my gaze darts for the door, he blocks me, his spine stiff and his expression warning me that he’ll rip me into a thousand and one shreds if I so much as move another inch.
“If you don’t let me leave,” I manage to say, “I will scream. I mean it, Phoenix. I’ll scream and campus security—”
“Go on,” he taunts and takes a step closer. I back up, but he keeps coming, his tan jawline rigid with rage. “I want to hear you scream. Fuck, I need to hear it.”
Somehow, I don’t doubt that.
He needs to know that this isn’t an empty threat and that I don’t care who he is. If campus security shows up and finds us like this, even he can’t get out of an assault charge, right? At least, that’s what I tell myself to keep from launching into full panic mode.
Still, we both know the bitter truth. That if I involve campus police and insult Thornwood’s king even more than he believes I have already, he’ll bring my world crashing down even more.
“Go on and scream,” he challenges again, tipping his chin up arrogantly. He waits for me to follow through, but all I do is stand there, my lungs on the verge of exploding and my body near collapse. “You really are predictable,” he spits out.
“B-because I didn’t do anything.”
His shoulders shake with violent laughter. “You should know, Luna, this isn’t over. I won’t be done with you until I get exactly what I want—what you took—and even then, you’re fucked. Make it easy on yourself while there’s still time.”
“I…” But my voice trails off into nothingness. I turn and run for the door, not looking back even though I know his eyes follow me as I flee into the hallway.
* * *
As I ridethe shuttle van home, still trembling because I can’t seem to rid myself of the sensation of Phoenix’s hands on my body and his breath on my face, I call Jasper. The phone rings and rings and rings some more, but he never answers.
“Dammit, Jasper,” I whisper, ending the call. I try again, for about the seventh time. He’s either ignoring me completely, or somewhere he can’t answer his phone. My bet is that he’s ignoring me. “Motherfucker.”
The van reaches my stop, and as I hurry off to head to my house, panic engulfs me, making it hard to breathe. If I can’t get ahold of Jasper, I don’t know what I’m supposed to do about Phoenix. I don’t know what the hell is going on or what my brother has gotten me into. Is this why he was acting so strange while he was here?
Why he was so paranoid?
As soon as I burst through the front door and rush to my room. I need to get ready for work at the store, but I don’t know how I’m going to be able to focus on my job when the threat of Phoenix Townsend still hangs over me. As I change my clothes, I tell myself I just need to stick to my story. I got the earrings at a pawnshop, and that whoever sold them to me must not have known they were valuable. That’s how they were cheap enough that I could afford them.
Yeah, that’s it. If I just stick to my story and don’t crack under Phoenix’s pressure, everything will be fine.
By the time I’m ready to head to work, I almost believe that.
The music store, Rainbow Records, is within walking distance of Nina’s house. As I make my way down the sidewalk, I’m constantly checking my phone to see if Jasper has called me back. I keep checking it even after I arrive at the store and begin my shift. I send him text messages, one after another, practically begging him to respond.
Yet, there’s nothing from him. Not even a text to say he’s alive. The bastard.
And unfortunately, the store is pretty quiet in the evenings, so I don’t have much to distract me from my worry and racing thoughts.
I’m about an hour into my shift when my phone finally buzzes. I dive for it, my blood rushing with adrenaline. A sting of disappointment stabs at me when I see that it’s not Jasper but Margaret. Huffing out a breath, I open her message and read it, expecting the usual nonsense that we throw back and forth to each other. Funny memes, Buzzfeed Quizzes, and maybe the occasional bit of gossip. What I find is a very abrupt message that doesn’t have any of the usual lightness I get from her.
Margaret Elsher: Phoenix just followed me on Snapchat so he could ask about you. WTF Joss?
I blink at her text in disbelief because this—this is a disaster. Phoenix told me we weren’t done with each other, but I hadn’t expected him to use my friends to get to me. God only knows what Margaret must be thinking.
I fire off a quick response.
6:09 PM:I have no idea why he’d do that.
It’s really only a small lie, but it’s not like I can tell her Phoenix wants to know more about me so he can make me pay for my brother’s alleged actions. She wouldn’t believe me, anyway. I haven’t told her much about Jasper, partly out of embarrassment and partly in an effort to protect him. The less people know about my brother, the less chance there is of someone turning him into the cops.
She doesn’t reply, and it takes all my willpower not to text her back. I tell myself I’ll talk to her tomorrow because I’ve got bigger problems at the moment, namely figuring out a way to get Phoenix off my back. I need to convince him that I really had nothing to do with his family getting robbed, or whatever it is that Jasper has done.
If I can remember to breathe, that is.
And think clearly.
The crushing sense of impending doom follows me through the rest of my shift and is still dogging me when I wake up the next morning and get ready for school. I’m almost too afraid to go today because I know how this works. Thornwood is his arena. He’s got way more power and influence there I could ever hope for there, and I fell asleep last night mentally yelling at myself for threatening him with campus security yesterday.
My stomach is so knotted, I skip breakfast. I have zero appetite and I know if I force something down, it’ll come right back up. Grabbing my bookbag and the jewelry box with the earrings inside, I shuffle to the front door, my heartbeat thumping harder with every step. I take a small amount of comfort in the fact that I have the whole ride to school to come up with a good strategy of avoiding Phoenix, though I’m not necessarily hopeful that anything I think of will work for too long.
But when I walk out onto the front step, I come to a stumbling stop. Any hope I have of avoiding Phoenix and just handing the earrings over to Gideon vanishes into the air as my eyes drink in the sleek black Mercedes SUV. It’s parked on the street in front of my house and sticks out among the cheap compacts and work vans that belong to my neighbors.
And leaning against the back of the Mercedes, his customary sneer in place, is Phoenix Townsend himself, a cigarette dangling out of his mouth. He isn’t dressed for school. No, today he’s wearing low slung jeans and a plain white T-shirt, the sleeves rolled.
Holy shit. What is he doing here? How did he find me?
It’s a true fight or flight moment. I have the distinct urge to turn around, flee back into the house, and lock the door behind me. The thing is, I’m fully aware it won’t stop him. Nothing will. If I don’t face him now, he’s going to haunt my every waking moment and probably my nightmares, too. Drawing in a deep breath, I lift my chin and throw my shoulders back before I march down the walkway and out the gate.
Once I reach him, I fold my arms. I give him what I hope is a truly contemptuous glare, but then I cough at the puff of smoke he blows in my direction. He chuckles and takes another drag.
My dad smoked. To the point that all my stuffed animals and clothes reeked of stale tobacco when I was little. Phoenix doesn’t smell anything like that, though. The scent of his cologne wafts around me, and I hate him for that. Hate him even more for looking gorgeous while doing something I abhor.
“What are you doing here?” I try to sound tough, but I practically pant my words.
His focus sweeps past me toward my grandmother’s house. “What? Am I not allowed to enjoy an early morning ride through subsidized housing?” He meets my gaze, that look in his eyes again. The one from the night of his party that’s all predator and zero shits given. “Why the fuck do you think I’m in the ghetto?”
Jaw clenched, I push past my fear and dig the jewelry box out of my bag. Shoving it into his hand, I say, “There. Take them. I didn’t take anything from you or your family, so just leave me the hell alone.”
“Do you really think it’s that simple?” To my shock and disgust, his lips quirk as he pockets the earrings. He flicks the rest of his cigarette into my yard and gives a one-shouldered shrug. “Oh, I know you didn’t take anything now that I’ve done my due diligence.”
“Due diligence? What is this, a real estate—”
“But,” he interrupts, his emerald green eyes glittering with some new and chilling emotion, “since you know who did, you’re getting in the car so we can have a discussion.”
Glancing from him to the Mercedes, I lift my chin. “I’m not doing anything with you, so take the earrings and leave before I…”
Shit, I can’t even come up with an adequate threat.
A wicked grin parts his full lips. Oh God, why is he grinning? Why is he grinning at me like that? “Before you what? Call 12 on me? You know what, Luna? I think you’re on to something with that snitching shit. We’ll do things your way. It’ll probably save me time, anyway.”
He draws his phone out of his pocket and makes a point to turn it so I can see exactly what he’s punching into his keypad. A nine. And a one. He lifts his finger almost dramatically and starts to hit the one again. My hands jerk out, wrapping around his wrist.
His pulse jerks beneath my fingertips. “I don’t remember giving you permission to touch me, Luna.”
Fuck this guy.
“Wait,” I breathe. “Phoenix … stop. Please.”
His eyes pop wide in mock surprise. “But isn’t this what you want? To be protected from the evil, pyscho rich boy by the people his family pays for? I think we should call them. See what they have to say about your slut fingerprints all over my mother’s twenty-thousand-dollar earrings that you bought at a pawn shop. That’s…”
Maybe he gives me a play-by-play of what will happen next. Or maybe he just insults my family again. I’m honestly not quite sure what he says, because his revelation is enough to send my world toppling over. I can’t let him call the cops. Jasper is gone, and I don’t know how to find him. I’ll be the one thrown in jail—I have no doubt about that.
He’s still talking when I snap back into the conversation, but he pauses when I start shaking my head. “No.” I grip his wrist harder and lick my lips, tasting the salt from my sweat on the tip of my tongue. “I’ll talk to you, okay? Just … please. Please don’t call the cops.”
“Say it again,” he husks out.
The bastard gets off on this. Making me beg. Reminding me where I stand with him. “Please,” I say through clenched teeth, and the expression he gives me reeks of triumph.
I hate that he’s manipulated me into getting his way. He swipes his thumb over his phone screen and shakes my hand off his wrist. Stepping toward the back door of the SUV, he opens it and gestures mockingly for me to get inside.
“So that I won’t have to fucking look at you,” he growls. “Now, get in.”
I have no choice but to obey.