Broken Pretty Things by Amber Faye

Chapter 2

Six months later…

I’m chokingon a fluffy chocolate chip pancake. I’m literally going to die, and, deep down, maybe I always knew this would be how I’d go.

“Andrea, honey?” my mother asks, stepping into the dining area from the little kitchen. She sees my arms waving around, my hands clutching dramatically at my throat, and she gasps. “Pietro!” she screams.

Footsteps thunder down the stairs. I get up from the breakfast bar stool and I’m torn between launching myself at the back of the chair to cough up the lump … and, honestly, just accepting my fate.

I know it’s dramatic, but a teeny tiny part of me would rather die right now than go to school today. That’s probably why this delicious bite lodged itself in my throat the second my mother asked if I was ready to head out.

“What the hell are you screaming at me about, woman?” Pietro asks, his tall, wide body filling up the doorway. Mom gestures to me, actual panic beginning to fill her eyes. It’s happening. Nobody knows what to do to save me. May my gravestone tell everybody how I died. Inhaling food so that I didn’t have to have a sit-down breakfast with my brand new little family in my brand new house. In my old town.

A town filled with people who hate me.

And I know my mom’s boyfriend’s kid is around my age. There’s no way he doesn’t know who I am. There’s no way he doesn’t hate me, too. I really, really don’t want to deal with him this morning.

“Pietro, for God’s sake, give her the Heimlich,” my mom is yelling, waving her hands around. I’d be madder at her for not doing it herself, but Mom was diagnosed years ago with osteogenesis. She can live a normal life, mostly, but her bones are brittle enough that if she tried to haul me around and squeeze the air out of my lungs, she’d crack eight of her own ribs.

I see terror dim Pietro’s eyes as he gapes at me across the room. Of course, he has no idea how to do a Heimlich. I don’t, either, but dammit — I’ve seen it done on TV enough that I’d at least try! But before he can snap out of whatever fear spiral he’s headed down, I feel huge arms wrap around me from behind. A chest presses against my back, and as the world starts to go a little blurry, I am aware of my feet being lifted off the ground, my body being wrung out from behind.

And a squishy lump of chocolate pancake sails across the room and lands … back on my plate.

“Shit,” the voice behind me says, and I’m dropped unceremoniously to the floor. A dark figure sweeps past me, pointing at my breakfast plate while I sit on the floor, gasping and clutching my throat. My mom jogs to my side and rubs my back. “Did anyone just see that?” It takes a second of processing, but I finally figure out who the dude must be.

“This is your soon-to-be brother,” Pietro says, waving at me. Is he not going to mention how he just completely failed to save my life? “Dimitri, say hello to your sister, Andrea.”

“Andie,” I say, or rather mouth. My voice is so hoarse it’s inaudible. I cough and get to my feet. “Thanks.”

“No problem.” Dimitri waves me off. “I really need to know if anyone saw that.” He mimics making a basket, flapping his wrist through the air. I squint up at him. He is at least six and a half feet tall, with shoulder-length straight black hair and broad shoulders.

I glare at the pancakes, offended that they’re still here. “Good to meet you,” I say to Dimitri, and grab my bag, smoothing down my hair and trying to regain my composure.

“Helluva first meeting,” Dimitri says. When I slip out into the hallway to get my shoes on, he follows me out and rests his hand on the wall right in front of my face, blocking my path. He has incredibly white, straight teeth that shine at me now. “Ever hear the term ‘meet cute’?”

I laugh, but I’m frowning up at him too. “Like two romantic leads in a movie first meeting?”

“Right.”

“That wasn’t what that was, stepbro,” I say, raising my eyebrow and wiggling my foot into my shoe. Rather than finding the last word offputting, as he should have, Dimitri bites his lip at the sound of it.

“Fuck,” he says, bringing his hand down to his crotch as something sparks in his eyes. “Why’d you have to blink up at me and call me that?”

I spring three steps back. “What are you doing?”

“Nobody told me I was getting a hot fucking stepsister this year.” He’s complaining now, and I’m more than confused. “The one year I actually need to concentrate on school, and my hot blonde stepsister is gonna be everywhere I look, calling me ‘stepbro’. How fair is that?”

Ew. The dude isn’t even ugly, not at all, but I don’t think I’ve ever been so creeped out as I am right now. “Two things,” I say quickly. “We go to different schools, and also I’m pretty sure you should be in college, since you’re at least a year older than me.”

He catches his tongue between his teeth, laughing at my cornered panic. Asshole. Weirdo asshole. “Three things,” he hits back, taking a step forward with every point. “My dear, sweet father wants to make life as easy as possible for you, Andrea, which means he transferred my ass to Tuberculosis Academy for senior year take two. Second thing, as I said, this is my second go-around, not that that’s any of your business.” I roll my eyes. “Third: I just saved your life, sis. You’d better be nice to me. Especially since you’re the reason I have to spend a motherfucking year surrounded by rich, preppy pussy-ass bitches.”

He’s closed the gap between us. I give him the iciest look I can muster. “I am most definitely not the reason you have to repeat the year,” I say, and duck under his arm. Before he can say anything else, I close my hand around the front door handle and go to open it. “Mom, you ready?” I call. My throat still hurts. My ribs, too. Maybe that’s cause enough to skip school today.

She appears in the hallway, beaming a smile as Pietro steps up behind her, threading an arm around her waist. She’s carrying a steaming mug of tea and gazes over her shoulder at him. “Honey, we thought you could grab a ride with Dimi. It seems ridiculous that you would go separately.”

Great.

“Pietro wants to spend some time ... showing me around the new house again today,” she says. Then they both avert their gazes and hide their laughter as he squeezes her hip. He’d better be careful with her, I think, and then shudder.

“Gross,” I say, pointing sternly at them both. “Giggling like schoolchildren. Stop that.” They laugh harder. I turn back to Dimitri, and then let out a breath. I don’t have a car. I don’t really have anything, since we just moved across the country twice in a year and sold almost everything we had both times.

“Ready, sis?” he asks, leaning in to breathe against my ear. I squirm away from him and the smell of spearmint and weed on his breath. He’s a wake-and-baker, then.

“Take good care of her, Dimitri,” Pietro adds before he turns away to lead my mother up the stairs. “Don’t test me.” There’s some unspoken threat inherent in those simple words. These two might not have the best relationship. Noted. And just another cherry on top of the barf sundae that is me living in Torrent Bay again.

A flicker of pure rage courses over Dimitri’s face, but then he shakes it off and turns to open the front door for me. “After you, KB.”

Or at least I think that’s what he calls me. KB? I shrug it off as some probably gross, possibly sexual acronym, and head out the door.