For some reason though, when Aaron looks at me with that stupid handsome face of his, all I feel is anger.

“Let’s go,” I snap, moving past him, and feeling his fingers grab the edge of my backpack. I glance back at him. He has the letters H.A.V.O.C. tattooed on the knuckles of his left hand, just like all the other boys.

Their own not-so-very-subtle gang symbol.

“Eventually, we’re going to have to learn to talk to each other,” he says, his voice hard, so different from the boy I used to know. There’s a fragment of that old Aaron in there somewhere, but that one bright ray of sunshine is swallowed by dark clouds. One day, probably someday soon, it’ll cease to exist.

“You think so?” I ask, and he sighs, raking his fingers through his hair. The muscles in his right arm bunch and swell with the movement, causing the sleeve of his shirt to ride up. I can see the names of his sister and cousin tattooed there, right over the generous swell of his bicep.

“You’re a part of Havoc now,” Aaron says, and I scoff, yanking out of his grip and reaching for the car door. He stops me, pushing in front of me and forcing me back a few steps. Our eyes meet, and I don’t care that he smells like bacon and maple syrup, that I know he cooked for the girls this morning, or that everything he does is for them.

Just like how everything I do is for Heather.

“I’m a plaything for Havoc now,” I say, and Aaron growls at me, grabbing me by the upper arms and staring into my face, almost pleadingly.

“Were you listening when Vic told you the price? Or are you so intent on your own destruction that you can’t see beyond the confines of your hate for yourself?”

Anger and pain flare through me, and I tear myself from Aaron’s gaze, leaving scratches on my upper arms.

“You weren’t even there,” I challenge, meeting his eyes, wishing he’d shove me or slap me, so I had an excuse to lunge at him, take out all the frustrations I’ve ever felt toward him and his gang on his hard body.

“I was behind the curtain,” he spits back, narrowing his eyes dangerously. “Because I couldn’t stand to sit there and watch you make the biggest mistake of your life. You would’ve been lucky if Vic had asked you to be our whore, and nothing else. You’re not getting it, Bernadette: you are a part of Havoc now. Forever.”

Forever … Such a foreign concept. Something that exists and can never be broken, something that won’t shatter, no matter how many times it’s tossed or torn or trampled on.

My mind can’t even comprehend it.

“You’re a member of the group,” Aaron repeats on the end of a long, tired sigh. “Nobody else wanted this but Vic. Nobody. It’s too much, too personal, it brings you too close. But he wouldn’t let it go.” He turns away from me for a moment, eyes burning, mouth pursed. “He wouldn’t let you go,” he adds, but the words are so light, I can almost convince myself I didn’t hear them.

Aaron moves around the front of the van and climbs inside, starting the engine and waiting there for me to join him.

To prove my own point, I wait on the curb, watching him through the window until I’m sure he’s about to break and take off without me. I climb in at the last second, and we suffer the rest of the drive to the school in silence.

Three years earlier …

The pageant meeting takes place in the cafeteria at seven, so I beg my old neighbor, Mrs. Kentridge, to watch Heather, and then head for Prescott High. The cool evening air is settling in quick, but the shivering doesn’t bother me, the rain doesn’t bother me. No, the only thing I’m thinking about is how this pageant could change my life.

The winner gets a full-ride scholarship to Everly All-Girls Academy in Maine which is about as far away from Prescott as one could get. I’d be flown there, first-class, get my own dorm, fully paid tuition, and I could finish my high school career out somewhere better than a drug-infested shithole in an asbestos-ridden building.

Penelope said she’d take care of Heather for me, and even though I don’t want to leave my sisters, I can’t take it anymore. I can’t take my mother or my stepdad or Principal Vaughn and the way his eyes glide down my bare legs during PE.

I’m at a breaking point.

Exhaling sharply, I take the steps up to the front of the building two at a time, and head for the security office to check in and gain entrance to the school. As soon as I do, I hit the front hall and pause, waiting as the security guard’s door slams shut and I’m left alone in a dimly lit building crawling with memories and pain.

Before I even see him, I know somebody’s watching me.

“Hello, Bernadette,” Victor says, stepping out of one of the classrooms and making his way slowly toward me. It occurs to me that we haven’t spoken since Aaron broke up with me. Aaron. Sweet Aaron. Aaron whose heart was ripped out by tragedy, who has nowhere to go but to the devil himself for help.

“What do you want?” I ask warily, hyper conscious of the fact that we’re alone together in here, that bad things can and have happened at Prescott High. A girl was raped in one of the classrooms just after a football game. It happens, and nobody cares.

My hands begin to shake, but I don’t run.

I want nothing more than to simply skip down this hall and slide into a seat at the pageant meeting. I’ve never thought of myself as pretty, or if I did, then I hated the world for it. Pretty girls get looked at; they get hurt. But if I can use the curse of this face and this body, and turn it into a blessing, I will.

Victor walks up to me, and even though I’m tall, he’s taller. I have to look up at him. He reaches down and brushes some white-blonde hair behind my ear, his fingers trailing across my skin, leaving scorch marks. My breath catches. Does he know that I’ve always watched them, him and his friends, that I’ve always wondered what it’d be like to be a part of something, to belong?

“Do you know Kali Rose-Kennedy?” he asks, and my face flushes.

Oh.

Of course he’s not here to talk to me. But for a moment there, I breathe a sigh of relief. Victor isn’t here to hurt me: he’s just here to ask about my best friend.

“We’ve been close since second grade,” I say, shrugging my shoulders loosely. Kali will be at the pageant tonight, too. We’re doing this thing together, me and her. In fact, she’s probably already waiting for me … “I should go.” I start to move around Vic, but he puts an arm out, palm flat against a locker and looks at me with something almost akin to sympathy in his dark gaze. Whatever I think I see though, is gone in an instant.

From one of the classroom doors, three of the other boys appear, the ones who make up the rest of their new gang: Havoc. The only one who’s missing is Aaron. My stomach clenches, and my heart picks up speed. It’s hard to swallow now, and I feel faintly dizzy, standing in this dark, dingy hallway wondering what’s going to happen to me.

“Bernadette,” Victor says again, and this time, I can’t decide if he’s using my name as a blessing or a curse. “Grab her.”

The other boys—Oscar, Hael, and Callum—come at me so fast I don’t have a chance to run, snatching me by the arms at the same moment Vic steps forward and slaps a piece of duct tape over my mouth. The fear is very real as they drag me backwards and out the front doors.