She wasn’t a cute drunk.

She wasn’t even a sad drunk.

She was straight-to-ER-then-rehab plastered, and my mood turned from sour to murderous.

I stepped forward, leaving Harry hanging and brushing past Arabella, who was biting down a vicious grin, and Poppy, who’d slapped a hand to her mouth, giving Lady Macbeth a run for her money in the melodramatic department.

Edgar beat me to his daughter, holding her arms to keep her upright.

Shock filled every wrinkle of his face. Guess he wasn’t used to his younger kid fucking up. For all the black shit she’d smeared on her face and worn, Lenora wasn’t a bad kid. A straight-A student who never said a word when she’d been through hell her entire senior year. No boy trouble. No drugs or alcohol.

Perfect, but not in a boring-ass way, like her sister.

She stumbled backward, squinting to try to bring him into focus. Her back hit the wall, and Rafferty and her dad both reached to help her. She swatted their hands away.

“Lenny, have you been drinking?” Edgar asked.

“Not as much as I should have, Sherlock.”

Edgar glowered. Arabella giggled in the corner, covering her mirth with her manicured nails that hadn’t seen a day of work. My eyes snapped from Len to Arabella, from Arabella to Edgar, then back to Len.

Fuck.

“She’s been slipping shots when I wasn’t looking, sir,” Pope said, excusing himself of any responsibility.

Breaking his nose was going to be the height of my year. Maybe even decade.

“You’re completely hammered.” Edgar ignored Rafferty, barely restraining himself from shaking Lenora.

Everybody stood back. Even Pope took a step away from the shitshow unfolding in front of us. I stayed close. I wasn’t in a trusting mood, especially where her father was concerned.

“Quite observant.” Good Girl zigzagged her way to the head of the table and fell into a seat with a sigh.

She reached for a tower of triangle-cut BLTs, popping one into her mouth without chewing. She knocked over three plastic cups and a burning candle in the process. Poppy was quick to pick up the candle before it burned a hole through the tablecloth.

“Quite, quite observant. I guess that’s one thing I didn’t inherit from you.” She dropped her head back and stared at the ceiling, her favorite thing to do.

I made a mental note to ask her why she was looking at ceilings all the damn time.

“What are you on about?” Edgar blinked, his stance still rigid. He stared at his daughter like she was mad.

And she was, I realized.

At him.

I glanced at Arabella, whose face was draining of color, even under her three pounds of foundation, blush, and bullshit fake smile.

“I’m talking about the fact that you’re a pig.” Len looked up and managed to somehow hold her father’s gaze before her eyes rolled in their sockets involuntarily, crossing then zoning out.

The room sucked in a collective breath. I advanced toward her, yanking her up by the arm, and tugging her to the door.

“Show’s over. Come on.”

She shook me off, slapping my hand away, hard.

“Don’t you dare touch me!” she screamed.

I turned around and glared at her. My teeth clenched in anger, and I took a deep breath before hissing, “Your ass needs a shower, water, and a loaf of bread. You’re saying shit you won’t be able to take back tomorrow. Unless you have a time machine handy, I’d strongly advise you let me handle this.”

She thrust herself at me, and maybe if she hadn’t been as drunk as an 18th-century sailor, people would’ve suspected we were banging, but she was so sloshed, I bet they chocked our familiarity up to sloppy drinking.

She whispered in my ear, “You knew and you didn’t tell me. We’re over, Spencer. Go find another unassuming girl to suck your blood and take your virginity. I won’t touch you with a ten-foot pole.”

My eyes flared in rage at her words. At my own stupidity.

Count to ten, I heard my mom’s voice pleading in my head.

Then a hundred. Then a thousand. Do not react.

Good Girl turned around and stumbled through the door, but the minute she rounded the hallway, I grabbed her arm and shoved her through a side door.

I slammed the door shut, hearing people outside looking for us. Since Harry had given me lengthy tours of this place when I was thirteen, I knew it by heart. This door was hidden under an alcove and looked like a part of the wooden wall. They’d never find us.

I cupped my hand over her mouth so she couldn’t call for help and dragged her down the pantry stairs while she resisted, kicking her legs and trying to bite my palm. The scent of old food they used to keep here—sacks of potatoes, condiments, and canned food lingered in the air, though the place was completely empty. Mold was also a big player in the puke-de-toilette fragrance. Under the stairway, there was another hidden door. I took the Swiss knife out of my boot and jammed its edge into the lock, picking it with expertise and elbowing the door open. I pushed a still-kicking Len inside and closed the door behind us. It was the deepest shade of dark there was: pitch black. She couldn’t see anything.

I couldn’t either, but I knew where we were. What was there.

“Where are we?”

She hiccupped, but her voice sounded considerably more sober and less pissed off. The sense of danger heightened her senses, maybe because we were officially underground, her family and friends were upstairs, and no one could hear her.

Maybe because they said this place was haunted, and they weren’t wrong.

It was.

With my own fucking nightmares, for instance.

It was kind of rad knowing she was lying on the cold, damp stone bench and I was standing, hovering over her. It was my favorite position in any encounter, no matter with whom.

But it felt particularly good when it was Len, because she was the only person who didn’t cower, even when her body language said so. I’d never managed to get her on her knees for me, and fuck knows I tried.

“What was that all about?” I ignored her question.

“Oh, let’s see. My father is shagging my nemesis—my teenage nemesis—and she threw it in my face this morning. Happy birthday to me! And she added that you knew about them and didn’t tell me. Why?”

Because it wasn’t my business.

Because hurting her unnecessarily wasn’t high on my to-do list.

Because I didn’t get the fucking chance to.

That was the worst part. She was fucking mad at me for not doing something, before I’d had the chance to decide whether I was going to do it or not.

“I have no loyalty to you,” I said coolly, following my instinct to answer to no one. I wasn’t one to be pushed.

“You don’t have any to Arabella, either. And she is the one in the wrong.”

True, but why would I ruin your day because your dad is a horn dog and Arabella is continuously breaking Guinness records as the trashiest person alive?

“I don’t owe you an explanation.”

“Do you like her? Is that it?” she asked.

Sober Lenora would never ask this.

“Fucking in love with her,” I said.

I was not in charge of how I was feeling, and that annoyed the shit out of me. A part of me wanted to scream that she was the dumbest smart creature I’d ever met, and another wanted to apologize for…for…Jesus fuck, why was I twisted inside-out over this bullshit?