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Scout
At half time, we take shifts for bathroom breaks. We let the newer members of the squad go first and then Nova, Blythe, Charleigh, her two minions—Paige and Buffy—and I all put down our poms and head for the locker room.
We’re supposed to be in and out, but as I leave the stall, everyone glances up from their phones.
“What are you guys doing? We need to get back out there.” I grab my phone from my locker, but Blythe steps in front of me and tries to wrestle it from my hand.
“B, what the hell?”
“You don’t want to look at that,” Nova says, and her sea-glass eyes are wide with horror.
“What the hell are you talking about?” I finally wrench my hand free of Blythe and glance at the screen. The notification sends ice shooting through my veins.
I tap on it, and a video pops up. A video of me and Lev in the guidance counsellor’s office. His head is between my legs and my own is thrown back, my eyes closed, mouth open as I come. For a beat, I think it’s not as bad as it seems. No one but Nav would know this was not him but, in fact, his twin brother. I glance up from the screen. Everyone is watching their phones. A chorus of my orgasms fills the room, all the videos playing at different times.
“Holy shit, Cub,” Lev whispers from my screen and my eyes immediately slide back to his face. “Your cunt’s so fucking wet for me, so ready.”
Only The Royals know he calls me Cub. I can still save this. I can come back from this. If only it weren’t for the next words out of my mouth, “I want you inside me, Lev. Please, fuck me like you did in the park.”
“Oh my God!” Charleigh whispers. The three of them share conspiratorial looks.
“Turn it off!” Nova knocks the phone out of Charleigh’s hand.
“Uh ... excuse you,” Charleigh says. She doesn’t stoop to pick it up though; she might miss my fall from grace. And we can’t have that. You only get to dethrone the queen once. You better make sure you don’t blink and miss it. “Well, well. Aren’t we the little whore? Did you bang the brother’s together?”
“Fuck you, Charleigh.”
“Likewise ... oh wait, everyone has already fucked you, haven’t they?”
“You’re finished, bitch.” I lunge at her, but Nova and Blythe hold me back.
“No, Scout. That’s where you’re wrong. It’s you who’s finished.” Charleigh snaps her fingers and Buffy snatches her phone from the floor. She hands it back to the girl who promises to be the new reigning queen of Scarsdale High. “We already took a vote, minus these two losers, of course”—she gestures to Blythe and Nova— “and you’re out. The Scarsdale Bears no longer want you as cheer captain.”
“We no longer want you on the team, period,” Paige says coolly, glancing at her nails as if I bore her.
I invented that move.
Charleigh pushes a button and another blast goes out. I glance down at my screen. It’s a grainy video, and at first it’s hard to make out, but I soon recognize the concertina doors of Fox manor, and their kitchen beyond. A kitchen where Lev is fucking me on the counter, the night he took my virginity.
Tears sting my eyes, but I will not let them fall, and then it occurs to me. The park yesterday, the letters in my locker. Justin has been the one trying to blackmail me all along. I feel so stupid for not seeing it sooner. “Oh my God. You’re working with that cretin, Justin, aren’t you? You helped him send the letters!”
“We have a common goal—to get you beneath us, where you belong. Just in different ways.” She shrugs. “Poor Navrin. I wonder what he thinks about his girlfriend begging his twin brother to fuck her harder?” She smiles like a particularly proud house cat who caught the mouse. “I guess we won’t have to wait long to find out. Oops.”
They giggle like the children they are, and I turn and leave before they can see my tears fall.
“Bye, bitch,” Charleigh says.
A slap sounds from behind me and I turn. Nova is shaking out her hand while Charleigh cups her cheek. I might have cheered for my best friend if it weren’t for my heart breaking in two.
The whistle blows, announcing the second half. My squad has never not been on that field to cheer on our guys, but I guess with Charleigh stepping into my shoes, they’re not my problem anymore.
I dart a glance toward the team. They’re already embroiled in the game, but not Lev. Lev sits on the bench, watching me. I glance away and head for the parking lot.
“Slut!” Someone shouts from the bleachers. I freeze and look up at the stands. The entire Scarsdale student body stares back. An eerie silence falls over the crowd and among them, a smiling Justin stands with his hands in his pockets. He tilts his head toward me. I scowl and stalk off.
I run toward the lot, desperate to escape the eyes that study me with condemnation, and the whispered taunts. It isn’t until I make it to the lot that I realize I came here with Nav. I know he hasn’t seen the video, because no way would Coach let the boys near their phones at half-time. He wants their heads in the game, but the whole school knows I’m fucking his twin. It won’t be long before he finds out too.
I walk through the lot and try to remember where he parked, but tears cloud my vision. Like any game night when the lights are on, the entire town is in attendance. There are cars everywhere, but no bodies. Heavy footfalls echo behind me, but I don’t bother turning around because I know it’s Lev, and I’ve had about all the drama I can take for one night.
“You know, I never pegged you as a girl who runs away.”
I still at the sound of his voice. My blood curdles, rioting in my veins. Justin Hearst. “Screw you!”
Justin laughs. “If only you had. If only you’d taken me up on my offer, I could have made you feel everything Lev did and more.” The flash of his white teeth in the half-light is predatory. “And none of this would have needed to happen.”
“I would never touch you in a million years.”
“That’s okay, baby. You don’t need to move a muscle in order for me to get my dick wet.”
“You’re disgusting.” I turn and stalk away.
He rushes me and shoves me up against the hood of a parked car. I scream. Justin’s meaty fist clamps around my mouth, cutting off my cries. I bite down hard, but he doesn’t budge.
A maniacal laugh bubbles out of him. The joy in that sound sends chills down my spine. “You think you can hurt me, slut? You can bite as hard as you like, princess, but I like pain. I’m accustomed to it after the last four years putting up with you Royals.”
He slides his erection against my ass. I scream behind his hand, but no one is coming to help me. I flail under his weight, but that just pushes him harder against me. His hands lift my cheer uniform, pulling my panties into the seam of my ass and yanking hard.
“Damn, I wish I could take my time, savor your sweet screams, but since you wouldn’t fuck me like we planned, I don’t have that luxury. I’ll just settle for making you bleed instead.”
I thrash against him, bucking my hips to try and unseat him. It doesn’t work. It seems to only excite him more. His fat fingers slip into my panties and I squirm away from his touch, but his body holds me in place.
“I’m gonna enjoy fucking the shit out of Scarsdale’s queen. You’re gonna be all used up, you little cock tease, and who’s going to want you then? No one. Not Nav or Lev—none of your friends will stick around. It’ll just be you and me.”
I scream, but the sound is swallowed by his hand. Thick, hot tears stream down my face and the feel of his fingers inside my panties and the smell of his hand against my mouth force bile to rise in my stomach. I retch.
“Fuck!” He yanks his hand free of my mouth, and I get one good lungful of air before screaming bloody murder. Then I jerk my leg back and attempt to kick him in the balls. I miss. “You stupid bitch.”
“Scout!” Lev shouts. Footsteps echo across the lot. I can’t see through my tears—not that I could anyway with Justin’s hand shoving my head against the hood of the car. I scream again, and kick out against his shins, connecting with flesh and bone. He grunts and steps back and I run. I don’t make it more than ten steps, because I collide with a solid wall of high-school footballer packing twenty pounds of padding.
Lev grabs my arm, preventing me from falling, and then his gaze settles on Justin, and I’m jostled aside as Lev charges toward him. Justin doesn’t even have time to turn tail and run before Lev does what a linebacker is supposed to and crashes into him, taking him down to the hard blacktop. He straddles Justin, and pounds fist after fist into the boy’s face.
“Did you touch my girl, you fucking piece of shit?”
Justin just laughs. Despite having the crap beaten out of him. “She wanted it. You saw the tapes; you fucked her. You know she’s a filthy fucking whore—”
Lev’s fist slams into Justin’s face, cutting off the vicious words coming from his mouth. I can’t breathe. I can’t stop him. All I can do is sink to my knees and sob. I shake and I tremble, and I cry. I’m not capable of anything else.
Lev is like an angry god, beating Justin’s face over and over. He’s going to kill the boy, and I don’t care. I want his blood. I want him to pay. I want to erase the last ten minutes of my life—hell, I want to erase my life completely. Popularity, prestige, and the way this school worships false idols are not worth this. Nothing is worth this.
With one last punch, Lev grunts and gets to his feet. He staggers toward me and wraps me in his arms. Justin’s blood sullies his hands, and my uniform, and I want to crawl out of my skin. My mind doesn’t tell me to run because it’s fractured, broken.
I’m broken.
“I’m not gonna ask if you’re okay.” Lev’s chest heaves as he holds me, and I can’t tell if I’m the one shaking, or if he is. “I know you’re not. I’m not. But I need you to tell me if you need to go to the hospital?”
I shake my head.
“Cub.” He holds me at arm’s length. The anguish and fear in his eyes turns my stomach. In all the time I’ve known him, I’ve never seen Lev afraid of anything, Until now. “Did he ... did he force himself inside you?”
Tears roll over my cheeks and I choke on the cry I’m trying to hold back. “No.”
He kisses my head and draws me in again. “Come on. I’m taking you to the hospital.”
“I-I don’t think I can r-r-ride your bike right now.” I stutter through my shock. “I’d p-probably fall off.”
“We’ll take Saint’s car.”
My teeth chatter so hard I worry they might shatter. “He-he-he’ll kill y-you.”
“He’ll be fine. I’ll text him when we get there.”
“N-no hospital.”
He shoots me a look, but I just stare at him, and for the first time I show him just how vulnerable I am. He nods.
“P-p-promise?”
“No hospitals.”
He leads me to the passenger side of Saint’s black McLaren and opens the door. I grab the handle for support but nearly stumble when it glides up in the air instead of out to the side. Saint and his fucking toys.
Lev helps me into the car and comes around the side, flipping down the visor and catching the keys as they fall into his hands. He turns the ignition and revs the engine, then peels out of the space. When we come to Justin lying prone in the middle of the road, Lev breaks so hard the tires screech. Justin moves, lifting his head slightly from the pavement. Lev revs the engine several times and bumps forward, and Justin scrambles to all fours and scurries out of the way.
I don’t look at the boy who tried to rape me as we drive past, and I wish to God that Lev hadn’t stopped for him.
The silence between us is deafening as he races through the empty streets of Scarsdale. “Last time I’m gonna ask if you want me to take you to the hospital, Cub? I won’t force you, but I think you should get checked out.”
I shake my head. I don’t want to go to the hospital. I don’t want to be around anyone right now and have to face dozens of questions. I just want a shower and I want my bed.
“Your parents are still away, right?”
I nod and Lev pulls into my drive.
“Don’t tell Saint.”
“Cub—”
“Promise me?” I whisper, staring out the windshield at the house. “He’ll kill Justin.”
“Yeah, well. I’m seriously entertaining the idea of going back to kill him myself.” He turns off the engine. It ticks as it cools down against the chilly air. I can’t move. He doesn’t move, and as I stare up at the brilliant white façade of the mansion, I break apart. I dissolve into tears and regret and agony. I’ve never felt so fragile, so breakable, so broken.
Lev doesn’t say anything. What is there to say? I played with fire, and I didn’t just get burned. I was incinerated.
My reputation is in tatters. Everyone knows. Nav knows, and a guy who I thought was nothing, dirt beneath my feet—less than that—someone I thought was no threat at all was the one to ruin me. In more ways than one. I think about his hands inside my panties, on me, and I shudder.
Unruly, unladylike sobs leave my chest and I don’t care. He touched me against my will, and it could have been so much worse. I was pinned beneath him, his erection at my back and his hands touching my body in a way that only Lev and Nav have.
I’m sullied.
I’m ruined.
The queen has fallen, taken off the board by a pawn, and now she’s nothing. Less than nothing.
I’m just another stupid girl so blinded by power, by love, that I forgot to harden my heart. I forgot that to love is to be ruined, and now there’s no way to come back from it.