The Betrayal of Renegade X (Renegade X, Book 3) (27 page)

The lightning bolt on my high-voltage T-shirt glows bright in the dark. It looks really cool, and I almost hate to take it off.

Almost.

Kat unbuttons my jeans and I unhook her bra. We practically tear the rest of our clothes off, and then we have sex in her bed. It’s a little bit weird that there are so many people just down the hall, and that they all must know what we’re doing in here. But it could be hours before they leave, so I decide I don’t care.

Afterward, we just lie there for a while, because neither of us has to go anywhere or answer to anyone. I can’t remember the last time we got to do that. Even when I stayed over for her birthday, I had to scramble to get to school the next day. And whenever we’re at my house, well, we usually only have a small window of time.

Now that I think about it, maybe it’s never been like this.

Kat rests her head on my chest and drapes her arm over me. I can feel her breathing, in and out, her breath warm on my skin. And it’s really stupid, but I think this might be the best moment of my life.

I should have gone on that ski trip with her. We could have had a whole week together like this. And yeah, everyone calls her Katie, and it’s super annoying. But whenever I call her Kat, her friends look at us like I must know something about her they don’t. Like I’m not just her boyfriend, but someone special and important. Which I am, obviously, but it’s cool that they notice.

“I made a mistake,” I whisper.

“No, you did fine,” Kat teases, and I can feel the muscles in her face twitch as she smiles.

“Not
tonight
. Not this. But, Kat. I think I really screwed up.”

She must hear in my voice that I mean it, because she goes tense. “Damien, what are you talking about?”

It’s more than just the ski trip. I sit up and run my hands through my hair. The peaceful feeling I had is gone, and maybe that’s my fault, maybe I can’t just accept good things when they happen to me, but this is big, and I can’t pretend I’m not thinking it. “I should have gone to Vilmore.”

“You what?”

“Seriously, what the hell was I thinking?”

“Uh, you were thinking that you wanted to be with your family.” Kat reaches past me and turns on the lamp on her nightstand. We both wince at the sudden brightness.

“My family? I bet I could stay here again tomorrow night and Gordon wouldn’t even notice. No one would care if I didn’t come home.”

“That’s
so
not true.” Kat shivers and grabs her shirt off the floor.

“Okay, maybe not. But it would just be another excuse for them to be pissed at me.”

“Did something happen?”

“You mean, besides everyone thinking I’m some kind of psychopath terrorist because of that video?”

“You meant what you said. And if your family didn’t know you felt that way, then maybe it
needed
to be said. They’ll get over it.”

“A full-ride scholarship. And I threw it away.” The enormity of that hits me, like it took this long for it to sink in. Or maybe it was because at the time, not taking it sounded like a good idea. It’s only now, when everything’s falling apart, that I’m not so sure. “That was my whole future.”

“Whoa, Damien.” Kat puts her hands on my knees and looks me in the eyes. “It was
a
future. That doesn’t mean it was the only one.”

“What if it was? I mean, what am I going to do? As a hero?”

“I don’t know. But that’s not the point.”

“If my whole family getting to know me is just going to make them hate me, then I should have stayed away.”

“They love you. It’s obvious they do. And what about your friends?”

“Riley and Zach aren’t allowed to see me anymore. Plus, Riley didn’t even want to be partners with me.” And Kat doesn’t want me hanging out with Sarah. “I just make trouble for them.”

“You think if you went here, you wouldn’t cause any trouble?” She gives me a really skeptical look. “It’s kind of what you do.”

I laugh. Just a little. “I probably wouldn’t cause
as much
here.”

“Yeah, right. You’d pick fights with every guy who flirts with me, or anyone who says something bad about heroes, because people do. It’s a school for villains, and like it or not, you’re still half hero. And you wanted to go to Heroesworth. You said yourself that going to Vilmore didn’t feel right anymore.”

“I know. And it was true. It
is
, I mean. I just miss you, Kat. I want you to be part of my future, but we’re going in completely different directions.”

Not just because she’s a villain and I’m trying to be a hero, but because she’s going to actually be successful, and I’m not sure I see that happening for me anymore, no matter what school I go to.

Kat gets quiet. She takes my hand and entwines her fingers with mine. “You know how much I wish we were on the same path. It hurts that we’re not. And I
hate
that you and Sarah are a thing.”

“We’re not ‘a thing.’”

“You work together.”

“I work with Riley, too.”

“But you haven’t made out with him.”

“That you know of.” I wiggle my eyebrows at her.

She elbows me in the ribs.

“
Ow
.”

“Riley also didn’t try to kill me.” She sighs. “You know why I can’t stand Sarah. And if you weren’t a hero, if you’d changed your mind and come to Vilmore,
we’d
be partners. Just the two of us. You’d know all my friends, and we could do our homework together and go to the same dining hall. But, as much as I want that, that doesn’t mean you made the wrong decision.”

“I have to tell you, you’re not really selling me on this. You’re kind of just rubbing it in.”

“My point is, it sucks that we’re apart so much, but we’re making it work. And if you hadn’t stuck it out with your dad, you never would have forgiven yourself. Deep down, you wouldn’t. Especially after what happened with your mom. You need him.”

“Take that back. I don’t
need
Gordon. I let him give me food and shelter and stuff for his benefit. It makes him feel good about himself, like he’s finally doing the right thing by me.”

“Uh-huh. That’s so what’s going on. And anyway, I meant emotionally.”

“Well, that’s where you’re really wrong, because I don’t.”

She shrugs, not believing that. “He needs you, too. They all do.”

“Sometimes I think me and him are never going to get along. It’s like, things are only good between us if he thinks I’m doing exactly what he wants. He doesn’t listen to me. He doesn’t
get
me. And just when I think he might be starting to, he says something completely stupid that totally ruins it.”

“Still. Just because it’s not easy doesn’t mean it wasn’t the right choice. I think you know that.”

I lean my head back and let it thunk against the wall. “Maybe. But I can’t take him looking at me like he doesn’t know me, like I’m just some villain exchange student who lives in his house.” It’s been almost a year. I should be more than that to him, even when he’s mad at me.

“Maybe you should tell him that.”

“He doesn’t listen to me, remember?”

“But if you don’t bring it up, then you’re not even giving him a chance. How can he listen when you don’t say anything?”

“Don’t be on his side, Kat.”

“I’m not. I’m on yours. That’s why I think you need to talk to him.”

I
’M LYING FACE DOWN on the couch Saturday night, flipping channels on the TV. I hate everything that’s on, and it seems like anything I might want to watch doesn’t start for at least twenty minutes.

Amelia suddenly looms in front of me, her phone in one hand. She snaps a picture of me sprawled on the couch with my face smashed into the armrest, then smirks at her screen. “You’re awfully mopey for having been at
Riley’s
last night.”

“It’s really hard to be away from Zach. You wouldn’t understand.”

Her nostrils flare in and out in outrage. I have a pretty good view of them, what with her standing over me like that. She leans in and whispers way too loudly, “I know you went to see Kat.”

She acts like wanting to see my girlfriend is so scandalous. I point the controller at her and hit the mute button, but of course nothing happens.

“You can’t even go to Zach and Riley’s house anymore. And Kat posted on Facebook that she cried when she said good-bye to you earlier.”

I lift my head at that and prop myself up on one elbow. It was so hard to leave today—I ended up missing the train, twice. We were lying on Kat’s bed, and I had my arms around her, and I kept saying I should go, but I couldn’t bring myself to actually do it. And yeah, there were tears in her eyes when I finally did get up to leave. And when we said good-bye at her door, she threw her arms around me, and we just stood that way for a while. She said she wasn’t crying, but my shirt was wet and her shoulders were shaking and we both knew that really she was.

“Did
you
cry?” Amelia asks.

“Why do you have to be such a heartless bitch? This is why Zach’s mom doesn’t want him around you.”

“That means you did.” She snickers, like she wasn’t sobbing over not getting to see Zach last night.

“Only because I had to come home to you.” For the record, I didn’t actually cry. But I still felt like complete crap, like every part of me was heavy and empty at the same time.

She opens her mouth to say something else—something smug, from the look on her face—but then Gordon walks in and holds up his car keys. “I’m making a run to the store. Damien, do you—”

“
Yes.
” I jump up from the couch and take the keys from him. Gordon might not be my favorite person right now, and I might not be his, but going to the store with him beats staying here with Amelia.

We put on our coats and get in the car. I’m in the driver’s seat, which I still can’t believe, even though I’ve had my permit for a couple months now.

Gordon doesn’t say anything until we’re about halfway to the store. Then he clears his throat. “Damien, I want to talk to you about something.”

I almost look over at him, to see if his expression is as serious as he sounds, but I decide I can’t risk taking my eyes off the road. “If this is some kind of trick and we’re actually going to an asylum or something, you really shouldn’t have let me drive.”

“What?” He sounds amused, though I still don’t feel comfortable looking over. Maybe at the next stoplight. “Why would you think that?”

“You don’t always think things through.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

We get to a red light, and I can finally glance over at him. He looks worn out, maybe kind of nervous, but not “tricking my son into checking into a shock-therapy program” nervous.

“Take a left here,” he says.

“The store’s in the other direction.”

“We’re taking a longer route.”

“Why?”

“Because I want to talk to you. And because you hate turning left.”

Only when there’s traffic, which there is. “Turning left is overrated. Turning right three times is just as good.”

“You’ll be fine. Put your blinker on.”

I do it and grit my teeth, waiting for the light to turn green.

“I actually have two things I want to talk to you about. After what happened last week, I really don’t think you should go to school on Monday.” He waits for me to say something. “Damien? Did you hear me?”

“Can’t talk. Have to concentrate.”

The light turns green, and all the cars from the opposite side of the road start going. People behind me squeeze into the space on my right so they can go past. The wind from all the cars whooshing by rocks the car a little, and I’m pretty sure we’re going to die here.

“Go after this next car,” Gordon says.

“There’s no room.”

“There’s plenty of room. Just trust me on this. It’ll be okay.”

Yesterday, he hardly looked at me, and now he wants me to trust him?

The car goes by, but I chicken out, and then after what feels like forever, the second car finally goes past. Just as the light turns red.

Great. “I’m going to turn right. Like a sane person.”

He shakes his head. “You need to learn how to do this.”

“You want me to do everything your way. And now we’re stuck here.”

“We’re not stuck.”

“And I’m going to school on Monday.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea. You’re getting into fights. It’s not safe.”

“It was one fight, and I’m
fine
. Nothing happened.”

“You don’t have to prove anything. If that’s what this is about.”

“It’s—” The light turns green again. There are about a million cars coming from the opposite direction. It looks like there’s never going to be enough space for me to cross. “It’s not.”

“Two more cars, and then go.”

“I can’t.”

“You can. Just— Now! Go now!”

Damn it. I don’t have time to think about it. Somewhere deep down, I must actually trust him, because I do what he says. I press on the gas and turn the wheel, and I’m not sure why my body is letting me go through with this, because now I
know
we’re going to die. And even though he’s the one who told me to go, it’s going to be all my fault somehow.

There’s a car coming straight for us. My heart pounds and lightning crackles across my skin. But then I press harder on the gas to speed up, and we make it past.

“You did it!” Gordon sounds super proud of me, like I just saved ten burning orphanages all at once.

The fact that we’re not going to die tonight slowly registers. “I did it. And I’m going to school on Monday.”

“Damien.”

“We’re starting new missions this week! We’re going to track down some notorious boat thieves. That practically makes them pirates. It’s rumored that they have a bunch of stolen artifacts on their current boat, too. I mean, seriously. I’m
not
missing that.”

“You like fieldwork.”

It’s not a question, but I answer it anyway. “Yeah, it’s exciting. And it’s the thing I like most about Heroesworth.” Kind of the only thing, but I leave that part out. “It makes all the other crap I have to deal with there actually bearable. So I’m going on Monday.”