Page 28 of Deposed

I glanced at the bank of cabinets on the left of the room. Each person’s mailboxes were arranged in alphabetical order, so what was Blake, whose last name began with S, doing so close to the end? I was about to ask when he raised his hand. “If you’re curious, we can talk later.”

Outside, the sun shone out of a cloudy sky, casting the campus in soft light. Pink blossoms covered the magnolia trees leading to the main teaching block, and a slight breeze carried their sweet scent. A limousine pulled up in the driveway by the steps of the house. Blake swept past me and opened the door.

He sat in the car and stuck his nose in the air, looking like he was striking a pose for the camera. “If you think we are friends after what you did, you can think again.”

The words landed like a slap, and I reared back. Blake had never expressed this level of vitriol in front of Henry and Edward. Tightening the muscles of my stomach, I raised my chin and sat straighter in the leather seat. “I was done with you months ago, when I realized we never had a friendship.”

The limo pulled out from the courtyard, its wheels rumbling over the gravel driveway. I fastened my seatbelt and folded my arms across my chest.

Blake’s haughty expression fell. “If I meant nothing to you, why did you bother to come back?”

I huffed an exasperated breath. He was always the first to flirt and to instigate sexual contact. And now, after declaring he wasn’t interested in me, he became upset when I didn’t fall to his knees and beg to be his friend. The boy was giving me whiplash.

“You’re making me regret my choice,” I muttered.

After clearing the campus, the limo sped down the long driveway that led to the front gates and then through the fields that led to the village. We sat in silence, each staring out of our respective windows, when Blake twisted in his seat and whirled on me. “Why did you do it?”

“Did I poke you in the ribs and ask you to stand in front of the common room and boast about becoming a prince?” My stomach churned at the lie, as I had all but goaded him into proving his worth.

“Who recorded it?” he snapped.

“You would have noticed me if I had a camera. Maybe one of the many people watching you that evening. How about the types always ready to shoot videos of people making fools of themselves to upload the footage to the Mercia-Net?”

“I find that hard to believe.” He turned to stare at the stone-fronted buildings of the village.

“Blake,” I snapped. “You’re the last person who should complain about being filmed doing something incriminating.”

“What?” Annoyance etched his handsome features, and one knee bounced up and down.

I rolled my eyes. Even though I wasn’t being completely truthful, his stupidity grated on my last nerve. “Look at what you did to Charlotte. She trusted you, and not only did you trick her into sucking you off, but you recorded it and then played it to everyone and made it look like I’d done it. And you wonder why someone wanted to give you a taste of what it’s like to have one’s vulnerable moments broadcasted?”

He opened his mouth to say something, then promptly clamped it shut. Likely because any arguments in his defense would make him a hypocrite. I might not have put up the camera above the mantle and I didn’t put those words in his mouth, but he had done all the things I had mentioned and worse. He folded his arms and fumed for the rest of the journey, leaving me a jumble of confusion.

Blake was something out of a Henry Wadsworth Longfellow poem about the girl with a curl in the middle of her forehead. When he wanted to be, he was the best of the triumvirate. He was friendly, fun, flirtatious, and so physically dazzling, it was hard to believe he was real. But then there was his horrid side, which craved chaos and loved to set things in motion so he could revel in the resulting car-wreck.

Despite this, there were glimpses of someone who craved love and attention, which gave him a vulnerability some might find endearing. Right now, all I could see was a gorgeous, empty-headed pain in the ass.

With a sigh, I sat back in my seat and pulled out my smartphone.

Whatever.

As expected, no messages arrived from Mom, but Dad filled my inbox with emails stuffed with goofy photos of him and the twins. I flipped through them, smiling at the cute pictures. Little Tamara had drawn a picture of her family and included a blonde-haired stick figure that was supposed to be me. Warmth spread across my insides. Even though Dad was half a world away and in no position to help, at least he kept me in his thoughts.

As the limo sped through London, Blake turned to me and spat, “You’re two-faced.”

“You’re hurt because I bested you,” I snapped.

“And duplicitous.”

A frustrated breath huffed out of my nostrils, and I turned to meet his accusing, chocolate-colored eyes. “If I am, I learned it from you. How many of those pranks did you help with, only to flirt with me afterward? All of them, most Ill bet.”

The limo pulled into the front of Kensington Town Hall, a blocky, red brick building consisting of octagonal shapes, where dozens of paparazzi jumped to attention and crowded the car door.

“Oh no.” Blake placed his head in his hands. “How may fucking reporters did they contact?”

“Your Mom?” I asked.

“And the palace, most probably. Shit.”