Chapter 2

Clara's POV

The next morning the sun comes through the little window in the rental and hits my eyes hard enough to hurt.

I stayed in the shower for three hours trying to scrub off the mildew smell and the shame that came with it.

The girl in the mirror is pale. Her eyes are cold in a way I don't recognize.

"Clara, don't go in today. I'll call you out." Bennett comes in with a bowl of hot oatmeal. His eyes are bloodshot. He didn't sleep.

Last night he kept at me for a solid hour before I finally told him everything Nash did.

I won't forget his face. I'd never seen him that angry. He smashed a glass and said he was going to kill Nash, and I had to wrap myself around him to keep him in the apartment.

"No, Bennett. I'm going." I take the bowl and have a spoonful. "I'm getting my stuff. I don't want to be there anymore."

At ten in the morning, I walk into the classroom.

The noise stops the second they see me. Every pair of eyes lands on me, some curious, some disgusted, most of them just enjoying it.

By now the whole school knows what happened in that closet, and it's the funniest thing anyone's heard all year.

I keep my eyes forward, walk to my desk, pull out a cardboard box, and start putting my books in one at a time.

An expensive handbag lands on my desk and knocks a stack of books over.

I look up.

Nash is standing there with his hands in his pockets, chin up.

"Okay, enough with the attitude. Last night, my guys took it too far. Left you in there longer than they should have. Camilla picked it out. It's limited edition. Call it me making it up to you. We're good now."

He doesn't even think he did anything wrong. He thinks a bag erases last night.

Camilla speaks up from behind him, doing that small voice she does. "He's right, Clara. He felt terrible about it when we got back. We all go to school together. Don't be like this."

The whispering starts around me.

"That's actually generous of him. That bag runs like thirty grand."

"Right? Her mom kept house for them. She's never buying that herself. She's cashing in."

"If I were her I'd take it and shut up."

Nash listens to all of it and looks even more pleased with himself. He's sure I'll do what I've done a hundred times before, that all it takes is one nice thing and I'll come crawling back like a dog wagging its tail.

He doesn't know that girl died in that closet.

I stop packing and look at the bag.

"What? Too happy to talk?" Nash scoffs.

I pick it up and throw it in his face in front of everyone.

The box catches his cheek and leaves a red line across it. The bag hits the floor and rolls.

"Clara! What the hell is wrong with you?" He's got a hand over his face, furious and confused at the same time.

"Your apology is worth about as much as that bag. I don't want either one." I look at him, cold. "And stop talking to me in that voice. It makes me sick."

Nash laughs, the way he does when he's too angry to do anything else, and reaches for my collar. "So we're doing this. Who do you think you are? Without my family you'd have starved in the street years ago."

His hand doesn't get to me. Someone comes through the back door fast and puts a fist into his jaw.

Nash goes down. There's blood at the corner of his mouth.

"Nash!" Camilla screams.

"You son of a bitch. You touch her one more time and see what happens." Bennett's eyes are red and he's pointing right at him. "Without your family? If my parents hadn't dragged you out of that car, you'd have burned to death ten years ago. You people owe us two lives. And this is how you treat their daughter?"

Somebody in the back audibly sucks in a breath.

All anyone here ever knew was that I'm the poor relative the Bellamys took in. Nobody knew the rest of it.

Nash holds his face. Something like panic crosses his eyes and then it's gone. "You hit me? My dad can shut your company down tomorrow. You want to see if I'm serious?"

"Then shut it down. I'll beg on the street before I let you people put her through one more day of this."

Bennett puts me behind him. When he turns around to me, everything in his face softens. "You got everything, Clara?"

"Yeah, Bennett." I pick up the box.

"Let's go. I'm getting you out of here."

He takes the box in one hand, takes my hand with the other, and walks me out of the classroom.

We go straight to the principal's office.

The Bellamys write the school a check every year, so the principal tries to smooth the whole thing over. Bennett puts the withdrawal paperwork down on the desk and makes it clear there's nothing to discuss.

Walking out the front gate, I turn and look back at the school that had me trapped for three years.

It's a nice day.

I don't look back again. I walk straight into the wind.