Hated (Hearts of Stone #3) Read online

  I could barely breathe past the lump in my throat. We were both someone else. Neither of us was the same and we could never go back to the way things were. Maybe we could build something else, but there was no guarantee that if we tore away all the broken parts that we would even have a foundation that was worth building on.

  The mournful melody of the song tumbled through the night, the words I remembered so clearly crawled unspoken through my open window and into my heart as Austin played. The lyrics lamented that if he could start over, he would. And he’d never give himself away again.

  Is that how he truly felt?

  When the last notes faded, Austin let the bow slide across the strings with a screech that sounded like a wail of grief. I cringed, bitter tears stinging past my lids. He reached behind him to grab the bottle and poured the alcohol into a shot glass. He took a drink, his lips pulling back across his teeth after the long sip.

  His gaze darted up to my window, and even though I knew he couldn’t see me in the dark, I folded myself back into the shadows. After staring for a few moments as if he could sense me, Austin picked up his bow and put it to the strings. When his body finally moved, so did the music. It was the theme song from Gladiator, “Now We Are Free.”

  And as he sat there pouring out his grief and despair and heartbreak, I sat there with him. Just as I had so many times before. The difference was that now there was darkness and years between us and neither of us quite knew how to navigate that distance. Technically, there was just a night-soaked yard, but it felt like a yawning chasm with no safe way to cross.

  Neither of us knew how to bridge the gap between us. So I sat as he played, bleeding his heart into his music. And I listened, letting my heart wish for things it no longer deserved.

  — AUSTIN —

  9. WITH DIGNITY

  FIVE YEARS AGO — APRIL 2012

  END OF SENIOR YEAR OF HIGH SCHOOL

  The desk in front of me was a haphazard collage of comic books—most in protective sleeves, some read countless times using gentle fingers to maintain their stature, and still others crisp and new. I treated my cello with respect, but I treated my graphic novels with…reverence.

  Most people gravitated toward the superhero themed comic books, but I loved the quirky and creative ones. Like Fable: Legends in Exile, my current favorite. Set in modern-day New York City, the storyline was mixed with well-known fairy tales…a gritty world where everything was familiar yet twisted.

  I’d been waiting all day to read the new release that I’d just gotten, suffering through practice with Dallas and then a family dinner where the only subject my mother wanted to discuss was our upcoming cross country move to Vegas. Just the idea of moving, of leaving our hometown, was enough to make me lose my appetite. We weren’t selling our house, but we’d be gone for an undetermined amount of time, and I hadn’t quite come to terms with the enormity of it.

  Everyone had gone to bed an hour ago and my time was finally my own. And I wanted to read.

  I pulled the new comic book out of the bag and gingerly flipped through it as I had in the store, the bright colors and vivid graphics flashing tauntingly from the pages.

  Frankie was the only one who appreciated my obsession. She didn’t read comic books and had made it clear that she didn’t care ever to do so, but she let me talk to her about them and listened while I explained the best stories and my favorite illustrators. She never told me it was stupid or childish.

  Dallas had never shared my enthusiasm or shown any amount of indulgence toward the subject. We might have shared the same womb and the same innate talent for music, but aside from that, we couldn’t be more different. Whenever I wandered off to the comic book store downtown, Dallas got lost in the record shop. He’d always wanted to play the guitar. Unfortunately for him, mother always wanted us to play in an orchestra. She couldn’t understand why he was drawn to what she called “the heathen beats of rock and roll” when there were so many wonderful classical pieces. What she couldn’t see was that for Dallas, rock was just like calling to like. That kind of music flowed in Dallas’ veins, and he wouldn’t be happy until that’s what he was playing.

  But my mother was never one to consult us on what our dreams were. As far as Chantel Stone was concerned, we were music prodigies, and she wasn’t about to waste that kind of talent on a guitar and a future with some band that might never see more than the back of an old van and a few musty bars. And that’s what always started their fights because Dallas would retort that he wasn’t going to waste his life playing stuff that only his grandma wanted to listen to. He could play classical music, but he didn’t want to.

  Sometimes it seemed that my purpose in life was to be a referee—between Dallas and my mom and sometimes even between Dallas and Frankie. Dallas and Frankie were friends a lot of the time, but they fought just as often. As Nana Ruth always said “Some people are like oil and water, but Dallas and Frankie? He might be oil, but she is the match.”

  Deep down, that bothered me. Because if anyone was going to burn for Frankie, I wanted it to be me.

  But I knew my role—I was the sand that was kicked over the fire of Dallas’s passion. I was the one who put out the flames of his tantrums and made sure everyone came out in one piece.

  Once—after a particularly vicious fight between my mother and Dallas over the type of music he listened to and the type of music my mother expected him to play— Frankie had suggested to Dallas, in a smart-ass offhand way, “Why don’t you just play rock on the cello? That way you and your mother will both be happy.”

  Frankie had meant it as a joke.

  Dallas had seen it as his salvation.

  And Dueling Cellos was born. A mix of classic and rock and passion. Against my mother’s wishes, we tried out for Rising Stars, a reality talent show. Not only did we make it through the first round, but we won the whole damn thing. Now we had the summer at home, and in the fall we’d leave for Vegas for our resident show. My mother was moving out there with us since Dallas and I were barely eighteen, and she had taken it upon herself to take over as our manager. Plus, with Dallas’s past health issues, there was no way she was letting him out of her sight. My father would stay home with my sister Abby. At least until she finished school and he found a job out west.

  I still wasn’t sure how I felt about moving cross country, but after Dallas’s illness and all the hospital stays, it seemed only fair to let him live out his dream. Dallas was finally happy, and the fighting between him and my mother had lessened. Frankie had been right. They’d found a compromise. Performing in front of a crowd, playing the kind of music he wanted, was a dream come true for Dallas. I wanted that for him. He was the other half of me, and I wanted him to be completely happy and fulfilled.

  The only problem was, for him to have his dream, I needed to make it mine, too. And music? I was good at it. Really fucking good. Only…it wasn’t my dream. It never had been. But without me? There was no Dueling Cellos. Without me, Dallas’s dream would go unfulfilled. With how hard he’d fought for his future, all he’d endured just to get well, I couldn’t take that away from him.

  As I sat there, musing over the end of the summer and all of the changes to come, I found that I suddenly had no interest in that brand new graphic novel that I’d been looking forward to all day. What I wanted…

  I felt the pull deep inside my chest and looked out my window, across the darkness as if I could see beyond the curtains inside the house next door. I don’t know how long I sat there… wanting. Waiting.

  Suddenly, my walkie-talkie crackled with static in the far corner of my desk, and then Frankie’s voice whispered into the silence. “Pssst. You there?”

  I picked up the battered old radio, the same one I’d used for years, and pressed the button to speak. “What’s up?”

  “Hopefully you,” she said with amusement. There was a muffled thud, and then the radio hissed like the sound of someone huffing through a microphone before Frankie spoke again. “Open
your window…I’m coming up.”

  I strode across the room, turning off all the lights except for the small desk lamp as I went. I didn’t want any nosy neighbors waking my mother up in the middle of the night to tell her someone was sneaking in her second-floor window.

  When I lifted the window and pulled out the screen, Frankie’s face appeared from the dark as she shuffled out across the limb of the tree that was just outside my room. She reached for the edge of the sill, and I grabbed her elbow to help her inside. She stumbled into my arms but didn’t try to move away once she’d steadied herself. Her expression wasn’t the carefree, amused one I was used to, even though she’d been joking only moments before.

  “If you wanted to talk, you could have called,” I reminded her.

  Frankie frowned. She hated phones and insisted the walkie-talkies were more fun because we were the only ones who used them. “And miss out on nearly breaking my neck trying to climb into your room?” She tried to laugh, but it was forced.

  “What’s going on?” I asked, peering into her eyes. “Is something wrong?”

  Instead of answering, she leaned forward and kissed me. Not the sweet, tentative, exploring kisses we’d shared over the last few months. Before this moment, she’d always kissed me carefully, like if she was too demanding or rough it might shatter something between us.

  Tonight, she was reckless. As she pushed me back toward the bed, her mouth and hands swarmed over me in a frenzy. I planted my feet to stop our progress and grabbed her wrists.

  She broke the kiss, her chest heaving against mine, fear and apology in her eyes. “I’m sorry,” she said, embarrassed. Sometimes it was still weird that the lines of our friendship had blurred into romance.

  “Frankie.” I rubbed my thumbs along the insides of her wrists. Maybe to calm her, I wasn’t sure. “What’s going on?” I asked again.

  She licked her bottom lip and blinked quickly, worry darkening her gaze. “You’re leaving. For Vegas.”

  I felt my shoulders slump a bit and I bent my head to bring my face closer to hers. We’d known that moving to Vegas would eventually happen. It hadn’t felt real until today when the date for our departure was finalized. And as I looked in Frankie’s eyes, I could see the hurt in them. I’d sent her a text after dinner to let her know because I wasn’t sure how to tell her to her face.

  “Not for months,” I said, trying to sound hopeful. “We have the rest of the school year and the summer.”

  “But you will eventually leave. And I…I can’t…I don’t think I can handle it,” she admitted. Her eyes were glistening as she pressed her lips together.

  The shock of her statement crushed my chest for a moment. Frankie had always handled everything. She was the strong one. And even if she was voicing fears I already had, it sounded worse coming from her. I was the one who always worried. Never her.

  “You should come with me,” I said quietly.

  Her eyebrows dipped, and her mouth flattened further into displeasure. “Come with you? That’s not even…” She huffed. “I’m only seventeen, Austin. Even though I turn eighteen in August, Nana isn’t going to let me move clear across the country to hang around while you,” she paused to flutter her hand around and then continued, “follow your dreams. What am I supposed to do? Go all the way out there and get a job at Target or something? I don’t think the role of best friend is one of those things—where you tag along with someone while they pursue a career.” There was so much bitterness in her words that I could taste it.

  A sound of disgust echoed in my chest. “You’re more than just my best friend. You know that.”

  She lifted a hand to rub across her forehead as she closed her eyes. “I know. I know,” she said softly. “But I still can’t leave for Vegas on a whim. You will be working. And I’d be…floundering.”

  I pulled her hands close to my chest and looked down at her fingers as I stroked along them with my own. “You could go to school out there.” She started to give me a look like I was crazy because we both knew she wasn’t planning on college right away. She couldn’t afford it yet.

  “And there are tracks,” I said, silencing her before she could give me an argument. “You could train on your dirt bike, compete, maybe even get a job at one of them. Whatever you want. It doesn’t have to be school. There are just as many opportunities out there as there are here. Maybe more.” I didn’t mention that if she moved out west, she’d also be leaving behind the stigma of her family’s reputation and that leaving the small town of Buckley, Maryland would be a way for her to shed the rumors.

  “You think so?” she asked, hopefully. Like she’d already thought about it but had been too logical to even consider it.

  I looked up to meet her eyes and was satisfied to see my relief reflected in her expression. “What other reason do you have to stay?” I asked. “I know you’re close to your family and don’t want to leave them, but all of your brothers have moved out, and Nana Ruth has her friends to keep her busy.”

  I didn’t mention that once I left, Frankie would be severely lacking in the friend department.

  “There are so many options for you out there. I even printed out some applications for scholarships and loans you might be able to get if you want to apply for school in the spring. They say it’s easier to get into schools in the spring. And I’ve also got some printouts on the local tracks—” I turned to my desk where the papers were buried under the comic books, but she held tight to my hand and pulled me back to her.

  “You were researching this? For me?” She chewed on her bottom lip and that light of hope I’d seen so often before was creeping into her eyes. Her father had taken that light away one too many times. I wanted to be the one who kept it there. The one who made sure it never went out.

  Frankie licked her lips and then pulled the bottom one between her teeth. She looked like she was about to cry.

  “Come here,” I said. I tugged on her hand and led her over to my bed so we could both sit down side by side, our backs against the headboard.

  We sat in silence for a few moments, our fingers doing a slow dance across one another as we held hands. Then, in the silence of the night, we planned our future.

  ***

  I held the copy of Fable in my hand, the smell of the ink and paper reminding me of the indie bookstore where I bought it. Just looking at the cover had thrust me back into the memories of that night—the night that Frankie had agreed to come to Vegas. The night we’d had sex for the first time. It had been the first time for both of us, and it was slow and clumsy and full of quiet laughter and teasing. Even now, I wouldn’t change a thing about it. No matter what happened between Frankie and me afterward, that night had been perfect, and I wouldn’t regret it.

  I set the comic book on the desk alongside the old walkie-talkie which had also been inside the box.

  I picked up another plastic-covered comic as a loud bark of sound, like that of a tree breaking half, was followed by cursing that would have made even Pauly DiGorgio pause in discomfort. The noise, both of wood shattering and swearing, drew me out of my memories. Setting the comic back in the box, I strode over to the window and peered out to see Frankie getting to her feet and brushing dirt off the ass of her tiny jean shorts.

  She was swearing at the porch railing—which appeared to have snapped in two and dumped her into Nana Ruth’s old garden. After yelling at the broken wood like it was a disobedient dog, Frankie angrily stomped off to the back of her house, pulling leaves out of her hair as she went. I assumed she was going to find Weatherby. I was about to turn away and let him deal with Frankie alone when I realized that it was Sunday and I hadn’t heard a single sound of construction all morning.

  Turning back to the window, I craned my head in curiosity to watch as Frankie stormed to the shed behind her house, yanked the door open, and disappeared inside. She was back outside moments later with a crowbar in her hand and a look of vengeance on her face.

  What the hell was she doing? />
  Through the open window, I could still hear her muttering curses as she stalked back toward the front porch before glaring at the broken railing. She lifted the crowbar like a baseball bat, the curved end menacingly hovering over her head.

  Was she going to—

  She swung the bar around on the railing so hard that another piece of it broke off with a resounding crack before cartwheeling into the garden behind her. She looked like a mafia hitman as she pummeled the wooden railing over and over again. Despite the fact that each blow seemed to shudder through her like she was a tuning fork, she didn’t seem to be ready to stop any time soon.

  Frankie DiGorgio was assassinating her porch.

  I sighed and shook my head. After the awkwardness of my drunken behavior last night, I had no business going over there. But I also didn’t want to have to take her to the hospital with a piece of deck shrapnel embedded somewhere in her body. And since Weatherby wasn’t around, it would be my neighborly duty to take care of her.

  I jogged down the steps and out my front door. As I approached, she stopped slashing at the wood with overhead blows as she breathed heavily and glared at the remnants of the railing. Frankie ascended a few steps to shove the curved end of the crowbar under one of the boards right before she used all of her weight to try to pry it free. She was throwing every ounce of strength into her effort, and the board refused to move even though she muttered threats at it.

  She was so intent on her battle with the porch that she didn’t see me come up behind her.

  “Need some help?” I asked, my voice a low growl of amusement.

  She swirled around in surprise, the crowbar hoisted in defense.

  I backed away, my hands held out in front of me. “What were you doing?” I asked, nodding my head toward the board she was trying to rip up.

  Frankie glanced guiltily over her shoulder at the board. When I followed her gaze, I saw that it was the piece of wood where I’d carved FRANKIE RULES all those years ago.