Chapter 6

POV Stas

“Stas, tell me—do you really like me?”

“Of course I do, baby.”

“For real? You guys are so fickle. Just recently I thought you were hanging out with Katka…”

“Polozova, did you come here to talk to me?”

“N-no.”

“Then keep quiet. Keep it up, and I’ll like you even more.”

Lenka was irritating. School was irritating. The whole world irritated me just by existing, with its endless fucking dead ends, because she was in it. My hated stepsister. From the moment she appeared, she’d taken over not only my territory but my thoughts.

“…Stas, Grisha and I want to take Nastia shopping. We need to buy her everything she needs for school. I hope you’ve grown up enough to handle that?”

“About time.”

“Your school isn’t exactly easy, and I don’t want her classmates picking on her. Nina Ivanovna says her granddaughter doesn’t need anything, but I don’t agree.”

I couldn’t hold back a nasty laugh, and it flew in my mother’s direction as she lit a cigarette by the window. Almost cheerfully.

“Oh, really? If that ancient crap her granddaughter wears can be called clothes, then the old woman didn’t just have a heart attack—she’s got dementia, too.”

That was too much, even if it sounded true, and my mother frowned at me in disapproval. Irritated, she knocked the ash from her cigarette into the ashtray.

“I’m not asking you for a diagnosis, smart-ass!” she snapped. “Be grateful Pop can’t hear you going on about Nastia’s grandmother! I’m asking what to buy the girl so she’ll fit in at school and with her new friends. You can’t seriously not care, son—she’s your sister, and she’ll be going to school right beside you. Keep the rest of your comments to yourself.”

Yeah, all right, I’d gone a little too far. A sister? Ha! No way!

“What should you buy?” I didn’t even have to pretend. It was obvious. I got to my feet and shoved my chair back with a scrape. At the last second, I stopped myself from smashing it to hell against the tile. “Everything! Just don’t haggle, Director, if you’re going for Stepmother of the Year. Otherwise Elf will remind you how cheap you were when you’re old…”

My mother didn’t haggle. She couldn’t have cared less what I thought! Her generosity had always set her apart from other people. So had her practicality and toughness, for that matter. No one had ever managed to take advantage of her, and I had no doubt my stepsister wouldn’t manage that little trick, either. All I had to do was put up with Mom playing fairy godmother to her quiet stepdaughter until everything returned to normal. I should have been able to, but my patience was nonexistent. Especially when I saw the cautious joy lighting Elf’s wide blue eyes whenever Mom spoke to her. And the sadness with which my father turned away from both of his women. As if he felt the same way I did.

But I had it worse. A thousand times worse. And I had to live with that.

I knew my stepsister was just another stupid girl like all the rest, and that evening she’d be hanging around the window. Breaking that damn mirror hadn’t been for nothing. And there she was. Trying on her new clothes, twirling in front of her reflection in the glass, naively delighted by her new stuff. Irritating me with that quiet happiness and making me watch her. Making me think about her in ways I didn’t want to.

I watched and watched her, smoking one cigarette after another, hoping to burn her up with my stare, but all I saw was her smile and her slim, girlish figure. Beautiful shoulder-length hair—soft, slightly wavy—and her shoulders, just as young and delicate as she was. My stepfather’s daughter, barging into my world without permission, whom I hated, hated, hated…

I repeated it again and again the next morning on the way to school while she ran after me, easily hopping over half-frozen puddles and trying to keep up with me. She looked around curiously, stealing shy glances at me from beneath a white pom-pom hat that suited her dark-blond hair and blue eyes so perfectly.

That’s right. Don’t come near me. Better yet, stay the hell away!

Fuck this! She wasn’t even close to the kind of girl I could like. I’d already had a taste of adult life with the older girls who hung around my friends, so I knew what I wanted. I needed more—much more—than the skinny skeleton in the window, and I intended to satisfy that need very soon. I’d already spotted the girl who could help me as I reached the school entrance: a beautiful, tall girl from the upper grades who smiled and stepped toward me when she saw me. The girl my friends and I had bet on yesterday.

Lenka Polozova, the stuck-up girl who fooled around with college guys? Why not? It was always interesting to find out how true the rumors were. At any rate, she definitely had everything in all the right places. I knew hanging out with older friends made me look older, and I planned to use that advantage as I worked my way toward her.

We helped each other forget ourselves easily and skipped class. Tossing her bra out the bathroom window was a piece of cake. No promises. No relationship. Just desire and opportunity. And the tears? What about them? She should have thought about that sooner, when she didn’t say no and let me go ahead. This is adult life, baby. Here, we’re the ones responsible for our own choices. Sure, I’ll see you again if you want. Why not? We could even meet at a party at my house. Once the parents take off, we’ll pick up where we left off in my room. You’ll like it, I promise.

And no stepsister. No new girl clothes in the closet. Don’t know, don’t see, don’t think. Don’t remember. I was living and breathing freely again, ruling my own world and striding confidently toward tomorrow. Tomorrow, when I planned to live just as I had before: in my house and with my family. Using my body and my parents’ money to the fullest. And maybe Pop would never even remember his daughter. The skinny, blue-eyed skeleton who knew how to smile like an angel. I just had to erase her from my life. That was all.

I stopped dead when she suddenly ended up at my feet. In the middle of the school cafeteria, where a fall like that always got a laugh. Just like now, when my friends were laughing like hyenas until one look from me shut them up. Two of them, anyway.

I didn’t need to see the girl’s face to recognize the hair spilling over her shoulders and the slender wrists showing beneath her cuffs. Not long ago, I’d had one of them clutched in my hand, feeling the pulse race beneath my fingers and Elf’s heart pound frantically. As if she were afraid of me. I hoped to hell she was.

She lowered her head to hide her blush, and through the gap between her dark-blond strands I caught a glimpse of the delicate line of her cheek and chin. A neat ear and a porcelain neck, so thin and fragile-looking that I forced myself to look up. It was her I’d pictured in my arms while I was touching Lenka. Damn it!

“What a picture—an oil painting. Poor little Nastia and her rightful trophy…”

“Shut your mouth, Seryoga. And keep it shut for a good long while. I’m not joking.”