Your Fault (Culpable Book 2)

It wasn’t going to be a good day. I knew as soon as I opened my eyes that morning. Not just because of the hangover, the headache, the profound desire to vomit, but also because it had now been a year since my father had died, and it was my fault.

I got out of bed, feeling my stomach screaming at me for all the alcohol I’d drunk the night before, and staggered my way to the bathroom to shower. I didn’t even know how I’d gotten to my room. I’d drunk so much tequila, I felt like it was coursing through my veins. I remembered seeing Nick…and Lion.

I needed to call Jenna and find out how the night had ended, but not today… Today I wasn’t going to talk to anyone. I was going to shut myself in my room with my inner demons and cry for a father who had never loved me, cry for a person who had tried to kill me and for a little girl who could never make her father care about her.

I knew I was an idiot for thinking about him still, but his words and the guilt that lived within me since his death would never go away. My nightmares were part of my existence when I went to bed, and sometimes, they even chased me throughout the day.

I’d loved him. Did that make me a monster? Was I a monster for loving the man who had hit my mother and hurt her every single day? Was I crazy because I went on thinking that if I’d just acted differently, my father would still be alive?

I closed my eyes, let the water fall over me, passed a sponge over my body. I felt dirty inside… I hated those thoughts. There were times when it was like another person was inside me, forcing me to be a masochist, to act in a way that did not honor me or my deceased father. He didn’t deserve my tears. He didn’t deserve the grief I felt for him…

It didn’t matter how many times he’d taken me to the park or fishing… It didn’t matter that he’d taught me to drive when I couldn’t even reach the pedals. It didn’t matter that I’d used to love watching him race and win.

He had been my father, and my little girl’s mind, my twisted little girl’s mind, had forced me to look away every time he mistreated my mother. I didn’t understand my thoughts or how I’d acted. I tried to analyze myself from another perspective, but none of it made any sense.

During the months I’d spent in the foster home, I had missed my mother, of course, but I had missed him, too… I had missed how he treated me better than he did her. In a horrible way, I had liked being different, knowing my father wouldn’t hurt me, that he loved me the most, that I was special to him… Of course, everything fell apart in the end, because he did wind up hurting me…and badly.

The memories, the conversations, came back to me, and there was nothing I could do to change that.

“You suck!” one of the girls at the foster home shouted. There were five of us girls and one little boy in that horrible house with fake parents who didn’t love us and didn’t take care of us.

“You took away my doll!” I shouted, trying to make myself heard over the sobs of the blond girl next to us. “And when you act bad, you get punished. Didn’t anyone ever teach you that?”

“Don’t hit her again!” The brown-haired girl with the pretty braids went on pointing at me with her dirty finger and hugging her four-year-old sister, whose cheek was red where I’d hit her.

The other two girls, who were seven and six, got behind Alexia, the dark-haired girl with the braids. I hated how they liked her and not me. All I’d done was take back what was mine—she had stolen my doll; I had a right to hit her, didn’t I?

That was how it went when a person was bad.

“You’re nasty, Noah. No one likes you,” Alexia said. She was almost as tall as I was, we were the oldest girls in the house, but she had a cruel face that I couldn’t imitate. Maybe I had hit her, but all I really wanted was for us to be friends. I had tried to tell her that when I was done playing, she could have my doll, that we should share it, but she had taken it away, torn it out of my hands. “No one talk to her,” she ordered the others. “From now on, you can stay all alone because meanies like you don’t deserve for anyone to like them. You’re nasty and you’re ugly, too!”

I felt the tears roll down my face, even though I knew I wasn’t supposed to cry. My father had made that very clear. Only weak people cried. My mother was weak because she cried; I wasn’t.

“Nasty! Nasty! Nasty! Nasty! Nasty!”

They chanted along with her, even the little one who had been crying started smiling and joined in. I grabbed my doll and ran off.

I got out of the shower trying to erase those memories. I looked at myself in the mirror and saw my tattoo. I traced its outline with my finger. It was small, but it meant so much. I took a deep breath to calm down. I didn’t want all this to get the best of me. I had done that before; I couldn’t do it again.

Just then, someone knocked at the bathroom door.

“Noah, it’s Nick,” he said.

I closed my eyes and counted to three in my head, then walked to the door and let him in. I didn’t know he had stayed over the night before. I turned around, still wrapped in a towel, and grabbed the lotion off the counter. I didn’t want company. I needed to be alone that day.

“You all right?” he asked, coming closer slowly, as if trying to feel me out.

“My head hurts,” I said, walking past him into my room. I knew he would follow me. I just hoped he could figure out this wasn’t the day. Sometimes we could pick up on each other’s moods. Hopefully he was able to now.

I walked into the closet and put on a T-shirt, the same one I’d had on the day I moved in there. It was one of the few things that hadn’t made it into my suitcases for when I moved. That T-shirt and a pair of tights I was about to slip on.

I felt him behind me just as I took the towel off my head and my damp hair fell over my shoulders. He turned me around, grabbing me by one arm, so I would look him in the eye.

“Are you okay?” he asked, pushing my hair aside.

“I’m just tired, and I have a hangover,” I said. He looked the opposite of how I felt. In his Levi’s and his white Calvin Klein T-shirt, with his bedhead hair, he was like a runway model.

“I’ll make you some breakfast before I go,” he said, kissing me on the cheek. “I wish I could stay here all afternoon with you, maybe watch a movie or something, but I need to work.”

I sighed with relief. I didn’t want him to see me in that state. I wasn’t in the mood for companionship. I’d just end up scaring him.

“Don’t worry. I’m just going to sleep all day.”

I stepped forward and kissed him on the lips, softly, patiently. Our fight on the day of the race was still in my head, the way we’d shouted at each other and he’d reproached me for not trusting him… But what if you didn’t even understand the way you felt? How could I explain to Nick what was going on? I just sensed that something wasn’t right, and I was dying to seek comfort in his arms, but I couldn’t… I was scared of telling him certain things, and I didn’t want him to be disappointed or to judge me.

He left, looking worried, and I tried to force a smile to relax him. I don’t know if it worked.

It had been a long time since I’d vegged out like that in front of the TV, eating chocolate and watching Friends. Some scientific study or other had said eating chocolate flooded your brain with endorphins, but it wasn’t working for me; it was just making me gain weight.

That day was a dark one, and however much I had wished at first that Nick would just leave for work, now I missed him, and I really needed him to come give me a hug.

I was surprised to see the chaos in the kitchen when I went downstairs for a soda and more chocolate. Mom was in a pretty dress and sandals, even makeup, and Will soon walked in afterward in a dress shirt and work slacks. I knew something was up.

“Are you having someone over for dinner?”

My mother, who was giving instructions to Prett, turned and looked me up and down with a dissatisfied face. “Senator Aiken and his daughter are coming over tonight.”

Senator?

“Just because or for some special reason? Were you not going to tell me?” My mother normally warned me about things like this. Did this mean I wasn’t invited?

“He’s an old friend of Will’s, and they want to start doing business together. Since you didn’t feel good, I assumed you’d want to stay up in your room,” she said, taking off the apron she had tied around her waist.

Perfect.

“Yeah, if you don’t mind, I’d rather skip dinner than hang out with some old dude and his daughter, thanks,” I said, a little grumpier than I had intended. I was in an awful mood.

My mother gave me a harsh look. I tried to ignore it as best I could.

“I’ll have Prett bring you something.”

“Don’t worry about it. I’m not hungry.” I turned around and went back to my room. Hesitant, I grabbed the phone to call Nick. I knew he was working the next day and wouldn’t be coming over, but I also knew one phone call was enough to get whatever I needed from him.

“Hey, Freckles,” he greeted me, sounding cheerful.

“Hey. What are you up to?” I asked, feeling him out.

He pulled his phone away from his ear to talk to someone. I heard a girl laughing and then Nick grumbling something about a horrible song.

My body immediately tensed. “Where are you?” I asked, a little cooler than usual, intrigued to know who he was with.

“Right now, I’m walking through the front door.” Just then, I heard a door open slowly.

“Where?”

“What do you mean, where? The same place as you—Dad’s house.”

He was here?

I went downstairs to receive him, almost shaking. I had wanted to see him so badly… It was almost as if a messenger had heard my call and sent him to me. I didn’t stop to think what his words signified or about the feminine voice I’d heard over the phone. I’d imagined I’d come out and throw myself in his arms, but instead I found him with her, the girl who had gotten Jenna out of jail.

I stopped in the doorframe.

She was well-dressed, with a tight pencil skirt that hung to her knees and a pale pink name-brand blouse. In her Manolo Blahnik heels—what else would you expect?—she was almost as tall as Nick.

Who the hell was she?

Nick’s eyes settled on me, at first surprised, then affectionate. The air blowing through the door whistled through my hair, pulled back on the top of my head. I stepped away to let them through.

“Noah, this is Sophia Aiken, my fellow intern,” Nick said, kissing me gently on the cheek.

With a curious smile on her fleshy lips, Sophia extended a hand with a manicure as perfect as my mother’s.

“It’s a pleasure, Noah,” she said.

I nodded, intimidated, feeling completely out of place.

Before I had time to respond, my mother appeared like the perfect hostess she was and greeted the new arrivals, looking over at me as she did so, probably surprised that her sloppy-looking daughter had come down to open the door.

What the hell was actually going on?

“Your father’s not here yet, Sophia. If you want to have a drink in the living room, Nick will get you something.”

She nodded and followed my mother inside.

Now that the initial shock had passed, all I felt was anger and an overwhelming urge to cry.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were coming?”

Nick seemed as confused as I was, and he looked away from my eyes and down at my T-shirt and tights.

My God…had I just opened the door for a senator’s daughter looking like that?

“I thought your mom told you… They called me this afternoon and told me to invite Sophia over for dinner. Apparently, her dad wants to meet me or something like that. I just assumed you knew. The other day, with all the stuff with Jenna, I didn’t have the chance to introduce you.”

“No one told me you were coming. If I’d known, I wouldn’t have said I wasn’t coming down for dinner.” I heard my mother talking to Sophia in the living room. “I can’t go in there like this… I’ll just go to bed, and we can talk when this is over.”

I tried to walk off, but he came around in front of me.

“What’s up with you? Just go upstairs, change clothes, and come down for dinner… I only agreed to this stupid dinner because I assumed you were going to be here. I don’t know what kind of BS they’re cooking up, but I’m not in the mood to sit there and blab about nothing.”

“Not my problem, Nicholas,” I said, trying to remain calm. “Plus, I think it’s weird you never mentioned her to me. You sure do seem friendly with her.”

With a scowl, he looked in the direction of her and my mother and then back at me.

“Are you fucking jealous?” he asked, rolling his eyes.

I slapped his arm without even thinking about it. “How can you say that?”

He laughed loudly enough to worsen my bad mood.

“For the love of God! She’s an unbearable snot-nosed brat who’s trying to get a job at my dad’s firm because she doesn’t want to work for her own dad. I can’t believe you’re jealous of her.”

“I’m not jealous, idiot!” I murmured, walking past him toward my room.

“If you don’t come back down, I’ll go find you and drag you back myself,” he threatened me playfully. “You know I want you here.”

If looks could kill, Nicholas would be six feet underground by now.

I looked at myself in the mirror, frustrated. I wasn’t going to get dressed up for that stupid dinner. Forget that.

I took off my T-shirt with the holes in it and threw it on the floor while I looked around for something so I wouldn’t have to unpack the bags strewn all over the walk-in closet. I ended up deciding on some tight black jeans, simple, the kind you’d wear for a casual night out, and a white T-shirt that said I 🤍 Canada.

I grinned. I was sure the senator would love it.

I let my hair down and pulled it back into a ponytail, washed my face, and put on lip liner. That was as fancy as I was going to get that night. Sophie could doll herself up all she wanted; I was pretty in anything…or that’s what my grandmother told me, anyway.

When I went downstairs, still in a shit mood, I heard an unfamiliar man’s voice. Five people—William, my mother, Nick, Sophia, and her father—were standing around the bar in the living room chitchatting while Will poured drinks. They looked like something out of a magazine: tall, distinguished, elegant. Looking at my shoes, I felt like an intruder.

My mother saw me, and her eyes widened as she noticed my T-shirt, but before she could send me back upstairs, Will noticed me and welcomed me with a smile.

“Noah, come on in. I want to introduce you to an old friend from school. Riston, this is my stepdaughter, Noah; Noah, this is my friend Riston.”

Unlike his daughter, Riston was as American as they come: blond, with light-colored eyes like my mother, as tall as Nick, and broad-shouldered. All he had in common with Sophia was the slight almond shape of his eyes and a little dimple in his chin… I had always thought that was supercute on a girl, but now that I saw she had one, I hated it.

I smiled and shook hands with him. I could feel Nick next to me, but not warm and protecting as usual. Instead, it felt like there was a barrier between us.

Soon we walked to the dining room, where Prett had set a table even more lavish than on Christmas. But then, the Leisters had never celebrated the holidays until my mother and I showed up and turned their world upside down. I still remembered how funny it had been, seeing Will and Nick in their Santa hats, and Nick frowning when I forced him to go get a huge Christmas tree and hang up wreaths. No fool, he’d also been sure to put up mistletoe in every corner.

To my irritation, since I’d joined at the last minute, I was seated next to the senator, with Sophia and Nick across from me…side by side.

Why the hell was I so jealous? Was it really so hard for me to keep from comparing myself to her?

They spent the whole dinner talking about some project or other Sophia was especially excited about. She talked about laws, numbers, and statistics as passionately as I’d have talked about the Brontës or Thomas Hardy. I was dismayed to see Nick was interested, too. I could see it in his eyes. And still worse, I couldn’t even follow the conversation… All those numbers made me dizzy, and I felt like a total idiot. William kept praising her and talking to the two of them like they were a team. Everyone seemed dazzled by them, like they were a new toy, and that gave me a very unpleasant feeling in my stomach.

Late in the meal, Senator Riston looked over at me. “So, Noah, how’s school?”

His question made an intense heat well inside me and rise to my cheeks.

Was it that obvious I had no idea what they were talking about? Was it so obvious that I wasn’t a real adult like his daughter and that he had to take pity on me at the end of a conversation, the way you asked a child about the goings-on at daycare?

“I graduated in June, so yeah, I’m just waiting to start my freshman year,” I said, grabbing the one glass filled with soda at the table.

I met Nick’s gaze across the table, and I felt the sting of awkwardness, of not truly belonging. I couldn’t help him with his projects; I didn’t even know what they were. Nick didn’t talk to me about work. He knew I couldn’t contribute in that department… Sophia bent over to whisper something in his ear, and Nick smiled.

What the hell were they talking about?

I barely heard the senator as he went on talking. “…Anyway, you’ll love dorm life. That’s one of the best things about college…”

I looked over at him and calmly said, “Actually, I’m going to be living with Nicholas.” I didn’t feel light-headed until silence overtook the table, interrupted by the clang of my mother’s silverware as she dropped it unexpectedly.

Nick’s eyes were like saucers as he gazed back and forth between our parents and me.

The senator was unsure what to say… I guess someone had forgotten to tell him we were going out.

Sophia, on the other hand, took it with aplomb, and that pissed me off even worse. If she knew we were going out, why hadn’t she stayed away from him? I felt bad about what I’d said when I looked at Mom. She was going to kill me that night, that much was certain.