Psycho Ex Boyfriend (Standalone New Adult Romance) (The Alpha Brotherhood Book 2) (5 page)

“Don’t turn around any further,” Adam says. “I’m not… Technically, I shouldn’t…”

“Are you talking to me?” I finally ask.

“Yes,” he replies with a hint of a laugh.

“And what are you technically not supposed to do?”

“Talk to girls.”

“Then why are you?”

“I hate being told what to do, for one.”

“Everybody does.”

“True. But I… I think I know you,” he says quietly.

“I think I know you, too,” I murmur, sitting straight in my seat.

Adam exhales loudly, but I can’t tell if it’s a breath of relief or exasperation. “Dover Street?”

“I don’t remember the street name.”

“Yeah, I guess you weren’t there for very long. But it was Dover Street, in case you ever want to drop by.”

“Why would I want to drop by?” I didn’t mean for that to come out so sharply.

“I don’t know. Maybe because I do.” Adam shifts in his seat in the corner of my eye, nonchalantly opening a textbook. “Sort of. But I can’t.”

No talking to girls, no visiting former foster homes. I wonder what else he can’t do. We’re four days into the school year and everyone is still speculating about these guys, but no one knows the story. I guess I’m in a pretty good position to get the scoop, not that I’d have anyone to tell.

“I mean I technically could, but Ellen would probably start asking questions that I shouldn’t answer,” Adam explains.

Ellen. Wow. I haven’t thought about her in years. As soon as he says the name though, my mind flashes back to her baking cookies. I loved the subtle color of her blonde-red hair. And her smile. “Questions about what?”

“Where I’ve been.”

“She wouldn’t be the only one. Everybody is curious.”

“Everybody?” Grinning, his eyes flick to mine for a moment before scanning the students around us to see if anyone is watching.

“Well, I don’t really care,” I reply, heat creeping across my cheeks as my palms start to sweat. He licks his lips, dropping his head down like he’s actually starting to read. “That came out wrong. I meant I don’t… I hate gossip and generally refuse to participate. And I’d hate it if everyone was speculating on my home life.”

“You’re one of what, five black kids at this school? Everyone is definitely speculating about your home life.” There’s a trace of resentment in his voice that I understand too well, putting me more at ease.

“I know.” I fidget with the corner of my textbook, scraping my thumbnail over the pages. “But I have a convenient, one word answer. Adopted.”

He’s quiet for a moment, smacking his book shut and crossing one ankle over the other. “How’s that working out for you, Sabrina?” he asks.

My stomach flutters as he says my name, but I ignore it. “Well enough, I suppose. I’m enrolled at this prestigious institution, aren’t I?”

“Indeed you are. Wealthy white parents?”

“Very wealthy, very pale parents. Who I’m told love me very much.”

“Told by whom?”

“By whichever nanny is raising me at the time,” I grumble.

“But you’re safe, right?” His voice cracks a little and he coughs to cover it. Does that mean he isn’t?

“Yes,” I answer quickly. “Yeah, I’m safe.”

“That’s all that matters.”

“I know. And I’m… I’m not ungrateful or anything, Adam. Just…”

“You don’t seem ungrateful, that’s not what I meant.”

“I appreciate them a lot, I do,” I reiterate, staring at the gold chain bracelet on my wrist and my professionally manicured, periwinkle polished nails.

“I get it, Sabrina. All these assholes around us, the ones born and bred into money, the ones that are entitled to be here? They’re ungrateful. Do you think any of them ever take the time to actually appreciate what they have and who gave it to them?”

I’m sure some of them do, occasionally. But I’m not going to argue with him. “I feel like I’m one of my Mother’s expensive purses. Something she takes out for special occasions to show off to her friends and then puts back in the closet when she’s done.”

“That’s a good analogy. Save that one for English class.”

“So my teacher can raise her concerns at parent-teacher conference time? Or, nanny-teacher conference time, in my case. I don’t think so.”

Adam snickers, bringing his hand to his mouth to conceal his smile. I’m sure he wouldn’t want a rumor spreading that he’s actually capable of making that particular facial expression. “What are the odds that we’d both end up at this school?”

“I’d have to know more about your own adoption in order to accurately answer that, but I’d guess the odds are pretty slim.”

“So you are curious.”

“Mildly.”

“Well, if you want that story, you’ll have to meet me for lunch on Saturday.”

I blink rapidly for a second, unsure whether or not I’ve heard him correctly. Taking a risk, I say, “I thought you weren’t allowed to talk to girls.”

“I’m allowed. It would just be incredibly inconvenient for me if my brothers found out, hence this double-agents-exchanging-files-in-the-park seating arrangement.”

“So they
are
your brothers.”

“It’s complicated.”

“Did you at least get to stay with your sister?”

The knot in Adams throat jumps as he swallows loudly, his spine straightening. “No. Molly ended up out in Homewood.”

“Homewood? That’s kind of far. Do you at least get to see her?”

“I do not.”

“That sucks. I’m sorry, I know you two were close.”

“Not close enough.”

“Well… I mean… she’s old enough to be out of the system by now. Maybe you could—”

“Molly is dead,” he interjects flatly.

Did I just hear that? “What?”

“Beaten, gang raped, and murdered, which I’m sure she was immensely grateful for at that point. Now, hopefully, she’s resting in peace. Buried in a mass pauper’s grave with a bunch of other people nobody gave a fuck about.”

“She was… holy shit.” I gasp.

“I said don’t turn around,” he reminds me as I move to put a hand on his shoulder.

“Adam… I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be. You didn’t do it.” He stands up, raising his arms over his head and stretching like nothing is out of the ordinary at all. “So Saturday,” he says softly. “If you want.”

“Yeah. I’ll find some excuse to get away.”

“I’ll slip you a note about where we can meet up tomorrow in English.” We have three classes together. English is the only one without any of his brothers in attendance. “See you around.”

I try to tell him some form of goodbye, but my throat is tight and tears are welling up in my eyes. By the time I’m composed enough to say anything, he’s already too far away.

The next day, he drops a small folded piece of paper on my desk without as much as a glance.

Sabrina

Age 15

I clutch my purse tightly against my side as I start up the stairs to the train platform. This is the first time that I’ve used public transportation in a while and I’ve never done it alone. My parents are more the private driver type. It’s also the first time I’ve lied to my nanny and I can’t help but feel
super
guilty about it. Heather is starting to grow on me, and she’s excellent with my little sister. I’d hate for her to lose her job over me right as she starting to settle in.

Getting caught seems doubtful, though. The restaurant Adam wants to meet me at is anything but upscale and it’s highly unlikely that I’ll bump into anyone that my parents know. Maybe that’s why he picked it.

When I round the corner, I see him standing outside the place, leaning against the brick wall. His face is as cold and unreadable as it is in school, but he’s wearing a plain black t-shirt and jeans which makes him appear more approachable. I almost wore a black t-shirt today, too but such casual attire didn’t match my cover story. And, if I’m being honest, I wanted to look cute. No, not cute. I’m too old for cute. I wanted to look hot.

It might have worked. Adam’s gaze drifts over to my direction as I walk down the street, doing my best to appear nonchalant and confident even though my heart is beating rapidly and I definitely made the right choice by wearing extra strength antiperspirant this morning. The corner of his mouth lifts slightly as I get closer and I can tell by the movement of the knot on his throat that he just swallowed a lungful of air.

Adam’s apple. That’s one of my favorite body parts lately, though I do live in a world where the rest of boys’ bodies are always covered up. I have a good view of Adam in our morning Economics class, and I spend too much of my time there looking at him. He’s rolled up his sleeves twice so far, but I’ve never seen his elbows or the bulge of his bicep above them.

I’m pretty sure that he’s mentally undressing me as well, but that could be wishful thinking. Once I’m standing face to face with him though, he definitely takes a glance at my boobs.

“Hi,” I greet him, pretending I didn’t notice.

“Hey.”

Do I hug him? Would that be weird? We both let out a nervous laugh and I find myself biting my bottom lip, unsure what to do.

“Sooo…. Have you been here before?” I ask.

“You could say that,” he replies.

“What does that mean?”

“That means… uh… fuck,” he breathes, rubbing the back of his neck. “Look, I need to know that you won’t repeat anything that I tell you today.”

“Will you take my word for it, or do I have to prove it somehow?”

“I’ll take your word for it.”

“Then I promise I won’t say anything. Not that I really have anyone to tell.”

“No best friend that you’re sworn to tell all your secrets to or anything like that?”

“Nope. I left all my good friends back in Ohio when we moved this past summer,” I explain. He eyes me skeptically. “Oh, come on, Adam.”

“I have a vested interest in this restaurant.”

“Vested interest?”

He nods. “We provided them with the startup capital and we own the building.”

“We who?”

“A business conglomerate run by my older brothers. And the man who recently told us that we should start calling him ‘Father.’”

“Are you messing with me?”

He grins, revealing the slightest bit of a dimple on his right cheek. “No. I’m not.”

“But how is that even possible? Minors can’t sign legal contracts.”

“Finally, someone that understands my pain,” he laughs. “Though, technically, we can sign them. And own stock in a company, which I do. But that doesn’t mean I control
shit
. Not yet anyway.”

This sounds fishy, but what a weird prank to pull on someone. I’m not going to call him on it, I’d rather see how this plays out. “So does that mean all the employees are going to be on their toes and that we’ll be eating for free today?”

“I would never let you pay for lunch,” he says, raising an eyebrow. “But no, the employees won’t be on their toes. I’ve never been here before, so no one will recognize me. Which is actually the point, because this place isn’t performing
nearly
as well as it should be and it might be time to sell before we start bleeding cash.”

“Well, I’ll keep my eye out for any waiters spitting in the soup.”

“Much appreciated.” Adam holds the door open for me. “Ugh. This place should be a lot more crowded on a Saturday afternoon.”

“Yeah, it is kind of dead,” I agree, taking a look around.

Despite the lack of customers, we wait for way too long to be seated by a frazzled hostess with flour handprints on her black pants.

“Two minutes and forty three seconds,” Adam says, jotting the wait time down in a small notebook he pulls from his pocket. While we’re waiting for the server to come to our table with water, another couple comes in, waits too long, and leaves before the hostess even notices them. “This is completely unacceptable.”

“Maybe you guys should hire a different manager.”

“That’s not how it works. We don’t micromanage. Investments either perform or they don’t. Trent found this place.” I’m pretty sure that’s the tall, smiley one who definitely doesn’t follow the ‘don’t talk to girls’ rule. “Why he thinks investing in the foodservice industry is a good idea, I will never understand. Even in the best case scenarios, the profit margins are next to nothing.”

“You’re going to do really well in Economics class, aren’t you?”

“I’d better,” he scoffs. “Considering my life is one giant business class.”

“About that…” I say, taking a sip of my water. “Where did you end up, Adam?”

He hesitates, crossing his arms and resting them on the table. “It’s kind of like a group home.”

“Co-ed?”

He shakes his head. “All boys.”

“How old were you when you went there?”

“Ten.”

“So you were at Ellen’s house for a while then, huh?”

“Almost four years. Maybe I should have stayed. I dunno. Molly…” He pauses after saying his sister’s name, his jaw tensing. “She was the one that encouraged me to go. Said it was a good opportunity.”

“Opportunity?”

“Yeah. It was. Father, the guy that started the place, he was an orphan. Tough old bastard, a real pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps sonofabitch. He handpicked all of us. No family of his own. We’re his legacy.”

“So the investing thing…”

“That’s part of our education. Has been for a long time. We didn’t go to normal schools at first. Reading and writing weren’t nearly as important as the arithmetic.”

The server finally shows up to take our order and I don’t get a word out before she disappears. “Did you just order for me?” I ask, a little insulted.

“Yes.”

“You don’t even know what I like.” Actually, he ordered exactly what I wanted, but that’s not the point.

“I thought the guy was supposed to order for the lady.”

“Maybe back in the fifties,” I inform him. “Now it just makes you appear controlling.”

“I am controlling.” His eyes narrow as he watches a waitress smacking her gum as she sits on her laptop two booths away from us.  “Plus, this place is specifically known for two signature dishes. I need to try them both.”

“Oh, so
that’s
why you invited me here,” I tease him. “I’m just a cover for your mystery shopping.”

Adam’s jaw drops open in mock surprise. “This is far beyond mystery shopping,” he says. “It’s a full scale investigation and I very much need your honest opinion.”

“In that case... The service here really sucks. And my soup is a little cold.”

He leans across the table and dips his spoon into my soup, tastes it, and lets out a huff. “Absolutely shameful.”

“The taste is pretty good.”

Nodding in agreement, he makes another note. “Still, this place simply doesn’t make the cut. It probably never really did.”

“Out with the old, in with the new?” I suggest.

“Something like that.”

“Will Trent get in trouble?”

“Not anymore. Back in the day though…” He trails off. Silently, I bat my eyes at him, urging him to continue. “Until recently, a lapse in judgement like this could get you expelled from the program.”

“That seems a little harsh.”

“It was. Trent is more of a risk taker than I am.” The food arrives shortly. It’s perfectly cooked and pleasant enough to look at. “The flavors really are quite good and it’s an excellent location,” Adam remarks. “If this place had taken off, it could have been worth it.”

“Everything you are describing sounds very strange.”

“It is. I’m sure the legality of the entire situation is questionable at best. But enough money can buy anything.”

“Even people?”

“Especially people.”

“Well, restaurants obviously aren’t your thing.” I won’t say it, but I’m pretty skeptical about everything he’s telling me. “What do you invest in?”

“We don’t really invest, not on our own. It’s more like scouting, running the numbers, and making a presentation. If the deal looks good, it goes through. We get a cut, stock mostly, and the privilege of the learning experience, of course. My father and older brothers get richer. Everyone wins.”

“So you’re venture capitalists-in-training,” I surmise.

“Essentially.”

“How the heck do you know what to look for?”

“It’s just what we do. We all have a knack for it, that’s why he picked us. We had mock stock portfolios at first.”

“At ten years old?”

“No, around twelve. We didn’t actually buy any of it. It was a test. We had a hypothetical amount of money to invest, and then we bought and sold, bought and sold, bought and sold…” He flags our server down for a refill on his drink. “If your portfolio lagged behind, you got cut.”

“And thrown back in the system?”

“I believe so. We’ve never seen those guys again, so there’s no way to know for sure.”

“But you grew up with them.”

“So?”

“Well… Don’t you miss them?”

“Of course not,” he answers, his brow furrowing like I’ve just asked something absurd. “Better them than me. They were always just competition from the start. It’s not like we’re actually related.”

“I’m not genetically related to my little sister, but I’d miss her if my parents just got rid of her one day. Totally devastated.”

“You have a little sister?”

“Yeah. Her name is Sun. And I’m pretty sure she’s the coolest five year old in the world. Want to see a picture?”

I start digging out my wallet before he even answers, anxious to show her off. It’s a great picture of us, laughing and rolling around in a pile of leaves we’d just raked up.

Adam smiles, his eyes lifting from the photo to meet mine. “She’s cute.”

“She’s fricking adorable.” I show him another one. Without really thinking about it, I start telling stories about her many talents, about how our entire family dynamic changed when Mom decided to adopt her.

“What’s it like, living in a house like that?” Adam asks.

I take a moment to think about it. “I mean, we get our share of funny looks when we all go out. It was actually weirder when it was just me. Now that my white nanny walks around with a black teenager and a Korean kindergartener, it’s kind of obvious that we’re—”

“That’s not what I meant,” he interrupts me. “What’s it like to be… connected?”

“Oh.” Well, crap. How do you explain that? “Don’t you remember?”

“Not really,” he replies. “I should, but I can’t.”

“You’re not emotionally attached to your brothers at all?”

Adam mulls it over, starting to speak a few times and stopping himself like he’s afraid he’ll say the wrong thing. “I’d never admit it to them. But lately, yeah, a little bit. Shane, mostly.”

“Because he’s the smallest guy, right?”

“The youngest, too, by more than a year. But don’t let that little fucker fool you,” he laughs. “He goes from 0 to 60 in a millisecond without much warning. And he’ll rip your fucking throat out with those little hands of his and use your bones to build a robot.”

“You sound oddly proud.”

“Perhaps I am. He was at Ellen’s, came to live with us a while after you were gone. We got recruited together, but he almost didn’t make it. I had to toughen him up.”

“How?”

“You don’t want to know.” His eyes darken, refusing to meet my gaze. “I don’t have any pictures of her,” he finally says.

“Of Molly?”

He nods. “I’m having a hard time remembering exactly what she looked like. I just found out a few months ago, when we came back to Chicago for high school. I was in New York when she died.”

“How long ago?”