Page 7 of Crazy Rich Monsters (Necessary Evils 1)

But people like Kyle King know no immortal Gods. Their God is money and social currency, wrapped up in the women they own and control. His eyes don’t leave me even as his body is climbing into the white SUV. Even as he’s pulling out of the driveway, reversing slowly as if he’s worried that he might run over an astray toddler, he doesn’t take his eyes off of me.

I watch him as he leaves, and even when he’s vanished around the corner, I watch for a moment longer. Paranoia has a way of making sure I’m always looking over my shoulder. I turn back to Paige with a hefty pang of suspicion in my gut. “I thought you were married.”

“Addison,” she assures me, “I am.”

I point backwards, back towards where Kyle’s car used to be. “Then why was Kyle King at your house?”

Paige was never a mild girl. She was always the wild one between the two of us, but she’s the kind of girl that dreams of monogamy and growing old with the same person. She was always the better angel, and it makes no sense that she’s engaged in an affair with a man she used to hate.

She’s silent. Only raises her hand, showing off the ring on her finger. The diamond shimmers underneath the morning sun. It’s enough to blind me. “When you moved away, things changed. She takes a heavy sigh, whatever she’s about to say weighing heavy on her chest. “I’m not the same person I used to be. I have a family now. The sweetest little girl.”

“And Kyle?” I question, already knowing exactly what she’s about to say. It’s enough to make me want to vomit, but I wait for confirmation. “Please tell me you didn’t marry him.”

She takes a measured step back, grabbing the doorknob. “I think you should leave, Addison.”

And just like that, she disappears into her picture-perfect house. The door closes on my face, leaving me out in the proverbial cold. I thought I knew exactly what to expect coming home, but she has thrown me for a loop. I’m lost in a whirlwind of emotions as I retreat to my car.

Paige is theonlyreason I’m here. Without her calling me out of the blue, I wouldn’t have ever thought to come back to this place. I tried to think about the mother I left behind as little as I could, but she was always there in the background of my mind. Sometimes, I wondered if she was even still alive. Other times, I wondered how long she had left on this earth. To my eyes, mother doesn’t look any better or worse than when I left, so I’m trying to make sense of why Paige felt that now was the time for me to come home.

Something doesn’t add up.

I try to solve the equation on my way home, but I keep coming up blank. When I step back inside my mother’s house, it’s quiet. She’s not sleeping on the couch like she was earlier, so I check her bedroom, but she’s not there either. Judging by the clock hanging over the entryway to the kitchen, it’s close to noon. I know that’s not true and notice the hands of the clock aren’t moving. The batteries probably died years ago.

I grab a change of clothes from my bookbag and head for the bathroom. The floor is wet and there’s a soaked towel lying in the middle of the floor. The sink is brown at the bottom with rust corroding the faucet. The shower is somehow even worse, with grime mucked between the cracks of the tiles. I turn on the water and adjust the temperature until it’s barely tolerable. Steam quickly fills the small room, the clouds of hotness barely concealing the marks on my body when I climb out of the clothes I’ve been wearing for far too long. I step into the shower, the heat scorching my bare flesh. It’s not enough to burn properly, but it’s enough to feel glimpses of pain. Water drips down my naked body, cascading past the self-inflicted scars on my thighs.

Forgiveness can only come to those who repent, but what do you do when you need to forgive yourself and you’re not ready to make amends?

ChapterFive

NICK

I’ve never been nice.

It’s not in my blood. The Calloway family is callous and cruel, as if hatred is wired into our DNA. As if we’ve never had a choice in the matter.

The earliest memory I have of Calloway cruelty is when I was seven. I watched as my father banished our neighbor, Kevin, from the Hamptons. It’s such a ridiculous thing to say, but the truth is always stranger than fiction. I can’t recall what Kevin had done to earn the wrath of my father, but I remember the night it unfolded. My father invited Kevin over for dinner with some of the most powerful men on the east coast. He used that platform to embarrass, humiliate, and force Kevin into exile. It was a dinner for adults only, so I only caught glimpses of the devilish display of power, and all I could do was watch, not in disgust but in awe.

I’ve never been logical, but that doesn’t make me stupid. It doesn’t mean I’m not smart. It simply means that I’m ruled more by my heart than my mind, and my heart can be black and cold. The first time I remember choosing my heart over my head was when I was eleven. On the beach, about a mile from the Calloway estate, I stumbled upon the bully that tormented me. He was caught off guard without his posse of asshole sidekicks. In my head, I knew the consequences I would face if I threw the first punch, but I did it anyway. I knocked him down into the sand. And as he cowered beneath me, his nose bloodied and broken, I knew that every punch I threw would only dig myself deeper into trouble. Tommy had tortured me enough that the only thing I felt was rage. Logic went out the window and I beat him until he lost consciousness. My brother would die on that same stretch of beach, and I sometimes wonder if it wasn’t my karma.

I’ve never been a stalker, but here I am watching Addison’s every step. When it comes to women, they flock to me. If they choose to leave, if they choose to run, I let them. They always come back and that’s always my favorite part. I love watching them squirm when they try to fix what they broke. I love watching them cry when they realize that they will never do better, when they realize they gave up their chance to own a part of the Calloway fortune. Addison isn’t like the other girls though. She’s so much fucking worse than a gold digger or a whore.

I’m not going to pin my character flaws on her, but I won’t hesitate to ponder the idea that I’d be a different person if she hadn’t killed my brother. The harsh truth is that there is only one reality and there’s no sense in wondering what could’ve happened or what should’ve happened. I am who I am and it’s too late to change that. She did what she did and she sure as fuck can’t change that. We’re dancing on a merry-go-round of revenge, but she’s not yet aware that she’s along for the ride.

I’m in my car, parked on the opposite side of the street. Addison is staying with her mother. It wasn’t difficult figuring that out considering nobody in this town wants anything to do with her. Nobody that knows her, knows what she’s capable of. Finding the address of her mother’s house was just as easy. All I had to do was watch the videos online from the protests outside the house after Carter died. The house number is plastered on the mailbox with frayed stickers. Anonymity is a relic of the past, privacy stripped by the advent of social media and the internet.

I’m not a patient person and she’s taking too long. I know she’s inside because I watched her shadow pass through the dining room behind a stained curtain. The odds are good that she might not even leave the damn house. If I were her, I sure as shit wouldn’t dare step outside. It’s been three years, but the townsfolk are known to carry their pitchforks for far longer than that. She could spend eternity running and she’d never escape the demons of guilt that eat away at her.

The front door cracks open and I hold my breath as I await to make certain that it’s her and not her shitshow of a mother. It’s her. Always dressed so damn modestly. She’s wearing dark jeans and a darker hoodie. Does this girl have anything else in her wardrobe? She pulls the hood over her head as she opens the rickety car door of a rusted sedan and climbs inside. She takes no time turning the ignition and throwing the car into reverse, almost slamming into the mailbox.

I should really be careful, but she’s speeding like a bat out of hell. Must have gotten into a fight. Unfortunately, I don’t know the details because the family apparently has enough common sense to close the curtains. I put my car into gear, pull away from the curb, and begin the chase. It’s a difficult balance to tail close enough to not lose her while staying far enough away that she doesn’t catch wind that she’s being followed.

That she’s being stalked.

It’s really such an ugly word, not by the way it rolls off the tongue, but the way society has contorted it into an act of violence. Words have no power without the backing of a society behind them. I guess it should be ugly though.

Where is she going? If I’m placing a wager, I’m betting she’ll end up at a bar. If she’s anything like her mother, that’s the only place she can go. It’s the one place free from the judgmental glares. Everyone’s working through their own demons at the bar, drowning them one drink at a time.

But she’s not going to a bar.

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