Dark Notes(32)

“This is wasting time for both of us,” I mumble, scrawling another sentence that states the opposite.

Whack.

A snap of heat blooms on my back, right above my tailbone. Motherf*cker, that hurts. But it’s not the worst pain, either. If anyone else raised a baton at me—Lorenzo or Prescott, for example—I’d snarl and throw punches. But this is my mentor, and I want to please him. While plotting his death.

I want the teacher back from three days ago. The one who touched my face so tenderly and said my performance moved him. Where did that guy go?

Maybe it’s my fault. I’ve been off-kilter, dreading tonight all week. I can’t put off Prescott any longer. His homework is done, and I’m a twisted-up bundle of nerves and anger. And with the weekend starting tomorrow, I’ll have two days at home. Two days with Lorenzo and his outrage at not being able to track me down all week.

“What did I say about questioning me?” Mr. Marceaux’s footsteps pace behind me, his icy eyes shivering the hairs on my nape.

If I didn’t know him better, which I don’t, I’d think he’s enjoying this. “Telling a student not to question her teacher is the worst rule in the history of rules.”

I tense for another swat, but it doesn’t come.

He leans a shoulder against the unwritten section of the board beside me, his hands behind his back and a smirk on his too-pretty face. “I’ll rephrase. Don’t question my methods.” His sharp gaze moves to the board. “Erase the last five sentences, and try again with penmanship befitting a seventeen-year-old.”

I thrust the eraser over the board with belligerent swipes and begin again. “I can write and talk at the same time, and I want to talk about Leopold.”

“You’re not good enough for Leopold.”

I whirl toward him as the crescendo of my heart crashes past my ears. “You said my interpretation of Islamey was extraordinarily passionate and stunning.”

Standing a couple of feet away, he watches me with hooded eyes—Bored? Sleepy?—and shrugs half-heartedly. “Those are meaningless superlatives, which I now regret using.”

My muscles quiver as a rush of fury slams into me. My hands ball into fists, and before my brain catches up, I rear back the marker and hurl it. Right at his forehead.

It bounces off his scowl lines and rolls across the floor beside his Doc Martens. He glares at it, shocked to terrifying stillness, before flinging the conductor baton across his desk and leveling me with glacial eyes.

Ohshitohshitohshit. My face catches fire as I stumble backward. My shoulder hits the whiteboard, but I keep going, sliding along the wall and toward the door. What the hell is wrong with me? I never lose my temper. Holy f*ck, I never throw markers at my teachers!

He reaches up, wipes his forehead, and glowers at his fingers. Yes, Mr. Marceaux, the fat black dot of my shame is now smeared across your furiously creased brow.

“I’m sorry.” I glance at the closed door, wishing I were on the other side, down the hall, and far away from whatever comes next.

Without removing his eyes from mine, he lifts his chin and loosens the knot of his tie. Fuck, that can’t be good.

As his hands slide over the silk, I recall another rumor I heard this morning about the depraved ways he uses his ties, belts, and other miscellaneous accessories. I don’t believe gossip, but as I stare into those cruel eyes, I plummet into the chasm of whispered images with a sinking stomach.

With the knot hanging loosely beneath his collar, he crooks his finger. “Come with me.”

Three words, spoken without effort, yet they have the power to devastate my future. Fear jolts through my stomach. If he takes me to the dean’s office, will it be a suspension? Or is hurling objects at my teacher grounds for expulsion?

But he doesn’t walk toward the exit. He strides deeper into the back of the room and around the corner, out of sight. I look through the small window in the door, into the empty hallway, and tremble with indecision.

Running will only make this worse.

I push myself forward on wobbly legs and weave through the rows of desks. Every inch of my body is strung-out, running on a live wire that connects the path of my feet to whatever awaits me around that corner. By the time I reach the piano and find him sitting sideways on the end of the bench, my pulse is a reedy, struggling vibration in my veins.

He points at the floor beneath the space of his spread thighs and flicks his wrist, as if adjusting the position of his heavy watch.

The sleeves of his gray and white pinstriped shirt gather around his elbows. He’s wearing another one of those waistcoat-vest things, this one black with little gray buttons. My attention shifts from the yellow tie to the dark shadow of his jaw, the flat line of his lips, and as I fall into the chilling trap of his eyes, I realize with renewed panic that I’m making him wait.

I hurry forward and stand where he indicated, swaying unsteadily between his spread feet.

There’s that crooking finger again, gesturing me closer, closer, and lord help me, when I’m finally in the position he wants, my boobs are right in his face. I curve my spine, attempting to rein them in, but dammit, they’re there and there’s nothing I can do about it.

Heat tingles across my cheeks as he blatantly stares down the scoop of my shirt. It makes me feel gross, cheap, and really f*cking angry.

I grab the neckline to yank it up.