Bully King - J.A. Huss Page 0,51

as I’m told.

I spend the next several hours filling up water balloons and by the time anyone comes over to check on my progress, it’s late afternoon, I didn’t get a lunch, and I have amassed a small arsenal of water balloon grenades in two giant plastic tubs.

The person who comes to check on me is Mona. She lingers at the small concrete table to my left, silent.

“What?” I snap.

“Wonder what these are for? Oh, I know. The wet t-shirt contest.”

I glance at her and roll my eyes. “Figures.”

“Right?” She pulls a smoke out of her wild hair and a lighter from her bra and lights it, taking a long, deep draw before blowing out. She’s the only one who isn’t wearing a bikini. She’s wearing coveralls cut into shorts with a white t-shirt over it—all the girls are wearing white t-shirts now.

Just like me.

And all of them have something derogatory written across the front in black marker. Ax’s handiwork. I can tell by the sloppy writing.

While mine says ‘Call me Fugling,’ Mona’s says ‘Call me Bitch Face.’ But the ‘Bitch Face’ part has been scratched out in red marker and an arrow has been added pointing to new words so it reads, ‘Call me anything other than Mona, and I will rip your balls off and stuff them down your throat.’

I laugh unexpectedly when I read that.

Mona chuckles too. Even though the cigarette is hanging between her lips. She takes another drag and blows it out. “I feel for ya, Fugling. You should just leave.”

“Jesus Christ,” I mutter. “I’m tired of hearing that. I’m not leaving.”

“Well.” Mona sighs, watching the other pledges as they sit around under thatched-roof cabañas playing Crimes Against Humanity or whatever it’s called. “If I could leave, I’d be gone.” Then she directs her gaze to me and lifts up her sunglasses so I can see her very bloodshot eyes. “And when you get to the end of the summer—and you will, Cadee. You will get there. Because you’re one of those determined go-getters, I can tell—you’re gonna wish you could go back and walk away when you had the chance. Because it really won’t get better.”

“Do you need something, Mona?”

“Nope. Just… visiting.”

“Well, I’m busy here. So…”

“Right. Water balloons. I can’t wait to see how this ends.” Then she laughs, gets up, and walks away.

“Line up!” Selina is clapping her hands at the girls. “Come on! It’s time to get down to business!”

It’s four thirty in the afternoon. They’ve been doing nothing all day except playing at the pool like spoiled rich assholes, and now it’s time to get down to business?

I watch Valentina approach Mona and they have an argument. I can’t hear the exact words, because they are doing the whole whisper-fight thing. But after a few minutes Mona whips her t-shirt over her head, unfastens her coverall clasps, and drops them to the ground. She’s wearing a black bikini underneath. But that’s when things really get interesting. Because all the girls start taking off their shirts. They have their backs turned to me, and the boys, since they are off to my left, so no one gets a peek at anything. But instead of staying that way, they each remove their bikini tops and pull their white t-shirts back on.

Ah. Mona was right. Wet t-shirt contest.

Have fun, pledges.

I glance at the boys and find them leering at the show across the pool, eager to see what comes next.

Part of me is happy that the girls are going to get their due. I got mine. They should get theirs.

But the girls didn’t do anything to me this morning. The boys did. And it doesn’t appear that they have to do anything to win this game.

How’s that fair?

“Cadee!” Cooper calls. Then he winces. “Fugling!” he corrects himself before Isabella can yell at him. “Bring the water balloons over here.”

I dry my hands on my shorts and go to pick up one of the tubs and then fall backwards right on my ass, because that fucking thing is heavy!

Everyone laughs at me. But I don’t care. I get up and try again. But I literally cannot lift this stupid tub.

“I’ll get it,” Lars says. He jogs over to me. “Step back, Cadee. You’re never going to be able to carry them.”

I always did like Lars. He’s definitely the nicest of the three. “Thanks,” I mumble.

But he doesn’t look at me. Just walks off and sets the tub down in front of the girls. Then he