My enemy had seen me naked. He was holding the proof right before my eyes, and my stomach lurched sickeningly. I ran to the bathroom and remained kneeling in misery after throwing up in the toilet for the second time that morning.
"Seems like you had too much to drink last night," he remarked in that condescending tone he always used with me. I looked up at him as he stood watching me from the doorway with his attitude of superiority. It was too much—the nausea, him witnessing me puking, his possession of that terrible picture. In that moment of weakness, I actually tried to plead with him. "Please. I've never done anything to you. Please."
"Begging me on your knees. That's a good start."
Dread turned my clammy skin cold. Mason Sumner hated my guts, and he would have no compassion for me. This was bad. This was really, really bad.
"Clean yourself up," he commanded. "In fact, take a shower. I don't want you getting in my car smelling like crap."
"Your car?" I asked in confusion, not understanding why he would allow me into his car. That was the last thing I would have expected from him.
"I'll take you with me since I'm here," he explained, "but you'll have to find your own way home."
"From where?" I questioned warily.
"My house," he replied. "You're going to clean it. Every week," he added.
I was beginning to comprehend that he was blackmailing me into doing this, and I felt relieved at first. It meant that he couldn't show the picture to anyone if he wanted me to comply with his demands. I had been terrified of him putting it out there for everyone to see.
"Get up and get in the shower," he snapped. "I'm not waiting around for you all day.
I pushed myself up to stand on my feet and awkwardly waited for him to leave the bathroom.
"What the hell are you waiting for?" he demanded.
A horrible realization sank in, and my voice trembled when I spoke. "I can't do it with you here."
"You'll do whatever I tell you to," he said. "But I don't have to be in here to see you naked, "He held up his phone to emphasize his point. "So I'll let you get undressed alone. Your uniform will be on the bed."
"Uniform?"
"Just put it on," he told me impatiently and walked out of the bathroom.
I closed the door behind him and pushed the toilet lid down to sit wearily with my head in my hands. Despair washed over me as I thought about my sudden, inescapable predicament. Why had I drunk so much? Because Addison had prodded me to keep drinking. It was just the two of us here having a good time. Best friends. Laughing and dancing around to the music she had put on, drinking and cutting loose.
Addison had betrayed me. She had let Mason Sumner in here while I was intoxicated and apparently passed out, and he had taken a picture of me after someone removed all my clothes. I had been naked when I stumbled out of bed this morning and puked my guts out in the toilet, and she had been standing in the hallway afterwards and solemnly told me to get dressed.
"Why did I take my clothes off?" I had asked. "Did I throw up on them?"
"Mason is here," she said instead of answering me. "He wants to talk to you."
I immediately thought of Mason Sumner, but she "couldn't be talking about him. He wasn't part of her social circle, and he certainly wouldn't come to her house to seek me out. "Mason who?" I asked.
"Sumner," she replied. "Hurry up and get dressed. He knows you're awake, and I could"
"barely get him to wait five minutes."
I gaped at her, but she gave me a desperate shove. "Now, Ella! He'll be coming out here in a minute."
I hurried back into her room to throw my clothes on as a whirlwind of questions swirled in my mind. I heard Addison holding him off outside in the hallway as she pleaded with him to give me another minute.
"What's the difference? I already saw everything last night," he said.
I fumbled with the clasp on my bra as my heart
I had just pulled on my shorts when he came barging into the room. With a shriek, I grabbed my shirt and held it in front of my chest. His striking silver-gray eyes regarded me coldly. "It's a little late for that. You sure weren't modest last night."
He showed "me the picture on his phone. It was me sprawled out naked on the bed with my legs spread open to reveal a part of my body that no boy had ever seen before. Mason Sumner was the first, and now he could show it to all his friends, to the whole school even. He certainly hated me enough to humiliate me like that."
"I had dropped the shirt and run to the bathroom to vomit again. I was still a pathetic mess sitting here on the toilet in my bra and shorts. I hadn't been able to find my panties in my haste to get dressed.
I jumped at the sudden sound of pounding on the door. "What are you doing?" Mason demanded. "Get in the damn shower or I'm coming in there."
I sprang up and quickly turned on the water in the shower. I hesitated to take my clothes off, not trusting him not to walk in anyway, but taking too long would guarantee that he would. So I stepped out of my shorts and took off my bra before hurrying into the shower and the privacy afforded by the shower curtain.
Washing away the clammy sweat from my skin made me feel a little better, and I rallied a bit. Anger started to course through me. I had never hated Mason before, but what he had done was despicable. And Addison...
What she had done was even worse. She had been my friend, and she had stabbed me in the back. How could she do this to me, I "I thought bitterly. My suspicion was that it had to do with her desire for popularity. I had told her that they weren't worth it, that the popular crowd was shallow and mean, but she still watched them with envy in her eyes. Mason must have promised her entry into" "their group if she got me drunk and let him take a nude picture of me.
Tears of shame and hurt welled up in my eyes, and I cried uncontrollably. What was I going to do? Mason was going to make my life hell with that horrible picture. I had just lost my best friend, and I had no one to help me.
My sob turned into a gasp when the water shut off and the curtain was yanked open. I flung one arm across my breasts and thrust my other hand down between my legs to cover my privates. Mason's eyes lingered on my body before taking in my teary face.
"Get out and dry off," he commanded, holding a towel toward me.
Reaching for it would require exposing myself to him. "Put it on the vanity," I said.
He complied and then crossed his arms as he planted his feet firmly in place. "Come out and get it."
"Leave. Please," I added grudgingly.
"If you'd rather have me watch you touch yourself, that's fine with me."
My face flamed with heat, and he used it against me. "Is that one of your fantasies?" he enquired.