Pretty Little Savage (Sick Boys #1) - Lucy Smoke Page 0,3

vomit and dust collecting in front of me makes me wrinkle my nose in disgust. She obviously never made it back to her room when she stumbled in the night before. Her emaciated hand hangs over the edge of the futon, her fingers brushing against one of the many liquor bottles that litter the floor. A white filmy dust coats the old, scarred coffee table.

A scowl forms over my face. Where the hell had she gotten money for cocaine?

I march across the living room and kick her hand, not caring if it hurts or leaves a bruise. She’d do the same to me if our situations were reversed. Actually, she’d do worse. "Hey!” I lean down and snap my fingers in front of her face. "Wake up."

A low moan leaves her dry parted lips as her snoring stops and her eyelids crack open the scantest bit. "Avalon?"

My scowl deepens. "Get up. I've got to go to school."

She doesn't so much as wave her hand as she lifts it and lets it flop back down in a useless gesture. "So go."

I clench my fists and kick her hand again. "No," I growl. "You have to come to my school today. We have parent teacher conferences. I told you about it last week.” I don’t necessarily want her there, but neither do I want the school to look into why my mother hasn’t answered any calls or why she doesn’t show up for scheduled meetings like the one we have today. Because she’s too busy fucking around, being drunk off her ass, or high as hell.

She mumbles something under her breath that I can’t hear and turns away from me. "Well, I’m fucking tired,” she says loud enough for me to hear. “Maybe if someone had offered to help me out last night, I wouldn’t be so exhausted. But no, one of us has to keep a roof over our heads.” It’s clear who this someone is supposed to be.

I resist the urge to yank her up by her hair and punch her teeth in, but just barely. “I’m not gonna fuck your friends for money,” I say through clenched teeth.

She just shifts over. “You will eventually, Ava. Keep fighting it, but you were born to be like me.” Her words are callous, not because they’re said with any derision or intended meanness, but because they’re so final. As if the idea of me fucking some old, smelly man for drugs or money is merely inevitable.

“You’re a bitch,” I snap, turning away and stalking towards the front door. It's no fucking use. She isn't going to get up and she’s not coming to the conference.

Out of pure spite, I slam the screen door behind me and relish watching the faded crack that’s been there for ages grow just a bit longer. I hope the noise sounded like needles in her ears. The selfish bitch.

“Avalon, looking good, li’l runt.” Halfway down the concrete front steps, my whole body freezes at the unfortunately familiar voice.

I eye the man who’d spoken as he cracks the door to an older model Cadillac that I’ve seen far too many times and steps out. “What do you want?” I ask sharply, not really caring if I’m not showing him respect.

Roger Murphy is one of the biggest drug dealers in Plexton and I’ve seen his ugly face—all puffy and red with an overgrown mustache and beard—all too often at my mother’s trailer. She might claim she’s nothing more than a stripper to the cops who bust her every once in a while, but I know the truth. There’s no way she can afford Roger’s shit from what she makes at the club.

Roger grins as he steps away from the Cadillac that's parked halfway on the grass. “Just stopped by to see yer momma,” he says. His belly jiggles as he moves, the whole middle of him rounded like a pregnant woman. He’s packing the same rot beneath his skin just like Patricia. His teeth are cracked and yellowed with age and drugs. His hair, straggly and limp. And as he gets closer, I can smell the sweet metallic odor that gives me an answer to my earlier unspoken question. Well, at least now I know where she got the cocaine.

“She’s asleep,” I state.

He strokes a grubby hand down his unkempt beard, fat fingers catching in the snarls and yanking free a moment later. “Well, that’s too bad. Cuz you see, I came to pick up payment for my last