Savage Lover: Chapter 1

I’ve been stuck under this Silverado for three hours now. I’m taking out the transmission, one of my absolute least-favorite tasks. It’s tricky, heavy, messy, and just an all-around bitch of a job. And that’s under normal conditions. I’m doing it on the hottest day of the summer so far.

Our shop doesn’t have air conditioning. I’m drenched in sweat, which makes my hands slippery. Plus, ON just came on the radio for the third time in a row, and I can’t do a damn thing about it.

I’ve finally got all the bolts out and the cross member out of the way. I’m ready to slide out the transmission. I’ve got to be careful to do it smoothly, so I don’t damage the clutch or the torque converter.

This transmission weighs 146 pounds now that I’ve drained the fluids out. I’ve got a jack to help support it, but I still wish my dad were around to help. He crashed right after dinner tonight. He’s been exhausted lately, barely able to keep his eyes open to shovel down a plate of spaghetti.

I told him to go to bed and I’d take care of it.

I ease the transmission down on the jack, then wheel it out from under the truck. Then I gather up all the nuts and bolts and put them in labeled baggies, so I don’t lose anything important.

That was the first thing my dad taught me in car repair—be organized and be meticulous.

“These are complicated machines. You’ve got to be like a machine yourself. There’s no room for mistakes.”

Once I’ve got the transmission out, I decide to grab a soda to celebrate. We may not have A/C, but at least the fridge is always cold.

My father owns a repair shop on Wells Street. We live above it, in a little two-bedroom apartment. It’s just me, my dad, and my little brother Vic.

I head upstairs, wiping my hands off on a rag. I’ve got my coveralls stripped down to the waist, and my undershirt is soaked through with sweat. It’s also stained with every kind of fluid that comes out of a car, plus just plain dirty. It’s dusty in the shop.

My hands are filthy in a way that would require about two hours and a steel brush to get clean. There’s oil embedded in every crack and line of my skin, and my fingernails are permanently stained black. Wiping my hands removes a little of the mess, but I still leave fingerprints on the fridge when I pull the door open.

I grab a Coke and pop the tab, pressing the cool can against my face for a moment before I chug it down.

Vic comes out of his room, dressed up like he’s going somewhere. He dresses like he should be in a music video—tight jeans, bright shirts, sneakers that he painstakingly cleans with a toothbrush if they get so much as a speck of dirt on them. That’s where all his money goes, if he ever gets any money.

I have to resist the urge to tousle his hair, which is long and shaggy and the color of caramel. Vic’s only seventeen, eight years younger than me. I feel more like his mom than his sister. Our real mom dumped him off on the doorstep when he was two and a half. He was this skinny little thing with big dark eyes that took up half his face, and the most outrageous eyelashes (why do boys always get the best lashes?) No clothes or belongings except for one Spider-Man figure that was missing a leg. He carried that with him everywhere he went, even in the bath, even holding it tight while he slept at night. I don’t know where they were living before, or who his father is. My dad took him in, and we’ve all lived here ever since.

“Where are you going?” I ask him.

“Out with friends,” he says.

“What friends?”

“Tito. Andrew.”

“What are you doing?”

“I dunno.” He grabs his own Coke and pops it open. “Seein’ a movie, probably.”

“Bit late for a movie,” I say.

It’s 9:40 p.m. Not many movies start after 10:00.

Vic just shrugs.

“Don’t be out too late,” I tell him.

He rolls his eyes and shuffles past me out of the kitchen.

I notice he’s wearing a new pair of sneakers. They look ridiculous to me—white and chunky, with some kinda weird, gray swoopy lines on the sides. They’re basketball shoes, but I don’t think you’d actually wear them to play basketball unless you were playing on the moon in the year 3000.

They look expensive.

“Where’d you get those?” I demand.

Vic doesn’t meet my eye.

“Traded my Jordans to Andrew,” he says.

I know when my brother’s lying. He’s always been terrible at it.

“You didn’t shoplift those, did you?”

“No!” he says hotly.

“You better not, Vic. You’re almost eighteen, that shit stays on your record—”

“I didn’t steal them!” he shouts. “I gotta go, I’m gonna be late.”

He slings his backpack over one shoulder and heads out, leaving me alone in the kitchen.

I finish my soda, scowling. I love Vic with every spare inch of space in my heart, but I worry about him. He hangs out with kids that have a lot more money than we do. Kids who live in the mansions on Wieland and Evergreen, whose parents have attorneys on speed-dial to bail their idiot sons out of trouble if they do something stupid.

We don’t have that same luxury. I tell Vic over and over that he’s got to buckle down and study hard in his senior year so he gets into a good college. He’s got no interest in working with Dad and me.

Unfortunately, he doesn’t have much interest in school, either. He thinks he’s going to be a DJ. I haven’t burst that bubble just yet.

I chuck the soda can in the recycling bin, ready to head back down to the shop again.

I spend another hour tackling the transmission. The owner of the Silverado doesn’t want a replacement—he wants us to rebuild it. Since we don’t know exactly what’s wrong with the damn thing, I’ll have to disassemble it entirely, clean all the parts, and check to see what’s worn out or broken.

While I’m working, I’m thinking about Vic. I don’t believe his story about the shoes, and I don’t like that he’s hanging out with Andrew. Andrew is the worst of his friends—arrogant, spoiled, and mean-spirited. Vic is a good kid at heart. But he wants to be popular. That leads to him doing a lot of stupid shit to impress his friends.

I wipe my hands again and grab my phone. I want to check Find My Friends to see if Vic actually went to the theater.

I pull up his little blue dot, and sure enough, he’s not at any movie theater. Instead, he’s at some address on Hudson Ave—it looks like a house. It’s not Andrew’s house, or anybody else I know.

Annoyed, I switch over to Instagram and click on Vic’s stories. He hasn’t posted anything, so I check Andrew’s account.

There they are—all three boys at some kind of house party. Vic’s drinking out of a red solo cup, and Tito looks completely sloshed. The caption reads: “Gonna set a record tonight.”

“Oh, hell no,” I hiss.

Jamming my phone in the pocket of my coveralls, I grab the keys to my Trans Am. If Vic thinks he’s going to get hammered with those d-bags, he’s got another thing coming. He’s not supposed to be drinking, and he is supposed to be working a shift at the Stop n’ Shop tomorrow morning. If he sleeps in again, they’re going to fire him.

I speed over to the location of his little blue dot—or at least, I speed as much as I can without overheating my car’s ancient engine. This car is older than I am, by a lot, and I’m mostly keeping it alive by sheer force of will these days.

It’s only a seven-minute drive to the house. I could have found it with or without the app—the thudding music is audible from three blocks away. Dozens of cars line the street on both sides. Partygoers are literally spilling out of the house, climbing in and out of windows, and passed out on the lawn.

I park as close as I can get, then hurry up to the house.

I push my way inside through the crush of people, looking for my little brother.

Most of the partygoers seem to be in their twenties. This is a full-on rager, with beer pong, topless girls playing strip-poker, keg stands, couples halfway to fucking on the couches, and so much pot smoke that I can barely see two feet in front of my face.

Trying to spot my brother, I’m not exactly watching where I’m going. I plow right into a group of girls, making one of them shriek with rage as her drink splashes the front of her dress.

“Watch it, bitch!” she howls, spinning around.

Oh, fuck.

I’ve managed to bump into somebody who already hated my guts: Bella Page.

We went to high school together, once upon a time.

It gets even better. Bella is standing with Beatrice and Brandi. They used to call themselves “The Queen Bees.” Unironically.

“Oh my god,” Bella says in her drawling voice, prickling with vocal fry. “I must be drunker than I thought. ‘Cause I swear I’m looking at the Grease Monkey.”

That’s what they called me.

It’s been at least six years since I heard that nickname.

And yet, it instantly fills me with self-loathing, just like it used to.

“What are you wearing?” Beatrice says in disgust. She’s staring at my coveralls with the kind of horrified expression usually reserved for car accidents or mass genocides.

“I thought something smelled like hot garbage,” Brandi says, wrinkling up her perfect little button nose.

God, I was hoping these three had moved away after high school. Or maybe died of dysentery. I’m not picky.

Bella has her sleek blonde hair cut into a long bob. Beatrice definitely got a boob job. And Brandi has a sparkly rock on her finger. But all three are still beautiful, well-dressed, and looking at me like I’m shit on the bottom of their shoes.

“Wow,” I say blandly. “I’ve really missed this.”

“What are you doing here?” Beatrice says, folding her skinny arms under those new boobs.

“Shouldn’t you be back at that shithole garage washing your face with oil?” Brandi sneers.

“I thought she’d be down on Cermak,” Bella says, fixing me with her cool blue eyes. “Sucking dick for ten bucks a pop, just like her mom.”

The heat and smoke and sound of the party seem to fade away. All I see is Bella’s pretty face, twisted up with disdain. Even when I’m fucking furious at her, I have to admit she is gorgeous: thick, black lashes around big blue eyes. Pink lipstick sneer.

That doesn’t stop me wanting to knock her perfect teeth out with my fist. But her father is some bigwig banker, storing cash for all the fancy fuckers in Chicago. I have no doubt he’d sue me into oblivion if I assaulted his little princess.

“At least she gets ten dollars,” a low voice says. “You usually do it for free, Bella.”

Nero Gallo is leaning up against the kitchen cabinets, hands tucked in his pockets. His dark hair is even longer than it was in high school, and it’s hanging in his face. That doesn’t cover up the bruise under his right eye, or the nasty cut on his lip.

And neither of those injuries can mar the outrageous beauty of his face. In fact, they only serve to highlight it.

Nero is proof of the perversity of the universe. Never has such a dangerous object been disguised in such an appealing wrapper. He’s like a berry so vivid and juicy that it makes your mouth water just looking at it. But one taste will poison you.

He’s liquid sex in a James Dean frame. Everything about him, from his fog-gray eyes to his pouty lips to his arrogant swagger is calculated to make your heart freeze up in your chest, and then jolt back to life if he so much as glances at you.

The girls’ moods shift completely when they catch sight of him.

Far from being annoyed at his jab, Bella giggles and bites her lip like he’s flirting with her.

“I didn’t know you were coming,” she says.

“Why would you?” Nero says, rudely.

I have no interest in talking to Nero, and definitely none at all in continuing my conversation with The Queen Bees. I have to find my brother. Before I can slip away, Nero says, “Is that your Trans Am out there?”

“Yes,” I say.

“Is it a ‘77 LE?”

“Yeah.”

“Same as Burt Reynolds.”

“That’s right,” I say, smiling despite myself. I don’t want to smile at Nero. I would like to stay as far away from him as possible. But he’s talking about the one thing I own that I actually love.

Burt Reynolds drove the same car in Smokey and the Bandit—except his was black with a gold eagle on the hood, and mine is red with racing stripes. Faded and beat to shit, but still pretty rad, in my opinion.

Bella has no idea what we’re talking about. She just hates that Nero and I are talking at all. She needs to pull the attention back to herself, immediately.

“I have a Mercedes G-Wagon,” she says.

“Daddy must have had a good year,” Nero says, curling up that full upper-lip, puffier than ever from its bruise.

“He certainly did,” Bella coos.

“Thank god there’re heroes like him helping all those poor billionaires hide their money,” I say.

Bella whips her head around like a snake, obviously wishing I would leave or die already so she could be alone with Nero.

“Please tell us how you’re saving the world,” she hisses. “Are you doing oil changes for orphans? Or are you the same loser you were in high school? I really hope that’s not the case, because if you’re still a grimy little degenerate, I really don’t know how you’re going to pay for my dress you just ruined.”

I look at her tight white dress, which has three tiny spots of punch on the front of it.

“Why don’t you try washing it?” I tell her.

“You can’t throw an eight-hundred-dollar dress in the washing machine,” Bella tells me. “But you wouldn’t know that, because you don’t wash your clothes. Or anything else, apparently.”

She sniffs at my filthy undershirt, and my hair tied back with a greasy bandanna.

It makes me burn with shame when she looks at me like that. I don’t know why. I don’t value Bella’s opinion. But I also can’t argue with the facts: I’m poor, and I look terrible.

“You’re wasting your time,” Nero says in a bored tone. “She doesn’t have eight hundred dollars.”

“God,” Beatrice giggles, “Levi really needs to start getting security for these parties. Keep the trash out.”

“You sure you’d make the cut?” Nero says, softly.

He picks a bottle of vodka up off the counter, slugs down several gulps, then walks away from the girls. He doesn’t look at me at all, like he forgot I was even there.

The Queen Bees have forgotten about me, too. They’re staring after Nero, wistfully.

“He’s such an asshole,” Beatrice says.

“But he’s so fucking gorgeous,” Bella whispers, her voice low and determined. She’s staring after Nero like he’s a Birkin bag and a Louboutin heel all rolled into one.

While Bella’s consumed with lust, I take the opportunity to head off in the opposite direction, looking for Vic. Not seeing him on the main level, I have to climb the stairs and start peeking into rooms where people are either hooking up, snorting lines, or playing Grand Theft Auto.

The house is huge but run down. This obviously isn’t the first party it’s seen—the woodwork is gouged, the walls full of random holes. From the look of the bedrooms, I’m guessing several people live here—probably all dudes. The guests are a weird mix of slumming socialites like Bella and a much rougher element. I don’t like that my brother is mixed up with this crowd.

I finally track him down in the backyard, playing ping pong on an outdoor table. He’s so shitfaced that he can barely hold his paddle, not making contact with the ball at all.

I grab him by the back of his t-shirt and start dragging him out.

“Hey, what the hell!” he yells.

“We’re leaving,” I snarl at him.

“I don’t think he wants to go,” Andrew says to me.

I really despise Andrew. He’s a cocky little shit who likes to dress and talk like a gangster. Meanwhile his parents are both surgeons, and I know he got an early acceptance to Northwestern.

His future is secure. He gets to play around at being a bad boy, and when he’s tired of that, he’ll sail off to college, leaving my brother behind in the gutter.

“Get out of my face, before I call your parents,” I snap at him.

He smirks at me. “Good luck with that. They’re in Aruba right now.”

“Fine,” I say. “I’ll call the cops and report you for underage drinking.”

“Alright, alright, I’m coming,” Vic says blearily. “Lemme get my bag at least.”

He grabs his backpack out from under the pool table, almost tripping over his own feet in those ridiculous sneakers.

“Come on,” I say, impatiently hauling him along.

I drag him through the side gate, not wanting to walk through the house again and risk another meeting with Bella.

Once we’re back down on the sidewalk, I relax a little. I’m pissed at Vic for getting drunk though.

“You’re still going to work tomorrow,” I tell him. “I’m waking you up at seven, and I don’t care if you’re hungover.”

“Man, I hate that fuckin’ place,” Vic complains, shuffling along after me.

“Oh, you don’t like bagging groceries?” I snap. “Then maybe you should pull your act together and get a proper education, so you don’t have to do it the rest of your life.”

I stuff him into the passenger seat of the Trans Am, slamming the door to shut him in. Then I go around to the driver’s side.

“You didn’t go to college,” Vic says resentfully.

“Yeah, and look at me,” I say, gesturing to my filthy clothes. “I’m gonna be working in that shop forever.”

I pull away from the curb. Vic leans his head against the window.

“I thought you liked it . . .” he says.

“I like cars. I don’t like changing people’s oil and fixing their shit, then hearing them bitch and complain about the price.”

I turn onto Goethe, driving slowly because it’s getting late and the street isn’t very well lit.

Even so, Vic is starting to look a little green.

“Pull over,” he says. “I might puke.”

“Hold on a second. I can’t stop right—”

“Pull over!” he cries, jerking hard on the wheel.

“What the hell!” I shout, yanking the wheel straight again before we hit the cars lined up along the curb. Before I can find a good place to stop, red and blue lights flare up in my rear-view mirror. I hear the short whoop of a siren.

“FUCK!” I groan, pulling over to the side of the road.

Vic opens his door, leaning out so he can puke in the street.

“Pull it together,” I mutter at him.

Before I can do anything else, the officer has gotten out of his car and is knocking on my window, shining his flashlight in my face.

I roll down the glass, blinking and trying to moisten my dry mouth enough to speak.

“Have you been drinking tonight?” the officer demands.

“No, I haven’t.” I tell him, “Sorry, my brother is sick . . .”

The cop shines his light on Vic instead, illuminating his bloodshot eyes and puke-spattered shirt.

“Step out of the car,” the officer says to Vic.

“Is this really—”

“Out of the car!” he barks again.

Vic opens his door and stumbles out, trying to avoid the vomit. His foot catches on his backpack, pulling it out into the street as well.

The officer makes him stand with his hands on the roof of my car.

“Do you have any weapons on you?” he says as he pats Vic down.

“Uh-uh,” my brother says, shaking his head.

I’ve gotten out of the car too, though I’m staying on my side.

“I’ll just taking him home, Officer,” I say.

The cop pauses, his hand on the outside of Vic’s leg.

“What’s in your pocket, kid?” he says.

“Nothing,” Vic says stupidly.

The cop reaches into Vic’s jeans and pulls out a little baggy. My stomach sinks down to my toes. There are two pills in the bag.

“What’s this?” the cop says.

“I dunno,” Vic says. “It’s not mine.”

“Stay right where you are,” the cop orders. He picks up Vic’s backpack and starts rooting around in it. A minute later he pulls out a sandwich bag full of at least a hundred identical pills.

“Let me guess,” he says. “These aren’t yours either.”

Before Vic can reply, I blurt, “They’re mine!”

Shit, shit, shit. What am I doing!?

The officer looks up at me, eyebrow raised. He’s tall and fit, with a square jaw and bright blue eyes.

“Are you sure about that?” he says quietly. “This is a lot of product. A lot more than personal use. You’re looking at possession with intent to distribute.”

I’m sweating and my heart is racing. This is a huge fucking problem. But it’s going to be my problem, not Vic’s. I can’t let him destroy his life like this.

“It’s mine,” I say firmly. “All of it’s mine.”

Vic is staring back and forth between me and the cop, so inebriated and so scared that he has no idea what to do. I look him in the eye and give him the tiniest shake of my head—telling him to keep his mouth shut.

“Get back in the car, kid,” the cop says to Vic.

Vic climbs back in the passenger seat. The officer closes the door, shutting him inside. Then he turns his attention on me.

“What’s your name, Miss?” he says.

“Camille Rivera,” I say, swallowing hard.

“Officer Schultz,” he says, pointing at his badge. “Come here, Camille.”

I walk around the car so we’re both standing in the glare of the headlights.

As I get closer to the cop, I realize that he’s younger than I thought—probably only about thirty or thirty-five at the most. He’s got close-cropped blond hair, buzzed at the sides, and a tanned face. His uniform is stiffly starched.

He’s smiling at me, but I’ve never been so scared of someone in my life. He’s literally holding my fate in his hands, in the form of a plastic bag of pills.

“Do you know what this is, Camille?” he says.

I look at the pills. They kind of look like Flintstone’s vitamins—stamped in the shape of school buses, pale yellow in color. So I’m guessing it’s Molly.

“Yeah, I know what they are,” I say. My voice comes out in a croak.

“Illinois has strict laws against MDMA,” Officer Schultz says, his voice low and pleasant. “Possessing just one tablet can result in a felony conviction. Fifteen or more tablets means a mandatory minimum sentence of four years in prison. I’d say you’ve got about a hundred and fifty tablets here. Plus the ones in your brother’s pocket.”

“Those are mine, too,” I say. “He didn’t know what it was. I asked him to hold it for me.”

There’s a long silence while the officer stares at me. I can’t read the expression on his face. He’s still smiling a little, but I have no clue what that smile means.

“Where do you live?” he asks me.

“On Wells Street. Above Axel Auto. That’s my shop—my father’s shop. I work there, too.”

“You’re a mechanic?” he says, looking at my clothes.

“Yes.”

“You don’t see a lot of girl mechanics.”

“I doubt you know a lot of mechanics at all,” I say.

It’s not the best moment for sarcasm. But I get so sick of the comments. Especially from men. Especially the ones who don’t trust me to work on their car, when they wouldn’t know a piston from a plug.

Luckily, Schultz chuckles.

“Just one,” he says. “But I think he’s ripping me off.”

The silence drags out between us. I’m waiting for him to slap the cuffs on my wrists and throw me in the back of his squad car.

Instead, he says, “Axel Auto on Wells Street?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll come see you there tomorrow.”

I stare at him blankly, not understanding what he means.

“Get your brother home,” the cop says.

He drops the pills into the backpack and zips it up. Then he throws the bag in his trunk.

I’m still standing there, frozen and confused.

“I can go?” I say stupidly.

“For now,” he says. “We’ll talk more tomorrow.”

I get back in my car, my heart thudding painfully against my ribs. My mouth tastes like metal, and my brain is screaming at me that this is very fucking weird.

But I’m not going to argue. I’m drowning in trouble—I’ll take any life preserver thrown at me.

I just hope it’s not an anchor in disguise.