by Elena Monroe
She survived while I coasted by on only a smile.
Elena Monroe
© 2020 by Elena Monroe. All rights reserved.
No portion of this book, except for brief review, may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise—without the written consent and permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Characters, names, dialogues, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, whether living or dead, businesses, locales, or events other than those specifically cited are unintentional and purely coincidental or are used for the purpose of illustration only.
The publisher and author assume no responsibility for errors, omissions, or contrary interpretation of the subject matter herein. The author and publisher assume no responsibility or liability whatsoever on the behalf of any purchaser or reader of these materials. The publisher and author do not have any control over and do not assume any responsibility for third party websites or their content.
First edition.
Cover Design: Maria with Steamy Reads
Cover Image Photographer: Michelle Lancaster
Cover Model: Andy Murray
Line/Content Editor: Mackenzie Letson of Nice Girl, Naughty Edits
Proofreader: Liz Argote
To the ones who laugh through the pain and are afraid to spread their wings.
George –
I graduated school, I took on more at work, I made books a priority and somehow you were still patient with me when I seemed to never stop being busy. You helped me build my castle and I can’t thank you enough. I love you.
Mac –
Joint custody. Forever. I am so beyond happy you find a piece of passion in this world and I cannot wait to see how you make a footprint in this world. Now I get to be your cheerleader, girl!
Amber –
Girl. I can’t. Just imagine me crying and voice messaging you one million times a day like normal only this time is a hailstorm of appreciation for having you. You could never be anything but amazing so don’t let the world’s horrors ever put out that light.
Liz –
This year was rough to say the least and I am so thankful for you. Our taste in angsty books, our appreciation for After, our long texts and how much we survived school and real life. You will always be someone who balances life with such grace I hope to have one day.
Give Me Books Promotions –
Stalker, loyal customer, annoying, slightly disorganized but always thankful for how smooth you guys make things. Forever yours.
Maria at Steamy Reads –
I am still in such a state of awe at the magic you create.
Rule Breakers, Bloggers, Readers, ARC Team & Street Team –
I write for you guys. All day. Every day.
All my stories belong to you.
Take a piece because what mine is yours.
Does that make us married now?
Shoreline Mafia - “Change Ya Life”
Pouya - “Who Am I to Blame?”
Halsey - “Drive”
Enrique Iglesias - “Be with You”
Tate McRae - “You Broke Me First”
Fall Out Boy - “Church (remix)”
Michelle Branch - “Are You Happy Now”
Holly Humberstone - “Falling Asleep at the Wheel”
Machine Gun Kelly - “Body Bag (feat. Bert McCracken”
Arizona Zervas - “RIP”
KHAOS
GRACE
GRACE
KHAOS
GRACE
GRACE
KHAOS
KHAOS
GRACE
GRACE
KHAOS
GRACE
KHAOS
KHAOS
ETHAN
GRACE
KHAOS
GRACE
ETHAN
GRACE
KHAOS
KHAOS
GRACE
KHAOS
KHAOS
GRACE
ETHAN
KHAOS
KHAOS
GRACE
KHAOS
GRACE
ETHAN
GRIMM
ETHAN
GRACE
KHAOS
KHAOS
GRACE
ETHAN
KHAOS
GRACE
VIC
BOWEN
KHAOS
GRACE
KHAOS
GRACE
GRACE
KHAOS
TRIGGER WARNING:
I don’t normally add these so it’s here for a reason.
You’ve been warned.
KHAOS WARNING:
He is not like the other boys in this series.
He is a mood.
You will laugh before you feel the angst.
There are monsters in his closet… wait for them.
She survived while I coasted by on only a smile.
KHAOS
I’m not living under any kind of false pretenses here. I know I’m basically a rapper’s attitude with R&B feelings and a pop star’s bank account.
There were a lot of ways to describe my unconventional lifestyle of part time cult member and full-time showman.
Risk taker.
Exuberant.
And my personal favorite adjective: undomesticated.
I surrounded myself with people who liked a good time but left after they served their purpose of making sure I felt nothing but top shelf feelings.
I wasn’t about to be like my brothers who let the darkness eat away at their vindication. The only crime I had ever committed was waving the glory of being invited, of saying I came and conquered around like a badge of honor.
Spoiler alert: None of that earned me respect.
There’s only one girl who managed to rob me of my fake smile...and my watch.
GRACE
I was a throw away, street trash, a child abandoned and scooped up by the bad people you only hear about after they get caught.
I was hard in a way people found uncomfortable and determined too much work to rehabilitate into society again. I was found guilty over and over enough to let the bad things become who I am, blurring the lines between freedom and a jail sentence.
Fraud.
Thief.
And my least favorite: fake girlfriend to a scary ass kingpin.
Forced out of a childhood I was surrounded by darkness, evil, and the kind of cutthroat loyalty that landed your body so mutilated they wouldn’t be able to tell who you were if you fell out of obedience.
They accepted me like family and there’s no quitting your family.
I had the respect to match my rap sheet.
There’s only one guy who managed to exonerate me… and my invisible wings.
KHAOS
Servants of Patmos was like visiting Hell but knowing you’d get out in four years. I vowed that when I left this backwards town drained of all things fun and replaced by all things creepy, I would never return.
Phrases like over my dead body weren’t things I spoke into existence.
Or maybe the phrase just hit too close to home when my prom pretty much turned into a bad Carrie remake and there was an actual dead body.
It wasn’t any real shock the townies hated having some elite boarding school in their woods with the acceptance rate of exactly four spots, all taken by us. Being the life of the party, I was I bridged a gap
between the two classes by throwing ragers no one could top.
Hefner.
Sixx.
Lucifer himself.
Unsupervised. No rules. No consequences. I was a young God for making it happen amongst the heathens I call friends. None of them even knew how to have a conversation without psychoanalyzing the other person or playing a game of search and destroy. Their people skills were lacking and I was rolling in the abundance.
Genevieve was the townie above all townies. I was under her spell with a single glance at the Halloween party I threw in the woods every year.
She showed up as a vintage Playboy bunny and I practically came at the same moment I bit my lip dramatically. She was fucking sex on legs with potential to be so much more.
She was picking a full solo cup from the table between two thick redwoods and I was in my feelings with Drake playing in the background not helping any. I was Kanye on the outside (too much to handle, utter spectacle) and Drake on the inside (passion fruit if you need a reference).
Feelings came naturally to me unlike the rest of the guys who were straight fucking allergic. Anti-human robots with no problem with blood and born into some pretty fucked up families willing to capitalize on that.
My mom is a crystal loving hippie and my dad wants nothing more than to forget the life he was forced into like me.
Genevieve was easy to impress with my superior attitude, chaotic charm, and complete lack of trauma. I was a normal kind of reckless youth I took a great deal of pride in. The kind of reckless that made her like me more than she was willing to admit when I got her alone and she let me feel up her shirt.
We were the ripe age of 17 and we had to tread carefully after Grimm stabbed a girl who slept in his bed overnight. Since then, the vibes have been real suspect, as in us - suspect.
Months passed and Genevieve still couldn’t get enough of me. I couldn’t get enough of her either, literally, she was playing hard to get so well I had to devise the most hideous way of asking her to prom. I made a trail of solo cups from her front doorstep to me at the end of her very long driveway where I spent hours decorating the sidewalk with graffiti art that said: don’t let me go solo to the prom.
Of course, she said yes, girls loved effort and I did all that with a smirk on my face.
Everything was drama free if you ignore how much the townie jocks hated me for snagging up the hottest girl of their school. When you’re the visitor that shit kind of hits the hometown in the gut especially when it’s the only peak they’ll see.
The guys only went to prom because I begged after they said no and convinced them it would help keep up appearances.
I needed someone to hang out with around the punch bowl that I planned to spike.
I didn’t know what to expect when our limo pulled up to the local high school and I offered my hand to Genevieve as she stepped out in a navy blue dress cluttered with rhinestones like the Italian mob lost one of their lambs. I could look past her being high maintenance when I remembered her body like braille every time we made out heavy in my bedroom.
Every curve.
Every inch of satin.
Every moan when my fingers would ease up and tease her to the edge of her made up mind to not fuck me.
I had to look past prom being in the gym with the bleachers pushed back to the walls too. The townies were ravenous for prom to roll around and when we walked across the lacquered floor I wasn’t impressed. A DJ table was under one of the basketball nets and there was a table of snack food along the bleachers not catching my attention. The lights weren’t even low enough to cause any real trouble without being easily seen.
None of that really mattered though because I had my arm around the prettiest girl in town and she was smiling for me.
Handing her my flask I had filled with coconut flavored rum she giggled pressing it to her lips. “That’s what I love about you… the risk.”
My lips touched her ear, “Can’t be all risk and no reward, Bunny.”
The guys basically complained the entire time while I did my best impression of Leonardo DeCaprio in Wolf on Street: the dancing and the conning my way into people’s hearts.
The end of the night was rolling around and I could feel the mounting tension in the gym. The jocks wanted to put me in my place as the outsider but didn’t know how. I was the guy who would get jumped then laugh the entire time even if it hurt because no one deserved to see me like that - not even my enemies.
Dylan, the school’s jock version of my Bunny, strutted towards me and I stiffened ready to bleed.
I wasn’t a fighter. I was slippery. I was full of tricks but physical efforts without a skateboard weren’t for me.
Wrong horseman.
“Genevieve, what are you still doing with this loser? The plan was to come with him not waste our entire prom.” His voice was soaked in irritation, nearly shaking at every word.
Twisting towards him with her punch glass she gave him a look I knew how to pull off better - getting caught. “Dylan! I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Trying to do some damage control, I slipped my arm around her only triggering Dylan to push me in a way that launched me. Falling back against the bleachers I took a minute to get myself together when I stood up.
Bowen, Vic, and Grimm were taking steps towards me like some kind of bodyguard gang. Tossing my hand out I held them off from reacting too soon.
“What’s going on, Dylan?” I was calm and seething only inside.
“You. You’re what’s going on. You really think she came here with you?” His hands wrinkling my shirt and keeping me upright so well I didn’t know if my vans were touching the ground.
“I don’t hear anyone confirming your story.”
Dylan smirked in my face and climbed what little of the bleachers were still seats for the tired of dancing or the lonely. “Genevieve, come up here baby. We wasted enough of our prom on this loser.”
I watched my date, my Bunny, step onto the bleacher with the help of his palm before their mouths clashed together.
My Bunny was feeding her tongue into his mouth and his hands were scaling down her back to her ass in a way that pained me.
Genevieve played me; the guy full of tricks who’s supposed to be playing everyone else.
I stepped backwards hitting a solid figure, snapping my head around to see Dylan’s goons all boxing me in, forcing me to watch the betrayal.
“Where do you think you’re going, pretty boy?”
I felt hands all over me like spiders, “Aw, you think I’m pretty?”
Kal, his right hand, pushed me from behind so hard I lost my footing and planted face first into the glossy gym floor. Picking up my chin and feeling my skin I felt the cut already developing into something worse.
“We told you we don’t like your kind,” Kal stepped towards me stomping on my hand before kneeling down to me with his shoe still pinning me down. “We warned you enough times. Now you’ll learn…”
His voice trailed off as Dylan got everyone’s attention. It was a small school, so it wasn’t that hard. Looking up I saw Grimm practically ready to combust with aggression when I strong eyed him to stand down. I could handle it.
Grimm was fueled by sayings like: family first, you fuck with one of us you fuck with us all, etc. Family was absolute for him and I was forcing him to watch this version of family get dragged like Drake when people found out he had a secret shame son.
Dylan was about to make a speech when Kal dragged me up for the crowd now appearing.
“This fucking rich asshole thinks he can come in here and run this town. I run this town! Tell him baby.”
Genevieve stood in front of me with a shit eating grin that I couldn’t tell was real or fake with her price tag all distorted. Hell, she was probably on sale and I got left with damaged goods.
“You really thought I would betray Dylan to be your real girlfriend? It was all a joke, Krosby. Every time you thought you were king of the mounta
in, we were laughing... Bunny.”
Her words slicked through me down to the very thin layers that felt like a thousand paper cuts with sanitizer poured all over them.
“Does your boyfriend know that his double agent had a mouth full? Stellar acting but he didn’t need you to commit that hard.” I wagged my eyebrows and felt the bang against my jaw rattling all my senses.
I was a limp rag doll being pulled and tugged on to stay upright in the middle of their fuck boy circle.
Dylan’s face was centimeters from mine and at any other moment I would have kissed him just for shock value but now wasn’t the time. “You think you’re funny? You don’t know who you’re messing with.”
Lifting my head up I could hear Kanye’s “Black Skinhead” swell in my mind tuning out almost all the dead noise when my eyes found his. “Astor. Rockefeller. Rothschild. DuPonte. I’m pretty sure you don’t know who you're messing with.” His grip on my shirt only got tighter and I felt my body being dragged closer to his. “I’m friends with Death, buddy, you pale in comparison but maybe in our next life.”
That was the moment my mouth became a weapon of war.
The horsemen were connected, they could predict my movements when I pushed Dylan with all the energy I could muster up while feeling the paper cuts of being played.
The fight broke out into a mess of chaotic beauty when I crawled my way between all the legs and made my break for it. I wasn’t a fighter.
Taking a big breath, I climbed the stairs to the roof shoving a shroom in my mouth trying to kick up this party of one up a notch. I chose to fall for Genevieve, but I didn’t choose the feelings I had right now.
Dating me was all a spot. She won gold if it wasn’t clear.
All the adrenaline was fading as the pure high took over and I didn’t want it to end. I wanted to break something just to feed the high and convince it to stay longer when I sat on the edge of the building letting my legs swing off. The sleeve of nips inside my jackets were barely touched when I twisted off the caps and downed a few nips in a row.