She shrugged. “Don’t be sorry, just get the hell out of my class.”
I stayed frozen to the spot, shame and humiliation swirling in a volatile mix inside my stomach as more silence descended while everyone watched the newest show.
The unwilling reality star of the day? Me.
“We’ve been over this, yes?” She pointed to the door. “I’m not a fan of repeating myself.”
“But—”
“Good. Bye.”
Mouth gaping, eyes stinging, I moved on autopilot. Each step I took closer to the door, the more I pictured it as a guillotine about to chop off my head and take my dream along with it. I needed to be in this class.
This was the only reason I’d come here.
Without this, I had...nothing.
A cold hand grasped my elbow as I crossed the threshold, turning me around.
Chef Stone stood there, a saccharine smile lying directly to my face. Or telling the truth, depending on how you looked at it. One way or another, it seemed she couldn’t be more pleased than to be getting rid of me. And the part that burned the most was that I had no idea why.
“One last thing,” she said, tone dropping. “Tell the Tarots—and your father—that I’m not to be fucked with.” She let go of my arm, pushing me across the threshold. “If there’s one thing they’ve always needed to learn? It’s that karma is a bitch.”
She shut the door in my face.
The blade of the guillotine fell.
And I watched through blurred eyes and racking sobs as the future that had been within my grasp spasmed in its death throes.
31
Ambrose
Someone was going to die, and there were no ifs, ands, or buts about it.
On second thought, maybe there would be some ands after all.
Alyssa Stone was going to die, and if she happened to take her house, her cars, and all her shiny trophies with her on the way out it would be doing the world a fucking favor.
I situated Emily more firmly on my lap so I could keep kneading at the various knots of muscle going up and down her back. I’d found her curled up in her dorm after an emergency text from Renata and stolen her away. A great decision if there ever was one. If I’d tried to get situated on her bed for as long as we’d been like this in mine, I would’ve gotten claustrophobic.
Then again, that would’ve relied on me being able to focus on how small her bed was. That wasn’t easy to do when I couldn’t pay much attention to anything other than the pain radiating from her body. She’d stopped crying before I made it to her, but the evidence of painful sobs remained.
Her eyes were red-rimmed and swollen.
Her strawberry-blonde locks looked like they’d been attacked by clawed fingers.
Her energy levels were at a discouragingly low level, as evidenced by how little fight she’d put up when I carried her up the steps. I went right past Chrom, Baron, and Erik to do so, and she hadn’t offered up a complaint.
Hell, she hadn’t spoken this whole time either.
But Renata was good for something every now and then. She’d given me the cliff notes and I’d filled in the pieces afterward.
Although, I almost wished I hadn’t.
Staring at the whole picture made some things horrifyingly apparent.
Namely, that the reason she sat curled up against me, half-lifeless, was my fault and I didn’t know how to tell her.
I knew how much this class meant to Emily. From the day she got confirmation that Alyssa Stone was back in the country and that things would be moving forward, it’d been all she talked about. She’d been all rainbows and sunshine the last time I saw her.
Now that excitement was nothing more than ash beneath a blaze I’d unintentionally started years ago.
“You’ve been quiet,” I said softly, brushing her hair back so I could peer at the side of her face. Her eyes were closed, breathing even, but the flutter of her lashes told me she was awake and listening. “Am I going to have to start calling you Cupcake again to get a response?”
Her hand gripped the fabric of my shirt in a quick squeeze and let go. Otherwise, she remained nearly comatose.
Fuck!
There weren’t many things I couldn’t accomplish, but I couldn’t fix this and it was eating me alive by the minute. What could I say to bring back the indignant girl who refused to deal with my shit? How could I pull her from this spiral when I’d never managed to do the same for myself?
Unless I came clean...
No. I pressed my lips to her cheek. That’s a last resort.
My mind spun before latching onto another secret I was keeping. It had seemed like a fantastic idea on the day of, but didn’t so many things? I was sure early pioneers who went into the Bermuda Triangle and never returned figured they were making the right choice as well until they found themselves stranded, their fates in the hands of destiny.
“Dylan Oliver,” I said softly.
The slightest tilt of her head translated her interest. When her mouth opened and raspy words emerged, I was positive that an angelic choir couldn’t have sounded better than her voice did to my ears right then.
“What about him?” she asked.
I shrugged, pushing aside the desire to snatch the name from the air and pretend this never happened. But I couldn’t leave her in this twilight state either. She was too vibrant to let slip through my fingers.
Maybe she needed time.
Maybe I was about to poke at something I shouldn’t.
Maybe a bit of peace and quiet would let her come to terms with the direction her life was taking.
Except I couldn’t wait for those maybes. Without my noticing, she’d become more than just someone I enjoyed. I needed her here with me, and I was nothing if not a selfish bastard.
I ran my fingers through her soft hair, wondering if this would be the last time I’d be able to do so as the words left my mouth. “I broke his legs.”
Emily stilled, glancing up at me. Her eyes flicked between mine, searching for a lie she wouldn’t find.
“This isn’t the time for jokes, Ro.”
“I know that. That’s why I’m not joking.”
She slid from my lap so she could sit up on the bed and I missed her presence immediately. Confusion gradually turned to irritation, twisting her lips as her fingers curled in the sheets. Her head tilted and she pulled her bottom lip between her teeth, biting down on it.
“Wait a second,” she murmured, looking around. “Danika tried to call me earlier, but I was kinda freaking out. Where’s my phone?”
I grabbed it from the table beside me and passed it to her. Her silence as she unlocked it and started swiping worried me, but when I grabbed her free hand and she didn’t pull away a bit of hope returned.
Maybe she won’t kick my ass for this?
Emily put her phone on speaker as the line rang.
“There you are!” said the feminine voice that answered a moment later. Danika, I was assuming. “Let somebody go off to a big ol’ fancy college and she forgets how to answer her dang phone! I’ve been callin’ you all day!”
“I know, I know.” Emily brushed her hair back from her face, glancing at the phone and then at me. “Look, there’s something I need to run by you really quick. Afterward, I’m all yours. But have you heard anything...weird about Dylan recently?”
“That’s what I’ve been trying to call you about!” Danika shrieked at a decibel my ears weren’t ready for. “You’re not going to believe this. He—”
Emily’s eyes flashed to mine as she said, “Broke both his legs?”
“That was...a hell of a guess, actually. How’d you know? I just found out this morning.”
My thumb swept over her knuckles and she sighed, drifting closer to me with a small smile that did fucked up things to my chest.
“Word traveled through the grapevine,” she told her friend. “Do you know what happened?”
“Not really.” The sound of heavy metal crashed throu
gh the speaker before being cut off. “Can you not, Carter? Can’t you see I’m on the dang phone?”
Emily did another curious head tilt and I immediately wondered who Carter was and if he also needed to have several limbs broken. I tapped her on the thigh, but she held up a finger.
Another voice came through the line from farther away. “You talkin’ to Sweet Tooth? She finally checked her shit?”
“Sweet Tooth,” I mouthed to Emily.
I was positive there wasn’t anything funny about the expression I wore, but she snickered and shook her head. What that was supposed to mean I had no idea.
“How’s it going, Carter?” She pushed at me when I reached for the phone.
As if she could really hold me off.
“Yeah,” I growled, swiping the phone and holding it out as she lunged across me for it. “How’s it going...Carter?”
A pause followed on the other end of the line, disrupted by Emily shouting, “Ignore him! He’s more temperamental than a cat sometimes.”
Laughter floated through.
“Let me guess,” said soon-to-be-dead Carter, “you’re the reason that cunt Dylan is acting like he wrecked his bike and somehow broke both his legs in the process?”
There was genuine animosity in his voice when he said Dylan’s name, and my blood pressure lowered to non-eruption levels.
The enemy of my enemy wasn’t my friend. Not when he had a nickname for my girl.
But maybe I’d toss some water on him if he caught fire.
Maybe.
Emily snatched the phone while I was distracted but she didn’t retreat. Instead, she climbed onto my lap and walked the fingers of her free hand back and forth across my chest. My hands found her hips like they were returning home after a long time away.
“So it’s true,” she said. “This actually happened.”
“Would I lie to you about this?” Danika asked.
Emily shrugged, then seemed to remember they couldn’t see her. “No one told me you two started getting along, either. So, I figured I’ve missed a lot.”
I could’ve heard a pin drop if I cared about anything other than the smile on her face as she held a finger to her lips. It was easy enough to find myself grinning along with her. Why did it not surprise me that finding a chance to fuck with somebody else was the thing to bring her out of her funk?
A muted back and forth occurred on the other end of the line. While they argued, I sat up, brushing Emily’s hair over her shoulder so I could rake my teeth along that spot. She sucked in a sharp breath, hand gripping my hair to tug me away. I bit down harder instead, dick twitching at her low, husky groan.
Carter came back on first. “We were gonna tell you. It kinda...came out of nowhere.”
“Is that a case of nerves I’m hearing from you?” Emily rolled her hips and I cursed under my breath. “Good. Does this mean I can skip the part where I threaten to cut your fucking balls off and mail them to another country if you hurt her?”
“Please don’t,” came Danika’s giggling voice in the background. “He’s in the doghouse for tellin’ you before we agreed on it, but he might need those at some point.”
Emily snorted. “Guys, look. I really don’t care. But I don’t need a play by play either. I just needed to confirm that that loser was in serious pain.”
“Trust us,” Carter said. “He’s not gonna be strollin’ around like a badass anytime soon, that’s for sure.”
“Great. Talk to y’all soon.”
She hung up and leaned over me once more to put the phone back. I couldn’t help but bury my face in her chest and enjoy the feeling of pillowy softness cradling my head. Who could blame me? She had amazing tits.
Emily sat back on my lap, cupping my face with her hands.
“You are too much, Ambrose LaCroix,” she said softly. “Sometimes, I don’t know what I’m going to do with you.”
We can figure it out horizontally, was what I wanted to say.
But while her body responded to mine—I could feel the heat of her pussy through our clothing—a tinge of sadness remained within those vivid blue eyes.
So instead of rolling her over on the bed and consuming her the way I wanted to, I brought our faces closer together. “I’ll get you back in that class, Em, no matter what strings I have to pull.”
“Promise me something,” she breathed against my lips, nose brushing mine.
“Anything,” I said. And meant it.
“Don’t get involved.”
I blinked and shook my head like I was trying to dislodge water from my ears. Was early hearing loss common on one side of the family and I didn’t know about it? Because I could’ve sworn she just told me not to get involved with the only thing she truly cared about.
What. The. Fuck?
“I think I heard you wrong,” I said carefully. “You mean, ‘Fix this now and make that bitch pay in the process,’ don’t you?”
Her cheeks twitched. “It doesn’t say great things about my morals, but I appreciate what you did to Dylan. That asshole didn’t get a slap on the wrist and I can’t even walk for long periods of time without thinking of him. But this is my thing, Ro. My dream. When my dad kicked me out of his life without looking back, he changed things forever. I refuse to count on other people’s generosity or connections. If I can’t make it happen myself then...”
I sighed, squeezing her tight as my eyes closed. “Then you’re worried it can all be taken away again.”
“And they say you can’t do anything but scowl and look intimidating.”
“Who says that? I’ll—”
Her finger landed on my lips. “Only a joke. Don’t go all Death on me.”
“I still don’t like this.” It’s my fault you’re in this situation. “If you give me a chance, I’m sure I can fix it.”
Emily kissed me, slow and sweet. “And I’m telling you”—her tongue brushed against my lips and fled before I could catch it—”stay out of it.”
“I sense an or else coming.”
“There doesn’t need to be one as long as you do what I say.”
Can I fix this without her knowing? Unlikely.
A knock sounded at the door before Chrom shouted, “Hey, lovebirds! Hate to interrupt the fuckfest but Lake just called. They’ve got the watch and want to meet up.”
“We’ll be there in a minute,” Emily answered for me.
Chrom laughed. “Lord help us, y’all are already becoming we people. Is this catching? Should I worry about breathing the same air?”
“What about him?” I asked Emily. “Can I fix him so he stops talking?”
“I heard that! You’re hurting my feelings.”
Groaning, I sat up. “Let’s just get this over with before I kill him.”
Chrom and Emily had polished off most of an extra-large pizza while we waited for Lake and Fletcher.
I’d spent most of my time watching them go at it in an attempt to understand where the hell it was all going. Chrom, I understood. If he didn’t get scouted for the NFL—unlikely, given how impressive he was on the field—he’d have no problem becoming a professional eater.
It was Emily that held my focus. I’d never seen anyone so small put away so much food. Watching her lick sauce from her fingers as she glanced over at me would’ve made my night if she hadn’t followed it by plucking a fallen pineapple from her plate and throwing it in her mouth.
My nose curled.
She cackled, drawing eyes to our table that quickly fled at my glare.
“I can’t believe you have a vendetta against pineapples,” Emily said, wiping her hands clean.
“There’s no vendetta,” I grumbled. “Cold fruit doesn’t belong on hot pizza. It just doesn’t.”
Chrom belched like a pig and leaned back in the booth. “Don’t waste your breath on this one. I’m positive his forked tongue has fucked up taste buds.”
“That’s rich coming from somebody who drenches everything in hot sauce.”
; “What can I say?” He winked. “I like my food just as spicy as I am.”
That doesn’t even make sense.
The door to the pizzeria opened, sparing me from acknowledging that idiocy as Lake and Fletcher stepped through, looking more put out than usual as they searched the crowd and found us near the back.
They’d been amenable enough when we spoke about where to meet, so I didn’t understand what had crawled up their asses and died in the meantime until a pretty girl with short, curly hair and brown skin a few shades darker than Lake’s stepped in behind them.
Chrom sat up straighter at the sight of Megan. And if I noticed, Lake definitely fucking noticed the way my friend eyeballed his sister as they approached. Sure enough, another notch etched itself between Lake’s brows.
Emily pressed her lips to my ear and whispered, “What’s with the new tension?”
I gave a light shrug and squeezed her thigh beneath the table. Wasn’t like I had an answer in the first place. Just suspicions.
Lake and Fletcher stomped the whole way, barbarians barely chained into civility by the audience. They loomed over the table, glaring. I raised a brow, but my body was tense. If they wanted to throw a fist, I had no issue with it. We’d fought before and I found it likely we’d find a reason to fight again.
But as Fletcher clenched and relaxed his fists, each breath coming harsher than the last, I met Lake’s stare and tipped my head towards the girl tucked into my side before baring my teeth in something that could never be called a smile.
The message was clear.
We can throw down without breaking the truce. But if she gets caught in the crossfire, all bets are off.
Lake’s gaze slid to Megan as she pushed through them and slid into the booth. He released a heavy sigh, and I knew the message was received when he clapped Fletcher on the shoulder and stole a spot beside her.
“We get it,” Emily chimed in when Fletcher didn’t move. “You’re pissed off and scary. Can you be pissed off and scary while sitting down before my neck starts to hurt?”
Grunting, he sat his ass down and my fingers circled Emily’s knee in appreciation. That’s the girl who’d smashed a cupcake into my chest the second time we met. Damn, it was nice to have her back.
Defiant Prince: An Enemies-to-Lovers Romance (Black Rose University Book 1) Page 29