by Amanda Heath
I open my eyes, about to turn over and kiss him, when I see the time on his alarm clock. “Oh my god!” I exclaim shooting up in his bed. “I’m going to be late for school.” I nearly fall on my face when I launch myself out of the bed.
Royal, who is suddenly moving at the same fast pace as me, gets out of bed and races to his closet. “I so forgot it’s Monday.” His face appears from around the door and he grins. “You really shouldn’t be keeping me in bed like this. I’ll think you’re into me.”
I roll my eyes as I pull on my jeans from two days before. “Whatever! You’re the one who talked me into staying the night. And then the next night.” Then I point my finger at him. “You promised you would set the alarm!”
He frowns then and disappears into the closet again. “I swear I did. But then I remember you showing some nipple and I forgot.” His voice floats out of the closet on an air of laughter.
I roll my eyes again. “It’s not my fault my nipples are so awesome.” Then I laugh myself. What a change in one night. Two days ago, I was afraid that if I laughed, I would be killed by lightning. Now all I want to do is spend another day in Royal’s bed. And laugh my ass off at his humor and good nature.
I’m just getting my shirt over my head when he comes out of the closet. “We really need showers, but if we take those, then we won’t have any time.” His smile is cheeky and I answer him with my own. His hands land on my hips when he reaches me and he leans down to press a kiss to my face. “I want you to run home and change. I’ll meet you at the front of the school with bagels. Then after school you’re coming over here and getting in the shower with me.” He kisses my neck this time before looking at me from under his lashes.
I kiss his lips, gently. They are swollen after all. “That sounds amazing.” I grab my shoes off the floor and head to his closed bedroom door.
His voice stops me from opening it. “Then we can talk about us. Because I don’t know about you, but I’m not real sure what’s going on between us.”
I turn to face him and take in the scared look on his face. What he is scared of, I don’t know. “That sounds good, too.” Then I leave.
***
“Did you spend all night getting laid?” a high-pitched voice asks me next to my locker.
I jump about ten feet in the air. Rachel has opened her locker door and is in the process of getting all her books together. I was too busy eating my bagel and trying to remember what class I have first period to even notice her approach. “What?” I stammer out.
She purses her lips and glares. “Don’t be dense, Wesley. I asked you if you had sex all night. Your hair is all over the place and your lips are so swollen I think I can pop them with my pencil.” Then she starts tapping her foot and I know I’m going to lie. “You know the funny thing about it is, when I left for school this morning, there was a Kia parked in my driveway. The same Kia that was there when I got home last night.” She pauses and taps her index finger on her chin. “Plus I saw it parked at my house two days ago. And Royal also has swollen lips and this hickey on his shoulder he didn’t think I saw.”
I blink a few times, wondering when Rachel became so…perceptive. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” It sounds weak, even to my own ears.
This is when she puts her hands on her hips and I feel like she might hit me. “Just admit it. Just admit my stupid brother is fucking the enemy and he won’t even let me have a boyfriend. I mean seriously. That’s another thing you probably didn’t know. Royal calls me when I’m even a minute late from when I say I’ll be home. He doesn’t get drunk at parties because he’s too busy following me around. And if he hears a noise in the middle of the night, he automatically comes to check if I have a dude in my bed.” She huffs and looks around the hallway. “Look, I don’t care if you’re fucking him, honestly. He’s been acting like a lovesick puppy since you started tutoring him. I’m actually rooting for the two of you. But I’m worried about the aftermath when Pierce finds out. And I won’t tell him, if you keep a secret for me.”
I move my head to the side slowly, and then I move it to the other side slowly. Did that sound right to you? Because it didn’t sound right to me. “You want me to keep a secret so you’ll keep my secret? How does that work exactly?”
“Ugh, Wesley. I swear you are making this harder than it has to be. I can’t tell anyone this secret because I don’t trust anyone enough to. I’d tell Paisley, but she’s got this best friend in bum-fucking nowhere she is more loyal to. We are friends, but I just tell her the gossip because she’s too introverted to see it herself.” She shuts her locker door and leans against it. The first bell rings and everyone runs to get to class. The two of us just stand there. “You want to go sit in my car? I hate my first period.”
I nod. “Yeah, at this point I can’t remember what I have for first period.” Then I smile.
Rachel grimaces and leads the way to her car, her designer purse hanging at her elbow. “You are going to make me sick. I’ll help you with relationship problems with Royal, but I won’t talk about the sex. Thinking about him having sex is enough to make me want to kill myself.”
“You’re really dramatic,” I tell her, smiling as she opens the front doors to the school.
“You’d be dramatic too, if your twin brother was stuck up your butt and your parents were pretty much nonexistent in your life.” We stop at a blue Mercedes, one of the SUV kind.
I climb into the passenger seat as she gets in the drivers. “My dad works for the mob, and my mom’s a lawyer. But they are still in my life, sometimes too much. What could yours possibly do that they ignore their children?”
“My mom is a shrink. She works at the Meadows Mental Hospital, has for ten years. And that place is up the road. She is always there! I’m even like ‘Mom come have dinner with me for like five minutes.’ She’s like, ‘Okay honey.’ And never show up. My dad is a surgeon in Dallas. He has a better excuse, because he’s always sewing someone back together. My mom doesn’t have patients all day every day.” Tears start to leak down her face and I grab her hand. Sometimes being there for someone else is as easy as saying my name.
“I can’t tell you what their problem is. I don’t know you that well, and sometimes I want to hit you, but that shouldn’t matter to your parents. Royal is amazing and they don’t spend time with him either. I’ve had to be there for him while he was upset about them. All I can tell you is, you’re going to have to realize that they aren’t going to be around. If you’ve tried everything you can, then they aren’t meant to be great parents. At least you have Royal. He could be absent too. He cares enough about you to protect you from his species.” We both laugh and I can see her working things over in her head.
“I know all this. It just hurts. Anyway, I’m supposed to tell you about my secret.” Then she pauses and looks at me, her eyes intense. “The real reason I want to tell you is, I figure you’re going to be around from now on. I’ve never seen my brother like this. Yeah he sleeps around, but I’ve never seen him take a girl to his room, let alone stay with her for an entire night. Then make plans to see her after school, after spending the previous day with her. I think you’re going to get him to commit. And I want us to get along, to be sisters.” She looks out the windshield and nods, like she’s come to a conclusion in her head.
The things she’s just revealed about her brother would have scared me before yesterday. Because I’ve already slept in his room, long ago. And he’s made plans with me plenty of times after seeing me the previous day. And while I’ll always love Trey, I know it’s time to move on. I want to be with Royal, as more than friends who have sex. I want to hold his hand walking down the hallway. I want go out on dates and cuddle on the couch watching movies I’ve already seen a hundred times. I want him to look at me with that rapture in his eyes while he’s above me, showing me heaven.
“I want us to be friends, too. I really like Royal. I think it might be really good for me to be with him,” I tell her softly. An
d while I might always think Rachel’s selfish and vapid, I get along with Annabella fine for the most part. That’s why they hate each other. They are pretty much the same person.
“Good.” Then she squeezes her eyes shut and grips the steering wheel hard. “I’ve been sleeping with Kellan Dean for the past three weeks.”
“One of Paisley’s cousins? The one who doesn’t have his tongue down Lola’s throat every minute of every day?” I’m pretty sure I know which one she’s talking about. Kellan Dean and Brody Vaughn are cousins to Paisley Vaughn. Also cousins to each other. They hang out with Channing. I’d consider them third and fourth hand man.
She nods and bites her lip, looking over at me. “He’s terrified to tell Royal, like Royal might beat the shit out of him. Now my brother has a few issues, but he’s not violent. The whole protective thing comes from childhood trauma. He kicked me out of a tree when we were five and I broke my leg. Now he won’t let me out of his sight when guys are around. My mom might be a horrible parent but she is a wonderful shrink.”
I laugh at her wink. “At least he felt bad about kicking you out of a tree. He could have thought it was funny.”
She shakes her head. “Bull. The bone was poking out. It was fucking gross.” Then she points to a scar on her shin, and a shiver crawls down my spine. “Right? I still see it in my dreams sometimes. At least I know never to be a surgeon like my dad. I’d be tossing my cookies left and right.”
We are quiet for a little while, reflecting on the conversation we’ve had. “I’m glad we did this, Rachel. I just don’t want you to get offended if I ignore you in front of Pierce and Annabella. I love Ashley and everything, but it’s just not my fight. And I’ve been stuck with them for my entire life. And if I have to fight with anyone, it’ll be you.”
She nods along before replying. “That will be fun! We can so fake catfight and stuff! Royal will love that.” Then she giggles and I find she might be slightly evil.
Chapter Seventeen
After my weird talk with Rachel, I figured out which classes I needed to attend. And it goes to show you how much my friends notice things. Rachel, who hasn’t spent her life looking at me¸ noticed I looked…different. Annabella and Pierce? No clue. They went about their own lives like nothing whatsoever was different about me. I almost went right up to Royal’s table at lunch and sat in his lap. Then maybe they would have noticed.
Last period had turned into a freak show. Rachel made funny faces at me behind her brother’s back. Royal pretended not to look at me, but his eyes always seemed to make it back to me. I didn’t mind because I like his eyes on me. Pierce and Annabella were too busy to notice anyway. This time it wasn’t because they were shoved up each other’s asses. No, apparently there is a big test in their Calculus class tomorrow, so they actually studied the whole period.
I was so ready to leave by the end of class, I shot out of my chair the second the bell rang. I was so excited to get to Royal’s house and take a shower. It was seriously hard this morning not to take one, but I really didn’t have the time. Which turned out to be stupid because I skipped first period anyway. I did put on tons of deodorant and perfume so I wouldn’t smell. And I know you’re sitting there with your nose scrunched up. Stop, because I totally took a shower yesterday at Royal’s. So I haven’t been sitting in my own stink for over twenty-four hours.
Right now, Royal has me pinned up against his shower wall. His hands are pressed into my butt, so he can hold me steady. His thrusts are hard and fast, coming at an even faster rate as I find my release. Stars shoot out behind my closed eyelids and I feel him jerk, getting off with me. His warm lips burn against my skin as they kiss a trail down my neck. “That just keeps getting better and better,” he murmurs, his breaths still coming out short.
I laugh and kiss his pec and lean my head against him. The water gets cold, so we just turn it off. “I think that happens when you have chemistry with someone,” I tell him, just as breathless as he is.
He opens the shower door and walks out. A second later a towel ends up in my eyesight and I take it. I wrap it around my torso as another one extends into the shower stall. I use that one to wrap around my hair. “I wouldn’t know, Duchess. I haven’t ever had this with anyone else.”
I smile, a big goofy grin. It’s nice to hear he hasn’t done this with anyone else. “Well you are handling it like a champ. You know what to say, even when you don’t mean to,” I tell him, finally stepping out of the shower.
He’s standing in front of his mirror, rubbing his towel over his hair. He has on black basketball shorts and nothing else. “What can I say, I’m good like that.” He gives me a fake cocky smile and I laugh.
I walk up behind him and wrap my arms around his stomach. I kiss the center of his back, mainly because I can’t reach higher up. “Do you really want to be with me?” I ask softly, my voice shaky.
His shoulders stiffen and I feel my stomach drop. He turns around and puts his hands on my hips. He picks me up and swings me around until my butt lands on the counter by the sink. His fiery brown eyes bore into mine. I don’t know what he’s searching for, but I know when he finds it. His entire body relaxes and he kisses my forehead. “To be honest, I haven’t wanted anything this much in a long time.”
I look up at him and grin. “I can’t remember the last time I wanted anything. And I know I want this, but before we do, I have to say goodbye to someone.”
Royal kisses my lips, sucking the bottom one into his mouth. His hands skim up and down my back. “I know you need to. And I know I’ll be right here when you get done.”
“You’re too good to be true,” I tell him, tears shining in my eyes.
His smile is small and barely lifts the side of his mouth. “I like what we have, Wes. I’m not going to screw it up by pushing you into anything. I can see the guilt in your eyes, girl. I know you think you’re hurting him by being with me, but you’re wrong. If he truly loved you, he would want you to be happy. And I know you’ll be happy with me. You just have to let him go first. He would want that.” He lifts my chin until my head is tilted all the way back. His lips hover over mine but he doesn’t kiss me. “I want you to know that I’ll wait for you. Always. I have to say that because when I look in your eyes, I see everything. I have hope you won’t freak out on me, but when it comes down to it, holding on to him means so much to you. And I can tell you until I’m blue in the face, that you don’t have to hold on to him, but you won’t listen. You have to want to let him go. And I’m hoping with all my heart, that you do it.”
I stare into his eyes, my own filled with confusion. Right here and now I want to let Trey go. I want to be with Royal. I want the kind of love I had with Trey again. And I know in my heart I could have that with Royal. But I’ve had this hold on Trey for so long, it’s become a third arm. How can I truly let that go?
“Are you two done in there? I really want to spend some girl time with Wesley!” Rachel yells like a banshee from inside Royal’s bedroom.
“What the fuck, Rach? I thought you were going to Paisley’s!” Royal yells back just as loud. I want to laugh because I have a feeling they yell like this a lot.
I hear something hit the bathroom door, but I have no idea what. “Royal Duke Sanders, you let that girl out of the bathroom. You can fuck her later. I want girl time with my new bestie!” Then something else hits the door.
“If you don’t stop throwing my shoes at the door I’m coming out naked!” This makes Rachel shriek before we hear the bedroom door slam. Royal looks down at me with a new question in his eyes. “Want to tell me what that was about?”
I shrug. I really need to learn not to shrug so much. It makes me look dumb. “Apparently there was a black mold breakout in her locker hallway. They moved her’s next to mine. She saw my car here last night…and this morning. So we started talking about that. And now it seems we are besties.” I want to laugh at his expression, but I refrain. “I actually like her, if that makes you feel better. You seem pr
otective of her, so don’t get all freaked out. It’s perfectly fine for your future girlfriend to be friends with your sister.”
One of his eyebrows raise. “Future girlfriend? That sounds like a promise.” Then he kisses my cheek and moves away from me. “Okay, I won’t trip about y’all being friends. Just don’t tell me what she says. Rachel hasn’t ever had a filter and most times I can’t stomach the shit she says about guys.” Then he shudders before leaving the bathroom.
I grab my bag off the counter and pull out clothes. I’m not staying the night, but I really wanted clean clothes to put on.
When I exit the bathroom, Royal sits at his computer desk, typing away. “You want to study later? We haven’t gone over your history in a while, and I don’t want you to get rusty.”
He turns in his chair, a huge grin on his face. “Will you take off a piece of clothing every time I get something right?”
I give him a sly grin. “Sure. I’ll even do that thing with my tongue if you get every question right.”
He stands up and walks over to me. He holds his hand out and I giggle. “It’s a deal, Bridges.”
“See you in an hour, Sanders.” I kiss his bare shoulder and head out to find Rachel. I’m not sure where her room is.
Turns out I didn’t have to wonder for long. She stands in a doorway, a nail file in her hand. “Took you long enough. I was about to come bang on the door again.” She looks up from her nails and gives me an evil grin. “You really shouldn’t fuck so much. You’re skinny enough as it is. I really don’t want to have to worry about you dying from starvation.”
“You have a way with words, Rachel. I don’t know whether to hit you or feel joy that you’re worried,” I tell her, walking past her to get inside her room.
“I don’t like to worry about anyone but Royal, so you should feel honored.” Rachel’s room is way plainer than I would have thought. The bedspread on her bed is a light pink, which matches the walls. She has white furniture, which includes a dresser, desk and chair, entertainment center, and a couch. The curtains are white, but the carpet is fluffy and pink. Her TV, incidentally, is pink, but I find that cute. “I take that back. I worry over Kellan, but that’s only because his mom is a straight up bitch. I think that’s why we bonded in the first place. My mom isn’t around and his tries to control his entire life. I even think she hits him.” She plops down on her bed and starts pinching the bedspread between her fingers. “He has these bruises sometimes, you know, when we do it. They are on his arms but he says they are from messing around with Brody.”