Wrecked: A Novel (Charming Knights Book 1)

by Shana Vanterpool

  In the front seat, she sobbed, hiding her face in her hands. “I’m so sorry, Cage.”

  “Don’t be sorry, Hallie. Just be mine. It’s easier on both of us.”

  Accepting your cage made it easier to want what was within, instead of always wondering what was on the other side of the bars.

  11. PART OF THE STARS

  Hallie

  I wasn’t in the mood to party.

  Wreck put his walls back up and stood guard outside his castle, his shield ready. Was it possible to not know someone you grew up with? I didn’t know this man. I thought I had him all figured out. I was wrong. I didn’t know how I’d never seen the perseverance and sacrifices he’d made before. Or how I overlooked a man fighting so many battles at once, most of which weren’t even his.

  His pain was eye opening.

  I felt atrocious knowing he’d struggled for over four years with something so dark on his own. He could defend it in his head, make sense of it any way he could, but I knew the truth from my end. He was raped. I felt the tears bubble in my throat once more. Not anymore. He’d never fight on his own anymore. I waged a new war. It wasn’t about just getting what I wanted, it was about giving him what he needed.

  “You ready?” His eyes flashed in the dark.

  When we left the car, I wiped my face clean and let my expression go with it. I knew how to do this. To be what others saw and embrace my nothing.

  Sparrow Cliff felt like it deserved a secret invitation. There were only seniors, and they weren’t all here. I spotted the Charming Knights scattered in the crowd, along with a peppering of Charmant’s future trophy wives and their husbands. Music played, interweaving the sound between the cliff and the trees growing out of the crag. Picnic benches made of solid wood were covered in food and alcohol spilled out of coolers around the cliff.

  There was a different energy on this bluff. I knew with absolute certainty nothing that happened here tonight would leave this cliff. Not that couple making out wildly in front of anyone, not the bottle of whiskey being passed around, or the musk of marijuana smoke wafting above the trees.

  It felt dangerous here. Electric. Spilling with life.

  I wanted to live.

  “Wreck!” Rip roared, dancing with four different girls. He shot him a grin and winked.

  “He looks happy.”

  “He’s captain of the Charming Knights. Best player two years in a row. Killer stats. Scouts are going to be licking his jock strap to get him on their team. He’ll be great because he is, not because of his father’s influence. What’s not to be happy about?” He gave me a sad smile. “You want a beer? Sparrow Cliff is like Vegas. No one will say anything.”

  I lived in a circle, but tonight I was inside a smaller one I’d always wanted to peek into. “Sure. You’ve been to Vegas?”

  His grip tightened on mine and led me over to a cooler. “You’re probably a light beer girl.” He picked a lighter colored beer and used his keys to open it. “You do good here, we’ll go. Go crazy. Poker, sex, the strip, bad choices.”

  It was like he knew how I felt, how much my skin was buzzing. Even he looked younger. Less heavy. I took the beer and tasted it, finding it crisp and lime tasting. “So, this is a test?”

  “Always is for first timers.”

  “Right. I’ll, uh, try not to bitch too much about missing my bed time.”

  “That’s a good sport.” He tossed his beer back and lobbed the glass bottle into the trash can within reach, grabbing for another before I’d drank a quarter of mine. “You never go to sleep right away anyway.”

  I searched his gaze. With all his secrets, he probably had far more. “Your knowledge is starting to concern me.”

  He laughed, because he knew I should be concerned. “Pretty and smart.”

  “Wreck!” someone squealed. Trudy attacked him, flinging her arms around him. “I’m so glad you’re here. It’s not a cliff party without you.”

  He hugged her back with one arm, offering a smile that was so handsome I almost believed it. Until I saw his eyes dull. He was in costume tonight. I should be too. “Can’t really remember the last one, but.” He shrugged, making her laugh knowingly. “I think that might’ve been the point.”

  “Shot train?”

  This time, when he grinned, I believed him. “Choo choo, Trudy.”

  She was still giggling when she pulled him away to a table of all women. She and Wreck poured a shot into a glass and put the glasses into their mouths. Trudy gave her friend a thumbs up. When her friend said, “Go!” she and Wreck started at opposite ends pouring shot after shot into the waiting women’s mouth, working their way through them to the center as fast as they could. Wreck was eerily good at it. Never missing, always getting the alcohol into his glass and into theirs. When he won, he slammed the shot glass on the ground and put his hands in the air. “What? Yeah!” he shouted, earning cheers and laughs.

  Holy crap he was good at this. He looked fun and charmingly sexy.

  “Where’s my prize?” he teased.

  Trudy rolled her eyes, but she so obviously wanted to give him one. She pushed him down on the bench and tucked a shot glass into her cleavage, filling it with brown booze. Then she grinned and tipped it into his mouth, spilling a little on his chin. He swallowed it all. And the entire time he was the Wreck I never wanted to know.

  Funny how a little insight changed my perception and emotions.

  I knew him now and wanted far more.

  “Rematch,” she demanded. I took that as my cue to find something new to stare at.

  “No, you don’t,” someone chastised, pulling me away from a lone park bench. “You’ve got to exist tonight, Hallie. Wreck put himself on the line to get you here. I mean, I guess you could have come anyway, but none of them would have showed up. Drink. Mingle. Talk. I know you can fake this shit if he brought you here. Wreck isn’t stupid.”

  Rip dared me to deflect with his deep green eyes. His tanned skin and black hair reminded me of a Disney Prince. A startlingly handsome fantasyland with all the right angles, and his voice was so deep I felt it when he talked. It wasn’t surprising that he got all the girls. He was insanely gorgeous.

  Which proved that good looks didn’t emit lust or even like. Attraction meant not focusing on your fake boyfriend taking shots with other women like he hadn’t turned me upside down all day.

  “Dance with me?” Rip started bobbing his head to a Katy Perry song. He leaned in and put his mouth close to my ear. “You want something to loosen you up?”

  “So I can wake up with a face tat and a strange baby? No, thank you. Hangover,” I explained, when he frowned. “The movie.”

  “Ah, got it. Not sure it was funny, but you’ll get funnier with a few more of these.” He guided me over and pulled out a new beer.

  “This feels like a scary accurate PSA about peer pressure. Are there men with clipboards in the bushes?”

  “No, just horny high school kids.”

  I shuddered. “I think that might be scarier.”

  He chuckled, eyes lighting with humor. “Restart this song, Emmie!” he called. “Chug your beer and get your hot ass over here.”

  “Secret? This is my favorite song.”

  “Then dance,” a familiar voice murmured, as Firework by Katy Perry restarted twice as loud, Trudy in tow.

  Screw it. I chugged my beer and threw the bottle in the trash and joined their flailing bodies. I knew every word. No use in pretending. I joined them at the hook, singing as loud as Emmie, a pretty mouse of a girl with huge brown eyes and dark hair. I thought her father was an architect. I felt the song, lived the words. Somehow, I ended up facing Wreck, and he grabbed my arms, lifting them in the air with our fingers tangled, hooded eyes holding mine the entire time we danced. Even when we got separated, he knew where I was. He felt like an anchor. I could have fun, because Wreck was there to watch my back. I tossed my head back and joined Rip’s crazy dance moves, laughing when he started shaking his ass.

/>   When the song shifted, he shouted, and everyone groaned. 24K Magic by Bruno Mars was made for him. I laughed at his friend’s groans and joined him. He guided me in front of him and grabbed my hands, grinding against me to the beat like he’d done this way too many times before.

  “Candy time!” Emmie shouted, disengaging herself from Wreck, who was staring at me like I was disemboweling him.

  “You know, as kids, we weren’t even allowed to look at you. Freshman year, gym, you bent over, and I may have noticed. I still can’t bend right without hurting the two ribs he broke with his elbow.”

  “That’s a nice story.” I disengaged from his hold and his chuckle, going to my weird kind of fake boyfriend who may or may not really be in love with me. “He’s your friend, Cage. I know and respect that.” I hugged my arms around his waist and gazed up at him from under my lashes. “You really broke two of his ribs just for checking out my ass?”

  That made his lips twitch. He pushed my hair out of my face and cradled it between his grasp. “You in the mood for a sugar buzz?”

  “Something tells me you’re not talking about Swedish Fish.”

  “No, my little star. I’m not. Ecstasy. Stay away from the blue ones if you do decide to partake.”

  “Are you going to do it?”

  “I have to,” he said simply, bringing me over to the group. “It’s a hill party.”

  Jace Lyles was handing the pills out. They were in the shape of little knights on horses. They were all blue. Wreck took his and placed it on his tongue, eyes closing in a way that made me think he wanted to escape. It made me sad that he wanted to get high to find peace. I held my hand out quickly and threw the knight into my mouth and swallowed it before Wreck opened his eyes.

  From across the cliff, Storm emerged from the shadows, pale and gorgeous, the only junior at the party. His eyes met mine with a smirk. He tossed his own pill back and then disappeared into the crowd.

  “I’m kind of hungry.” The junk food was like a moth to a flame. I sank onto a bench in front of a bag of nacho cheese chips and guacamole. Wreck set down a beer and dug in alongside me; we tossed back chips with too much guac and drank our beers too fast.

  “You nervous?”

  “About what?”

  He gave me a look. “There’s nothing you don’t do that I’m not aware of.”

  Why did it always sound like he was privy to things he shouldn’t be, like I was a topic he studied endlessly? “What about my flatulence? You aware of that? Because guacamole gives me killer gas.”

  His brows shot up. “You too?”

  I giggled. “What is it going to feel like?”

  “The E? Up to you. You feel what you want to feel, but ten times stronger. It’s freedom inside of yourself. I can’t get high too much,” he said, giving me a knowing look. “But E’s cool every once in a while.”

  Rules and money… “I want to feel alive.”

  He swallowed the bite in his mouth and reached over to grab a napkin, wiping the cheese dust from his fingertips. “Then you will.”

  I wanted to tell him that he wasn’t responsible for my sense of life, but it was probably futile. He wasn’t responsible for my birthday, and he still made it better. He wasn’t responsible for Illa, and even though his motives were clearer now and neither of us probably had a choice, he still let me think he was. Because in some weird place in my heart, the burning in his eyes looked a lot like madness, and love was never far from madness.

  Peeking out the corner of my eye, I watched him peel back the label on a tub of spicy melted cheese sauce. The party was raging, and there were too many grinding body parts behind me to look too closely. He looked so… mine. In my little bubble, aware of my desires.

  I looked around and then leaned in. “Does it really make you horny?”

  He smiled softly and shook his head yes.

  “What’s that going to be like? You and me, both crazy horny, Vegas rules, an audience? Things are probably going to get naughty tonight, Wreck. And if it’s up to me, probably is more like will.”

  He sucked some cheese off his thumb and snatched up a pack of sour gummies. “You still want me?”

  “What do you mean?” I leaned to catch his gaze, but he seemed entirely focused on that damn cheese sauce. I knew a wall when I saw one. “Wreck, what does that mean? Tell me,” I urged softly, touching his face. I watched in surprise when he leaned into my touch like it was second nature. His stubble scraped against my palm as he nuzzled me. If I kissed him right now, we’d taste like cheese and spice. Tingles shot over my skin at the idea of our tongues being twisted and tangled. Hot, wet, dark passion.

  “Louanne,” he whispered, eyes closing in regret.

  My heart broke. That’s all it had been doing lately. “Cage, please look at me.” When he did, albeit sideways, I guided his face closer. “I want you because of you. Because of how you make me feel. I’d never not want you because of your past. If anything, it makes me want you more. To have been there when you needed me. To protect you.” I was struck by intense regret and sadness. It was so strong, I immediately understood his frustrations. “You’re right. Our first time should have been with each other. I’m so sorry.”

  His forehead came to rest against mine. His eyes were both broken and enraged. The real reason he’d never forgive me for Tristan didn’t really have anything to do with sex. It had to do with what he lost, and I gave away. That connection we’d never get back. We could never go back and share that together, but we could share other things.

  Not expecting an answer, I was unsurprised when he disengaged and resumed shoving food into his mouth, hiding behind his walls. I had to do something to fix this. We’d always come back here if he was still harboring his hurt. Trauma needed to be talked about, it needed to be set free. Owen may have gotten rid of the cause, but he didn’t do anything about his wounds. They were scars now, brutal ravished scars that tainted his expectations.

  A body sat across from us suddenly, tearing open the package of Oreos. Storm tossed two into his mouth and chewed happily. He looked far less empty this evening. Buoyant even. It made me suspicious.

  “How’s your night going, Ryder?” I snatched a couple cookies.

  He shrugged.

  “Doesn’t his lack of responses drive you crazy?”

  Wreck shrugged.

  My eyes twirled. I pushed away from the table, snatching up my beer. “Don’t talk each other’s ears off while I’m gone.”

  I stepped over a pair of naked legs and a condom wrapper—yay for safe sex—and scoured the crowd for a safe place to be by myself. Shouldn’t be surprised that it was on the edge of the cliff.

  I approached the edge of Sparrow Cliff and looked down into the cavernous darkness. Charmant twinkled gold far below us. The fall would last long enough to think. The air up on the cliff was ice, whipping between the crags and howling in the hollows. In the night, I couldn’t see the beginning or end of this city. It was oddly fitting for it. There was no beginning or end once you were inside, only a middle, and it was sticky and forever. I sank down carefully and slid closer to the edge, dropping my legs over; they dangled in the dark nothingness.

  It was about surviving now. My eighteen-year war had been futile. I don’t regret never wanting to be an empty vessel for Charmant’s loose change. But I had a feeling the real fight was just starting.

  Tingles traveled down my spine. I sat up straighter, rolling my neck from side to side. I knew why the Charming Knights picked Sparrow Cliff. It was on the edge when they were so stuck.

  “Uh-oh,” Rip said, sinking down beside me and dangling his feet over. “You’ve got that look on your face Wreck gets when he takes this shit.”

  “What look is that?”

  “The one I wear every day.” He tipped his beer back, pupils dilated when they landed on me. “You have a connection to yourself right now you can’t get sober. Let’s talk. It’s a fucking wet dream for me.” He leaned in and grinned when I did. “Hooking
up is cool. I’d take it over talking any day, but every once in a while, I want to talk, Hallie. Not just spit bullshit, but everyone’s too afraid to talk in this town. You’re not afraid, are you?”

  “We’re all afraid, Rip.” I took a drink, feeling my skin prickle all over, like warm fingers on my skin. It wasn’t unpleasant. “Some of us just know what we’re afraid of a little better than Trudy Lowell.”

  “You jealous?” This seemed to please him immensely. “Don’t be. She’s just a hook up. She knows it, that’s why she’s been glaring at you all night, but you’re too sweet to ever lessen yourself by reacting.”

  “Sweet Hallie. That’s me.” I slid further to the edge, peering between my thighs into the dark.

  “Didn’t look too sweet on the field earlier.”

  I blushed furiously, groaning into my hand. “Shut up, Geoff.”

  “Don’t be embarrassed. I’m a fan of public protests too.” His leery chuckle made me blush even harder.

  “Wreck!” I shouted, peering over my shoulder for him. He was still sitting on the benches, but he was facing my back now, gaze locked on me. “Come over here please, your friend is going to accidently end up on the other side of this cliff if he doesn’t shut up.”

  “Yes, dear,” Wreck murmured, making his teammates chuckle. He sat on my right, long legs plunging over the edge. “How do you feel?”

  “Tingly.”

  His fingertips slid up my forearm, making me shiver. I felt it everywhere. Rip touched my other forearm, both their strong male hands delicately igniting bumps and chills down my spine. I shoved Rip away and slid closer to my fake boyfriend.

  “Your tactile senses are heightened. Be careful on this cliff, please.”

  “Yes, dear.”

  “Get lost, Rip,” Wreck ordered.