Savage Royals

by Callie Rose

  “Have you ever killed someone?”

  His brows drew together at that, and my question seemed to have insulted him enough to finally draw him out of his silence.

  “No. Jesus. What the fuck kind of person do you think I am?”

  I decided there was no way to answer that without sounding like I was insulting him, so I shifted topics.

  “Why did you want to fight Preston?”

  Cole relaxed again, leaning into my touch slightly. I checked under the gauze, where the bleeding was finally slowing.

  “He insulted my family. Talked shit about my sister. I won’t stand for that.”

  My brows pulled together. He has a sister?

  That shouldn’t have surprised me. Had I really thought I knew everything there was to know about Cole Mercer?

  But what did surprise me was the warmth that spread through my chest at the way his tone changed when he mentioned her. His voice softened, becoming almost reverential, and without thinking, I reached up with my free hand to brush a few dark strands of hair off his forehead.

  His gaze jerked to me, blue eyes burning.

  Slowly, he reached up and tugged both my hands away from his face, pinning them to his chest. The gauze fell from my fingers as my palms splayed across his skin, and I could feel his heart beating hard beneath them, like it was trying to tell me something he couldn’t.

  “I know you think I’m a fucking monster, Legs,” he murmured. “But I fight for the people I care about. And I always will.”

  There was a hint of challenge in his voice, as if daring me to agree with his first statement, to disavow him as a brutal beast. Savage. Irredeemable.

  But in that moment, I couldn’t.

  In that moment, I couldn’t stop thinking about how much different my life might’ve been if I’d had someone who would fight like that for me.

  Someone who would do anything to protect me.

  And maybe it was that thought, or maybe it was the feel of his heart thudding beneath my hand, reminding me he wasn’t a machine but a very real, very human boy—but before I could stop myself, I leaned forward.

  He leaned in too, pressing his lips against mine, darting his tongue out to taste my skin.

  It started gentle, but it didn’t stay that way.

  With a rough groan, he released my hands and wrapped his arms around me, hauling me into his lap. My knees ended up on either side of his hips, bracing against the couch as he pulled me flush to him, his tongue delving into my mouth as his hands palmed my ass.

  I could feel him between my legs, growing hard and straining against the confines of his pants, and the flood of desire as he ground that hardness against me made me dizzy. My fingers delved into his hair, sliding through the short strands on the sides and grabbing fistfuls of the longer locks on top, as if I were trying to hold him in place so I could devour him.

  I’d never kissed like this before—never been kissed like this—with the kind of angry, urgent need that was almost painful. I gasped into his mouth, unable to pull in a full breath, as his large hands moved over my body, stoking the flame inside me higher and higher.

  His fingertips slipped under the hem of my shirt, and the second they came into contact with my bare skin, I whimpered, moving my hips against him.

  He deepened the kiss, sucking my tongue into his mouth before breaking away and trailing kisses over my jaw and neck.

  The musical chime of my phone ringing made me jerk, and we both froze.

  My heart thundered, and for a second, Cole and I stared at each other in silence, both seeming as shocked as the other at what we’d just been doing.

  Then my phone rang again, and I scrambled off his lap, diving for the other end of the couch to pick it up.

  “Hello?” I sounded breathless and weird.

  “Hey, Legs. Can you put Cole on? He’s not answering his phone. It must be on silent.”

  Mason’s voice was clipped and cool, and without a word, I handed the cell to Cole, who was watching me with an unreadable expression. His chest was still rising and falling fast too though, like he was as out of breath as I was.

  He narrowed his eyes as he accepted it, glancing down at the screen before putting it to his ear.

  “Yeah?” The room was quiet as he listened for a minute, then he nodded. “Okay. Good. And you don’t think he’ll say anything?” He listened, then huffed a short laugh. “Right. Thanks, Mace.”

  Swiping to end the call, he handed the phone back to me. I took it, and our fingertips brushed together as we both held still for a second. Then he released it and stood, picking up his discarded shirt from the end of the couch.

  “I better go.”

  He hesitated, staring at me with his lips slightly parted, like he wanted to say something else. Then he stepped forward and brushed his fingers through my hair, trailing them down the side of my face.

  “Thanks for patching me up,” he murmured roughly, even though I hadn’t done anything. The cut by his eye was still seeping slowly.

  I nodded, and he disappeared out the door.

  Chapter 21

  The next week was consumed by studying for tests and taking tests. Preston missed two days, but was back in class on Wednesday. Rumor around the school was that he’d gotten mugged in Roseland over the weekend, and no members of the fight club spoke up to correct that story.

  I hunkered down in my dorm to study, spending most of my free time there, but there was another reason I was avoiding the Princes, if I was honest with myself.

  That kiss.

  I didn’t know quite what to make of it, or what to do about it. The kiss itself had been amazing, but in the aftermath, I really didn’t know what it meant. Cole and I had kissed twice now, and the first time, he’d used it to hurt me, to twist a fucking dagger in my heart that’d wrecked me.

  This kiss hadn’t felt the same at all, but my self-preservation instincts still told me not to trust it.

  Not to believe the lie of how good his lips had felt.

  Not to get attached.

  But that didn’t stop me from replaying it in my head. Over and over.

  Neither of us mentioned it though, and I was almost certain he hadn’t told the other guys. If Finn had known, I definitely would’ve heard about it. That boy couldn’t keep any thought or feeling to himself for more than two seconds.

  Each of our midterms was two hours long, and they were staggered throughout the week. I wrote down the name of each class in block letters in my notebook and took vicious joy in crossing them out with a big red sharpie as I knocked out each one.

  By the time I emerged into the bright afternoon sunshine on Friday, my brain felt like mush. Finn was waiting for me outside Craydon Hall, and he wrapped an arm around me as he escorted me back toward my dorm.

  “You ready for tomorrow?” he asked.

  “Yeah. What time are we leaving?”

  “Probably like 11:30.”

  Elizabeth Thomas’s parents were in Spain for half the year, so she’d invited a bunch of kids to spend part of Spring Break at her house, which was about two hours up the coast.

  I was actually kind of excited, although nerves still jostled in my stomach. Adena and her friends were still bitchy and rude to me, but the rest of the student body had become welcoming and friendly. That overt friendliness still freaked me out a little, and I found myself hiding behind the Princes sometimes, using them to deflect would-be hangers on. They were better at dealing with that shit than I was.

  But they’d all be there, and even if Adena would be too, I felt confident I could handle her. Plus, I needed a break. It’d been a long time since I’d actually been able to take time off on school holidays instead of just picking up extra shifts at the diner, and my body felt like it was revolting, demanding a little rest and relaxation after the years of stress I’d put it through.

  Finn sighed as we rounded the corner of Hammond Hall, and I glanced up at him.

  “Rough midterms?”

  �
�Yeah.” He looked thoroughly disgruntled. “You could say that.”

  “You know, Finn, if you ever want help studying, I’d be happy to do it,” I offered, craning my neck to look up at him.

  I thought he might smile down at me with his lazy grin like he usually did, but instead, I felt his body stiffen next to mine.

  “Um. Yeah. Thanks, Legs. Maybe.” He stopped walking abruptly, his arm slipping away from me as I continued forward. When I turned toward him, he was already backing away, his jaw clenching slightly. “I gotta get back, but I’ll see you tomorrow, yeah? We’ll come get you. 11:30.”

  “Uh… okay.” I shrugged vaguely, watching as he turned and headed for his dorm.

  That was fucking weird.

  He wasn’t one of those guys who had a hard time with a girl being smarter than him, was he? Not that I was necessarily smarter—I just knew he’d struggled with finals last semester too, and if he needed help studying, or even a study buddy, I’d wanted him to know I was available.

  Maybe I’d hit a nerve somehow without meaning to though.

  I shook my head as I continued on to the Wastelands alone. Even though they’d become generally less dickish, these fucking Princes could drive a girl out of her mind with their quirks and secrets.

  Packing took about an hour as I laid things out on my bed, mixing and matching various combos. I threw my bikini and a pair of flip flops—two things I’d never owned before I moved to California—into the bag too, and then spent the rest of the night watching stupid comedies on my laptop.

  Jacqueline texted me, inviting me to stay with them over the holiday. I told her I couldn’t come for the whole week, but I agreed to stop by for a few days before school started back up.

  It felt like she was putting an effort in, so I figured I should too, as much as I wasn’t looking forward to it.

  The next morning, Elijah came to collect me outside Prentice Hall and carried my bag across campus as we headed for the student lot. We all piled into Mason’s car and sped away from the school. I was a little shocked the guys had given me the front seat, and when I turned around to look at Elijah, Cole, and Finn all crammed into the back, I snorted a laugh.

  “Oh, you think our pain is funny, Legs?” Finn grumbled, elbowing Cole, who elbowed him right back.

  “Actually, yeah.” I smirked. “I really, really do.”

  I swore I heard Mason chuckle, but when I glanced at him, he was staring at the road with a neutral expression. Then he flipped his sunglasses down over his eyes and gunned the engine. I leaned back against the headrest, watching the beautiful scenery of California rush by. I wasn’t sure I’d ever get used to the vibrancy of the colors out here, as if nature had been saving all its best paint for this part of the country.

  A finger slid under the strap of my bra, and I jumped, craning my neck. “What are you doing?”

  “Getting your attention.” Finn laughed, his finger still hooked around the strap of my bra.

  Heat blazed through my cheeks as he traced his knuckle over my skin, and I shot a furtive glance at Cole. The black-haired boy was watching our exchange, but I couldn’t get a read on his expression. The bruise near his eye had faded to a purplish-blue, a little green around the edges, and I couldn’t help but remember what it’d felt like to run my hands through his hair.

  “Well, you have it. What do you want?”

  I shifted uncomfortably as Finn’s fingers slid under my other bra strap as well, the contact making little zaps of lightning shoot through me. I squeezed my legs together, and Mason’s head jerked in my direction, although with his sunglasses on, I couldn’t tell if he was actually looking at me.

  Fuck. Had he seen that? Did he know what Finn’s touch was doing to me?

  Maybe going on a trip with these four boys wasn’t such a good idea after all. They’d promised me I’d have my own bed, but that wasn’t even really the issue. After things had shifted so dramatically at the beginning of the semester, I’d been slowly starting to trust them.

  But I wasn’t sure if I trusted myself.

  “I’m bored.” Finn snapped both my bra straps, and the little sting of pain made my body clench.

  I sucked in a breath and turned around in my seat to glare at him, trying to hide the flush burning up my cheeks. “So what do you want me to do about it?”

  “Entertain me.”

  He slid a finger under my bra strap from the front this time, tugging on it gently as a wicked light gleamed in his amber eyes. I batted his hand away, and he laughed, leaning forward and hugging the back of my seat until we were practically nose-to-nose.

  “Come on, Legs.” He tugged his full bottom lip between his teeth, his dimples popping out as he smiled temptingly. I could smell the mint on his breath, and for a second, I could hardly think of anything else. Not the car, not the three other boys watching us, not the salty ocean air rushing by.

  I swallowed, drawing back to escape the bubble he’d put us into. “Fine. What do you want to do?”

  “Let’s play a game.”

  My nose wrinkled. “What are you, twelve?”

  “No, I’m bored.”

  “Can’t you just play on your phone like a normal person?” I groaned.

  Elijah laughed. “Finn? Normal?”

  A shoving match broke out in the back, and I used the opportunity to turn back around to face the front, tilting my head up to the sky and letting the sun hit my face.

  Jesus, Tal. Keep it together.

  We finally made it to the house, which wasn’t a house at all. Like most homes I’d been to in California, it could be more accurately classified as a mansion or a small palace. It felt like stepping onto a movie set—everything looked too perfect and shiny to be real. A bunch of people had arrived before us, and we walked into a house full of rich kids in bikinis and swim trunks, smoking and drinking like they were going to die tomorrow.

  “Come on. We’re in the back.” Elijah rested his hand on my hip, guiding me confidently through the chaos.

  They must’ve all come here before at some point, because they navigated the maze of hallways and rooms confidently, leading me to a massive bedroom in the back of the house.

  Of course, there’s a room specially designated for the Princes.

  I wanted to roll my eyes, but I was just grateful I didn’t have to room with Adena or something. She’d been worse lately, sneaking in little digs at me when Mason or one of the other Princes wasn’t watching, writing nasty messages and slipping them into my locker, and glaring at me in our shared classes. I’d put up with much worse last semester, so it was relatively easy to endure—but if I’d been stuck in a room alone with her for an entire weekend, I was sure she would’ve tried to pull something much worse.

  As the guys settled into the room, I grabbed the maroon bikini I’d brought and slipped into the adjacent bathroom to change. My skin was pale against the dark color of the fabric, and I ran my fingers nervously over the flat plane of my stomach before blowing out a breath and squaring my shoulders.

  Whatever. They can say whatever they want.

  I had a good body—or at least, I liked it. It was strong, my limbs long and lean. But I didn’t look like some California heiress on the cover of a magazine. My dark hair was piled in a messy, windswept bun on my head, and I didn’t have the same perfect cleavage and tan skin I was sure most of the girls here would.

  Pushing aside my nerves, I slipped out of the bathroom. The casual conversation in the room died, and I glanced up.

  Four sets of eyes stared at me as if I were some kind of rare animal. I swallowed hard, fighting the urge to wrap my arms around myself.

  “What?”

  “I’ve never seen you show so much skin, that’s all,” Mason finally said, his gaze still locked on me. His eyes looked darker than usual, and a muscle in his jaw jumped.

  “It’s not…” I took a step back toward the bathroom. Fuck it, maybe I’d swim in my clothes. “We don’t really… tan in Idaho.”

>   “Hey. You look perfect.” Finn was the one who stepped forward, and when he slid his fingers under my halter straps and tugged gently like he’d done in the car, I stepped toward him. His dimples were nowhere to be found, his face oddly serious as he dipped his head to murmur in my ear. “You’re gorgeous, Tal.”

  I blushed so hard I was sure he could feel the heat coming off me, but he didn’t comment on it. Instead, he dropped a chaste kiss on my cheek and turned around, striding over to the bed as he tugged his shirt off. The other Princes followed suit, tearing their gazes away from me after another uncomfortable moment of staring.

  My cheeks, already warm from their intense scrutiny, warmed even more as I watched them.

  Fucking hell.

  These boys were way too damn hot for their own good. They were all wearing board shorts slung low on their hips, and without their shirts on, they looked so good I couldn’t help but stare. Cole was the biggest, only narrowly beating out Finn. Mason and Elijah were both leaner but cut, with those sexy V’s at their hips disappearing beneath their shorts. They all looked like they belonged in California and nowhere else.

  I was staring at them worse than they’d stared at me, and I had to work to force my eyelids to blink, tearing my gaze away. I was about to step toward the door when Elijah turned around, and I got a good look at the tattoo on his back. I’d known he had one, but I’d only ever seen it from a distance before, never close enough to tell what it was.

  “Holy shit…” I breathed, stepping closer.

  It was the image of a man kneeling, his head bowed so his features were obscured. Huge dark wings sprouted from his back, placed in such a way that they almost looked like they could’ve been sprouting from Elijah’s back instead. A few black feathers drifted down below the wings.

  “Oh. Yeah.” Elijah caught my awed gaze and shrugged lightly. “My mom and dad almost fucking disowned me when I got this. Worth it, though.”

  “Oh my God. It definitely was. Can I…?”

  “Sure.”

  He turned around, and I stepped closer, drawn to the raw emotion in the image. It had to mean something to him—the image covered his whole back, and it didn’t seem like the kind of thing someone would just get on a whim. Asking about it felt too personal though, so I just traced the image with my fingertip, trying to absorb the emotions in the ink. His stiffened under my touch, and I saw goosebumps rise on his skin as his breathing picked up.