Vote Then Read: Volume II

by Lauren Blakely

  She closed her eyes, taking a deep breath. “Last year you threw a fit because a few of your things were forgotten…”

  “It was my entire wardrobe. I had nothing to wear. I had to go shop and replace everything—”

  She opened her eyes, pinning Abigail. “Hush. Are you incapable of going even one hour without making a scene?”

  Ever calm and collected Tansy Crowne looked on the verge of explosion. Her cream hands in tight, white fists, her jaw clenched.

  “We’ll need to make a landing, Mrs. Crowne,” the pilot said. “There’s wine on the dash. We’ll take you back to Crowne Point.”

  “Landing?” Tansy asked, a frown making what little lines she had on her face pop.

  “But we’ve barely been in the air,” Gemma said, then turned to Abigail. “I hope you’re fucking happy.”

  “I won’t be happy until you’re dead,” Abigail yelled.

  The fighting nearly started up again, so I pulled Abigail away from her family, away from everything, all the way into a secluded bedroom.

  The pounding of my heart was louder than the engines and wheels of the plane as the pilot began the descent.

  “It’s her fault,” Abigail said, staring at the door.

  “What’s her fault, Abigail?” My words were quiet. It felt like a secret, one we’d been holding in for far too long.

  She kept staring at the door, so I cupped her neck and cheek, turning her to me. Her eyes settled on mine.

  “All of it,” she finally said, but like there was more she’d wanted to say. “What do you mean I abandoned you?”

  My grasp on her neck and cheek tightened, my thumb fanning to encase her entire jaw.

  “You sent me away to California, Abigail,” I replied, the memory still stinging. I stroked her jaw with my thumb, kept my grip on her neck possessive. “You left me. You took me in and then abandoned me just like my fucking mother. At the time, I didn’t know why, but now I do. You saw me with Gemma—”

  “I didn’t send you away,” she cut me off, eyes wide. “You were my best friend. You were all I had. I loved you… even if you didn’t love me.”

  A weighted pause followed her words, our eyes locked. I didn’t know if I could believe her, if I wanted to believe her.

  If Abigail didn’t send me away, then who did?

  Before I could think too long on who had actually sent me away, turbulence jostled the plane. Both Abigail and I lost our footing. I fell backward into a black leather chair, catching Abigail in my lap. The plane steadied, but neither of us moved.

  She pulled the bracelet she’d given me out of her pocket.

  I thought she would’ve thrown it away.

  “I always assumed you left me,” she said, fiddling with the beads. “Because you wanted my sister and were tired of pretending to like me.”

  Her quiet confession cut through me. All this time she’d been hurting just like I had.

  I stroked my thumb across her cheek. “Sweet girl, I would never leave you, not willingly, not unless I had to.”

  Her eyes found mine, lips parted. Warmth radiated from her clay eyes, affection a luminous glow. My eyes landed on her lips, when all at once she jumped off me. She took two quick steps back until she was almost at the door.

  “I-I don’t believe you, Theo.”

  There wasn’t determination in her voice; if anything, she sounded afraid. She tugged on the bracelet, pulling the beads apart, the white twine shiny.

  I tilted my head. “Yes, you do.”

  She mashed her lips together, eyes darting around the room. I stood up, walking to her leisurely, grasping her wrist and anchoring her attention on me.

  “This could all be another elaborate trick,” she said, allowing me to drag her into my embrace.

  I don’t know if I was ready to completely forget five years of resentment and pain. When your view of someone is stained in heartbreak, it’s hard to completely wash that away, even if that view is wrong.

  But love or hate, I couldn’t go another minute without Abigail.

  “Could be,” I admitted.

  I rubbed my nose along her cheek slowly, her sharp inhales spiking my heart rate.

  “You say you… care… about me, and you don’t actually like my sister, and you even tattoo me, yet you wear someone else’s bracelet—”

  I crushed my lips against hers, quick and harsh, shutting her up. Enough to bruise and leave her breathless.

  When I pulled back, her eyes were hooded, locked on mine.

  I thumbed her bitten-red lower lip. “You gave me that bracelet.”

  16

  ABIGAIL

  Theo was in my room.

  A nervous laugh bubbled out of me. I quickly smothered it with the back of my hand, trying to pretend it was a cough.

  Theo shot me a curious look, the one that said he saw right through me, then turned from me, busying himself with something I couldn’t see on my nightstand. Grateful for the momentary respite from him, I breathed.

  Mother was furious we had to reschedule the flight. It appeared no serious damage was done, yet a full top-to-bottom inspection had to be done before we could fly out, which meant a night back at Crowne Hall. A night alone with Theo…

  I fiddled with the bracelet on my wrist. All these years I’d wondered who gave him the bracelet. Making up ridiculous stories like he had a girlfriend he pined for, or a long-lost soul mate, and all this time it was me?

  My heart cracked open.

  For all his bluster, Theo hurt the most.

  Another laugh threatened to burst.

  I was acting ridiculous, like he hadn’t been here a thousand times before.

  He’d replaced the light bulb on the light not inches from him.

  Theo Hound had been in my room more than anyone. As a best friend. As an enemy. And each time, he was the only person guarding my door. Now… as a lover? The thought seized my throat.

  What would he think? I wouldn’t be good enough. I never was. Not for Mom or Grandpa, not for the world, definitely not for him. I didn’t have practice in this. I should’ve practiced. Why didn’t I practice? Maybe he would be fine with just oral.

  I could do oral.

  I was so busy weighing the pros and cons of presenting my just-oral-for-life idea that I didn’t notice he’d left my nightstand and come before me.

  “Hey.” Theo pushed my hair behind my ear, and I nearly jumped at the contact. He laughed, but it was soft and low. “You’re so transparent.”

  I looked away, mumbling, “Only to you.”

  “Good,” he practically growled. The way he spoke, as much as the meaning behind the words, curled my gut.

  He grasped my chin, lifting my eyes to his. I leaned on my tiptoes, angling for his lips, wetting my own. His burning, pale eyes dropped to them and his breath warmed my mouth. I could practically taste him.

  “Show me your art,” he said against my lips.

  I tried to ignore the flutter of him calling my found jewelry art. Garbage, junk, those were words I’d expect… but art? Only in my dreams. I didn’t bother questioning how he knew I still made jewelry. That was Theo; he always saw into me. What I did wonder was why the fucking fuck now? I was still on my tiptoes angling to kiss him, and I could feel him against my hip—hard.

  I blinked, bringing the hazy room back into view.

  “Now?” I asked.

  A slow grin curved his right lip, melting my insides like butter, and then he nodded. He released my chin, and I walked in a trance to grab the box where I kept my secrets and jewelry.

  “I think that’s the first time you’ve listened to me,” he said to my back.

  “Don’t get used to it.”

  After grabbing my jewelry box, I turned around. Theo was in the process of tearing off his wine-stained hoodie. I nearly dropped the porcelain box to the floor. As if in slow motion, he revealed his body to me.

  Theo had always been muscular.

  But oh my God.

  I tilted
my head, pushing my tongue into the muscle of my cheek. He slowly revealed the ridges of his cut eight pack, his tapered waist leading my eyes to his sculpted Adonis belt, which disappeared beneath jeans slung low on his hips. I licked my lips, too easily imagining where those toned vee muscles led.

  “A guy could get addicted to the way you look at him.”

  I quickly busied myself with my box.

  Theo laughed. “Is Abigail Crowne shy?”

  My cheeks heated, and I lifted the box to cover it. “I’m not shy.”

  I’m petrified.

  But Theo doesn’t get to know that.

  I kept fiddling, pretending like it took more than one second to open a fucking box. Art, that’s what I was focused on. Not Theo’s abs.

  Rigid. Cut. Hot.

  Suddenly his lips were at my ear, and I couldn’t breathe.

  “I promise…” He spoke the words of our game, trailing off as his teeth grazed my ear, barely a bite, the pain a shiver of its own promise for more. “I’ll take all night fucking you.”

  He ended on a growl that vibrated through me. My hands shook. His breath was hot on my skin, his body hard against my back.

  “I promise by the time I’m done with you, you’ll be ruined for everyone but me.”

  Breathe. Remember to breathe.

  When his tongue caressed the tip of my ear, I dropped the box entirely. He grabbed it, reflexes so fast, but didn’t cease licking me, kissing me, sucking on me, until the room faded, and all I knew was him.

  When he was done devouring my ear, and I was sufficiently putty, he handed the porcelain box back to me.

  “But we’ll go at your pace, nice and slow.”

  He grinned, then made his way to my bed. Feathers from my massacred pillows lingered on the floor, and my mattress was askew on the frame, but he lay on it without so much as a blink, and something about that made him even hotter, sitting among his carnage like nothing.

  There was something in my hands. I looked at my jewelry with foreign interest. Why did I have this? What was my name again?

  Oh. Right.

  I took a seat on the edge of my destroyed bed, afraid my legs would stop working. Jewelry, I said to myself, show Theo my jewelry. I repeated it like a mantra.

  “Do you know why I want to go slow?” I didn’t respond, but he didn’t care. “Seeing you like this is fucking hot, Abigail. It’s the greatest foreplay. Wide-eyed and without walls. No more lies. But that lip.” He zeroed in on it. “Bite it again and I might change my mind.”

  My eyes met his as he adjusted himself. There went my thoughts again. Even through his jeans, I could see the outline of him.

  I wetted my lips. “Aren’t your jeans wet?”

  “Are you trying to get me naked, Abigail?”

  “No,” I said too quickly. He was still drenched in wine and it had to be uncomfortable—maybe a naked Theo crossed my mind.

  His grin spread. All white teeth. Somehow both sweet and vicious, carnal and loving. All Theo. I nearly sighed. I missed his smiles.

  Theo slid his zipper down—an act that was far too sensual—then slipped out of his jeans and tossed them to the floor. I briefly thought about all the stains. Dark wine on my perfect white satin sheets, now on my plush feathery rug. I loved it. A dark, twisty part of me wanted the memory of him forever.

  Theo grabbed a joint from his discarded jeans, and with the snick of the match, something inside me lit ablaze as well.

  A joint.

  I swallowed, trying not to read too much into it.

  He was in nothing but satin-looking gray briefs, and once again I was distracted. They clung to roped thighs, and if I thought he was hard in his jeans, it was nothing to now.

  My throat dried.

  His laugh filled the room like the butterflies in my stomach.

  I forgot showing him my jewelry. I forgot everything. Theo had one arm folded behind his head, bicep popping and carved, muscles I didn’t even know catching the fading sunlight. Wine drenched strands of hair, dripping down onto his full lip, as he smoked with his free hand.

  He blew out a puff, watching me with an intensity that stunned me, drew me in, until it was nothing but us.

  Theo Hound was art.

  Hedonist. Hellish. Art.

  I dropped my jewelry, and it fell with a clatter of beads and sea glass and silver to the floor. I crawled atop him. He kept smoking, blowing in and out, but if it was possible, the look in his eyes sharpened further. Musky smoke enveloped us in a warm haze, softening us, but through it all, his eyes were clear.

  I stopped just before his jaw, his sharp, smooth jaw. Nerves strangled my stomach. I could feel him hard and digging into my stomach. This was Theo. This wasn’t some random asshole. I cared desperately what Theo thought of me.

  Heat blazed in his eyes.

  I wanted to kiss him so badly.

  So of course I distracted myself.

  “I don’t remember,” I said. It was barely a whisper. Theo arched a brow at my non sequitur. “Giving you this bracelet,” I explained.

  He blew out smoke. “You were small.”

  His hand settled casually yet possessively on the back of my thigh, just beneath my ass. I swallowed air. I wanted him so badly I felt like I was going to combust. All the while Theo just watched me.

  As if the memory came back to him, a small smile tugged his lips. “Little Abigail Crowne, in black jeans, a fur vest, and leather boots… an outfit that cost so much it could probably get me off the streets. You know what I remember most?”

  His thumb grazed the underside of my ass. Slowly. Easily.

  “What?” I couldn’t breathe.

  “You had the same fucking look in your eyes. Lonely…” His eyes softened. “But so damn tenacious. I thought you were going to hand me money, but you gave me a fucking bracelet. I was hungry, so I was pretty pissed.”

  As he told the story, it came back to me. We’d spent the day at Crowne Point Day Camp, a nonprofit camp set up by Mom and Dad. It was only for appearances, and the last time I ever went somewhere like that, but I got to make a friendship bracelet. I didn’t have a best friend to give the bracelet to, but I loved the thing. It was the first thing that was mine, not Abigail Crowne’s, but mine. Still, when I saw him, I wanted to give it to him. I don’t know why. Maybe my heart knew what my mind didn’t.

  I guess I’d latched on to that feeling, even if I didn’t remember its inception. From that point on I made jewelry until I reached an age where I had to start hiding it from my mother.

  A Crowne isn’t a petty craftsman.

  I did it in secret, and it saved me. I was so young—so young I forgot Theo—all I remembered was that feeling. I forgot the boy who played an integral part of the dream that saved me from disappearing into Abigail Crowne.

  I stared at him with newfound amazement.

  His thumb traveled higher, into my linen floral shorts and sliding over my panties, and I could barely get out my next words. “You kept it.”

  “I kept it.”

  His thumb disappeared too soon, now using the arm to wrap around my waist, sliding me higher, pushing me against his dick.

  Hard.

  Rock hard. And he felt like heaven between my legs, hitting that aching spot, making me ache even more but in a delicious way.

  I couldn’t stop the moan that dripped from my lips. At the sound, he pressed his head against my headboard and groaned. I think I could get addicted to that sound. Rough, a little strangled and pained. My eyes dropped to his lips, waiting to hear it again.

  “Condom?” he asked, voice rough. His head was still against my quilted headboard, only dropping his gaze to meet mine.

  “I don’t have any condoms,” I said. “I mean… I just… I never…”

  I mean, I did, but I bought them when I was sixteen.

  Theo lifted his head, brow furrowing. “You’re really a virgin?”

  I looked away. “If we’re going by heteronormative norms, but I’ve done ever
ything else so—”

  His lips were on mine.

  He tasted like wine and smoke and sex, like some heathen god. His kiss was soft but unyielding, and it was over too soon. He broke off, my eyes still closed.

  “You just said heteronormative.” He caressed my cheek with the knuckle of the hand that held his joint. “Careful, Abigail, someone might figure out there’s more to you.”

  I didn’t get a chance to respond, because then his hand disappeared from my waist, and he was sliding up my thigh, into my shorts, fingers pushing aside my panties, spreading me. Breath left me in gusts, my fists curling into his chest.

  God, the way he watched me… it was intoxicating. He drank me in like the wine clinging to his skin, registering my smallest movements, the quietest sigh. All with one finger, all while he smoked, the air growing thicker and hazier.

  Every bit of his focus was on me, and that made me feel worthy.

  “Please.” I wasn’t sure what I was asking for, but I knew I needed something.

  His green eyes narrowed slightly, a barely-there smile hooking his right cheek.

  “Abigail Crowne.” He stamped out the joint on my nightstand, eyes still locked. “There’s no going back from this.”

  17

  THEO

  We collided like atoms.

  Tongue, teeth, and bruising lips. Abigail ripped at my clothes, tearing and stretching my shirt, fingers flying from my hair to my shoulders, nails biting into my flesh.

  It’s so fucking hot.

  It’s not right.

  “Slow, sweet girl,” I said softly against her lips, pressing her down on my cock, spreading her thighs around my hips.

  I was aching to be inside her, but this is her first time—our first time. The night can’t end quick and dirty. So even if we explode into a billion pieces tomorrow, when she puts them back together, I’ll be inside her forever.

  “I’m not going anywhere,” I said. “Let me make you feel good.”