Pretty Young Things (Spinful Classics Book 1)

by Ace Gray

  When I managed to open my eyes he was watching me so intently, his face so soft. I raised my fingers up to trace that angry scar that marred his brow. He nestled into my hand and twisted just enough to kiss my palm. I smiled just before he hit my G-spot and my sounds—my world—exploded.

  My voice echoed off the walls of the cave and there wasn’t a hint of pain or hurt or anger in it. It was pleasure. It was mine.

  Dantè groaned as he stilled his hands and let my greedy sex cling to him over and over with the waves of the orgasm hitting me. When my body stilled, we both sat, the soft sound of rain surrounded us, punctuated only by my heavy breathing.

  Thanking him, loving him, was on the tip of my tongue, but he dove for my lips before I could whisper the words. My body was limp and useless but I kissed him with everything I had left.

  But then his hand disappeared as his lips still tangled with mine. He pushed at my overalls slowly, and when I was bare, he smoothed them back beneath me. I tried to gasp as the cold air hit me but…He. Just. Kept. Kissing. Me.

  Then the sound of his zipper undid my soul.

  This was home. This was where I belonged. In his arms. On this beach. Erasing everything that had come before and starting what would be. And when I felt his velvet hardness against me, I welcomed it. I welcomed everything that being back together would mean.

  My body wept for him.

  And when he slid in, every nerve danced with the pure joy he brought me. His husky groan trailed off to something weak and wild and it sent another thrill up my spine that I could do that do him. This man who had lost so much, who’d taken revenge for it, was fragile for me.

  I bucked my hips up to meet him, and the few grains of sand that had snuck between us simply sufficed to remind me that this was real. We were real again.

  He started slow as his hips pumped into me, each time he seated himself deep inside and breathed. Then again, he’d pull out and push back in like the steady beat of a drum declaring war on me. Over and over and over. Until he picked up the pace.

  I think I cried out first at the pure pleasure of his wicked thrusts but maybe it was him. Either way, our voices became a beautiful, passionate, and pained labor, echoing off the walls. Even when he thrust into me with his full strength, he was still careful with me, careful that it wasn’t too much.

  And with him, it never would be.

  Ever.

  I knew that now, but the important part was so did he.

  He cried out, agonized in that blissful way a moment before I felt heat flood inside of me. I smiled at how beautiful the sound was. At how he tensed in between my legs and that gorgeous body went rigid as stone. And when he collapsed on top of me, breathless and heart hammering, only to collect himself a moment later and shower me in kisses, I giggled. Full and loud and free.

  He kissed me even more. Everywhere.

  Then his laugh broke through in warm puffs against my lips and cheeks. He rolled off me onto the sand opposite the fire. I missed him the moment he was gone but he knew—of course, he knew—and he pulled me into the crook of his shoulder.

  I was satiated. But more than that, I felt cared for. I felt loved. And everything else just melted away.

  I think I liked the way his glasses slid down his nose the best. Bert looked sophisticated and worldly, and it betrayed his thick eyelashes, his curtained bright eyes, and dashing cheekbones. And to top it off, he only let them slide down his nose at home—my home, his home, it didn’t matter—like they were the wall he held between himself and the world. The wall he let fall when it was just him and me.

  “You’re staring,” he poked fun at me without lifting his eyes from the book he was reading.

  “You’re naked, I couldn’t help myself.” I smiled as I propped myself up on my elbow on the comforter that had somehow piled on the floor with us.

  “You weren’t staring at my body.” He arched his eyebrow and simply flipped the page he’d been reading. That’s what we did after sex, read books like the filthy nerds we were. He’d come back to apologize, and the way he asked for pardon was absolutely and un-fucking-deniable. I mean, he’d come back to me. And hours ago.

  “Whatcha got there?” I asked, gesturing at the book but still focused on his face.

  He finally looked up, his thumb sliding upward on the page to hold his spot. “You snore,” he said simply.

  “I do not!”

  “You do. I almost missed this part because of your snort…”

  “Bert—” I shrieked as I slapped his chest but he kept speaking.

  “‘Do I love you? My God, if your love were a grain of sand, mine would be a universe of beaches… I have stayed these years in my hovel because of you. I have taught myself languages because of you. I have made my body strong because I thought you might be pleased by a strong body. I have lived my life with only the prayer that some sudden dawn you might glance in my direction. I have not known a moment in years when the sight of you did not send my heart careening against my rib cage. I have not known a night when your visage did not accompany me to sleep. There has not been a morning when you did not flutter behind my waking eyelids…’”

  “‘I love you. Okay? Want it louder? I love you. Spell it out, should I? I ell-oh-vee-ee why-oh-you. Want it backward? You love I.’ ”

  I knew the book he’d picked up, The Princess Bride by William Goldman, and the picture of Cary Elwes in his dark black pirate garb and Robin Wright holding tight to him on the cover. I’d bent the cover back searching for the kind of love that had me saying as you wish with a smirk.

  Or the smile that split my cheeks now. “You love I,” I said as I reached for the book and closed it then set it on the floor by my knee as I straddled his thighs.

  “My heart is careening around.” He sucked in a deep breath just before I settled into his lap.

  My hips rocked against his, my hands found a grip on his shoulders. And my lips, well my lips—

  “Max, holy Gods,” Dantè interrupted the moment; I hadn’t even heard him come in. And now he was seeing me naked. NAKED. In our living room.

  I shot off of Bert and scrambled for the comforter beneath us. “What are you doing, Dantè?”

  My eyes darted to Mercy first, holding his hand, stringing along behind him as he stepped into the apartment. But when they found his, his face was wide, eyes sad, and staring right at Bert. Bert who thought Jordan was straddling him and Row had walked in the door.

  Fucking facepalm. Fucking massive facepalm.

  The truth was bound to come out sometime but it wasn’t supposed to be like this. Never like this.

  “Dantè?” Bert questioned. “Max?” He harpooned my heart even as he held me as tightly as I held the blanket around my shoulders.

  “I…” Dantè started, and I shot daggers at him that shut him up. I didn’t want to hear I’m sorry.

  “Jordan, who’s Max?” Bert asked, this time more direct.

  “Merce, come on, we’ll get my stuff,” Dantè said in the background of my world crashing around my feet.

  They shuffled away, which made the silence stretching between Bert and I all the more deafening. The world muffled as if I was underwater. And when he pulled away from me, I knew I was. I knew I was drowning.

  Dantè’s door closed behind him and it was just us left in the room. Me, my lies, Bert and his innocence.

  “Who’s Max?” He grabbed my shoulders a little too tightly and shook me just the slightest bit.

  “Me,” I broke. “I’m Max.”

  His face crunched behind his glasses then smoothed. His eyes darted every which way across my face, my body, each glance as if he was seeing the bits of me for the first time. And he didn’t like what he saw.

  “It’s a nickname.” It was only a question according to grammar, his tone was flat as if he knew.

  I started nodding my head, slow and somber as my eyes fell to the floor beside us. “My sister is Jordan.”

  “And his name is Dantè? Like the guy wh
o used to live in my house?”

  I couldn’t even nod this time. He saw the truth, it put the wrinkles in the corners of his mouth and eyes.

  “Why did you lie to me?” he asked, still notched between my thighs, and for the time being, I could convince myself he’d stay there.

  “I didn’t know I’d fall for you,” I whispered as I looked away.

  He gently pushed me to the side and reached for his boxer briefs as he stood and walked to the other side of the room.

  “So the lying was fine but the falling in love was a problem?” he asked, his voice icy and cool as he pulled on his clothes.

  “Bert, that’s not what I meant.” I gathered the comforter around my shoulders as I stood.

  “But it’s what you said.”

  “No…” My voice trailed off as I tried to find the words. “It’s just…” I reached out for him, and he shrugged out from under my touch. “They weren’t my secrets to keep.”

  “They were his?” He arched his eyebrows as he pointed toward Dantè’s room. “So you lied to me for him?”

  “It was for both of us. For what we’ve been through. For what they deserve!” I hadn’t meant to shout. Nor had I meant to let that all vomit out. And when Bert’s eyes went wide, not with fear or shock but with disgust, I wanted to reel in not just the words but the past few months, back into the void slowly opening inside me.

  “For what they deserve?” He enunciated each word. “Is he the reason that my roommates are in the hospital?”

  “It’s a long story, but you can’t blame her.” It was Dantè’s deep voice that answered from where he reappeared, still holding Mercy’s hand and donning a new backpack.

  “She. Lied,” he said simply. “Maybe Danger and Rousse aren’t her fault, but lying sure as fuck is.” He pulled on his shirt. “I just found out where her love and loyalty lie.”

  Dantè slid his backpack from his shoulder onto Mercy’s slight one.

  “You found a woman who has been hurt, broken, but picked herself up. She’s successful but still devoted to the lives of others. She finds gutter rats like me and gives them purpose, gives them life.” He stepped closer to Bert, and I could tell by the clench of his fists he wanted to shove his finger into Bert’s chest as an exclamation point. “It’s an honor to call Max my friend. You’d be so lucky to call her yours at all.”

  Bert sucked in a deep breath, his shoulders rising to his ears and his eyes falling on me. It was his look that made me feel naked despite the comforter wrapped around my shoulders.

  “We’re putting those boys in jail. For murder.” Mercy finally spoke, adjusting the pack on her shoulder.

  “Wait. What?” Bert twisted toward Mercy.

  “Danger, Diego, and Rousse murdered someone and got away with it. For years. I didn’t know until now…But Max is going to help us get real justice. Isn’t that type of nobility worth a lie or two?” When Mercy spoke, the whole room hung on her words, quiet as they were.

  “Yes, but…” Bert started, his face drawn, and his brow dark behind his glasses. “I lived with…” He tried again, this time a little more hurt. “But I didn’t even know your name!” He settled on shouting his frustration.

  “That’s the only thing you didn’t know. I swear.” I couldn’t help but step toward him. “You know what’s in my heart. I know you do,” I whispered.

  “So I just forgive you both for everything?” he asked.

  “I don’t give a fuck,” Dantè said. “Spend my forgiveness on Max.”

  Mercy shot him a look then rolled her eyes. Her delicate hand slid into his, and she started pulling him from the room. “Don’t,” she murmured under her breath.

  He smiled under his shaggy beard and it was so light that my heart fluttered too. I looked at Bert full of that hope, that love, hoping he would see. I hid my regret and put my champion of a cause face forward. I repeated my silent prayer that Bert would see the good, feel it from within me. That he’d realize it was just a name.

  But when I looked over at him, my name—whatever it was—was the bitter taste on his tongue that twisted up his face. He wanted nothing more than to spit me out.

  I’d tripped and fallen into classic literature. Into convoluted vengeance plots, rolling like the lush green out of some Jane Austen novel. I mean, what the actual fuck? My girl and my boss had pulled away their silken masks, and rather than finding Musketeers, it was Cardinal Richelieu up in this bitch.

  It was The Count of Monte Cristo. For reals.

  My mind spun only to land on Mercy. My roommate. The only one who hadn’t lied to me. The one that seemed to hold on to some semblance of reason. I watched her face as she and Row—Dantè?—whateverthefuck, left the apartment. She had been a haunted Havisham woman, harboring ghosts behind her deep green eyes as long as I’d known her, but the woman I saw today…

  She’d forgiven him—them—for their deception and lies. When all those things had hurt her most, had left her heart hanging by a thread, she’d brushed them off like the sand from the beach, easy as it fell back to earth and danced in the wind. God, I wanted to brush it off too but when I went to, it was mud and muck not sand.

  The door echoed in the room when it shut behind Dantè and Mercy, and I stared after them.

  “Are you going to look at me?” Jord— Max—asked timid and shy behind me; my heart cracked at her tone.

  “Not until you put on clothes.” I crossed my arms with my back to her.

  The muffled thump of her comforter cover up hit the floor, and I knew what was on display behind me. She might have been short but the woman behind me had curves miles long. I’d noticed them first in that bright white bikini as I came to. I’d noticed her heart not long after.

  “Better?” she asked, and I turned only to find her in my Gryffindor shirt that I’d lost track of a week ago. It dusted her thighs, her legs seeming far longer than her tiny body could allow.

  I tried to say something but all I managed was to clear the lump out of my throat.

  “I was his advocacy lawyer,” Max began when I couldn’t. “Mercy called day after day after day. All I wanted was to help.”

  I remembered that version of Mercy. The one that tried to hide her puffy eyes and tearstained cheeks. I’d always wondered why none of the boys noticed; I was starting to wonder if they hadn’t wanted to.

  “She desperately wanted my help.” Max folded her hands and shyly rolled her ankle back and forth.

  “But?” I could sense it.

  “No but. I did help her. I researched, interviewed, everything I could think of, and eventually I found his alibi.” A small smile tugged in her cheek. “But when I found it, I wasn’t sure I could trust her. Dantè wasn’t sure.”

  “How did Danger, Diego, and Rousse get involved?” I leaned back against the counter across from her.

  “They set him up. They framed him for murder.”

  I sucked in a deep breath. This wasn’t child’s play. Some bullshit argument over eating each other’s food in the fridge or a hole in the carpet.

  “They didn’t even think about him.” She wound her arms around her ribs and held herself. “About her either.”

  “So you’re saying that they deserve what they got?” My voice wavered.

  God, I didn’t know how I felt about my question. Or her answer. This was murder. Murder. And Dantè—Row—had gone to jail for their lies. I couldn’t fathom what that meant. What that had done to him. I mean, to some extent I realized they’d ruined his life…

  But now he’d almost done one better. He’d almost killed them.

  And Jordan—Max—whoever, knew. She fucking knew!

  “I know Dantè deserves justice. They all do.” Tears clung to the corners of her eyes and trembled with her words. “So many voices stifled…”

  I got the sense that she had a story, someone else in her life that she was talking about. Someone that had carved out a piece of her that she was still missing. My hands flinched automatically as if I could p
lug it for her. There was something down deep in me that still fucking wanted to. It was only the fact that Dantè left, at peace, with Mercy while Max still seemed haunted that made my hunch tickle. Made me all the more sure she was keeping secrets.

  “Maybe my roommates deserve to bleed. Maybe they all do.” I sighed. “But it’s not a reason to lie to me.”

  “I know.” She only pulled her hands from her sides long enough to wipe her tears away.

  “What should I do with I know?”

  She bit her lip and tried to shrug. The weight of the world hung on her shoulders and she couldn’t quite manage.

  “Well, what are you going to do now?” I asked as I leaned back against the counter and crossed my arms.

  “Prosecute them.”

  The maroon of my shirt fluttered against her thighs and the urge to lift it still strummed my fingers but I just wouldn’t give in. I couldn’t.

  “What are you going to do now?” she asked all timid.

  “Let you,” I answered simply.

  She nodded for a moment. “And about us?”

  “I can’t decide that right now.”

  Her lips floundered for a second, words so obvious on the tip of her tongue but she swallowed them, choosing to nod instead, then reach down for the comforter as a shield. She had it gathered at her chest with one hand while she reached for the hem of her shirt—my shirt—with her other.

  “Max, stop.” I stepped toward her and grabbed her wrist before smoothing it down to her side. “Keep the shirt.”

  “But then you don’t have to come back, ya know, if…” Soft little sobs shook her shoulders.

  I reached out to touch her. It was just a soft brush of my fingertips but it soothed something and electrified something inside me all at once.

  “We’ll deal with that if.”

  The buzz of clippers was the only sound inside our house but it accompanied the horrific smell of burning hair. After I’d left Max, I’d aimlessly driven up the coast until the sun started to rise. When I’d finally landed at the house, the crime scene out front made me nauseous.