by Callie Rose
I’m beyond worrying about what this means anymore, giving myself a free pass for the moment from wondering if it’s a really stupid idea to get involved with multiple guys at once.
Because right now, it seems like the best damn idea I’ve ever had.
I come hard on River’s tongue, my back arching off the bed as my hips tilt and swirl, grinding against his face. Lincoln was inside me three times last night, and somehow, knowing that River is kissing the place where Linc and I were connected makes every bit of my orgasm more intense.
He slows the movements of his tongue but doesn’t stop until he feels my body relax completely, melting against the mattress in exhausted satisfaction. Then he crawls up and flops over onto the bed beside me, tugging me with him so my body drapes partway over his. I got his shirt off already, but he’s still wearing his shorts, and I can see the visible bulge of his cock straining against them.
I rise up on one elbow, lifting my head to gaze down at him as my hand slides over the washboard of his stomach to the waistband of his pants. He watches me, his gray eyes dark in the dim light, and when I lift and tug on the elastic, he helps me work them off.
Holy shit. I can’t believe I’m doing this. I can’t believe it’s real.
His cock is hot and hard and heavy in my hand as I wrap my fingers around him.
God, I want him. I want to feel him inside me so badly. But I’m a little terrified of it too. Of what it would mean for me and Linc. For me and the twins.
For me and all four of them.
I’m not ready for that step, so I don’t take it. Instead, I move down his body, planting kisses on his chest and abdomen as I do, until I reach his dick. I lick the underside all the way up to the tip, and I hear him groan above me. When I wrap my lips around the velvety head, he makes another noise.
Shit. A girl could get used to this.
His hand finds my hair, wrapping the long, dark strands around his fist to keep them out of my way as my head bobs up and down.
“Oh, fuck,” he mutters. “Fuck.”
His abs are contracting rhythmically as his hips rise up to meet my mouth. I’m not exactly the queen of blowjobs, but I like doing this to him. A lot. I try to figure out what turns him on the most, doing more of what draws the biggest responses out of him.
When I wrap my lips around just the tip and swirl my tongue over the smooth head of his dick, he makes an inarticulate noise in his throat. When I flick my tongue over the small slit at the end, his hips jerk. And when I use my hand and my mouth together, working his entire length, I feel him swell and thicken in my grasp.
“Oh shit, Low. I’m gonna… fuck!”
He sounds desperate.
Tortured almost.
Like he needs something so badly it’s almost killing him, but at the same time, he’s not ready for it.
I hollow my cheeks, picking up my pace as I drag the nails of my free hand down his side, over the firm muscles of his obliques. His whole body shudders beneath me, and he comes hard in my mouth. I swallow, doing my best to catch all of it, and when his body finally starts to relax, I release him from my mouth and glance up at him.
He’s gazing down the length of his body at me, his fingers still tangled in my hair. The look on his face makes arousal flare inside me all over again, and I crawl slowly back up the bed, letting my skin brush against his as I do.
The hand holding my hair releases it, and he palms the back of my head instead, bringing my lips to his. We’re both more relaxed, softer now, and I feel that in our kiss—a recognition that something fundamental has already changed between us.
It will never go back to the way it was.
But that’s okay. I don’t think I want it to.
When our kiss breaks, I roll off of him and drape myself against his body, pressing our naked skin together. I crane my neck to look up at his face, then murmur, “You’re not still gonna sleep on the couch, are you?”
“Fuck no.”
He smiles, kisses my nose, and then reaches down to pull the covers over us, as if to show me he has no intention of leaving. Then he wraps his arms around me, keeping me nestled against his side.
“I won’t tell Linc or the other guys what you told me, Low,” he whispers. “But you should tell them. They won’t freak out or get weird, I promise. I know it’s easier keeping it a secret… but having people you trust know your secrets and still see you for you? That’s even better.”
I nod, because he’s right. I have that with my mom and Hunter, and it’s the only thing that’s helped me keep my sanity sometimes. Mom still worries about me, but that’s different than the pitying looks strangers give me when they hear I had childhood cancer. She went through it all with me, so she’s allowed to worry.
A moment later, River shifts our positions so he can lean over and turn off the bedside lamp. I end up curled on my side, the little spoon to his bigger one, as his arm steals around my waist, his palm resting on my stomach and his breath stirring my hair.
We fall asleep like that, our bodies molded together, and it might be even better than everything else that came before.
18
I half expect things to feel awkward in the bright light of morning, but they really don’t.
River wakes up slowly and kisses me thoroughly, and then we take turns in the bathroom getting ready. He grabs us some breakfast from the kitchen, and I don’t see either of his parents. As far as I know, they have no idea I slept over last night, but that can’t possibly last. Not once Mr. Black realizes I’m no longer staying under his roof, and not after I tell Mom I moved out.
But it’s not really worth stressing about until it happens—there are bigger, more important things to be stressing out about right now.
River’s phone vibrates a moment before Dax and Chase pull up outside. The two of us slip into the back seat, and I can feel the twins’ gazes on me—Dax through the rearview and Chase over his shoulder. I wonder if they know what happened between me and River last night, if they can see it on my skin somehow. I don’t look any different, but I feel different, like the change between the two of us set off a change in me too.
Neither of the copper-haired boys comment on it though. Instead, Chase shakes his head.
“Samuel fucking Black, huh?”
“Yeah. Maybe so.”
God, it still feels so weird to talk about it out loud. It’s hard to wrap my head around the possibility that the man who hired my mom could be a killer. Hard to reconcile the powerful, controlled figure in the black ski mask with the man who smiles more than most situations call for.
“Linc’s gotta be losing his shit,” Chase mutters, still craning his neck to look at us in the back.
My body goes rigid with worry, and River’s hand finds mine, squeezing gently.
“He can handle it,” he tells Chase. There’s an admonishing note in his voice, and I can read between the lines pretty easily to pick up the subtext—don’t freak Harlow out.
The boy in the front seat flicks his gaze to me, and he nods vigorously. “Yeah. Yeah, of course he can. We just gotta find some evidence to prove it, and then we can finally go to the cops. Let that Dunagan guy take it from there.”
Yes, please. There’s nothing in the whole damn world I want more than to pass off the information clogging up my brain and heart to someone who knows what they’re doing. Who has the resources to investigate and the authority to arrest the true killer.
But I can’t do that until I know it won’t put my mom or any of us in worse danger.
Not until we have solid proof.
We meet Lincoln outside the front doors of Linwood, and it doesn’t look like he slept at all last night. He looks slightly disheveled, his hair unkempt and his eyes a little too bright, like he’s exhausted and wired at the same time.
I step into his embrace immediately, and he wraps his arms around me, his grip almost bruising. When he pulls back, his gaze darts from me to River. The gray-eyed boy nods slightly, and I hav
e a feeling they just pulled a Dax and Chase and communicated some message without words. I also have a very strong feeling that message is about me.
Linc’s amber eyes focus on me again, and when he speaks, his voice is low, meant only for me.
“Did you go swimming, Harlow?”
I want to laugh at the fact that somehow that’s become our code word for whatever this thing developing between us all is, but I’m too nervous to even crack a smile. I know what he said, and I know what River said. But it’s still hard for me to wrap my mind around the fact that they could all really be okay with this. That it could really be possible.
“Yeah. Just… in the shallow end.”
He does smile at that, and some of the strain and exhaustion leaves his face for a moment. Then his grip tightens on me a little. “We still good, baby?”
“Yeah. Always.”
He nods in satisfaction, and we all turn to head through the front doors of the school.
In the afternoon, Mr. Arndt gives the class a pop quiz in Business and Economics, and—as he promised Mr. Osterhaut he would—he takes steps to ensure I can’t cheat. I have to leave my backpack and cellphone at my desk and go sit right up front where he can watch me. He even makes the two kids on either side of me move so there’ll be no chance I can cheat off of them.
The quiz isn’t actually all that hard, but I deliberately get a couple questions wrong. The last thing I want is to be accused of cheating when I just happened to know all the answers for once.
As soon as I finish filling out the last section, I drop my pencil and hold up both hands, fingers splayed like I’m being held up at gun-point. I keep them there until Mr. Arndt calls time at the end of class, and when he comes by to personally collect my quiz sheet, I think I see him fighting an amused smile.
Good. He used to like me pretty well, and I want him to like me again. I need all the allies I can get around this place.
I pass Savannah in the hallway as I head to my next class. Trent is leaning against a bank of lockers, and she’s leaning against him, her back to his front and his arms around her waist. His gaze lands on me and slides away immediately, but her blue-green eyes narrow as they track my movement.
“Don’t you just hate pop quizzes?” she asks loudly, turning her head to direct the question toward Trent, even though I’m sure it’s meant for me. He chuckles but looks a little uncomfortable.
My footsteps freeze, and I turn toward her, my hands already curling into fists. We haven’t spoken since our altercation in the girls’ bathroom, and I really thought she knew better than to keep fucking with me.
She snorts a laugh, although I notice she sinks deeper into Trent’s embrace, probably hoping to use him as a shield if it comes to that. “Don’t worry, Pool Girl. Nobody messed with your quiz. You can fail that class all on your own.”
Her falsely sweet smile makes me want to knock her fucking teeth out.
But I don’t.
I force my fists to unclench, then turn and walk away, pressing my lips together as her lilting laugh follows me down the corridor.
Focus on what’s important, Low. Focus.
What’s important is finding something real to tie Mr. Black to Iris’s murder.
What’s important is keeping out of trouble at school so Mom has one less thing to worry about.
Punching Savannah in the face would be satisfying as fuck… but it’s not important.
Calculus goes by in a blur, and by the time I make it to my eighth period History class, I’m so ready for this day to be done. I barely got to talk to the guys at lunch, and I want to find out if Linc has any ideas of where to dig for clues about his dad. I’ve snooped around the house a bit, but he’s got to have access to stuff I don’t.
I take notes as best I can with half my brain already focused elsewhere, and as soon as class ends, I gather up my bag and head for the door.
“Ms. Thomas. Hold on a minute, please.”
Our teacher, Mr. Heller, is an older man who always looks like he’s counting down the days until retirement, and when he says those words, there’s a flatness to his voice that makes my stomach drop.
You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me.
Praying fervently that this is about something stupid and mundane, I hesitate by the doorway, turning to look back at him. When he grabs a small packet of papers from a stack on his desk, I blink at it like he just picked up a live snake. I know exactly what that is. It’s the test we took a week ago.
“I’ll be handing these back tomorrow, but I noticed some… discrepancies with yours. I need you to come with me to Mr. Osterhaut’s office.”
The air seems to go out of the room.
Shit.
Shit.
That’s what Savannah’s falsely sweet taunt was about. She was fucking with me. She didn’t sabotage my Business and Econ quiz—she picked a new class.
And that makes me look guilty as hell.
I can’t get my mouth to open, can’t form words to answer Mr. Heller, but he doesn’t wait for me to respond, stepping forward with my graded test in his hands and gesturing me toward the door. He leads me down the steps to the admin wing, and my legs feel numb as I follow him.
How many times can I fucking do this? I already begged the principal for a second and third chance. He won’t give me another, I know it.
Mr. Osterhaut looks up as we enter, his face pinching when he registers who it is. And I’m positive in that moment he already knows what this is about, and he’s already determined I’m guilty.
I don’t know what to say. Last time, I started blurting out declarations of innocence as soon as I sat down, but it hardly helped my case. And I don’t know how to convince him I didn’t fucking do this.
Mr. Heller hands over my test—one of the biggest we had all semester—to the principal, explaining how my exam was clearly doctored.
Mr. Osterhaut glances over the papers, shakes his head, then sets the packet down and interlaces his fingers. His expression settles into a mixture of frustration and resignation. “Harlow, I thought when you promised not to cheat again, you understood that applied to all of your classes, not just Business and Economics. To say I’m disappointed is an understatement.”
Jesus, no. This can’t be fucking happening.
“I’ve given you allowances and second chances—more than are usually granted in these types of situations, because I know you’ve been going through a lot.” He leans forward, his expression softening somewhat, like he’s going to try to convince me this is all for my own good. “But when people who act out continually get away with bad behavior, it sets an unacceptable precedent for me, for the school, and for them. I simply cannot allow it.”
“So, what?” My voice is harsh, thick with angry tears that haven’t fallen yet. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying that effective immediately, you are expelled from Linwood Academy, Ms. Thomas.”
The words hit me like a punch to the solar plexus, and the tears I’ve been holding back pour out of my eyes. I hate crying in front of people—I’ve never been the type to use tears to get out of traffic tickets or make people feel sorry for me. But I can’t keep them contained right now.
I don’t say anything, hardly make a single noise as the world blurs in front of me. When I glance over at Mr. Heller, he looks awkward and uncomfortable, like he really wishes he didn’t have to be here for this part.
Mr. Osterhaut’s face is carefully blank, as if he doesn’t want to be accused later of being either too cruel or too kind.
“You may collect your things from your locker. We’ll notify your mother in writing.”
My mom. Oh fuck, my mom.
At least they can’t call the prison to tell her. It’ll take them a few days to send her the notice, and by that time, I’ll have told her myself. She deserves to hear it from me.
I don’t know what else to say. I want to drag the principal down the hall and find Savannah, to put him face-to-face with her
and make her fucking admit what she did. But she won’t. All that will do is give her a front-row seat to my expulsion.
Mr. Osterhaut says something else, but I barely hear the words. The second he dismisses me, I grab my backpack with numb hands and bolt for the door, still half-blinded by tears. I’m charging down the hallway with the vague idea that I have to get to my locker when a voice stops me.
“Low?”
It’s Dax.
I turn to see him and Chase striding toward me, twin looks of concern on their faces. The sight of them snaps the last bit of manic energy that was keeping me going, and I start to shake all over. My legs feel like they’re about to give out, and I just want to get off this fucked up ride before the people I love get hurt any worse.
“Jesus.” Dax’s voice drops to a low growl, and the next thing I know, he and Chase are at my sides, their hands gripping and supporting me. “What the fuck happened? Is it your mom? Did Mr. Black—”
“Dude. Not here.”
Chase shushes his brother, then the two of them tug me toward a door and pull me inside an empty classroom. I almost trip over my own feet; I’m still trembling so badly I can hardly stand.
The classroom is dim. The lights are off, so the only illumination is from the gray winter sky outside. I can feel Chase hovering nearby as Dax grabs my shoulders gently, ducking his head to peer into my eyes. “What the hell happened, Low? What’s going on?”
“I got… expelled,” I choke out. “Savannah. She fucked with my tests again—and I got expelled.”
“Oh, shit.”
His face drops, and he tugs me into his arms. I never bothered putting my backpack on, and now the straps fall from my fingertips and it hits the ground with a dull thud.
Dax’s voice rumbles in his chest as he glances at Chase. “Text Linc and River. Tell them where we are. What’s going on. Shit.”
There’s a pause while Chase does what his twin asked, and then he steps up behind me, the hardness and warmth of his body shielding mine.
I don’t know how this keeps happening. How I keep ending up encapsulated between these two boys. I only know that it’s starting to feel like one of the safest places in the world. Their bodies surround me completely, Dax’s head by my right shoulder and Chase’s by my left, their arms looped around me like we’re some kind of three-headed statue.
