by Mallory Fox
“What the fuck are you doing? We’re still in public,” says Gabby, looking absolutely horrified now.
“Hurry. Move quicker and swap with me.”
Gabby’s eyes dart around, checking no one is coming, before dumping her own satchel and taking off her skirt and boots.
Minutes later, we’ve swapped skirts.
I’m sitting on the bench, zipping up Gabby’s over the knee boots while she watches me with slits for eyes. “The bodyguard could have walked in you know.”
“Do I look alright?” I ask her, as I get to my feet and glance at my reflection in a windowpane.
She sighs. “You look killer in my clothes. You should let me shop for you.”
“Is Seth still outside?” I say, plucking out the pins holding my hair up and fluffing it so it falls soft around my face.
“Yes, he and Charlie are still talking to the pilot. Why? What are you going to do?”
One last thing. Unbuttoning my blouse a little, I fix my cleavage.
“Watch me,” I say with a smirk, and then I’m gone, strutting out onto the airfield toward Seth, my heart beating rapidly like it might burst at any moment.
He doesn’t see me, not until I’m right upon him.
He turns just as I take hold of him by his necktie, stand on my tiptoes, and French kiss him for all the world to see right in front of the classroom. It’s childish and juvenile but I’m sick to death of being told that I can’t have Seth, while all the time he does things to confuse me.
Fuck Claudia.
Fuck the tossers who attend this school.
And fuck Lana fucking Langfield.
Chapter 9
Seth
Hot and cold. That’s how she burns. One minute she’s all over me and the next, she’s acting like she hates me with a passion. I made it a rule before coming back not to get sucked into the games we play.
But as Pearl grabs me and kisses me, taking my fucking breath away, all of that goes out of my mind.
I’m drowning in the taste of her, instantly hard. My hands move of their own accord, gripping her waist, moving over her ass, and then sliding under her skirt as she lifts her leg up and hitches it around me.
Fuck, she drives me insane.
Charlie, the pilot, and the whole goddam class next to the helipad are watching, but I don’t care.
Finally, Charlie behind me coughs making his presence known. I’d rather he piss off so I can enjoy whatever the hell this is, but Pearl pulls away at his interruption.
My dick is still raging. I give her a long, hard look. Cherub face tilted, eyes burning into my soul, she looks like heaven in that short skirt.
My eyes flick to the back of the copter and then to her, cocking my head, considering for a moment what it would be like to take her to the back of it and bury myself inside her at 10,000 feet in the air. I can’t help but appreciate the image my mind conjures up of her in those leather boots that go on for days and nothing else.
Pearl glances at the back of the helicopter and her eyes blaze as the same thought enters her head. She licks her lips.
“So, are we going in, or are you going stand here with your dick hanging out?”
Charlie, you fucking cock block.
But, I’m glad he’s here. This… is the whole reason I was avoiding coming back.
I keep my eyes firm on hers. “So are you going to tell me what that was?”
“No,” she says.
“Did you get what you needed at least?”
She smirks at me. “Of course.”
Then, she sighs and gives Charlie an arched brow. “Hello, Charlie, no doubt I’ll be seeing you around if you’re here to shadow Seth.”
She turns heel and stalks off. Gabriella, waiting in the wings with her bag and jacket just outside the viewing platform, gives me a disapproving stare. Pearl is back to looking my way as she takes her jacket from Gabriella and slips it on, flicking her hair over the collar of it, doe eyes giving me one last lick of attention, and then she disappears inside.
Charlie gives a low whistle once she’s completely out of sight. We’re heading to the same platform, the one that connects the buildings to the student hangar and leads all the way back to the main campus. “You know what that was, right?”
I minutely shake my head. “She’s taunting the hell out of me?”
“She’s marking her territory. You’re a glutton for punishment with that one,” he says in a gloating tone.
I let my eyes roll back. “Says the bastard who voluntarily dated Felicity Godfrey.”
Charlie’s own eyes cloud over with dread at the mere mention of his ex-girlfriend’s name. “Why did I agree to be dragged to the same location in the world as my ex again?”
“Because you’re bored playing lord of the manor in the middle of fuck knows where. And I’ve missed your company.”
It’s true.
I haven’t seen Charlie much since I was carted off to Blackheath. I certainly never saw him the entire time I was enlisted there. Not that I didn’t want to, but not being able to physically leave the academy made it difficult. After I graduated, it was apparent we’d both changed, moved in different circles. I signed myself up to do a tour in Northern Ireland and then we lost contact.
Until today.
Charlie sighs. “Don’t lie. You’ve brought me here to be your fucking candy man at this yacht party of yours.” He’s partly right. Charlie is still the person to get anything you need. It just so happens I need a shed load of drugs.
But also, Charlie is one of those friends you can count on to have your back. What I like about Charlie then, is still true now. Never has he once asked me what happened to me during those five years apart. He treats me the same as he used to. And he hasn’t changed one fucking bit.
I give a shrug. “You know she won’t come unless there’s goodies to be had.”
He jerks his head and looks at me. “Lana?”
When I nod, the muscle in his jaw ticks. Charlie has a hate-hate relationship with the girl who picked me back up after Pearl. I see no reason why; Lana is just as much as coke fiend as he is.
“Couldn’t we have done this in bloody London?” he finally asks after a pause.
My mouth makes a hard line. “No. Lana hates London.” Not to mention, I draw the line at going back to France yet again. Marcel is on the warpath and I’ve no desire to be in the firing range. True to the old principle, Switzerland is the most neutral place for me right now. I’m pissing no one off by being here. Well, except Pearl. “Lana can come to us for a change.”
Marcel’s also been known to track my whereabouts and devices, so I couldn’t take a chance that he would have someone following me in London. The yacht is the last location he would expect to find me, and Pearl’s father was a paranoid fuck. He showed me all of the detectors and security gadgets on board when we stayed here for the wedding. There are hidden compartments and cameras everywhere.
My old friend seems to consider this and shrugs. “What makes you think she knows anything anyway.”
“Lana borrowed my car and stayed at Coldhart house that weekend. The matron let her into my room.”
Charlie cocks a brow. “The weekend you went to Courchevel?”
I give him a direct look that says it all, though I don’t need to affirm anything to Charlie. He knows that DB5 was parked at Ravenwood. Lana needed somewhere to hide from the press for a while, I had a room sitting empty and a car she could use at the time. Between me picking her up and driving her to my old school, the keys getting locked inside, and Henry picking up the car and taking back to the Kensington flat for Pearl to drive, something happened to it. And I need to know what.
My phone dings so I retrieve it from my pocket and swipe to read the latest message. It’s from Pearl.
That’s twice I’ve had to kiss you first. Don’t make me do it a third time.
The smile is on my lips before I can stop it.
“You look like the cat who caught a mouse.”
“Or a raven,” I say absently.
“A what?”
“Nothing.” In my pocket is Pearl’s pin, which I’ve started carrying around as some sort of good luck charm. I should give to back to her, but I never officially made Pearl a raven for all the hoops I made her jump through at school. Hell, I’m barely one myself after the shit storm I went through.
It’s strange how things change. Back then being a member of the Ravens and being CEO to my grandfather’s company was the most important thing to me at the time. Later at Blackheath, this morphed into getting revenge on Pearl and clawing back what I’d lost and more.
Now? I’ve no fucking clue. I’d be lying if I said how I feel about Pearl is as simple as black and white, as simple as love and hate…. It’s not.
“Hold on, we’re not going on the lake house, are we?” Charlie asks as soon as we get to the car.
I cock a brow, unlocking the doors and sliding behind the wheel. “I need to get the rest of my things before we head out. Don’t be such as pussy.”
“Fuck. I need a smoke. I turn up there unannounced and my ex is going to annihilate me.”
“Join the fucking club.” I laugh at him. “Join the fucking club.”
Five years ago.
“Wake the fuck up. Who gave you permission to sleep, Barbie?”
I drag my eyes open.
It’s pitch black so I know it’s in the middle of the goddamn night. Aruba is standing over me, torch in my face. “Good you’re awake. Now get the fuck up.”
The torch flares in the darkened dormitory as my eyes adjust, revealing Aruba, Digger, Mace, and Shorts all crowding around my cot. Mace’s face is red and streaked like’s he been fucking crying, and Shorts is sweating like a pig.
Aruba postures, waving at me with his torch. “I said get the fuck up, Barbie, or do I have to repeat myself?”
“Why the fuck should I?” I drawl, relaxing back onto my cot. Like hell am I going anywhere with them.
Aruba snarls. “Are you fucking questioning me? Think you’re too good for us? You dirty fucking FNG.”
FNG. Fucking New Guy.
I knew this was coming. All week the two self-appointed kingpins of this shitty military academy have been making promises to “put me through the wringer”.
Aruba—a nineteen-year-old reject from a bona fide military school and not some behavioral correctional facility for the rich and famous that this place pretends it’s not—has been a dickhead at every turn. Closely followed by his bum-fuck buddy, Digger, who, according to the student files I managed to acquire, is a pyromaniac serial killer waiting to happen.
But unlike the other unfortunate new recruits… Mace, a tall, skinny, rich kid, opiate addict from London, and Shorts, an overweight computer programmer from Kent with a snuff problem of all things. I haven’t been backing down. I’ve been downright ignoring the lot of them.
Keep out of trouble and get out of here by the end of the year. That’s what Grandfather promised me. And as much as I can’t stand this entire fucking joke of a school, I’m going to do my damndest to do just that.
“You think this is fucking funny, Barbie?” That damn nickname.
The guys here, delinquent rich boys without their designer clothes and big allowances to insulate them, took an instant disliking to the way I looked and gave me that fucking idiotic label.
Not that I give a fuck.
Not that I’m going to retaliate.
Yet.
A stab of pain on my upper arm makes me hiss and jump to sitting, and I jerk away from the right side of my cot where Digger is closest. There’s a flare of orange light in Digger’s cupped hands.
The bastard chuckles. “Get up, Barbie, come play, or we burn you where you sleep. Your choice.” He flicks the zip lighter in his fingers on and off.
He’s not bluffing. Digger was caught covered in accelerant, running away from his parent’s mansion in the middle of the night. Only, the dumb fuck admitted that he forgot to turn off the fire alarm and sprinklers so they would have burned alive.
Forcing myself to relax, I slowly get out of bed. Shorts is whimpering so loud I’m surprised no one else has woken up. Probably, they don’t want to be involved. Head down, nose clean, do your time without a scratch. Poor little hard done by rich boys. This place is crawling with them.
Aruba makes us walk outside to one of the training fields. It’s pissing down with rain. Aruba and Digger are fully dressed while the three of new guys are still in our kecks. At least it’s not too cold. Mace gives me a consolatory look and is at least pulling himself together. Shorts is freaking the fuck out.
When we get to the middle of the training yard, Aruba flashes his torch our faces.
“I want a hundred push-ups and hundred squats, now.”
Nothing I haven’t done before. That’s not even a hardship. Mace and Shorts just stand there, so I shoot Aruba a challenging look and drop to the ground. It’s been raining hard, so the concrete is waterlogged. The quicker I get this done, the quicker I can go to back to bed,
“Hold up, Barbie, who said you could fucking move. Stand up and strip off. I want to see you ladies naked.”
“Oh, fuck off, I’m not doing—” I don’t get to finish. Digger comes at me and kicks me hard in the gut.
I’m not expecting it so it fucking winds me, slamming the air out of my lungs. Instinctively, I curl up on the dampened concrete, hands protecting my head while Digger rains more blows on the rest of my body.
Until there’s a popping sensation and searing pain explodes in my chest.
Until I can’t fucking breathe.
Aruba finally barks an order and the pounding halts, almost as quickly as it started.
Someone is crying. Bloody fucking Shorts.
I really can’t breathe.
“Get the fuck up, Barbie, we don’t have all night.”
It takes effort to drag in myself to a standing position. Every movement, every inhale, sends a tight stabbing up and down my left side. I glare at Digger, refusing to clutch my side as he fucking smirks at me, flipping his shitty lighter in his hands.
One day, I’m going to take that lighter and shove it down his goddam throat.
I promise him that.
“Glad you could join us, Barbie. Now, all of you, strip before I lose my fucking patience. Digger is not your worst nightmare. I am.” Aruba’s eyes flit to mine as he finishes his little declaration. There’s a spark of curiosity in there. He wants to see what I’ll do next.
The guys standing in a line next to me, Mace and Shorts, shrug off their boxers until they’re completely naked. I do fuck all. If they want me naked, they can come and undress me themselves. I dare them.
When I don’t move to comply, Aruba snarls. “Are you fucking deaf, Barbie?”
Digger’s psychotic smile twists on his mouth. He pockets the lighter and comes right up and in my face. “I think he wants us to fuck him up so bad that he can’t walk out of here tomorrow.”
My jaw tightens.
Tomorrow. The first day of leave for this term commences tomorrow. Every cadet has the opportunity to get out of this hell hole for two whole weeks. I had planned on going to stay with Charlie in Costa Rica for the entire break, but suddenly it dawns on me. This isn’t a cock measuring contest I can win. For my own sanity I need to get the fuck out of here. And I can’t do that if they beat the living shit out of me.
Swallowing down every part of me that’s raging right now, grappling every piece of self-control, I shift my eyes to Aruba.
“Fine. I’ll strip for you. If that’s what gets you off. But tell your little pyro bitch to get out of my face first.” Pain flares around my ribcage as I talk.
Digger licks his lips, eyes full of crazy, muscles in his arms twitching. “What the fuck did you call me?”
Aruba’s face darkens. “Do you have a death wish, Barbie? You and your smart fucking mouth?”
Fuck it. Sod Charlie. I’m not getting out of here.<
br />
Cocking my head at Aruba, I give a shrug. “Do your fucking worst.” I’m breathing shallower, trying not to react to the agony I’m in. Bastard has well and truly broken a few ribs.
The evil grin on Digger’s face has my fists curling and my muscles tensing. I’m not lying on the ground this time. I’m fully alert and ready for him.
I meant what I said.
I’m going to shove that lighter down his fucking throat.
It doesn’t take long for the rest of Aruba’s guys to appear. They hold me down and beat the shit out of me, to the point where I can’t move, never mind walk back to my cot.
They leave me broken, lying in a puddle of blood as the rain lashes down, wheezing like an old man, trying to breathe.
Just before I black out, the memory of her smiling softly at me filters into my mind. And the hurt of her betrayal comes flooding back.
And I remind myself.
Whatever pain I’m in now is nothing compared to that.
Absolutely, fucking nothing.
Deal with it.
Chapter 10
Pearl
“I still don’t understand why you aren’t together if you kissed him,” Flick says as we exit the limousine at the Marina di Portofino to attend the mid-term Annual Harbor Party.
I haven’t seen much of Seth since I kissed him on the helipad except for in lectures. Flick wasn’t even there when it happened but she seems to think that it means something. It means nothing.
Absolutely, nothing.
“Are you and Charlie an item?” I say, knowing full well that she and Charlie had it out the day he arrived. I wasn’t there. I was too busy scheming with Gabby how to break into my own yacht because, let’s face it, it is still my yacht. But when I got back, Flick was in tears and all of Seth’s belongings were gone.
She sighs. “It’s complicated.”
I roll my eyes at Flick and let out a long breath when I see how far we have to walk. We’re both in very high-heeled strappy sandals that we can easily slip off when we board the boat but are mainly for show. I was so hoping we didn’t have to walk far in them.
