by Cassie James
“Jude,” I whisper as he pulls away from my trembling embrace, his face full of pride. “Holy shit. That was amazing.”
“Get used to it, sugar, because that was just a taste. I’m not stopping until I’ve run you dry.” It’s a promise that makes me shiver. And while I know he’s serious, I know there’s more than just his pride at stake. Because as much as I’m sure he wanted to fuck me for his own benefit, he wouldn’t have treated my body so reverently if he didn’t care about more than that. He can act like an asshole all he wants. When it matters, he fucking melts for me.
As we start to clean ourselves up, my body still feeling like fucking jello, I can’t help but think about the fact that I’m in so much fucking trouble. Sex with Jude was amazing, even more so because he keeps pausing to kiss me as we re-dress. But it’s still not enough. There’s still that small part of me reminding me that it could still be better. That I still want more. All three of The Thorns share my heart, and I have no idea how I could possibly ever end up anything other than heartbroken.
22
Piper
The first couple weeks of January slip by in a haze as I struggle to deal with growing feelings for The Thorns. I finish my Humanities project and manage to keep Mom appeased for the most part. But everything else feels so overwhelming that I slip up and start making sloppy mistakes.
Like asking Dad about the pool again even though I know it will get back to Mom. Accidentally mentioning something that happened in October, which makes Mom’s mouth tighten even though it makes no sense that she still assumes I just never heard or learned anything about 2.0. And letting Macie drop me off at home on days Tyler has practice and it’s cold enough that I can’t bear to sit in the stands waiting for him.
It’s one of those days that Macie brings me home when everything seems to go to shit. Macie’s chatting away about her latest date with Rhys Collier, her boyfriend from Exeter, when I happen to glance up and see Mom standing in the doorway as we pull up. Surprise, surprise. She doesn’t look happy.
“Hey, Mace,” I interrupt her as I lock eyes with Mom. Macie keeps chatting away as Mom beckons me, and my stomach bottoms out at the realization that I very well may have just screwed myself over. “Mace, I have to go. Now.”
“What? Why, what’s wrong?” she asks when she catches the panicked edge to my tone. I nod my head toward the house where Mom is home earlier than she was supposed to be, and she’s standing there with this expression on her face like she’s ready to rain down hellfire. “Fucking shit, okay. Yeah, go. Text me later, though, just to let me know you’re okay.”
I don’t respond, too shocked by the sight of Mom standing there with her arms crossed over her chest and her toe tapping impatiently as she glares toward the BMW parked in her drive like it doesn’t fucking belong. I force myself to keep my head up as I march toward the house, breezing through the open door like I’m not seconds away from possibly being reset and losing myself all over again. The weight of my carelessness crashes down upon me as the door slams. I don’t bother moving past the foyer, knowing Mom’s just going to summon me back, anyway.
When I glance back at her, she points silently to the living room. I follow her in there, dropping my purse at the base of the stairs and praying like hell that she won’t find my phone hidden in the discreet inside pocket of the bag. That phone—and all the information on it—was my saving grace last time around. She points a rigid finger at one of the club chairs that sits directly across from the couch, and I drop down into it obediently even though I’d rather bolt and try to make a break for it.
I force calming breaths that don’t actually seem to work as she sits across from me, crossing her legs and cupping her hands around her knee. She stares without speaking for the longest time, and I’m pretty sure I’m going to be fucking sick. I don’t know what to say to spin this in my favor, so I don’t even try. This is the one situation that I’d rather be reactive in, letting her take the lead while I take the time to scramble together a defense.
“Was that Macie Wharton?” she finally asks, her tone ice cold. I simply nod, still not quite trusting myself to not say something stupid. “Why were you with Macie Wharton? Tyler gives you rides home from school.”
I take a deep breath. And then another. As I exhale, I gather myself, sitting just a little taller as I square my shoulders. Mom needs to see me acting like 3.0, not 2.0. “Tyler has practice, and it was too cold to wait around for him. Brennan was already gone since he had to pick his sister up from school today, and I couldn’t find Jude.”
“Why didn’t you ask one of your other friends. Tori?”
Fuck that. I can’t tell her why not, though, so I scramble for an excuse and hope like hell it doesn’t come back to bite me in the ass later. “She had detention for being late.” It wouldn’t be the first time it had happened. “Mom, Macie was a last resort, I swear.”
She sticks her nose in the air like the bitch she is. “You could have called me or your dad to come pick you up.”
My eyes narrow, annoyance pulsing through me as I struggle to deal with how pushy she’s being about this. “I never know where in the city you guys are or when you’re with clients. I didn’t want to bother you to drive all the way out to Rosewood to drive me fifteen minutes home just to have to go all the way back out to wherever you were working today.”
Mom hums in the back of her throat, but there’s still a shrewd type of fury burning behind her steely eyes. I’m on high-alert, my body thrumming with currents of anxiety as she stares at me through narrowed eyes. “What have you learned at school since you’ve been back?”
I know she’s not asking me about my coursework, but the alternative is so much worse. So I offer her a sarcastic grin and a scoff. “Not enough.” I say, and her eyes flash with anger. I’m quick to add, “I’ve caught up my grade in Humanities, and the rest of my courses are hardly a challenge at all.”
“That’s not what I mean, Piper, and you know it.”
Shit. Shit fuck damn. Fucking shit. Hell. Motherfucking shit.
She’s laid her trap well, and I’m about to prance right fucking into it. My stomach twists, and I think that I might get a pass if I lean over the side of the chair and vomit all over the floor. Mom’s eyes are flinty, though, and I’m pretty goddamn positive that vomiting all over her floor won’t actually get me out of this. I offer her what I hope is a sheepish smile, though at this point I might be cringing for all I know. My body feels fucking numb.
“After a few weeks, I found out about an email that suggested I was… here before.”
Mom’s teeth grind, and I barely stave off the urge to twist nervously in my seat. Instead, I mimic her pose, crossing my legs and dropping my hands to cup my knee. I try to act unaffected, like I couldn’t give a shit that she’d tried once before with me and failed, but I’m not positive I’m pulling it off. Especially when her lips press into a line so tight they go white, and she leans forward like she wishes she could reach out and shake me.
“Have you learned anything other than what’s in the email?”
Yes. So much, you sadistic bitch.
I shake my head emphatically and offer a half-hearted shrug. “No, just some stuff here and there around school, but nothing of importance. Why, is there something else?”
“No.” It’s a firm answer, and even though she’s still furious, her posture’s starting to relax a little. I don’t want to congratulate myself yet, but it seems like she’s satisfied with the way I’m acting, channeling enough old Piper to keep her appeased. “So you’ve read about the first AI?” She asks blithely, and I nod even though I’m sick to my stomach that she uses the word AI like it’s filthy. “And what do you think of the girl they called 2.0?”
My gut fucking burns, but I know what Piper would say, and I know what Mom’s expecting to hear. “She was weak.” I reply breezily, and a flash of appreciation courses over Mom’s face before a mask of stoicism replaces it. I can taste the bile rising in the ba
ck of my throat, but I push myself forward, knowing I haven’t said quite enough to appease her entirely. “I don’t think she deserved the opportunity she got. You made the right decision when you asked Stan to start over with better programming. I hate that you even had to ask, really. How incompetent was he to get her so wrong the first time around?”
Mom practically fucking preens as I spit the words I don’t mean with vitriol that I don’t feel. Her mask slips into place again, though, and I barely contain a gasp when she asks, “So you fully understand the consequences for poor behavior?”
The word reset hangs heavily in the air between us as I nod. “Very much so,” I answer seriously, and she regards me with an appraising look. “I’ll avoid riding with… others, from now on.”
The smile she offers me is so fucking bright it’s almost blinding. “Good girl.” She says breezily as she stands, moving toward the foyer with measured steps. She pauses in the doorway, glancing over her shoulder with a smile that is equal parts charming and off-putting. “I’m glad we understand each other.”
I’m not so sure that we do, but I don’t tell her that. I don’t stick around to see if she decides to go for round two. I jump up as soon as she’s gone, grab my purse, and dart up the stairs two at a time. I don’t really feel safe until I’m in my room with the door locked behind me.
I collapse onto my bed, digging my phone out as fury swells to life within me. How fucking dare she? Knowing that the threat of a reset is possible is much different from actually being outright threatened with a reset if I don’t comply, and my gut is burning. My fingers are flying over the screen, tapping out a message that’s risky but that I don’t regret sending.
Mom’s fucking insane, but I’m safe from a reset and feeling rebellious. How do you feel about going on a double date sometime soon? I need to have some words with Rhys about treating you like a lady.
The bubbles that show Macie’s typing a response pop up almost immediately, and I grin when I see her reply.
Okay, one, don’t you DARE tell Rhys to treat me like a lady—we have a VERY nice arrangement. ;) ;) But also, yes, girl! Fuck that crazy bitch. I’ll talk to Rhys, but maybe we can do this Saturday?
I respond with a thumbs up emoji but nearly break out into a cold sweat when I see her next message.
Which one of your sexy, broody boyfriends are you bringing?
I shake my head but don’t respond. Because honestly, how will I ever choose who to invite? Especially when things have been a little strange, but okay over the past couple weeks at school. The tension’s still there, and I still catch them sending glares in one another’s direction, but none of them have asked me for anything serious, so I haven’t had a reason to have the talk yet.
I think it might all crash and burn when I do, so part of me is fucking relieved that all I’m getting are stolen moments alone with each of them. It’s a miracle that serious rumors haven’t spread after everything that went down at the New Year’s party. So either people don’t care, or one of them has already handled it. I shake my head as I text her back. I’m nowhere near having any answers.
I’ll figure it out later. And stop calling them my boyfriends. Someone’s going to take you seriously one of these days.
Yeah, Piper. And hopefully it’s one of those dense fuckers.
23
Tyler
Piper surprises the fuck out of me when she asks me to take her on a double date with Macie and some guy from Exeter that Macie’s supposedly seeing. We haven’t had as much time together since Christmas break. And based on the rumors that picked up when we started back to school, it’s not hard to guess why.
Piper openly flirted with all of us at Jude’s New Year’s party, but I guess I thought I was on better footing with her, based on the fact that we spent half the break fucking our way through every room in my big ass house. Apparently, she was kissing me. Then hanging out in Brennan’s lap. And then disappearing somewhere with Jude sometime later.
Maybe the most surprising part is that for the first New Year’s Eve party ever, Jude didn’t brag about who he’d been fucking at midnight. That was enough to confirm that the rumors must be true. If it had been anyone else, he would have bragged like always. I’m surprised he still didn’t.
Now, of course, the rumors are squashed. Jude took care of that. “Say another word about Piper’s dating life and those will be the last words you ever say.” Brennan and I took a similar, but less violent-sounding stance, until finally people stopped mentioning it. The curiosity still lingered, I could see it in the way people watched us with her—but now, everyone was too afraid to be caught running their mouths to risk saying anything.
My jaw clenches as we pull into the parking lot of the restaurant we’re meeting Macie and her date at, and I force myself to remember that she asked me on the date tonight, not Jude or Brennan. I don’t let myself ponder too long over what they had going on instead because deep down I know they’re both busy with other shit this weekend, and I can’t stomach the idea that I might’ve been a last resort for her.
Her hand reaches out and brushes mine. I shoot her a smile. The way she’s looking at me… she wants me to be the one that’s here with her. There’s no regret in her eyes, like maybe she wished it were someone else.
“You’ve been quiet,” she murmurs, her eyebrow quirking. I flip my hand over, lacing our fingers together with a squeeze, but I don’t offer her an answer other than that. “What’s on your mind, Ty?”
I let my eyes roam her body, taking in the jeans and fitted top she’s wearing under a sexy as hell brown leather jacket I didn’t even know she owned. She’s hot in that effortless sort of way she doesn’t seem to realize she has, and I don’t think twice about my answer. “You.”
“Good things I hope?” Her head tilts to the side as she studies me. I lean over and capture her lips for a quick kiss.
It doesn’t turn out to be as quick as I meant it to be. She presses closer just when I’m about to pull away. Not that I’m complaining. I run my hand along the side of her neck, thumb brushing her jaw as her mouth opens to me. This is heaven.
A heavy knock on the window startles us apart.
I jerk away from Piper to see Macie waggling her eyebrows and winking through the window behind her best friend’s head. I roll my eyes and turn my attention back to Piper. I rest my forehead against hers and finally respond to what she said before we started kissing. “I only have good things to think about you, Pipe.”
“Sweet talking will get you everywhere.” She smiles, starting to lean in for a kiss again, but Macie pounds her fist on the window until we break apart.
“Get your asses out here!” Macie shouts through the glass at us.
I lean forward to give her the middle finger, but stop as soon as a guy comes up behind her. He’s fucking huge. There’s no way the fucker is actually a high school student. As we get out of the car, Piper falls into step with Macie, the two of them giggling together or whatever as Macie’s dude and I get left behind.
“What’s good, mate?” he asks, and I pick up a distinctly foreign accent. Not quite sure from where, though.
I shrug but offer him a hand when he circles around the car. “Nothing much, man. Tyler Hamilton.” His grip is strong, which is unsurprising considering he’s built like a fucking tank. I’ve always felt pretty good about the way I look, but this guy dwarfs me easily. I’d hate to make an enemy of him that’s for fucking sure.
“Rhys Collier,” he introduces himself as we walk into the restaurant.
The girls are waiting for us just inside the door. Impatient looking, as if they hadn’t just been the ones to run off on us. Piper smiles at Rhys as he offers her a hug, and I have to bite back a growl watching him put his arms around her. When he pulls back, though, he ruffles her hair and I relax. He’s not here for her. She shoves him away with what looks like all her might, but he doesn’t budge. It’s obvious they’ve met before and get on well. Still, I can’t help but si
de-eye him one more time. Making sure he’s not checking out my girl. Lucky for me—and for him—he’s only got eyes for Macie.
We end up sharing an easy dinner. Rhys isn’t bad, which is good since we end up talking more to each other than the girls, who apparently have a million things to talk about that don’t involve us. It doesn’t bother me, I like watching Piper as she talks to her friend, her face so expressive and relaxed. When we move on to the movies, the girls sit next to each other with Rhys and I on either side of them. I’m starting to think maybe this was just an excuse for the two of them to hang out, not to actually spend time with us guys. They giggle through the trailers, and I’m positive they’re going to whisper through the entire movie until Rhys wraps his arm around Macie’s shoulder and pulls her closer to his side.
I follow suit, happy for an excuse to pull Piper into me. She turns her head to smile up at me as she shifts her feet to the end of my reclining chair, snuggling as close as she can with an arm rest between us. Everything feels perfect for a minute until it sinks in that the movie we came to see is one of Jude’s dad’s latest films.
I struggle not to let it bother me that Jude somehow still manages to work his way into our date. Other than that, I do genuinely have a good time. Piper stays close to me, even as we say our goodbyes after the movie and walk slowly back to my car.
She catches my eye. “Thanks for coming with me, Ty. I had a lot of fun with you.”
It’s a throwaway comment, one that I definitely shouldn’t fixate on, but something about it rubs me the wrong way. I pull away from her as I clench my jaw, teeth grinding against the urge to ask her questions that honestly aren’t going to do me any favors. But then all I can hear in my head is that comment she made about how she couldn’t wait to talk to Jude about how good she thought his dad’s movie was, and I snap.
