by Jordan Grant
He blinks once before he sheers his gaze from Barley and looks down at me. My glass heart splinters and shatters.
Dark lashes frame his steely gaze above impossibly high cheekbones. Blood coats the bottom half of his face, painting his pout vermilion. It pours from his busted lip, wets my hands, and trails in a single rivulet down his chin. He is a beautiful, wicked sight.
“I accept,” I say as the blackness slithers in across my chest and constricts.
I close my eyes and take in a shaky breath. When I open them, Ian stares down at me. The chant has died down, and they all watch us, waiting.
“I accept.” My voice is clear, but my words are soft, spoken just for him.
An emotion I don’t recognize flits across his gaze. What is it? And why does it feel like one part relief and one part guilt?
I open my mouth. I don’t know what I’m about to say, but I have to say something, anything.
But he steals the words from me as his lips crash into mine.
26
Harlow
I taste the iron of his blood and the bite of hard liquor. His kiss strikes me like steel on flint, sending sparks cascading down into my belly.
I am momentarily frozen in place, but like the flicker of a flame to ice, I melt into his embrace. He tugs me until we are flush together, and there’s no mistaking the hardness in his dark jeans that presses against me. Warmth spreads like a hot shower over my skin. He feels…good—too good—and I breathe him in, cardamom and mossy earth.
“Fight! Fight! Fight!” The chant continues, but it already fades.
Part of my brain wonders what I am doing. Whatever happened to the dream I once had of a knight in shining armor coming to my rescue? I suppose that dream is dead because princesses locked in stone towers don’t normally come with special sanity pills or the ghost of their brother by their side.
It’s official. I have too much baggage for Prince Charming.
Not to mention, I don’t want to be the only damaged one. That’s got to be a lot of pressure, to be the one who’s not perfect. No, I want my knight with dents in his gauntlets and blood splatter on his boots.
Whether or not the students of Voclain Academy see it, their star quarterback is battle-worn. He may have the face of a model and the body of an athlete, but he has the scarred soul of a warrior. He’s not perfect, and he doesn’t pretend to be. Maybe he is my knight in not-so-shiny armor after all.
My palms flatten against his chest so I feel the thump of his heart battering inside his chest. Maybe it’s adrenaline from the fight because I think I can’t affect him this way. That’s crazy. The Devil is supposed to tempt the human, not the other way around.
Someone wolf-whistles and starts a slow clap, but still Ian doesn’t release me. He steals the breath from my lungs, sucking it into his own like an incubus. Only when my lungs are incinerated, gray dots hazing my vision, does he let go. I gulp in air greedily, but he doesn’t let me escape. He traps my face between his palms and silently demands I stay there.
He stares at me, his gaze locked on mine.
We stand there, the catcalls and drunken cheers fading away to nothing. Hot embers from the bonfire rise into the night sky and bathe him in orange light as smoke dances in the air above us. It’s just me and him now—no friends, no foes—just us, and I could stand here forever, entranced by him and the primal thing he awakens inside of me.
Finally, his fingers fall from my face to grab hold of my hand. He leads me away from Molly and Barley, from Raven and Archie, and all of his friends.
Classmates who have gathered around us to watch the spectacle stagger out of our way as he pulls me past the fire pit and the kegs of beer, past the couples making out and doing more wanton things in the shadows of the trees.
He snatches a hand towel from the outdoor bar and cleans his face as we walk. When I stumble, he doesn’t hesitate. He swoops down and lifts me into his arms.
I squeal, and his grip on me tightens, one arm below my knees and the other around my shoulders. Ian continues forward like he’s on a mission. He clumsily jerks his keys from his back pocket but manages to not drop me.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
He doesn’t answer. He just hits a button, and the door to his Lamborghini lifts into the air.
“What are you doing?” I repeat.
He looks down at me. “We are leaving,” he says, his words gruff. “My place.”
I cross my arms over my chest indignantly. Well, as much as one can cross their arms over their chest indignantly while being held. “You’ve been drinking. You can’t drive.”
He turns, taking me along with him, and looks back at the house before muttering, “No way is our first time going to be in Aurora’s fucking lake house.”
“Our WHAT?!” I squirm and jerk until he drops me.
I catch myself, with his help, before backing away from him. I raise my hands as if it will protect me from him, which really is laughable. He stares at me, a quizzical confusion on his otherwise perfect face.
“I am not sleeping with you,” I say.
The quizzical expression continues, and I briefly wonder if I have broken him.
Ian steps forward. Somehow his one long step makes up for all of mine.
I lick my lips, and his gaze latches onto the movement.
“I…” I begin. Why is it so hard for me to say this? “I like you, Ian, but I’m not ready for that...” After last time. “I don’t know if I want that...” Again.
“You’re a virgin?” He doesn’t look sad or happy, just mildly surprised.
“Well, um,” I look at the ground, then past his shoulder at the house, then off into the trees. Why is my mouth so dry? “No.” I swallow. “It’s…I’d rather not talk about it.”
Why do I sound like I’m sitting in confessional? Should I ask for a couple of Hail Mary’s while I’m at it?
His gaze darkens with something—desire maybe? Possessiveness? He grabs my hands I now have latched over my belly and holds them in between his own.
“Did someone hurt you, Harlow?” His words threaten murder.
“No,” I shake my head quickly. “It’s not like that. It was a couple of months after William, and we were both just really drunk, and...” Please don’t make me talk about it. My eyes close as the fuzzy images float through my head.
Me giggling as we staggered up the stairs.
Him smiling before he attempted to rip his shirt off, got tangled in it, and once free, threw it across the room.
Me waking up alone and realizing I had added another notch to his never-ending bed post.
I shake the memories away and shut my mouth to prevent the continued spillage of words.
“I’ll wait, Stormy,” Ian says softly. “I will wait for you.”
His words send a crack straight through my porcelain heart.
Then he is tugging me toward the car again.
“Where are we going?” I laugh. “I thought we just had this conversation.”
Ian nudges me gently into the driver seat before strapping me into a crazy five-point harness, which only illustrates why I shouldn’t even be in this car, much less in the driver’s seat.
“You said no sex,” he says as he latches the last clip. “But you never said I couldn’t taste you.”
I have the fleeting realization that I don’t think he’s talking about my mouth before his lips crash into mine in an all-too-quick kiss and he shuts the door.
He jogs over to the other side of the car. As he buckles himself in, he asks, “Have you ever driven a stick?”
I snort because although my dad made me learn, it’s not high on my list of achievements. I’m not even sure I could classify it as an achievement. It’s more of a participation-award sort of thing.
“It’s been a while,” I say, looking over at our classmates still mingling about on the lawn. “Maybe we should…”
Ian shakes his head. “Don’t worry, sweetness. I’ll show you.”
“You steer and brake when I tell you,” Ian says, resting a hand on the gearshift. “I’ll handle the rest.”
“Are you sure?” I calculate how many chores it will take me to fix this if I screw up his car. It’s gotta be somewhere in the indentured servitude level.
Ian levels his gaze at me. “Do I strike you as unsure?”
“Remember that when I destroy your transmission,” I squeak.
Ian shifts the car into drive, and I tap the gas. The car lurches forward.
I slam on the brakes, and we both jerk against our seat belts. Ian groans.
“Let’s go slow,” he says, “so we don’t die, because I have so many plans for you that don’t involve dying.”
I punch him in the arm, and I’m rewarded with one of his heartbreaking smiles.
My foot hovers over the gas pedal, and I lay it down ever so slightly. It barely feels like I’m touching it. We don’t even make it out of first gear as we roll down the long driveway.
Ian groans, and by the sound of it, you would think I just stabbed him or something.
“You are killing me, Stormy,” he says through gritted teeth. “I take back everything I said. If we don’t get back to the Academy within the next hour, I am going taste that sweet pussy of yours in my car until you fucking scream.”
I hit the gas a little too hard.
Ian laughs.
“Let go of the gas,” he instructs as we pick up speed. “Gently hit the brake.”
He shifts gears. We continue, him directing me that way until we are out on the highway.
We glide over black asphalt hills, alongside a never-ending thicket of trees, the car hugging curves illuminated by nothing except the full moon and starlight.
27
Harlow
Every movement of his Lamborghini is fluid, the ride smooth and steady.
I’m struck by something as I pull into the student parking garage and then carefully park the car in his spot. He hasn’t once looked at his phone. He seems content with me, no distractions necessary. Even Molly looks at her phone while I’m talking sometimes, and Molly is the most polite person I know.
“You can handle my stick anytime, sweetness,” he teases, turning off the engine and undoing my harness before his own. He grins at me, his teeth gleaming white in the darkness of the car. “Let’s get you to my room before I have a heart attack. You are literally killing me over here.”
I giggle.
It feels like a dream being with him, like I’m going to wake up at any moment and miss this fantasy. I slide out of the car and close the door. He grabs my hand.
“You’re not going to have a heart attack, Ian,” I chide, my tone soft. “You’re like the fittest person I know.”
He leads me to exit the garage and holds the door for me. Chilly air greets me.
“Maybe I’ll take you to the gym,” he says, grabbing my hand again. He looks serious, but I can’t decide if he is messing with me or not. “One of these days, I’ll show you the positions that really get my heart rate going. Maybe I’ll even let you score a home run.”
“You’re a football player,” I tease, my face giving away my blush. “Shouldn’t you stick to football euphemisms?”
Ian raises a dark eyebrow as we cross the quad. Grass pads our footsteps. “Who said I don’t play baseball?”
I laugh because, of course, he’s not joking.
“Are we going to get in trouble?” I say as we arrive at his dorm, a monolithic monstrosity with Roman columns for days.
If I’m being honest, it’s not Headmistress DuMonte or the punishment if we are caught that scares me. It’s me and what I might do with him.
Ian shakes his head. “The Administration doesn’t care as long as no one ends up pregnant. That would be bad for the Academy’s reputation and all.”
He swipes his key card, and the door unlocks with a click. He leads me by the hand into a lobby identical to the one in the girl’s dormitory. We take the stairs. Even as we walk, he never releases my hand. We arrive at the top floor, and I am breathless, but I know it’s not just from the climb.
It’s him. Ian Beckett, star quarterback and dirty talk aficionado, who stole all my breath weeks ago, leaving me to get by on borrowed air.
I glance over at him. His black hair is tousled. His cheeks are warm from the cool wind. He looks like he just went for a mild stroll.
“We really have to work on your stamina, Stormy,” he says with a simper. “Don’t worry. I’ll practice with you every night.”
Fire kindles in my belly and ignites. It feels like I am being incinerated from the inside out, but I relish the burn.
Ian unlocks the door in less than two seconds and tugs me inside.
I expect to see a bedroom like the one I share with Molly. Instead, we stand in a compact kitchen that leads to a living area with a flat screen television mounted to the wall and a sleek black leather sofa across from it.
Ian throws his keys on the counter and shrugs off his jacket before laying it beside his keys. Seeing my perplexed expression, he says, “Perks of being an RA. Someone around here has to keep the boys in line.”
“You’re the RA?” I ask. “I thought that was reserved for seniors.”
Ian shakes his head. “Seniors get even nicer rooms. Plus, if you were a senior, would you want to spend your last year trying to wrangle our fellow classmates?”
I grin. “Absolutely not.”
Ian walks up behind me and stands there. I feel his presence as I take in the room. The space smells like him, exotic yet masculine. It matches him, all monochromatic blacks and grays and silvers. On the outside, it looks deceptively uncomplicated, just like him.
His fingertips brush my neck as he wraps his hands around my jacket and pulls it off my shoulders. He lays it on the counter besides his like it belongs there.
His hands graze down my sides to my hips before he tucks my hair behind my ear. His lips brush against the side of my face as he murmurs, “I probably should be a good host and offer you something to eat or drink, but I need you, Stormy. All I need is you.”
I turn to him, unable to resist his pull.
He kisses me delicately, tasting of salt and liquor. He kisses me as though he is trying his best to memorize the feel of my mouth. I wrap one hand around his waist as my other presses flat so I can feel his heartbeat, steady but fast.
He deepens the kiss, his lips gently nudging mine apart so his tongue laves over mine. He groans into my mouth, his hands warm through the thin fabric of my dress.
I want more. I want all of him. It would be so easy to give in right now and let him chase away my worries. He tugs on my dress, and I raise my arms willingly. He lifts it over my head and drops it to the floor. His hands ignite my bare skin, but I target his shirt, and he lets me raise it. It falls, a ball of warm fabric onto the tile.
My heart batters inside my chest like a stampeding bull as my fingers trace the hard muscles of his abdomen and dance upward over the indention in the center of his chest, to his pectorals. We are standing so close I can see my breasts quivering against the lavender lace of my bra.
I am shaking. Goosebumps pepper my skin, and my breath catches, lodged in my throat. He is so perfect. Tan and tall and absolutely, devastatingly perfect. Warmth pools between my legs.
It takes everything I have, but I lift my gaze to his and watch as something breaks behind his eyes. His hands tremble before his lips and body crash against mine. He walks me back, knocking us into the sofa—which makes us both groan—and then into the wall before we finally reach his bedroom.
He breaks us apart.
“Fuck,” he growls.
He puts his hands on my shoulders and tips me back onto his bed. I land, cradled by soft silk sh
eets and the scent of him.
My heart ricochets, bouncing against my ribs. He kneels over me to pepper kisses over my mouth and my cheeks, down my throat, over the swell of my breasts, and over my belly button until his hands reach the silk lip of my panties.
He hooks his thumbs on either side, and I lift my hips on instinct. His gaze never leaves mine as he lowers my panties until he disappears below my line of sight. My shoes come off next. My gaze rolls around the room, taking in cream-colored walls, the dark curtains, the dark bed on which I lay.
“Hey,” Ian says, drawing my attention back to him with the snap of his fingers. “None of that. I want you here with me for everything, not getting lost in your head.”
I am completely exposed from the waist down as he stands there in his dark jeans and boots. My heart stumbles as he lowers his gaze to me, his gray eyes dilated to black. His hands skim up my knees to my thighs and spread me wider, his touch like the grit of ultra-fine sandpaper.
He bites his lip until the spot of skin he clinches is white like his teeth, and it takes him a long moment before he says, “So damn beautiful.”
He crawls on top of me, and the pounding of my heart is so loud I hear nothing else. His body catches on mine, his jeans brushing against my bare legs, the pad of his thumb caressing my bare shoulder, his nose skimming up my breastbone, igniting a million tiny fires inside me.
I raise my hand, brushing over the stubble on his chin and jaw. I swim in an invisible ocean of him.
“I’ve wanted to do this since the moment I first saw you,” he says.
His lips pull to mine, beginning tragically slow, and I taste the hint of liquor fading from his breath. Everything about him is hard against my fingertips. His tongue teases the outside of my lips before delving inward, and I am lost.
He falls, and I relish the weight of him, the pressure against me.
His hand traces the swell of my breast and down my side until he is there at that most intimate part of me. Everything feels different from anything I’ve ever experienced before. I’m not drunk. He’s not clumsy.
