Broken Rules: The Elites Of Weis-Jameson Prep Academy Book 2

by Hart, Rebel

  The weather in Massachusetts is beautiful, especially in Jameson. It’s a small enough town with a historic square in the middle that gets decorated with lights, greenery, and bright red bows every November, and stands through the holidays. It all looks so beautiful with the snow and the sparkling salt on the cobblestone sidewalks. It’s so scenic that horse-drawn carriages park in wait for people who want to pay to ride around.

  The orange and red autumn leaves have shriveled to dried, brown, crunchy dead things that are frozen and buried deep beneath the snow. In some places where the snow has turned to slush from cars or foot traffic, you can see the black mush of the soggy thawing leaves underneath. It’s a gross contrast to the pure white snow, and a reminder that just beneath the beautiful surface of everything winter has brought, there are remnants of the fall still lurking. Secrets and bad memories that will inevitably surface in the spring.

  I have a newfound gratitude for my family. I always knew that they were loving and supportive in ways other kids at WJ Prep did not seem to have at home. But now my appreciation has only grown since I’ve seen the cruelty of Emmett’s family in full force. The sting of what they did isn’t just that they forced Emmett to sign over everything he had inherited, it’s more about how they went about it—lying and tricking him into thinking they were in danger to try and make it look like he was mentally unstable just for caring about where they were and if they were okay.

  Emmett and I have spent a lot of time listening to music in his motel room. One of us always plays something on our phones before we make love. Both of us like brooding, sad songs, and the band Emmett wants to take me to see has a heartbreaking, sort of ethereal sound to it. But lately we have both taken to listening to happier songs. Anything to help build the momentum of how we’ve been feeling. Maybe if things can feel happy and simple for just long enough, we won’t completely crumble when the next wave of the Elites’ drama strikes.

  Emmett has been spending a lot of time with my family, and he has just enough money to keep his room at the motel for a little while longer. My mom knows something happened at his home that is making him come around so much, but explaining it requires so much backstory that I’m not ready to give her just yet. But sooner or later, he will have to figure something out for money. What little bit his mom left him won’t last much longer, and I hate her for putting him in that position. He never had time to think about what he might want to do with his life when he was growing up because it was always planned out for him. Now all of that has been taken away, and he has to decide all at once while he is starting over again from scratch.

  The snowflakes cling to my cheeks and melt against my warm skin, getting caught in my eyelashes. I love seeing them accumulate in Emmett’s curls, reflecting in Emmett’s gray eyes. His cheeks blush from the cold, rounding out around his playful smirk. I like seeing him this way. He looks happy.

  He catches me by the door and brings himself close enough to pin me to the car. He grips my face and brings my eyes to his, lingering for a moment before pressing his lips to mine, urging my mouth open with his tongue. I moan into his kiss, suddenly feeling burning hot even in the snow.

  “I’ve got plans for you later tonight,” he warns.

  “Oh, yeah?” I smile devilishly.

  He swoops his mouth over mine again, biting at my bottom lip with always the perfect amount of roughness. Enough to keep me on my toes and keep me burning for no one else but him. The kind of roughness I never expected I would like, but that he does so well.

  The cold air carries with it a new hope. A hope for these unexpected changes, and that they can somehow work out better than we ever planned. While what happened to Emmett seems awful, we both know things might be better this way. Before, he only had one possible path in front of him that he just had to make the best of. Now he has the opportunity to do anything he wants. I call tell the crash of choices scares him, but it’s exciting at the same time. The hope of possibility. And while I promised I didn’t care if things with him weren’t easy, the hope of it all being simpler in the future is refreshing.

  We’re both smiling and grinning in his car, relaxed against the lingering warmth of the heated seats. My fingers loosely grip my phone in my lap, and I see Emmett close his eyes and tip his head back with softened features. It’s something I see him do a lot now, as if he is breathing in as much of this peaceful time as he can before it slips away again.

  Emmett smiles at me from the driver’s seat before he blows into his cold, red hands and rubs them together. The car smells like burnt lint as he turns up the heat, which is strangely comforting. He hasn’t talked to his family since the night they officially cast him out, and Malcolm and Bernadette have yet to return to school. But he seems happier this way. More at peace. I don’t think he could have ever turned his back on his family. Loyalty to them above all else was too ingrained in him for that. But when they disowned him, he was freed and it gave him permission to wash his hands of it all and walk away. I know there is an emptiness left in him, but not for the family he had. It’s a gaping hole for the family he should have had. The one he deserves—much like how I feel about my own father.

  As we drive off, my phone buzzes in my bag. “It’s my mom,” I tell him. “She’s probably wondering if you’re coming over for dinner.”

  “Hell yeah, I am,” he shoots back without hesitation. “I love your mom’s cooking. I’ll come any time she asks.”

  Emmett and I have decided not to tell them everything for now. We know we need to, but we decided we needed time to process it all ourselves first. Plus, we don’t want anything else to change right now. We want to get through the holidays with a sense of calm, and plan to catch them up to speed in the new year.

  “Mom?” I answer, still shivering as the car heats up.

  “Ophelia,” she huffs back, sounding worried. “Are you on your way home?”

  “Yeah, Emmett’s driving me,” I tell her. “Everything okay?”

  “I need to talk to you,” she says sternly.

  “Okay, sure,” I answer pensively, afraid of what this could be about. “What about? Care to give me a hint?”

  “It’s your father,” she replies grimly, stopping my heart cold. “He called me today. I haven’t talked to him since I left him when you were just a baby.”

  “Uh-huh,” I stammer, unable to breathe. “What did he want?”

  “Just come home,” she says again. “I need to talk to you before he gets here.”

  “Gets there?” I demand. “What do you mean ‘gets there’?”

  “He’s joining us for dinner,” she says plainly, but with an obvious tinge of anxiety.

  I hang up and stare straight ahead, wishing the afternoon hadn’t taken this unexpected turn. I want to go back to how I felt just minutes ago, when everything was going well for once. I don’t want my dad in any part of my life, even the dark, distant part my mom doesn’t know about. I can’t stand the thought of those two worlds merging. My mother, who I love. and the man who beat and left her. I hate him enough as it is. I can’t bear to see him with her and let the rest of it slide so easily.

  “What was that all about?” Emmett asks.

  “My father,” I reply breathlessly. “It seems he’s coming over for dinner tonight.”

  My blood boils. I grew up hearing my mom refer to him as the scum of the earth, and now he is coming over for dinner. He was completely absent for most of my life, and then became responsible for the torment I had to endure at the hands of the Elites.

  “I forgot to tell you,” I remember suddenly. “I got pulled over. The night Lily got arrested. The cops were asking me about him again.”

  “Did you tell them anything?” He looks at me questioningly.

  “No,” I reply. “I didn’t know what to say. I wish you had never made that deal with him Emmett. Now I feel like he’s never going to go away.”

  His face contorts. “You know what would have happened if I hadn’t made that deal. One
of our fathers would have killed you, and my dad would still be reigning over everything.”

  “I know you were desperate to get rid of him.” I sigh in acceptance. “But it’s like making a deal with the devil. I’m not convinced my father would have been any better than yours…if he had been around.”

  “Well, it sounds like you’re about to find out,” he says ominously.

  I remember my father defending his decision to kidnap me if Emmett hadn’t stepped in. He claimed he just needed to ‘remove me from the game.’ Like I was just some kind of gambling chip in his mind, one that was swinging the odds out of his favor. At the time, I didn’t know if I was better off with Emmett or my dad. Now it seems I’m getting both, whether I like it or not.

  We’ve come so far since then. When everything about Emmett and my dad came out, I couldn’t imagine ever trusting Emmett again after everything he had put me through. I certainly never thought we’d be where we are today. But I can’t help but feel like the lingering presence of my father threatens what we have. I don’t know how, but I know it’s not good.

  “Do you think he still keeps tabs on my mom and me?” I ask Emmett nervously. “You remember what he said after everything happened with your father. About my mother belonging to him before anybody else. You don’t think he’s...trying to get her back or something…He wouldn’t, right? Not with Brendan around.”

  “Despite what you think…your dad and I aren’t buddies, you know,” he reminds me. “My guesses about this whole thing are as good as yours.”

  “I don’t understand why he’s still around!” I lament. “He said he was going to leave me alone now that Thomas is dead.”

  Suddenly, I wish I had told Mom everything. Then maybe she would have known better than to let Dad join us for dinner. I’d like to know how he talked his way into this one, anyway, especially since my mom hates him. Not to mention how Brendan must feel about it. I cringe to imagine what kind of smooth talk he must have laid on them to make this happen.

  “What do you think he wants?” I ask as Emmett continues driving.

  “Maybe he just wants to be closer to you,” he suggests innocently.

  “Oh, come on,” I scoff. “You know better than that.”

  “Well, there’s only way to find out,” he says. “I guess we’re going to have dinner with your dad. And Mom. And stepdad. All at the same time.”

  I swallow hard, wishing there was some way out of it. Maybe if we can get there in time, we can talk some sense into my mom. But I don’t see how we can do that without telling her everything.

  “I guess we need to start working on our story.” My voice cracks. “Decide on a version of it my mom can handle.”

  “Your house is only fifteen minutes away,” he retorts. “I think it’s going to take a lot longer than that.”

  I press my head to the window and look out longingly. I knew things couldn’t stay simple and easy for long, I had just hoped that we could have until the new year before everything went haywire again. But I guess that’s just life in Jameson.

  * * *

  Thank you for reading BROKEN RULES. Don’t miss GAME CHANGING RULES, book 3 in Emmett and Ophelia’s love story, and be sure to join my SMS list below to don’t miss any of my future books!

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  About the Author

  Rebel Hart is an author of Contemporary and Dark Romance novels. Check out her debut series Diamond In The Rough.

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