Treacherous: Twisted Youth #1

by Chloe Walsh

"That's quite enough, Mr. Messina," a stern voice ordered, cutting Noah off mid-sentence. "Put Miss. Connolly down."

  Noah growled against my lips before reluctantly placing me on my feet. He kept his hands on my hips and I buried my face in his neck feeling like I was about to die of shame.

  While I was contemplating how much trouble we were in for our public display of affection, Coach Johnson said, "In future please refrain from copulating until you're on your own time."

  "Sure thing, Coach," Noah replied before looking down at me in confusion.

  Coach shook his head and stared at us with a look of total dismay. "I just can't figure kids out nowadays."

  "Copulating?" Noah mouthed, looking down at me.

  "Mating," I clarified, red-faced.

  "Oh goodie. A new fun word," he declared in a sarcastic tone, showing me a side of him I hadn’t seen before. "Sweetheart, would you care to join me in the janitor's closet. I'm feeling a very strong urge to copulate with you."

  Humorous Noah…Wow, this was kind of a revelation.

  I rose my brows in amusement. "Sweetheart?"

  Noah's face broke into a huge smile and my chest tightened. He didn’t smile enough. It was a truly beautiful sight. "Well I'm kinda scared to call you baby," he told me in a teasing tone. "But I feel like I should have an endearing name for my girl."

  For my girl…

  Oh Jesus…

  Taking his outstretched hand I waved to the girls and followed Noah out of the cafeteria. "Teagan," I told him, forcing my lips not to smile at him as my lungs played havoc with my oxygen supply. His words squeezed something deep inside of me. "You can call me Teegs or Teagan."

  "Okay, my little thorn," Noah replied sweetly before pressing a kiss to my nose as we wandered outside into the bitter cold.

  I liked the snow here in Colorado. Back home, the closest I'd been to snow was in the form of a can – the horrible sticky kind people sprayed on window panes for Christmas-dynamic purposes. Here snowflakes fell from the sky in abundance and it made me feel all squiggly inside.

  "Why do you always say that? That's like the millionth time you've called me Thorn," I asked Noah, shuffling closer to his body for warmth from the arctic air.

  "I told you," he chuckled, smoothing his thumb over my knuckles as he led me down the snow-covered steps towards his car. "You're my thorn, if you leave me I'll bleed out."

  My heart sky rocketed when those words left his mouth and I felt kind of dizzy.

  Deep breaths…

  "Oh…hey, I told you I have a test after lunch," I reminded Noah when he unlocked his car, opened the passenger door and gestured for me to get in. "I'm not skipping, Noah. I'm in enough trouble because of you as it stands…"

  "Relax," he coaxed. "I need a smoke, that's all." He shrugged and smiled lazily at me. "Thought you could keep me company."

  "And partake in some secondhand inhalation," I grumbled, watching as Noah walked around to the driver's side. "Wow, Noah, you sure know how to treat a girl."

  "Don’t you just know it," he shot back with a smirk before climbing inside.

  Didn’t I just…

  I sat into the car with him but I pretended it was because I was cold. I was a liar though because I was fairly certain I'd inhale the fumes of a jumbo jet if it meant I could keep him company.

  God, I was a very sad girl…

  "So what did you want to talk about?" I asked him as I watched him flick cigarette ash out his window. "You said there was…"

  "Ellie's back," Noah husked before exhaling a cloud of smoke. Turning his face, he looked directly into my eyes and sighed. "Which means George is on route."

  My heart sank.

  Everything had been so perfect these past few weeks and Noah's so called family returning would ruin it.

  "Ellie's back. Yay," I muttered sarcastically. "I was missing our little sparring sessions."

  "Can you do me a favor and try not to antagonize her?" he muttered in an irritated tone and his irritation seemed to set off mine.

  "No, actually I can't," I shot back petulantly. "She's a bitch and I happen to be deathly allergic to her particular breed."

  Noah snorted and I looked over at him and smirked. His eyes darkened as he stared intently at me.

  This lunch could be salvaged yet…

  "You know, you're turning me into a rule-breaker," I purred. A seedy image of the two of us sparked to life in my vivid imagination and I blushed. "I'm still not supposed to have contact with you – of any kind."

  "Well, it's lucky your uncle doesn’t know about the elevator then isn’t it," Noah crooned as he flicked his cigarette butt out the window and dragged me across the console so that I was straddling his hips. "Or our nightly get-togethers… He might try to keep you away from me until your twenty-first birthday."

  "He might," I agreed, wrapping my arms around his neck.

  "Thorn, you know what George returning means for me, right?" Noah whispered and my heart shriveled inside in my chest. "You know what I'll have to do for him…for her?"

  I nodded slowly.

  I knew what it meant. Noah would have to fight again and it put the fear of god inside of me…

  "I don’t have a choice, Teagan," Noah added, noticing my sudden deflation. "You know that."

  "I hate this," I told him, burying my face in his neck. I knew Noah didn’t have a choice, but that didn’t mean I had to be okay with George Dennis using him as a human punching bag. "I hate him."

  "Me too, baby," Noah coaxed, pressing a kiss to my collarbone and I didn’t bother correcting him. "That's why I need you to not argue with Ellie." He let out a heavy sigh as he trailed his lips up my neck. "We don’t need to draw unwanted attention to…"

  The driver's door flew open, causing Noah to trail off and me to yelp in surprise.

  "So it's true?" Ellie sneered, holding the car door open, wrecking our private moment and boiling the blood in my veins. "You're with her now?" She looked at me straddling Noah and shook her head in disgust. "You idiot."

  "Walk away, Ellie," Noah shot back in a tight tone of voice. "Now."

  "You should take your own advice," Ellie hissed. "And walk away – from her."

  "What the hell is your deal?" I snapped. Enough was enough and I'd taken all I could from Noah's skanky sister.

  "Stay out of it, Thorn, I'm handling this…" Noah began to say but I shut him up with one look.

  He had my hips clenched so tightly I had to physically remove his hands from my waist so I could climb off his lap and out of the car.

  "No," I warned him in an even tone as I stood outside his car. "I may be your girlfriend now but I still have a mind of my own, so I will speak for myself, thank you very much."

  Noah looked up at me with reluctant admiration shining in his dark eyes before nodding his head slightly.

  "Well isn’t this a Kodak moment, L?" A familiar voice laughed. "Noah's breaking all of his rules these days." Reese walked over and stood beside Ellie glaring daggers at me.

  "You’re telling me," Ellie replied coldly.

  "Jesus fucking Christ," I heard Noah grumble as he got out of the car and came to stand beside me. "Come on," he husked, wrapping his hand around mine. "Let's get just leave."

  "You know he'll get bored, right? You're just a fresh challenge for him," Reese sneered, flicking her red-hair behind her shoulder. She looked me up and down slowly before scrunching her small nose in distaste. "You're no different than me, Ellie, and dozens of others girls at this school."

  Ouch…

  "Wow," I replied, keeping my tone light and carefree even though I was anything but... "Thanks for the heads up and all, but you're kinda reeking of jealously, Rice." Shrugging I added, "It's a very ugly trait, you know."

  "It's Reese," she hissed. "And you won't be so smug when you see what we've got…"

  "Reese, let's go," Ellie interrupted, staring meaningfully at her friend before stalking off.

  Reese's whole face lit up and without another
word she rushed after Ellie.

  "Let me guess," I sneered when the girls were out of earshot. "You slept with both of them?"

  "Teagan…"

  "She's his youngest child – daddy's little girl – there to do her father's dirty work and get all the staff on board…"

  He was staff… "You slept with your own step-sister?"

  "Did you take her virginity, too, or was that just me?" I hissed, feeling outrageously pissed. "And what about Reese and the dozens of other girls at this school?"

  "Thorn, just calm down and listen to me," Noah coaxed, tugging me closer to him. "I never claimed to be a saint…"

  "Don’t talk to me, you man-whore," I hissed. Breaking free from his grasp, I turned on my heels and stalked back towards the school.

  "You're jumping to conclusions without hearing me out again," Noah growled as he chased after me and tried to hold my hand.

  "I told you not to talk to me, slapper," I shot back, slapping his hand away. "And it's not so much jumping to conclusions as it is putting two and two together." The thought of Noah with any other girl, not to mention dozens, drove me freaking crazy. "Go run after your little brothel buddies," I hissed. "I'm done."

  "Teagan…"

  "Fuck you," I snarled.

  "You already did that," he shot back.

  "Go away, Noah." Ugh, jealously was an ugly trait and right about now I was bursting to the seams with it. "That's obviously why Ellie's been such a bitch to me," I hissed. "You're with her."

  "I'm with you," Noah growled.

  When Noah tried to grab my hand again, I swung around and pointed my finger in his face. "Back up, buddy," I warned. "I'm pissed as hell with you right so just respect my personal space."

  "No," Noah snapped, stepping forward. He grabbed my hips and pulled me flush against him. "I won’t respect your space, because it's my space too."

  "What the…?" I shook my head and began to protest, but Noah interrupted me by pressing a rough kiss to my lips.

  "I'm either fighting with you or I'm fucking with you," he growled against my lips. "There's no middle line, Teagan. Not between us."

  "But you slept…"

  "I understand why you're mad, Thorn," Noah told me, snaking his arm around my lower back. "I do, and we can hash it all out later, but first you need to understand this."

  Raising one hand, he clasped my chin and lowered his face to within an inch of mine. "There will be no storming off and breaking it off with me," he said slowly. "I've risked too much to fuck this up on a tantrum, so if you've got an issue, Thorn, you better raise it with me because you're not walking away from me."

  "I wasn’t having a tantrum," I muttered sulkily. My cheeks were burning and I felt like a grade A idiot. "I didn’t have one…"

  "There will be no break-ups," Noah continued, stroking my chin with his thumb. "In fact there will be no breaks of any fucking kind."

  "We've been boyfriend and girlfriend for less than a month," I managed to choke out, my voice thick with emotion. "Don’t you think you're being a little full on?"

  "We've been a lot more than this for a lot longer than that, Thorn," he husked, pressing a kiss to my lips. "You know it as well as I do."

  I nodded and wrapped my arms around his neck

  Noah was right. I knew it too, and that knowledge scared me to death.

  ****

  Max's face, when I climbed out of Noah's car after school, was one of pure unadulterated rage. He stood on our porch glaring down at us as Noah rounded the car and pulled me into his arms.

  "Your uncle sure looks chipper this evening," he chuckled before pressing a kiss to my cheek.

  "Yep," I replied with a sigh as I wrapped my arms around Noah's waist and hugged him tightly. I knew I was going to hear about this from Max but to be honest I really didn’t give a damn of what he thought anymore. I was quickly discovering the only thing I truly cared about was the boy whose arms were wrapped around me.

  "I'll see you tonight, okay," Noah whispered, stroking my cheek with his thumb. "After he falls asleep…"

  "I'll leave a key under the mat," I told him before reaching up and covering his mouth with mine.

  When Noah eventually stopped kissing me and went inside his house, I remained standing in my driveway, staring at the front of his house.

  I needed to help him.

  I couldn’t sit back and wait for George to return and ruin his life all over again.

  I needed to fight for Noah Messina just as viciously as he fought for his mom.

  ****

  Chapter 22

  Noah

  "We need to talk about where your loyalties rest, kid," was the first thing I heard when I opened my front door Tuesday morning and my heart sank.

  He was home.

  Back to reality…

  "I'm late for school, George," I replied stiffly as I closed the front door and made for the stairs. Ellie had returned from their trip two weeks ago and when George hadn’t returned with her a tiny part of me had hoped – fucking prayed – he never would… "We can talk about my loyalties later."

  I'd spent most of the night fooling around with Teagan, but I'd slipped out of her room at the crack of dawn before her uncle came home. Besides I needed to go home and grab a shower before school.

  Now I was wishing I had just gone stinking and bookless. It would have been a hell of a lot easier than having a confrontation with my stepfather.

  The sound of the staircase creaking behind me confirmed George wasn’t in the mood to wait.

  "You don’t make the rules around here, Messina," George rasped as he hurried after me, also confirming to me that I had a fifty percent change of making it out of here unscathed. "JD seems to be under the impression you're seeing that little bitch next-door," he snarled. "He reckons she's been spotted at the quarry twice – and was with you at the hotel."

  "Yep," I muttered through clenched, pushing my bedroom door open. "She was." There was no point in lying. He would find out either way.

  "What's going on with her, Noah?" he wheezed, standing in my doorway. "You know better than to stick your fingers in the goddamn cookie jar. Her uncle's a doctor for Christ's sakes – that’s almost as bad as a cop."

  "She is none of your business," I warned him, reeling from the emotions that were seeping into my body. "I fight for you – that's the agreement – and I do it when I'm told, no questions asked. But you sure as hell don’t get to tell me who I can spend my time with," I added as I rummaged in one of my dresser drawers for a clean pair of socks and boxers.

  "Spending time with her?" George sneered as he took a step into my room. "So that's what Ellie saw you doing – spending time with her – when you were screwing her in my goddamn kitchen?"

  "Be very careful, G," I seethed. Walking over to my closet, I grabbed a clean pair of jeans, t-shirt and hoodie. "I'm feeling really fucking reckless right now. One more word against her and I'm gonna lost my shit."

  His hand clamped down on my shoulder, nails biting into my shoulder blade, and I had to force myself to remain still and not pulverize the creep into next year.

  There was no doubt in my mind that I could. George knew that as well as I did. But the bastard held the trump card – the one thing that assured my submission – and he wielded it over me any chance he got. "And how was your pretty little mommy?" he sneered, green eyes narrowed and full of poison. "I heard you paid her a little visit over the holidays."

  "Like you don’t know," I hissed, roughly shaking his hand off. "Her nurse told me about the visitor." I shook my head in disgust. "What was it this time, meth or coke?"

  "What can I say…she called me begging for it," he chuckled. "Your sweet little momma's crazier than a bag of frogs, Messina, but she's one hell of a great fuck."

  "You make me sick." My fists clenched with the urge to knock him out. "You're scum, George. Fucking scum." I was shaking with temper as I watched him step out of my reach.

  "Sooner or later I'm going to get her away
from you," I vowed. "Someplace you and your scumbag cronies can't get to her – can't poison her body."

  George's eyes lit up with amusement. "But what would be the point in that, Noah?" he asked in an innocent tone. "Now that I know about your little soft spot for the doctor's niece and can easily use her instead of your mother to keep you in-line."

  My blood turned to ice in my veins. "Don’t even think about involving Teagan in this…"

  "You already did that, you little shit," George snarled. "When you fucked me over with Gonzalez. Be glad that your body's not rotting in the fucking mountains next to your father's."

  I watched George walk across my bedroom. "You fight Gonzalez's boy, Javi, Friday night – the thirteenth," he informed me and my stomach churned.

  Gerome Javi was a fucking butcher. No one survived a fight with the guy, let alone beat him. Javi was a fight to the death kinda guy – no remorse and no way out. Step into the ring with him and you were signing your own death certificate. I didn’t have a prayer of beating him and George knew it…

  "This is different, isn’t it?" I husked, feeling more fear than I had felt in years. "This is it – my punishment." I could feel the vein in my temple throb as I glowered down at the man I hated more than anyone else on this planet.

  George nodded his head, confirming my worst fears, and my legs felt weak.

  This was bad…

  This was so fucking bad…

  "The rules have changed, Messina," he told me. "Because of your defection I can't trust you anymore."

  "My defection," I repeated flatly. "I fought to make some extra cash and get my car fixed – I'd hardly call it defection."

  "That's because you don’t have a loyal bone in your body," George snarled, red-faced, as he stepped towards me and poked my chest. "You don’t have a clue of what loyalty means – just like your piece of shit father."

  "I'm not my father," I snarled.

  "Not yet," George sneered. "But lose against Javi on Friday and you'll be spending a whole bunch of time with him."

  "So that's what this is?" I hissed, forcing my voice not to shake even though the image of Teagan's face was making me feel faint with fear. "You want rid of me, but you want Javi to do your dirty work for you?"