Riot Rules

by Callie Hart

  Dash smiles, brushing his mouth against mine. “It’s okay, Stella. We’ll be a permanent eclipse. That way, we’ll always be together.”

  “That way, the world will always be in darkness,” I argue.

  He shrugs, flicking my lip with the tip of his tongue. “Who gives a flying fuck about the rest of the world. I only care about you and me.”

  His hands slide up the inside of my camisole, and my ears begin to ring. He leaves flames in his wake, heat licking at my skin where his fingers trail over my hips and up either side of my spine. He smiles, mouth open, pupils blown when I arch against his hand, my breath stuttering out of me.

  “God, you really are something.” He kisses me. “I keep waiting for this to become normal. But you’re too fucking much. I feel like I can’t catch my breath around you.”

  The compliment brings that heat creeping over my shoulders and up into my cheeks; he can ignite me with a touch, but I burn just as easily from his words. Winding my fingers into his hair, I tangle the softness of it around them, luxuriating in the feel of it. He groans, his eyelids slowly closing, his head rocking back. They snap open a second later, when I use my nails to lightly scratch the back of his neck.

  He likes this. It’s one of Dash’s triggers. He growls, nuzzling into my neck, applying the perfect amount of teeth to the sensitive skin there—just enough to make me rock forward against him, gasping out loud.

  His hands work their way over my ribcage, fingers tracing the underwiring of my bra, and the anticipation is almost too much. I want him so fucking bad. “You seem a little agitated, Stella,” he muses. His breath is hot against my neck. I shiver in his arms, which seems to please him even more. “Do you need me to flip you over and fuck you, love?” he whispers into my hair. “Is that what it is? Are you all wound up?”

  I nod, lightly cradling his face in my hands, eating up the ravenous hunger that I can see in his eyes. Both of us have been consumed by this thing between us. We’re both hooked on the burn, both craving touch, and taste, and each other’s panted, breathless pleas. We enable each other’s desperate addiction, and neither one of us wants it to stop.

  The tension builds to suffocating levels…

  …and snaps.

  He withdraws one hand from underneath my shirt and grabs me roughly by the back of the neck, pulling me to him. Our lips meet, and I open to him, too needy and eager for his tongue to kiss him softly. Dash smiles against my mouth—I can feel the shape of his amusement against my lips—but he answers my need with an urgency of his own. His tongue stokes mine, his mouth possessive, owning mine. He huffs, his breath quick and frenzied, which only stokes the flames in my chest into a raging inferno. He rips his mouth from mine and stoops down, sucking my nipple into his mouth through my camisole. His mouth is hot, wetting the silken material, his tongue licking at the tight bud of flesh through the fabric. His fingers dig into the fullness of me, holding me in place while he licks and sucks. I cry out, not caring about the noise. There’s a party going on downstairs. No one’s going to hear us over the loud pulse of the music.

  Dash looks up at me, eyes unwavering, and clamps my nipple between his bared teeth. Oh…oh fuck! A sharp dart of pain-edged pleasure fires between my legs, making me buck against him, and Dashiell’s eyes darken with desire. “I’m gonna have you come on my fingers first,” he promises. “And once you’ve done that, I’m gonna have you on your knees for me, love. I’m gonna fuck your mouth ’til I’m ready to bust. Are you gonna let me?”

  “Yes! Fuck, yes!”

  He flares his nostrils grabbing my top. I see what he’s planning on doing too late. The material’s already started to tear by the time I cry out. Half a second later, it’s gone, and so is my bra.

  “Up,” he commands. “On your back.”

  I do as I’m told, and he rips the black pants from my body, too. He likes to really take his time stripping me out of my clothes, but not tonight. Neither of us has the patience to drag this out any longer. He undresses angrily, jaw tight, eyes fierce, pinning me to the bed with his intense gaze.

  I marvel at his naked body, excitement rising with every square inch of flesh that’s exposed. He’s fucking glorious; there’s no other way of putting it. There isn’t a pound of extra fat on him. He’s perfect skin, and taut muscle, and flawless lines. I can’t help but whimper when he takes his hard cock in his hand and shuttles his hand up and down the length of it. “I’m gonna fucking ruin you, sweetheart. I hope you’re ready.”

  Oh…

  My…

  God…

  Dash Lovett likes to fuck. He likes to tease. He likes to make me scream.

  He does not like to rush.

  Over the next hour, he makes me come so hard that I forget what planet I’m on.

  He strokes my face, whispering and encouraging me while I take his cock in my mouth. And when he finally fucks me, sinking himself as deep as he can inside me, he holds me by the hips and shatters me into pieces.

  He comes inside me, panting, forehead pressed against mine, crushing me to him so that I can barely breathe, and I am exactly where I want to be.

  He pets me as our skin cools, peppering my lips, my forehead, my cheeks, and my neck with featherlight kisses.

  Downstairs, the party rages on. We draw lazy circles on each other’s bodies, relishing the time we get to spend together. Eventually, Dash stirs, and I can feel the energy drawing back into his body. It’s time for us to go back downstairs. Before he can say it out loud, I ask him for something I’ve craved for a very long time. I turn my face into his hair, closing my eyes, and I whisper, “Play for me?”

  He goes very still.

  “Please, Dash?”

  Oh god. He’s not going to do it. He’s not going to do it. We’ve been spending every single night together for two months now, and I’ve secretly been missing my covert Saturday night spy missions to watch him play. I wouldn’t trade his company or the epic sex we’ve been having for the world…but sometimes I consider trading it for the music. Just for one night.

  Dash props himself up on one elbow, looking at me. I crack one eye open and look back at him. He doesn’t say anything, and neither do I, but I can tell he’s weighing. Measuring. Deciding. Drawing in a deep breath, he rolls off the bed and pulls his boxers on, groaning unhappily, but then he pads over to the piano. God, I am literally the luckiest bitch alive. The view as he walks away is…it’s just… I laugh silently under my breath, just not handling it at all.

  He sits at the piano. “Close your eyes, Stella.”

  “What if I don’t want to?”

  He plays a dramatic, sinister chord, looking back at me darkly over his shoulder.

  I laugh. “Okay. Okay. Closing my eyes.”

  He begins to play. The music starts off quiet and slow. One bright note. Another. The pace picks up so slowly, gradually building, one striking note and then a chord—a melody shyly presenting itself as the shape of the piece emerges.

  It’s beautiful.

  I hold my breath, listening with every cell of my body. Listening with my soul.

  The music quickens, properly introducing itself, and the odd minor note creeps in, but the discordant elements aren’t jarring. Oddly, they only complement the rising, uplifting, soaring aspect of the song. The music climbs and climbs, ascending to dizzying heights, until I’m drowning in a waterfall of sound and emotion. Faster and faster, more and more complex. I open my eyes at last, because what tone deaf fool could sit in amongst this kind of beauty and resist seeking its source?

  Dash is bent forward, his head tilted to one side, and I can tell from the way he’s sitting that his eyes are still closed. The muscles in his back shift as his hands move gracefully up and down the keys, his fingers hitting each note with perfect precision.

  I’m gripped by such an overwhelming swell of emotion that my eyes burn, tears beginning to form…

  Still, it rises. The music folds in on itself, repeating, repeating, yet subtly changing each
time, growing more complex and wonderful, and my heart flies.

  It’s maddening in its brilliance. It takes ahold of me and burns.

  And just when I think the mounting swell of sound will rob me of my mind, it starts to slow. The complexity begins to unravel, breaking down into its simpler parts. One little piece at a time, Dash disassembles the towering masterpiece he’s created, until eventually the skipping chords become skipping stones again, single, bright hopeful notes…

  Spaced out like breaths…

  Little gasps…

  Flourishes…

  In the dark…

  And then silence.

  Dash eases back from the piano, sighing like a weight he’s been carrying around for a very long time has been inexplicably lifted.

  “What…was that?” I whisper.

  The bench underneath him creaks as he spins around and faces me. “What d’you think it was, silly girl,” he says. “It was you.”

  26

  DASH

  Let me tell ya, I’m no prude, but it’s hard to feel comfortable around seven other guys, running around with their cocks out. This would never fucking happen in England. Even in locker rooms, British dudes wear towels synched around their waists to preserve their modesty. Americans are much freer with their bodies, but this kind of display goes beyond the pale. I recognize their faces, as the dudes barrel across the foyer, completely naked, but I couldn’t tell you their names. All I know is that they’re Wolf Hall students, they’re high as fuck, and they’ve probably been screwing girls (or each other) in the formal dining room.

  Carina mutters, “Oh, Jeez,” and ducks her head as they fly past us. I ready myself for a full-on assault if any of them so much as look fucking sideways at her, but none of them do. They tear out of the open front door and into the night, screeching and yelling at the top of their lungs like animals. Why Wren thought this was a good idea, I will never know.

  Speaking of Wren…

  We find him sprawled out on the rug in front of the fireplace, a pink party hat strapped to his head, the elastic tucked under his chin, his dark curls forming a halo around his face. He’s cata-fucking-tonic.

  “He missed the whole party,” Carina nudges him with her bare foot. I wince, waiting for his eyes to snap open and laser in on us, but he doesn’t even twitch. “God, he’s not dead is he?” she whispers, bending down to study him closer.

  I crouch beside my friend, checking for a pulse, which I find right away—a little quick but otherwise steady. His chest rises and falls, confirming that he’s breathing too. I have to move him, but I’ll have to find Pax first. No way I can carry the fucker upstairs on my own.

  Thankfully, most people have already gone back down to Mountain Lakes or up to the academy. There’ll be a handful of people who need rounding up and herding out, but Riot House is mostly deserted. There’s broken glass everywhere I look. There’s also a bright red slash of color across the sectional couch, that could be blood but I’m hoping is wine. Cups, glasses, plates. Half gnawed-on slices of pizza, face-down on the marble. A used—urgh!—a used condom discarded on the fucking coffee table? What the fuck is wrong with people?

  “Looks like you guys are gonna have some cleaning up to do.” Carina looks horrified as she spins around, taking in the destruction. “I could stay and help?”

  God, she’s fucking perfect. Her color’s a little high. Bright splashes of red stain the apples of her cheeks. Her baby pink lip gloss is long gone—that vanished the moment we started making out—and now her lips are a natural ruby red, swollen and pouty from all of the attention I’ve given them. Her flowy black pants are fine, but the little black top she showed up in didn’t survive the night. She’s wearing one of my t-shirts, the material tied into a knot over her left hip, and she looks so hot I almost want to take her back upstairs and fuck her all over again.

  I tuck her wild curls behind her ears, smirking at the fact that I can see her nipples through the shirt. We couldn’t even find her bra. “It’s okay. We have a cleaning crew booked for six a.m. Normally we go down to Screamin’ Beans for breakfast while they clean the place, but I don’t think that’s on the cards this time. Wren’s out cold, and Pax…” I cast a look around. “Fuck knows where he is. Probably off deflowering a virgin somewhere. Where are your friends?”

  She takes her phone out of her purse and taps the screen, groaning when it doesn’t light up. “Dead. Oh, shit. Poor Pres was practically passed out when I left her in the kitchen. I hope Mara looked after her.”

  “Mara doesn’t strike me as the Florence Nightingale type.”

  “She’s not. And she was fighting with Mercy, too. I don’t think she was really focusing on Pres.”

  Mara vs Mercy? Now there’s a fight I would have struggled to put odds on. “Last I heard, those two were thick as thieves.”

  Carina gives me a look. “Well, they fell out over something. Mercy came over and told Fitz that Mara was screwing Wren, and—” She frowns. “How weird was that, by the way? Fitz was here. Just…showed up and started taking shots with us like it’s totally okay that he’s having sex with a student.”

  I freeze, the hairs on the back of my neck prickling. “Mercy told him what?”

  Carina looks at me blankly. “I mean, yeah. It’s fucked, I know. She played into what Mercy was saying because she liked how jealous Fitz got, but—”

  “Shit. Fuck. Oh, god, this isn’t good.” I run my hands through my hair. “Wait. What exactly did Fitz say when Mercy told him Mara was fucking Wren?”

  Alarm creeps onto her face. She doesn’t have a clue how bad this situation is yet, but my reaction must be tipping her off to some degree. “Uhh, I don’t know. Mara said she didn’t know they were exclusive or something, and Fitz agreed. He seemed calm, but he went really pale, and then he stalked off to the bathroom. That’s the last time I saw him before you showed up and we bailed. Dash, what the hell’s going on? Why do you look like you’re about to have a heart attack?”

  Shiiiit. I clench my jaw. I haven’t said a word to Carrie about Wren’s extracurricular activities. I wanted to make sure she didn’t get dragged into this hot mess if it was avoidable, but now I’m not sure that I have a choice. Wren’s still passed out at my feet, looking ridiculous in his pink party hat, and for the first time ever I want to throttle the bastard. He’s probably been loving the way Fitz and Mara have been vying for his attention. He thrives on chaos. Fuck, he’s the king of chaos. And now it looks like things are about to blow up in his face.

  Urgh, where do I even begin with this shit? Probably best to just come out and say it. There’s no sense in sugarcoating it. It’s going to sound bad, no matter how I phrase it.

  I breathe deep and spit it out. “Mara hasn’t been fucking Wren, Carrie. Fitz has.”

  27

  CARRIE

  Fitz and Wren. Fitz and Wren? I keep turning the idea over in my head, and it makes no sense. Only…I guess it does explain the way Fitz reacted in the kitchen earlier. Just like everyone else, I’d thought he was jealous over Mara hooking up with another guy. I hadn’t even considered that he might have been jealous because of the other guy fucking Mara. What a goddamn mess—the three of them locked into this poisonous love triangle, and Wren smack dab in the middle of it.

  Dash finds someone to help him carry his friend up to his room. I wait downstairs in the foyer, pacing up and down in front of the door with my shoes in my hand, wondering what kind of epic fallout will arise from this fucked up situation. Whatever happens, it isn’t going to be good.

  Eventually Dash jogs down the stairs with a set of keys in his hand. “Come on. I’ll drive you up.”

  At first, I think he’s ‘borrowed’ the keys to Pax’s Charger. I’ve never seen any of them in a car besides the Charger, so I’m shocked when Dash leads me around the back of Riot House and there’s a large detached garage set back into the trees.

  It’s warm by New Hampshire standards, but it’s still pre-dawn. I wrap my arms a
round myself, shivering while he reverses a black Mercedes SUV out of the garage. It’s only when Dash has turned the car and pulled it up alongside me that I can see it’s a Maybach. Christ. That’s a hundred and fifty thousand dollars’ worth of car right there. I only know because Alderman’s always going on about buying one.

  I go to get in, but Dash races to get to the door handle before I can. “I might be a piece of shit, but at least let me pretend to be a gentleman.” He kisses me swiftly on the temple as he bundles me protectively into the front seat.

  “I had no idea you even had a car,” I tell him, as he pulls away from the house.

  He scowls. “I hate it. My father had it delivered on my last birthday. I’ve driven it three times. Ever.”

  I check out the odometer and laugh out loud at the figure displayed on the dial. Fifteen. There are fifteen miles on the clock. My old Firebird’s approaching the one-hundred-and-twenty-thousand-mile mark.

  The drive up the mountain is short. It takes three minutes to wind our way up the switchback road. Before I know it, Wolf Hall materializes out of the dawn gloom like an abandoned ghost ship, floating on a sea of fog.

  Dash pulls the car up in front of the academy’s entrance, leaving the engine idling. He kisses me again, and this time the contact between us is deep, and gentle, and means something. “Text me when your phone’s back on,” he whispers. “Let me know you’re okay.”

  I laugh. “I doubt anything’s going to happen to me between here and my bedroom.”

  He pulls a face, pretending to cry. I think it’s the most endearing thing I’ve ever seen. “Fuck. I wanna sneak in there and hold you. I wish I fucking could.” He can’t though. He has to go and make sure that the cleaners have shown up at the house, and that Wren isn’t choking on his own puke in his sleep. I know all of this, but it doesn’t stop me from groaning, too. I kiss him one last time and get out of the car.