“Oh my god,” groans a fanboy behind me. “You’re so lucky. How did you get Royal Dolce?”
I shrug and pretend I don’t hear him and the freshmen girls speculating. I fucked Royal, sure, but lots of girls have done that. I didn’t rat him out for our trip to the basement, but lots of girls have endured that, too. The only thing special I did was possibly try to kill him. But I’m not volunteering that information.
After the game, Baron grabs me and drags me to the Range Rover. Eleanor and Everleigh come bouncing up, still in their cheer uniforms. “Can we ride with y’all?” Everleigh asks, hanging onto Duke’s arm and batting her eyes at him.
“Gloria ran home to get last minute stuff ready before the party,” Eleanor adds, hooking her hand through Duke’s other arm.
“No one rides with us,” he says, sliding a hand up the back of each girl’s leg and under her skirt. “But one of you can ride my dick later, and the other can ride my face.”
“Okay,” says Everleigh, giggling and pretending she’s trying to squirm away from him but falling against him instead.
“What about her?” Eleanor whines, giving me some stink eye.
I cock a brow and swing my ponytail behind my shoulder. “What about me?”
She juts out her chin and rolls her eyes. “Nothing.”
“No, go ahead. If you’ve got something to say about me, don’t be a little bitch about it. Say it. I can handle it.”
She glances from me to something over my shoulder, which I realize is Royal when he steps up right behind me, not touching me but looming over me. “Go on,” he says, his voice low but laced with menace. “Say it.”
Eleanor huffs and crosses her arms. “I just don’t understand why she gets to ride with you, and we don’t. We’ve been with you for over a year. She just got here.”
Royal just stands there staring her down while she looks up at the streetlights or anywhere but him. At last, she drops her arms from across her chest and meets his gaze. “Fine,” she mutters. “I understand.”
Without a word, he turns and climbs into the car. I don’t know what the fuck she understands, but I know one thing. Someone just had my back.
Royal just had my back.
My heart is glowing like a fucking firefly inside my chest. Nothing else matters all evening. We go to a party hosted by the Waltons, who, it turns out, live down the street from the Dolces. Though Royal says I’m his plaything, I’m really no different than any of the other Dolce girls, who are playthings and booty calls for the twins. No one makes any distinction, either. And though only six girls sit with the six boys at school, there are at least a dozen girls who wore their jerseys and stood with me at the game. After a few drinks, Everleigh explains that they’re former or hopeful Dolce girls—they aren’t in favor right now, but at any moment, one of the six could be booted in favor of one of them.
I decide to play it cool and not hover and cling to Royal, but the apparently that sentiment is not mutual, because every time I wander away, I turn around to find Royal watching me from across the room. I don’t love crowds or obnoxious drunks, but I can hold my own at a party, so I mingle and have a drink and try to ignore the heat of Royal’s gaze on me. After about an hour, he comes over and slides an arm around me from behind. He flattens his huge hand across my belly—I swear his fingers reach all the way across my entire torso—and leans down, pressing his mouth to my ear. “Let’s get out of here.”
A tingle goes through me at his touch and the warmth of his breath tickling my ear. I lay my hand on his, closing my eyes and leaning back against him for a second. Maybe I haven’t been hovering, but I’d be lying if I said my mind hadn’t been on him every second since we got here. Wondering if he was going to humiliate me in front of everyone, or hook up with some other girl to prove to me that we aren’t together, or see me talking to a guy and make a scene, or just pull me possessively back to him the way he has before.
He texts his brothers on the way out, and we hop into the Range Rover. My heart is pounding, and I swallow hard in anticipation as we circle around the gravel road through the neighborhood toward his house. But instead of pulling in, he keeps driving. I don’t ask where we’re going. I know he won’t answer, and tonight, there’s no anger rolling off him. So, I open the window and turn up the music, letting the cold winter air and thudding base of Harlow and the Honey Badgers sweep through the car.
I watch the road, the familiar turns he takes that lead us back to the bridge where just a few weeks ago he almost killed me. He pulls over and rolls up the windows before shutting off the engine. Without a word, he reaches for me and pulls me into his lap so I’m straddling him. Leaning the seat back a little, he shifts under me and hooks his hand into the front of my jeans, speaking for the first time since we left the party.
“Ready for me to wreck this sweet little cunt?”
I wrap my arms around his neck and kiss him. “I’ve been ready since Monday,” I say, toying with the soft hair at the back of his neck. “You missed out. That’s what happens when you don’t talk to me all week.”
He yanks open my button and zipper and slides a hand inside, cupping my bare mound. He drops his head back against the seat, his nostrils flaring as he takes a long, slow breath, his fingers gently moving against my soft flesh. “You kept it shaved and ready for me all week? Waiting for me to call?”
“Like a good girl.”
He rakes his other hand up from my knee, over my thigh, and around to my ass. Holding my hip, he watches my face while he sinks a finger into me. My lips fall open as a shudder of pleasure rolls through me, making my toes curl and my skin prickle all over my body. Releasing my hip, he leans forward and grabs his phone out of the console, thumbing it open while he slowly circles his finger inside me, hitting all my walls.
“This is why I waited all week,” he says, handing me his phone. “I don’t want to ever wear a condom with you, Harper. I want to cum so deep inside this delicious little hole that you’re walking around with me inside you for days afterwards.”
My core throbs at his words, and he chuckles, pulsing his finger inside me in response. I read the email on his phone, and he shows me the two attachments with our lab result—both clean. “That’s great news,” I say, rocking against his hand, my words breathy with desire. “As long as neither of us are taking risks with other people.”
“Are you asking me to be exclusive?” he asks, working another finger into me. His own breathing is heavy, and I can feel his erection pressing up against my ass as his fingers strain inside me.
“I’m asking you to keep us both safe, if we’re not using protection,” I say. “I’ll do the same. Pregnancy is not the only STD.”
“I’ll keep you safe,” he says, pulling his fingers out and smearing them between my folds before stroking my clit a few times. “Now I want to watch you sink this tight, wet cunt over my tip and bounce on it until we both cum. Can you do that for me, my perfect little whore?”