Stuck With The Four Hotties

“It’s nice though,” Zayd says, this twisted, mangled mess of inked limbs on the seat next to me. “Seeing how the other side lives, you know? It’s not as bad as I thought.”

“The other side?” I ask with a small laugh, and he shrugs, looking politely chagrined.

“You know, like commoners. Peasants. Uh …” I give him a look and he stops, grinning brightly. “None of those?”

“How about you just practice saying people?” I suggest, and Zack smiles like he thinks he has a leg up on the others. Sure, he went to school at Lower Banks, so he’s got some street cred, but he also thought it was acceptable to pick a random girl and bring her to her knees for the sake of a bet. He almost killed me. That tells me he’s no better than the others: at least back then, he didn’t see the general populace as being worthy of the same respect as his peers.

“Why did you pick me?” I ask suddenly, and I notice Windsor exchanging a look with Zack. They’re friends now, I’ve noticed, more so than the other boys. All that time spent together during second year was good for them.

Zack Brooks looks back at me, and he doesn’t seem particularly happy about this thread of conversation.

“Can we go back to talking about railroad barons?” he whispers, but I just sit there and look at him. I want to know the truth, and I sense there’s something more to it than a random act of malice. When I don’t respond, Zack sighs and rakes his fingers through his shiny brunette hair. It’s much longer this year than it was last year, although still relatively short. “MarnyeContent (C) Nôv/elDra/ma.Org.

…” He glances over his shoulder in Ms. Felton’s direction, but I’m not about to get into details. She probably doesn’t even know what we’re talking about. “Fuck.”

“Language, Mr. Brooks,” she says without bothering to turn around.

Zack rolls his eyes at her, but then focuses his attention on me. Creed and Tristan watch him, this calculating sharpness to their gazes. Zayd looks uncomfortable, and Windsor looks like he already knows.

“It wasn’t you, in particular,” Zack says, looking at me with regret plastered on his face. “It was Adam Carmichael. Your mother’s married to him, isn’t she?”

The color drains from my face, and I sit forward on the seat.

“You picked me because of Adam Carmichael?” I ask, feeling nausea roll over me. Adam is the same guy that let my mother leave her young child at a rest stop in the middle of nowhere. He’s scum, pure scum. And also the father to a sister I’ve never met.

“Not me,” Zack says with a long sigh. “Lizzie.”

“But why? Are the Waltons and the Carmichaels in some kind of feud?” “Adam had an affair with Lizzie’s sister,” Tristan explains, his voice as

cold and matter-of-fact as always. It’s just a mask, I know that now, but it’s a damn good one. “She was only eighteen at the time, and he was … in his forties, at the very least.” My stomach clenches with nausea. “Lizzie’s hated him ever since.”

“So she picked me because of him?” I ask, and Tristan nods.

“I have nothing to do with Adam; I’ve never even met him.” My mind is reeling right now, and I lean back into the leather seat next to Creed, wondering how the hell I’m supposed to process this.

“We had to pick someone,” Zack whispers, “and your sister, Isabella, she was too young. I’m sorry, Marnye. I’m so fucking sorry.”

“That’s a mark, Mr. Brooks,” Ms. Felton says as I close my eyes and lean my head against Creed’s shoulder until I fall asleep.

If the boys talk throughout the rest of the drive, I don’t hear it.

The entire second year class is staying at the Fairmont Hotel which is about a ten minute drive from the symphony, depending on traffic. It’s definitely a luxury hotel, that much is obvious from the moment I walk in the door. Charlie and I could never afford to stay in a place like this. Actually, we can’t afford to stay in the city at all. When we come to see the symphony, we drive home after.

“What the hell is this?” I whisper as Creed unlocks the door to a room on the top floor. Miranda’s right behind me, but the other boys have disappeared to various other rooms to drop off their stuff. I’m staying with the Cabots, courtesy of Kathleen. The academy does provide standard hotel rooms free of charge, but it’s two students to a room, and the pairings are random. Upgrades cost big money, but as Creed put it earlier: it’s literally nothing, so I take their generosity over the random chance I might get paired with Anna or Abigail or Mayleen.

Imagine the things they’d do while I slept.

“The presidential suite,” Creed says, yawning. I don’t think he means to be disrespectful (although he probably doesn’t care much about the lush splendor surrounding us). He just … well, he’s always yawning and lounging and draping himself over furniture. “Your bed is through that door”-he points at it, and then scowls-“and, unfortunately, I have to share the other one with my sister.”

“A massive suite like this, and it only has two beds?” I ask, moving over to the windows and covering my mouth with both hands. We’ve got a two hundred and seventy degree view of the city. I can see the Golden Gate Bridge as well as Alcatraz. It’s beyond amazing. I’m so excited by it that when Creed saunters up beside me, one hand tucked into his pocket, I throw my arms around his neck and give him a huge squeeze.

Miranda watches us from the seating area, smiling tightly. When I finish hugging her brother, I hug her, too. She laughs and pats my back, pushing me back a step. I notice that her cheeks are flushed pink though, and her pulse is pounding. Maybe she’s still crushing on me? My own cheeks heat with embarrassment.

“It’s ridiculous, right?” Miranda says, dragging her suitcase toward the bedroom on the opposite side of the suite. “You can fit twenty people in this room, but you can only really sleep four at most.”

She shrugs her shoulders and returns to the bedroom, closing the door behind her as I return my focus to the wall of windows. The only plans for tonight include a late dinner in the restaurant downstairs, but otherwise we’re attending the symphony tomorrow, and the ballet on Sunday. On Monday, we have a whole day to explore the museums.

“She really likes you, you know,” Creed says, sighing and running his fingers through his hair. “Don’t you dare break her heart,” he warns me, moving over to stand beside me and cupping my chin with his long fingers. “Don’t you break mine either.”

Creed leans in to kiss me, and I lift up on my toes to meet him halfway, curling my fingers around his lean but still muscular shoulders.

Our kiss sears every part of me, my lips, my heart, my soul. It amps up like it did in the library and I pull away before Miranda can come out and see us. Creed makes a little groaning sound as I pull away, his fingers sliding along the curve of my waist until they finally drop by his side.

His eyes linger on me until I disappear behind my bedroom door, and I have to take a minute to sit down the edge of my bed and breathe before I

have enough mental energy to get up and change for dinner.

Every time they touch me, I feel something shift inside, this wild heat awakening in my body that I don’t know what to do with. It’s almost painful, how much I want them.

That feeling, it isn’t going to last lon

g without pulling me apart completely.