Page 47 of Riot Rules
Tone it down, dude. Laying it on a little thick there.
Pax is great at reading cues. Whether he chooses to act on those cues is another thing. He’s not even looking at me right now, though, so he misses my wide-eyed warning. He runs Fitz through with a look so sharp that the other guy breaks out into an agitated sweat. “Doesn’t seem like a retaliation from Edmondson,” he says. “They probably would have just painted a bunch of dicks on the front of the building.”
Great. Not on the nose at all. Good job, Pax.
“Nah, this was a personal attack. From where I’m sitting, it looks like whoever did this was trying to send a message to you and you alone.”
Fitz stares Pax down, flaring his nostrils. He bounces on the balls of his feet. “Yeah. Well, like I said. If anyone has a problem with me, it’s much smarter to come and discuss it face-to-face. Behavior like this is immature. It speaks of serious developmental issues that need to be handled in therapy.” He moves on before Pax can snipe back at him. A good thing, too. By the heat radiating off him, Pax would have said something incendiary that would have landed us in hot water.
“Fucking therapy,” my friend rumbles. “I’ll givehimtherapy.”
Fitz proceeds with our lesson for the day. Mercifully, we’re moving on fromThe Count of Monte Cristo. We spend the next fifty minutes breaking ground on Romeo and Juliette. “Clichéd as hell, I know, but it’s part of the curriculum, boys and girls. The Bard is a must, and if we have to spend our time on Shakespeare, then it might as well be the one with the sick movie, right?”
He tells us to watch the Baz Luhrmann movie instead of reading the book, and for once no one groans at the prospect of homework. I do my best not to look across the room to the couch beneath Gustav Klimt’s ‘The Kiss.’I almost manage it, too. I watched Carrie slip into the tight blue jeans and grey sweater this morning, so I already know how good she looks. She still knocks the wind out of me, though. Her jeans are tight, yes. The sweater, too. Her tits look fucking phenomenal straining against the wool. Now that I’ve seen how amazing she looks naked, it’s impossible to look at her and not remember…
Last night was fucking incredible. Her skin. Her mouth. Her pussy, for fuck’s sake. So tight, so wet, so sweet. Soperfect. I had no idea just how perfect until I sank my dick inside her and met resistance. I’d tried to stop, but it had already been too late. I was already taking something that didn’t belong to me, and—
Fuck.
I’ve been staring at Carrie this entire time.
Her cheeks are flushed, her bottom lip sucked into her mouth. She’s staring down at the notepad resting on her knee like it holds the answers to the mysteries of the universe. She knows that I’ve been staring at her, and from the way she’s working that bottom lip, she knows exactly what I was thinking about, too.
Dangerous. That’s what this is. I can’t be caught staring at her. Wren looks like he’s fast asleep on the leather couch, but I know him better than that. He’s taking in everything that’s going on around him, even with that arm over his face, blocking out the light. He picks up on the smallest things. And Pax is sitting right next to me, for fuck’s sake. He doesn’t seem to be paying much attention to me, though. He oscillates between glaring daggers at Fitz and mournfully nursing his blistered hand. Looks like I’ve gotten away with it this time.
I’m far more careful during the remainder of the class. And when I see Carrie in the hallway before biology, I pretend I’m preoccupied with my phone. Outside the dining hall at lunch, when we pass each other in the hallway, I look right through her like she doesn’t even exist, and that is far more difficult than I could ever have dreamed it might be. Now that I’ve felt her skin on my skin, and I’ve been inside her, and I’ve held her delicate sleeping body inside the circle of my arms, I’m officially screwed. For three years, I walked the hallways and classrooms of this academy without ever noticing her once. Now, Carina Mendoza isallI can see.
21
CARRIE
“You’ve lostyour freaking mind. I’ve been thinking about it for hours, and that’s the only explanation I can come up with. You’ve officially gone crazy.”
Presley is red from the roots of her hair all the way down the collar of her t-shirt. The backs of her hands are splotchy, too. “He was in your room, Carrie!Someone could have just barged right in.”
I push open the door to the dining hall, giving her a pointed look. “Someone did barge right in.Youdid. You remember how to knock, right?”
“I don’t count. I’m one of your best friends, and as one of your best friends, I’m allowed to enter your bedroom without knocking if something scandalous has happened. Don’t change the subject, anyway. You cannotbe having sleepovers with Da—” She lowers her voice to a strained whisper. “WithDash Lovettin your bedroom, Carina! You’ll get kicked out!”
“Don’t worry. It was an accident. It won’t be happening again.” We join the back of the line to collect our meals, and all the while I’m hoping that will be the end of the conversation. Ha! Like hell it will be.
Presley holds up her binder, using it to cover her mouth, like she’s afraid someone might read her lips. “You won’t be having sleepovers in your room again? Or you won’t be having sex with Dash again?”
“Seriously. Can we just…” I look around, gesturing to all of the people who are in line ahead of us, as well as behind us now.
Pres nods. “Right. Right.”
We collect our food and find a table to sit at on the outside perimeter of the room. Presley bounces up and down in her seat, desperate to ask her questions. She looks like she might explode from theneeding to know.I roll my eyes. “Go on, then. Get it over with.”
“Was it amazing?” she blurts out. “How big was his dick?”
I drop my fork. “Pres!”
“I’m sorry! You can’t blame me for asking. How long have we been lusting over those guys? And now you’ve actually slept with one of them? A girl’s gotta ask the important questions.”
Urgh. I’d probably be asking the same questions, too. I’m not proud to admit it, but she’s right. “Yes, it was amazing. And no, I am not telling you how big his dick was. Some details are just sacred.”
She pouts, but then quickly brightens when she looks down at her plate. A second later, she’s holding up a corndog on a stick, waggling her eyebrows. “Are we talkingbiggerthan? Or…” Her smiley face turns into a sad face. “Smallerthan?”
