13. Hawthorn
My limbs feel like they’re full of static electricity as I watch the clock tick down till the end of the day. A part of me wants to just get up and walk out of class, but making a scene will have too many people asking questions that I’m not ready to answer.
I blew Gulliver off when he asked what happened to me at lunch, but I know sooner or later they’re going to expect me to tell them what has me smiling like an asshole one minute, then scowling like I’m ready to kill someone the next moment. Princess has that effect on me. After she walked away from the darkroom earlier, I was fucking euphoric, high off the endorphins and excitement of touching, playing, and fucking her again.
Having her panties in my pocket while I sat in history was exhilarating, but the more time that passed, the quicker the excitement drained. I have no idea what the fuck I’m doing with Penelope. I don’t know if I want her or if I just want to fuck her. I don’t know if I can look past all the awful things she’s done or if there will never be a place in my life or in my family for her.
I know Izzy is more than ready to start fresh with her sister, and though Gulliver, Davis, and Kip would accept her as Izzy’s twin, would they ever accept her as one of us if she were mine?
The moment the bell rings, I stuff my laptop into my bag and barge my way out of the classroom, eager to get to my car. When I got to school this morning, my plans for this evening were to do my homework, then meet the guys at some charity event we’d RSVP’d for, back when we were still trying to make sure everyone important knew Izzy wasn’t her sister. Only now, instead of going to the marina, I find myself handing my keys to the valet outside the Haywood Hotel.
Riding the elevator to the fourth floor, I try not to think too hard about why I’m here. I already fucked her once today. I should have had my fill of her, but my dick isn’t hard right now, so why am I here instead of with my friends?
Honestly, I don’t know. Penelope Rhodes is a grade A bitch, but a part of me understands why she behaves that way. The girl’s parents are fucking awful, and Penelope was the focus of all of their guidance for years. She isn’t blameless for everything she’s done, but she is a product of her parents’ design, and when it counted, she found a way to go against them and do the right thing.
I’m not blind to Penelope’s faults, but I’ve seen the other side of her too, and I know there’s more to her than just the evil villain she’s shown the world.
The elevator dings, heralding my arrival on her floor, and I stride purposefully toward room 459, rapping my fist against the wooden door when I reach it. Inhaling deeply, I have to fight the urge to kick the door in when she doesn’t answer. I know she’s here, and I doubt she would be expecting anyone else. Lifting my fist, I knock again, harder this time. “Princess, open up.”
After a minute, the door cracks, and a rumpled looking Penelope appears, peering around the gap. “Hawthorn?”
Not speaking, I push the door open and step past her. The room is small, just a normal hotel room, and nothing at all like I would have expected her to pick. Weirdly, Izzy stayed in a similar room when she fled from her parents’ house too. “No suite?”
“Someone booked all the suites and the penthouses,” she says with an annoyed shake of her head.
Scoffing, I smile, watching as she closes the door behind me. Turning so her back is against the door, she wraps her arms around herself, gripping the hotel robe she’s wearing to her chest. I’m not sure if I just woke her up or if she really is sick, but her hair’s a mess, and her face is fresh and makeup-free. She looks adorably rumpled and perfectly fuckable, and my dick rises enthusiastically.
For a long moment, neither of us speaks, until finally she sighs. “What are you doing here, Hawthorn?” she asks, climbing back into the bed and pulling the covers up over her legs.
“I have no fucking clue,” I admit, lowering myself down onto the bed next to her and kicking my shoes off so I can stretch out on top of the comforter.
The silence thickens the longer we just lie here, not touching, just existing in the quiet side by side.
“Do you even like me?” she asks.
“Not particularly. Do you like me?” I ask, turning my head to look at her.
“Not really,” she says, a faint smile ghosting across her lips.
“Are you okay, Princess?” I ask, shocking myself with how much I really care.
“No. But that’s my problem, not yours,” she whispers, and even though I can feel the sincerity in her words, everything about what she just said feels wrong to me.
I don’t even try to fight the urge to pull her into me, wrapping my arms around her while she rests her head on my chest. She doesn’t resist me, instead, she burrows into my neck and clings to me like I’m the only thing keeping her head above water. Just like every other time I’m alone with her, a controlling urge rises to the surface, and I don’t try to pretend that it’s not there. Instead, I place my hand on her head and hold her to me while she cries into my shirt.
Once she’s stopped crying and her sobs have dissolved into shuddering breaths, I push her hair away from her cheek and press a kiss to her temple. “I’ll order us room service,” I tell her, carefully moving out from beneath her and reaching for the phone. “Hi, can I get a bacon cheeseburger, a chicken Alfredo, and two chocolate brownies with whipped cream, please?” I say, then glance at Princess. “What do you want to drink?”
“A sparkling water, please,” she says, her eyes a little wide.
“And a sparkling water and a beer, please, whatever you have on draft. Thanks.” Placing the phone back onto the receiver, I turn to look at her and smile.
“I can’t eat any of that,” she says, her voice weak and so fucking sad.
“Sure you can.”
“I’m not allowed carbs or trans fats or dairy. I can’t afford to get fat; my looks are the only thing I have left.”
She’s so fucking serious that I find myself just staring at her, unsure how to even start to tell her how wrong everything she just said is.
“Penelope, you’re skin and bone. I think you might actually be skinnier than when I saw you on the boat. You didn’t eat anything at lunch, and don’t even get me started on you thinking being beautiful is the only thing you have going for you. But first, who the fuck told you that you’d get fat?”
“Everyone in modern society,” she says sardonically, rolling her eyes and flopping back against the pillows.
“Let me guess, your psycho, asshole parents told you that no one would want you if you gained enough weight to be healthy. Seriously, did you listen to everything they told you and just accept it as truth? You’re eighteen, it’s time to start thinking for yourself,” I snarl, frustrated that she’s so blinkered by their opinions.
“Oh my god, Hawthorn, don’t be so self-righteous. Yes, okay, my mom told me I’d get fat if I ate unhealthily and that no matter how rich I was, no man would want me if I was fat. And yes, my parents told me that I had to do things a certain way, so that’s what I did. That doesn’t make me an idiot, or maybe it does, but my life was a bit more complicated than most eighteen-year-olds,” she says, jumping up and putting the bed between us, her chest heaving up and down. “All I’ve thought about since the day I got that stupid letter from my great-grandfather is how I was going to make sure I got that money. All anyone wanted to talk to me about was who I was going to marry. All I’ve lived and breathed and thought about are those godforsaken rules, so I’m sorry that you think I’m na?ve or stupid or whatever, maybe I am. But the only thing I’ve ever done that made me interesting and worthy and loved was having my name written into that will.”
As she shouts, the front of her robe slips open a little, revealing the swell of her small, pert breasts as her chest lurches up and down. Her hair’s wild, her eyes are red and wide, and her lips are parted and full. She’s a fucking mess, but she’s never looked more perfect to me than she does in this moment.
Penelope is a beautiful woman all of the time. She’s stunning in a school uniform and in her awful tight dresses and adorned in evening wear. But right now, raw, unkempt, and angry, she is fucking glorious.
Her chest continues to heave once she’s finished speaking, and I close the distance between us until I’m pressed up against her, my chest touching hers. She tips her head back to look at me, and her eyes tell me that she’s just as confused about this as I am.
“You asked me why I’m here, and this—you in this exact moment—is why. I don’t understand it, a part of me hates it, but I saw you that day on my boat. I saw the side of you that you don’t show people, and I’m here for that Penelope. I’m here because you need to be saved, and I need to save you.” Leaning down, I kiss her, slamming my lips against hers and demanding she kiss me back. She doesn’t push me away, doesn’t fight me as I slide my tongue into her mouth. Her movements are slow and uncertain, but her fingers clutch at the back of my neck, holding me to her and telling me without words that she wants this as much as I do.
After a second, we find our rhythm, and the kiss becomes a game of give and take. She gives me everything, and I greedily take it and demand more. Tangling my fingers in her hair, I turn her so I can deepen the kiss, and she melts against me. The more control I exert over her, the more relaxed she becomes.
Both of us are breathless, my dick is rock-hard, and she’s grinding her pussy against the thigh I pushed between her legs, but this kiss doesn’t feel like a prelude to sex, it’s not the tease that will lead to more. I don’t really know what it is, but in this moment with my Princess in my arms, hate doesn’t matter, who she is doesn’t matter, my prejudice and her behavior don’t matter.
Izzy once told me that who you are in the quiet moments is the real you, and right now, in the silence of this hotel room, Penelope Rhodes, my Princess, is mine, and that’s all that matters.