Chapter 14 #2
Him and me, we look at each other for a long, sticky minute. Figuring things out as we go. This is not how Ash planned our night. He didn’t mean to slip up and fuck me. My lips twitch. To-do list was right. Consider Fuckboy Two done.
“Wonderful. Glad you were able to save some stuff.” Alexis, you cunt. My eyes shift to the door that leads to the hallway. I can feel Bohnes behind me, standing naked in the bathroom and watching us. Absorbing this new dynamic. Probably working out ways to manipulate us and regain control.
“I wasn’t going to say goodbye like this, but you’re so stubborn.
” Ash grits his teeth, dark eyes flicking up in wild accusation.
He’s wearing fresh pants, but he smells like sex.
Still biting at the leash, is he? Thinks he’s going to die, so he’s savoring the feeling of me on his skin? How precious.
I imagine a future where I’m famous for having three boyfriends, and I only have three boyfriends. The thought rings in my head, a warning bell that reverberates throughout my entire body.
I reach out and snatch Ash by the front of the nice trousers he’s wearing. Nothing else. He’s shirtless and pale and eerily beautiful. Treacherous. Far too rich. Way too rich for my liking. Being born into the Kelly family was a curse he won’t allow himself to even fathom escaping from.
“Jonas’ death is not worth your life.” I’m as cold as Bohnes, my words like black ice. Ready to catch a tire and crash a bitch.
Bohnes laughs from behind me, a completely unhinged sound.
“You know how easy this conundrum would be to solve if we did leverage his life?” he asks, pausing beside me and stroking his black-painted nails through my hair. “But I understand: you helped him win that race for a reason. My poor, sweet gentle Scarlett and her telltale heart.”
I’m still angry about that race, but eh, priorities. As long as my boys are alive, I can punish them later. Take my time with them. Have a little fun. This is a tense space, and we’re on a countdown. I want us out of this house and away from here as soon as possible.
“Let’s not go there just now, shall we?” I smile tightly as I unzip the garment bag, drawing out an unfamiliar dress—not one of the rescued ones, but a new one from Ash—and I drop my towel to the floor.
Bohnes slips past, butt-ass naked body rubbing against mine like a finicky cat. He pauses to dig through Aspen’s drawers. When he doesn’t find anything he likes, he heads over to Ash’s room. I imagine he’ll just step right over the unconscious body of the police chief to access the dresser.
I put the dress on with one less pair of eyes burning into me, and then cock a brow at Ash.
I’m wearing this little black slip of nothing, feeling Ash’s want drifting from his skin like hot fog.
It’s a haze of need that I shake off by tossing my wet hair over my shoulder and using my fingers to pull apart a few tangles.
I could have easily chosen sweatpants instead. More comfortable. Also boring. I strive to be anything but boring.
“Panties?” I’m making it a mission to either wear or not wear them, based on Bohnes’ ‘orders’.
Ash smiles at me as Bohnes pads up behind him, dressed in black sweatpants and pulling a tight t-shirt over his wet head. His blue eyes are feral as he looks me over in the dress.
“I only bought useful things. No good reason for you to wear panties.” Ash steps over to the hall door, opens it, and holds out his arm like he’s welcoming me home.
A chill creeps down my spine, but I grab the pair of heels left beside the door, slip them on, and step into the hallway.
“For once,” Bohnes says blithely, “Ash Kelly and I agree about something.”
A violent crash sounds up ahead, like something very big and very angry and entirely untamed is having a fit somewhere. Ash takes us to a door across the hall, but he doesn’t get the chance to open it.
A fist comes flying through the drywall, snatching my arm and yanking me against the brand-new hole. I recognize that spiderweb tat. That big, angry, untamed thing is Widow. His fingers bruise my bicep, but his face, when it appears in the ragged space he just punched-out, is tender.
“Scarlett,” he breathes through the drywall dust and the torn bits of silver and blue wallpaper. He drags me closer and then makes an impossible kiss happen, putting his mouth to mine through the fuckin’ hole he just made in the wall of the mayor’s mansion.
It’s a kiss crafted from relief and edged with white-hot rage. He gives me his tongue, tasting like sweat and dust as he seals our mouths together in the settling debris.
“How overly dramatic,” Ash deadpans, unlocking the bedroom door and pushing it open.
Widow and I pull apart with a gasp, and I drag myself away from him, his sweaty fingers sliding off my arm as his own retreats back through the wall.
Bohnes saunters in ahead of me, stepping aside as I swing around the corner in my heels, fingers curling around the edge of the impressive jamb. This place is fuckin’ fancy.
Widow turns to look at me, sweat beading on his skin, blood all over his shirt and face.
He was going wild in here, like an animal in a cage. Overturned furniture, chairs that have clearly been thrown against the closed shutters. Holes in the walls and bloodied fists. Shredded feather pillows. A couch cushion impaled by an ice pick.
His hands snatch my shoulders and drag me into the room, pushing me up against the wall and covering my mouth with his before I can even register him moving.
I’m tempted to throw him off, just to see if I can do it, but I…
I was honestly worried about him. Too worried to care about an aggressive kiss.
Widow’s tongue is a hot lash, almost a punishment—probably for picking Ash to join our little ghoul gang.
Next thing I know, he’s wheeling around and throwing a punch that Ash catches in his fist. The two of them strain against one another, veins and muscles pressing against the skin of their hands and arms as they struggle for dominance.
“Better handle your pets, my unhinged sweet,” Bohnes whispers in my ear, hands crawling over my shoulders from behind. I’ve already stepped away from the wall, ready to handle this my way.
Make no mistake: these are some psycho fuckboys, but there is nobody in this room who is more psycho than me.
My sister died today.
My sister is dead.
Another Prescott girl is gone, buried under the scheming and the bullshit and the false promise of an easy out.
I grab a heavy statue off a nearby dresser and swing it hard enough to break bones.
Both men are smart enough to release one another, allowing the statue—it’s a naked dude holding an apple and it’s creepy as fuck—to pass harmlessly between them.
“Enough. We’ve got shit to do. There’s no time for testosterone-fueled pissing contests. Fucking Christ, and this is why people don’t trust men. Too emotional and prone to fits.” I scowl at the pair of them, chucking the stupid statue onto the floor.
It has a plaque on the base that reads Adam, a Piece of Eden. Not that it matters now because when I threw it, the cock snapped off and went rolling under the bed.
Widow is panting, hands in fists at his sides. Fucking werewolf boy. I reach out to pet his hair back and he slaps my hand aside. I lift the corner of my lip at him, sparks flying between his gold eyes and my brown ones. Oooh, he is mad. More fired-up than I’ve ever seen him.
“Scarlett-chan,” Ash admonishes, looking down at the statue with raw bemusement. “My brother paid six-figures for that at an auction. You might’ve bloody sold it to fund your rebellion.”
“It’s hideous, and that dick wouldn’t please even my most shallow-pussied girlfriends. Don’t start with me, Ash-pen. I’d like to see Miss Marie Jennings now.” I don’t bother saying please. Alexei is a need, not just a want.
This is me, forming my own dark militia. Putting my soldiers in place. Tightening the strings on my marionettes.
I should probably ask to see my grandmother, but…
we need the last member of our little group.
These men are now my ride-or-die bastards, right up there with Basti and Nisha.
Goddamn, Basti and Nisha are going to gut me for this stunt.
Coming to stay at some rich boy’s mansion while my house burns to the ground?
This is some shit.
“You can actually drive that army tank if needed, right?” I ask Bohnes as he slouches against the wall, hands tucked in the pockets of his sweatpants, his white hair mussed from the shower.
He flicks graveyard eyes to me and grins.
It’s not a smile that would inspire peace or calm in anyone.
Bohnes smiles like an animal does, like the baring of his teeth is always a threat.
Just not directed at me.
“Why? Care to blow something up? It’d be my great honor to burn this entire city to the ground.”
I rub at my face.
“It’s too early to make a decision like that, but…maybe.”
“Are you seriously going to stand here with this wealthy motherfucker and act like you trust him? He’s got money shoved so far up his ass that he spits fool’s gold when he talks.” Widow is right there beside me, curling his arm around the narrow tuck of my waist.
“Ash is working through the last of his defiant streak.” My eyes are on Kelly as he steps aside, leaving the doorway clear so we can rejoin him in the hallway. “He’s going to call me Daddy and get his ass in line, isn’t he?”
Ash ignores the taunt, leading us down the hallway. Him in front. Widow with his arm around me. Bohnes padding barefoot behind. Widow leans down to whisper in my ear.
“We shouldn’t be here at all. We need to leave, Scarlett.”
He’s not wrong. And we will. But on my timeline and not his.
“Widow, you did not win the race tonight. Ash did. And Ash is giving me full control.” I state this like it’s a settled fact, the words causing Ash’s shoulders to curl inward. He’s in his defiance death throes here, struggling against the inevitable.