Pembroke Prep, page 18
I’d long since stopped trying to understand why Lennox Lincoln-Ward hated me—although I used to think about it constantly, used to wonder if I could fix whatever it was. Or at least change it so that he’d stop. It couldn’t be that I’d offended him before the first day of freshman year, because until then I’d gone to school in D.C. And it couldn’t have been anything I’d done that morning, because when I initially walked into the seminar, he’d looked up at me and offered me a careless grin—like he wanted to know what my lip gloss tasted like but he was too lazy to try to find out.
It wasn’t until he heard my name that he’d swiveled his head to stare at me—lips parted in shock, eyes bright with fury—and then abruptly scooped up his bag and stormed out of the room.
And after that, the true torment began.
Lube in my book bag, caricatures drawn of me in bathrooms, classroom projects replaced with a single, thoroughly dead rose. The rumors he started about me—some silly, some ridiculous, some vicious as hell—and his cruel laughter following me everywhere I went.
And his presence.
The presence of him was its own torture.
He didn’t stalk me, I wouldn’t go that far, but he haunted me, he encircled me and bedeviled me, made it so that every corner of Pembroke was suffused and pervaded with him. He would be in doorways I needed to go through, blocking my escape, or sitting at my desk before class started, eating an apple and staring at me with glittering eyes. He’d be at my chair in the library when I’d come back from grabbing a book, his three-thousand-dollar Italian shoes kicked up on the table, or jogging behind me as I did my morning run on the track, never approaching me or coming closer, but keeping pace with me perfectly no matter how much I sped up or slowed down.
Being raised by my father meant that I was more capable of defending myself than anyone knew, and it also meant I wasn’t in the habit of taking anyone’s shit. For every time I found my books and tablet slicked in lube, I discreetly and efficiently picked the lock to his room and replaced his hair gel with KY and his toothpaste with Astroglide (for variety). I wasn’t a fan of bathroom vandalism, but I did help myself to some classified student records early on, and then occasionally amused myself by distributing his cell phone number to giggling freshmen eager to kiss a real-life prince.
And when he blocked a doorway, when he sat at my desk, when he ran behind me every morning with a gray hood drawn over his striking blond hair—I never let him see the fear that sizzled over my skin. I couldn’t.
Because if he saw the fear, then he might see how it mingled with other feelings. How the adrenaline made my blood spark and made something deep in my core go all twisty and hot.
He could never know.
I could survive his hatred maybe, but his pity?
His smug superiority once he learned that under my defiance crawled something much, much more embarrassing than fear?
I didn’t even think I could attempt to endure that. I would have to move and change my name. I would have to change all distinguishable identifiers. I would have to dye my hair and wear colored contacts and take the helix piercing out of my upper ear. And I really liked that piercing.
No, he could never know.
Which actually made it very convenient that Rhys was coming over to our table just now. Although he’d been as bad to me as Lennox had over the years—I suspected the most creatively depraved of the bathroom graffiti was the work of Rhys’s degenerate mind—I really hadn’t minded kissing him at the masquerade. And I minded even less that it made me appear indifferent to Lennox, that it made it very clear I did not think about Lennox in any kind of kissing capacity ever—that I did not sometimes let my hand wander over my body at the thought of Lennox’s mouth or his lean body or his elegant, long-fingered hands which looked like they’d feel so very good shoved into my panties.
Rhys was an opportunity to protect myself, and I’d learned early on from my father never to waste those.
My father.
I had wondered before . . .
Well, there had been a scandal with Lennox and Aurora’s father, years ago—a massive Ponzi scheme and substantial prison time after. INTERPOL had been the investigating agency, and it had been the US and several European bureaus working together to make the arrest. I’d asked my father about it once, not long after Lennox’s torment had begun, but he told me he had only consulted on the case once and barely looked at it after. So I knew his vendetta couldn’t be about my father.
Maybe Lennox merely hated anyone or anything to do with INTERPOL? But Aurora had mentioned more than once that both she and Lennox were very happy about their father being in prison and hoped he’d stay there, so it made no sense to hate me over a father whom they were quite satisfied to have rotting in prison.
It couldn’t be that. So what was it?
“Ladies,” Rhys was saying as he sauntered over. “How beautiful you all look today.”
“We’re not interested,” Sera replied shortly. “Fuck off.”
The evil grin faded, replaced by a look so cold that even I fought the urge to shiver.
Sera, for her part, just continued glaring up at him.
“I’m not here for you,” Rhys said in a silky voice.
“Then god is real,” said Sera.
Rhys’s face didn’t change, but his eyes did, growing even blacker. “If I want you, I’ll have you.”
Sera looked away, her expression cool. “I’d like to see you try.”
And then—most frightening of all—Rhys smiled. “Maybe one day, van Doren. But only after you beg, and who knows? Maybe then it will be too late.”
Sera rolled her eyes and got up to leave. Rhys stepped forward, towering over my slender friend, and for a moment, I thought he might stop her from leaving. But then, with that eerie smile again, he stepped aside, and with a huff, Sera stalked away from the table with a muttered see you later to me and Aurora.
Rhys took her seat with a prompt grace which suggested he’d been planning on driving her off all along. “Now, Sloane,” he said, as if we were picking up on a conversation we’d started before. “What time should I have you picked up next Saturday for the gala?”
Aurora nearly spit out her drink. “You’re going to the Huntington Gala together?”
“No,” I said, narrowing my eyes at Rhys. “I’ve never been invited to the gala, remember, Aurora?” While my father made decent money in his work—decent enough to send me here—he didn’t make gala money, and I hadn’t exactly grown up with the gala set. The annual Huntington bash was one of the events that everybody knew about and only a chosen, insanely wealthy few could attend. And I had never been one of them.
Which I truly hadn’t minded—Tannith was as unconnected and socially obscure as me, and so we usually spent the evening in the near-empty common room watching a weird mix of BBC literary adaptions (her choice) and bloody action movies (mine). And I hated getting dressed up anyway.
Plus, the Huntington mansion was outside of Boston, which meant that attending the gala was a weekend-long commitment with the long-ass drive factored in. No thanks.
“Consider this your invitation then,” Rhys said, undaunted. “And of course, you’re welcome to come down early with me on Friday. Spend the night, see my childhood room.”
Even out of the corner of my eye, I could see Aurora’s jaw drop.
“Okay, this is getting weird. I’m out,” I said, standing up and slinging my bag over my chest. “I’ll see you later, Aurora. Bye, Rhys.”
Rhys was up and next to me in an instant.
“Let me walk you to your next class,” he said smoothly, taking my hand in his.
Just like his kiss at the masquerade, it didn’t feel unpleasant at all. It was nice, actually. I normally didn’t mind that karate and exercise kept my curves more flat than interesting, and I had no interest in changing how I dressed—usually a short ponytail and boots to go with my school uniform. But I couldn’t deny that I was hardly luring boys to my side this way and getting to hold hands with someone was a nice change. Even more so when he pulled me out into the almost empty corridor connecting the dining hall to the main lecture building and pressed his warm lips to mine.
“Come to my family’s gala,” he murmured, pulling back to look down at me. Those black eyes were inscrutable. I had no idea what he was thinking and no reason to trust that it might be good.
“Wouldn’t you rather go with someone else?” I asked. “Anyone else?” I wasn’t a knockout like Sera or royalty like Aurora. I wasn’t rich like Clara Blair and her friends. The most interesting things about me—what my father did for a living and all the things he’d taught me—weren’t apparent on the surface.
In short, there was no reason to believe that Rhys wasn’t playing some kind of stupid Hellfire joke on me right now. But then he said the one thing that made me believe him.
“I’m never going to fall in love with you, Sloane Lauder. But right now, you’re the most interesting girl at this school to me. And I like interesting things.” He gave me an assessing look, like he could see my bra and panties underneath my school blazer and skirt. “I like interesting things quite a lot.”
With another penetrating but mysterious look, he walked away, calling over his shoulder, “Five p.m. next Friday, Sloane. We’re going to my house.”
I didn’t answer him. Mostly because he was already prowling away, but also because the answer that leapt to my lips wasn’t an immediate no. As much as I thought I’d hate the idea of going to something like the Huntington Gala . . . it was really flattering to be asked.
Maybe it wouldn’t be the worst thing if I went.
With a glance down at my phone, I saw I had some time before my next class, and I decided to take the long way to the science building. I’d only made it a handful of steps down the stone-flagged corridor when the hair prickled on the back of my neck.
I spun around just in time to stop Lennox from grabbing my arm, my training flaring up instinctively. I blocked his grab and was about to seize his wrist and twist it when he did something I had no preparation for.
He hauled me tight against him with his free arm around my back, so tight that I could feel the angry heave of his chest and the firm wall of his abdomen, and at the press of his body against mine, all my instincts left me. Well, all except the dumbest one, which pleaded for me to rub against him like a cat and purr until he petted me.
“No need to fly into a fit, darling,” Lennox said, his British accent curling around me like the tendrils of a lovely but lethal frost. “We can be civilized about this.”
“Civilized about wha—Lennox!” He was dragging me into a nearby storage closet, throwing open the door with one hand as he easily pulled me inside. The only way I could have broken free was by hurting him—a finger rake to his eagle-gold eyes, a knee to the groin, maybe some broken fingers—and I found . . . well, I found that I didn’t really want to do that. Not until I had no other choice, at least.
“Let. Me. Go,” I demanded the minute the door was closed.
He flicked on a light, still keeping me close, and then looked down at me. We were surrounded by boxes of paper towels and industrial-sized rolls of toilet paper, but even in here, he looked like a prince; arrogant and majestic. The dim light from the single light bulb caressed his sharp cheekbones and pout-shaped mouth.
“Lennox,” I bit out. “I’m not asking. Let me go.”
He looked a little surprised at himself when he admitted, “But I don’t want to.”
I glared up at him. “You realize I can make you, right? And it won’t be pleasant.”
“I don’t doubt it,” he said honestly. “But I don’t think you want to make me. I think you like being right here.” A cruel smirk twisted the corner of his mouth. “I definitely like you being right here.”
He tugged me even closer—and I could feel more than his chest and stomach now, I could feel his . . . oh wow.
Wow, wow, wow.
He might technically be a prince, but there was one place where he was all king.
No! Focus, Sloane!
I twisted away and this time he let me, dropping his arm and leaning back against a wall of shelves as I took a deep breath and steadied myself. Karate prepares you for chokeholds and grips, for locks and strikes, but it definitely does not prepare you for the feeling of a hot, hard cock attached to an even hotter and harder prince, and I needed a second. Maybe two.
Finally, I could think with a mostly clear head again. “What do you want, Lennox?”
“I wanted to warn you about Rhys.”
There were so many things about that statement that didn’t make sense. But the only thing I could articulate was, “You needed to warn me in a closet?”
He frowned. “Well, obviously, we can’t be seen talking like this. Think of my reputation, darling.”
“I’m not your darling,” I said irritably. I wasn’t darling; I was deadly, and also it was very unfair how sexy the word darling sounded with his accent.
“My apologies,” Lennox said with a slicing grin. “What would you rather I call you? Poppet? Dove? My sweet, heartless huntress?”
“I’d rather you call me nothing,” I said emphatically, even though I didn’t entirely hate the way any of those endearments sounded on his lips.
Lennox kept smiling. “My nothing, my sweet nothing. Oh, I like the sound of that. It’s quite Shakespearean.”
I refused to indulge him a moment longer. “Okay, well, if that’s all—”
The frown returned. “That’s not all. I haven’t warned you about Rhys yet.”
“A warning is unnecessary,” I told him. “I know exactly what kind of guy Rhys is.”
Lennox took a step forward. In the small expanse of the closet, it brought him within touching distance again. I tried to ignore the thrill my body gave at that.
“I don’t think you know at all,” he said, and for once, his voice wasn’t dripping with scorn or crackling with hate. He sounded completely serious. “Rhys is practically sociopathic. He’s a monster. If he asked you to the Huntington Gala, it’s not because he wants to go on picnics and skip through the bloody park with you.”
Irritation surged within me.
Finally! Here was my fighting instinct!
I stepped right up to Lennox and lifted my face defiantly to his. “He’s already told me all of this.”
Surprise moved across Lennox’s aristocratic features. “He has?”
“Yes. He’s been nothing but honest with me. And you know what else?”
Lennox’s face was tilted down towards mine now, his soft blond hair tumbling over his forehead. “What else?”
“He can talk to me outside of closets. He’s really romantic like that.”
A muscle jumped in Lennox’s jaw.
And then in an instant, his hands were on me again, dragging me against his body as he pressed his lips to my ear. “How would you, my cold, heartless sweetheart, know anything about romance?”
His words whispered warmth over my skin and sent shivers skating down my spine.
I meant to push his hands away, I meant to wedge my elbows between us and drag them over the nerves in his forearms. I meant to shove my head into his, and then finish him off with a swift strike to the sternum.
I meant to do all of those things. But instead, I melted into him. I melted into the hard, arrogant heat of him, I melted into those sinful lips against my skin. And even though he whispered hatred and poison with those lips, my body responded like he was whispering the tenderest, naughtiest secrets instead.
“You wouldn’t know, would you? Because you, my sweet, frigid darling, are the lowest order of virgin. You are locked up so tight that no one’s ever been inside, and no one’s ever even been close, have they? Is that because you won’t let them or because nobody wants you—”
Of its own accord, my right hand reached up and cracked across his perfect cheek, slapping him as hard as I could. And for a single moment after that, neither of us moved. Me with my hand still stinging in midair, and him with his cheek and jaw growing red, his gold eyes blazing down at me like he wanted to light me on fire with his fury alone.
But he didn’t light me on fire. He didn’t even speak.
Instead, he slashed his lips over mine and took my mouth in a searing kiss.
A kiss that went from mere hungry lips to hot, searching tongues sliding against each other in seconds.
My slap hadn’t affected his erection in the least. If anything, he was even harder than before, his thick column digging into my belly as he hauled me closer and closer with impatient hands, and then finally—with a growl I’d remember for the rest of my life—he shoved me up against the door.
“Wrap those legs around my waist,” he grunted between wild, angry kisses. “I know you’re strong enough.”
“Fuck off,” I retorted. But I did it anyway, because I needed—oh God—yes. I needed this. I needed my legs around his waist and my skirt up around my hips and his big erection right against my center. It felt so good.
“Bleeding Christ,” Lennox muttered, tearing his mouth from mine to look down at where he rocked against me. “Even through your knickers, I can feel how hot you are.”
My head dropped back against the door as he moved his hips again, dragging his clothed erection against me, dry-fucking me. I’d never done this—I’d barely even kissed a boy before—and it felt so much better than anything I’d ever done on my own; it felt so good I thought I might die right there among the paper towels.
My panties were damp, and my nipples were beaded so tight in my bra that they ached. And every time Lennox moved, there was an answering surge from deep inside my center, an urgent clenching, like my body was trying to . . .
“Are you about to come for me?” Lennox breathed, dipping his head to bite at my neck. “Are you about to make me miserable? Hmm? Show me what I’m missing?”
I couldn’t answer. I couldn’t even think. My hands were in the thick silk of his hair and my lips burned without his on mine and I was so close . . .
