Total pages in book: 119
Estimated words: 113837 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 569(@200wpm)___ 455(@250wpm)___ 379(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 113837 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 569(@200wpm)___ 455(@250wpm)___ 379(@300wpm)
“And now you’ve given him a boner, Nora.” Wolf shook his head. “Congratulations. He’s gonna hump your leg like a dog with its red rocket out.” The guys all laughed while Nora glared at Hendrix like she’d choke him if she could.
The car rolled to a stop at a red light, and I faced the front again, unable to ignore the way the streetlight played over the shadows of Bellamy’s face. He turned and caught me staring. “Don’t worry, I hate you, too, baby girl.” His hand landed on my thigh, rough fingers sweeping over sensitive skin.
I turned my gaze out the window, staring at the boarded-up buildings around us while trying not to react to the heat of Bellamy’s palm branding my flesh, promising he would eventually own me. Nora sighed from the backseat. “You know you guys are gonna get arrested?”
The guys barked out laughs. When the light turned green, Bellamy moved his hand from my thigh, shifting into first, and I missed that contact.
“Come on, Hora Nora, that’s not how shit works between Dayton and Barrington. You know that.”
Bellamy weaved in and out of traffic, eventually taking a hard turn into Barrington and gunning it through the subdivision. The brakes screeched when he slammed to a halt in front of my drive. Nora shouted for Hendrix to move before the back door opened, then slammed it shut.
“Thanks for the text.” Bellamy brushed his rough, battered knuckles over my cheek, and my heart fluttered like a dying bird. “It was cute.”
I swept my thumb over his split lip. “Put some ice on that,” I said, then I got out of the car.
Nora stood in my driveway, glaring at Hendrix, whose face was plastered to the back window. His tongue pressed over the glass before the car sputtered off.
“That…” Nora pointed down the street as the taillights of Bellamy’s car disappeared around the corner. She started up my sidewalk, toward my house, stopping at the door to wait on me. “Seriously, Drew, I’m telling you, you keep messing around with Bellamy, and you’re gonna get hurt.”
That was nothing I didn’t already know, but I couldn’t stop myself. He was like a tsunami I couldn’t outrun, and I knew I’d just chosen him over my friends. He had my loyalty, whether I liked it or not. I was going to drown.
I unlocked the door, then shoved inside the cold foyer. “It’s not like that.”
“I saw his hand on your thigh, Drew.”
“It’s...” I dropped my keys to the entranceway table, then we headed through the dark house toward the stairs.
“It was a ride home, Nora. What was he gonna do? Leave us to walk through Dayton…”
“Did you miss the part where he called you his girl? Or where he was willing to leave me while demanding you get into his car?”
“He was just saying that to wind Jackson up.” And I like it, way too much. I changed out of my clothes, pulling on an oversized T-shirt before I settled on the bed beside her. “And he wouldn’t have left you.”
“Had it just been me, he wouldn’t have stopped in the first place. He’s not nice, Drew.”
No, he wasn’t, but for all the shit between Bellamy and me, he’d never hurt me. Although I now realized how easily he could have; I understood the wide berth people gave them in the hallways. The fear, the reverence. In my world, money was power, but in theirs, violence ruled. And that, they had in spades.
“I’m just trying to warn you. Fuck him all you want, whatever. Just don’t fall for him. Okay?”
Nora fell asleep, and though I usually found the sound of another person’s breathing comforting—thanks to always sharing a dorm—I couldn't sleep. My mind was a jumbled mess, my body restless—and it was Bellamy’s fault. I couldn’t get him out of my head. I’d tried to block him out after the party at Jackson’s house, told myself he was bad and that I was done, but we weren’t done.
Me: You called me your girl...
Dickhead: Yep
That was it, not, “because you are” or, “I was just winding Jackson up.” Just “yep.”
Dickhead: So, are you going to tell me why you were with him?
How quickly he moved on, and to such an obvious topic. I didn’t owe him an explanation, but after the beating he’d just given Jackson, I could surmise that this was a very sore spot right now. Whereas Jackson had always seemed like the good guy, tonight I saw that he wasn’t. He wanted to pit eight against three, was friends with a guy who would date rape girls, and the way Olivia looked at me... I thought maybe they were nice, so long as I fit into the perfect Barrington box. They were no better than my dad. And now, I was no better than the trash I’d “sided” with. I’d sooner be trash than an asshole.