Ruthless Noble by Alley Ciz
CHAPTER 12
It’sa good thing I’m used to balancing on three millimeters worth of steel when I’m on the ice because this past week has felt like exactly that—a balancing act.
On the one hand, I have Dad’s threat forever looming over my head. On the other, I want Savvy despite what he has to say.
Then there’s the fact that Duke is Savvy’s fiancé. On the flip, he isn’t taking it seriously, so why should I?
Have I touched her more than I should? Sure. Sorry not sorry, Dad. But can you blame me? She smells so good, and the skin on her upper thigh is so soft. At least I haven’t marked her again. Plus, I feel like I should get credit for not dragging Savvy into the nearest empty room with a lock and fucking her until we’re both blind.
“You sure you’re cool?” Duke asks in a surprising display of empathy. We haven’t really discussed the whole he’s engaged to my girl thing. At school and at practice, it doesn’t factor much into play.
No new pictures have surfaced either, not even the time I couldn’t help myself when I caught Savvy in the library. I had her pinned to the stacks, her ass cradled against my hard-as-fuck dick, my mouth licking along her neck as I pretended to reach for a book on a shelf above her.
I’ve chosen to ignore the niggling voice in the back of my mind that wonders if that particular moment not being documented was because Savvy realized the first attempt didn’t succeed in getting the engagement called off, or if she’s not the one responsible and the one who is just wasn’t around. While smashing in Duke’s Mercedes sort of just happened, me going outside was witnessed by others, so it wasn’t as spur of the moment as the library.
I’ve tried to feel Savvy out, tried to see if she’s treating me any different, if she’s trying to lure me into a false sense of security. She isn’t. She still gives me the same attitude she always has; the only change I’ve noticed is it has a slightly less hostile edge to it, but the argument could be made that it’s because I stopped nailing dead rats to her locker.
There’s also the fact that she has no idea what’s at stake for me if we get caught messing around, so is it really believable to think that’s her motivation?
“How bad could it possibly be?” I hold the door open for Duke, and we exit the locker room. “The last dinner we attended with our families ended up with a trip to the emergency room. The bar is set low for this one.”
Because of the close relationship—personally and in business—of our fathers and Duke’s future stepfather-in-law, my family was invited to this weekend’s celebratory engagement dinner.
“Truth.” Duke holds out a fist for me to bump. Like the engagement, we’ve avoided all talk of Savvy and her asthma. I don’t know about Duke, but I hate how even the memory makes me feel helpless.
“Just be grateful they are doing it at home and not Drumthwacket.” He mentions the “official” governor’s mansion with a shudder. “I always feel like I’m going to break shit when I’m there.”
“Could you imagine how much your mom would freak if you did?” It’s my turn to shudder. Like the White House in DC, the New Jersey governor’s mansion is known as “The People’s House.” They offer tours to the public and often rotate out priceless art exhibits. Duke’s not exaggerating. The last time we attended a state dinner there, he almost took out a bust of George Washington on loan from an art museum in Princeton.
“Hopefully, it goes by quick. And who knows”—he pops a shoulder—“maybe being with Savvy could open up a spot in one of the more exclusive of her brother’s races. He typically has them on Saturdays.”
The possibility of a race is like an injection of gasoline into my system. Fuck yeah. Now that’s a plan I can get behind.
“Oh shit!”
“No way!”
“How did they do that?”
“Is that Savvy King sitting on…”
“Daaayum,they had an inside man.”
The excited comments and shouts echo down the hallway as students rush toward the front of the school. It’s the mention of Savvy that has Duke’s feet and mine moving a little bit faster to follow.
The volume and severity of the curses being spewed increase as we step outside to see that the parking lot that was once filled with the cars of the athletes who had morning workouts is now mostly empty.
“Is that my fucking car?” Midas roars, and sure enough, the missing cars have been shifted to the manicured front lawn. Headmaster Woodbridge is going to pass a stone.
The vehicles’ seemingly sporadic placement makes me suspect they were used to spell something out, but I can’t quite make it out from this vantage point. There’s also a small box with large purple bows placed on the hood of each.
Front and center is my Ferrari. A smug-looking silver-haired devil sits nestled in the S-duct carved out of the front hood, phone in hand, gaze trained our way.
Duke cracks up, arms folded across his middle and bent over while he does his best impression of a stoner told the world’s lamest dad joke. Dude is lost in his own little world while Midas and Brad are ready to rip heads off bodies. It’s only the fact that most of the faculty are now outside that keeps them from storming over and doing just that.
Duke takes off toward Savvy, bellowing her name, tapping the side of his G Wagon parked two spots down from my F8 on the way.
I head in their direction, arriving at the same time Duke scoops her off my car and into a spinning hug. “How did you pull this off?”
“Because we’re awesome, and you BAssholes are amateurs when it comes to pranks,” a voice calls out from Savvy’s phone.
“Hell yeah! You only have my girl on loan. Doesn’t mean she switched loyalties,” adds someone else, I assume Tessa with the my girl reference.
Duke and I move behind Savvy to see those on the screen, and Savvy flips the camera so it’s showing us and not the guys currently losing their shit around us.
“Tasty Tessa!” Duke winks.
“You wish you knew if I was tasty or not.” Tessa rolls her eyes.
“You got that right, baby.” Duke shamelessly licks his lips. “Name the time and place, and I’ll make it happen.”
“You do realize you’re supposed to be engaged to my bestie, right?” She calls him out for flirting. She’s got that same ballsy, call-me-a-liar delivery as Savvy.
Thankfully the only people within hearing distance aren’t paying our little group any mind, and those around Tessa don’t seem to be able to hear us all that well. Unsurprisingly, people took the news of the engagement at face value. Arranged marriages are not uncommon among powerful families. Duke and Savvy aren’t the first alliance and won’t be the last set up for those attending Blackwell Academy. It was a fact I had to accept after the shock wore off.
The dynamics at school have changed. The shift in the social hierarchy was cuttingly swift. Duke and I have managed to keep our top spot as kings of the school, but Arabella and the rest of the Unholy Trinity have seen a loss of their influence.
“Tessa, you ready to go?” A male voice calls out, and as he moves into view of the camera, I get a jolt of What the fuck is he doing there?
I take a step forward as if I can reach the asshat who put his hands on Savvy when I drove her to BP. Same as that day, Savvy stops me from intervening. It’s not necessary. It’s not like I can grab him through the screen.
I glance at the hand pressed to my lower belly, matte purple fingernails playing along my muscles, before lifting my eyes to silently ask her the same question I did myself.
“Yup.” From the shake of the video, you can tell Tessa bounces on the balls of her feet, a perky ball of energy I would have never paired with Savvy’s stoic nature. She blows a kiss. “Love you, and your Royal reign.”
“You’re a nut, T.” Again, I’m taken off guard by the open affection, though it turns off like somebody flipped a switch when she focuses on the football douche. “You got the aerial shot I sent?”
“Received and posted. Nice to see you haven’t lost your touch going to school with those jackoffs.”
The smile that curls Savvy’s lips—lips I want to kiss, bite, suck on until she’s squirming against me, shit!—is anything but sweet. It’s the one she’s reserved for the times she’s sparred with me, the times she wouldn’t back down no matter how much I pushed—the same one that makes my dick harder than my hockey stick.
“It would do you well not to forget that fact again, Gunderson.”
That’s my girl. Fierce as hell.
Yeah, yeah, I know—not my girl, but whatever, I’m proud.
She hangs up and flips through her apps until she pulls up an Instagram account showcasing a picture of an aerial view of cars spelling out BA SUCKS—twenty-eight familiar, I’m standing right in front of them cars.
Wow!
“How’d you do it?” I ask, only to get a maddening smirk in return.
“Did you bring in the”—Duke drops his voice to a stage whisper—“Royals? You know”—he waggles his eyebrows—“to help hot-wire or whatever.”
“No.” Savvy rolls her eyes with a headshake. “We used your keys, of course.”
She turns to face my Ferrari. My gaze drops to watch the way the hem of her uniform skirt rides up the backs of her thighs as she stretches across the hood. My dick chooses that moment to perk up and point out that we haven’t fucked her bent over a car yet. If it wouldn’t cost me my starting position on the hockey team, I would be making plans to rectify that immediately.
I’m still too busy getting lost in my fantasies of riding Savvy from behind to notice she’s now standing in front of me, hands holding a small black box with a giant purple bow I can see is printed with miniature versions of the Blackwell Public dragon mascot.
She stares up at me, a hint of vulnerability peeking out from beneath her lashes while she does her best to cover it with a mischievous glint. She’s pure temptation in every way. From her attitude and confidence to the way she wears her uniform with an I-don’t-give-a-fuck lack of conformity, there’s not one thing about her I don’t want to own.
She presents the box to me much like I suspect Eve presented the apple that damned humanity to Adam. She’s the definition of forbidden fruit, and I long to sink my teeth into her.