Ruthless Noble by Alley Ciz

CHAPTER 28

You would think beingin the middle of a fistfight would be the most volatile situation I found myself in tonight, but you would be wrong.

Savvy staring down half a dozen guys with only the three of us at her back has the atmosphere so fraught with tension it’s a damn miracle it’s not something able to be seen with the naked eye.

She releases a sigh, and with our bodies touching how they are, I can make out a slight rattle inside her chest.

Fuck, her asthma.

A part of me wishes I didn’t know about her asthma because, since the moment I learned about it, I’ve come to worry about Savvy in a way I haven’t about anybody else before.

The most fucked-up thing about that realization is how she got pissed at me for doing so. I can still remember how she slapped me and called me a pussy when I let fear override my lust that day in the parking lot.

She’ll have to learn to live with it, to deal with the fact that I’m always going to worry about her, wanting to make sure she’s managing it correctly because I care. It’s not because I think she’s weak or that her asthma makes her any less of an opponent.

No.

It’s.

Because.

I.

Care.

And because I do, I reach around her side and feel around the pocket of her jacket, searching for her inhaler.

She stiffens when I find it, her blazing eyes meeting mine in a silent promise of all kinds of pain and retribution if I pull it out in front of all these people. I won’t. I just needed to confirm it was in reach should she need it. The helplessness I felt the night she succumbed to her asthma attack is not something I ever wish to repeat.

Instead, I flatten my palm over the cylindrical object and press it against her side, purposely leaving my hand inside her pocket.

“Brian,” Savvy says as she returns her attention to the group before us. “Is this some kind of power move? You saying who can and cannot go as a way to prove your own lineage?”

What the hell is she talking about? A quick glance at Duke tells me he’s as clueless as I am.

Brian's face contorts, brows coming together, mouth turning down as an expression darker than the one he wore while we were fighting overtakes his features. This time, he makes the mistake of directing it at Savvy.

My adrenaline surges with my protective instincts. Reluctantly I pull my hand free from Savvy’s pocket and slip the other from her hold. She’s going to be pissed—surprise, surprise—but I step out from behind her until I’m standing partially in front of her. If this dumbass decides to act on his own poor instincts, he’s going to have to go through me first.

“I shouldn’t have to prove shit, Savvy.” He beats a hand against his chest. “I’m from a founding family too.” Another thump to his chest. “What makes yours more special than mine?”

“Nothing.” It takes more than it should for me not to react to the implied duh she laces into the word. There are days I wonder if it’s an impossibility for Savvy to resist sassing a person when she thinks they’re being a dick. “But you have to stop holding it against me that my brother didn’t ask you to roll with his crew. We’re”—Savvy’s arm brushes against mine as she bounces her hand between the two of them—“five years younger than Carter.”

“You’re still one of them,” Brian says, but it comes out more accusation than anything else.

“Again…” Savvy modulates her voice like she’s speaking to a child. “He’s my brother. It’s kind of hard not to be around the Royals when you live with them.”

She used to live with Carter? Why wouldn’t she live with her mom? Is that why she calls her mom by her name? Why is she living with Natalie and Mitchell now? What changed?

These thoughts continue to pop up in my mind like a game of Whac-A-Mole, but now is not the time or place.

Savvy’s head falls back as she looks heavenward, mulling something over. I get distracted by how the move exposes the long line of her throat. It’s all smooth, pale, unblemished skin begging me to mark her as mine.

For all this guy’s bluster, he remains silent while Savvy thinks.

“How about this?” she asks, breaking the silence. “I’ll race you for their freedom.”

“What?” Brian barks out a laugh, and I whirl on Savvy like she’s lost her damn mind. That’s the only explanation I can think of. It’s one thing for her to have managed to figure out how to drive herself the five minutes from her brother’s place, but racing is not something an unlicensed driver can fake.

“Let Duke and Banks go now since you already said it was cool if Duke left.” She hooks a thumb at them. “And I’ll race you from here to BA for the right to finish your fight.” She bounces a finger between Brian and me. “Because the way you’re really digging your heels in on this makes me suspect you are the one responsible for Jasper’s fat lip.”

There are so many things happening at once that I don’t even get the chance to bask in the fact that she said my name.

“I can’t race you, Savvy.”

“Why not?” Her voice is sugary sweet.

She does this thing where she cocks her hip out, tilts her head, and twirls the end of her ponytail like she’s this innocent damsel. It’s fascinating to watch when she’s anything but. No…this is her luring a person who underestimated her into a false sense of security before she strikes.

“Afraid you’ll lose to me?” Round and round, she twirls her hair. “I mean…it wouldn’t be the first time.”

“What?” Now I’m the one shouting, confused as all hell.

Savvy’s smile widens until a full row of white teeth shows between her black-painted lips. “If the thought process behind it wasn’t so brilliant, it would be embarrassing how easily you all believed the lie.” She shakes her head as if she’s the one in disbelief. “Think about it.” She points to her temple then to the Camaro. “Carter’s reputation as a racer started before he even had a license. Did you all really think he wouldn’t make sure his baby sister knew how to drive?”

“But that’s Wes’s car,” Brian counters.

“With purple under lighting, purple detailing in the paint, and a purple crown in the rear tint?” I swear the single eyebrow she arches asks, Are you really that clueless? “Tessa may have nicknamed him Prince Charming, but there’s no way this—”

She struts away, not stopping until she gets to the Camaro, where she hoists herself up to sit on the hood. She eyes us from a distance, her eyes missing nothing as she takes in our dropped jaws, casually crosses one leg over the other, and braces herself with her hands flat on the hood behind her.

“—would be Wesley Prince’s color scheme of choice.”

Holy shit!

Savvy drives. Not only does she drive, she races.

Wait…

She said the Camaro is her car.

That means…

“Fuck me.” My hands go to my head, my fingers curling over the ball cap covering my skull. “It was you driving in the races?”

The smug satisfaction on her gorgeous face has me close to coming in my pants. The only thing keeping me from going over there and kissing it off of her is the unknowns in the witness pool. The second I get her alone…

Savvy leans forward, forearms draped across her top thigh. “What’s it gonna be, Brian?”

There’s a lengthy pause while he debates; whether it’s about racing or if he believes Savvy’s claim is yet to be seen. “Let’s do it.”

“Perfect.” Savvy claps her hands and hops off the car.

First, she instructs Duke to take Banks and go to her brother’s. Then she lays out how the race will work without the aid of the typical GPS units.

Scott, the handsy one, is supposed to drive to BA with whoever else wants to go. Ten minutes after they leave, Savvy and Brian are to stick to the three main roads that lead from this side of town to the other. I’m to ride shotgun with Savvy, and if she wins, I’m free to go.

Brian and his teammate who will be riding with him head for his Mustang in the parking lot while Savvy and I do the same with the Camaro.

Savvy never shut the car off when she arrived, so FINNEAS’s “New Girl” fills the silence when I open the door.

Thankfully the passenger seat is already adjusted as far back as it can go, and I fold my legs under the dash and wait for Savvy to join me inside the car.

My eyes are locked on the way the denim of her jeans cups her ass as she stands at the open door, watching Brian walk away before she finally slips into the driver’s seat. The second she does, I’m reaching across the center console, cupping her at the nape, and pulling her toward me to crush my mouth to hers.

She whimpers the moment our lips touch, and precum leaks onto my boxer briefs. Not even the sting from my cut is enough to deter me as my hold on her only tightens and I stroke my tongue inside her mouth.

Her hands come up between us and clutch the thick cotton of my hoodie. The tips of her chilly fingers brush against the hollow of my throat when they slip over the collar.

I palm the back of her head, changing the angle of our kiss and cursing our inability to take things further as weeks of pent-up lust, frustration, and longing spill out of us.

This is the moment where things officially change between us. There’s no coming back from this. Fuck all the threats. I’ll find a way to salvage the rest of my future. Because…Savvy not being a part of it is no longer an acceptable option. She’s mine. It’s time for the rest of the world to know it.

When the kiss finally breaks, we’re both breathing heavily. I give a cursory check to make sure there’s nothing abnormal about hers, but all seems to be fine on the asthmatic front. There’s no missing the way Savvy narrows her eyes at me when she catches what I did.

“I’m fine,” she huffs.

“I know.” I slide a thumb over the apple of her cheek. “But I’m not going to apologize for wanting to make sure you’re okay, Princess.”

Shockingly, her features visibly soften, and she nuzzles into the hand I have cupping the side of her face. This side of her is so rarely seen that I take a pointed moment to bask in it.

Her eyes fall to my mouth, and this time they narrow into slits. It’s not at all typical of how she usually looks when my mouth is her focus. Even when she pretended to hate me, she could never disguise her want when locked onto the area south of my nose.

She cups my jaw and runs her thumb underneath my lip. “Of all the times to not have my gloves,” she says as she stares at the blood gathered on the pad of her finger.

“It makes my dick hard when you get all feisty like that.” I bring her hand back to my mouth and suck the tip of her finger into my mouth, cleaning off the blood and teasing her with an extra swirl of my tongue.

Her lips part with a gasp, her eyes flaring wide enough for me to see her dilated pupils. And because she’s Savvy King, she trails a hand down the middle of my chest and palms my hard-on through my jeans, pushing the heel of her hand against my erection harder when I groan.

“Fuck, Princess.”

“Not yet.” Her breath is hot against my neck when she leans in and places a kiss on the underside of my jaw. “I have a race to win first.”

She turns to click her seat belt home and shifts the car into reverse. She keeps slow as she backs the car off the football field and out through the large gates.

My gaze falls to how her fingers are curled confidently over the gearshift, her wrist flexing as she easily shifts into first and steers us toward the parking lot.

Her posture is relaxed, the way she’s slightly slouched in the bucket seat portraying just how comfortable she is behind the wheel as she keeps her focus out the front windshield, her left hand draped over the top of the steering wheel.

“Where’s your ring?” I ask when I notice the distinct lack of bling on her ring finger.

She folds her fingers down, her thumb pressing onto the naked area on the fourth one. “It has no place in my real life.”

Satisfaction fills me with how easily she dismisses the engagement after spending weeks being subjected to watching her act like a picture-perfect fiancée.

“If the engagement isn’t real, why did you come tonight?”

She pulls up along a cherry red Mustang, shifting into neutral before bringing her full attention to me. There’s something unreadable in those purple pools as her eyes bounce between mine. “The engagement might not be real, but our…friendship is.”

We are so much more than friends. Instead of arguing this fact, I let her have it for now. This is the first time she’s admitted we are anything more than adversaries without being prompted. But make no mistake, I’ll be coming for her soon. Really fucking soon.

Locked in each other’s gaze, we both startle at the sound of a horn honking.

Savvy hits the button to lower the window but waits a second longer before finally turning away from me to look at the Mustang next to us.

“We’re here,” a voice says over the other car’s Bluetooth.

“Okay…here’s how we’ll do this,” Savvy says once the call disconnects. “You”—she points at Brian’s passenger—“will honk the horn three times, and we go after the third. Got it?”

The window closes with a whirl, and Savvy shifts back, readying for the race. She hooks a thumb inside the steering wheel, her other fingers folding loosely over the top. The muscles of her thighs flex beneath the denim of her ripped jeans as she presses the clutch down and adjusts her foot on the brake to be able to quickly punch the gas when the time comes.

The transformation that overtakes her as she palms the gearshift is so complete that if I had any lingering doubts about her actually being the driver in all of her brother’s races like she claimed, they would be obliterated.

Honk.

Honk.

Honk.

Tires spin until they grip the road, and then my back is slamming against my seat as Savvy tears out of the lot. She cuts the wheel to the right then jerks it to the left, kicking the clutch and executing a textbook-perfect drift onto the main road, overtaking the Mustang in a squeal of tires.

I’ve only ever been a driver in the street races I’ve partaken in, so being the passenger is a first for me. Experiencing one with Savvy as the driver sends all the blood surging to my cock in a painful fashion.

Again I find my gaze falling to the flex of her thighs, and I can no longer deny the compulsion to touch her.

I drop an arm over the console, slip my fingers inside one of the wide rips high up on her legs, and squeeze her thigh. Savvy’s focus stays on the road as she drops a gear around another curve, but there is the smallest flicker to where my hand remains in an easy possessive grip.

“Your touch is very distracting.”

My lips kick up, and by the way her eyelashes push closer together, I take it she’s spotted my trademark smirk. “You seem to be managing just fine.” The Camaro picks up more speed, and I can no longer see headlights as she makes another squealing turn.

“Years of experience with annoying passengers.” The tip of her pink tongue peeks out playfully, taking any sting out of the words.

“Years?” My head lolls on the headrest as I take her in, my thumb tracing figure eights between the frayed white strings inside the rip. “You’re not even eighteen—that has you shy of the two-year mark from permit eligibility.”

“I’ve been driving since I was fourteen and could properly reach the pedals.”

I’m jolted, my gut jumping into my throat and my foot automatically pushing into the floorboard when Savvy suddenly brakes as we come upon a set of cars on the next road.

Tugging at the seat belt that locked across my chest, I smooth a finger under the Kevlar digging into me.

While my body’s response was me grasping for control, Savvy remains almost unaffected as she effortlessly assesses the surrounding area before crossing the double yellow lines and maneuvering around them.

“Why doesn’t that surprise me?” I ask, forcing myself to relax after her obvious display of skill.

“Because…” Her eyes slide to mine for an instant before the engine roars as she punches it into fifth gear. “Despite what you may think…you actually know me better than most.”

This strange warmth blooms in my chest. Her shell has been harder to break through than vibranium. To hear her own admission that I—not Duke—could worm my way through it settles something I didn’t know needed settling.

“If you’ve been driving that long, why does it always seem like others are driving you around?”

I’m impressed by her ability to carry on a conversation while driving when I typically can’t manage more than a few grunts when I do. Racing has a way of forcing you to focus, but I guess if NASCAR and Formula 1 drivers talk to their crew chiefs, it makes sense.

When she suddenly goes silent, I pull my gaze from the scenery whizzing by to focus on the side of her face. Based on the passing landscape, we don’t have long before we reach BA, and I wonder if she’ll answer me before then or not.

“Carter learned to drive at about the same age as me, so by the time he got his license, he was instantly able to make a name for himself not only in the state’s, but in the tri-state area’s street-racing circuit.”

Neither of these facts surprises me. “He does have quite a reputation.”

“That he does.” The light from the dash illuminates Savvy’s face enough to make out the pride in how her cheeks rise. “But as you can imagine, not everyone was happy about some kid coming in and stealing all the glory.”

Something I can’t describe snakes it’s way around my spine. “What happened?” The question comes out rough, my voice sounding like I’ve been swallowing gravel.

“A few guys saw his Corvette—a slightly older model than the one he drives now—while he was out somewhere—”

“He does have a distinct paint job,” I muse.

“That we do.” Her eyes rise to the rearview mirror, another smile, this one teasing with a hint of Nice try there, buddy in it at the sight of the fast-approaching headlights. “Anyway…luckily Wes and Leo were with him at the time, so he was fine, but he didn’t want to risk the same ever happening to me.”

I wholeheartedly agree.

“I get why you wouldn’t openly drive the Camaro, but you don’t drive at all.” This is the part I can’t work out in my head.

“The fact that I lived with my brother and that I could always be found with him or one of the other Royals made Carter worry people would assume I would follow in his footsteps.” She shrugs.

She claimed I know her better than most, but it still feels like there’s so much to unpack from this conversation. This is the second time she’s mentioned that she lived with her brother, and I’m dying to find out why. Later though. Right now, I need answers about how the girl who handed me my own ass in the race was able to keep that kind of skill hidden from the outside world.

Why?

My hand spreads on her leg, my thumb slipping down the side of it to stroke the soft skin of her inner thigh, and I’m able to make out the indent left behind from the seam of her jeans. Her breathing hitches. I love that she is so responsive and that she can’t hide how my touch affects her.

“To be fair…” Even her voice is huskier when she continues. “They weren’t wrong.”

No, they were not. Carter may still be the sought-after driver in the local-ish street-racing circuit, but the last two years, the Royal Camaro has quickly risen in the ranks when it comes to drawing new blood in.

“So Carter wanted to make sure they had no reason to suspect I had the skills to do so.” The car slows as she downshifts, pulling into the main lot at BA and kicking the clutch again to spin us in a donut before engaging the parking brake. “There are many things I can accuse my brother of being overprotective about, but this isn’t one of them.”

While I can see the merit behind this particular issue, I can’t help but wonder what other things Carter has been protective about…and just how much it affects the way Savvy lives her life.