“What . . . the hell . . .” I moan.
“Did you like that?” Miles asks.
“It was unbelievable.”
Miles seizes me and kisses me, biting my lips.
“You’re mine,” he growls. “All mine.”
“I only want to be yours,” I sob. “Don’t let him take me.”
“I promised you,” Miles says. “I don’t make promises easily. And I never break them after.”
He crushes me against his body, holding me so tight that I know for certain he’ll never let me go.
I touch my throat with my fingertips. I expect it to feel swollen or sore, bruised even, but it’s completely fine. Even in the fever pitch of his arousal, Miles never lost control. He was careful not to hurt me, not even to leave a mark.
I stay on his lap a long time, curled up against him, listening to his heart racing against my ear. Eventually its beating slows, becoming a steady metronome instead.
Hours have passed. It’s late at night.
Still, we stay together.
When Miles finally shifts, I feel a stab of disappointment.
It eases when he says, “I don’t want to take you back yet. Let’s stay a while longer.”
“Yes, please,” I agree.
Miles picks up the remote again, switching the music to something slower and more romantic. He pulls me up off the sofa and then into his warm embrace. We sway together, naked but not cold, wanting every inch of our skin to touch.
Unchained Melody — The Righteous Brothers
Spotify → geni.us/rebel-spotify
Apple Music → geni.us/rebel-apple
“This is from a movie, too,” he says. “Do you know it?”
I shake my head.
“I’ll play it for you next time.”
I look up into his face.
“How many next times will there be?”
“Infinite,” he says.
14
Miles
All through January and February, I strategize how to break Zoe’s marriage contract.
The simplest method would be to murder Rocco Prince.
I’ve considered it. Many times. But it would be risky, for a variety of reasons.
First off, Zoe and I would be the obvious suspects. Despite our best efforts to be subtle, it’s widely known that we have feelings for each other. Kingmakers doesn’t always enforce its rules when it comes to petty misdemeanors like fistfights and hook-ups, but some rules are sacrosanct. The most iron-clad is the Rule of Recompense. Any serious injury or death is punished in the old way: an eye for an eye. Tooth for a tooth. Life for a life.
Even if we could skirt punishment by the school, the Princes would seek revenge. Rocco, as unlovable as he might be, is their only child and Heir.
I don’t want to start our life together with a cycle of retribution.
I want to do what I do best: solve the problem, once and for all.
I need to make a deal with the Romeros and the Princes. Something that makes everyone happy.
Zoe has explained to me what her father and the Princes stand to gain from the marriage contract and its accompanying trade deal.
I have to offer them something better.
Something much better.
I wish it were as simple as money.
I have 10.4 million now. The full balance of my seed money that I’d planned to take to Los Angeles after I graduate.
If I thought the Princes and the Romeros would take a check, I’d clear my account today. But they stand to make much more than five million each off their deal.
I have to take that ten million and turn it into something more valuable. I have an idea for how I could do that, with Ozzy’s help. But I need another player. And probably every penny of cash I can muster.
I work on my plan every spare minute, whenever I’m not in class or sneaking out to see Zoe.
It’s starting to shape up, bit by bit.
Only one flaw remains intractable and irascible. Even if I convince the Princes and the Romeros, the one person I’ll never convince is Rocco himself. He’s the thorn in my side. The one threat I can’t remove entirely.
I turn the problem over in my head again and again, but I can never think of anything that will satisfy him. Nothing but Zoe.
I move forward regardless, trusting that even if Rocco is angry, he’ll have to abide by what his parents decide.
Rocco knows I’m seeing Zoe, much as we try to hide it. He knows, and his inability to prevent it makes him angrier and angrier.
I’ve warned Zoe not to go anywhere alone on campus. She’s careful to stick close to Anna and Chay.
Rocco retaliates by venting his rage on me instead. I’m an easier target, since we share classes and the same living space in the Octagon Tower.
Rocco and his stooges break into the dorm room I share with Ozzy. They destroy everything inside, slashing up our uniforms, ripping apart our books, and pissing all over our beds.
Ozzy discovers the mess. He’s shaking with fury when I join him in the midst of the mayhem.
He holds up the blanket his mother knit for him, one that he’s had all his life, torn to pieces and soaked in urine.
“I’ll fucking kill them,” he hisses.
It takes a lot to make Ozzy mad. But once you do, he’s got a hell of a temper buried under the jokes and the smile.
“I can room somewhere else till all this cools off,” I say to Ozzy, feeling guilty for bringing this down on his head.
“Fuck that,” Ozzy said, dismissing the idea at once. “This isn’t just between you and Rocco anymore.”
It’s true—at this point, Ozzy and Wade Dyer hate each other nearly as much as Rocco and me.
Wade has taken a strange obsession with Ozzy that goes far beyond following his boss’s orders. He snipes at Ozzy constantly, shoulder-checking him every time they pass. They’ve almost come to blows a dozen times, held back only by the presence of teachers or staff.
Wade mocks Ozzy’s height, his looks, his accent, his family, and his interests. Ozzy seems unable to shrug it off as he usually would, maybe because Wade is tall and blond and good-looking, the epitome of what Ozzy believes Chay would prefer.
Ozzy and Chay are still hooking up. I don’t know if it’s good for him. He looks sick every time he sees her chatting with some other guy, laughing and smiling up at them in her usual flirtatious way. His feelings for her deepen by the day, but it doesn’t seem to be reciprocated, and it’s driving him mad.
The tension eats at me, the secrecy and the strain to find some way out of this. The conflict with Rocco feels like a rubber band stretched to its furthest limit. There’s no doubt it will snap. The only question is when.
My only relief is sneaking out to see Zoe.
It’s not just for sex. I love that part of it, of course, but more than anything I want the freedom to talk to her, fully and openly, without anyone listening.
I’ve read through her whole script now, and I think it’s brilliant. She has an incredible way with words. She reminds me of Aaron Sorkin or Greta Gerwig, in that her characters are wildly articulate and bold in speaking their minds.
It gives me a look at what Zoe herself would be like, without fear of threats or spies or reprisals.
She’s working on the ending. Sometimes she asks me for ideas, and I try to give suggestions, even though I don’t know fuck-all about writing. Sometimes we even perform little bits of it, laughing at how awful we both are at acting.