“Your balls are just that big, huh?” I asked as his knee knocked against my thigh.
“You know it,” he replied cockily, his gaze skimming the room. “Where’s the new girl then?”
I looked up too, scanning the sea of familiar faces for a moment before shrugging. “If she makes a habit of running later than you then there’s no hope for her anyway,” I said dismissively.
“The way Blake told it last night, she could be later than the devil to a church service and you still wouldn’t kick her out of bed,” he replied and I gave him more of my attention at that. Blake had had more than his fair share of girls and if he’d rated her that highly then she was undoubtedly worthy of notice.
Kyan gave me a cocky smirk as my gaze trailed over his tie which he’d hung around his neck without tying it. The four buttons he’d left undone revealed the flames surrounding the devil tattoo on his chest. He’d tossed his blazer over the back of his chair too and had rolled up his shirt sleeves to show off even more of his ink. He looked like a fucking dipshit and he knew it. He also did it more just to piss me off.
At least his hair had been tamed into its topknot, but the stubble lining his jaw told me he hadn’t bothered shaving for a few days. Honestly, if he was anyone else I would have had his ass expelled for the pure fact that his appearance fucked me off.
Before I could decide whether or not to fall for the bait he’d set me, Blake hopped over the table and damn near knocked my espresso over.
“I’m surrounded by fucking idiots,” I muttered as I rescued the coffee and Blake fell into his seat on my right.
He turned to throw a wink at the girls on the closest table as they watched his display and fell over themselves giggling in appreciation. Dickwad.
The waiters appeared with food for the other Night Keepers and I tried not to sneer at the plate full of deep fried grease that landed in front of Kyan. That asshole was gonna be one fat old man if he didn’t get that shit under control. Blake’s stack of pancakes slathered in cherries and syrup wasn’t much better either.
The ends of our table slowly filled with members of our clique, though I left decisions on who made the cut to Blake. No one sat opposite us, leaving the view over the room clear for us to watch our prey. Blake liked to joke that we were like kings sitting up here watching over the common folk. I tended to see that as less of a joke and more of a fact.
The waiters made quick work of rushing back and forth, handing out meals to the masses as I worked on finishing my food.
Just as I laid my knife and fork down, Kyan’s elbow rammed into my ribs.
“What?” I snarled, shooting him a dark look, but he wasn’t looking at me. His gaze was fixed across the room and there was almost a grin plastered on his face which was a feat in itself. Kyan only smiled in public if someone else was bleeding.
“The new girl just walked in,” he said without tearing his eyes away from her.
I turned too, lifting my grapefruit juice to my lips and looking over the rim of it as I surveyed the crowd.
I didn’t even have to hunt for her. The girl was like an emerald sparkling amidst a sea of shit. She wasn’t even trying and yet she stood out from a mile away.
A waterfall of honey blonde hair fell in waves down her back to the base of her spine and my gaze naturally followed that line over the curve of her ass. I scanned down to the hem of her forest green pleated school skirt which stopped just high enough to give me a glimpse of her tanned thighs. Her knee length socks took over from there, but I could appreciate the lines of her toned flesh through the tight material.
She was walking away from me and I was already captivated by the way her hips rocked and her hair swung.
She followed Mila Cruz through the crowd to a table of our followers and they made room for her to join them with wide smiles and enthusiastic greetings.
Gerald Holt gave her a huge grin as he leaned forward to drop a napkin over her lap and she laughed, waving him away with a casual gesture that said no chance asshole as she sat back, offering me a clear view of her face.
She had big blue eyes which sparkled with laughter beneath lashes long enough to kiss her cheeks when she blinked. A smattering of freckles graced her high cheekbones and her pink lips had a natural pout to them which instantly had me imagining my cock between them.
“Mine,” Blake growled beside me as he realised what we were looking at.
“Fuck that,” I muttered. “A girl like her is gonna want the top dog, sorry asshole.”
“Bullshit. She wants someone who can make her laugh, not a dipshit who doesn’t know to loosen his tie,” he goaded. “Besides, when did I ever agree that you were top dog?”
“You don’t need to agree, I just am,” I said dismissively and he bristled.
“Maybe she wants a man who will tie her to his bedposts and fuck her so hard she can’t walk straight the next day,” Kyan added in a low tone which made both of us pause.
I turned to him with an eyebrow raised. “Seriously?” I asked. “You wanna fuck a rich girl now?”
“First time for everything,” he said, his gaze sliding over the new girl in a way that told me he really was considering it.
“A nice girl like her won’t wanna mix it with you,” Blake taunted him. “She wants the golden boy.”
“Naw,” Kyan disagreed. “She’s no nice girl.”
“You haven’t even said one word to her,” Blake scoffed.
“Don’t have to, she has that look in her eye.” Kyan shrugged like that was an actual thing and I snorted a laugh.
“Whatever fuckers, the girl won’t look twice at either of you once she sees me,” I said cockily.
“Want a bet?” Kyan asked, tearing his gaze from the temptation in the room to offer me a taunting grin.
“We don’t need a bet,” Blake said irritably. “I told you, she’s mine.”
“You can’t just claim people, asshole,” I replied.
“Fine. I get first shot at her then,” he countered.
“How do you figure that out?” I asked.
“Because my mom is dead,” he said simply.
“That’s cold, man,” Kyan said, snorting a laugh.
Blake had started using that shit right after he’d snapped out of his grief. He wasn’t fooling either of us. He’d loved his mom and he was devastated when she caught the fucking Hades Virus. She’d been on a cruise to Hawaii right around the time when the cases there started exploding.
It turned out there was one or two things money couldn’t buy after all. And a cure to Hades was one of them. They didn’t name it after the god of the dead for no reason. I was just glad that we were holed up here away from all that shit. Everlake Prep was basically in isolation without even trying. The only place even remotely close to here was the town of Murkwell and that was still ten miles out. Beyond that, you had to drive fifty miles to find anyone else.
Who knew being shipped off to the middle of nowhere would come in so handy?
For the moment, the virus was mostly contained to certain hotspots around the world, but it was obvious it was going to continue spreading globally.
Blake hadn’t even been able to go and visit his mom to say goodbye. He’d had to do it over FaceTime, watching through a screen as day by day it ravaged her body and finally stole her away from him for good. Shit like that had to sting. But he wasn’t letting it show. And if that was how he wanted to play it, then I wasn’t going to call him out on it. His grief was his own.