Playboy Princes (Royals of Arbon Academy, #2)(7)

I nodded slowly, releasing the heavy breath I’d been holding. Suspecting wasn’t knowing, and that made all the difference to me. He’d also tried multiple times to warn me away from Alex, in his own fucked-up way, and I’d chosen to ignore him. I had no one to blame but myself for this mess.

“Well,” I muttered, feeling my shoulders sag under the weight of all my issues. “Maybe you can understand why I needed to forget all of that for a while.”

A fake cough near the door alerted us to another participant in the conversation, and Nolan grinned a sly, sexy grin. He held my missing blade, which he must have rescued from the tournament. Relief flooded through me that it hadn’t been lost or stolen. I’d worked too damn hard to earn that blade.

“Well, New Girl. If that’s how you forget your problems, I, for one, would like to be involved.”

He was joking. Wasn’t he?

“Me too,” Jordan added, and he definitely wasn’t joking.

What. The. Fuck?

Rafe just snorted and shook his head. “I’m finishing my shower, since I got interrupted. Figure this out yourself, Cinderella.”

The bathroom door slammed behind him, leaving me naked, bruised, bleeding, and squirming under two sets of all-too-interested eyes.

Oh shit. I was so fucked.





Chapter 3





I managed to avoid seeing anyone for the rest of the weekend. Mattie blew up my palm reader, requesting me for movies, parties, and just general chick time. But I couldn’t. I literally couldn’t deal with what had happened.

I’d imagined killing Alex, that lying piece of shit, more times than was probably healthy. In fact, nothing I’d done since finding out had been healthy, including fucking someone who could barely stand me at the best of times. It didn’t matter though, I couldn’t get Rafe out of my head. My body, still bruised and battered from more than the fight, ached to be touched like that again, but I was not giving in. Rafe was a weakness I would exorcise from my being.

“Violet Rose Spencer, open this fucking door before I smash it down!”

Mattie followed her words with some loud banging on said door, and I wondered if she was really going to attempt to break it down. The solid timber doors here were designed to protect each room’s rich, famous, and royal inhabitants, and there was no way my slender best friend had a hope in hell.

But she’d give it a try because that’s who she was.

“Vi, seriously,” she huffed, and I leaned my head against the door for a moment before I yanked it open. Mattie almost toppled in, just catching herself on the ridiculous six inch heels she sported.

“You’re dressed to kill,” I said, stepping back to see her better. She had on a royal blue minidress with lace cutout panels in the front and, from what I could see, the back as well. Her boobs were pushed to their limits, her legs long in those heels, and her hair straight and shimmery in the two low lights illuminating my room.

“You’re dressed like death,” she shot back, eyes wide as she ran her green-eyed gaze over me. “My god, Violet, what in the heck are you wearing?”

I looked down. Holey shirt, tracksuit pants, chocolate stain near my right thigh, wine stain on the center of the shirt.

“And you smell like death too,” she added, pushing inside. “To finish off”—she waved her hand at my slovenly appearance—“this package.”

Laughter burst from me before I could stop it. I hadn’t expected that.

“Please come in, insult me some more while you’re at it,” I said, sweeping my hand to the side.

Mattie ignored me, striding through my mess and kicking clothes to the side like she gave no fucks. When she reached my bed, she spun around and glared. “Why are you ignoring me? And why in the hell are you all bruised up again? Did someone hurt you? So help me, I will fucking bring this school down on them.”

My heart ached, and this weird sensation started to fill my throat and eyes. Like… there was so much love in my body that it was overflowing and the only place it could exit was from my eyes. “I’m sorry,” I said huskily. “I’m really fucking sorry for being a shit friend. I tend to shut down when my life screws up. It’s easy to forget that I have someone in my corner now.”

Mattie took two steps forward, and I was hauled into a fierce hug. “You’ve got me in every fucking corner and at your back and front. You don’t have to face them alone, girl.”

Jesus. Make her stop; I really didn’t have time to be a bawling mess.

Not that I’d change Mattie for anything in the world.

When she let me go, our eyes met, and she shook her head. “You’re scaring me,” she whispered.

“It’s Alex,” I said softly, forcing myself to feel the sting of his betrayal again—feel every facet that would burn my body but fill my resilience. I needed that to go the extra mile and take him down.

Most of the time, the twins, Mattie and Nolan, wore these relaxed, easygoing expressions that said they’d go along with whatever and were cool as cucumbers doing it.

But every now and then, their expressions reminded me of my sensei. Scary. Resolved. Ready to take down the biggest baddest mother in the room and not blink twice about it.

Mattie had that look now as she marched to the door, and I could have sworn her chest rumbled. “Be right back,” she growled. “Got a prince to kill.”