The Risk: Kings of Linwood Academy #3 Read online

“Do you know what I thought to myself the first day I saw you, Low?” he murmurs, his voice rough.

  “That you’d seen better tits?” I ask archly, trying to distract myself from the sensations spiraling through me, filling my whole body with liquid fire.

  He laughs again, dropping his head to lick and suck my breasts, lapping at my nipples like he’s trying to make amends for anything bad he ever said about them. Then he angles his head to look up at me.

  “No. I thought about this.”

  “You thought about fucking me on the hood of your car?”

  My words are breathy and uneven. I’m having a hard time thinking, let alone talking. He keeps driving into me, a steady pace that’s pushing me higher and higher.

  Then he brings his mouth to mine again, kissing me like I’m the answer to every question in the world before breaking away to brush his lips over the shell of my ear. “I thought about having you in my fucking arms.”

  There’s a raw honesty in his voice, and it makes my heart clench. The swell of emotions inside me sets off a domino effect, and before I can stop myself, I’m coming around him, grabbing onto him and whimpering as waves of ecstasy crash through me.

  He doesn’t stop, driving into me harder as I tighten and convulse around him, and when the last shudders of my orgasm fade, he pins my wrists to the cold metal above my head and fucks me like he means it.

  I can’t stop staring at him.

  The beautiful blue-green eyes that hold both light and darkness.

  The curve of his cheekbone, the angle of his jaw.

  The mouth that smiles so often but is now set in a determined line.

  So much more is contained within him than I saw when I first met him. Dax is so many things.

  And right now, most importantly, he’s mine.

  He lets out a low curse and buries himself inside me, and as he comes, he wraps his arms around me and hauls me up off the car, impaling me even harder on his cock.

  “This,” he mutters in a rough voice as we cling to each other, his face buried in my hair. “This is what I thought about.”

  It takes several moments before I feel like I’ll be able to walk again—I used muscles I’m not used to needing as I braced my feet against the car’s bumper. When Dax pulls out of me and gently sets me down, he holds onto me for an extra second to make sure I don’t topple over. I wobble anyway as I move to collect my discarded pants, and he chuckles.

  “All right, stud,” I shoot back at him, laughing even as my body flushes with new arousal. “Gold star for you.”

  We clean up and get dressed, but instead of heading back into the house, Dax opens the driver’s door of the car and rifles around under the seat for a second. When he pops back out with a little plastic baggie of weed and some rolling papers, I perk up immediately. I haven’t smoked in a while, which is ironic, considering my stress level this semester has been off the fucking charts.

  He rolls the joint and pulls a lighter from his pocket, and we lean against the car to smoke.

  We pass the joint back and forth, and even though we just had sex, even though his cum is still inside me, little sparks of energy zap between our fingers every time we touch. Our hands linger, holding the contact longer than necessary, soaking up these little pieces of each other every time our atoms collide.

  I told my mom the truth earlier.

  I care about these boys. I trust them to have my back.

  And it’s a good goddamn thing I have their help.

  Because come Monday, I’m going to need it.

  18

  I don’t know why, but between Dax and Chase, Dax is almost always the one who drives.

  Chase has a car though, a dark red Aston Martin that sits in the garage next to Dax’s gray Mercedes. And he lets me borrow it early on Monday morning, walking down the stairs with me and escorting me out to the garage.

  It’s a testament to how worried the kings were about me after my accident—and how worried they all are now—that he doesn’t crack any jokes about how I shouldn’t scratch the paint or anything. The roads are clear and dry, so at least I won’t be dealing with snow and ice on this little excursion.

  Just… other threats.

  “You ready for this?” he asks as he hands the keys over to me, using the opportunity to tug me into his embrace.

  Something has shifted now that I’ve had sex with each of the guys. They touch me all the time now, and I touch them right back, our hungry bodies constantly finding their way closer to each other, as if we can’t ever get enough.

  My arms wrap around his back, the keys clutched in my hand, as I tilt my face up toward his.

  “Fuck, no. But I’m doing it anyway.”

  He chuckles at my blunt response, but worry floods his eyes a second later, banishing the spark of mirth. “Be safe, Harlow.”

  “I will.”

  “I’m serious.” His grip on me tightens a little. “You don’t know how many times the four of us had to talk each other out of calling this whole thing off and tying you up to your bed so you couldn’t go.”

  Nerves twist my stomach. If they’d tried to do that, I would’ve found some way to break free and snuck off to do this anyway. And I’m guessing they know that, which is probably a huge part of the reason they didn’t even try. But I don’t like this any better than they do. I feel like I’m about to barf.

  Forcing myself into action, I rise up on tiptoes and kiss Chase quickly before turning to his car. Before I slide into the driver’s seat, I glance back at him. “I’ll see you guys soon.”

  “Yeah. Soon.”

  He backs up and watches as I pull out of the garage, and I lose sight of him as I head down the driveway toward the street.

  The address is loaded on my phone’s GPS, and I follow the calm female voice on autopilot, my mind already skipping ahead, trying to foresee the future, to imagine the different scenarios that might play out.

  Will Hollowell believe me? What will happen to me—and my mom—if he doesn’t?

  My evil brain has no problem coming up with a million horrible answers to that question, and my hands start to shake on the wheel, so I turn up the radio and try to drown out my own thoughts.

  The recent snowfall has melted a little, and the snow that remains is turning brown and gray. The world doesn’t look like a pristine winter wonderland anymore, and that somehow seems fitting as I make the final turn and head up the driveway toward Judge Hollowell’s house.

  I turn down the music, as if I’m afraid he’ll hear me coming, and when I roll to a stop at the end of the drive, I stare through the large windows of the living room, trying to make out any movement inside.

  God, I hope he’s home.

  I came here early enough that he shouldn’t have left for the courthouse already, and also early enough to make sure he knows I haven’t met with Detective Dunagan before arriving. He has to believe that I truly won’t do that.

  Okay. You can do this, Harlow. Just breathe and keep your fucking head on straight.

  At least I don’t have to pretend to like him anymore. I won’t have to look at him with a blank, innocent expression on my face as if he’s just some friend of my mother’s who might be able to help me.

  Those cards are on the table, and there’s no taking them back now.

  Not giving myself the moment or two of stillness it might take to realize this is all a horrible, dangerous idea and back out, I shove open the car door and head up the walkway toward the front door.

  As I ring the bell, adrenaline surges in my system, ratcheting higher and higher as I wait for a response.

  It doesn’t take long. Maybe he saw me coming from an upstairs window or something.

  Hollowell opens the door, and I can tell right away that he did see me coming. There’s no surprise on his face, only light curiosity and a smug sort of triumph.

  “Harlow. Hello.”

  He dips his head. His hair is wet, making the salt and pepper strands appear just a bit more viv
id than usual, and he’s wearing a suit with the tie untied but draped over the back of his neck. I probably interrupted him as he was getting ready to head to work.

  “Does the offer still stand?” I ask bluntly, refusing to waste a second making polite chit-chat with this man. There’s no fucking point anyway; the charade would be for no one, since each of us are well aware of how the other person feels about us. He can save his non-threatening nice guy act for people who still believe it.

  Which, unfortunately, is way too long a list.

  “Yes. It does.” The glow of triumph in his eyes flares brighter as he smiles slightly, and he tilts his head, the gesture almost sympathetic. “I’m assuming you’ve decided to accept?”

  “Not yet,” I bite out. His calm control makes me furious. He always looks so unruffled, as if an invisible shield protects him and nothing in the world could ever hurt him.

  I want to see him hurt. I want to see him desperate.

  I want him to feel a fucking fraction of what I feel.

  Hollowell raises an eyebrow. “No?”

  “I want to talk to you first. To make sure I understand the… terms of your offer.”

  The words stick in my throat, and I don’t even bother trying to hide it.

  His smile grows, and he steps back, opening the door wider. “Of course. Come in.”

  My body physically resists stepping over his threshold, as if I’m a dog afraid of a shock collar. But force myself to follow him inside as he shuts the door behind me and gestures to his left.

  “You remember where the living room is.”

  I glare at him but step toward the large, open space, finding a seat on the angular couch I sat on last time. The elk head presides over the room from its spot on the wall, and the little gray fox on the pedestal stands in exactly the same pose as before, its beady eyes bright and its nose lifted as if to sniff the air.

  The sight of it opens a hole in my heart for some reason. And it makes me think of Iris.

  Judge Hollowell killed her just like he killed that fox. He froze her in time. She won’t ever graduate or go to senior prom. She won’t go to college or get married or have kids. She’ll exist only in memories and photographs, forever seventeen.

  “So.” Hollowell steps into my view, settling on the seat across from me and sitting up straight as he knots his tie. “What is it you want to know?”

  Tears burn the backs of my eyes as I look over at him. “What happens when my mom gets out? After five years? What happens then?”

  “Well, that would be up to her to decide, Harlow.” He shrugs as if that should be obvious, sliding the knot on his tie up to his neck. “She’ll have a criminal record, of course, and that may make it somewhat more difficult to find work, but it won’t be impossible.”

  God, he makes it sound so fucking straightforward. So simple and easy.

  “No, I mean, what happens with you?” I demand. “Do you promise not to hurt her?”

  I’m crying openly now. Just being in this house is ratcheting up my emotions so tight it feels like I’ve got a fucking car on my chest. I suck in two deep breaths, wiping the back of my hand angrily against my eyes. I hate doing this. I hate letting him see me like this. Weak and vulnerable.

  But more than that, I hate the sympathy that comes into his expression.

  He sits forward on the chair a little, smoothing his lapels down as he gazes at me seriously.

  “Yes, I do. I don’t want to hurt Penelope. Or you. I’m not a killer, Harlow.” He spreads his arms, as if presenting himself as an open book. “That’s not who I am.”

  “You killed someone,” I shoot back angrily. “So that’s exactly what you are.”

  Judge Hollowell’s face hardens. It’s not the same as seeing him hurt or afraid, but at least it’s something. It’s a crack in his mask.

  “People do things out of necessity sometimes. Things they don’t want to do.” He clears his throat, his hazel eyes glinting. “That doesn’t mean those actions have to define them for the rest of their lives.”

  “No. This won’t define you.” My voice is thick. “It will define my mom.”

  He shrugs, as if that’s a minor detail. “For a while, yes.”

  My lip trembles as I think of Mom sitting behind the little glass partition, the way she looks so different in prison orange. Five years. Five years of only getting to see her in tiny doses, of never getting to eat ice cream and watch movies or sit on the couch and talk about nothing for hours.

  Five years of her life. Gone.

  What would five years of prison do to her? Would she be the same person at all when she got out?

  “All right.” A tear slips past the corner of my mouth as I speak. “You win. I won’t talk to Detective Dunagan.” I laugh bitterly. “He’ll probably be thrilled not to hear from me.”

  Hollowell nods, smiling reassuringly. “I’m glad, Harlow. You’ve made the right choice.”

  His words hit me like a punch to the sternum.

  There’s a box full of pain in my chest that I haven’t allowed myself to open since the night Mom was arrested. It’s where I shove everything that hurts too much, that threatens to drag me under and make it impossible to keep functioning.

  And as I stare at Hollowell’s blandly attractive face, I let that box snap open.

  It hurts.

  So fucking bad.

  I crumple, resting my elbows on my knees and dropping my head to my hands as a wracking sob tears through my body.

  “Fuck. Fuck,” I mutter, the words like broken shards of glass in my throat. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Mom.”

  My pain feeds itself, each sob pulling out another, and from what feels like a great distance, I hear Judge Hollowell telling me it’ll be all right, that I’m doing the right thing, that it’s better this way.

  I struggle to take in a full breath, but my lungs are seizing so hard it’s almost impossible. My eyes hurt, and my throat hurts from crying so hard.

  The couch cushion shifts slightly as someone else’s weight settles onto it, and when Hollowell’s hand falls on my knee, I jerk my head up, my body going rigid, my tears fading as revulsion floods me.

  “I know you’ve been put in a hard situation by all of this, Harlow. So have I. We’re both doing the best we can.”

  Judge Hollowell looks so perfectly sympathetic that I could almost believe he means it.

  And I see it now, more clearly than I ever have before.

  He wants to believe his own lie. He wants to believe he’s a good man who made one mistake. Maybe he even hopes that pinning Iris’s death on my mom will erase some of the guilt on his own soul, as if convincing the world she did it will make it true somehow.

  I stand up abruptly, jerking my knee out of his grasp as another hitching sob escapes me. I rub my hands under my eyes, and they come away dark, smeared with mascara.

  “Can I… use your bathroom?” I ask, my voice scratchy and raw.

  He hesitates for a half-second, but then nods and stands. “Of course. Come with me, I’ll show you where it is.”

  Striding from the living room, he leads me down a long hallway toward the back of the house. Halfway down the corridor, he stops, gesturing to a partially open door. “Here you are.”

  He makes no move to leave, so I brush past him and step into the bathroom, closing and locking the door behind me. The face in the mirror almost makes me jump. My skin is blotchy and red, my eyes swollen and bloodshot. Mascara has streaked and smeared around my eyes, making it look like I got punched in the face.

  I switch the tap on.

  But instead of splashing water on my face, I turn quickly and survey the room.

  My body feels turned inside out, and my stomach and chest ache from crying so hard, but my heart jumps to life inside my chest again as I shove down the pain I unleashed earlier.

  I need to be quick, and I need to be subtle. I have less than a minute before this starts to seem suspicious.

  In keeping with the rest of
the house, the bathroom is large, modern, and sparse. A large shower with natural stone tiling takes up one corner of the room, and lining the wall beside it are three large windows. Through them, I can see a portion of the yard and the privacy wall that surrounds the property.

  Moving fast, I dart over to the first window and unlock it, sliding it up just a fraction of an inch. The gap is so small I don’t even know if I’ll be able to fit my fingers inside it later, but I can’t risk opening it wider—it would be too easy to spot.

  Then I hurry back to the sink, and this time, I do lean over to wash my face, letting the cold water soothe my hot skin. I grab a tissue and wipe away the mascara smears from under my eyes, then blow out a shaking breath.

  Adrenaline replaced all the sadness in my body as soon as I stepped into the bathroom, and I hope Hollowell can’t see that changes in my eyes.

  But the honest truth is, I still look like shit, and when I let my shoulders slump, I’m the perfect picture of sorrow and defeat.

  I’m still dabbing at my eyes as I open the door and step out of the bathroom. As I suspected he would be, Hollowell is waiting in the corridor for me, his hand resting lightly in the pockets of his suit. He looks me over with an assessing gaze, and I don’t try to hide my distaste. It would probably make me seem more suspicious if I didn’t seem to hate him.

  “Are you all right?” he asks, tilting his head sympathetically.

  “Yeah. I’m fine.” I wrap my arms around my stomach in a protective gesture. “I have to get to school.”

  “Of course. You can still have a good future, Harlow. So can your mom. Remember that.”

  Hollowell’s voice takes on the quality I’ve heard teachers use when they’re trying to impart some pearl of wisdom to a troubled kid. Gentle and condescending, as if he doesn’t expect me to truly understand his words yet, but he knows that one day, I will.

  “Yeah,” I say again, then turn and walk back down the hall.

  Judge Hollowell moves too, stepping forward so he’s just ahead of me as he leads me toward the door. He opens it, and I step out into the cool February air. But before I can head to my car, his voice stops me.