way, but I'm already one step ahead of him. “Somewhere that nobody will recognize us. Mud Street Café in Eureka Springs is always a hit with my family.”
Calix turns back to the front, putting the car in first, and peeling out as he sends the Rapide flying down the bridge. A small shriek of surprise escapes me as he whips us around the corner.
“This baby corners like it's on rails,” I choke out as I find myself plastered to the seat. Calix is going fast, way too fast really, but I roll my window down anyway, the wind whipping my purple hair into a wet tangle.
“My mother loves that movie,” Calix says after a few minutes, slowing down a bit as we near Eureka Springs. The small-town cops around here are anti-Crescent Prep. They really don't like rich kids being thrown into their neck of the woods to cause trouble, and none of the parents of the students seem keen on paying off local law enforcement like they probably did back home. I figure it makes them feel like they're sending their kids off for some real punishment, but then, a speeding ticket has never broken any of their backs, now has it?
“Pretty Woman?” I reply, surprised that Calix even got my reference. It's a little weird, thinking of Julia Roberts and her character's rich benefactor with his fancy car. Too close for comfort, although my body is most definitely not for sale.
“That's the one.” We slow down even more as we come up behind a van with a New Hampshire license plate. Several cars are heading down the opposite side of the road, leaving us zero room to pass. “Have you ever sat down to watch it? Or just heard that line in passing?” Before I question myself, I slip my wet t-shirt over my head, followed by my wet bra.
Calix says nothing, but his dark eyes do flick my way briefly, taking in the hard pink points of my nipples. He's seen all this before, so even though my cheeks are burning, and my body's flushing with heat, I pretend like his stare doesn't matter.
It does.
I'm such a fucking liar.
I yank the baggy hoodie over my head, glancing down at the Burberry Preparatory Academy logo on the front—a pair of griffins holding a shield—and cock a brow. Calix never attended Burberry; the only high school he's ever attended is Crescent Prep. I know because he's been there since my first day, climbing out of a red sportscar and staring up at the Tudor-style building with a scowl before he dropped his gaze and found mine.
We didn't hate each other then.
Or … anything else for that matter.
I'm not sure what, exactly, Calix did to get sent to Crescent, especially since he seems so fucking concerned with what everyone around him thinks—much to his own detriment. He's a cruel asshole, but he's also subtle. I'm surprised that he was ever caught playing his devil's tricks.
“I've seen it. Poor girl fucks her way into a rich guy's heart. What's so interesting about that?”
With a scoff of my own, I chuck my wet clothes into the back seat, and kick off my skirt … and my panties. “Jesus.” The word is barely there, more like a surprised exhale than anything else, but I hear it. My lips twist into a wry smile.
The clock on the dashboard screen reads 9:17 am.
I am officially living September 26th—the day after Devils' Day.
My heart swells with excitement, even as I slip my red panties over my toes, my bare ass heated by the seat warmer. Don't get too excited, Karma. This might not be it. And why would you want it to be? Pearl is dead.
I glance over at Calix and, after a moment of consideration, slip my panties over his head. Not enough to obscure his vision, but more like a racy red hairnet. He narrows his eyes, but he doesn't bother to remove them.
“These better be clean,” he says, but he doesn't sound entirely convinced by his own statement.
“They're not,” I retort defiantly, yanking the sweatpants up my bare legs. They smell like him, the sweatshirt and the pants. My cheeks heat even further as I settle back into the seat. “And also, screw you.”
“Screw me?” he asks, driving a luxury car—that I ruined with my yellow hunk of junk—with panties over his perfect ebony hair. “Screw me, how? You uploaded a sex tape of us. The repercussions of that will follow us forever.”
“Aww,