Devil Incarnate (Boys of Preston Prep #4) - Angel Lawson Page 0,140

that. Sebastian has excellent taste in jewelry. Aloud, I say, “He wasn’t trying to get into my pants. He’d already met Sugar by then. In fact, that’s the reason he gave it to me. It was a ‘thank you’ for having his back.” Sniffing, I rest back against his shoulder. “All the Playthings got one.”

“Exorbitant overspending to make up for a lack of personality. Yep, sounds like my little brother.” It’s a bit ironic, since that’s exactly how I might have described Heston a few months ago. He pulls me closer into his side, arm trapped under my waist. “Don’t know why he’d need anyone to have his back with the trailer trash, anyway.”

“Shut up.” I shoot him a glare. “Sugar isn’t trash, okay? She’s had a really hard life, and she’s strong as hell. She’s amazing. You don’t know anything about her.”

“Whatever.” He rolls his eyes, obviously deciding not to argue with me on this.

“We never had sex, you know. Sebastian and I? We fooled around, but...never that.” I let my hand rest on the hard, flat planes of his stomach. “He and Sugar make a good couple.” I say, hoping that he’ll understand that I have no interest in Sebastian. He’s a really great guy, but the chemistry was never there. For some reason, my words only serve to instill the silence with a heaviness that I don’t really understand.

He clears his throat before tucking his hand behind his head. “My dad would have never let me date a girl like her.”

I glance up at him, noting the tired lines around his eyes. “No?”

He shakes his head. “He would have wanted me to be with a girl like you, actually.”

I snort, looking down to watch my fingers play in the hair below his navel. “There was a time my mom would have thrown a parade for me snagging a Wilcox. Before you besmirched your good name, that is.” I worry for a moment that the comment might irk him, but when I chance a look up, he’s just staring at the ceiling, eyes distant.

“That’s why he really cut me off, you know. It wasn’t the gambling or the videos. He wouldn’t have given a shit if I’d done that to a girl like Sugar.” His lips flatten into a tight, wry curve. “It was because you and Sydney were society girls.”

I frown at him, feeling his stomach cave at the tickle of my fingers. “That seems a bit ungenerous.”

“No,” he instantly says, finally meeting my gaze. “That’s what gets me. People think he’s this upstanding moralist for putting his foot down and cutting me out. But it’s all bullshit.” He watches me, eyes searching mine. “When it came to girls, Sebastian and I had all these rules. Some of them were hard-coded into our trust funds, like that we needed to use birth control.”

I give him a skeptical look. “You can’t be serious.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Oh, I’m serious. Do you have any idea how much our trust funds were—are worth? Imagine knocking up some random girl. She’d run roughshod over your bank account. It’s easier to put on a rubber than bribe some girl into getting an abortion, so that’s what we had to do.”

I throw my leg over his, wondering, “Then why is it you refuse to ever wear a condom?”

“Because I love a good gamble?” He shifts his shoulders in a shrug. “I don’t have to now. It’s basically one of the only bonuses of this whole shitshow. Why shouldn’t I take advantage of the finer things?”

“Well,” I say, “I can see the logic in him not wanting you to have a child out of wedlock. I’m not sure how that makes him a bad person.”

Shaking his head, he adds, “That was just the beginning. My brother always had it easy, but me? My dad was always on me to protect the family. He used to say that, with the way I treat girls, I’d need evidence. Insurance.” He looks at me, eyes shuttered and blank. “Proof that they wanted it.”

“You mean…” It finally dawns on me what he’s saying. “Are you saying he wanted you to make those videos?”

“Wanted me to? Hell, he’s the one who taught me how.” He looks away, giving a slow, heavy blink. “Like I said. He’s not the saint everyone thinks he is. He’s not mad at me for doing it. He’s mad at me for getting caught.”

I think about that for a long time, tucked into Heston’s side,