RIOT HOUSE (Crooked Sinners #1) - Callie Hart Page 0,107

and I don’t even know if she’s keeping quiet anymore. I don’t know if I’m keeping quiet. The only thing that matters is the feeling of her wrapped around me. Her mouth on my mouth. Her breath and my breath. My hands on her skin, and hers on mine, her nails raking across my back, the desperate, wordless pleading in her eyes as she arches away from me, her head falling back, and she shudders as she comes.

I’m managing to keep my shit on lockdown fairly well, pushing back the rising feeling that I’m gonna come, but the moment I see her surrendering to her orgasm, her nipples peaked and tight, her eyes rolling back into her head, I have no fucking choice in the matter.

I come with her, clenching my teeth and pressing my forehead against her collar bone, my ears fucking ringing, my head spinning like I’m trapped in a tailspin and I can’t even tell the difference between the ground and the spinning sky.

It ends. After a long, dizzying moment, trying to figure which way is fucking up, it ends. Elodie falls limp against me, her forehead beaded with a damp coat of sweat, her hair mussed and all over the place, and something foreign squeezes painfully in my chest.

This beautiful girl with the freckle on her chin, hair the color of sunlight, and a heart as fierce as a lion’s—she carefully lifts her hand and strokes my hair back out of my face, searching my features with a stunned look in her eyes. “That was—” she says, obviously struggling to find the right word.

“Intense?” I can’t move. If I do, this strange spell we’re trapped in will break and we’ll have to disentangle ourselves. I don’t want that. Not yet.

Her eyes shine brightly as she nods. “Yes. Intense. Why did you—” She trails off again, her fingers trailing down over my chest. She watches her own hand, golden and beautiful against my paler skin, as if she’s as stunned as I am that she’s actually touching me like this. “Why d’you move me?” she asks.

I laugh softly, arching an eyebrow at her. “Why? Wasn’t this position to your liking?”

She laughs, too, ducking to hide behind her hair. “No. It was perfectly satisfactory,” she says.

I jerk back, feigning surprise. “Satisfactory?”

She squeals when I bury my face into the crook of her neck and I bite her, reminding her that I still have teeth. Her question’s forgotten, which is a relief.

I promised back in the gazebo that I’d always give her my truths. I just don’t know how to tell her this, though. That I wanted to face her when I was inside her. That I wanted to kiss her. That I wanted to hold her. That I wanted to see her.

I don’t even know how to admit it to myself.

24

ELODIE

A secret is a terrible and wonderful thing. It’s a flickering candle flame in your chest, warming you from the inside. It can have you grinning into the crook of your elbow, face hidden in your shirt, while you wish away the hours until ‘later’ arrives, when you get to see the object of your infatuation again. But a secret can also make you feel soooo shit.

“I’m so glad you transferred. Honestly, I was so miserable before you showed up. Senior year at Wolf Hall was going to be so fucking horrible thanks to Dash. But even those Riot House pieces of shit can’t ruin the last few months here now. My grandmama always said a good friend can fix anything. God, your hair is beautiful,” Carina says, her fingers quickly working over my head. Sitting on the floor in between her legs, I stay still as she works her magic, taming my unruly hair into a complicated braid. “Have you ever thought about dyeing it back to your natural color?” she asks.

She’s no idea that I feel incredibly guilty over what she just said to me. I’m not a good friend. I’m an awful friend. I can’t fix anything. I’ve gotten myself mixed up with a guy Carina hates, who’s best friends with the guy who broke her fucking heart, and I can’t see myself getting out of the situation any time soon. Selfishly…god, I can’t even believe that I’m letting myself think this…I don’t want to extricate myself from the situation, even though I know how hurt and upset she’d be if she knew what I was up to. What kind of friend does that make