Total pages in book: 131
Estimated words: 125121 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 626(@200wpm)___ 500(@250wpm)___ 417(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 125121 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 626(@200wpm)___ 500(@250wpm)___ 417(@300wpm)
How could I walk away from them? People waited their whole lives for the support and loyalty my Rogues gave me from day one.
But what do you expect from Victor? Most fiancés aren’t asked if their partner’s four boyfriends can come on the honeymoon too.
I trudged onto the front porch, wincing at the sunlight. Why did I come out here like I had somewhere to go?
“Luna?”
Blinking, I glanced down. Adonis stood halfway in the driver’s side—either climbing in or climbing out.
“Adonis? What are you doing here?”
I probably should’ve called him Professor, but he’d never looked less like one in his entire life. The clinging gray slacks, ties, and fitted vests were discarded for a button-up shirt he didn’t button all the way up. It opened at his chest, revealing curling tufts of hair. Continuing down, I slid over his jeans and sandals—blushing for no reason at the sight of his foot tattoos. A soaring raven on one. An inkwell and dripping quill on the other.
“Mother summoned me. Had something she wanted to discuss.” He drifted over my head. “I hoped to talk to Victor while I was here, but she said he was in the middle of a serious conversation and had to work things out with someone. Now I see that wasn’t just an excuse.” He hesitated. “Did you work things out?”
I laughed mirthlessly. “Believe it or not, I think he’s fine with the whole kissing-his-brother thing. It’s my love affair with four hot criminals that’s holding him back.”
“What?”
A sudden, frenzied energy gripped me. I ran down the stairs, falling against his chest. “Adonis, take me somewhere. Anywhere. Please.”
“Luna, what are you saying?” He gently, but firmly grasped my shoulders—holding me at arm’s length. “You know I can’t do that. It’s not appropriate.”
“I didn’t say take me somewhere and screw me in the back seat.” My voice was louder than it needed to be. “Please, Adonis. I can’t go home. I can’t go back in there. And as much as the Gallery’s been a sanctuary for me, getting there means walking through hell itself—remembering with each step through that campus how my life turned to festering, fly-covered shit.
“I just need to get away, and I’m afraid if I get in a cab, I’ll tell him to drive and not stop until I’ve drained my bank account. Please,” I repeated, eyes welling. “Please.”
“All right, all right,” he whispered. “Don’t cry. I know you’re going through the worst time, but there are lines we can’t cross.”
Can’t. Not won’t.
“Can you not be my professor today? Just be my—”
“Your what? Brother-in-law,” he said, voice hard. “Because the lines he can’t cross are even wider.”
“I was going to say friend.”
“We’re not friends.”
The reply didn’t sting. “I’m your closest friend, Adonis. Because I’m the only one who knows what you’re going through. No one else in this gold-paved town understands what it is to lose their future.”
Sighing, he tipped his head back, curls falling over his eyes. “A couple weeks ago, you were convincing me I haven’t lost my future. I’m just looking at a different one.”
“Did you buy it?”
He didn’t reply right away.
“Get in the car.”
Holding my breath, I didn’t chance saying anything that’d make him change his mind. I rounded the hood, hopping in the front seat. Adonis took off through the gates like someone was chasing us.
That energy was back. Sizzling my veins. Thrumming my pulse. Popping beads of sweat on the back of my neck. The closest I felt to this was the night I snuck out of the boarding school and caught two buses and a train to Paris for a concert. It’s not every time you know exactly what the consequences will be, but you break all the rules anyway. But I knew then nothing good awaited me on the return journey if the nuns discovered we ditched.
And at the end of my journey with Adonis... I wouldn’t feel as I did if deep down I believed there was something good in that future.
I chanced peeks at him during the drive. His folks dissolved his trust fund, removed him from the will, and kicked him out of the mansion, but it was clear they didn’t take away all his toys. A man who sold tires knew a lot about the cars they went on. Years around Jack filled me with the useless knowledge of recognizing I was sitting in a teal, two-seater McLaren 720S. The only thing more impressive than its style and sleekness, was the cost.
Wind whipped through his curls, carrying the scent of sea salt and cedar. Adonis always smelled good—something I wasn’t supposed to notice. He always looked like he stepped out of the pages of a magazine—something I shouldn’t think about.
I forced myself to look straight ahead for the fifth time. I recognized the route we were taking as the same road Lucien and I drove down the day he took me to the vampire club. My face heated remembering the things we got up to in a room full of people. I bounced on his fingers like a wanton minx, dressed like a bloodsucker and surrounded by people way too committed to the life. That’s not where we’re going, was it?