Stupid me for thinking he’d just leave it at that and let me slink over to my table, away from him. Nope, Prince Alex of Australasia needed to really drive his point home, so the next thing I knew his lips were on mine.
I shouldn’t have been surprised. It was the same controlling bullshit he’d been pulling every damn second we’d been near each other since I’d confronted him. Yet, there I was, gasping in shock as he kissed me in the middle of the damn dining room in front of all our peers.
Alex pressed his body into mine, running his hands down my sides and groping my ass as he slipped his tongue past my lips. My moment of stunned surprise passed quickly, though, and I bit down ever so lightly, warning him.
My silent threat to bite his fucking tongue off must have been clear because he released me long enough to thread a hand into my hair.
“Careful, Violet love,” he whispered in my ear, his voice husky but so soft not even Mattie would hear him, “I quite like it rough.” A roll of his hips reiterated that statement, and I internally gagged at the idea he’d just gotten hard from forcing me to kiss him.
“Enjoy lunch, girls,” he said in a louder voice, knowing full well we had an audience. Of course we did. He was a fucking crown heir, and I was a ballot winner. We were literally the hottest gossip in the whole Academy. “I’ll be seeing you later, gorgeous.” He smacked a hot, wet kiss on the curve of my neck, nipping the skin lightly with his teeth, then laughed under his breath as he walked away. It wasn’t a cheerful laugh, either. It was a dark sound, one that spoke to all the stains on his soul, and it sent a shiver chasing down my spine.
My hands balled into fists at my sides as I followed Mattie over to our table, where Jordan, Rafe and Nolan were all watching us with laser-like intensity.
“What?” I snarled when Rafe scowled at me as he gave my hands a pointed look.
He arched a brow—probably at my tone—and just shook his head. “Nothing,” he lied. “Your lipstick is smudged, though.”
My brows dropped into a scowl of my own, and I uncurled one of my fists long enough to flip him off. “I’m not wearing any, dickhead, but thanks for making an already shitty day even shittier with your foul attitude.”
“Whoa,” Luca commented with an awkward laugh. “Alex must be a pretty shitty kisser if that’s the mood he puts you in.”
Oh crap. I’d been so focused on the way the guys had been staring at me—at the way Jordan and Rafe had been staring at me—I’d totally forgotten their other friends were at the table. Friends whodidn’tknow Alex was a two-faced, cheating piece of shit who’d threatened to kill me on several occasions. Friends who potentially couldn’t be trusted.
The effort it took to wipe my face clear of all the anger and frustration was immense, but Mattie was already coming to my rescue.
“Oh please, Luca,” she snickered, “you can’t recognize sexual frustration when you see it ’cause you never get girls all worked up like that. Vi is just shitty that she can’t go chase Alex down and ride him like her personal pony. Right, babe?” She gave me a playful nudge, and this time my laugh was genuine. She’d deliberately called mebabelike Alex had, and it seemed to clean the word of all his creepiness.
“Yeah,” I agreed, giving a small laugh, “something like that.” I shot a lightning fast look over at Jordan… and Rafe. Damn my body for still being attracted to that bastard. “Actually, I’m not really hungry after all. I might just go over my notes for tomorrow’s chem lab.”
Mattie frowned at me like she wanted to call me on my bullshit, but I was already escaping the dining room. After everything with the dean and then Alex, I needed a second to justbreathe. I wasn’t going to get that while sitting at an awkwardly tense lunch with the guy who wanted to date me, his best friend who had fucked me until I saw heaven, and a bunch of clueless bastards who thought I was dating someone else entirely.
I let out a groan when I was a decent distance from the dining room and scrubbed my hands over my face. “When did life become so complicated?” I asked myself, wondering for the millionth timewhyI’d decided to enter the ballot in the first place.
Footsteps on the marble tiles alerted me to someone approaching, and I released a heavy sigh.
“Violet,” Jordan called out, and I turned to face him. When I’d heard someone following, I’d initially expected Mattie. And then when I’d realized it wasn’t a girl, I’d assumed Rafe had come to pile onmoreassholery.
“Jordy, hey.” I gave him a weak smile, wrapping my arms around myself. Of all my new friends, he was actually the one I’d most wanted it to be following me. “What’s up?”
He tucked his hands into his pockets and dipped his head, looking at me with those coffee-colored eyes in an almost coy gesture. “I just… I know you wanted a moment alone. I just wanted to… uh… fuck it.” He looked both ways up and down the hall—making sure we were alone, I guessed—then reached out to me and clasped the back of my neck.
This time when I found my lips pressed to someone else’s, it inspired a totally different reaction within me. I froze, but not because I was disgusted or horrified. I froze because I wanted to savor every single second. Jordan was kissing me, and it was a damn fairytale moment.
Except, he wasn’t a mind reader and pulled back abruptly, misreading my inactivity as a rejection. “I’m so sorry, Vi. I shouldn’t have—”
“Shut up and kiss me again,” I cut him off. But I didn’t wait for him to initiate this time. Nope, I was a strong, independent woman who owned her own sexual desires, and holy crap, did Jordan fall into that category. I threaded my arms around his neck as our mouths caressed, and when my lips parted to deepen the kiss, he made this unbelievably sexy sort of groan that had me wanting to jump his bones right then and there. Yeah, it wasn’t the most romantic of sentiments, but I’ve never claimed to be a princess.
We kissed for longer than we should have. Considering everything with Alex and the ballot and…everything… it was foolish and risky to just stand there kissing like we didn’t have a care in the world, but he seemed just as reluctant as me to end our embrace.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered, husky and breathless when we finally parted. His lips continued to trace my jaw with feathered kisses. “I shouldn’t have kissed you without your permission. I just couldn’t stand the idea of him being on your lips a moment longer.”
Holy crap. My heart did this weird fluttery thing, and I found I needed to swallow before I could find the words to reply. “For the record, Jordan? You definitely have my permission. One hundred percent.”
I couldn’t see his face, but I could feel him smiling against my skin as he kissed the bend of my neck. Of course he’d seen Alex kiss me there, too, and was erasing that unwanted touch with his own.
“Cool,” he replied, then sucked in a sharp breath and shifted back with a pained look on his face. “I can’t believe I just said that. That’s the best I had? I’ve officially lost all my smooth.” He groaned, hanging his head and shaking it mournfully while I tried really hard to bite back a laugh.
“I should go,” I said, reluctant as all fuck. I didn’t try to hide that emotion when Jordan looked back up at me either. I wanted him to see me. The real me. “If anyone sees us here…”
