Total pages in book: 136
Estimated words: 130673 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 653(@200wpm)___ 523(@250wpm)___ 436(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 130673 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 653(@200wpm)___ 523(@250wpm)___ 436(@300wpm)
I snorted. “I’ve met actual cereal boxes more decisive than you. Pick a lane, my guy.”
“Dylan.” He turned to me sternly. “Can we have some privacy?”
Sure can, in your own house. Truth was I wanted to pull myself together after what had happened. “Looks like you two wanna kill each other.” I shrugged. “I wish you both success.”
I took the stairs up and rounded the first corner of the stairway, staying close by. I hoped they’d stay in the kitchen.
“I’ve been waiting for our hookup for ages,” Piper whined.
The knowledge they hadn’t been together yet shouldn’t have filled me with relief, but oh, it did.
“I feel bad for her,” Rhyland explained, as cool as a cucumber and just as phallic.
I felt myself dwindling into something small enough to fit inside a pocket, becoming smaller still when he added, “I thought she was you.”
Piper snorted. “I’m hotter.”
“Okay, Pipe, no need to kid yourself.” He chuckled.
I blushed. Rhyland was a party animal, a fun guy, but he could sometimes be cruel.
“Anyway, it’s sad, you know, that she’s staying here. Taking on a waiting job. She’s not a dumb kid, just impulsive and overly emotional.”
“She’s not your problem,” Piper all but mewed.
“Let’s not get carried away here. I was just copping a feel, not filling in her college application.” He laughed.
Bile coated the back of my throat.
“Mistake or not, you have to keep your mouth shut about this, Pipe,” Rhyland warned. “Row can’t find out, and history isn’t kind to people who fuck me over.”
“Okay, okay,” she huffed, flustered. “I won’t say a word.”
“Good girl,” he said in that derogatory way. “You keep my secret, and I’ll keep yours.”
“What secret?”
“That pink coke bag that disappeared from Allison’s locker senior year?”
“So…are we off?” Piper asked finally.
Girl, he just blackmailed you. Have some self-respect.
“We’re off,” Rhyland confirmed. “This was a bad idea anyway.”
“Yeah,” she said unconvincingly. “Totally.”
The conversation seemed to be over, with the sound of beer bottles clinking, dishes being washed, and trash bags being filled. My blood simmered with rage as I perched on the stair on the second floor, my heart in my throat.
He felt bad for me.
My life was sad to him.
In one careless moment, he’d shattered years of pining and teasing and daydreaming about the what-ifs. I’d always burned for Rhyland Coltridge. Now all I wanted was to burn him down.
But I was Dylan Casablancas. Fun. Witty. Creative. Unhinged.
And Dylan Casablancas never cried.
So I did the only thing I could do to ensure Rhyland knew I was over our so-called misunderstanding. I went to my room, put on my most sexy, cute getup, did my makeup, curled my hair, spritzed on a small pond of Libre by YSL, and took the stairs down two at a time, barreling through the backyard doors. I looked like a million bucks and felt like fifty cents, but I kept my smile intact as Rhyland, Row, and their girlfriends all hung their stunned, awestruck gazes on me. Rhyland’s expression darkened into something feral when he gulped at the sight of me.
“You gonna let your sister go out of the house like that?” he growled at Row.
Row shot him a puzzled look. “Yeah,” he said slowly. “I don’t own her. Wrong era, asshat.”
“She looks like fucking prey,” Rhyland countered, scowling at my brother.
“How she dresses is none of my business,” Row maintained. “And you know I make a lot of her shit my business, so let it go.”
“Sorry, Rhyland.” I patted his shoulder with a sweet smile. Something dangerous rippled up and down my spine. “I know you want me, but I’m too much for you to handle. Not gonna happen. Take the L. Row?” I snapped my fingers.
“Yeah?”
“Drive me to the moorlands. I’m going to that party.”
And I was going to fuck Tucker Reid and his bad poetry and his dubious intentions and my entire freaking future, all at once.
After all, I was Dylan.
Impulsive.
Overly emotional.
And a very sore loser.
DYLAN
The next day, after a morning walk, finger-painting, sensory play, and cookie baking, Grav decided she’d had enough of our quality time and retired to her new room to flip through her books.
I heated up some water in a MacKenzie-Childs check tea kettle I got for no other reason than the fact that I saw it in a Nara Smith video and wanted to feel wholesome and belligerently perfect. I didn’t even like tea—I was a coffee girlie through and through. Three shots, at minimum, before I started my day. But I felt like reinventing myself now that I was in the big city.
As I waited for the water to boil, I leaned a hip against the kitchen island and stared out the floor-to-ceiling windows. The apartment overlooked Central Park, and even though the park was just one small slice of lush, heavenly green in a concrete jungle, it very much felt like living in a tree house.