Total pages in book: 168
Estimated words: 160578 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 803(@200wpm)___ 642(@250wpm)___ 535(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 160578 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 803(@200wpm)___ 642(@250wpm)___ 535(@300wpm)
“Good. Perfect for you to finally push me over it.” I glare up at her, shoving my shoes back on.
Her green eyes come to mine. Evie is all long legs, sassy attitude, and manners I’m not sure anyone this day and age uses. We don’t associate with many people outside of the EKC, but Evie and her father definitely started the exception to the rule. It became obvious the moment she and Halen first met.
But there is also that one time…
“You and I both know that I would have pushed you over a long time ago if I really wanted to.” She’s in front of me now, reaching up to grip me by the chin and forcing my eyes down to hers. When we were in tenth grade, a list of names went around Riverside Prep about the hottest girl in school.
Evie was number one. Until Stella grew an attitude that had all the boys thinking they could be the one to change her.
Evie was chestnut hair, dark skin, and bright eyes. She has the kind of smile that could cure anything. She’s also one of the only people walking this earth who even comes close to knowing a smidge of the kind of darkness I carry inside of myself.
How she found out was an accident, but when she kept it to herself, that proved her loyalty.
“How much have you had to drink?” Her eyes narrow, before she lifts the hand holding the almost empty bottle.
I don’t pull from her, not bothered by the way she’s always handled me. “Not enough.”
Her hand falls to her side and the two worry lines I’m well acquainted with form between her brows. “Priest…”
I reach for the door handle, desperate to get away from her before she does what she’s good at, penetrating the other side of my brain. The side that she’s always wanted.
The side that once wanted her.
I know she’s not following when the door closes behind me. For one, she knows the rules and how it goes. Evie is still on a need-to-know basis, but she’s not stupid. She knows when to push and when to keep her distance. It’s partially why she’s managed to stay around for so long, and why she’s being pulled in deeper.
Keeping the Watch Tower close was one of the first things I knew I wanted, so we connected it with the pathway that separates the black sunflowers all the way to the entrance. The elevator closes, and I hit the only button inside that takes you to the top. The doors open onto everyone, where Halen is already at the table, her finger tapping against the marble. River and Stella are to her left, with Vaden and War opposite.
There haven’t been many times that we’ve all sat at this table, but it will be the first time we have with me now holding the gavel, and with it now on my property.
“Finally, Priesty!”
Stella’s nickname for me is going to land her ass at the bottom of the ocean one day. I bare my teeth at her in passing, making sure to swipe the bottle of Don Julio on my way. My mind is a mass of identical scribbles and words like the ones she’d left in my room.
“Should you be drinking that much?” Halen asks, her head jerking toward the bottle in my hand. “Or has the gavel got to you that much?”
I clear my throat from the poison of tequila while lowering myself down. “You and I both know that alcohol doesn’t affect me the way it does you. I could drink this entire bottle and still put a bullet clean between your eyes.”
Halen’s smirk vanishes as Vaden remains quiet to my right.
I place the bottle on the table, tossing my phone beside it. I don’t want to fucking be here right now, seated between any of them. This is the one day a week I told them to leave me the fuck alone.
Simple instructions.
“Updates. Go.”
War traces his upper lip, as if considering whether he should launch at me right now. “Close. We’ve shut the doors during the day, managed to change the hours to five to nine, and I’ve hired a new faculty of staff.”
“Close never got you far,” I answer his small warning with a shadow of a smirk, and he replies with one that matches my own. I know the same love that he has for my sister will be the same that he uses for his loyalty to the Kings. Anyway, he’s Nate fucking Malum’s son. I refuse to believe anything less than terrifying would leave the nut sack of that demon. “So you’re on track.”
War being a Riverside Malum, means he is taking over his dad’s role in the schooling system.
I point to Vaden. “You?”
Vaden slides his ringing phone across the table, flashing an unknown number. I tap the speaker button.