Page 54 of Burning Embers
Dec looks a little uncomfortable with the turn this conversation has gone. “Doesn’t she like girls?”
“So?” Kain lifts an eyebrow sardonically. “Once she has a taste of my cock, she’ll never want to go back to pussy.” He licks his lips exaggeratedly. “I couldn’t stop staring at her nipples when we had that swimming unit in gym class last year. They were so hard, and I just wanted to bite down?—”
“You guys are being real dicks, you know that?” I snap, my frayed nerves finally snapping.
I don’t know Desiree and Mimi that well, and I never even met Emilia, but I hate the way these guys are talking about them. It’s condescending and rude and so fucking infuriating that I want to stab them with my plastic fork.
“Knock it off, guys,” Jake agrees, finally lifting his head from his food. His eyes blaze with an emotion I can’t quite name. “Izzy’s right. You guys are being dicks.”
“At least we’re notthinkingwith our dick,” Kain snaps back, which I find fucking ironic for him to say, considering he spent the last few minutes talking about some girl’s breasts. “Speaking of dicks…”
His gaze homes in on something—orsomeone—over my shoulder, and his scowl deepens.
I follow the direction of his stare to see two familiar men walking towards us.
Ethan and Emery.
My heart skips a beat.
Behind them stands a man I never met before but who instantly makes my palms slick with sweat. As if he can feel the burn of my stare, the new guy’s gaze focuses on me unerringly, his brows lifting in surprise.
Like Ethan and Emery, this guy is insanely good-looking, but unlike the twins, I wouldn’t describe him as handsome or even pretty. His features are too rugged for such a descriptor.
He has dark-brown skin and tightly coiled black hair cut close to his scalp. His eyes, at first glance, are an unassuming shade of brown, but on closer inspection, I see specks of gold in those mesmerizing orbs. He’s shorter than the twins but broader, his muscles compacted and chiseled beneath his dress shirt. Despite his smaller stature, he carries with him an auraof superiority and dominance that has heat rushing through my veins.
Aura of superiority and dominance?
Where the hell did that thought come from?
“It looks like Desiree’s boy toys discovered we were talking about the Queen Bee,” Kain murmurs with a chuckle.
His words have me spinning back around to face him.
“Boy toys?” For some inexplicable reason, the thought of any of those men with Desiree makes me feel sick to my stomach. It’s a completely irrational reaction to three virtual strangers, yet one I feel regardless.
It seems as if I’ve been plagued by irrational reactions since I first arrived on campus today.
“Don’t worry,” a sultry voice murmurs from beside me. Desiree stands directly behind Jake with her hip cocked to the side and her blistering glare fixed on Kain’s face. “Those three arenotmy boy toys.”
Kain pulls his lip away from his teeth in what I would almost describe as a snarl. “But you want them to be.”
“You don’t know what I want,” Desiree replies flippantly before dismissing him without a backwards glance.
I notice, somewhat belatedly, that her hand is on Jake’s shoulder, the touch almost absent-minded. She doesn’t seem to notice she’s even doing it.
But Jake surelydoesnotice if his crimson face and rapidly blinking eyes are any indication.
“I would ask if you wanted to sit by me, Mimi, and Emilia,” Desiree says to me, nodding her chin towards a table on the opposite end of the room.
Mimi and another girl sit there, deep in discussion. There are a few other people at the table—boys and girls alike—but I can’t put names to faces yet.
“But I have a feelingyourboy toys won’t like it.” A mischievous smirk curls up her lips.
I choke on my sip of water. “Myboy toys?”
I glance at Jake in horror, who looks as if he wants the ground to open up and swallow him whole. What is up with people thinking I’m dating Jake? No offense to him…but eww.
“I’m not dating anyone at the table.” And I don’twantto date anyone at the table, though I don’t say that part out loud.