Kingmakers, Year Two

16. Zoe

16

ZOE

T he weather warms rapidly as we move into spring. Students start throwing more parties out of doors, down at the Moon Beach and in the River Bottoms.

I’ve received three extremely nasty letters from my father after my cousins reported me attending those parties. I crumpled the letters up and threw them away half-read. It might be madness, but I’m starting to think that the plan Miles and I formulated might actually work, which makes me uncharacteristically reckless.

Either way, my father can’t touch me here. He could punish me over the summer. But if Miles’ visit is successful after the school year ends . . . everything will change.

I’m trying not to hope. Trying not even to think about it .

Which isn’t that difficult, because my mind is filled with Miles himself. I’ve never had such a difficult time paying attention in class. Every minute that we’re apart I’m fantasizing about sneaking away with him again. I’m picturing his crooked smile, his low, mocking laugh, his clear gray eyes that remind me of steel, of smoke, of early morning light . . .

I’m picturing his body with his rich, nut-brown skin and his dense muscle, his warm flesh and his even warmer hands that grip and manipulate me like a doll in his arms, while I’m carried away on waves of pleasure that are steep and endless . . .

I had never been happy before, not really. I never knew what it felt like.

Happiness is exhilarating, intoxicating. I’m drunk on it. It makes me believe I can do anything. It makes me believe that everything will be okay.

It’s changing me. And it’s changing Miles, too.

“I’ve never seen him like this,” Anna tells me. “I’m not saying he was a dick before—I mean, he was always nice to me. When he felt like it. But he was obsessed with doing everything his own way, without help. Everybody’s his friend and everybody owes him favors, but ultimately it was about Miles and what he wanted. You’re bringing out the best in him, Zoe. Giving him something to care about outside of himself. ”

“I don’t know about that,” I say, blushing. “I’m not trying to change him. I like him exactly as he is.”

Anna laughs. “Oh you do, do you? Have you forgotten the Miles of last year? You really must be falling hard.”

I stare at her open-mouthed. I had actually forgotten that I disliked Miles in my Freshman year. It seems impossible now, like I was a completely different person. Somebody uptight and miserable, which of course is true.

“I hope you keep liking him.” Anna smiles at me. “We could be family.”

The idea hits me like a bolt of pure joy. Anna and Leo as actual family, not just friends . . . Miles as my family . . .

I want it. I want it so badly that it feels like it will tear me apart.

“Are you coming out with us tonight?” I ask Anna.

“I wish I could,” she sighs. “I have three different papers due. Leo’s gonna keep me company in the library, though I shouldn’t let him. He’s more distracting than helpful.”

“Come join us later if you can?—”

Chay interrupts us, barging into the room with arms laden with books. She dumps them down on her bed, crying, “Fuck class! Fuck homework! When’s our picnic? ”

“In an hour,” I laugh. “Lend me something cute to wear.”

Chay, Ozzy, Miles, and I planned to have a picnic down outside the school grounds. I was hoping Anna and Leo could join us too, but it sounds like they’ll be occupied in the same manner as Cat, drowning in midterm papers.

Anna helps us get ready anyway, picking out a pair of jeans and boots for me to wear. Chay lends me an oversized Queen shirt. I can’t borrow pants from Chay because she’s so much shorter that they’d fit more like capris.

“Let me do your makeup,” Chay demands.

“Not too much…”

“I never do too much! On you . . .” Chay amends, laughing.

Chay gives me a nice subtle smoky eye and a little lip gloss. I pull my hair up in a messy ponytail. With the band shirt and Anna’s boots, I feel a tiny bit rockstar. I like it. I never felt “cool” in my life before I met these girls.

Chay spends forty minutes more redoing her own elaborate makeup, until I’m fidgeting with impatience and almost pulling her out the door.

“Alright, alright!” she says, “I’m coming!”

Chay looks surprisingly sweet and feminine in a white summer dress, cardigan, and espadrilles. The pink streaks have faded from her hair, so now it’s just a soft fluffy mane of her us ual strawberry blonde, which contrasts nicely against her golden tan.

When we meet up with Ozzy and Miles outside the stone walls of Kingmakers, Ozzy stares at Chay with a stunned expression.

“You’re just . . . perfection,” he says.

Instead of laughing and agreeing like she usually would, Chay says, “That’s really sweet of you, Ozzy.”

“He stole the words right out of my mouth,” Miles growls, slipping his arm around my waist. “What can I tell you now—what’s better than perfection?”

“This,” I say. “This moment right now.”

The evening is warm and still, the fresh scent of new grass sweet in the air. Tiny paper-white butterflies flit over the wildflowers in the field. The light is golden and soft.

I shouldn’t let Miles touch me while we’re still within sight of the school. But there’s no one around. I feel safe and flushed with happiness.

“Where should we go?” Chay asks.

Ozzy hoists his backpack on his shoulder. “I was thinking we could go to the cliffs above the Moon Beach,” he says. “Watch the sun go down. ”

We tramp across the field, through a strip of woods, and then westward through the vineyards. The vines are just beginning to flower, the leaves green and lush but the grapes still tiny and hard.

“The deck behind my parents’ house is covered in fox grapes,” Miles tells me.

“Oh really?”

“They’re old vines, brought all the way from Italy two hundred years ago.”

“Your family brought them over?”

Miles nods. “We had this old Georgian house in Chicago. It was in the family for generations. My grandfather Enzo lived there, my mom was born there, lived there all her life. The fox grapes grew up the side of the house and over the pergola on the roof. But the house burned down.”

I groan with sympathy.

“Actually,” Miles gives a short, mirthless laugh. “Dean’s grandpa set it on fire. Alexei Yenin—just picture Dean, with KGB training and an even worse attitude. Leo’s father married Alexei’s daughter, you know that?”

I nod. Anna told me when she explained the tortured history between the cousins .

“Anyway, Leo’s dad Sebastian, he was in the house at the time, with Dean’s father Adrian Yenin. Alexei didn’t care. He firebombed the house with his own son inside. Sebastian left Adrian to die, and he almost did. He was burned over half his body.”

Ozzy and Chay are listening as intently as I am, though I’m sure Ozzy at least has heard this story before.

“Uncle Seb fought Alexei Yenin. He killed him. It was revenge, because Alexei had already killed Grandpa Enzo. Tried to kill the rest of my uncles, too. Seb and Uncle Miko—Anna’s dad, you know him.”

Chay nods.

“They beat the Bratva. Took back their half of Chicago. But the house was totally destroyed—the books, the photographs, my grandmother’s piano, even Uncle Nero’s cars in the underground garage. My family was devastated. They didn’t try to rebuild.

“The next spring, my mother came back to the lot before it was going to be cleaned up and sold. She found one sprig of the fox grapes still growing. Green where the rest of the vines were nothing but ash. She dug it up and replanted it out at the lake where she and my dad were just starting to build their own house. It grew perfectly. The grapes are thicker than ever. The bees and the wasps get drunk every fall. ”

I’ve never heard Miles talk like this before. He loves to discuss his plans for the future. I’ve never heard him sentimental.

“The lake house is gorgeous,” Ozzy tells me. “I visited—you can see trees and water from every room.”

Miles told me about the house, about his little brother and sister, and about his parents—the stern Irish mafia prince and the wild Italian princess who were married against their will to avoid all out war between their families.

Obviously, I hate the idea of any kind of forced marriage, but Miles assured me they didn’t stay enemies for long.

“Once they were done trying to kill each other, they got along great,” he laughed.

That’s an outcome that could never occur for Rocco and me.

One I wouldn’t even want, now that I’ve fallen head over heels for Miles. There’s no other happy ending for me. I want Miles, and no one else.

“I want you to see it,” Miles tells me now, “I want you to see the grapes and the lake house. I want you to meet my family.”

“I’d love that,” I say, swallowing hard. In truth, I’m intimidated by the description of Miles’ parents. They’re brilliant and ruthless—they run half of Chicago. Having never known affectionate parents myself, I have a hard time picturing powerf ul people who might also be loving and supportive to their children.

“I told my mother about you,” Miles says.

“You did?”

I’m stunned. For all the promises Miles made to me, this is something different, something concrete and real. He wouldn’t have done that if he wasn’t serious about moving forward with our relationship.

“Have you told your mother about me?” Chay says to Ozzy, in her teasing way. She’s only joking—she wouldn’t expect Ozzy to tell his parents about their hook-ups.

But Ozzy looks her in the eye, his face serious.

“Yes,” he says. “I did.”

Chay is taken aback. She’s quiet for a moment, then she says, “What did you tell her?”

“I told her I met a girl who’s bold and funny and creative, and absolutely fucking gorgeous, and that I’m crazy about her.”

Chay’s blue eyes are wide and startled. For once, she’s not laughing.

She opens her mouth to reply but doesn’t seem to know what to say .

It doesn’t matter—we’ve arrived at the cliffs, so she’s saved from responding.

Ozzy unzips his backpack, taking out a blanket, a bottle of wine, several packs of sandwiches, and a half-dozen apples.

“No glasses,” Ozzy says. “Seemed like they’d only end up smashed.”

“You remembered the bottle opener.” Miles pops the cork. “That’s all that matters.”

The wine is from the very vineyards we just traversed. The bottle is stamped with the plain, dark label showing an outline of the island, no text. It’s a rich, dark pinot noir that you have to drink carefully, because the effects creep up on you quickly.

Chay is uncharacteristically quiet as we eat and drink, looking out over the sparkling water at the setting sun.

We’ve come just in time to watch the heavy orange sphere sinking down into the waves. Enough clouds blanket the sky that we can look directly west, watching the colors change from pink to orange to a deep, bloody red.

“Tell me about your family,” Chay asks Ozzy, once we’ve drunk more than half the wine.

“I’m an only child,” Ozzy says, taking an aggressive bite out of an apple. “I’ve got a million cousins, though. We grew up wild and fe ral in Tasmania. We’d go surfing in the Bay of Fires—there’s orange lichen all over the rocks, so it really does look fiery, especially when you’ve got a sunset like this one going. We’d run through the lavender fields in February when they bloom. There’s tulip fields too, and raspberry farms—it’s fucking gorgeous, really. Nobody knows how pretty ‘cause nobody comes to see it.”

Ozzy’s face is half-lit by the setting sun. The shadows bring out the rugged lines of his broad nose and jaw and the deep dimples as he smiles. Ozzy may not be conventionally handsome, but his warmth and charm are undeniable, especially when he’s speaking in his bright, lilting accent.

“I’d like to see it,” Chay says softly. She’s looking at her hands when she says it, and then she chances one quick glance up at Ozzy.

“Don’t tease me, girl,” he growls. “I’ll buy you a ticket right now.”

I’m leaning back against Miles’ chest, feeling warm as toast with his arms around me. As the sky darkens, the rhythm of his breath rocks me, and I become sleepy and peaceful.

“What are you thinking?” Miles murmurs in my ear.

“I’m thinking this is the best day of my life. All the best days have been with you—they just keep getting better .”

“My mother told me that once,” Miles says quietly. “When you find your soulmate . . . every day is the best day.”

He tilts my head back so he can kiss me.

“I didn’t understand it then,” he says. “I’m starting to now.”

I reach my hand up to tangle my fingers in his thick, dark curls. The kiss deepens, and Chay says, “Ozzy, take me for a walk so I can sober up a bit before we head back.”

“Sure,” Ozzy replies affably.

I know they’re leaving to give Miles and me a little privacy, and I appreciate it.

As soon as they’re out of sight, walking south along the cliffs, Miles starts to undress me. Now that the sun is almost down, a breeze blows in off the water. It feels cool and delicious, liquid against my bare skin. Miles strips me completely naked, then trails his fingers lightly over my flesh, tracing the profile of my nose, lips, and chin, then drawing the curves of my breasts, slowly circling inward until his fingertips stroke my nipples into hard, aching points.

He runs his hand lightly down my navel. His fingers caress me like the breeze, like I’m a maiden that fell asleep in a field and he’s the god of wind, come to ravage me.

“You’re the most beautiful sight I’ve ever seen, Zoe,” he growls, his voice low and thick. “No sunset, no painting, no creation of god or man is more stunning than you.” He laughs. “Not even in Tasmania.”

I should be afraid—I’m naked as a jaybird, out in the open on the cliff-top, where anyone could see me. Students roam all over the island.

But I feel nothing but pure bliss. Miles is a drug—its effects are reckless abandon.

“Take me,” I beg him. “Right here, right now.”

I don’t have to ask twice. Miles puts his face between my thighs, pushing my knees apart with his hands to spread my pussy open the way he likes. He licks me everywhere, making sure I’m wet and throbbing and ready for him. He never tires of eating my pussy. He enjoys it even more than I do, if that’s possible—he wants it every single time.

I’ve never thought of this as a dominating act, but Miles never has more control over me than when he’s between my legs, orchestrating a symphony of sensation that blasts through every cell of my body, taking me over from head to toe. He owns me like this. I’ll give him anything in the world, as long as he doesn’t stop.

He makes me beg and cry. He makes me feel like I’m dying. And when I’m limp and shaking with pleasure, that’s when he mounts me and thrusts his cock inside of me. All I can do is cling to him with my arms around his neck as the sensation begins to build all over again.

I never knew sex could have so many personalities. Sometimes Miles orders me around, and the power play of his dominance and my submission is achingly erotic. Sometimes we fuck like animals, driven to claw and bite as we mate. And sometimes sex is like this: slow and sensual, sweeter than honey and warmer than a bath.

Our bodies melt together, our mouths locked, our tongues entwined. I can hardly tell where Miles ends and I begin. The waves washing against Moon Beach below are distant and soothing. The sky is fully dark now. The cocoon of that darkness makes me feel that Miles and I are alone in the world, two people that are really one person, one being.

“I love you,” I whisper. I don’t know if I said it out loud or only in my head.

“I love you,” Miles says, at the same time.

I’ve never felt connection like this, or pleasure like this.

I can’t give it up. Not for anything.

Miles fucks me deep and slow and hard. The head of his cock hits the furthest point inside of me, which should be uncomfortable, painful even. I’m so aroused that it isn’t painful, it’s deeply satisfying instead. In fact, I’m beginning to feel an intense pleasure at that hidden spot, nerves that have never been t ouched before stroked into firing. They blaze into life, a totally new sensation, and I start to orgasm in a way I haven’t before, in a spot I didn’t even know I could feel.

The orgasm pulses out in waves, clenching and squeezing around Miles’ cock. He starts to cum too. He can never hold back if I cum while he’s inside me.

Miles crushes me in his arms, he drives deep inside of me and holds his cock there while it twitches and pulses in response to my climax. I’m still cumming, one long, continuous orgasm that perpetuates just as long as his, maybe even longer.

We’re both panting and sweating in the cool breeze. I hate that I have to pull my clothes back on, because I’d much rather lay in his arms all night long.

I barely dress myself in time, before I hear Ozzy calling out, “Break it up, lovebirds, we gotta head back.”

I can hear Ozzy and Chay tramping through the high grass before I see them. Ozzy’s bright grin gleams on his face, and Chay’s hair looks tousled enough that I’m guessing their walk turned into something similar to what Miles and I were doing.

Ozzy starts packing up the picnic supplies while Miles shakes off the blanket.

“We should have brought a flashlight,” Chay says .

“The moon will be up in a minute,” Miles says. “We’ll make it back alright.”

Sure enough, the moon rises bright and full, a flat silver disk that drowns out the stars.

It’s bright enough that we don’t stumble as we head back through the vineyards.

I don’t think I’d stumble anyway—I feel like I’m floating, with my hand wrapped up in Miles’ and my feet barely touching the ground.

Nothing could ruin this moment.

Until we come out of the trees that border the vineyard and a horribly familiar voice says, “There you are. We thought we missed you.”

Four figures stand in the field south of Kingmakers: Wade Dyer, Dax Volker, Jasper Webb, and Rocco Prince. They form a barrier between us and the castle.

Miles’ fingers lock tight around mine as his body goes tense as stone. He casts a quick glance behind us. I know he’s contemplating telling me to run. But the only thing behind us is the cliffs, and the path down to Moon Beach, which is another dead end.

We got sloppy. Rocco hasn’t spoken to me in weeks. He lulled us into a false sense of security, which I’m sure was exactly his intent ion. He let Miles and I get wrapped up in each other, forgetting that Rocco even existed. While he never forgot about us at all.

“What do you want?” Miles says.

I know he’s afraid, because he can see the ugliness of our situation just as well as I can. But there’s no hint of fear in his voice. He sounds as strong and clear as ever.

“I want what I always wanted,” Rocco says softly. His pale face looks flat and waxy in the moonlight. “I want Zoe.”

Before I can open my mouth to reply, Miles steps in front of me.

“No,” he says.

Rocco laughs. His laugh is more breath than sound, eerily repetitive.

“We’re going to beat you until you barely blink, Miles. Then I’m going to take what was promised me. I’m going to fuck Zoe right in front of you. Maybe I’ll let Wade and Dax and Jasper take a turn. You’ll lay there watching, choking on your own blood. When I’m finished, you’ll both finally understand the truth. She belongs to me. She always has, and she always will.”

He jerks his head toward Chay and Ozzy. “You two can go. ”

Chay scoffs right in his face. “Who the fuck do you think you’re talking to? You’re not touching our friends.”

I’ve never loved Chay more than in this moment. But unlike Miles, her voice isn’t calm and confident. It’s tight with fear, coming out an octave higher than normal.

Ozzy backs her up, addressing Wade, Dax, and Jasper, because he knows there’s no point reasoning with Rocco. “Don’t be stupid,” he says. “This won’t end well for any of you.”

Wade smirks, his handsome face not looking handsome at all when it’s twisted up in disdain.

“Please tell me this wasn’t a double-date, Chay,” he scoffs. “Fucking this grubby little degenerate is one thing, but actually going out with him . . . say it isn’t so.”

Chay meets Wade’s scorn with a cold stare.

“He’s ten times the man you’ll ever be,” she says.

Wade stops smiling. “He’ll be ten times the man when I rip him into pieces,” he seethes. He strides forward.

I scream, “No!” trying to step out from behind Miles, but he won’t let me, he blocks me with his arm.

“Leave them alone!” I shout over Miles’ shoulder.

“Come with me now and I will,” Rocco hisses, his eyes dark and gleaming in his white face .

“No fucking way,” Miles barks, before I can answer.

“So be it,” Rocco says, flicking out the blade of his knife.

Wade, Dax, Jasper, and Rocco all charge us at once.

Wade and Dax run at Ozzy, Jasper at me, and Rocco at Miles.

It’s a blur of motion and confusion in the weak light.

Half of what I perceive is through grunts and yells, rather than what I can actually see.

Rocco slashes his knife wildly at Miles, the blade winking in and out of sight as it reflects the moonlight. Miles twists and dodges, the tip catching him at least twice, slicing through his shirt and slashing his arm.

Jasper comes at me just like he attacked Dean in the ring—with breathless speed and absolute silence. I try to slip his grasp, but he’s much faster than me. His arms lock around me, harder than iron.

Trying to remember everything I ever learned in Combat Class, I stomp down hard on his right foot, and whip my head backward, hitting him in the mouth with the back of my skull. I hear Jasper’s grunt of pain. Warm blood spatters my arm.

Jasper’s python arms barely relax for a moment. When I try to twist away from him, he locks his forearm around my throat instead, pinning me against his chest .

Head swimming, I see Wade and Dax pummeling Ozzy, a maelstrom of punching fists where Ozzy gives as good as he gets because he’s stocky and powerful. His tight punches rocket out from his body, slamming into the other two boys with echoing thuds. Still, Wade and Dax are bigger and just as used to fighting. They’d overwhelm Ozzy in minutes, if they hadn’t forgotten Chay.

She jumps on Dax’s back, locking both arms around his throat and choking him hard. Dax stumbles backward, trying to shake her off. Meanwhile, Ozzy tackles Wade. They roll around in the trampled grass, hitting and throttling each other.

I’m still squirming and flailing my elbows, trying to hit Jasper in the body. The more I struggle, the more he tightens his arm on my throat. I’m so dizzy I can barely stand.

Rocco takes another slash at Miles’ face. This time, Miles manages to catch Rocco’s wrist and hold it. Rocco punches Miles with his free hand, three times over in the side of the face, but Miles maintains his death grip on Rocco’s knife with both hands, twisting Rocco’s wrist until the knife flies through the air and lands in the grass next to Ozzy’s boot.

Now Rocco and Miles are brawling in earnest, and I realize that I’ve underestimated Miles yet again. I’ve never seen him fight before. In this moment, Miles is no dancer or deal-maker. He’s a fucking killer. He looks crazed as he hits Rocco over a nd over, savage blows with no caution behind them, no hint of restraint.

Rocco is a snake, but Miles is a lion. No matter how Rocco gouges and bites and claws at him, Miles responds with twice the fury.

I take heart from Miles, redoubling my efforts to get free of Jasper. I twist and flail until I manage to reach back and smash him in the balls with the side of my fist. That’s what finally forces him to let go. I break free right as Wade Dyer hits Ozzy with a punishing blow that knocks him back to the ground.

Dax is staggering as Chay cuts off his air. Wade charges at Chay and punches her in the side of the face, hard enough that she loses her grip and tumbles to the ground.

Both Miles and Ozzy roar with outrage. Miles flings Rocco off while Ozzy stumbles up and charges at Wade. Miles hits Dax twice in the face, which is enough to finish him, still dizzy and gasping from Chay’s headlock. Meanwhile, Ozzy pummels Wade with hitherto unseen fury. Wade elbows Ozzy in the face, with a crack of bone-on-bone that breaks his nose.

Miles is so enraged that he leaps on Wade, hitting him again and again.

Wade’s face is a mask of blood, and still Miles hits him.

Miles looks insane, completely out of his mind .

“STOP!” I scream, grabbing him by the shoulder and dragging him back.

Miles tries to break free, his bloody fists still raised, but I seize his shirt and pull so hard that he falls over backward on top of me.

Wade looks demonic, his eyes bright chips in his blood-soaked face.

Howling like an animal, he charges at Ozzy, who gropes in the grass beside him and snatches up Rocco’s knife.

Wade jumps on Ozzy and Ozzy swings the knife.

“NO!” I scream.

The knife disappears into the side of Wade’s neck.

My shout still echoes while absolute silence falls over the group.

Rocco stands up, his eyes fixed on Wade and his face utterly expressionless.

Jasper has taken several steps back. He stands alone, one skeletal hand pressed to his bleeding lip.

Dax is half-conscious, unaware of what’s going on.

Chay is wide-eyed, both hands clapped over her mouth.

Ozzy freezes in place, horror-stricken at what he’s done .

And Miles looks like he’s about to throw up.

“Don’t move,” Miles says to Wade. “Don’t touch it . . .”

Wade frowns, confused, as his hand fumbles against the side of his neck, his fingers brushing the handle of the knife.

He takes one staggering step forward. He opens his mouth to say something. All that comes out is a strangled, gurgling sound, and a large quantity of blood.

Then he sinks to his knees and topples forward, face-down in the grass.

“We have to get help,” Ozzy cries.

We all know it’s too late.