Damaged Elite (The Darlington Elite Book 2) Read online

  “Can I stay with you tonight?” he asks, but only after he pulls me in closer and his hands find the bare skin of my back beneath my t-shirt.

  I nod because even though things will never be the same between us, I need this tonight. I need a good night's rest, and I always sleep soundly next to my best friend.

  6

  Zach

  She’s a virgin. How the fuck did I not know that? I know everything about her. I’m not sure if I’m more pissed at myself for not realizing it before I had my hand shoved down her pants like a fucking animal, or with her for not telling me. I don’t take the best friend title she gave me lightly, and I thought I knew every detail about her. But finding out something this huge feels like a sledgehammer to the chest.

  This changes the game, though. I always assumed that she’d slept that asshole Mark she was seeing for a while, and she mentioned other guys she went out with in high school. Her body has always been so receptive to mine, and my dick hardens at the realization that she’s only that way with me. I mean, there’s no way in hell they didn’t try, and she must have turned them down. She’d give herself to me though, I know she would by the way she looks at me, the way she pulled me into her, she wanted me as much as I wanted her last night.

  But I have to be the noble fucking asshole.

  I’m sitting on the couches in the basement with Patrick and Miles, we’re waiting for Henry to bring Tommy down. None of us want to have this conversation, but it’s only right if we do this together. He’s not going to take the news well, but at least he’ll know that we all have his back no matter what. If it were me, I’d want the guys to tell me together.

  I glance over my shoulder when the exterior basement door opens, and Kennedy comes in, brushing snow off her jacket. We haven’t talked since last night, and I’m dreading the conversation I need to have with her even more than telling Tommy some witch he hooked up with had his secret baby.

  I open my mouth to say something to her, but she’s not even looking at me. Instead, she addresses Patrick, who is already scowling in her direction.

  “Before you start, Everly is upstairs, and Henry is outside. I wasn’t unsupervised, and yes, the fox ate all the food I left for him, thanks for asking.”

  Patrick lets out a grunt instead of acknowledging her.

  “I’m sorry I thought you were being reckless, Kennedy,” she says in a singsong voice, and I can’t help but laugh at the way she tries to get under his skin.

  “Run along, Kimmy.” Patrick grunts the words, and goes back to focusing on his phone.

  “Have you guys heard anything about Cassandra?” Kennedy asks Miles, ignoring Patrick and still not making eye contact with me. She takes her jacket off and lays it across the back of the couch I’m sitting on. Shamelessly my eyes rove over the way her long sleeve shirt clings to her curves. I’m itching to reach out and touch her. I know what she feels like, I know how her body responds to me, and as terrible as that is with all this other shit going on, she’s all I can think about. I feel like a fucking junkie looking for my next fix, and she’s so innocent, standing there asking about our injured friend while I’m over here thinking about fisting my hand in her hair and devouring her plump lips.

  “I’ve been texting one of the nurses, she said her vitals look good, but still no major changes.” Miles glances up from his phone, and it’s only then that I realize how bad he looks. Giant black bags have formed under his eyes, and his normally pale skin seems more hollow.

  “If you need someone to go with you to see her or anything…” Kennedy trails off when Henry and Tommy come in from outside, stomping the fresh snow off their shoes. She knows what we’re about to do, so she only nods in departure and heads up the stairs.

  Once Tommy is seated, we all just sit there looking at Henry like fucking idiots.

  “What the fuck is up with you guys, you’ve been weird for the last week.” Tommy rubs a hand over his tanned cheeks that are flushed from the cold.

  “We need to tell you something,” I say, eager to get everything out in the open because I can’t handle the awkwardness that’s swirling around the room.

  “Okay….” Tommy’s eyes dart from me to Henry to Patrick, and then back to Henry before he nervously says, “You’re freaking me the fuck out, what’s going on?”

  “You got the Leary’s bitch pregnant, and you have a son,” Patrick blurts out, and Henry hurls a couch cushion at him. “None of you assholes were stepping up, and he needs to know.” Holy fucking shit, we all want to get this over as quickly as possible—but Patrick definitely isn’t known for his sensitivity.

  “What? Who? That’s impossible. There was only one time I didn’t use a condom, and that was freshman fucking year.” I can see the color draining from Tommy’s face.

  “Jackie Bower.” Henry’s voice is calm, and I see the realization on Tommy’s face. I’m willing to bet that she was the only time he didn’t use protection. She’s not a bad looking girl, but the fact that she runs with the Learys is enough to make me wonder why he’d be so careless with her.

  “That’s insane.” I expected Tommy to be loud or angry, but he’s sitting stock still with his elbows resting on his thighs. “He’d be two years old.”

  “Everly found this when she was trying to find out what the Learys were up to,” Patrick says, handing Tommy his phone and presumably showing him the photos of his son.

  “Holy shit,” Tommy whispers when he sees the resemblance, dropping the phone to the floor and standing up.

  “Where are you going?” Henry questions, when Tommy nearly trips over the coffee table and heads for the stairs leading up to the kitchen.

  He doesn’t answer; instead, he stomps up the stairs and slams the door behind him.

  Well, that went well.

  The silence is broken by the loud ringing of Miles’s phone and his anxious voice as he answers. “Is she awake? Oh. Okay.” He pauses before asking, “Can I come by for a bit tonight?” Another pause before he ends the call with, “Thanks, see you soon.”

  He’s already up, shoving his phone in his pocket when Patrick reaches his arm out to swat him in the stomach, trying to get his attention. “What the fuck was that about?”

  “Was that the nurse you’ve been flirting with?” I ask him because I’ve seen some of the texts she’s been sending him.

  “Just doing what I have to.” He shrugs, slipping on his coat. “They released Beth, and she’s letting me come by to see Cass.” I see the way he falters when he uses her nickname that none of us knew he had for her until now.

  “You should let one of us…” Henry starts to suggest, but Miles shakes his head, putting his baseball cap on backward and heading for the back door.

  “I just want to be alone with her.”

  I’ve tried to talk to Kennedy about last night four separate times today, and she’s brushed me off or avoided me every time I’ve approached her. I’ve been pacing around my room for the last half hour, trying to talk myself out of breaking down her bedroom door to prove to her that she can’t ignore me or the way I make her feel. The thought scares the shit out of me because it’s reminiscent of the time my father kicked in the bathroom door to get to my mother. He’d hurt her that night, dragging her out into the yard by her hair. She’d been wearing nothing but her nightgown. I shake away the memory because I’d never do that to Kennedy. I don’t want to hurt her, I just need to talk to her, try to explain the mess of emotions I can’t seem to sort out.

  I try to push away the thoughts, but when I glance over at my empty bed, the decision is made for me. I’m halfway down the hallway before I even realize it, and I’m about to bang on her door until she answers, but the door is slightly ajar. Inside, I hear her humming, and I know she must be getting ready for bed. I push the door open.

  She looks at me through the mirror of her vanity as she applies lotion to her beautiful face. I see the hurt swirling in her brown eyes before she looks away. She’s standing on her tiptoes, leani
ng across the counter and examining her face.

  “Windburn sucks,” she says of her rosy cheeks, but my eyes are sliding down her neck over her exposed shoulder, where my hoodie that she’s chopped up hangs off. She’s wearing light grey leggings that hug her ass and thighs, and I’d sell my soul for my hands to be in their place.

  “You’ve been avoiding me,” I say, and this time when her eyes meet mine in the mirror, there’s no hurt there.

  She actually smirks when she says, “I’m not playing your little game, Zach.” She turns to face me before she hops up on the top of her vanity. Crossing her petite, shapely legs, she reaches up to adjust her messy bun, her sweatshirt riding up with the movement, exposing the creamy skin of her stomach.

  “You think last night was a game?” I move closer, anger coursing through me that she’d think that any of this is a game to me. My agitation spikes when I think about how she’s denied me the affection I’ve been craving all day.

  She looks away for a second, and I reach out, tugging her chin to face me. She doesn’t pull out of my hold, which surprises me. I let my hand slide down her neck, my thumb stroking over her throat, and my dick twitches when I feel her swallow hard. She can pretend she’s unaffected, but I felt how wet she got from my touch last night.

  “I think you were right, and our friendship isn’t worth throwing away. You don’t want to be my first, and I’ve reconciled with that fact,” Kennedy says, but her body’s reaction contradicts her words when she leans back against the mirror, tilting her head up and exposing her neck for my fingers to explore her soft skin.

  I reach down with my free hand and tug her legs apart so I can move forward and stand between her thighs where I belong. I lean in, pressing my mouth against her ear and whisper hotly, “What I want and what is good for you are two different things.”

  “Zach…” The way her voice falters around my name tells me how much she wants me, and confirms that I’m only torturing us both by the way I’m behaving. But I’m not good enough to pull away from her when her small arms wrap around me, and her nails dig into my back through my t-shirt. My mouth finds the flesh of her neck as my hand slides down her body and latches onto her hip, pulling her to me. Even in my frenzied state, I’m careful not to move so that our lips might touch. It’d be all over for me then, any sense of control I’m harnessing would be fucking destroyed along with the last shred of sanity that I own.

  “We need to stop,” she says, but her fingers flex against the muscles of my back, pulling me closer, and her legs wrap around my hips, encouraging me to buck my hardness against her.

  She kissed me once, a few months into our friendship, and at that moment, I knew I’d never get over the feelings this pixie of a girl evokes in me. She moans softly when my hand slips under her top, and I growl when I feel her firm, bare breast, and squeeze, rolling her nipple between my fingers. Sex was always a means to an end for me, and I never thought about trying to make sure any of my previous partners were fully satisfied, but with Kennedy…I want to spend hours pleasuring her body until she can’t think of anyone else but me.

  Kennedy squeals when the door to Tommy’s room next door is slammed so hard the walls shake.

  I pull my mouth away from her neck and quickly remove my hand from under her shirt.

  Fuck.

  If I’m not careful, I’m going to ruin everything by fucking her on a goddamn piece of furniture like she’s some random I met after a game, instead of the single most important person in my life.

  “Shit. I’m sorry,” I say, backing away, and she doesn’t look surprised or confused. My hot and cold actions are expected by this point, and I vow silently right then that this is the last time this happens between us. I’m hurting her by trying to protect her and that tears me up inside, and the only way to make this better is to put an end to it altogether. With all the stuff going on around us, there’s no way to put the physical distance between us that I need in order to keep my fucking hands to myself, so it’s time to construct some serious emotional walls. “I should go check on him, he uh…”

  “I think that’s for the best,” she says, and she doesn’t sound bitter, but she definitely sounds over my bullshit.

  When I’m out of her room, I hear the lock click into place, and it makes my stomach coil in regret. It reminds me of the time a few months into our friendship when we were lying on her bed watching some stupid movie. She’d just recently broken up with Mark because he told her he didn’t want her hanging out with me because he didn’t trust me. He wasn’t wrong. I’d wanted her from the second I’d laid eyes on her, and if I hadn’t fallen for her quirky personality even harder than I’d wanted her body, I would have taken her from him that night.

  I flop down in my bed and stare at the ceiling, remembering the way she grabbed my face that night, like she often did when she wanted my undivided attention. And I’d be lying if I said I didn’t frequently pretend to be distracted, just to feel her small hands on my face, demanding that I look her in the eyes as she excitedly explained whatever was on her mind. I was surprised that time when she didn’t start spouting off some random fact, but instead, she softly brushed her lips against mine for two heartbeats, not nearly long enough.

  I remember the electric zing that lit up my body from my lips to my fingertips. Kennedy must have felt it too because she quickly pulled away, touching her fingers to her lips as if she’d been shocked, before announcing breathlessly, “Sorry. I just wanted to know what it felt like.”

  I’d been the one who grabbed her, pulled her on my lap, and brought our mouths back together—this time for a deeper, slower kiss, my hands entwined in her hair as her ass ground against my hardness.

  It was then that I realized just how careful I needed to be. I’d ended the kiss abruptly, dumping her on the bed and making some lame excuse about needing to get to the frat house. I was running away from her just like I did every other female, but this time for entirely different reasons.

  I tried to stay away from her, but it was only two nights before I was back at her door, needing to see her. We’d agreed we couldn’t be more than friends because neither one of us wanted to lose what we’d forged. And I’d hung in there for a year and a half, trying to fuck her out of my head with random girls I couldn’t remember and alcohol. But every night, no matter who I’d been with or how drunk I got, I always ended up back at her dorm, climbing in her bed and holding her until we both fell asleep.

  I grip the sheets of my cold, empty bed, and grit my teeth. I’ll keep her safe, I’ll make her hate me before I let my baggage hurt her.

  7

  Kennedy

  “If you don’t eat, I’m just going to keep driving in circles until we run out of gas,” I tell Miles as I drive us toward the hospital. He looks ashen and weak, and I make a mental note to mention it to Henry. I’m sure he’s on top of it, that he’s already aware and probably has a plan, but I’m afraid if Miles plays in another game he’s going to get really hurt.

  After everything with Zach last night, I needed to get out of the house, so I practically kidnapped Miles as he was leaving for the hospital. I told Everly where I was going, but she was arguing with Patrick over a book, so I’m not sure she heard me. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that he didn’t really think the book she was swooning over was stupid; he just gets off on working her up.

  “I’m not hungry,” he mumbles, looking out the window, but I can tell his mind is with Cassandra.

  “You’re always hungry,” I counter, and as I pull up to the stoplight, I hand him a bottle of soda. “Miles.” I reach over and pinch his thigh through his sweatpants, causing him to glare at me with icy blue eyes.

  “You need to take care of yourself, or you’re not going to be any help to Cassandra,” I gently chide him, pressing on the gas as the light changes. “She needs you,” I add, annoyed that I have to play this game, but I don’t want to see anything bad happen to him.

  He takes a swig of the soda and open
s the bag of chips I shoved at him. We’re quiet for a few moments when he mumbles, “Thanks, Kennedy.”

  “Anytime,” I grin, turning into the hospital parking lot. As I back into a parking space, I ask him, “Why’d you let me come with you? You haven’t really been in the mood for company lately.”

  He leans his head back against the headrest, his eyes fluttering shut in exhaustion before he looks over at me. “You have a way of making everyone around you feel better, and I guess I needed that today,” he says sincerely, and I’m so shocked by his admission that for the first time in a long time, I don’t have a retort. Despite the instability of my relationship with Zach, once again, I’m so grateful for these people I now call family.

  I reach over to unbuckle his seatbelt, then nudge his arm. “Come on, let’s go see your girl.”

  Cassandra’s room is pristinely white and eerily quiet, aside from the beeping of the machines she’s hooked up to. She looks worse than I imagined, but I guess I hadn’t really tried too hard to imagine what she might look like after being shot several times.

  The nurse who barges into the room before we even have a chance to sit down gives me the stink eye. Honestly, I feel like rolling my eyes and telling her that I’m Miles’s girlfriend who he’s brought to see the love of his life while she’s in a coma. Something tells me she won’t get my sarcasm, so I settle for returning her condescending fake smile.

  “I’ve been looking after her for you,” she says, pointedly addressing Miles, and I want to stick my finger down my throat and gag at how desperate she sounds.

  Miles doesn’t look up from Cassandra as he takes her hand in his, and I quietly snicker at the look of rejection that passes over the blonde nurse’s features.