Page 84 of Something So Strong

“Hey!” Jesse says sharply—spinning around before moving past me to lean in the corner with his arms crossed

“What?” I look at him dubiously. “Though you do look cute when you’re pissed.”

“I’m not pissed. Just curious,” he responds in a brighter tone.

“About what?” I lean on the wall beside him and copy his stance.

“Earlier, when Wade offered himself as a third, you said you had someone else in mind.”

Pretending to gloat, I push off the wall and stand directly in front of him with my legs on either side of his. There was absolutely nothing behind the statement other than to make Wade feel like he was missing out on something.

“Jesse, Jesse, Jesse. Don’t you worry your sweet, pretty self about that.” I poke his cheeks, then run one finger down his tie. “I don’t want anyone like I want you.”

“That doesn’t answer my question.” He pushes me back, and I laugh.

“You never asked one.”

“Alright! Who’s first?” Esther’s voice booms through the expansive foyer, and I suck down my amusement. “Your face looks pretty good, considering,” she continues without waiting for an answer and grabs my chin, moving it back and forth as she inspects my bruise.

“I’ll go first if that’s okay with you.”

“Go for it, Jesse boy,” I tell him. And as he walks behind Esther, I wink at him suggestively. “I’ll be here waiting for you when you get back… OW!” I stare at Esther, wide eyed, as she pushes the door closed behind Jesse after flicking me in the forehead.

“You need to cut that out.” She wags her finger at me en route to the concierge computer. “He’s a good boy. Too good for your bullshit.”

“Did you ever think maybe I’m the one too good for him?”

Esther dips her head towards me with a look that says, you’re Kai Tremblay. I’ve met you before.

“Okay. Okay. But how can you know enough about him to not question that his nice guy image isn’t all fake?”

“Because I know how to use Google.” She shakes her head, then rolls her eyes when she sees my expression. “Seriously, Kai. You need to get out of your little bubble.”

“Fuck you,” I jeer. “Why would I think to Google him? If you type in my name, nothing comes up.”

“That’s because your grandfather wasn’t a Baron.”

“A what?”

“As in, welcome ‘Lord Jean-Jesse Kendrick, Baron of Dawnchester’.”

“Piss off,” I shrug dismissively and walk towards the drawer to fetch my phone.

“See for yourself. I mean, Jesse himself isn’t a Baron, his uncle is. But I’m still pretty sure he technically should be addressed as Lord Jean-Jesse, or some shit like that… Just put in his full name and ‘grandson of Baron of Dawnchester’. It’ll save you some time.”

“Fuck,” I sigh out a few beats later, because—sure enough—there he is. Wearing a fancy dress suit with tails, a waistcoat, and a fucking top hat at some place called Royal Ascot.

“Yeah, yeah, open that one up,” Esther instructs from over my shoulder. “If you flick through, there are some with his friends in it. You know? The hot ones he came here with.”

“Romeo and Saxon?” I ask.

“Yeah, maybe,” she shrugs. “I don’t know their names. But the three of them are the kind of important that makes me wonder what the hell they’re doing here.”

If someone had asked me when I was sixteen where I thought my life would take me, my answer would have probably been either in prison or deep in some kind of substance abuse. Never, not even in my wildest pipe dreams, would I have even thought to imagine I’d be straddling the hips of a mostly naked Lord. Tracing my fingers up and down his chest, outlining his muscles. And being so deeply fixated, not only on him but also on how he looks at me with infatuation and a completely unfounded equality.

He knows I come from nothing, have built nothing, and therefore have nothing to offer him. But I can’t see anywhere in any of the different kinds of ways he stares at me, that he cares even in the slightest.

I mean, why in hell is a member of the British nobility working for minimum wage when they could have absolutely anything they want without lifting a finger?

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