Page 12 of Dirty Heirs

I rolled my shoulders against the chair. “No idea. I told my grandfather I wanted to paint with Alex, and he worked his magic. But the Salvatores must have intervened because I don’t have any classes with my sister.”

“They’re notorious for doing that.” She sighed. “Those boys control everyone and everything at this school. Especially Luca. He’s the mastermind of the group.”

“I plan to knock his ass down a peg. He’s not getting what he wants from my sister.”

“If I had to choose between the four Salvatore brothers, I would pick Marcello.” Her eyes darted across the room to the football team’s table. “He’s nice. Everyone likes him. And he’s really cute.”

“Yeah,” I agreed. “I told my sister the same thing. Marcello is her best chance at having a normal life.”

I followed her line of sight, but my eyes landed on Sonny instead of Marcello. That arrogant dick pissed me off. He seemed friendly enough, but I hated being told what to do. Jocks were not my thing. I was too punk rock for him. Although, I wouldn’t have minded seeing how nice his ass looked in a pair of football pants.

“Have you been accepted to art school yet?” Ella said, drawing my attention from the hot jock and back to her.

“Yeah. I’m going to RISD with Alex in the fall.”

Her mouth widened in shock. “I applied for an early decision. How did you hear back already?”

I shrugged. “Family connections.”

“Yeah, that’s one nice perk of being a Wellington, huh?”

I wanted to say being a Wellington kind of sucked, but I kept that to myself and said, “At least you’ll have two friends at your next school if you get accepted. And none of these assholes there to hold you down.”

I liked the idea of introducing Alex to Ella. They would hit it off. And like Ella, Alex never had a girl friend. She was treated similarly to Ella at our last school by the girls she tried to befriend. They all thought she would steal their boyfriends or some shit. So we stuck together and did our own thing.

I nodded at her plate. “Finish eating. I have a surprise for you.”

She didn’t ask questions and scarfed down the last bite of garlic bread and rigatoni. After she wiped her mouth clean, I shot up from the table and offered my hand.

When she hesitated, I pulled Ella toward me. “Let’s go. We’re not sitting over here anymore. This is your last year at Astor Prep. No one is putting Cinders in the corner anymore.”

She giggled but didn’t say anything. Not until I led her to Sonny’s table, holding her hand.

“Aiden, no.” Ella tried to yank her hand out of my grasp. “We can’t.”

Everyone stared at us.

I didn’t give a shit.

“Yes, we can.”

I tapped Sonny on the back.

He angled his body to look at me.

“Move over, Pretty Boy.”

His blue eyes flicked from me to Ella and then back to me. “Aiden, we talked about this. She’s bad news.”

“You talked. I didn’t listen.”

Ella clutched my arm. “Aiden, it’s okay. We can go sit somewhere else.”

“Yeah, good idea,” a meathead-looking guy with dark brown hair said with an attitude.

“Got something to say?” I snapped, ready for a fight, my free hand balled into a fist at my side.

I didn’t know this girl, but I wouldn’t have thought twice about swinging at anyone who talked shit about her. She reminded me so much of my sister.

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