Page 107 of Filthy Elite

It’s just for me.

For once, it’s all mine. My body is all mine.

Iam all mine.

I’ve reclaimed myself, and I’m never giving her back.

And maybe, if I learn to love her—love me—it won’t matter that no one else does. It won’t matter that no one ever has. Maybe that’s healing. Being strong enough to keep dancing, head held high, while the world scorns at you. Searching through the ruins to find something of value in the rubble that everyone else has already discarded. Knowing you’ve been broken you too completely for anyone to love, but doing it anyway.

Or maybe it’s just another version of what I’ve always done—taking what I can get, and telling myself it’s enough even though it’s not.

twenty-seven

Rumor Has It… a newly crowned member of the elite was overheard pining for the love he lost. Will this lonely soul find his true love before school ends, and if so, which lucky girl will snag him?

Colt Darling

“I can’t believe she said no to me,” Rylan fumes at lunch, staring across the room like he’s considering shooting up the school if he can’t get laid by the girl he wants. “Again. This is the third time I’ve asked her. It’s like she thinks she’s too good for me.”

I follow his gaze and see Gloria and Harper standing in the food line, laughing like they don’t know—or care—what everyone has been saying about them. I remember faking it like that, wanting so badly to be back in my rightful place that it hurt but acting like I was too cool to care.

“Maybe you should stop asking,” I say. “Sounds like she’s made her answer pretty clear.”

“Dude, why are you still crying about her?” Duke asks, throwing his arm around the smaller guy. It’s been two weeks since the night under the treehouse, and from what I can tell, Duke was either blacked out and has no memory of it, or he’s pretending as much. That works for me. It wasn’t my best decision either, and I didn’t do it to lord it over him the way he does the day in the basement. I did it to stop being beholden to a Dolce.

“You’ve already fucked her,” Duke points out to Rylan. “You only have a few months of senior year left, and so many pussies left to pound.”

“Yeah,” Rylan mutters. “I guess. But she’s different.”

Duke laughs. “Trust me, little bro, her pussy’s not that special. I’ve wrecked hundreds, and I barely remember hers.”

I think about her on the console of my truck, her knees open, the soft, shell-pink center of her flushed red and glistening for me, and my cock stirs in my jeans. Duke has to be lying. For worse or for better, everything about Gloria Walton is memorable.

“Maybe the problem is you,” I say before I can stop myself. “Not her.”

Duke gives me a sloppy, crooked grin and palms his crotch under the table. “Then how come I remember everything about your sister’s snatch?”

“Say another word about that, and see what happens,” I say, staring him down. Maybe I should thank him for killing my spontaneous erection by mentioning my sister, but that’s not a subject I want discussed over lunch.

“What are we talking about?” Dixie asks, dropping into her seat, her cheeks flushed from scurrying over so she wouldn’t miss anything.

“How delusional your boyfriend is,” Duke says. “Apparently your twat’s addictive or some shit.”

“Guess you’ll never know,” I say coolly, since I know it kills Duke that there’s a girl he can’t get, even if he’d only do it once, to piss me off as much as to say he’d fucked every girl in our class—his current claim to fame.

He’s probably lying, but it’s not like anyone’s going to contradict him.

“Did you say that?” Dixie asks, giggling and burying her face in my shoulder.

“Something like that,” I mutter as I watch Harper and Lo head outside with their plates. Suddenly, the whole room is claustrophobic, the glances in our direction, the longing stares, the bullshit. Everyone wants to be me again, and no one else seems to stop and think how utterly fucking ridiculous that is. I wanted this, when I didn’t have it, but it’s hollow now because I know it’s meaningless.

All I really want to do is shrug off Dixie, punch Duke’s teeth out, and go sit on the bleachers with my friends, watch the way Gloria’s hair glows gold against the dreary, late February grey, listen to Harper tell me I’m not crazy, that it’s all fake. She’s the only one who still tells me straight now that I’m an elite. The rest of the school fawns over me like the last three years never happened.

“Where are they going?” Rylan grumbles, glaring after them. “Why do they leave every day?”

“They’re probably going to hook up,” Dixie says. “They’re both total nymphos. I bet they’re so desperate they’d do each other. It’s not like anyone else will fuck them.”

“And that’s why they leave every day,” I say, shrugging her off my shoulder. “Because of bullshit like that.”

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