Broken Knight (All Saints High 2)

I cupped and lit my joint, sucking on it as I watched the amber flickering under my nose. I passed the joint to Vaughn, releasing a plume of smoke and sinking back into the plush couch until it swallowed most of my upper body.

“Suck a dick,” I told Hunter, my voice hoarse from the smoke.

“Any tips from a pro?” he teased, mumbling “Sláinte” and knocking back a shot of something electric blue.

“Let me call your mom and ask,” I quipped.

“Friday is a busy night for her; better call Hunter’s sister.” Vaughn, who somehow still held the title of my best friend, had a profile like an eagle and a voice so low it felt like black smoke seeping into your ears. “Side note: Knight wasn’t looking at the door.”

I had been. But I was also high and drunk, and a little off guard. Nothing a few harmless flirts couldn’t fix.

“Sure, sure,” Hunter said in his Boston accent.

I pulled him into a headlock, messing his perfectly moussed, wheat blond hair.

There was just one crack in my unshakable, good-natured, billion-dollar smile, and hot-motherfucker-jock stereotype persona. A barely noticeable chip. You could see it from one angle. Only the one. And only when Luna Rexroth entered the room and our eyes met—for exactly the first half-second, before I rearranged my features back into my usual smug grin.

Other than that—as far as anyone else knew, at least—you couldn’t rattle me if you tried. And, seeing as I was an untouchable legend among the mortals inside the walls of All Saints High, many people did. Often.

Why I thought she’d be here was beyond my basic-ass logic. The shit I was smoking was obviously more powerful than a nice tall cocktail of bleach and antiperspirants. Moonshine didn’t frequent parties. She had no friends other than Vaughn and me, and she only hung out with us when we were riding solo, sans our harem of fangirls and shit-for-brains entourage.

Maybe I thought she’d come because summer break was crawling to its inevitable end. My eighteenth birthday had come and gone, and Luna was still dragging her feet about college.

Her dad told my dad he was trying to convince her to go to Boon College in North Carolina. It was highly populated with gifted students who had mild disabilities. She fit the profile perfectly. But she’d been accepted to Columbia, Berkeley, and UCLA as well. Personally, I found it damn near offensive she’d think about moving out of Todos Santos at all. There were a few academic establishments in San Diego, a stone’s throw away from us, that should do her just fine. Luckily, I knew Moonshine, and she’d never leave home, so it didn’t really matter.

“I’m in the mood for some ass.” Hunter slapped my thigh, probably sensing I was spending too much time in my head. He leaned toward the coffee table to grab his beer, elbowing Vaughn in the process. “You in?”

Vaughn stared at him blankly, as if the answer were obvious. With his icy, pale eyes and raven black hair, he looked like a dropout from a Twilight movie—a vibe a surprising amount of girls dug. More than anything, Vaughn had perfected the art of making you feel like a dumbass for asking him a simple question, the way he’d done to Hunter right now.

Fitzpatrick swiveled to me. “Cole?” He wiggled his brows.

“Bouncing chicks is my side hustle.”

That was my official statement, anyway. Also that I wasn’t hung up on Luna Rexroth, who’d friend-zoned me so fucking hard even my nocturnal emissions were platonic at this point.

Hunter, an Irish polo prince—too posh to play football like me and too remarkably untalented at anything to be an artist like Vaughn—put two fingers in his mouth and let out a whistle that pierced through the music. The guys around us clinked their beers, trying to bite down their excited grins. When we wanted a piece of ass, that meant they were in for a treat, too.

“Ladies, line up toward the entertainment room. Make it neat. No cutting in line. Chop, chop. If you’re lovely, daring, and willing, you’re an applicant we want to see. Just be sure to remember—we won’t call you tomorrow morning, won’t follow you on social media, and won’t acknowledge your existence in the hallways. But we will carry you with us forever, like hepatitis B.”

A herd of junior and senior girls scurried up the stairs of Vaughn’s mansion in pairs, whispering and giggling in each other’s ears. Vaughn threw parties every other weekend while his parents were in their Virginia castle, probably fucking the memory of their devil spawn out of each other’s minds. The girls lined up outside the entertainment room, spines rod-straight against the textured gray walls. The line started at the base of his spiral stairway, snaking all the up way to a heavy set of black doors.