Page 20 of Devious Lies (Cruel Crown)
You slept with Nash Prescott.
Nash Fucking Prescott.
And it felt amazing.
Don’t freak out.
Don’t freak out.
Don’t freak out.
I was totally freaking out.
Nash raked his fingers through his hair, leaned over to snatch my robe, and tossed it to me. “Just fucking relax, would you? You’d think the goddamn orgasm would loosen you up.”
For a split second, all I could think was, you weren’t always like this.
Perhaps to other girls, but never to me.
Nash was a fierce protector, the guy who would stop by my table with his brown paper lunch bag when my mom ‘forgot’ to give me lunch money. And while we’d rarely talked, even when he would share his lunch, I always took comfort in knowing I had two protectors—Reed and Nash.
Something flipped the night of the cotillion. And after cops almost arrested Reed, the rift between him and Nash became unnavigable. They barely spoke. If they did, it was with a cordiality that reminded me of my relationship with Mother.
My heart wept for Betty, who tried desperately to mend things. Surprise parties. Homemade dinners. Family outings they couldn’t afford with a son going off to college and one fresh out of grad school.
Reed placed all his focus on Basil, football, and school. And Nash? He became a different Nash around us. One who lived up to his reputation. Gorgeous. Arrogant. Insufferable. Whenever he visited, he’d spend the weekend fucking every bored twenty-something housewife in Eastridge.
I don’t recognize you anymore.
The words sat at the tip of my tongue. I would never release them. That was Reed’s hill to die on. I cared because I hated the way Nash stared at me sometimes, accusations stabbing me from his eyes.
Snide comments I would never ask him about because I was loyal to Reed, and even talking to Nash felt like picking the wrong side.
“Such a Winthrop, Emery,” Nash once said when I stole capers from Reed’s plate after Betty made Chicken Piccata.
“So good at hiding things.” He caught me sliding extra money into Reed’s stocking. I lied about it being from Dad. “Gideon has you sneaking around for him often?”
“Betrayal. Taste it often?” I’d spit out a rotten peach from the garden. It landed by his foot, a few inches past my target.
I wanted to take a few seconds to study Nash, to process my mortification, to enjoy the aftershocks of my first orgasm, yet all I could feel was Nash’s overwhelming gravitational pull, one more dangerous than that of any other boy I’d ever met.
But Nash Prescott wasn’t a boy.
He was a man.
One who made me feel like the little girl I’d convinced myself I wasn’t.
My arms slipped through the robe. The second the tie wrapped around my waist, my body solidified. My underwear remained lost somewhere, but at least I was covered.
I ignored the sting of his derision, shook my head, and pushed aside the embarrassment. “Did you know?”
The sharp accusation unfazed him. He stretched his arms, drawing my attention to the deep V of his body. I clenched around him. A reflex. My mortified eyes flicked up in time to catch his cocked brow.
“I figured it out when you moaned my brother’s name while coming around my cock.” His eyes dipped down as if to remind me I was still on him.
I scrambled off the bed, pushing the blanket over with the rushed movement. Horrified didn’t even begin to describe how I felt, but it was the plain irritation on his face that almost undid me.
