Cruel Elite - A Mafia Romance

NOAH

It's only mid-January, but it feels like early fall.

It's just a bonfire party in the woods, but it feels like Hell.

Caleb doesn't agree with me, though.

"For fuck's sake, you are dramatic." He rolls his eyes at me and nuzzles into his girlfriend, Haley. She giggles, and her dark brown hair slides in front of them like a curtain.

I can hear but-thank the fucking Lord-I can't see the way their tongues are tangling together.

"There's fire and sinners as far as the eye can see. Feels like Hell to me," I respond.

Usually, Caleb would take this opportunity to point out his many angelic qualities as proof we couldn't be in Hell.

But his mouth is too busy doing things God surely wouldn't approve of.

That is, assuming the Big Guy Upstairs isn't super into public displays of affection.

I sigh and go back to surveying the party.

Winter break is supposed to be exactly that-a break. A break from school, and more precisely, from my fellow Ravenlake Academy students.

Yet here I am, sitting in the woods with a horde of my shit-faced classmates. They're drinking and laughing and making out all around me.

If it had just been us Golden Boys chilling, maybe I'd be in a better mood. But there are too many other people here I'd rather not see.

A beetle lands on my shoulder, buzzing in my ear. I lean forward and flick it into the flames.

"Fucking bugs," I mutter.

More evidence that we're in hell: flying cockroaches. What kind of sick pervert invents something like that?

Only one answer: Satan.

An ice cube pelts me in the chest. I look up to see Finn staring at me, eyebrow raised.

"What?"

"You're being a buzzkill." He holds up a beer can. "Get a drink and lighten up."

Usually, Finn is on my side. At least, he used to be.

But that was before Lily.

Now, he's "happy," or so he says.

To which I say, congratu-fucking-lations.

On the other hand, at least he's not tonguing down his girlfriend a foot away from me. So he's at least one spot better than Caleb on my Shit List rankings.

"You know, Noah, three girls have already asked me if you're here with anyone," Lily says, tossing her platinum blonde hair over her shoulder. "It wouldn't take much more than a look for you to be having a better time."

Lily always had an artsy vibe, but she's refined it since she and Finn started living in New York. She wears loose, paint-splattered jeans with a tight, long-sleeved crop top and chunky leather boots.

Nothing like the girl I would have imagined for Finn.

Not to say I don't like Lily. I do.

I just assumed Finn would end up with a trust fund baby. A spoiled rich girl who said "wine o'clock" unironically and had aspirations of being a "stay-at-home mom" with a full-time nanny.

You could throw a rock and hit ten women like that in this godforsaken town.

I spit on the forest floor. "I don't need a girl to make me happy."

Viktor throws up his plastic cup in a salute, liquid sloshing over the side. "That's right, Miss Independent! You don't need no one, nuh uh." He snaps his fingers to complete the joke.

Everyone else laughs.

I roll my eyes.

"I don't need a donut to be happy, but it helps," Lily argues when the laughter subsides.

"Good idea," Finn says, wrapping an arm around Lily's hips and sliding her closer to him. "Maybe if you get a bite of someone's cake, you won't be such a drag."

Lily gasps. "That is not what I meant!" She turns to me. "It was an analogy. I just meant you could talk to one of them. Maybe get to know them."

Finn barks out a laugh before I can. He pats Lily's head condescendingly. "Oh, sweet Lily. Naïve, idealistic Lily. That is never going to happen."

Lily opens her mouth to argue, but I cut her off before she can. "It's never going to happen."

Her shoulders slump forward. "Why not? They seemed nice."

"That's exactly why! Because they seem nice!" Finn answers. "Does Noah look nice to you? Does it look like he wants a nice girl?"

Lily studies me.

I look away, tired of being under her magnifying glass.

Ever since she and Finn came back to Ravenlake for the holidays, she's been watching me. I mentioned it to Finn last week, but he brushed it off.

"Lily just wants to help people," he said.

"No shit," I'd replied. "Why else would she be with a charity case like you?"

We laughed, and I let it go, but it still bothers me.

I don't need help.

Not from him.

Not from her.

Not from anyone.

J.C. jumps over the log I'm sitting on with both legs, kicking up a cloud of dust, and flops down next to me. "Please tell me you aren't looking to become monogamous. Because I just accepted the offers of a pair of very lovely, very naughty girls who want to meet the two of us in the woods."

He hitches a thumb over his shoulder. I turn just in time to see a curly redhead and a box-dyed brunette strutting into the woods on their heels.

Who wears heels in the woods?

"Are you talking about Penny's Dreadfuls?" Haley asks, top lip curled in disgust. "I saw you talking to them."

Finn immediately asks the question we're all thinking: "How did you do that with Caleb's tongue down your throat?"

But apparently, Haley is capable of swapping spit with Caleb and eavesdropping on the party at the same time.

Talented girl.

Caleb shrugs. "She knows all. I've learned not to question it."