Revelry (Taint #1) (12 page)

“Holy shit,” I say, and attempt to scramble off him, but I’m yanked back by the roots of my hair.

I scream, because on top of the almighty hangover I have, some arsehole is pulling my fucking hair out by the roots.

“Wait,” Cooper growls, and he grabs my hips with one hand, slamming my waist against his.

“Ow. Let go you fucking psycho.”

“Your hair is caught on the bed,” he says.

I stop struggling and go limp. “Oh. Sorry.”

“It’s okay, just … hold still.” He sits up, and his position brings us a new closeness. I gasp, as the hardness of him presses against the softness of me. He’s still in jeans. I feel the denim on the insides of my thighs, and thank god, because if he were naked I’m afraid I could not be held entirely responsible for my actions. Coop’s hands are careful and tentative as he works my hair away from the bed. My scalp prickles with relief when he slides his hands free.

“All done,” he whispers, and his warm breath washes over my breasts, my nipples forming two hard peaks. I send a prayer up to the universe that he won’t see, but the universe is a cock-sucking bitch that needs to choke on a rotten whale’s vagina because Coop’s gaze drops directly to my nip nips and he inhales sharply. Cooper’s hands cup my arse, squeezing my flesh and rocking me back and forward on top of him. My hips flex in time with his as I writhe on his lap. He presses a kiss to my breastbone. He’s not touching either boob yet, but the fact that his head is between them is … wow … and then I recover my sanity and come crashing back down to earth.
Okay no
!

“No!” I shout and scramble off of him, clobbering my head again on the underside of the top bunk. “We cannot do this. This cannot happen.”

“I agree,” he says, sliding out of the bed and standing opposite me.

“You agree? You were the one who was just getting ready to lick my boobs.”

“Okay, first of all, I don’t lick tits. I suck them, hard, if you’re lucky.”

“Yeah, well you are not allowed to touch me that way. Or look at me like that. And you’re definitely not allowed to have a huge fucking erection right now,” I shout, staring up at the ceiling because … holy hot cock, Batman.

“Afraid I can’t do much about that. It’ll stay that way until I take a piss or I fuck it out.”

“Okay, stop talking and cover that shit up.”

“Look who’s talking,” he says, tilting his chin towards me. I glance down at my body with a panicked expression and fold my arms across my chest. I have on black cotton panties, so there’s not a whole lot that needs to be covered there.

“What in the hell happened last night? And where are my clothes?”

“Your jeans are on the floor. And your T-shirt is probably still on the floor of Zed’s lounge room where you left it.”

“Oh god.” I rack my brain, trying to remember why I was taking off my clothes last night. This is why I can’t be trusted to smoke pot. “Did I spill something on them? Or set myself on fire?”

“Nope.”

I glare at him incredulously. “Well it’s not like I removed them voluntarily.”

“Actually you did, right about the time you were giving us a strip tease and attempting to pole dance.”

“Oh god.”

“Yeah, that’s pretty much what we were all thinking.”

“Fuck you.”

“I meant that as a compliment,” he says, and bends over to lift a shirt from the ground. He throws it at me and I catch it with one hand, flashing him even more nipple. I thread my arms through the holes and pull it down over my body. It smells like him, and I have this odd flashback to snuggling into the crook of his arm, our naked bodies pressing together.

“So, we didn’t …?”

“Nope,” he says, and then he frowns. “We were both pretty wasted though.”

“Oh, thank god.”

“Yeah, god forbid you actually fucked me.”

“Aww, that’s cute. The rock star has a vulnerable side,” I say slipping into my skinny jeans and yanking them up. Whoever invented these should die a slow, horrible death.

“You know maybe if you worked out some of that tension you wouldn’t be such a bitch. How long was it again? A year? More?”

The blood drains from my face. “How did you know that?”

“You talk a lot of shit when you’re drunk, Ali-Cat. It’s cute.”

“I will hurt you if you tell anyone that.”

“Who am I gonna tell? Your secrets are safe with me.”

I shake my head, and yank open the door. My stomach flips as the scent of bacon, eggs and pancakes assaults me. I clutch my belly and stop in my tracks, uncertain whether or not I’m going to hurl. It’s a little hard to tell right now if I want to eat a freaking horse or run like one … right to the bathroom.

Cooper runs into my back, and his hands slide around my waist to steady me. “Shit, sorry.”

“It’s fine,” I murmur, and that’s when I realise he’s doing more than just steadying me with his hands. They’re gripping my waist pretty tightly, and the length of him is pressed against me from shoulder to groin, that maddening erection still tormenting me.

“Coop, you can let go of me now.”

“Right,” he says, but he doesn’t, and the second I try to move away, he pulls me back against him, hard. He whispers in my ear, “I’m pretty sure I told you this last night, but in case I didn’t, your tits are fucking awesome, Ali-Cat.”

“I hate you.”

“No, you made it pretty clear last night that you didn’t hate me. And this morning, come to think of it.”

“You’re confusing me with my rabid vagina. Of course she likes you, Coop. You have a penis, and she hasn’t been thoroughly fucked in a long, long time. But me? I really dislike you.”

“Liar,” he whispers and lets me go. I stomp away, heading out to the lounge room, following that damn scent while Coop heads to the other side of the apartment, I assume to the bathroom.

“Good morning,” Zed says, standing at the stove in only a pair of jeans. He’s drinking from a coffee mug that reads
Rock out with your Coffee Out
, which he sets down as he flips a pancake in the air.

“Morning. Sorry we kinda hijacked your bed last night.” I cringe when I realise that there really was no other way to say that. Cooper and I did hijack his bed, but not for the reasons he’s more than likely thinking. “We didn’t have sex or anything, so there’s no chance of finding nasty surprises on your sheets, but I’ll wash them anyway—”

“You two didn’t fuck?” Levi says, and I turn to see him lying face down on the leather couch, his chin propped up on the armrest as he watches me with a dubious expression. Leif braces his elbows on his knees and holds a steaming cup of coffee in one hand while he rubs at his temple with the other, and Ash is lying flat on his back in the middle of an Escher inspired rug. It hurts my eyes just looking at it.

“No we didn’t fuck,” I mutter, glaring at him.

“Ha! Pay up, motherfuckers,” Zed says, pointing his bright green spatula at both Levi and Ash. Apparently Leif hadn’t bet against his brother.

“You guys really bet on whether Coop and I had sex?”

“Well, it’s not really a question of whether you will, it’s more like when,” Levi says, hopping up off the couch and walking towards us. I swear I hadn’t intended for my gaze to drop to his crotch, but there is some serious erection going on there. I don’t know how he can be comfortable walking around with the fucking kraken in his pants.

“Though if you keep staring at my dick, we might need to change that bet, Red.”

“I’m sorry … I ...”

“It’s okay, most women can’t take their eyes off of it either.”

“How do you even, how does it …” I stop and shake my head. “Never mind.”

“Well I didn’t make sausage.” Zed chuckles as he glances at me. “But if you feel like it, there seems to be enough on display in this room.”

I groan and smack my head against the counter. “Zed, please tell me you have coffee?”

“Yup.”

He places a fresh cup under a Nespresso machine and hits a button. It flares to life with a loud grinding noise and then the scent of coffee wafts over to me. Cooper chooses that time to come out of the bathroom. Levi punches him in the shoulder as he passes and mutters, “Way to make me lose a hundred bucks, you douche.”

“You’re welcome.” Coop grins.

“You’re such a fucking pussy. If a woman’s naked in front of you, you bang her. It’s simple, Coop.”

“No, you bang her.” He smirks and rounds the counter in the kitchen, leaning up against the bench. “I wait until she’s completely conscious so she remembers every little detail.”

Cooper grabs the cup of coffee from under the machine, stirs in two sugars and sips it, leaning back on the counter.

“That was my coffee, you butt munch.”

He just smiles over the rim of
my
cup.

“Oh yeah,” Leif says. “I give them about a week.”

“I give them five more minutes,” Levi says, coming back into the room and leaning up against the breakfast bar beside me.

“Are you fuck heads betting on whether or not I’m going to get laid again?” Cooper asks.

“
Au contraire
, my friend, we’re betting on
when
you and the lovely Miss Ali here are going to get your shit together and fuck one another’s brains out.”

Levi studies me a moment and says, “Nope, I’m switching teams, and adding another player into the mix.”

“I’m sorry, what?” I ask.

They all ignore me in favour of asking, “Who?”

“Me. Red’s hot for my cock.”

“In your dreams, arsehole,” Cooper says, and his tone is pure undiluted venom.

Zed moves to the freezer and opens it, pulling out a wad of cash. He places two fifty-dollar notes down on the counter and says, “Tour bus. Coop. Five weeks from now.”

“No way. Me. Backstage. After the opening leg of the US,” Levi says and he places three notes down, so that Zed has to return to the freezer for another.

“She’s gonna be opening her legs for someone, but it won’t be you, Quinn. Hotel room. Cooper. Two weeks from now,” Ash says, and he adds his money into the pool.

“Alleyway, after a show. Coop and Quinn.” Leif puts in. He only sets down two fifties though, and the other boys glare at him. “I’ll put in drugs, whatever the winner wants.”

“Done,” Zed says.

“Zed, write that shit down.”

“Oh my god, are you guys serious?” I say, looking to each of them in the hope that they’ll tell me this is a big joke. “I’m not sleeping with any of you.”

Levi smirks. “We’ll see, Red.”

Zed picks up his phone and dials a number. Before long, he says, “Deb, another bet.”

“My sister is in on this too? Jesus Christ.” Coop shakes his head and stares at me across the breakfast bar.

Zed must flick her over to speaker because suddenly her sharp, sullen tone fills the tiny kitchen. “Cooper, you’re a fucking pansy. I had good money riding on that bet.”

“Sorry to disappoint, Sis.”

“You want in, Deb?” Levi shouts into the phone.

“Hell yes I want in,” she says, “It’s gonna be fun to watch you fuckers fall flat on your face.”

“Time, place and who,” Zed commands.

“Who?” Deb asks. “Who the fuck else is she gonna sleep with?”

“Levi seems to think it’ll be him.”

There’s a crackling pause from the other end, and then she howls with laughter. “Nice try, Quinn, but as much as I dislike her, I can tell already the girl has standards.”

“She wants me. I can tell by the way she’s looking at me right now,” Levi crows, I simply glare at him.

“What’s the figure?” Deb says.

“One fifty. Leif put in drugs.”

“I don’t want his fucking drugs. He can buy me a fucking Michael Kors clutch I’ve been wanting.”

They all nod in agreement, and I laugh. I don’t know much about designer handbags, but I know it likely costs a lot more than Leif’s drugs. I’m kind of impressed with Deb’s ingenuity.

“Okay. Cooper.” She emphasises her brother’s name. “Airplane on the way to the US. Four days from now.”

“Got it,” Zed says, setting the phone on the bench and jotting down Deb’s answer on a piece of paper along with the others. “You comin’ by later?”

“To hang out with you losers? Hell no. Since Red came along I have tonnes of free time. I’ll see you idiots at the airport,” she says, and hangs up. Zed tosses his phone on the bench and goes back to flipping pancakes and then he sets one on a plate in front of me.

Did that really just happen?
I stare dazedly at the men surrounding me.

“Boys are kinda big on bets,” Coop says, and at least he has the good grace to look apologetic.

“You know what I’m big on?” I ask, glaring at all of them. “Not sleeping with rock stars. What happens if all your bets fall through, boys?”

Zed laughs, Ash just shakes his head and Levi makes a derisive scoffing sound.

“Pfft.” Leif dumps his coffee out in the sink. “As if that’s going to happen.”