CHAPTER THREE
We do not hate as long as we still attach a lesser value, but only when we attach an equal or a greater
value.
- Friedrich Nietzsche.
Juliette
I watch Cas with a flipping stomach as he shovels another spoonful of cereal into his already full mouth. He looks perfectly content with his bobbing head, bouncing foot and heaping spoon of cereal. If you had just met him, you'd think he suffered from ADHD, when in reality, his physical ticks come from his curse. He has so much energy in his body that he has to get it out of his system. He can never sit still.
Perry walks into the room, a bounce in his step that soon disappears when he sees my queasy face.
"Scared?"
I reluctantly nod.
He answers this with a shrug and a pat on the head as he breezes past me and looks around the kitchen. It's fully stocked and a spacious place. Cas, Law and I sit around the grey granite island. Cas eating his food, Law drinking his coffee and me over-analysing every event that could possibly take place today.
"Where's the food?" Perry asks, and Law glances up from his book to point to a set of wooden cupboards. Law scratches the blonde stubble lining his chin before giving me a reassuring smile and looking back to his book. The eldest of my brothers isn't much of a talker, and with the least embarrassing long name of us all, he doesn't have much to be quiet about. He's smart, from all the girls that flock towards him I've deducted that he's good-looking, but quiet. He isn't shy, he's just more of a brooder than a joker like Cas or Perry, a sarcastic charmer like Sebastian or a strong leader like my dad and Zak.
It was the biggest shock of my life when Zak told us he was joining the army two years ago and dropping out of college.
The family still hasn't gotten over it.
Perry frowns and glances at the cupboard.
"What? No pancakes? No freshly squeezed orange juice or croissants?"
Cas, with his mouth full of colourful loops, shrugs his shoulders with a resounding; "Nope."
Perry sighs before slinking over to the cupboard and grabbing a bowl, a spoon, a box of cereal and a carton of milk from the fridge.
Sebastian waltzes in after that, hair wet from his shower and eyes drooping.
"Rough night?" I ask, taking in his haggard but satisfied appearance.
"No," Cas answers for him, both of them sharing a look. "Rough morning."
"What do you mean?"
Law sighs from the end of the island while Sebastian slides in beside me, robbing Cas' untouched glass of orange juice. "He means that Sebastian slept with some poor local girl last night and that he had to wake up early this morning to sneak out of her house and into this one." Law's lips tilt upwards a little. "Walking a few miles at dawn isn't the most relaxing thing."
Sebastian smirks, the closest that boy ever gets to a smile.
Perry and I share our own look, both of us grimacing at the thought of Sebastian's active sex life. I'm disgusted, while Perry is envious. Sebastian being newly nineteen, and Perry being eighteen, Perry can almost taste the freedom Sebastian has. Just one more year of school and then he's free. We both are.
I sip at my water, trying not to think about school, when Dad comes in. Freshly shaved and in his new suit for work, he cleans up well. He grins at us all as he heads over to the coffee machine, and Sebastian lets out a long whistle.
"Wow, Grant," Cas and I both wince when Sebastian says Dad's first name. "You scrub up nicely. First date?"
Ignoring his son's sarcasm, Dad turns around and holds his mug, smiling. "First day at work. I haven't been excited about working at a firm in years."
I guess being a lawyer isn't half as glamorous as Cas has led us to believe.
"Want a refill, Lawrence?" Dad asks, always using his first name. It's just a thing among our family. He gave us all old-fashioned names, and he likes using them. He only ever uses our full names or pet names, never any of our nick-names. He says that he gave us these names, and if we refuse to use them, he'll accept that he's the only one to call us them.
Perry hates his full name (Peregrine), and instead goes for "Perry". Cas hates his full name too (Cassius) and prefers Cas. Sebastian hates any shortened version of his name, and he'd punch you in the face if you called him "Seb", so we stick to his full name, which he likes. Law is relaxed on what you call him, though he does secretly like Law better than Lawrence. Zak hates his name (Zachariah), and won't answer to anything but "Zak", unless you're our dad, that is.
I don't care what they call me, though the older I get, the more I'm starting to resent the nick-name "Runt". Other people alternate from "Jules" to "Julie", with only Dad and the elderly calling me "Juliette". And strangers.
My old friends thought having such long names was hilarious or nice, my brothers and I disagree. I've yet to meet an Amber or Eve or Ashley who hate their name because it sounds so old.
Dad talks about his new job to Law, while Cas and Sebastian try to give tips to Perry about how to get girls to talk to you.
"Smile at the cute ones."
"Ask them where your classes are."
"Start with the losers and work your way up."
"Try not to look lost, dude. It's a total turn-off."
"Under no circumstances are you to answer any questions in class. Last thing you need is for people to think you're a total nerd."
"Make sure there's nothing between your teeth."
"Stand tall... Or, at least... Taller."
At that, the conversation ends as Perry glares at Sebastian.
Sebastian just flashes a quick smirk and stands up.
"Well, I'm gonna go and survey this town before little brother kills me." He looks to me. "Good luck, Runt. And if any guys hit on you, just tell them you've got four bigger brothers and a slightly smaller one."
He walks out of the house, shaking his head with a smirk – his definition of laughter.
"Jerk." Perry mutters, angrily standing up and taking his bowl and spoon to the dishwasher.
Dad sighs. "Don't take what he says to heart, Peregrine. He's just trying to toughen you up."
If someone at school had said what Sebastian had said to Perry, Perry just would've laughed it off. But Perry looks up to Sebastian and I guess it's a real killer when you're idol keeps putting you down. Sebastian doesn't realise this, of course. I like to think that if he did, he'd be a little nicer, but it doesn't matter. Five seconds later, Perry's light mood is back again.
Eventually, time runs out and Perry and I start getting ready to leave for school. My legs turn to jelly as I stumble down the stairs, messenger bag slung over my shoulder and heavy with books. But, then again, I'd be even more worried if I wasn't nervous.
We say our goodbyes, and Dad walks us both to Perry's car. I can drive, but believe me when I say, nobody wants me behind the wheel. I'm a terrible driver, a menace on the road. Sometimes, I wonder if my brothers were right when they said the only reason I got my license was because I was wearing a particularly low-cut shirt that day.
"Now, today is a fresh start for all of us," He hands us some money for lunch, and I feel like a little kid again, which isn't hard when your dad is a giant. "I've got a new job and you've got a new school. Just remember, neither of you are alone, you've got each other."
He says this, though I know my brother will make friends in minutes, and there's not a chance I'm clinging on to him. I've got to strap on my boots and make my own friends. I'm not standing in anybody's shadow at this school.
Giving Dad a parting hug, I slide into the passenger seat and Perry starts the ignition, pulling the seat up as it was way too far back to fit Law in when he drove it a few days ago. Law is 6'5, so Perry has to swallow his pride as he adjusts the seat and the rear-view mirror.
"So, how are you feeling?" Perry inquires as he navigates his way through this alien town. It's alien to us.
"Nervous. Like I'm going to pee my pants. You?"
"Lovely mental image, and nah, I'm okay. Excited, I guess." He grimaces. "Never thought I'd be excited for school."
I shrug. "There's new people, you love new people."
He glances over to me, sky blue eyes bright as he flashes me a smile. "People are awesome."
"The people you hang out with seem to always be awesome." He's a drama nerd, born to perform and be on stage. He's so dramatic that anything less than acting would be wasting his amazing talents.
"Drama nerds are the best kind of people, Runt. You should join with me, you'd have a clique."
I wrinkle my nose at that. My old school was full of girls, and where there are girls, there are cliques. The hierarchy ruled over the school, everyone knowing their place and who their friends and enemies were. And, if you didn't know your place, people wouldn't be shy to tell you where it was. Usually, the bottom.
"I think I've had enough cliques for one life time."
He gives me a side-ways look. "Really?" I can tell he's worried, he doesn't want his little sister to be a social outcast. "You could join the cheer squad, I bet. You've done taekwondo for years, surely you're flexible enough for a few flips."
When he brings taekwondo up,I realise how much I miss my old instructors and my class, but I squash it down and instead think about his words. He's simplifying it. Sebastian and Law were both on their school's football team when season came around, and I've had to sit through too many football games on T.V. I know that cheerleading is more than just "a few flips", it takes skill. Skill I don't have.
"I think I'll just stick to making friends in class. The old-fashioned way." Is my reply, and he gives me a doubtful look.
"Okay, but just so you know, you can hang out with me if you want, I won't be embarrassed."
"Gee, Per, thanks a bunch."
"You know what I mean." And I do, I'm also suspicious as why he's being so nice to me, when usually we're beating each other up or verbally assaulting each other as we wrestle for the remote or the last cookie.
"So," I say, moving the subject on. "Your plan to make new friends is to just join the drama club? Nice way to find yourself a girlfriend."
He shrugs. "I'm not interested in getting a girlfriend." Ah, that's right. Perry is one of those Bloods who are firm believers that your soul mate are the only ones for you. They're supposed to be your "first". I'm under no illusions that Perry's a virgin, though I am sure that his first proper girlfriend - not just a girl he hangs around with at a party for a few hours – will be his Blood Bound. There are Bloods like that out there, that believe that you're supposed to be "clean" for your soul mate or whatever, though Perry is a little more lenient with those rules. He hangs around with girls and flirts and makes-out with them (too many times have I walked in on him and girls from my school), but he doesn't date any of them.
Basically, like most of the Blood guys, he's using his Blood Bound as an excuse to be a player.
He has no more of an idea who his Blood Bound is than I have. All of my brothers are in the dark and none of us, not even my dad, have found our soul mates. That's how rare they are, how rare your chances of finding them are. There's no outward sign that their yours, no way you can tell if you pass by them on a street. The only way to be sure is by blood, and by some "unreasonable pull" you're supposed to feel towards them. But, in my lifetime I've felt a lot of unreasonable pulls towards boys. Towards Tom and his eight-pack, towards one of my taekwondo instructors and his perfect face, towards a certain Warren boy and his cheerful charm.
But Tom was just a human, my feelings towards that instructor was a crush, and nothing can happen between me and that Warren guy.
The biggest rule among the Clanns is that if you're in a Clann, you can't be involved in any sexual or romantic relationship with somebody else in a Clann. It's treated like incest, even though you're not related. It's looked upon as if you've fallen for your own cousin.
But it doesn't feel like that.
"But, I do have a plan to make me cool no matter what class we have." Perry breaks me out of my reverie and flashes me a mischievous grin. "Don't worry, I'll make sure you're in that class to witness it."
"A plan? What plan?"
He shrugs, grinning like a little kid. "Just a plan to make me cool."
I give him an unimpressed look. "I'm pretty sure cool people don't call themselves cool."
"Nah," He replies, undeterred. "I call myself cool all the time."
I groan, because there really is no talking to this boy.
___________
As Perry locks the car, I look up at the huge building that is Leaf Valley High. Blindingly white with a green striped banner above the front doors, I conclude that it's a new enough school. It's all one floor and spaced across a lot of land, looking spread out and modern. Most of the cars that drive into the parking lot seem to be sleek and expensive looking, revealing that a lot of people around here are probably rich. As we make our way over to the school, I see the writing on the banner telling the Bullfrogs to "win 'em all", that must be the school mascot.
Great, I have that to look forward to.
As we make our way through the cars, I can't help but feel eyes on me. The students passing by us stare at us as if we're aliens.
We can't be the only new students, right?
But by the way they all stare at us, like we're fresh meat, I'm wondering if maybe that assumption is wrong.
"Tight knit school." Perry mumbles to himself as he notices the staring. "Not only is the town small, but so is the community."
Wonderful.
Once through the doors, we walk down the green and white-walled hallways, passing grey lockers and signs declaring all the sports and clubs that are having try-outs and auditions for the new year. Perry and I by-pass all of this, realising that we have to walk through practically the whole school to get to the office where we're meant to pick up our starter packs with our schedule and school rules.
More and more people start to fill the hallways and I feel their stares burning into me. Along with the whispers of "twins". I want to yell that we're not twins. That there's eleven months between us. That if anybody in my family should be called twins it's Cas and Sebastian, as they're only ten months apart. Or Perry and Sebastian, as they're only nine months apart.
At least with Perry and I our parents paused.
Briefly.
Grimacing, I almost miss the office, until Perry grabs my elbow and yanks me inside, causing me to bang my foot on the door and hiss a cuss. A passing Latino girl catches my eye and gives me a dirty look before sashaying off in her skimpy outfit.
I get that it's hot outside, but it's not that hot.
Walking into the office, I catch Perry mid-flirt-session with the young secretary. There's something indescribably disturbing about watching your older yet shorter brother flirt carelessly with an older woman. He gives her those slow smiles that guys give me when they want a kiss, and I try not to gag. She blushes and looks flustered as she flies around the office, looking for our starter packs.
Finally, we get our schedules, Perry walking away with a satisfied smirk on his face.
"Five minutes in and I've already got a number." He hums to himself.
"Dude, she was, like, thirty."
He rolls his eyes. "She was twenty-one, Runt. Exaggerate much?"
I ignore him as I scan the lockers for my number.
Once we find our lockers – luckily they're not too far away from each other – we both look at our class schedules and compare them with only five minutes left until home-room starts.
Perry glances down and punches the air.
"Yes!" He cheers, causing a few people to look at him funny. He ignores them and glances at my time-table too.
"We don't have home-room together, but we've got AP English second period after lunch."
I nod, cracking a smile. "Anything else?"
He scans the list and nods. "Spanish, but that's after English."
"That's it?" I can't help the panic that wells up inside of me at that. But I take a deep breath, reminding myself that we're lucky to have any classes together. Perry is a genius whereas I, on the other hand, am not.
He shuts his locker door with a resounding bang and gives me a sad look. "I'm sorry, Runt. But, we always have lunch together, right?"
I nod as he gives my head a pat before he's off and facing the world by himself.
_____________
Deep breaths, Jules. In through the nose, out through the mouth.
It's bad when you have to remind yourself how to breathe. It's even more embarrassing when you're blonde.
My hand wobbles over the door knob, the faint sounds of conversation fluttering from inside the classroom. The bell is going to ring in a minute, signalling that I will be officially late to home-room. But my nerves are over-taking me. If I don't faint, I'll puke, and neither are too appealing to me right now.
"Hey, are you gonna open that, because I'm gonna be late if you don't." A light voice asks from behind me, and I turn to see none other than Hoodie Guy from the grocery store a few days ago. Blinking up at him, I realise that his over-sized hoodie has been replaced with a dark green Letterman jacket, signalling his jock status.
Something flits across his face, and I realise he remembers me. I'm just about to start picturing our first kiss when he grins and exclaims;
"Hey, it's Tampon Girl!"
I don't know who's more embarrassed, me for having that nick-name, or him for saying it aloud.
"Uh, sorry." He grumbles, shoving his hands in his pockets. "I don't have a filter between my mouth and my brain, I say the first thing that pops into it." Then he grimaces. "And you don't care about that at all, I'm sorry, I'm annoying you."
I shake my head, laughing. "No, no, don't worry. You're not annoying me." I do the first thing I can think of and fling my hand out, trying to remember if teenagers shake hands anymore. "I'm Juliette."
He grins, and I notice how little his hands are as he shakes mine. "I'm Josh."
"Sorry to interrupt, but are you two going to join in on the class, or...?"
Both of us jump and turn around to see a middle-aged man standing in the home-room door way. He holds the door wide enough for all the class to see us, and I hope my tan is dark enough so that they can't see my blush.
Josh brushes past me, heading to a seat in the back beside his friends. All of them wearing the same Letterman jackets as him. Feeling a little rejected, I hand the teacher my admin slip and head to a seat in the front, brushing my hair over my face and realising what a long and painful day it's going to be.
______________
I follow behind my new Chemistry partner, Maia, as she leads me to the cafeteria. She laughs as I compare our Chemistry teacher, Ms. Dewy, to a rat and she flicks her dark brown hair over her shoulder. Her Native American complexion and clear skin are to die for, and so are her unnaturally hazel eyes. And I'm not going to even mention her extremely long eyelashes.
"I'm sorry I can't stay and eat with you. I'd introduce you to my friends, but we're all heading to a school council meeting." Then her eyes spark and she bumps my shoulder. "You should join! It's a great way to make friends, we're all totally cool there."
This is the seventh time she's said "totally" this minute, I'm pretty sure it's a Californian thing.
"I think I'll pass." I say, as she stops outside a set of doors swinging open and shut as people run through them.
Her face falls with disappointment, but she nods and motions through the doors. "The lunch line is usually huge, you'll have a long wait, but don't worry, the food's usually edible." Then she's off and around the corner with a flick of her dark brown hair and a bat of her lashes.
Luckily, I have no problem pushing my way through these doors. I'm so hungry that I'd run through this place naked if I was promised food at the end of it.
Once through the doors, I keep my head down and my blonde hair hiding my face as I weave in and out of the lunch crowds and to the end of the line. I don't look around for Hoodie Guy – Josh – as I expect him to be hanging around with his jock posse. At least, I assume that from his Letterman jacket. The first time I saw him, I thought he'd be with some stoners under the bleachers, not an athlete.
Glaring at the guys and their Letterman jackets in front of me, I stare enviously at the students already sitting down with their food. I roll onto my tip-toes and look over the heads of the jocks in front of me to catch sight of the slices of pizza and cheese burgers on the steel plates. There's the vegetarian option, of course, but my eyes can't stop looking at the pizza and burgers. And when my eyes latch onto the sight of the pre-packaged cookies, I have to press against the wall to stop myself from shoving my way through the lunch line and to the food.
The line shuffles up slowly, and at this rate, I won't have time to eat the food. But all that melts away when I start to hear the chants.
"Fight!"
It's like we're in some bad, American T.V show.
Breaking food-eye contact with the pizza, I turn my head to see the large crowd forming at the back of the cafeteria. Too many heads are blocking my vision, so I just turn away and instead concentrate on the slow moving line.
A tall, mountain of a guy in front of me shoves a shorter – but still as muscley – blonde guy out of the line, saying;
"Check out who's fighting."
The blonde guy rolls his eyes but jogs over to the crowd. He must be pretty popular, because the crowd kind of parts for him.
Shaking my head, I focus on the food again. Imagining all the melted cheese, the meat and the bread. Like my brothers, I love the good old meat-and-bread combo.
Too wrapped up in my food haze, I miss the start of their conversation, but when I hear the blonde jock in front of me telling all of his friends who's fighting, all I hear are the words "new guy", and then the food disappears from my mind. I don't even stop to hear who Perry is fighting before I'm abandoning my space in the ridiculously long queue and running over to the fight. Pushing and shoving my way through.
I'm so swept up in trying to make it to the centre of this huge crowd full of teenagers that I knock over a lanky guy, his phone flying across the floor and bumping off my shoe. Hastily picking it up, I blow the hair out of my face and take the boy's outstretched hand to yank him up.
He flies to his feet, his hair all over the place. His uncanny resemblance to Andrew Garfield has me pausing for a second, before I hear the crowd cheering like Romans in the Colosseum.
Where is this school's faculty?! Why is nobody breaking up this fight?
"Whoa," The guy says, and he steadies me as I turn too fast and get a head-rush. "Are you okay?"
I realise what a mess I must look like, a mad woman with wind-blown hair attacking this poor guy. On further inspection, I see that his nose is too big, his eyes are too dark and his body is too thin for him to actually be Andrew Garfield, though he could definitely pass as a younger brother of the celebrity.
He plucks his phone out of my hand and turns the camera of it on me.
"What are you doing?!" I sputter, momentarily forgetting the fight.
"Oh, I'm Parker. Sorry, I'm on the school newspaper. I've been looking for you or your brother all day to try and see if we can make your arrival a story, but he's fighting s-"
I don't bother telling him that this school must be pretty damn boring if he's trying to write a story on my brother and I (or how creepy that is), and instead I run my hand through my hair and ask through gritted teeth;
"Who's he fighting?" There's no way I'm able to get through that crowd. Glancing at it, I see it's as wild as a mosh pit, people flying into other people. Even the jocks who were ahead of me in line have given their space up to see a bit of this fight. I need to figure out who Perry is fighting and hope that Perry will still be breathing when I beat the kid up later.
But then, the newspaper kid – Parker – says two words that I know way too well. A name that I've heard and said a lot more then I wanted to hear or say. And before I know it, the cafeteria is going all slow-motion and dramatic on me as I shove my way through the crowd again, wondering how this fight could've gotten so out of hand.
But there's no space in my head for any kind of rational thoughts as I push my way through. I don't understand any of this. Why he's here, why he's fighting Perry (a known pacifist) or why he exists. My mind is a jumbled mess as I finally break free of the crowd and end up in the centre, staring at the two wrestling bodies on the ground.
Catching Perry by the T-shirt, I mercilessly rip him off the guy, leaving his fist to connect with nothing but thin air. Even if I didn't do taekwando I'd be able to lift Perry, he's not scrawny, he's pretty sturdy, but he's just light.
He stumbles off the guy and looks up at me as the shouts from the crowd die down and they wait to see about this new development. Perry blinks back tears as he wraps an arm around his ribs and presses the back of his hand to his bloody and burst lip. His right eye looks red and is swelling fast and he can barely keep it open.
Seeing Perry like this – sweet Perry who prefers watching gardening shows to wrestling – pisses me off even more. Which is saying something, because just this guy's name has me seeing red.
I slowly turn around, hoping that if I go slow enough, I'll realise that this is all just a dream and that, in reality, I'm sleeping and my imagination is running wild on the worst possible thing that could happen today.
And the worst possible thing to happen today is not to faint, or to throw-up, or to face public humiliation.
It's to discover that by some cruel twist of Fate, I've ended up in the same school, the same town as this guy.
Heath Hayes.
The minute I think the name, he turns around, wiping up the blood from his nose with a tissue. He's careful to hide his blood, knowing that the pure black liquid would scare normal people. His eyes widen and the bloody rag almost slips out of his grasp as he stares at me, chocolate brown eyes becoming impossibly big.
"Juliette Soren."
The possibility of me throwing-up is pretty high right now.
His lips tilt up in his legendary smirk – the one that could make a nun give up the celibate life – as he gives me a once over. "Wow, you've really grown up since the last time I saw you." His eyes hover over my chest. "When was that, three years ago?"
My eyes narrow into slits. "I don't know, I'm not exactly counting the days."
He gives me a chuckle, shaking his head as if I'm an amusing little five-year-old. "You say that, but I bet if I looked into your diary, I'd se-"
"What the hell are you doing here, Hayes?" I know if I let him go off on one of his sarcastic rants, I'll end up making an idiot of myself with a less-than-witty come back.
He looks at me as if I'm an idiot. "It's a school, Soren, I'm here for the same reason you are."
Perry walks up beside me, pushing at his burst lip and wincing in pain.
"You are in so much trouble," I tell Perry, looking away from Heath and his unbearably smug expression. Heath looks unharmed except for the slight nose-bleed. Apart from that, the jerk is... Perfect.
"Dad is going to kill you for even talking to one of them, you do know that, right?" Then I shake my head, getting on to the more pressing matter at hand. "Why were you even talking to him?"
Perry sends his fiercest glare over to Heath, which really isn't that fierce. Heath just cocks a brow, while I wait for Perry to answer.
"He called me some names and I lost it, sorry." He grumbles, rubbing his aching side.
I turn to Heath, stalking up to him.
"What did you call him?" And I feel like the most over-protective little sister ever, but I don't care how many man points will be taken away from Perry for me having to step into this fight, I'm not letting a Hayes beat up anymore of us. Especially this one.
The Sorens are usually just, pleasant, gentle people.
Until a Hayes gets involved.
Heath folds his arms over his chest, looking both unimpressed and bored. He doesn't count on me being a threat.
"Why don't you let Big Man over here tell you?" He says with a nod of his head, and anger blooms in me like a flower, right in my chest. 'Big Man', is what Heath and his stupid brothers call Perry, playing on the fact that Perry isn't big at all and being so goddamn original.
I hate that a Hayes – especially this one, the one I hate the most, which is really saying something - is using that nick-name in front of all these strangers. I hate that he has any sort of power over my brother and I. I hate that he can make Perry feel so small and inadequate with two words.
But most of all, I hate him.
I've never experienced rage and indignation on this scale before, and to be honest, the shake of my hands as I curl them into fists beside me scares me. The way that the anger spreads through me like it's in my veins has me terrified, but not terrified enough to stop.
"Well, Big Man?" Heath challenges. When his eyes glint as his mouth turns up into a smile, I know he knows what I'm thinking and I know what he thinks I'm going to do. That I'll grab Perry's hand and walk away. Taking the higher ground and proving that like the nursery rhymes that are told around the Blood Clanns, the Sorens are made of light. That I'll walk away with my brother and my family and we will move away and continue to all be good, little, blonde hair, blue eyed fairies that the Hayes' think we are.
But... Who wants to be good all the time? Especially when I don't feel like a good, little fairy.
So, instead of taking Perry's hand and taking the high road, I stalk up to Heath Hayes and I punch him in the jaw.
Liking the sound of skin on skin.
And loving the way he stumbles back and lands on his ass.
_________
Author's Note:
Don't forget to comment, vote and fan! Tell me what you think about Juliette, do you think she's just a good fairy, or does she have a bit of back-bone? Leave me a comment on your thoughts of this chapter.