Popped Read online

  ALSO BY ELIZABETH STEVENS

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  Some Proposal

  Royally Unprepared

  The Damned Trilogy

  Damned if I do

  Damned if I don’t

  Damned if I know

  Elizabeth Stevens

  Sleeping Dragon Books

  Popped

  by Elizabeth Stevens

  Print ISBN: 978-1925928037

  Digital ISBN: 978-1925928020

  Cover art by: Izzie Duffield

  Copyright 2019 Elizabeth Stevens

  Worldwide Electronic & Digital Rights

  Worldwide English Language Print Rights

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned or distributed in any form, including digital and electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the Publisher, except for brief quotes for use in reviews. This book is a work of fiction. Characters, names, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  For nerd-kind,

  Without whom, the world would be much less colourful.

  Contents

  Chapter 1: Bash

  Chapter 2: Paige

  Chapter 3: Bash

  Chapter 4: Paige

  Chapter 5: Bash

  Chapter 6: Paige

  Chapter 7: Bash

  Chapter 8: Paige

  Chapter 9: Bash

  Chapter 10: Paige

  Chapter 11: Bash

  Chapter 12: Paige

  Chapter 13: Bash

  Chapter 14: Paige

  Chapter 15: Bash

  Chapter 16: Paige

  Chapter 17: Bash

  Chapter 18: Paige

  Chapter 19: Bash

  Chapter 20: Paige

  Chapter 21: Bash

  Chapter 22: Paige

  Epilogue: Paige

  POPPED

  Thanks

  My Books

  About the Author

  Chapter 1: Bash

  When you’re the school Casanova, you have more experience popping cherries than you do getting popped yourself. But I was soon to learn that there was more to pop than just cherries and even Casanova wasn’t safe.

  “No way!” Rufio breathed from the backseat and I threw a look in the rearview mirror to see Leo nodding vigorously.

  “Yes way.” Leo grinned.

  “Then what happens?” Rufio asked excitedly and I smiled at seeing my mate be so enthralled by my little brother’s story.

  “D’you see Mia’s Insta on Saturday?” Jendo asked from the seat next to me.

  I huffed a rough laugh. “I did. Half thought she was naked for a second.”

  “I doubt it took long for Dowell to get her naked after it.”

  I snorted and immediately threw another look to the backseat again, but Leo was busy regaling Rufio with the latest in his saga.

  “Your Insta was oddly quiet that night…” Jendo said, leaving the question hanging.

  I slid him a cocky grin. “A gentleman doesn’t document his adventures, mate.”

  “Oh. So, you’ll have plenty of proof, then?” he teased and I laughed.

  “What about your night?”

  “You know I got fuck all. What was Saturday’s girl like?”

  “Saturday’s girl?” Rufio asked and I could basically hear his ears prick.

  “Never you mind, mate,” I told him.

  “No. No. No,” Rufio said, leaning forward to rest his arms on the two front seats. “I want to know about this girl on the weekend.” He looked back to Leo for a second. “Close your ears.”

  I shrugged. “And which girl would that be?” I asked, throwing a shit-eating grin to Jendo in the seat beside me.

  “I dunno. Girl number six-hundred and forty-three?” Rufio snorted. “Do you remember her name?”

  Jendo sighed. “Mate, after my birthday…” he chuckled wistfully.

  “Aw, you jealous, man?” I teased as I pulled onto the road our school was on. I shot another look in the rearview mirror and saw Leo watching us with vague interest.

  “Jealous?” Rufio gasped sarcastically. “Are we jealous that you’re now eighteen, with full license to get into pubs and clubs, drink to your heart’s content, and hopefully convince some girl to take you home?” He scoffed. “No. Why would we be jealous?”

  “What a fuckin’ ridiculous notion,” Jendo agreed with a smirk.

  “Language!” Rufio cried, throwing his hands over Leo’s ears as my brother tried to wave him off. “He’s young and impressionable.”

  “So, impress upon him,” Jendo sniggered.

  “Impress upon me what?” Leo asked, finally shoving Rufio’s hands away.

  There was silence and I waited with a smirk for the next obvious part of the conversation.

  “Oi, Jendo?” Rufio mused.

  “Yo?”

  “Did you notice how Casanova avoided the topic?”

  “You know, Roof? I did.”

  I could feel both their eyes on me as I pulled into the school carpark. “What do you want me to say, boys?” I asked them coyly.

  “Well, we were kinda hoping to hear how you…” Rufio paused, then whispered “fucked her six ways from Sunday,” like Leo wasn’t going to be able to hear him, “and got out of there without telling her your name to be honest.”

  I nodded thoughtfully as I scanned for a park. “Well boys, I can safely say there is one less virgin in the world and she…” I petered off, grinning as I saw the ostentatious pink VW Beetle slowing down ahead of me, indicator on.

  “Yes!” Jendo and Rufio laughed, and Leo leant forward to see what was going on.

  As she slowed for safety, I swung out and stole the parking space right from under the little princess’ nose…or bumper in this case. I heard her lean heavily on the horn and we all looked out the back window to watch her drive by. The three of us laughed as she and her friends scowled at my rear window. Leo smiled as usual and joined in Rufio’s fist bump, but I never knew whether he understood the joke or if our laughter was just infectious.

  “Another victory against the Triad,” Jendo said happily.

  “Do you think they realise they named themselves after a gang?” Rufio asked, leaning over the backseat into the boot to get his bag.

  “Organised crime syndicate. And I think that’s racist…” Leo said uncertainly as he got out of the car, his nose scrunching while he thought about it.

  “Yeah, Roof. Racist much?” Jendo mocked.

  “When does it stop being racist and start being true?” Rufio’s muffled voice floated to us, his head in the boot.

  “Uh, I think never,” I told him.

  “Well, regardless,” he huffed as he plopped back into the middle seat with his bag and blew a stray piece of hair out of his face. “You think they know?”

  I smirked as I grabbed my keys and phone, and popped the boot for Leo to open. “I doubt it.”
/>
  “That would require them using their brains for something other than fashion,” Jendo laughed as we climbed out.

  “Yeah. True,” Rufio mused before climbing out himself. “Georgie must know?”

  “Okay. Even I know that’s racist,” I snorted.

  I waited until he had his door open before locking the car, then shoved him along so I could get to the boot. Leo already had his bag and was hovering like he did when we got to school. I chuckled as I grabbed my bag, waited while Jendo got his, then slammed the boot shut again.

  My little Mazda Astina might have been older than me by a good decade or so, but it was more reliable than Rufio, suited any purpose I gave it, and had the added bonus of being cheap.

  “We’ll meet you back here after school, my man?” Rufio asked Leo, holding up his hand.

  Leo clapped it and nodded. “I’ve got PE last lesson, though.”

  Rufio shrugged. “Too easy, buddy. We’ll be here.”

  Leo hiked his bag straps further up his shoulders and started heading for his classroom. I ruffled his hair – black like mine – as he passed me.

  “Have a good day, yeah?” I said with a wry smile.

  Leo nodded as he looked up at me, blue eyes shining through his glasses. “Yeah, all right.” He gave me one of his goofy smiles and I gave his bag a gentle shove as he walked away.

  “Learn good!” Jendo called. “And behave yourself.”

  The three of us watched Leo wave back to us absently over his shoulder.

  “Right. Let me play devil’s advocate here,” Jendo started as we headed for our lockers to dump our shit before first lesson.

  “Oh, this oughta be good,” Rufio muttered with a laugh.

  “Nah. Listen. I’m quite partial to a bit of strange, right. But can Casanova here give us the numbers?”

  “Numbers for what?” I asked.

  “I want the percentage of these girls who turn out to be a bad lay.”

  “What?” I spluttered.

  “Stay with me.” Jendo was obviously serious about it because he started waving his hands around. “You’ve never met most of these girls. True?”

  Rufio erupted in a snort of laughter. “Only because he’s running out of girls at school.”

  Jendo grinned. “Either way.”

  I shrugged. “Yeah. I’ve never met most of them.” I pushed the main door open and waited to follow the boys through. “What of it?”

  “Doesn’t this run the risk she might be a shit lay?”

  “The Bash Man knows what he’s doing,” Rufio answered for me. “That man can make any lay a good one.”

  I huffed a short laugh. “He’s not totally wrong.”

  “Yeah. But doesn’t like finding an excellent lay and, I dunno, keeping her number on speed dial like make more sense? Like, then you’ll know you’re gonna have a good time,” Jendo mused.

  Rufio careened into the nerdy band geek in the year below us, and Jendo gave him an extra shove for good measure.

  “Mind how you go, Mr Trombone,” I laughed as he stammered awkwardly, gave up on verbalising actual coherent words, and hurried off.

  “You’ve still avoided the question, Bash,” Jendo pressed, whacking me in the arm. “Are one-nighters better than a regular lay?”

  I tuned out as they started debating whether a regular lay would lead to attachment – of which I wasn’t capable according to Rufio – while I thought how best to answer.

  What I wasn’t going to tell either of the boys was that there were rare times when I wondered what it would be like to have a regular girl. I wondered if it would be worth it to have something – someone – like a centre. But that shit made you weak and I couldn’t afford to be weak. I had to be the strong one. People depended on me so I couldn’t go around being dependant on anyone else. Someone had to be the tall, indestructible stalwart.

  Rufio’s elbow in my side brought me back to the present.

  “Tell him I’m right,” he insisted as we pushed into the Common Room.

  “Even if you were, I’m siding with Jendo,” I replied cockily as we got to our lockers.

  As we did most mornings, we pulled them open almost in sync.

  “Fair,” Jendo agreed.

  “Not fair,” Rufio huffed.

  “Fine. I wasn’t even listening. What were you saying?” I threw my backpack into my locker and rifled around for my Maths exercise book.

  “I told him one-nighters all the way.”

  “I never said you were wrong!” Jendo exclaimed indignantly.

  “You didn’t say I was right.”

  “I just said I needed more data before making an informed decision.”

  “And I told him he was a twat.”

  “Which didn’t actually answer my question.”

  I shook my head with a wry smile. “Against my better judgement, I’m siding with Roof. On both counts,” I added before Jendo could argue.

  He frowned. “I’m still not convinced.”

  “That you’re a twat?” Rufio asked as we closed our locker padlocks and angled ourselves between the sea of kids.

  “Up ya mum’s twat maybe,” Jendo replied quickly and Rufio shook his head.

  They were still squabbling as I started leading them to our classroom.

  “I thought we agreed to keep everyone’s mum out of it?”

  “I don’t think that was the deal.”

  “Okay. Then I’m asking for it.”

  “So was your mum,” Jendo chuckled as he shoved Rufio companionably, who shoved him right back.

  I hid my snigger behind a smirk as we trailed into the classroom and headed towards the back. Mitch Adair was sitting in my usual seat and I glared at him in question.

  “So-sorry, Bash,” he stammered. “I miscounted…” He quickly grabbed his things and slunk off to another chair.

  I dropped into mine, Jendo and Rufio falling into place beside me.

  I saw Miss Princess give me an unimpressed once over as she sat down at the front of the classroom with her two best friends and an exercise book covered in contact a pink to rival her brand spanking new, limited edition VW. Her pencil case was pink. Her watch band was pink. I was pretty sure the only reason Watford’s house colour hadn’t been changed to pink was because she hadn’t thought of it. If she had, you can bet your little cotton socks the ribbons in her hair would be pink not yellow; no teacher had ever denied her anything in the whole time I’d been at Mitcham College.

  She was all of five foot seven, slim and perky, objectively beautiful, with olive skin, dark blonde hair and hazel eyes. She was also, for some God forsaken reason, the school’s ‘it’ girl; everyone worshipped the very ground she walked on. I was honestly surprised we didn’t sing hymns to praise her glory in our weekly chapel service. Not that anyone had been in any position to fully know her glory in order to praise it. If you know what I mean.

  I was distracted from thinking about all the things that annoyed me about her by a new teacher walking through the door. She was young – had to be recently out of uni – and everything tall, dark and delicious. She had to be what I got to look at after Burby broke his ankle going up the stairs the week before.

  “Good morning, class,” she said, as she stopped at the teacher’s desk. “My name’s Miss Marino and I’ll be your substitute while Mr Burby’s leg is recovering. I understand we take the roll first?”

  Little Miss Perfect nodded from her seat up the front and said, “Yes. Just first lesson and after lunch though.”

  Miss Marino smiled. “Thank you…?”

  “Paige. Paige Nicholls, miss.”

  I rolled my eyes to Jendo and Rufio, who both sniggered.

  “Paige Nicholls, miss,” Rufio mocked and Jendo barely covered a laugh with a cough.

  “Thank you, Paige.” Miss Marino looked at the three of us pointedly before looking down at her school-issued laptop. “Okay. Mitch Adair?”

 
“Here.”

  “Sebastian Baker?”

  I lifted my hand up by my head and back down again, smirking at her suggestively.

  “Great,” Miss Marino said, taking her eyes off me quickly. “Lucy Brenner?”

  “Here.”

  “Daniel Carvalho?”

  Rufio lifted his hand with a grin as a few people softly chanted his nickname around the room. Story was that Rufio’s parents had named him after a character in a movie because, when he was a baby, he’d had the same hairstyle and the nickname had – fortunately or not for him – stuck right through.

  There were a couple more names until… “Jean Des… Desjardins?” As usual with any new teacher, her pronunciation wasn’t worth shit. And she was obviously questioning that as much as she was asking if that student was present.

  I snorted and I wasn’t the only one. Most of the kids in the class were in various states of humour and Jendo just sighed. His whole life people had been mispronouncing his name, and thinking he was a girl to boot.

  “Jendo’ll do, miss,” he said as he lifted his hand.

  Miss Marino looked up at him. You could see her trying to reconcile the facts in front of her with the assumptions in her head. “Jendo?”

  He nodded. “It’s French. Jean. Everyone just calls me Jendo though.”

  She looked like she wasn’t sure whether to believe him or not. I personally didn’t think even Perfect Princess Paige up front would sneak into a Maths lesson and pretend to be someone else. Miss Marino was a looker, mind. Had she not been my teacher, I might have considered it at least once.

  “Okay…” she said finally. “Jendo.” She nodded, paused for a moment, then continued on again with the roll.

  Jendo huffed and slid down in his seat, flopping his hands down on his desk in front of him.

  “You right there, Jean?” I whispered, purposefully pronouncing it ‘Gene’.

  “Fuck off, Sebastian,” he muttered back testily, but there was a slight smile to his lips he couldn’t hide.

  Chapter 2: Paige

  When you’re the school’s silver spoon – its Queen Bee – you’re used to people treating you a certain way. However, I was soon to learn that the higher up the food chain you were, the further you had to fall.