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“Is it already determined that you two will fight in the final match?” I asked, my heart doing that flip flop response whenever I thought about the two of them locked in the cage, beating the shit out of each other, seeking dominance over the entirety of Dirty Kingdom.
“It’s pretty much determined,” Valen said. “The odds are in their favor that they’ll meet up. The bookies have all decided that will be the pairing with the highest number of viewers and the maximum possible in betting.”
“Is all of this just about money?” I asked.
“Yes, mostly about money. But it’s also about rich people being bored as fuck, and boring enough that they can’t think of any other way to entertain themselves. When you have too much money, everything becomes too easy after a while,” Valen explained.
“That’s disgusting,” I said as we crossed the wide veranda at the top of the low, wide staircase. It was all done in white marble and glowed like smooth glass under the multitude of lights. “If you have that much money, why wouldn’t you do something beneficial with it? Like help poor people or feed starving children?”
“I guess because they’ve lost touch with reality,” Archer said as we edged our way through the tightest clot of people congregating just inside the double folding doors to the outside. We were in search of a bathroom so I could get the blood off Kingston’s face and press some ice on it if we could find any. “Even my parents don’t understand how there are poor people in the world. They just assume everybody has money, just some have less than others.”
“I wish I lived in that bubble,” I said and led them down a hall to where a bathroom might be. I checked every door and we finally found one. I helped Kingston inside and I opened a closet to find it stacked with towels of all sizes. I ran cold water over a small hand towel and pressed it against Kingston’s face as I gently washed the dried blood away.
“You don’t want that, princess,” Ryker said with a rueful grimace. The three of them crowded around us, watching me work. “Living in a rich bubble means you’re a moron who can’t see what’s in front of her pretty face.”
“I get what you’re saying,” I told him as I gently cleared the blood away from under Kingston’s nose and off his cheek. His eye looked bruised, and his nose had a crooked slant to it that wasn’t there before. I hoped it wasn’t broken. “But the thing is, it’s much easier to be sad about life if you have a swimming pool. It sucks when you have nothing and hate your life.”
Ryker laughed and said, “Okay, you’ve got me there.”
“Ouch,” Kingston said and winced as I hit the split on his lip. It’s funny how he didn’t complain when we were kissing, but now he was queasy over it. I guess horny hormones helped keep the pain away.
“Sorry, almost done,” I said and wiped one last time, cleaning his face. “Can anybody find anything for infection? Like an antibiotic for the skin?”
Archer rummaged around the closet and pulled out a drawer. He looked through, held up a small tube and said, “Like this?”
“Yeah, exactly what I want,” I replied and took it. I squeezed a little out, applied it to the open wounds on Kingston’s face, and slipped it into my pocket. We might need it for later.
“Do you want to go home?” Kingston asked. “Is this too much for you, Evie?”
“Only if you do,” I replied and frowned as I examined him carefully. “It’s not too much, is it? Because if it is, then we should get you to the ER.”
“That’s a big red flag warning sign,” Valen agreed. “When Kingston fucking Taylor doesn’t want to party, you know he’s dying.”
“And I’m not dying,” Kingston said, standing upright and stretching slowly, giving me a good look at his gorgeous body. “So let’s go find my shirt and get fucking hammered tonight, boys!”
All four of them whooped like Kingston had the best, most unique idea on the planet, and I had to smile at them, my three Kings and the mercenary.
We did just that, found Kingston’s shirt, found some alcohol, and began to enjoy ourselves in the wild chaos of a teenage party.
And nobody could party like the wealthy. Not that there weren’t people at the party from my side of the town there, there were plenty of those, but rich kids had this extra edge to everything. This manic craziness, where they had to ramp everything up a notch as if they couldn’t feel anything unless it was dangerous or illegal. I thought about what Ryker had said, and realized there was a lot of truth to it.
They were bored. That’s the simplest explanation. When you could have anything you wanted, wanting things lost the serotonin thrill that it gave normal people like you and me. They could buy and sell anything, and it grew less and less exciting as they grew older.
So they did stupid shit like drive somebody’s Tesla X into the pool to see if it would explode, you know, electric car and all that.
Spoiler alert, it didn’t.
They broke furniture, destroyed priceless paintings and sculptures, and a big group of particularly annoying douche bag boys ganged up and tore down a really beautiful wooden gazebo over a hot tub on one of the verandas.
“They’re fucking nuts, won’t the kid’s parents get mad at all this destruction?” I asked the guys sometime after that.
“That’s one perk of having rich parents,” Valen said. “Even when they do show up, they don’t usually notice if you destroy things.”
“Or you can hire people to fix it before mommy and daddy get home,” Archer added.
“Gross,” I said and sipped my vodka drink. I didn’t even know how many I’d had at that point, probably about five too many. I was still aware of my surroundings, though, and still able to make choices about what I wanted to do.
And at that point, I wanted to fulfill my earlier promise.
