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My body longs for it, my womb pulsing through me, sending shivering sensations surging around my sex.
But now my high school bully is at the door.
“Kimberly,” Kristian snarls, nodding to the ensuite door, hefting the gold vase as though it’s weightless. His silver hair is swept to the side, his quicksilver eyes stark and wolfish and intense. “Now.”
“Okay, okay,” I breathe, running for the ensuite.
I fumble with the handle and let out a gasp. I feel so clumsy, my head foggy from the jarring switch in atmosphere.
Aaron is here.
Is he here for me?
I push open the bathroom door and walk inside. The heated flooring turns on and lights blink awake, showing the marble tiles, claw foot tub, rock sauna, and Jacuzzi, all laid out like a spa.
I turn, closing the door, leaving a small window for me to watch.
I can’t not watch.
Something might happen to Kristian.
“Kimberly?” Aaron laughs after a long pause. “I fucking knew I recognized her. Kimberly Grayson. I’ll tell you, life is full of weird coincidences. The last time I saw Kimberly, she was all teary-eyed because I said I’d go to prom with her. Ha, can you imagine? Goddamn, she was so gullible.”
Pain pulses through my chest, my eyes tingling with the suggestion of tears. I want to be strong.
“You’re a dead man,” Kris says calmly, his voice matter of fact and violent, “if you make another comment about her again. You shut your fucking mouth about my woman.”
“Don’t make threats, Kris.”
“Boss, I’m sorry,” another man whines, his voice thick and raspy with a smoker’s cough. “He’s my dealer and I said, have you got any speed, and he was like, yeah, yeah, we got speed. So I followed them and one of them knew me, and they made me find you.”
“That’s right,” Aaron says, his voice brimming with the same pride I remember from high school.
After prom, I’d run into him and the cheerleader at the mall, passing by the food court. I walked by, my head held high, desperate to seem like I didn’t care. But then Aaron would see me, and he’d nudged his girlfriend. As I walked right past them they’d started to make horrible oinking noises.
I kept my head held high, but that just made it easier for the tears to slide down my cheeks.
“So open up before I blow this door down. I’ve got my whole crew with me.”
His crew.
Aaron is a drug dealer now.
I always knew he’d end up doing something like this. Most bullies like him do.
A twisted part of me is glad. I never should’ve let him make me feel small.
“Maury, how’d the fuck you know I was here?”
“Your little friend,” Aaron answers for him. “Winnie—Vinnie. Whatever the fuck his name is.”
“Is he alive?” Kris snarls, tightening his grip on the vase.
His knuckles are turning white with how hard he’s gripping the solid gold. His muscles throb against the fabric of his jacket, his shoulders bulging, veins dancing in his neck. It’s as if any second his muscles could explode out of his skin. His eyes blaze.
“Alive enough,” Aaron says, chuckling. “Now, you’ve got until the count of five before I huff and puff, Krissie, my man.”
“Does he know who I am?” Kris says.
“Yeah, boss,” Maury says. “He says he don’t care. You’re just a rich man like everybody else.”
Kris shakes his head slowly, his eyes on the floor.
I wonder if he’s going to glance over here, but he seems in complete disbelief that somebody would be stupid enough to do something like this to him. He looks like the most alpha lion in the region getting ready to defend his territory.
Animal awareness floods his expression a moment later.
“And he thinks he can get away with this?” Kris snarls.
“You and the girl, you know, home invasion sorta deal,” Maury murmurs, his voice trembling.
I can hear regret and sorrow quivering in his voice.
He’s the man who left the drugs at the houses, the drugs Tinkerbell almost ate.
And now he’s led them here, to us, on one of the most important nights in our relationship.
I want to scream at Kris to make Maury pay, but he sounds too scared.
Aaron is worse.
“Gonna do some pretty nasty shit if you don’t give us what we want,” Aaron says.
“And what do you want?” Kris growls, working his jaws from side to side.
“One million dollars in cash.”
“Such a little sum,” Kris chuckles, the corners of his lips twitching upward like a beast getting ready to bite. “A lot of effort to go through for that, Aaron, but I suppose little boys can’t be expected to know such things.”
“Careful,” Aaron snarls through the door. “There’s four of us out here and we’re armed.”
“One million,” Kris booms, slamming his hand against the door along with his laughter.
I wonder what he’s doing – if he’s gone mad – but then I see him drifting off to the side of the door. He makes himself as flat as possible, a hard feat when his muscles are straining with everything they have to erupt from his crinkled gray suit.
