Page 41 of Lethal in Pink

How much longer are you going to keep pretending to be a normal person?

Jab.

The bag thuds.

Are you actually here to find yourself?

Cross.

The chain snaps tight.

Or is this just an expensive way to piss off your parents?

Hook.

My shoulder burns.

I strike harder. The bag swings farther; I catch it and shove it back, then hit it again and again. My rhythm fractures.

Sweat beads at my temple and my shirt clings to my back. Technique turns into brute force until my hands ache and my lungs burn. The anger is still there, but it’s quieter now. That’s exactly what I needed—less noise. I stop punching and catch the bag with a gloved hand, slowing it to a stop. Resting my head against the cool leather of the bag, I inhale a deep breath before letting it out in a slow, steady exhale.

I unwrap my hands slowly. The wraps are damp; my knuckles glow pink underneath.

The pain is clean.

Simple.

Nothing complicated about it.

I grab my phone.

No new messages from Kiho.

I open our thread anyway.

His last question is still sitting there.

I stare at it.

My thumb hovers over the keyboard.

I could reply. I don’t—because I don’t know. And that’s what stings: not his doubt, but that fleeting moment I thought he might be right.

I lock the phone, sling my bag over my shoulder, and nod at the attendant on my way out. The evening air hits me—cool, smoggy LA, a mix of car exhaust and sweet syrup from the bubble-tea shop next door.

The edge is gone, even if the question remains.

Chapter fourteen

Amiyah

The apartment smells like someone tried to mask a crime scene with cheap air freshener and then gave up halfway through. Stale weed. Fast food grease congealing on unwashed plates. Underneath it all, is the putrid moldy-rot smell of neglect, the kind that seeps into the walls and stays there

Julias Nevera is already high when I find him. Not a little high. Not pleasantly buzzed. The kind of high where your pupils eat your irises whole and your mouth hangs open like a broken cabinet door. He’s slouched on a cracked leather couch that might have been black once, before time and bodily fluids had their way with it. A half-eaten bag of chips rests on his chest, rising and falling with each breath. On the large flat-screen TV screen across from him, some reality show murmurs at a volume just loud enough to mask the sound of my footsteps.

I don’t need to mask my footsteps. He’s not hearing anything right now.

“Camera three is wiped,” Penelope’s voice says in my earpiece, crisp and clear. “DVR loop running clean. You’ve got twelve minutes before the building’s security cycle resets and the cameras come back online. Clock starts now.”