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She hated me. Good. I liked it. I needed her to hate me so she could stay away from me. I didn’t need nor could I afford someone like her fucking with my head the way she thought she could.
I danced with her.
I got her here.
She’s a fucking recruit.
“You seem lost…” she teased from the corner of the cell, her finger running circles on the floor. It’s not concrete and old. The flooring downstairs was all carpet in their cells. They had comfortable beds and clean sheets. The whole idea was to get them to bend and play, not to run and cry.
Unfortunately, the ones who did the latter ended up bleeding out down the drain and burned to ash before being scattered over the lake behind this building. There were six rooms, all the cells as walls and doors. Right now, Kerry was in one, and we had twin boys in another. They weren’t sure what they wanted to do. Unlucky for them, their family ran, and now they had to pay their parents’ bills.
“I’m never lost.” I leaned forward on my chair until I rested my elbows on my thighs. “I’m just wondering when you’re going to crack and agree.”
“Hmmm…” She crawled toward me on her hands and knees. It wasn’t until she reached the door that her little fingers wrapped around the poles and she pulled herself up to her feet. She wore the same clothes she did the other night when we took her. It was her way of defiance. Not changing. “I will never do that.”
“I can make you.” The words weren’t supposed to come out as a threat, but I forgot who I was sometimes. I may only be seventeen, but I didn’t age the same way others did.
“You killed that man last night.” She turned her back to me. “Why?”
“I do it often.”
“Do you have reasons?”
“Aside from this?” I asked, pointing around the place even though I knew she couldn’t see. Why the fuck I was talking with her, I didn’t know.
“Yeah.” Her voice was husky, like she’d burned the hairs on her throat from too much nicotine. Way too mature for her age bracket. “I see it in your eyes. I saw it last night when you killed him. You don’t do it because you have to.” She finally turned back to me, and I studied her face closely. I needed to know why she crawled beneath my skin all to claw her way out. “You do it because you need to.”
I leaned back against the chair, losing my thoughts on the way her dark brown hair glided down to her hips. She reminded me of a siren. Small, frail features, and heavy hair. “No. I do it because I want to.”
For the first time since that night in the club, I watched as her cherry red lips turned upward in a grin. “Then do it to me.”
You can’t burn off the memory of killing someone. I’ve never not wanted to kill someone I’ve killed. Power lies in the simplicity of rules, and mine were very clear. If they didn’t do things a certain way, or if they went against what they were told to do, they were put down. I didn’t make the rules, but I sure as fuck was the enforcer. And when I didn’t have rules or an outlet… I made one.
“I can’t even think of the show right now with everything else going on in the background. What the fuck is even the point? We need to get Eli back on track and figure out what Cartier is doing.”
“The show must go on,” King replies, leaning back against one of the chairs used in the VIP booths near the stage. Maya and Val are working on their set, with Perse on the other side of the stage fixing her ballet slippers.
“Cartier isn’t hiding anything else that we need to know,” I clarify, ignoring Kyrin hovering at the end of the table like a lion ready to feed. “Ky, fucking chill. You’re making me edgy every time I mention her name.”
“So what is happening there, hmmm?” Kyrin asks, and I know it’s a double-edged sword as far as questions go. It’s also a valid one.
I lean forward on the table. “I know this is hard for you to hear, but Cartier and I aren’t anything new, bro. We really ain’t. We’ve been doing this dance for fucking years, so as far as I’m concerned, I don’t have to answer that question because there is no answer for it. Neither of us is looking at labels, because it has never been labels for her and me. It is just that. Her and me.”
“So you’re both not seeing anyone else? You’re both going to not get hurt when the other finds out, oh, I don’t know, that the other has been lying to them.” His voice picks up toward the end, and I have to fight with myself not to reach over and clip him in the jaw. The last thing I need right now is Maya and Val stirring the girl drama pot.
“Fuck outta here with that bullshit, Ky. You and I both—no—everyone sitting here right now knows that it has to be this way so she doesn’t get hurt.”
Kyrin’s jaw clenches, his eyes stirring with anger. I get it. He’s mad as fuck. I always knew it was going to happen, but I didn’t consider this. It slipped my mind. I don’t know what’s going to happen. In fact, I would do everything in my power to make sure she never finds out.
Including lying to her.
“Look!” Killian snaps his fingers in front of my face, forcing all of our attention on him. “We can’t be doing this. Keaton is right, that whole thing there is something she doesn’t have to know—no—shouldn’t know. We can’t have it. If she finds out that—” His face pales and King shifts uncomfortably beside him. “No, yeah, it’s bad.” Killian breathes out loudly, surrendering his hands in the air. “I ain’t got nothing. It’s fucking bad. Like really fucking bad.”
“What are you all talkin’ about?” Kohen slams his hands on the table. Fucking Kohen. He knows everything too.
“About a big fat secret that you will keep, because if you don’t, I’ll kill you,” I answer flatly, my eyes drifting over his shoulder when I see the girls all packing up.
