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“I was in Chicago.”
“And?” She reached around me to grab my belt.
I put my hand over hers. “Did you want me to drive all night or fly?”
“You could have been here if you wanted to be.” She purred, and I knew there was a punishment coming for not doing what she’d never asked me to do. But that was Lucy. She wanted you to read her mind, and if you didn’t do what she wanted when she expected it, there was always a punishment. And for a long time, I thought I was the problem. Maybe a part of me still did, and that’s why I came back at my weakest. “Let go, or you won’t like the way tonight ends.”
I released her wrist, already regretting coming in here. “Let’s leave then.”
“No.” She pulled my belt, opening it. “No one can see.”
“You know how I feel about—” I didn’t want to say it. Not in front of Kingsley.
“No one can see. You’re pressed up against the bar.” She popped open the button on my jeans between rough fondles.
“Lucy, seriously. Not here.” My body locked up, and sweat prickled my brow. It was too close to how it had happened. It was hard for me to do anything in public. Not after—I swallowed, trying to block it out. Then with my privacy breached so many times because of fame the trauma around it nearly threw me into a panic attack.
She knew this. She’d tried it before. Maybe when my dick didn’t get hard, she’d get the idea.
“Aspen,” Kingsley said through his teeth.
“You should go.” I pressed my eyes closed, fingertips digging into the bar top, but I didn’t have time to make the argument because Lucy’s fingers were working their way under my briefs.
“I’ve giving you five seconds...” Kingsley said, gaze boring into the side of my face.
I couldn’t will myself to say anything to him. I tried to fight off the rising panic. My brain was losing control of my body.
“Baby, are you not happy to see me at all?” Lucy said in her pouty baby voice against my ear.
“You know—” But I couldn’t get more out. I swallowed again, trying to fight off the panic. My ears rang, and my vision narrowed.
“What?” she said, all coy like.
I couldn’t talk or move, my body locking me out. Anyone else I would have laid out. But for some reason, maybe because Lucy was a woman, I couldn’t do it. We didn’t hit women. That had been drilled into me since I was a kid. Not even when they took advantage.
Or so I told myself. It was easier than thinking it had anything to do with my trauma.
“What the fuck are you doing?”
In an instant, the press of Lucy’s body was gone, and I sagged, only holding off dropping to my knees by the grace of God. Kingsley put his arm around my shoulders, which helped keep me upright.
“Can we have a glass of water?” Kingsley asked.
“I’m fine.” Feeling returned to my fingers, and I fixed my pants to see if what I thought was happening actually was.
I turned around to find Royal standing over Lucy.
Fuck.
FIVE
Royal
Idon’t know what made me follow Aspen, but the way he left the bar told me he’d go find her. The text from Kingsley only confirmed it. I tracked their location, thanks to Aspen never turning his off. He really shouldn’t leave it on when he was going to find her, but I wasn’t going to tip him off.
None of us liked Lucy, but hate was too nice a word for how I felt about her. I’d thought about shoving the cunt in front of a bus a time or two, but I couldn’t say shit while she was dating my best friend. This was too far.
I walked into the little dive bar expecting to have time to talk him out of his stupidity, but her hands were already on him, and his expression told me everything. I knew what she was doing. She had no fucking excuse. She knew what he’d been through.
