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“You are never to follow me again. Do you understand?” He grasped my shoulder firmly. “You are much too young to be out on these streets, to see things like that.”
I clenched my jaw, my entire body still burning up with humiliation.
“You are becoming a pain in my ass, Katrina.” He stood fully up, pinching his nose. “Come on, let’s go home.” He led us back to the ship, forgetting about his rich lover left in the alley.
But I never got the vision of what he had been doing to her out of my head. Later, at boarding school, wrapped in the jacket I stole from him, I imagined myself in her place.
“Are you going to eat that?” Sprig’s voice jolted me out of my thoughts, his little body crawling down my arm to the plate of cabbage rolls. “Do they have honey in them?” He poked at the roll. “Why does it look like an uncircumcised wet penis? Not that I would know what that looksortastes like. I mean, if it had honey on it… or even a little squirting out of it—”
“Sprig.” I shoved one in his mouth. “Shut up.”
Frowning down at the one left, I sighed, my hunger evaporating, my mind still on the past.
For a while after that night, we both pretended nothing had changed, that I hadn’t seen his bare ass thrusting into that woman.
But everything had changed for me; the innocence in my admiration was tainted. I felt different around him, my hormones not only shifting how I viewed him, but how I reacted when he strolled up on deck, how I felt about him. My body flared with awareness, and instead of being disgusted about what I saw, I was curious. I continued to follow him, getting better at staying hidden, wanting more and more for the woman to be me.
I was no longer the young, innocent girl who wrote his name in my diary. Nor the woman he could screw in an alley and leave. I became the woman who fuckedhimand left and would not become one of his whores.
I mean, I was fuckin’ Puss in Boots! Though without my boots or jacket, I felt defanged and clawless. Maybe that was the problem. I just needed to get back to my ship, sail the high seas—kill, pillage, and screw every handsome, rich guy in port.
Get back to what I knew. What I loved.
Though, watching Croygen stroll away, his firm ass straining his new cargo pants, I ignored the hollowness of being with anyone else, as if what I loved before was a mirage, an empty vessel. I had seen through it, gone to the other side. Something in me once again had changed, and as much as I wanted to go back to how it was, I knew I never would.
Just like that night. Croygen ruined me.
I thought I cursed him when I left his ship, but in reality, he cursed me.
It took us most of the afternoon to find someone willing to tell us where this place was. People kept clamping their jaws shut, looking around before dashing off. We were outsiders, and most weren’t willing to talk to us. Finally, some teenage kid who got a good chunk of change brought us down an ordinary-looking lane. It held a handful of shops, with wagons and people weaving down the tight passage, the sun low enough to cast deep shadows. The boy’s head tipped purposely as we passed a nondescript building.
“Look,” Cooper muttered to us, his chin flicking to an iron door. A small, freshly painted symbol of a Lantern tattooed the wall near the door, almost unnoticeable unless you were really looking for it.
“Think we found our place.” Croygen glanced over at Cooper, lowering his voice. “Take AB home. Kat and I will handle this.”
“No.” Cooper shook his head. “What if you need backup?”
Croygen snorted, his gaze landing on me for a moment as if to sayI got backup right here, then went back to Cooper. “We’ll be fine.”
“Croy—”
“She’s exhausted.” Croygen nodded at AB, speaking for only him to hear. “We don’t know what we’re walking into. Take her back. Be with your girl.”While you can. “Kat and I got this.”
Was it sick somewhere deep inside I felt pride he considered me an equal? Not as man or woman, but as a pirate. With any trouble, he knew I could take care of myself and probably him too.
Cooper scanned the door, his feet shifting, not wanting to leave, but taking AB into a situation where things might go bad… he wouldn’t do that to her if he didn’t have to.
“Okay.” Cooper nodded. “But if you aren’t back in a few hours…”
“What, you’ll huff and puff and blow the house down?” Croygen grinned wickedly.
“Fuck off.” Cooper rolled his eyes, taking AB’s hand. “I’m serious.”
Croygen nodded in understanding, watching them stroll away before he turned to me.
“Ready to follow me into the abyss where we might be attacked and killed, Kitten?” Half his mouth inched up in a grin.
“Always.” I grinned back before both of us realized we couldn’t stand the other and stepped back.
