“Oh yeah?” I made a point to tie Rico up again. “Why were you on his phone?”
She stirred. “I liked Rico, and…well, we kind of messed around, so…he went to the bathroom to take a shower and, I just…picked up his phone.”
“I get it.”
“I have trust issues.”
“Was there anything else besides pictures of Zola?”
“No, but some were of her sleeping, and a few were her coming out of the shower. It was like he took it when the door was ajar.”
Yeah. Rico, I’ll be paying you another visit.
11
Trigger Fingers Turned to Broken Fingers
Zola
Trigger tapped my arm. “Zola?”
I kept back my annoyance, trying to figure out how I’d managed to date him earlier this year. “Yes.”
“Who’s the new guy?” Trigger asked. “What happened to Rico?”
“Why?”
“Just wondering.”
“About what?” I asked.
“If the rumors are true.”
“What rumors?”
“I heard you had a stalker. It was on The Shade Room this afternoon.”
“That blog gossips.”
“They also tell the truth.” Trigger leaned in closer. “So?”
“My team has everything covered.”
“You should let my people get over there.” Trigger did his signature look, raising the side of his lip into a growl. “I rock with strong hitters, baby. Street dudes. They’ll die for me. They’ll die for you, if you fuck with me.”
“Really?” I gestured to his boys as they snorted a line of coke. “I’m good.”
Tomorrow, it would be all over Twitter. Natural Health cigarettes may love or hate the scandal. Only the devil knew which one it would be.
Alexander stepped up to the stage and snapped his fingers. “Okay. After this song ends, it will be time.”
The song played.
Trigger smiled.
I stiffened.
And Hunter leaned down to me and whispered, “Time for what?”
I was speechless for a few seconds. Hunter’s scent encased me. I instantly went back to how it felt hugging him earlier. Clearing my throat, I whispered back to him, “We’re going to dance to Trigger’s new hits. They’ll need some pictures.”
“Are you serious?” Hunter frowned. “The dance is in the contract?”
“Yes.”
Hunter didn’t look excited about the idea of Trigger and I dancing. It could’ve been for safety reasons. It might be hard to guard me on a crowded floor.
Either way, I rose, already done with this night. I’d been up since five in the morning for the damn safari shoot. Later, I discovered my apartment and belongings torn apart which was a true symbol that my stalker was not going anywhere soon.
And that wasn’t even the biggest and most emotionally exhausting part of the day.
Hunter…wants me. He didn’t come to Christmas for all those years because of those feelings? It can’t be that simple. If so, then this is more than lust.
My heart kicked into high gear. I calmed myself. I couldn’t go there just yet.
Hunter was so damaged and had such skewed ideas of love. With my mom, he was a perfect angel, and there was no reason for him to be. Mom loved him because he was him. Anybody who met Hunter was instantly infatuated. Yet, he worked so hard for Mom’s love, when he didn’t have to.
And it was so hard to convince him of that.
The tiny burns on his body was the reason. They were reminders of his past. I’d seen him at the beach as a teen. Even then he had muscles. It was hard not to drool over him. And if one looked long enough, one could see some of the marks on his back, stomach, and arms.
This is going to complicate things.
Now that Hunter had opened the gate, I damn sure was walking through. Maybe he just wanted to fuck me. Perhaps, it was no more than him needing to get it out of his system.
Well…he could sign me up for that too!
Hunter had been the man of my sexual fantasies for years. A taboo. A thing I shouldn’t have even taken there with my libido, but still I did. How could anyone go through puberty with a sex god living in their house, and not masturbate to him a few times.?
Every damn girl in his school loved him. York hated it. Not that York had a problem with getting girls. He just disliked how Hunter took his female bombardments for granted. The girls always came, but Hunter barely talked to anybody and never dated. It was either football, school, or watching me for Mom.
Due to that, Mom spent months convincing Hunter to go to his senior prom. At York’s and his school, there was tradition of the boys doing elaborate things to ask the girls out to the prom.
In Hunter’s case, the girls asked him. He was the hot quarterback that was taller than all the guys, respectful to the teachers in class, yet talked to no one but York and his teammates.
Dark and mysterious always lured hungry hearts.
During his senior year, he spent days bumping into massive surprises. It must’ve been ten elaborate prom proposals. The best one was Sara Parker, who’d tied hundreds of balloons to the trees in front of our house in the middle of the night. The rest of her cheerleading squad had helped. Hunter had left to go to school that morning, and she’d greeted him with a BB gun, which had caught him off guard. Then she asked him to shoot the balloons. He did with no problem, and cards fell to the grounds. Tons and tons of different colored ones all with the same question: