Crowned by Hate (Crowned 1)

“And who was that?” I add a quirked eyebrow.

“That?” he looks over his shoulder innocently. “What?”

“Devon!” I bite at him.

“It’s not as—” another person walks past him, only this time, it was a girl.

“Really?” I deadpan. “You had to go there?”

He grins at me, his baby blue eyes lighting up my room and enough to break through my pissy mood.

I sigh in defeat. “I’m just jealous. I haven’t gotten any in well… almost a week.” Collecting up the rest of my clothes, my head slightly hanging between my shoulders. In this day and age, the word ‘Nymphomania’ is tossed around about as much as said ‘nymphos,’ but I truly believe both Devon and I suffer with this condition. Both for different reasons. I don’t know much about Devon’s family life. In fact, any time I ever asked about his family he always shut down, but I know my reasons have a lot to do with my home life. You know, ‘she wasn’t loved enough as a child’ blah blah. It’s all fun and games until someone really wasn’t ‘loved enough as a child.’ I have issues. Deep issues that I run away from by the temporary void sex gives me. I’m working on it, I guess. But if I’m being honest, I haven’t gotten much better.

“Well…” Devon places his bowl on my dresser, coming further into my room. I watch as each muscle clenches with every movement. “You know I can scratch that itch, baby.”

“Don’t!” I hold a single finger up. “I’m not… no. I’ll be okay. I’ll go out with Jen tonight.”

I could go out with Jen, but in all honesty, a night out with Jen isn’t always a good time.

“Baby, you know you need it…” Devon begins, inching toward me. “You need to find you a daddy. One who will not just rock your world, but fucking smash it into pieces.” Devon starts air humping the post of my bed, and I toss my shirt at him. “Get out!”

I need a new best friend.

Once he finally leaves, I tug on my jeans, jumping up and down to squeeze the goods in and then throw my shirt over my head. Walking into the bathroom, I fluff my dark hair up until it falls in natural waves down to my tailbone. I quickly dust on some make-up, I don’t wear much of it and hardly wear it so it’s all cracked and old. Brushing on my mascara, I chance a real look at myself in the mirror. I wouldn’t say I was unfortunate in the looks department, but I have insecurity issues that I fight with every day, which is why, in short, I have sex with men because it makes me feel good. It fills a void that was left inside of me when my mom abandoned me and my nonexistent father decided that his career was more important than raising his daughter. So yes, I enjoy sex. It’s something that makes me feel good—what’s so wrong with enjoying that? I’m so sick of the slut-shaming in this day and age. A girl gets called a slut if she has the sexual appetite of a man. Well, I’d wear that badge with pride and polish it with my middle finger.

Exhaling, I place my mascara back into my make-up bag and look back at myself in the mirror. My eyes are a deep green, almost like greenstone, while my skin is more on the paler side — thanks to my mom’s Scandinavian heritage. I do have my father’s angular jawline and his small pixie nose. I think. I’ve only ever seen one photo of my mom and it was an old image of her and my dad sitting around a dinner table. The photo was in color—I’m not that old— but it’s the only time I’ve ever seen a photo of her. I have her skin and eyes, from what I could see. Maybe even her black heart.

Shoving my phone into my back pocket, I head out of my bedroom and into our tiny living room. We live in a small apartment in the French Quarters of New Orleans, but my parent’s house—outside of the Whitehouse, the house I grew up in— is in Greenwich in Connecticut. So every time I have to fly home, that’s a two-hour flight. Lydia always pushes me to use my father’s private jet, but I’d be much more comfortable traveling amongst civilians just in case someone decides to shoot my father’s plane down or something crazy like that. Running for second term presidency, we have Peter S. Johnson. Aka, my dad. Though he’s never been overly active in my life as a teen, he’s still my dad. He stands for family values but doesn’t seem to have any himself. Figures. In order for him to keep up appearances and keep his unscathed name peachy and squeaky clean, I have obligations. It’s unfortunate really, and it’s why I moved to New Orleans in hopes to leave all this behind me, or rather, run away from it all. But no matter how fast and how good I am at running—