He was so close, his tobacco and spice intoxicating me, poisoning my body against my mind. All I could see was his tattooed throat, the rich pink hue of the lotus blossom he’d inked onto himself just for Dane, and the blown up black of his eyes threatening to swallow me whole. He leaned closer still, so that his breath was my breath, only I was finding it impossible to breathe.
“You don’t get to tell me I don’t got love in my heart,” he whispered, his voice low and as smooth as a purring wildcat. “You think I got some heart of stone? You think I was un-fuckin’-moved when I held little girl you in my arms as your mum died? Think I didn’t about crack in two when Dane, the first brother by choice I ever made, was ripped away from us? You think I wouldn’t about die if somethin’ happened to you? To the girl I swore Dane I’d always protect? To the girl who I used to think knew the heart of me more than anyone else?”
He paused, breath heaving, so hot against my lips it scalded the tender skin. There were tears in my throat, heat building between my legs. I felt like I was about to come apart at the seams.
“You wanna sit on some high fuckin’ horse and tell me about my own heart when you clearly know shit all about it, go right ahead, Lila.” He released me so abruptly I slid against the smooth enamel of the fridge, knees weak as overcooked noodles, and spilled to the floor.
His face was twisted up, ugly with cruelty. For one second, I thought he would spit on me, shame me with everything he could.
Instead, he sneered and shook his head as he backed away, hands in his pockets. “You’re so disappointed in me? For bein’ furious, for bein’ concerned? Yeah, well, I’m used to that shit. But you? Yeah, Li, I’m fuckin’ gutted by my disappointment in you. Let’s see how well that sits with you, hmm?”
And then he turned on his booted heel and left.
NOVA
Later, so much later it was flat black outside the window of my apartment and not a thing was stirrin’, not even the racoons, I sat in bed, back to the black headboard, naked but for my boxer briefs, computer on my lap, fingers sweatin’ but unmovin’ on the keys.
Wet Works website was typed into the search bar, the home page showin’ a collection of newly added pornos, the left sidebar the categories available to me, and the right a series of girls one could click on to see them preform a live cam show.
She was there.
Lila.
Listed on the site as Nina Flores, a play on Flower Child.
In the screenshot, she was on her knees on a white bed, thighs spread just enough to show a sliver of lace, lavender panties at her sex, the same material strugglin’ to cover the twin swells of her caramel breasts. Her hair, the entire thick mass of it, was in disarray, as if she or someone else had been runnin’ their hands through it.
Agony burned through me as I stared and fuckin’ stared at that thumbnail.
It was too complex a pain to detangle.
I was fucked up over it, disgusted by the risk she’d taken, shamed by the desire I felt like banked fire in my groin, concerned people would find out she’d done this and that they’d humiliate her for it, terrified the Ventura’s would catch on to her charade and end her.
That, the last part, was keepin’ me up at night.
Couldn’t sleep more than an hour, and I was sufferin’ for it. The skin under my eyes was so damn bruised with fatigue, it ached, and my body moved slow, so slow I couldn’t put up any kinda decent fight against Wrath in the ring or lift any heft in the gym with Bat.
I was driven useless by this.
By her.
By my Li girl bein’ so stupid, so damn dumb.
So fuckin’ courageous and lovin’, so ready to martyr her damn self for others it was as gorgeous as it was horrifyin’.
And there I was for the last hour, starin’ at her half-naked on a goddamn porno site.
I tipped my head back and groaned, knowin’ it was only a matter of time before I gave in.
A minute later, I clicked on Nina Flores.
Immediately, the only video came up, a small counter showin’ over 2,000 views in the first three days of it bein’ live.
No surprise there.
Lila was a stunner and braced like she was on the bed, her full, dusky mouth parted, tongue peekin’ between those lips like a promise, I had no trouble understandin’ why it was so popular.
It woulda been easy to tell myself I was watchin’ ’cause I was concerned, ’cause I needed to know exactly what she’d gotten herself into it.