Sighing, I press my cheek against the cool metal of the pole as his finger dives into the waistband of my panties.
When my eyes fly over my shoulder to find James, he’s gone.
My shoulders relax as my fingers flex around the pole, grinding my ass into the crotch of his pants. His fingers move around my hips as he yanks me around to face him.
His head tilts.
“Lapdance” by N.E.R.D starts as his hand finds the curve of my throat, his other diving into the front of my panties. Frustration fights pleasure as I attempt to find his eyes. Who the fuck are you?
His fingers come to my ass as he lifts me off the ground, and I wrap my legs around his waist, just as someone else comes up behind me, unzipping my dress. It falls around my shoulders and he tugs it off, over my head, my hair flopping down my lower back. The guy in front of me rolls and leans down and sinks his teeth into the skin at my collarbone.
I moan, tilting my head for him as the one behind me dips beneath my panties.
“Fuck!” someone roars behind us, so loud the music is drowned out momentarily. “Yo! Stop!” Hands come to the shoulder of the guy who is holding me.
The voice sounds familiar.
When the guy who is holding me sets me back to the ground, spinning around to face his friend angrily, I watch in slow motion as he snatches my phone off him. His shoulders tense as he slowly turns with my phone in his hands.
My phone? Shit.
“What!” I snap, annoyed that I‘m sitting in the middle of a makeshift stage in my bra and panties while they’re all staring at me like they’ve never seen it before.
He throws my phone across the room and takes three angry strides to me, yanking me up by my arms and tearing off my mask.
I gasp, my eyes furious. “What the fuck!”
He pulls off the bandana that’s around his face and my world stops. My stomach falls to the ground and solidifies at my feet.
“What the fuck are you doing here, Duchess?” Royce’s face comes into full view, and I blink a few times to make sure I’m not hallucinating.
Reaching up to the rim of his hoodie, I shove it off his head until it falls around his tattooed neck.
“Oh shit,” I whisper, my blood turning as cold as ice.
He backs me up until I’m colliding into the chest of the guy who is behind me. Royce’s eyes furiously fly over my shoulder, and I watch as his jaw sets to stone, his eyes burning up all the energy in the room. “Get. The fuck. Away from her.” His tone is low, dangerous, and a thousand levels above the temperature of Hell. The music cuts off in the background as Royce gathers up my clothes from around my feet and shoves them into my chest. “Get changed. Fucking now!”
I do as I’m told. What is happening? Shoving on my crop top and yanking my skirt back down, panic seizes my muscles as I furiously search around the room. Royce pulls at his hair in frustration as he sits on the sofa, a cigarette between his two fingers.
“Roy, what the fuck?”
“Shiiit,” one of the others murmur, removing his bandana.
I still. “Orson!”
Orson shakes his head, running his hands over his mouth. “‘Sup, Duchess.”
I pale, walking over to him and wrapping my arms around the back of his neck. “You’re married! What the fuck are you doing here?”
“We have a different kind of marriage.”
My muscles tense. “L’artisaniant, it’s French…” Putting the pieces together about Orson being part French. He flashes me a sad smile. “Yeah, Dutch. We—”
“Shut the fuck up!” Royce growls without looking up at us. When I turn to see the final two guys have removed their bandanas and masks, I’m not even slightly surprised to see one is Storm, but I am to see the other is Wicked.
I gulp, my eyes falling down his body. Judging by the fact that Storm is too lean and Orson too tall, I’m gathering it was him and Royce who I had sex with the first night.
Oh god.
I fucked my foster brother without even realizing.
The room tilts as I drop down onto the stage, disbelief rendering me speechless.
“Royce,” I whisper, willing him to look at me.
He doesn’t move, his shoulders rolling up and down as he takes deep breaths. When I don’t think he’s going to say anything and Orson disappears to the bar to grab a few bottles of top-shelf whiskey, I crawl across the floor until I’m in front of him, my hands on his knees.
“Royce…” I repeat. “Look at me.”
The muscles in his thighs tense. He whacks my hands off his knees, leans back on the sofa while placing the cigarette between his lips, and pinches his eyes closed. The scowl that’s etched into his brows carve enough fear into my marrow that my feet twitch to run, but I stay. Because I need to do this. Because I know that he’s going to lash out, and he’s going to try to hurt me, it’s how he deals with his emotions. He deals with his manic emotions by pretending that he doesn’t have any, but he forgets that our souls were one once upon a time. I feel what he feels.