“Then we’ll play.”
She swings her leg off me and makes her way to the stage, ducking behind the curtain. I know I shouldn’t be teasing her, or at the very least, I shouldn’t be teasing her a lot. I don’t know what she’s playing at, but I know I’ve met my match. I thought coming into Mayhem and playing it the way I did was smart.
Now I’m thinking it’s exactly what she wanted me to do.
The lights dim and music starts playing and I watch as Lilith once again enters the center stage. She’s nothing like you’d expect from a ringmistress. She’s not articulate with her movements, or even precise. She’s messy and rogue and it captures the audience instantly. She finishes her magician set—thankfully, no one dies—before she and Saskia perform a joint fire scene. The song shifts to old-school heavy metal as King leads The Brothers out on their dirt bikes. I can’t fucking help myself but watch Kyrin and I hate it a little. I hate that I let him get beneath my skin, knowing damn well I wouldn’t have even scratched the surface of his. Not even she could, at least not yet. You give someone like Lilith time, and she could eradicate all of your fears. After the triple ring of death with the bikes and a couple of the girls, the bikes take off behind the curtain and Lilith enters another scene. This time, her little finger points to me.
“You look fun,” she murmurs into the mic.
Fuck.
“Come on, play with me?” The sensual way the words roll off her tongue and the perfect little tilt to her head has the crowd cheering me to go on. She’s a whole ass red flag.
I stand, adjusting my dick in my jeans and make my way up onto the stage. I have to be careful with whatever she chooses to do. She might just awaken the old sorcerer of death and no one—especially me—wants that. Jumping onto the stage, Lilith takes her hand in mine and I find myself looking at the connection, swallowing past everything that her touch brings to the surface.
Again.
Fighting it is hard. Harder than having her right there in front of me.
She pushes me onto a single chair with a spotlight shining on it. Fog spills around my feet and she disappears in the mist, the light blinding my fucking retinas. A single blindfold is placed over my eyes, tied tight as her mouth comes to my ear.
“Are you here for me?”
My blood turns cold. “What?” The smirk that is always so boldly placed on my mouth has vanished and my teeth clench.
She must be sitting on my lap doing fuck knows what because the audience is loving it. I feel her hair brush my knuckles and I squeeze my fist closed to fight, grabbing at her hair and throwing her ass down to ask her what the fuck she means.
“Are you here for me?” she repeats, dipping her thumb into my mouth while rolling her hips over my crotch. “Because if you are, you are mistaken. I don’t need saving.”
I snap. My hand is on the back of her neck as if I could see all along, pulling her lips to mine. “No.” Then I push her away from me and tear off the blindfold. Forgetting I’m in the middle of a show, I plaster on a fake smirk and raise my head to her in challenge. “That the best you’ve got?” I lean forward, running my tongue over my lip. “Hate to break it to you, baby girl, but I’ve had better.”
Her eyes turn to slits, but she meets my challenge. She flies up from the ground and uses the same tie she just had around my eyes and binds my hands before dragging me to where a coffin stands. I swear to fuck if she plays the whole cut you in half game I’m running, and I don’t care what that looks like to everyone else.
She pushes the coffin backstage. I figure she did that to get me off stage without a scene, which I appreciate since there was very real potential of us both tearing each other into shreds out there. I climb out, with Mischa waiting for me on the other side. Her hands rest on her hips. “You’re cute.”
“So are you.” My words are honest, but my tone screams I’m not interested.
She cocks her head. “But you’ve clearly got a death wish.”
I ignore everyone and head back to the RV, needing space and silence. It’s so fucking loud. Everything is so fucking loud in this world.
I fall down on top of my bed, tapping my phone against my thigh. I need to talk with Bishop.
I hit dial on his name and bring the phone to my ear.
We are about ten hours away from being back in New York. No one has said anything of what is going on, but it’s obvious there has been a shift. I haven’t seen Kyrin or Eli since last night’s show, and almost everyone has stuck to their circles, which just made it very clear how much I don’t have one. It’s late, almost two a.m., and we’re still driving. Knowing I won’t be getting any sleep anytime soon, I make my way into the bathroom and pull out all of my makeup. After my show last night, Perse came into my cubicle to say I needed to start building my social media to however I wanted to be branded as. I don’t know what she meant by brand, but I can take some photos. I work on my makeup, lining dark kohl over the edge of my eyelids, and lining my lips with the same black. Black lips and eyes, before smudging on dark smoke on my lids. After dusting on blush and applying fake lashes, I unclip my hair and allow it to trail down my back, running my fingers through the strands and brushing it all to one side. The dark makeup only allows my eyes to pop and my skin to appear fairer, which helps with the aesthetic I want to start posting.