“Still haven’t told me where I’m going.”
“And Isaac…” He ponders the words and slides his gaze to mine to see my reaction, though I’m doing my best not to give him one. “Isaac is a lot,” he says finally. “If you let him, he’ll wanteverythingfrom you.”
“I’m not sure whateverythingmeans,” I say and hate that I’ve given him any indication I want to continue this conversation.
“It means everything, Wendy,” Cyril shrugs. “Especially since it’syou. Did you know I’ve heard about you since we were seventeen?”
I can’t help it. My disinterested façade falters, and I gaze up at Cyril with eyes that I’m sure are wide. “Really?” I ask. “He remembered me?”
“Of course he did.”
Before I can say something sappy or pathetic, I scoff and say, “Well, you didn’t tell me aboutyou. Or are you not on the menu?”
“I’m on the secret menu,” Cyril hums, his humor back in place. “You have to know how to ask for me.”
“Wow. Don’t you think highly of yourself?” I hesitate, hating the words that are about to come out of my mouth, and say them anyway. “How does someoneaskfor you, then?”
“By always wanting the last word and not getting in the Uber that’s pulling around the corner,” Cyril tells me sweetly. “And sticking her nose where it doesn’t quite belong if she wants to still be considered agood girlafter all of this.”
I don’t know what to say this time. I take back my phone, which now has an address on it, and I sigh through my nose. “If there are drugs in my pocket, and I get arrested–”
“It’s not drugs,” Cyril says again, with a laugh in his words. “You’refine. Take the Uber to the restaurant, go in and ask for Bill. Give him the package and tell him it’s from Cyril Chancellor. Easy.” He steps forward as the Uber pulls up beside us and throws his arms over my shoulders to pull me into an embrace. From anyone else’s point of view, I’m sure it looks like we’re lovers or just really good friends telling each other goodbye.
But Cyril’s eyes turn cold, and his smirk is not so friendly any longer as he leans in and brushes our lips together, just to say, “Don’tfuck it up, Ari. And don’t try to fuck me over. You’re Lost Boys’ property, remember? So act like it.”
My stomach knots up, and when I open my mouth to say something I shouldn’t, Cyril takes the opportunity to crush our lips together. His hand fists in my hair, harder than I had expected, and I whimper at the tight prickles of pain in my scalp.
Then he bites me.Hard.Hard enough that I taste blood and gasp into his mouth at the searing flash of agony in my bottom lip.
Cyril only laughs, and the sound is swallowed up by my mouth as he swipes his tongue around the small wound in my lower lip. “Get going, Wendy Darling,” he purrs, pulling away with the barest hint of a red smear on his own full mouth from my lip that throbs. “There are consequences for being late.”
I back away from him, rubbing my bottom lip as I do, and when I come away with blood, I turn to him and gesture rudely, raising my middle finger as I yank open the back door of the Uber.
If anything, Cyril’s smirk grows wider, and he lifts one hand to wave at me until the car pulls away from my apartment, and I lose sight of him as we turn the corner.