2
Alex
“We should takethis somewhere more…private.” The blonde trailed her fingers down my arm, her hazel eyes bright with invitation as she swiped her tongue over her bottom lip. “Or not. Whatever you’re into.”
My lips curved—not enough to classify as a smile, but enough to broadcast my thoughts. You can’t handle what I’m into.
Despite her short, tight dress and suggestive words, she looked like the type who expected sweet nothings and lovemaking in bed.
I didn’t do sweet nothings or lovemaking.
I fucked a certain way, and only a specific type of woman was into that shit. Not hardcore BDSM, but not soft. No kissing, no face-to-face contact. Women agreed, then tried to change it up halfway through, after which I’d stop and show them the door. I have no tolerance for people who can’t keep to a simple agreement.
That was why I stuck to a roster of familiar rotating names when I needed a release; both sides knew what to expect.
The blonde was not making it onto that roster.
“Not tonight.” I swirled the ice in my glass. “It’s my friend’s farewell party.”
She followed my gaze toward Josh, who was basking in female attention of his own. He sprawled on the couch, one of the few remaining pieces of furniture after he’d packed the house up in anticipation of his year abroad, and grinned while three women fawned over him. He’d always been the charming one. While I put people on edge, he put them at ease, and his approach toward the fairer sex was the opposite of mine. The more, the merrier, according to Josh. He’d probably fucked half the D.C. metro area’s female population by now.
“He can join too.” The blonde edged closer until her tits grazed my arm. “I don’t mind.”
“Same.” Her friend, a petite brunette who had been quiet up till now but who’d eyed me like I was a juicy steak since I walked in the door, piped up. “Lyss and I do everything together.”
The insinuation couldn’t have been clearer had she tattooed it across her exposed cleavage.
Most guys would’ve jumped at the opportunity, but I was already bored with the conversation. Nothing turned me off more than desperation, which reeked stronger than their perfume.
I didn’t bother answering. Instead, I scanned the room for something more interesting to hold my attention. If it were a party for anyone else but Josh, I would’ve skipped it. Between my job as COO of The Archer Group and my…side project, I had enough on my plate without attending pointless social gatherings. But Josh was my best friend—one of the few people whose company I could stand for more than an hour at a time—and he was leaving Monday for his gap year as a medical volunteer in Central America. So here I was, pretending like I actually wanted to be here.
A silvery laugh pealed through the air, drawing my eyes toward the source.
Ava.Of course.
Josh’s little sister was so sweet and sunshiney all the time, I half-expected flowers to sprout on the ground wherever she walked and a coterie of singing woodland animals to trail behind her while she traipsed through meadows or whatever girls like her did.
She stood in the corner with her friends, her face bright with animation as she laughed at something one of them said. I wondered if it was a real laugh or a fake laugh. Most laughs—hell, most people—were fake. They woke up every morning and put on a mask according to what they wanted that day and who they wanted the world to see. They smiled at people they hated, laughed at jokes that weren’t funny, and kissed the asses of those they secretly hoped to dethrone.
I wasn’t judging. Like everyone else, I had my masks, and they ran layers deep. But unlike everyone else, I had as much interest in ass-kissing and small talk as I did in injecting bleach into my veins.
Knowing Ava, her laugh was real.
Poor girl. The world would eat her alive once she left the Thayer bubble.
Not my problem.
“Yo.” Josh appeared beside me, his hair tousled and his mouth stretched into a wide grin. His hangers-on were nowhere—wait, nope. There they were, dancing to Beyoncé like they were auditioning for a gig at The Strip Angel while a circle of guys watched them with their tongues lolling out. Men. My gender could use a little more standards and a little less thinking with their small head. “Thanks for showing up, man. Sorry I haven’t said hi till now. I’ve been…busy.”
“I saw.” I arched an eyebrow at the lipstick print smeared on the corner of his mouth. “You have a little something on your face.”
His grin widened. “Badge of honor. Speaking of which, I’m not interrupting, am I?”
I glanced at the blonde and brunette, who’d moved on to making out with each other after failing to capture my interest.
“No.” I shook my head. “A hundred bucks says you won’t survive the full year in Bumfuck, Nowhere. No women, no parties. You’ll be back before Halloween.”
“Oh, ye of little faith. There’ll be women, and the party is wherever I am.” Josh swiped an unopened beer from a nearby cooler and cracked it open. “I actually wanted to talk to you about that. Me being gone,” he clarified.
“Don’t tell me you’re getting sentimental on me. If you bought us friendship bracelets, I’m out.”
“Fuck you, dude.” He laughed. “I wouldn’t buy your ass jewelry if you paid me. No, this is about Ava.”
My glass paused an inch from my lips before I brought it home and the sweet burn of whiskey flowed down my throat. I hate beer. It tastes like piss, but since it was the drink du jour at Josh’s parties, I always brought a flask of Macallan whenever I visited.
“What about her?”
Josh and his sister were close, even if they bickered so much I wanted to duct tape their mouths sometimes. That was the nature of siblings—something I’d never quite gotten to experience.
The whiskey turned sour in my mouth, and I set my glass down with a grimace.
“I’m worried about her.” Josh rubbed a hand over his jaw, his expression growing serious. “I know she’s a big girl and can take care of herself—unless she’s getting stranded in the middle of fucking nowhere; thanks for picking her up, by the way—but she’s never been on her own for so long and she can be a little too…trusting.”
I had an inkling of where Josh was going with this, and I didn’t like it. At all. “She won’t be alone. She has her friends.” I inclined my head toward said friends. One of them, a curvy redhead in a gold skirt that made her look like a disco ball, chose that moment to hop onto the table and shake her ass to the rap song blasting through the speakers.
Josh snorted. “Jules? She’s a liability, not help. Stella is as trusting as Ava, and Bridget…well, she has security, but she’s not around as much.”
“You don’t need to worry. Thayer’s safe, and the crime rate here is close to zero.”
“Yeah, but I’d feel better if I had someone I trusted looking after her, ya know?”
Fuck. The train was heading straight off a cliff, and I couldn’t do anything to stop it.
“I wouldn’t ask—I know you’ve got a lot of shit going on—but she broke up with her ex a couple of weeks ago, and he’s been harassing her. I always knew he was a little shit, but she wouldn’t listen to me. Anyway, if you could keep an eye on her—just to make sure she doesn’t get killed or kidnapped or anything? I’d owe you big.”
“You already owe me for all those times I saved your ass,” I said wryly.
“You had fun while doing it. You’re too uptight sometimes.” Josh grinned. “So, is that a yes?”
I glanced at Ava again. Took her in. She was twenty-two, four years younger than Josh and me, and she managed to appear both younger and older than her years. It was the way she carried herself, like she’d seen it all—the good, the bad, the downright ugly—and still believed in goodness.
It was as stupid as it was admirable.
She must’ve felt me staring because she paused her conversation and looked directly at me, her cheeks tinting pink at my unflinching gaze. She’d changed out of her jeans and T-shirt into a purple dress that swirled around her knees.
Too bad. The dress was nice, but my mind flashed back to our car ride, when her damp shirt had clung to her like a second skin and her nipples had strained against the decadent red lace of her bra. I’d meant what I’d said about her not being my type, but I’d enjoyed the view. I could imagine myself lifting that shirt, tugging her bra aside with my teeth, and closing my mouth around those sweet, hardened peaks—
I yanked myself out of that startling fantasy fast. What the fuck was wrong with me? That was Josh’s sister. Innocent, doe-eyed, and so sweet I could throw up. The total opposite of the sophisticated, jaded women I preferred both in and out of bed. I didn’t have to worry about feelings with the latter; they knew better than to develop any around me. Ava was nothing but feelings, with a hint of sass.
A ghost of a smile passed over my mouth when I remembered her parting shot earlier. I hope that stick in your ass punctures a vital organ.
Not the worst thing anyone’s said to me, not by a long shot, but more aggressive than I’d expected coming from her. I’d never heard her say a bad word to or about anyone before. I took perverse pleasure in the fact that I could rile her up so much.
“Alex,” Josh prompted.
“I don’t know, man.” I dragged my eyes away from Ava and her purple dress. “I’m not much of a babysitter.”
“Good thing she’s not a baby,” he quipped. “Look, I know this is a big ask, but you’re the only person I trust not to, you know—”
“Fuck her?”
“Jesus, dude.” Josh looked like he’d swallowed a lemon. “Don’t use that word in relation to my sister. It’s gross. But…yeah. I mean, we both know she’s not your type, and even if she was, you’d never go there.”
A sliver of guilt flashed through me when I remembered my errant fantasy a few moments ago. It was time for me to call up someone from my roster if I was fantasizing about Ava Chen, of all people.
“But it’s more than that,” Josh continued. “You’re the only person I trust, period, outside of my family. And you know how worried I am about Ava, especially considering this whole thing with her ex.” His face darkened. “I swear, if I ever see that fucker…”
I sighed. “I’ll take care of her. Don’t worry.”
I was going to regret this. I knew it, yet here I was, signing my life away, at least for the next year. I didn’t make a lot of promises, but when I did, I kept them. Committed myself to them. Which meant if I promised Josh I’d look after Ava, I’d fucking look after her, and I’m not talking about a text check-in every two weeks.
She was under my protection now.
A familiar, creeping sense of doom slithered around my neck and squeezed, tighter and tighter, until oxygen ran scarce and tiny lights danced before my eyes.
Blood. Everywhere.
On my hands. On my clothes. Splattered over the cream rug she’d loved so much—the one she’d brought back from Europe on her last trip abroad.
An inane urge to scrub the rug and tear those bloody particles out of the soft wool fibers, one by one, gripped me, but I couldn’t move.
All I could do was stand and stare at the grotesque scene in my living room—a room which, not half an hour earlier, had burst with warmth and laughter and love. Now it was cold and lifeless, like the three bodies at my feet.
I blinked, and they disappeared—the lights, the memories, the noose around my neck.