“Fuck you, Gloria. I’ve got my pride, too.”
“Fine,” she says. “If that’s what you want, at least let him know.”
I narrow my eyes at her. “And what? Put myself out there again? Make myself available twenty-four-seven, like you and your sisters, and I can be a Dolce girl, too?”
“That’s not what I’m saying.”
“But that’s what you told me after my first trip to the basement, remember? Keep going, and if I survive them, one day I’ll be where you are. Well, here I am. So close I can taste it. Now you’re telling me I have to prove myself to him somehow? Again?”
“Exactly,” she says, grabbing my hand and squeezing. “Can you imagine? We could be friends, Harper. You could be a Dolce girl like us. Like me.”
Her eyes plead with me, and I wonder why she needs a friend so damn bad. She has her sisters, and the three other official Dolce girls, and then a whole squad of wannabes who follow them around in football jerseys and sit at the next table like dogs waiting for someone to toss them a bone… Or like vultures circling the throne, waiting for one of the royals to fall so they can ascend.
“What do you want me to do?” I ask, pulling my hand away and shooting her a cool grin. “Fight you for him? Because I’m down for a rematch. You’re not half bad.”
“He’d probably like that,” she says, returning my smile. “That would definitely prove you want him.”
“I’m not sure I need to prove anything to him,” I say. “But if that’s what it takes to earn a place at his table, let’s do it. But I’m warning you. If we’re fighting for Royal, I will win.”
“Stop being so confrontational,” she says, shaking her head. “I’m trying to be real with you. I don’t need to fight for Royal Dolce. I have something more valuable than his dick already.”
I look her up and down. “You pregnant or something?”
“What?” she asks, spinning to the mirror and pressing a hand on her flat abdomen, as if I’m suggesting she’s fat.
I laugh, and she glares. “No, you idiot,” she snaps. “His friendship. Besides my sisters, Royal is my best friend in the whole world, Harper. Sometimes even before my sisters. Trust me, when you get here, you need all the real friends you can get.”
I rock back on my heels. “Okay…”
“He isn’t someone to be trifled with,” she says, getting out her lipstick. “But I’m not here to warn you about the big bad wolf in your bed. You already knew that before you took him to bed. That’s why you invited him in, isn’t it? The fangs and claws are exciting.”
“Sounds like you’ve got it all figured out.”
“What I’m trying to say is, there’s more to Royal Dolce than fangs and claws,” she says. “He’s… Well, I won’t say he’s a good guy under it, or anything like that, but there’s more to him than you know. He’s a real boy under that wolf costume. If you want him, let him know now, before he thinks you don’t. And if you don’t…”
“Wait, are you telling me His Majesty Royal Dolce needs reassurance?”
“I’m telling you that if you trifle with that boy and hurt him… I will cut a bitch. You think I’m talking shit with nothing to back it up, because you think you’ve got me all figured out. But I’m not some spoiled little rich girl who can’t defend herself and hers.”
“I know that,” I say. “You gave as good as you got in that fight.”
“Good,” she says, popping her red lips and dropping her lipstick back in her bag. “Then picture that, but with a knife in my hand.”
I sigh in frustration. “I’m still confused. Are you saying Royal is yours, and I need to back off? Or that I’m supposed to make a move? You can’t have it both ways.”
“I’m saying there are things you don’t know about him, things you might not be able to handle, no matter how tough you are. I’m not telling you this to protect you from him, Harper. I’m telling you I’m not sure of your intentions, and I want to know.”
“So you’re protecting him from me?”
“That’s exactly what I’m doing,” she says. “I think you’re cool as shit, but Royal is my boy. I fucking ride for him. So if there’s anything in his past, present, or future, anything he could do or you could find out that might make you walk away, and you care for him at all, then be a good person and just walk away right now. But if you can handle anything he’ll throw at you, he needs to know that, Harper. And he needs to know it soon.”
“I won’t beg for his attention,” I warn her. “I’m not going to be some desperate little twit like your sisters. No offense.”
“I’m not asking you to,” she says. “But seeing the look on his face when he talks about you… Damn.”
Royal is talking about me? For once, my heart and head get on the same page with that. It can only be a good thing.
And there it is—hope, the world’s cruelest master.