Page 70 of Emerald Malice

“He disappeared before I could,” she insists innocently, spinning around on her bar stool so she can watch Leonty pace across the porch, talking to someone on the phone.

We end up ordering Chinese and congregating around the coffee table.

Leonty is just as charming as he looks. Although he certainly doesn’t have to try too hard where Mila is concerned. She laughs at all his jokes, even the subpar ones. And when I grab everyone’s plates and slip off to the kitchen, neither one seems to notice I’m gone.

I wash up quietly, observing them the whole time. There’s undeniable chemistry in their banter, an easy back-and-forth that leaves me feeling hollow.

Will I ever get to experience that with somebody?

Taken by a sudden urgency, I leave the dishes half-done in the sink, grab my perfumed shopping bags, and slip into the bathroom.

I have five new pieces of lingerie.

I pull out the most conservative of the lot and hold it up to the mirror. It’s a lace nightie that falls around my upper thighs. The cups cover my nipples, but the rest of it is delicate lace. The only coverage it offers comes in the form of a matching pale pink thong with tiny bows on the straps.

I’ve just stripped down to nothing when I hear Mila and Leonty’s laughter wafting towards me through the crack in the bottom of the door.

It makes me feel lonelier than ever.

Aw, hell—if I’m gonna do the thing, I might as well do it right.

Armed with a new and almost certainly short-lived sense of boldness, I swap the pink gown for the most daring of my new purchases—a crotchless, cupless, black lace teddy, complete with a built-in thong. Mila bullied me into buying it with a snippy, “Don’t be a fucking wuss, Nat. You might as well wear these things while you have the body for them.”

With my heart hammering madly in my chest, I put on the black teddy—which takes a surprising amount of time, considering there’s so little to work with—and stand breathless in front of the mirror.

My jaw drops.

It’s giving fallen angel turned dominatrix.

I turn this way and that, like I’m flickering back and forth between two different versions of myself.

There’s the old me who thinks all of this is ridiculous and dangerous and very much a bad idea.

And then there’s the new me, who looks damn good in this shit and thinks bad ideas sound like exactly what ought to be on the menu.

New me takes charge.

Shaking off my nerves, I grab my phone, open my pitifully blank text thread with Andrey, and open the camera. I angle the screen down just enough so that my face is cut off.

And just like that, the show begins.

I take a few pictures, making sure Andrey can appreciate all the features (or lack thereof) of the teddy. Every curve is on display. Damn near every inch of skin.

I scan through the barrage of photos, pick the two that make me the least nauseous, and load them into the message.

My finger trembles over the Send button, suddenly wracked with fear.

Once I send the pictures, that’s it, there’ll be no bringing them back.

Don’t do it. It’s too desperate, too pathetic, too much.

You’re being a wuss.

No, you’re being sensible.

Chicken.

“Fuck,” I mutter to myself.

---