Page 10 of Beautifully Savage Butterfly

“Believe it or not, they come in handy from time to time in my line of work,” I say dryly. “They’re not as good as the real thing, but they’re better than nothing.”

The stubble on his chin makes it harder to get the strips to stick, but it’s not impossible. After I get the first couple applied, the bleeding finally stops, and the rest are a lot easier to place. There’s already purple bruising and swelling forming around the cut.

“Why are you doing this?”

“Because you’re too stubborn to go get proper stitches,” I say with a pointed look.

“That’s not what I meant,” he mumbles, his face hardening again, his eyes searching mine like he’s looking for answers to questions he hasn’t bothered asking out loud. “I just damn near sexually assaulted you and you’re playing doctor.”

I snort a laugh. “If that had been sexual assault, I’d have shot you in the dick.”

Orion winces. “Jesus.”

I should quit while I’m ahead. He already thinks I’m a heartless monster, willing to shoot a waitress in cold blood if she gets my order wrong. But there’s some sick need inside of me that keeps my mouth moving, some fucked-up voice in my head that wants to know just how much I can make him hate me.

“It wouldn’t have been the first time, and I promise you, I would have gone home and slept like a baby while you spent the night bleeding out here on the bathroom floor.”

Right on cue, coldness flickers in Orion’s eyes and he jerks away from my touch. Satisfaction and disgust with myself war inside of me.

“Playing god is just a day in the life of a Moretti, isn’t it?”

“Sometimes,” I admit, leaning in closer again to reclaim the space. He doesn’t move, doesn’t shove me away or tell me to back the fuck off as I ghost the tip of my nose along the uninjured side of his jaw, then up to his cheek, where I press my lips against his skin. Orion shudders and tenses, but still doesn’t make a sound. “Thanks for tonight. I’ll see you around.”

Everything inside of me wants to drag him back home with me. I want to spend the rest of the night finding different ways to press his buttons to see just how brightly I can make his eyes burn with rage. I want to let him hate me until I’m immune to the sting of it.

But I’m smart enough to know when I’ve pushed my luck enough for one night. I can feel his eyes on my back as I leave the bathroom. I stride through the raucous crowd again, passing the bar without stopping to so much as glance at the bottles lined up along the back wall, up the stairs, and out into the alley. I’m vaguely aware that my hair and clothes are still a mess, completely at odds with the dangerous, organized man I walked in here as tonight.

Orion took me apart, and I think he’s the only one who can put me back together.

ORION

I glare at the door and finish cleaning the streaks of blood off my skin as best I can. My balls are still fucking tingling from how hard I came in Elio’s mouth. His handy little butterfly sutures solved the problem of the bleeding, and then he had to go and drop some psycho shit like that before leaving. As if he was the one who used me and just got to walk away.

What the fuck is wrong with him?

And why the hell do I want to follow him out of here just to yell at him some more about fucking with my head? Every time I see him, I tell him to leave me the fuck alone. Now, when he actually walks away, I want to chase him?

I get rid of the last of the paper towels and force myself to wait a few minutes, so I won’t feel like I’m going after him. I shove my hands into my pockets when I finally slip out of the bathroom, checking that my money is still there. Not that I think he could have pickpocketed me. Well, maybe he could have. What the fuck do I know about the things a Moretti is capable of? Even if he had, it wouldn’t have mattered. This money is going right in his till anyway.

The humid air of the bar gives way to a cool breeze when I step out into the alley. Gravel crunches under my feet, drowned out after a few seconds by the familiar sounds of the city. Traffic, voices, music. It’s a lively, comforting sound that never fails to make me feel at home, and yet somehow completely alienated at the same time.

I pass by the assisted living facility without stopping tonight. I can’t go in there with blood crusted on my shirt and a fresh cut on my face. Jack will want to know what happened, and I’m too tired to come up with a plausible lie.

I pick up my pace until I’m practically jogging, trying not to imagine the disappointed look on my brother’s face if he knew about all the shit I’ve had to do to keep up with the cost of his care. Underground fights, borrowing money from the Morettis…

He has enough to worry about without having to stress about all that bullshit.

I reach my building and stop to fish my keys out of my pocket. I jog up the few steps to the main door and mutter a curse under my breath when I see it’s propped open. It’s like people want to get robbed. I kick the doorstop out of the way and let the heavy door swing closed behind me.

The yellowing walls of the entryway smell like decades-old cigarette smoke and the remnants of a million dinners that have wafted through the hallway over the years. The linoleum floor is peeling, and I notice some black specks in one corner that are more than likely rat droppings.

Home sweet home.

I turn towards the stairs, but movement catches the corner of my eye. There’s a quiet mrrrow and an undersized gray tabby cat scampers out from the storage space under the steps.

“Come here, you little troublemaker.” I stoop down and drum my fingers on the floor to entice the cat towards me. “You know, if you’re going to spend so much time roaming these halls, you could at least try to eat some of the rodents.”

He meows again, and butts his forehead against my knee, purring when I put my hand under his chest and scoop him up. He digs his claws into my shirt, the fabric making little tearing sounds as he kneads it and purrs even harder on our way upstairs. He sniffs at the blood on my shirt and makes an offended face at me that draws a chuckle from my throat.

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