Page 59 of The Dollhouse

Lake went on, “I think that was some stupid test. He went on and on about loyalty. He said he’ll let me stay in your life, as long as I don’t hurt you.” His cheeks flushed a bit. “I never knew I had to get a stranger’s permission to date the girl I like, but I guess life is full of surprises.”

I let his words sink in. “You mean, you’d still want to see me, even if that’s where I work? Even if…” God, how could I say this without sounding insane? Even after all this time, I wasn’t sure what to call the deal between Roman and me. “Even if I’m still with Roman?” When Lake said nothing, only stared at me, I added, “I know it might be stupid, I know the man is dangerous, but… I don’t know. There’s something about him I just can’t walk away from. He helped me feel alive again.”

He bit his cheek, still silent.

“If you’re not okay with that, I get it,” I said. “No hard feelings or anything. I just… I need to know if we can at least be friends.” I took a moment to glance around my place, at the fancy furniture and everything that still didn’t feel like it was mine. “I have nothing here. Nothing but you and Roman.” And Carter, but I always lumped him in with Roman.

Lake was slow to say, “We can be friends.”

I’d be lying if I said my heart didn’t sink a little at hearing that. Being friends was nice enough, but it was second place to what I really wanted. I knew, though, I couldn’t force Lake to do something he didn’t want to, to be in a weird relationship with me while I was under Roman’s thumb.

But then he said something else, something that made my heart swell with joy.

“I’ve heard relationships always work better when the people in the relationship are friends.”

A lump formed in the back of my throat, and though I heard him perfectly clear, I still found myself muttering, “What?”

Lake leaned forward, setting his arms on his knees as he stared straight at me, the intensity in his eyes almost too much to bear. I didn’t think I’d ever seen him so serious. “I want to be with you, Zoey. I don’t care where you work. I want to take you out on dates, watch you demolish a basket of wings every Friday night, and let you be my mentor when it comes to horror movies.”

I grinned. It was insanely hard to remain on my bed and not lunge at him; I wanted to kiss this guy so bad it was ridiculous.

“I want to see that smile a million and a half more times,” he went on, matching my smile with his. “I want to be there for you, Zoey, and I want you to be there for me. Roman is… a bit of a scary dude, but I’m not going to let him scare me away from you. Maybe it’s stupid, but I don’t care.”

Oh, God. Lake was so sweet. So fucking sweet I probably spontaneously got a dozen cavities listening to him go on and on, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.

On one hand, I had Roman and Carter, the rough and wild ones, the dangerous ones who would literally kill anyone who looked at me wrong—even though it hadn’t happened yet. On the other hand, I had Lake, the sweet boy next door with the cute dimples and the gentle yet awkward personality. Two opposite sides of the coin, and I craved them both.

You know what? Fuck it.

My tiredness was a thing of the past, and I slipped off my bed, practically rushing to the couch. I threw my arms around him and kissed him, stopping him from saying whatever the hell he’d planned on saying next. He tasted like promises, sweet and soft, a future I wanted.

Maybe, as complicated as this all was, this could work.

Chapter Sixteen - A Man

It’d taken him a while, but he’d found her. Had to go sniffing through all of his old channels to do it, too. It was a good thing the kid who hired him was loaded—he was making bank on this job, and the man wished every job would be as profitable. Granted, it was good not every job took as much time as this one did.

Bus tickets. Trailing someone who used cash. It wasn’t easy, but it wasn’t impossible. The man had been at this a long time, finding those who did not want to be found. Sometimes those who’d run ran for a reason, and sometimes they didn’t. It was not his place to judge; only to find them.

And find her he did.

Zoey Marbella, heir to the Marbella fortune, eldest daughter to the rich clan in Hillcrest, was now working at a strip club and living in the dingiest looking apartment building the man had ever seen.

He’d found her, followed her to her job one night, even took a seat just to get a better look at her. She didn’t know him, so she didn’t look twice at him, which was fine. Tonight, he waited in his car for her to come back, and when she did, he coughed her name out of the window, just to be one hundred percent certain it was indeed her and not a pink-haired lookalike.

The Zoey Marbella his client had hired him to find didn’t have pink hair when she’d hightailed it out of Hillcrest, you see.

But it was her. When he’d called her name, she stopped, shoulders snapping straight, and looked all around. Of course, the parking lot was near pitch black, so she didn’t see him sitting in his car, off to the side, watching her.

Though it was late, the man picked up his phone after Zoey went inside the building. He dialed his client’s number, and it rang a few times before a groggy voice picked up, “Hello?”

“It’s me,” the man said, his voice coming out gruff and gravelly, the result of heavy smoking his whole life. And then he told his client the words he’d been waiting to hear for weeks now: “I found her.”

Regardless of what his client ended up doing, the job was now done, and he could wash his hands of the matter. After all, what happened between lovers during a quarrel was never anyone else’s business. Zoey Marbella and Bryan Oakes would have to hash it out on their own.

Chapter Seventeen – Roman

Zoey was thrilled to have the green light from me when it came to Lake; I didn’t need to spy on her to know it.

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