Page 88 of The Dollhouse

“I don’t know,” I truthfully told her. “It might be a week, might be a month, might be longer than that. I’m sure Roman will still come around to make sure things are running smoothly, but if everything goes right, he’ll be coming with me, so you shouldn’t have to deal with him too often.”

I had to say that, because Jamie didn’t really like Roman. Or Carter. She knew they were dangerous. She’d warned me, way back when, that they’d give me diamonds, but those diamonds would be laced with blood. She hadn’t been wrong. What she just didn’t understand was I didn’t care about the blood.

Jamie sighed. “Where you going off to for so long?”

“Did I ever tell you how I wound up here to begin with?”

When Jamie shook her head at me, I gestured for her to follow me, and together we left the darkened main area of the club and headed to the employees-only section, pushing past the swinging door to the back locker room. I brought her to the office past the lockers.

Once Jamie and I were sitting down, I started the story: “I was in college, and one day one of my classes was canceled, so I went home early. My sister’s two years younger than me, she was a senior in high school. They get out early every day. When I got home, I found her in her room… with my boyfriend.”

Jamie made a face. “Damn, girl. That’s some shitty luck right there.”

I ran my fingers along the edge of the desk, shrugging. “Yeah, well, after seeing my then-boyfriend pile-driving my sister in her own bed, I kind of lost it. I freaked. I freaked, kicked him out, and reamed into my sister. She must’ve called our parents, because the next thing I know, they were both home and trying to calm me down. They thought I was blowing everything out of proportion.”

Looking down at my lap, I frowned. “Then my mom made a comment. Off-hand, muttered under her breath, but I heard it. They’d known. I’d been in the dark, but my parents had known for a while my ex had been two-timing me with my own sister.”

“Shit,” Jamie said, making a tsk-tsk sound. “That ain’t right.”

“So, I left, and somehow I wound up here.” I motioned to the room around us. “I never really got closure, and after the shooting, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about it.” I mean, even before the shooting, I’d thought about it a lot, but knowing I could’ve died… that tended to put a different spin on things. “I need to go back, but I don’t know how long I’ll be gone. I want… maybe it’s petty, but I want to make things miserable for them. I want them to see the new me and know I’m doing so much better now that I’m not stuck living the life they wanted for me.”

It took Jamie a little while, but eventually she said, “I get it. You gotta do what you gotta do. I’m always here for you, hun, you know that. If you need me to run this place, I’ll do it—just, uh, keep your phone on you, in case I got a question. I’d much rather talk to you than Roman.” She frowned when she said his name. “You’re still happy with him?”

Sighing, I felt my whole mood change, practically instantly, the moment he was brought up. “I am. He’s good to me.” And, beyond that, being with Roman was like being with the devil himself. Hot as hell, exciting, the best kind of fuck there was. He’d helped me open my eyes to a whole new world of kink, and I craved it like an addict did her next fix.

“Well,” she said, “I suppose that’s good, at least. That man… when he and Carter would show their faces here, I always expected shit to go down. I warned the girls they’d take to the back, but none of them ever seemed to care.”

Yeah, before me, Roman and Carter had their pick of the girls who worked here. They’d take them to the backroom, and Roman would watch Carter have at them like a wild animal. Then Roman would pay them for their time and their bodies, and they’d go. Needless to say, that all stopped the moment I entered the picture. The very moment Roman laid his eyes on me, everything had changed. His life, Carter’s life, and mine.

“To be honest, I thought they’d be done with you a long time ago, so maybe there’s more to Roman and Carter than I thought,” Jamie said.

I chuckled, and we both got up. It was high time to return to the club; Jamie had probably missed some drink orders while she listened to my sob story. Okay, okay, maybe not a sob story, more like an… origin story? Like the ones in the comic books.

Not saying I read comic books, but Lake did, and when he got excited about something, he was like a giddy schoolgirl about it, telling me every single detail he remembered. It was freaking adorable.

I was the first to walk out of the backroom and into the club, greeted by dim lights and pounding music. The air reeked of sweat and sex, desperation and hunger, and if I was honest with myself, I kind of liked it. I liked the constant state of arousal the men here were in, liked how easy it was for the girls on stage to make every single man enraptured. Sometimes I even wished the one on the stage was me.

Having all eyes on me, I liked it. All attention, all focus, everything. Oh, yeah. Roman had opened my eyes to a whole new world, and this new Zoey was never sated.

Jamie returned to the bar, and I went to lean on the wall opposite her station, folding my arms over my chest and watching. We’d hired more bouncers, more guards, after the incident. They patted down each and every customer before letting them inside the club. The Dollhouse had never been more protected.

That wasn’t to say I felt safe, because now that I knew how dirty some people were willing to get, I knew you could never be truly safe in this city.

I didn’t know how much time passed before two familiar faces appeared just beyond the bouncers at the front of the club, but it was like magic. The very moment they walked in, looking downright sizzling, my head whipped around, and a low ball of heat rose up in my lower belly.

Roman and Carter walked in like they owned the place, which I supposed they kind of did, the bouncers stepping aside without patting them down. They were the only ones who could carry weapons on the premises.

They made a beeline for me, and I pushed off the wall, arms dropping to my sides as I watched them approach me. My heart began to speed up, and I just barely resisted the urge inside to make a mad dash over to them and climb them like trees in front of everyone.

Because I totally could. Either of them. Both of them. They were both tall, sexy as hell, cool drinks of water in the middle of the desert on the hottest day.

Carter was six years older than me, with brown hair whose length was cut short on the sides and left a bit longer on top. His eyes were a vivid green, though they were usually set in a scowl. He might claim to never brood, but he totally did. He had muscles too, the kind of muscles girls dreamed their boyfriends had, muscles most people didn’t even know existed.

And his stamina? Hoo boy. Don’t even get me started on his stamina.

Roman was older than Carter, in his mid-thirties. He had pitch-black hair, though it tended to have a blue tint in the sun, eyes so dark his stares were damn near soulless. His hunger mainly lay in watching, but every so often the need became too much and he had to feel my body wrapped around his. He always wore a sleek suit, dark colors his jam. I think the man would rather die than wear bright colors.

Neither man was particularly fond of smiling, but the moment they lay their eyes on me, I swore I saw both their mouths quirk upward, just a bit.

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