Page 37 of Lost Kingdom

He yanks the door open with a heavy-handed tug that has the wind whipping through my space. Panicked, I snap my arm down and furiously hold on to the front of my gown before I’m exposed. “Dude! Close the damn door!”

“Whose dick did you see? I need a name. You won’t need to worry about him anymore.”

I roll my eyes and bend to grab my jeans. Seems I’m dressing much like I did last time I was in a gown in front of this man. “I see penises every single day, just so you know. I’ve seen a thousand at this point, though at least half of them belonged to little old men heading toward eighty years old. I’ve seen them in every shape. Every size. Every color. I’ve even seen one that was flayed. The one today, though, was extra special.” I shuck my jeans on, bouncing to get the denim up, but extra careful not to lose my top and give the man a show.

He hasn’t earned it yet.

“This guy was in a motor vehicle accident. Shattered his face, pierced his brain with the jagged tip of his nasal bone. Oddly, that wasn’t what killed him.”

Playing along now—way more fun than the squeamish Archer Malone—he steps into the changing room and closes the door to give me privacy.

Magnanimous of him.

“How’d he die?”

“Internal decapitation. Click, click.” I tilt my head left, then right, as though to illustrate my point. “Momentum of the crash had his body going one way, his head the other. Then his seatbelt snapped, his face slammed against the windshield, nose stabbed his brain, face hit the brick wall for good measure, he felt no more pain. But!” I snag my shirt and carefully shrug into the soft cotton, dragging it down to cover the bust of my gown, knowing I’m skipping theputting a bra onportion of my re-dress, fully aware I can’t do so without partially exposing myself to the man who so badly wants to see.

“Have you ever heard of a Jacob’s Ladder?”

His eyes spring wide. “Come again?”

“Steel bars pierced through a man’s penis.” I glance down at my crotch, which is an oddly inaccurate way of illustrating what I mean. “He had eight of them stacked along his shaft.” I snicker and continue to dress and undress at the same time. It’s a system. It works. “He wasn’t a particularly handsome or athletic man. He was on the shorter side. Low muscle tone. His job had him sitting eight hours a day, and the indent of his wedding ring meant he probably wasn’t showing his wang off to random ladies.”

Tim’s lips firm into straight, unimpressed lines. “Wang?”

“Yes, his external male sex organ. This organ serves to excrete urine and ejaculation of?—”

“I know what a fucking wang is, Aubree!”

“So why’d you ask?” I turn from him, if only to hide my smile and let the man suffer a little longer. “Though, if I’m being completely honest, I was concerned that you didn’t know. Like, how can you beyou, atyourage, fromyourworld, and not know what a penis is? So strange.”

“Aubree Grace…”

“Oh good. I’ve annoyed you. Now we’re even. What do you want to eat for dinner?” I peek over my shoulder and press a palm to my belly. “Anything but sausage, please. I’ve seen enough today.”

13

TIM

SO YOU’RE SAYING THERE’S STILL A CHANCE

“Ignore them all.” I steer Aubree with my palm wrapped around the back of her neck, my fingers digging in just firm enough to give her direction, but not nearly so tight that my touch causes her pain. And though her little cheer squad takes up prime seating at my bar, I keep us walking. “If you stop and talk, you’ll think of a reason to be mad at me again. So walk, Emeri.”

“You’re bossy.” But she blushes warmly and smiles all the way past her pals and through the commercial kitchen. The skin on the back of her neck pebbles with goosebumps. They’re contagious, because they work up through my arm and into my shoulder, sparking my heart and making the fucking thing stutter with nerves.

Or maybe that’s just me… tempting fate and defying everything I was bred for.

“This appears to be a hostage situation, just so you know.” She starts up the stairs and reaches back to knock my hand off her neck. But then she scoops her arm around mine instead, curling into my side and forcing us to walk together. No one leads. No one follows.Equals. “To outsiders, anyone who doesn’t know better, one could assume you’ve coerced me into being here and I’m actually being led toward danger.”

“Yeah?” I carry a bag of Chinese noodles in my free hand, the plastic crinkling against my leg every time I move up a step. But my eyes are forAubree. For her perfect ocean-blue stare and the glisten of her thick, pouty lips. “Do you feel coerced?”

She snorts. “Yes. Often.”

“Well… do you feel sad about that?”

“Not particularly.” We come to a stop at my door, locked up tight and accessible to only a few. But she doesn’t release my arm to allow me to grab my keys. Instead, she reaches across and takes our food, fluttering her lashes when I accept her hint to keep holding on. Then I use my non-dominant hand instead. “Is this a date?” she wonders out loud. “Or another one of those kidnap situations where you force me to stay the night and won’t let me leave?”

“Same means.” I unlock my door and push it open. “Same end. But two very different versions of the same story. The version you tell the cops matters quite a lot in a court of law.”

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