Page 13 of The Failed Audition

“One piercing,” he says deeply. “If you’re frightened, leave now. I don’t want you crying or suing me or the bar or Aerial Ethereal. We have a verbal contract that you’re consenting to this, yes?” This sounds rehearsed, like he’s said this plenty of times before to other girls and guys.

“Yes,” I nod.

And then he removes his hand off my thigh, slipping it underneath the cotton of my tee. My breath hitches, his fingersskimming the smoothness of my bare skin, up to the line of my tight sports bra.

Without removing my shirt, he rolls up the bra to my collarbone.Okay, I can do this.He moves inconspicuously—thankfully. The sandalwood scent of his cologne dizzies my head.

He searches my eyes for reactions, reading me like an unraveling book. He hesitates for a prolonged second, and his eyes narrow at my blue glow necklace. “You’re single.”

It clicks. It should’ve clicked way before now, but I must’ve had sensory overload to compute the necklaces to relationship statuses.

Blue = single.

Green = ?

Red = ??

I glance at his red necklace, more curious. “Why do you ask?”

“I’m making sure you didn’t lie,” he tells me. “I don’t want an angry boyfriend in my face tonight.”

“I didn’t lie,” I breathe. “You know…you could’ve just asked me if I was single.”Instead of guessing based on my reaction to the statement.

He doesn’t say anything. His hand simply ascends to my left boob. Dear God. And he rubs my nipple between two of his fingers. My back arches in stiff awareness, the tequila from earlier doing nothing but covering me in a hot blanket.

“Your eyes are black again,” he says casually, as though he’s not massaging my boob right now. “Thinking of sucking out my soul?” He actually asks this. A real question. His gray eyes penetrate mine for an answer.

“No,” I whisper. “You already said that you’re the kind of guy who can’t be possessed.”

“But you seem like a girl who’d try, even if it’s a losing battle.” All because I accepted the handstand challenge—that’s how he concluded this.

Even if I could respond, I wouldn’t know what to say. He drops his gaze, and my nipple hardens for him. He slips his other hand beneath my shirt, piercing needle now closer to my boob. And it dawns on me.

“You’re doing this blind.”

He pauses off my fear. “Either that or I remove your shirt.”

I shake my head repeatedly.

“I won’t miss. Trust me.”

“I don’t even know you,” I say softly, adrenaline pulsating through my veins. He has led me to the precipice of a cliff, pushed me off, and now he’s clasping my wrist. He can let go at any moment, and I will fall.

“Every day,” he says lowly, “I hold a person’s life in my hands. The circus is based one-hundred percent off trust. I give it all to someone, and they give it all to me. I’m asking you, right now, to trust me.”

His words seem genuine. His eyes seem confident. And somewhere, I begin to calm. Somewhere I reach into the furthest places of my mind and rewire the responses that saystay cautious.The ones Shay tightened before I left.

I nod for Nikolai to continue, my hands heavy on his muscular shoulders.

“Inhale,” he orders. And I feel the cold metal of the needle. My ribs lift in a deep breath, and before I exhale, a sharp pain stabs my nipple. He’s quick to secure the tiny silver balls to either end of the barbell. I stifle a wince, a foreign pressure lingering on the sensitive bud. Throbbing.

He wipes a trail of blood with a nearby towel, and then he retracts his hands from my shirt. I’m not sure if I should roll down my bra, but I do anyway, ignoring the pain that wells. Nikolai lifts me from the chair and sets me on my feet as he stands.

The crowds cheer and drunken girls hop up and down, waving their hands sloppily to be picked next. My mind whirls in five different directions.

“Keep that clean,” he tells me. His gaze already starts to break from mine, to focus on other girls, on more people.

But I hone in on his red glow necklace before we part from each other. I can’t hold it in. I say, “Will your girlfriend be mad?” He just fondled my boob, and if the red glow necklaces meanin a relationship, then she might not be happy with him.

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