Page 63 of PortCity Killers

It didn’t help.

The heat that crept up my neck burned at the thought of Valentina seeing me in a way that threatened to unleash the torrent of nervous giggles that I could feel rioting in my belly.

I dressed quickly, and when she patted the seat in front of her, “May I?”

She held up the brush. Did I want to deal with the frizz puff that would be my hair after? Probably not. But I took the opportunity to face anywhere but her gladly and with gusto.

My hair was up in its normal bun, curls falling out around my face this way and that. I took the scrunchie out, wrapping it around my wrist as Valentina began playing with the thick mass of hair. There was no running your hands through curls, not really.

There was always something to snag on, but she ran her deft fingers underneath the strands as best she could, giving the back of my head little scratches here and there that had goosebumps prickling up my arms and legs.

“It was your hair that caught my attention first,” she sighed, beginning at the bottom with the brush, slowly working her way up, “I thought to myself, ‘I want nothing more than to wrap a hand around her hair and watch her eyes tear up as I fuck her pretty little face.’”

If I hadn’t been blushing before, dear Jesus I was now, but I was brave not facing her and managed a little tease to my voice, “Is that why you had your fingers in my mouth the first chance you got?”

“Yes,” she laughed, a soft, lilting sound that followed the same cadence she shared with Don. “That is exactly why. I wanted to have touched you before Don for once. Claim you in a way he had not.”

“Do you not like sharing with Don?”

Because the way she said it made me think that maybe she wasn’t as keen on it as she had led me to believe. I winced, when she caught a particularly stubborn snag, but stayed silent.

“I think at the moment I had preferred not to.”

“Why did you give me to Don, then?”

I felt her shrug behind me, “Tal vez I was nervous you would not want me as I did you. Women tolerate me at first. They think who they truly want is Don, but they do not want him for himself. They want him for what he can give them, and they think they can use the both of us to get it. We have shared women, but not in the way we have shared you.”

I groaned as her fingers began moving against my scalp, brush forgotten, “By the end they only want to remove me from the picture. I am too much, too in their business for a sister. Sometimes they come to my bed—they think if they can appease us both then I will not be so...intense. It never works. I am who I am; I am not going to change. So, they feel guilt and shame for being with us in this way when they don’t get what they want.”

“Maybe it’s because they think you’re siblings unless you tell them?”

Don had said that they don’t talk about it to others, but I wanted to hear it from Valentina. She shrugged again, giving a disgusted sound, her fingers working through my strands to braid my hair.

“It wouldn’t matter if we were night and day. People are small minded, and they don’t like what doesn’t go safely in their little boxes.”

“That still doesn’t say why you made me suck Don’s cock.”

“I’ve never shared a woman with Don like that. We have fucked the same woman, yes, but never together, and I think I want that...with you.”

I shivered, warmth filling my insides at the thought, “I want that too.”

“Without shame? Without guilt?”

I turned to her, taking her hand in mine, relishing in how smooth her long, cool fingers were against my short, warm ones, “I should feel guilty.”

“But you don’t?” She smiled, clutching my hand in hers.

I sighed, looking at her straight on. I wanted no misunderstanding between us, and there was a lot of shit that was in the middle of any sort of workable arrangement, “You would have killed my brother.”

It was a statement, not a question, because I knew for a fact that without confirmation that Valentina would have killed Jaymes if it had suited her best interest, and I had very little thought that she had changed her mind on that stance, regardless of what she wanted from me.

“We still might if he causes trouble.”

And didn’t that ring with the fucking truth.

“You made me kill someone, nearly fucked me in their blood.”

“And I would do it again,” her smile was Cheshire wide, “We can if you would like.”