Page 24 of Pretty Monster

That last one grates on my nerves. How the hell does he know I’m not home, and judging by the look in Viper’s eyes, he’s wondering the same damn thing. He shakes his head and exits out of my notifications before locking my phone and stepping around me, sliding it into the back pocket of my jeans. “Come on, I’m taking you home.”

I scoff. “You and I both know that’s not a good idea.”

“Kyah, you’re fucking drunk. I’m not about to take you home and fuck you blind when you can’t even walk in a straight line,” he says. “That’s Crew’s specialty. Not mine.”

“Huh?” I say, my brows furrowed. I start shaking my head, not liking where this is going. I mean, I know I might have let it slip that something happened between me and Crew, but I don’t like the insinuation that he took advantage of me. “What are you talking about?”

“Last night, Ky. You got drunk at that dive bar across the street from your apartment and let him touch what’s mine, and the second you turned your back and walked out with that other asshole, he couldn’t fucking wait to brag about it.”

Unease pounds through my veins. “I’m not yours, Viper,” I say, needing to throw that out there, despite knowing it’s landing on deaf ears. “But you’re wrong. Crew wouldn’t do that to me. Now, I get those texts don’t look great, but that’s not really who he is. What happened between us is none of your damn business.”

“Exactly, it’s none of my fucking business, so why the fuck did he feel the need to tell me all about the way you tasted on his tongue?” Viper just stares at me, giving me a second to process, and the longer he waits, the quicker I start to realize that Crew would do exactly what Viper’s accusing him of.

Crew is brutal and cruel to everyone but me, so why the hell wouldn’t he try to weaponize what we did, especially if he thinks it could give him an edge over Viper? Or at the least, use it to get under his skin. Fucking me is the perfect knife through Viper’s back, and Crew couldn’t wait to be the one to get to do it. Though, Viper only cares because he wants to own me, not because the thought of being with me like that makes his heart race.

It’s not as though I care if Viper knows I slept with Crew, but I thought it meant something, that it was a step in the right direction for us, even though it terrified me. What I didn’t expect was that I could have just been a notch on Crew’s belt.

It felt like so much more.

Has he been playing me this whole time?

There’s got to be more to this, or at least some sort of explanation as to why he would possibly think I’d be okay with him using our sex life as a bragging tool against Viper. I mean, I completely get why he did it, but surely he knows me well enough to know that I wouldn’t be down with it. Either way, the betrayal stings.

If I knew he was going to be like this, knew he was going to look at me like a possession he has the right to make demands from or use what we did as a weapon to hurt other people, bragging about it like it was some kind of bet, I never would have put myself in that position, never would have opened myself up to him like that.

Hell, the way he was acting in the shop today, he’s never treated me like that before. And now these texts? What the fuck is that about?

I just don’t get it, there have been plenty of times where we’ve screwed around, where I’ve dropped to my knees for him and taken him right to the back of my throat, and he never once said a word about it. So why now? Why ruin it now that things have finally started to shift?

Fuck. I never knew that sleeping with Crew was going to be something I would regret.

Viper clenches his jaw, stepping closer into me so that his big body presses in against mine. “When the hell are you going to realize that you have no fucking idea who Crew Ledger really is?”

I swallow hard, my mood plummeting, everything I thought I knew about him now being brought into question. “I mean, I knew he was an asshole, but he’s never been one to me,” I say, still feeling the need to defend him. After all, Crew has been one of my closest friends for six years. Surely that’s supposed to mean something.

Viper shakes his head, looking at me as though I were some kind of lost puppy he’s been left to deal with, and I fucking hate it. “Come on, Ky,” he says, his hands slipping into mine, his grip almost bruising. “I’m taking you home.”

Letting out a heavy sigh, I let Viper pull me along, and before I know it, I’m straddling the back of his bike with my head a mess of emotions. Part of me is still riding the high of this new excitement brimming with Alex, while the other part crashes through the lows, the idea of Crew’s betrayal tearing me to pieces.

But then Viper goes and kicks over the engine of his Harley Davidson, and as the vibrations rock right through my core, suddenly there’s only one thing on my mind. “Oh God,” I grumble, my arms locking around Viper’s waist as I plaster myself to his back. “When I throw myself at you later and beg you to fuck me on the back of this thing, promise me you’ll be the perfect gentleman.”

I feel Viper’s laugh rumble through his decorated chest. “Cross my heart and hope to die,” he tells me, amusement dancing in his deep tone. “Now hold on, baby. Let me take you for a ride.”

11

REID

Thedeeprumbleofa motorcycle echoes through the empty street as I gaze out Kyah’s bedroom window, finding her on the back of some asshole’s bike. It’s almost two thirty in the morning, way past her bedtime, but damn it, she looks so fucking good on the back of that bike that I might even forgive her for keeping me waiting like this.

Her arms drape over the rider and I grit my teeth, watching as the asshole climbs off the bike and offers her his hand. She takes it greedily, looking up at him as though he were her whole world, and soon enough, she’s going to look at me like that.

I can’t fucking wait.

Kyah climbs off the bike and steps right into the guy, her hand pressed against his chest, and I hate that I can’t hear a damn word they’re saying. She’s fucking dazzling, and I know if she were looking up at me like that, I wouldn’t be able to resist a damn thing she wanted. Hell, if she asked to strap on a fucking ten-inch monster cock and peg me, I’d be straight on my knees telling her which drawer I keep the lube in. But fuck, if she wanted to go in dry . . . shit. I don’t know about that. Ahhh, who am I kidding? I’d still do it with tears in my eyes, only for her though.

Fuck. Ending her life is going to be harder than I thought.

These past few weeks, I’ve imagined every possible way I could end her life and how good it would feel, and damn it, it would, but the thought of doing it so soon . . . shit. I can’t bring myself to want to. There’s still so much I have to learn about this woman, so much I want to explore, and what really fucks with my head is that for the first time since I started playing this messed-up little game, I can’t see the ending in sight.

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