Page 47 of Evil Deeds

“I always dress up,” Gloria says. “I am a costume.”

With a toss of her long, blonde hair, she climbs back into the ’69 Mustang before waving out the window to the crowd. People stomp their feet to keep warm, huddling into their winter coats and calling out for the race to start.

“Ready?” I ask, looking down at Dixie and trying not to feel like a fucking tool in my tights and ruffled shirt. It doesn’t matter that she interrupted my moment with the Queen of Hell. I’m fucking stupid to even look at Lo and I know it. It’s just that weird lucid dream I had this morning still fucking with my head.

But that’s all it was. A dream.

Dixie assured me it wasn’t real, that I didn’t even talk to Gloria last year during the month I can’t remember. It was just my damaged brain making up things, mixing memories and fantasies. And fantasies of Gloria Walton are as dangerous as the reality.

This is my reality.

Dixie is what I can get. I don’t have friends. I’m not welcome at parties. Hell, they probably wouldn’t even make an exception for Bye Week if they didn’t need my connections. I don’t touch any girl that the Dolces might consider as a future option, let alone one they’ve already fucked and might call back into rotation, anddefinitelynot their queen.

They look the other way and let me have this one thing, this one girl.

I’m grateful she sticks around, that she loves me when no one else can. But I’m also guilty as hell, because this isn’t what she really wants. She wants to be at the center of everything. If she could hire someone to follow her around with a boombox to play her own personal soundtrack and a spotlight to shine on her at all times, she’d die happy.

All I can do is give her the flag one night a year and let her start the race.

I fire the shot into the air, she drops the flag, and the cars launch, a row of roaring beasts spitting fire and smoke and thrusting forward into the icy night. The crowd screams and surges closer, trying to keep the cars in sight, pumping their fists in the air. My adrenaline spikes even though I’m not in a car. I can feel the vibration of all those motors running through the ground, my feet, up through my bones. I watch the green Mustang blow the doors off everyone else, and a shiver of some forgotten memory sends goosebumps racing up my spine. Did she win last year?

Dixie turns and throws her arms around my neck and kisses me, and I lose sight of the cars, trying to give her my attention, the least she deserves.

It’s not enough. Not for either of us. Shallow as I am, I want to be everything my girl wants. Knowing I can’t be everything to Dixie only reminds me every fucking day that I’m not the man I used to be, the man who could have given her everything. I’m not a star on the football field or off. I’m a pariah.

Maybe that’s why Gloria pisses me off so much this year. She’s constantly reminding Dixie that she could do better, that she’s settling. And every time Gloria reminds Dixie she could do better, it reminds me. I’m not afraid Dixie will realize it and leave me. That would be better than knowing that she’s already realized it, and she stays anyway.

Maybe that’s even the reason she stays.

“Dixie,” calls a voice behind us, and the female demon twins, also known as the other Walton sisters, shove through the press of bodies, gripping each other so they don’t get separated in the crowd. “You looked amazing out there. I can’t believe you got him to do a couple’s costume!”

“It’s so romantic,” says the other twin, holding onto her sister and gazing at us with a dreamy expression that says she might want to join us for some more intimate moments later. Dixie’s not into sharing though, so my days of being able to pull two girls for a threesome are over.

“DeShaun would never do that,” says the first twin. I know their names, but I’ve never bothered to figure out which one is which. They’re both as evil and toxic as Gloria, and I only know her name because she’s not identical to them.

“I know,” Dixie says with a giggle, huddling into my side for warmth. “I’ve got him whipped.”

“I’ve got some tea for you,” says a Walton twin. “It’s about Lo and Rylan…”

She wiggles her brows and nods her head for Dixie to step aside.

“I’ll be right back,” Dixie assures me, like I’m the one clinging to her hand. She and her friends move off to gossip, working their way through the packed spectator area.

“Hey, Romeo,” Maverick says, sauntering along the pavement to join me at the front.

“Get off the road, dumbass,” I say, pulling him into me so he won’t get hit by a returning car.

“They’re not even back yet,” he says, though we can hear a cheer go up somewhere down the street where more viewers are watching. “Got a smoke?”

“Yeah,” I say, digging in my pocket.

Maverick watches, smirking. “Those are some tight pants you got there,” he says. “Or are they tights?”

“Shut up,” I grumble, pulling out my case.

“Hey, I wasn’t criticizing,” Maverick says with an easy grin. “I was appreciating.”

I glare at him and take out a joint. Maverick blocks me from the sharp sting of the wind, huddling over me and cupping his hands around mine while I light up. His cold fingers linger on my hands, and I’m aware of how much more sensation I have in the healthy skin on the back of my right hand than on my burned left one.

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