Total pages in book: 97
Estimated words: 95833 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 479(@200wpm)___ 383(@250wpm)___ 319(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 95833 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 479(@200wpm)___ 383(@250wpm)___ 319(@300wpm)
All the stress and fear and longing.
Elise didn’t mean to trigger it—but she did.
And now I feel the memory writhing around in my skull like a pit of rotten maggots, and I don’t know if I can ever make them stop.
Chapter 23
Nico
Karah’s quiet when I pick her up from the bowling alley the next night. She stares out the window like the beige buildings flashing past are the most interesting things in the world, and she doesn’t even rise to the challenge when I mention that she smells like buttered popcorn and bleach.
Which is weird because she loves giving me shit more than anyone in the world, and I love taking it from her. The sparring’s like a sport to me now, made doubly more exciting by the knowledge that at any moment I can pull her aside, bend her over my knee, and spank her ass pink and purple until she screams with delight and begs for more.
That’s the pinnacle of a good, healthy relationship: when happiness and joy and comfort and all that normal shit are drowned out by pure, unbridled lust.
“Where are we going?” She blinks and frowns at me in the darkness and frankly, I’m surprised she noticed that we weren’t headed toward Villa Bruno.
I figured she’d be a zombie until I woke her up.
“My place.”
“Your place?” Her eyebrows rise dramatically.
There she is. Now she’s listening. Little princess never once imagined that I’d pull her out of her comfort zone so fully, so deeply, and drag her into my hell.
“I have an apartment, believe it or not.”
“Here I was thinking you lived at Villa Bruno since you’re always hanging around.”
“I only sleep there on weekends.”
“God, do you really?”
I smile and don’t answer. Let her wonder about that one—although I do have a room tucked at the end of a quiet corridor that nobody else bothers to check except for the staff.
My apartment’s in a plain building about ten minutes from Villa Bruno. It’s a family-friendly sort of place with balconies draped in plants, the occasional gas grill, children’s inflatable toys. I park up front, get out, and Karah hurries to follow, her footsteps making a nervous patter over the concrete.
“I can’t imagine you living in a place like this.”
“I guess you don’t have a very good imagination then because I do.”
“Are those roller skates?” She stares at a child-sized pair left haphazardly next to the front door.
I kick them aside. “Don’t mind the mess.”
“Do actual children live here?”
“More than one, I’m afraid.” I unlock the door and head up the main stairwell to the second floor. It never occurred to me until now that it might be dangerous for me to live around kids, but hell, I’m barely ever here to begin with. My enemies are much more likely to find me driving around the city than to try to come kill me in this place. My apartment’s a two-bedroom unit at the very back with easy access to the fire escape for all those late-night comings and goings, such as they are.
I unlock my front door and step inside. A closet is straight ahead and I hang my suit jacket inside along with all the others. I head to the kitchen but stop when I realize Karah’s still lingering outside. I backtrack and lean against the doorframe, studying her.
She’s glaring at me with a deep frown. “Why am I here?”
I cross my arms and take a deep breath.
Why would a young, eligible man bring a woman back to his apartment?
To fucking ravish her in privacy, of course, instead of rutting with her in the gutter like a common street rat—but I don’t tell her that part—not that I’ve ever rutted anywhere. Not my style.
“You shared something with me, now I want to share something with you.” I gesture with my head. “Come inside, princess.”
She trails after me this time and I take her to the kitchen-slash-living room area.
My place isn’t nice. I don’t spend a lot of time in it and haven’t put more than the bare minimum amount of thought into furniture and decorations. I have some paintings hanging on the walls—shit some girl I knew once recommended and since it was expensive and pretty, I figured why the fuck not, she might be impressed, and she was, but unfortunately I got bored of her after one night and never spoke to her again—and some half-decent furniture the Famiglia stole from a designer a couple years back.
Otherwise, the place is barren.
It’s the opposite of Villa Bruno—that place is a like a temple dedicated to its own opulence, whereas my apartment is the cave of an ascetic monk.
“I half expected to find bloody bodies hanging from hooks,” she comments as I make drinks. Whiskey for me and gin and tonic for her. She accepts the glass and sips without commenting that I know her favorite drink.