Total pages in book: 192
Estimated words: 182641 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 913(@200wpm)___ 731(@250wpm)___ 609(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 182641 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 913(@200wpm)___ 731(@250wpm)___ 609(@300wpm)
He’s … grinning.
And then his hands come up, locking onto Kylo’s wrist, his legs swinging up as he balances his weight like a fucking boneless acrobat. His legs come up a split second later, wrapping and locking around Kylo’s neck, swinging and slamming him to the floor with a booming thud that sends a cloud of dirt into the air. The same moment he’s whipping through the air, he swings, the angle of his fist a downward motion, driving right into Kenex’s temple.
He’s knocked out cold.
Kenex is bent, gripping his side.
And Bastian pushes to his feet, spitting at theirs.
If the crowd was loud before, they’re deafening now.
People scream and shout, whistling and screeching sounds you’d never hear in the training studios at Greyson Prep. It’s pure drunken debauchery.
Fingers wrap around mine, and a swift inhale zips down into my aching lungs, reminding me to breathe. I look down to the large, inkless hand as it peels mine from the fraying rope. Slowly, the guy flips it over, and I frown at the small drops of blood pooling around the crescent marks, a perfect match to my fingernails.
“You hurt yourself,” he whispers in my ear. “He won’t like that.”
“I didn’t know.” I also don’t know why I answer … or why, when he lifts my hand in his, tugging it beyond my line of sight, I allow him to do so.
A warm tongue flicks along my palm and I frown but don’t pull away.
If Bastian trusts him, I can too.
Wait.
What?!
I yank away and the male chuckles.
“Your blood tastes the same, but it ain’t, is it, blue blood?” he rasps.
“Hayze.”
My eyes fly forward, gasping at the sight of Bastian standing tall, not three feet away, staring right at me.
The body behind mine disappears as the crowd does.
His lip is split once more, the small gash at the edge of his eye bleeding less, the blood now gathering near his hairline.
But he stands solid and strong. Unfazed.
Suddenly, Damiano is in the center of the ring, bent and checking Kylo for a pulse.
“He’s alive,” Bastian tells me.
I nod. I know. I saw Bastian peek at his chest when he pretended to only be spitting at Kylo’s feet. Something tells me he wouldn’t have cared if it weren’t for me.
Not that he cares if they’re hurt, but it would probably suck for him to kill someone in my circle, not knowing what such a move would lead to. At the very least, he recognizes this much.
We stare at each other for several long minutes and I’m pretty sure it’s my smirk that’s set free first, though I try to squash it to the side to hide it.
Bastian chuckles and comes closer, stopping right in front of me, his dark hair stuck to his forehead and hanging over his left eye.
He’s slick with sweat, smeared in blood and dirt, yet I still want to reach out to him, to touch him. Trace his tattoos. But now is not the time, as the rest of my crew steps up to join us.
He gives me one more second of himself, then a mask slips over his face, and I know the part we can’t avoid comes next.
He stole one of ours and it’s time to find out why.
For his sake—or maybe mine—it better be a damn good reason.
Bass
The crowd wasn’t expecting a second show.
When I left the building, I knew someone would follow, and I knew, if it was going to be one of them and not some beefy security dude, he’d be quick to volunteer to be the one to tail me out.
He—they—didn’t want anyone to find out what they’d done. That was my thought, one that proved right when I got sight of the angry faces that didn’t belong on these dark and dirty grounds.
Like my Rich Girl, these Greysons, as their little rich kid club like to call themselves, are all big and bad … so long as they don’t tug their leashes too hard, reason number one why they came my way. I didn’t put it together right away, but all it took was five minutes of working through my thoughts to link the bracelets.
Now I’m sitting on a crate staring into the eyes of the pretty motherfucker who knows what my girl feels like on the inside.
Not sure how I feel about it.
“We should speak somewhere more private,” blond James Bond suggests, trying to take the lead.
“Ain’t no privacy out here, pretty boy.” Hayze hops up beside me, tossing me a white shirt he found in the car since I used the one I had on to wipe the blood off me as best I could. “This is as close to alone as you’re gon’ get.”
James Bond narrows his eyes, glancing around the space.
Most people are gone already, the ones who aren’t are too drunk or high to pay attention, and they’re also clustered in their own little cliques closer to the front.