Touch (Denazen #1)(76)

A cold sweat broke out across my forehead and under my braid as I backed away. “It was you.” All the air drained from my lungs and my vision swam. No. It couldn’t be. “You told Dad about me and Kale.”

I turned to scan the room. The bar where I’d left Kale and Fin was crowded now but neither were there. Mercy-as-me had told Curd I wanted to hook up with Fin. Curd, in turn, passed the message along. Fin, being the dog he was, jumped at the idea. While I was wasting time up here talking to Alex, Mercy-as-me had probably swaggered in and snatched Fin up. He would have gone along like a puppy begging for a treat after finding out I was on for him. Sure, I’d already told him I had a boyfriend, but with my rep, that wouldn’t mean crap. My only hope was that Kale had been intimidating enough for Fin to back off in search of more promising prey.

I turned back and grabbed the front of his shirt. “What the hell did you do?”

“It’s too late for him. If your dad doesn’t have him yet, he will soon.”

“How could you do—”

“The way you were kissing me the other day—then you pushed away. It killed me. Then you said it was because of him… When you went out to the car at my place the other day, I called your father back. I told him I’d make a deal. You for Kale. I told him you were infatuated with the little freak. He wasn’t surprised to see me at the coffee shop, Dez. He already knew I’d be with you.”

This person standing in front of me was a complete stranger. This heartless, selfish, cold thing that wore the face of someone I’d once cared about. “How could you do that? Knowing what they did to him—what they’re going to do to him?”

“I did what I needed to—to make sure you were safe.” He stood straighter now, jaw set. “That freak was going to get you killed. He was going to get us all killed.”

I couldn’t believe he was actually defending his actions. Trying to justify what he’d done. Even if his intentions had been good, he knew how I felt about Kale. He knew what they did to Sixes at Denazen. To knowingly hand one over…

“You disgust me.” I spat in his face and turned away.

I left him in the corner and went to find Kale and my mom, wearing my ex boyfriend’s face.





29


I’d been looking for signs of Kale, or my mom—even though I had no idea who to look for—when I spotted myself by the lower bar. I was wearing a pale pink bikini with a fluffy pink cotton ball tail attached to the back. My hair—in its former glorious blonde and black incarnation—hung in loose ringlets spilling from a pair of long pink ears pointing skyward. A playboy bunny? Seriously? I’d kick Mercy’s ass from here to Jersey for that alone.

I made a beeline for the bar with a sudden burst of renewed energy. The mimic had still taken its toll, but my anger gave me a second wind. And a third. Plus, if one more trampy girl threw herself at me-as-Alex, someone was getting hurt.

“Hey,” I said, leaning close. I hoped I could channel Alex well enough to make her believe I was him. “What the hell are you doing lounging around? We have work to do.”

She shrugged and sipped her green drink. “Fin’s been taken. It was so easy. I walked up to the kid, blew in his ear, and he followed me like a starving man.”

“What about 98?”

She shrugged again and downed the rest of her drink. “He wasn’t with Fin.”

Her hand snaked out and caught me by the waist. After a moment it slipped down to my ass—Alex’s ass. I’d never get over this as long as I lived, no matter what Denazen did to me.

“We’ll find them. Her mother’s here and she knows it. I made sure of that. That will be enough to bag her. And once we get Dez, 98 will be a cinch.” She squeezed my ass. “We can kill the time by waiting for them in a dark corner somewhere.”

It took me a minute to figure it out. My gag reflex kicked into high gear and I stumbled away. “Ew!”

“You didn’t think that when you had your tongue down my throat last night,” she snapped.

Wow. Just…wow. He was that warm for my form that he’d screw this cheap imitation?

She reached for my arm, and I let her take it. This whole thing was creepy and disgusting in an epic way. But ick factor aside, I could usually see the possibilities in any situation. This might actually work to my advantage. I wanted her out of my skin, and to do that I had to get her alone. “Fine, let’s go.”

She led me around the back of the bar. The door to the storage hall was open and, thankfully, empty. I didn’t waste any time. Unfortunately, neither did Mercy-as-me. She pawed Alex—me—trying to back him up against the wall the second the door closed. “I know you were mad when you found out I wasn’t her, but it was good, right? Something about that little tramp’s body—it makes me bolder.” Her hands were everywhere, grabbing and squeezing parts of me that triggered an intense need for eternal therapy.

I shoved her off and growled. No amount of scrubbing would ever scour the memory of this moment away. Brillo. Lufa. Boric acid. Nothing.

As she rounded for another pass, thinking it was all part of the game, I punched her in the face. She went down like a sack of textbooks. “You and Alex? That is so gross.”

She stirred and I didn’t wait. Falling to my knees, I grabbed her hand. Like back in the woods when we’d escaped her office, I concentrated on mimicking Mercy back to Mercy. Focusing on what was on the inside rather than the outside. A rush of warmth spread throughout my limbs, accompanied by a slight prickling in my temples.