Sicko(28)

My muscles seize. Just as Sloane whips her head to where I’m sitting. “Really?” She raises her eyebrows. “I can assure you, that is most likely about to change.” I can feel recklessness seep into my bones, my head pounding as quickly as my heart.

He still sleeps around. He may still be like that, but he has another thing coming if he thinks I’m the same girl who will tolerate the same shit. I’ll lay another man flat on his back on the very same ground I used to worship Royce on.

I stand to my feet. “Nellie?”

“Yes, little one?”

I want to hit her. I have to force myself from not reaching across the room and punching her straight in the jaw.

I ignore her. “Take me to the bar.”

Sloane smirks from behind the rim of her glass. “Atta girl.”

I can feel almost every set of eyes on us while we head right for the bar. I don’t know where Royce has gone, but there’s one thing that I do know, and that’s that no matter what he says, I don’t think he would let anyone hurt me. He may be a cruel god, but he’d never let his disciples hurt me. At the very least, I’m willing to test that theory.

Nellie hands me a shot of vodka, for liquid courage, and points around the room.

“That’s Lion,” she says, rolling a new glass between her fingers. “He’s the president and best friend of Sicko. They’re so tight it turns me on.” She pauses, pointing to another. “That’s Gypsy. He’s a total fucking idiot who manages to sleep with Victoria’s Secret models on the weekends—and that’s no lie—before dealing with club business right after. Pretty boy.” Nellie’s eyes fly to the man beside Gypsy. “And that is Wicked.” As soon as the name leaves her lips, I find myself watching his mouth move.

Wicked.

Oh.

“Hmmm,” I murmur, tilting my head. “Interesting. Tell me about Wicked…” Something that doesn’t involve how I know him. As I take in Wicked’s hard features and stone-cold eyes, my stomach flips. As if sensing my gawking, he turns his head, his dark ink hair glossing against the lighting. He wears a white shirt beneath his leather vest and loose black jeans with cuts on the knees. His combat boots are tied loosely at his feet, the dried mud over the rubber edges displaying how dirty he obviously gets.

Hmmm.

“Wicked doesn’t really talk. He addresses people by his movements, unless you’re one of the holy ones that he speaks to, which is usually only the brothers. The disrespect is real with that one, so I wouldn’t even try.”

Even more interesting. “Spend Some Time” by Eminem is beating against the walls, matching my pulse.

“You don’t say.”

Wicked’s eyes are on mine and my stomach hits the floor as he directs his bleak orbs down my body, right to the tips of my toes. I feel the tingles fizzle through my veins as he slowly brings his ice blues back up, thick lashes fanning over his high cheekbones. Wicked is probably by far one of the most beautiful looking male specimens I have ever seen. Royce is a nightmare wrapped in a dream, but Wicked is the Devil’s pet.

Tipping back my head to swallow my tequila, or rum, or whatever, I bring my eyes to Nellie and away from Wicked. “Interesting.”

“Wicked? No. Nope. He’s pretty to look at, but Sicko is more my speed.”

I can’t help it, and with all the alcohol pulsing through my veins, I can’t stop it. Laughter rolls out of my mouth.

“Something funny?” Nellie asks, as if insulted. She should be. I’m straight-up laughing at her.

“No.” I look to Sloane, ignoring Nellie. “Ready to go?”

She watches me with careful eyes, aware of my sudden shift in attitude. “Okay.”



After sneaking out of the clubhouse and catching an Uber, I’m once again back in the safety of my covers in my dorm. I feel as though I’m finally able to catch up with everything that happened tonight. From thinking Royce had kidnapped me, to seeing Wicked. My phone vibrates on top of my dresser, and I grab at it to see I have missed a couple of text messages. Seeing an unknown number, I open that one first.

We’re not done.

I chew on my bottom lip, the light from my phone killing my vision. I move away from his to one from James.

Be ready by six tomorrow. Expect a parcel.

I exhale, my fingers hovering over Royce’s text. Before I can stop myself, my fingers are flying over my screen furiously.

We were done the day you left me.

I think about waiting for his reply, with a belly full of anxiety, but before I can drop my phone back onto my bedside table and get some much-needed sleep, he texts back.

Yeah?

I ignore his vague text, shoving my phone under my pillow and finally resting my eyes.



My legs were stretched wide, spread by a metal bar that seemed to extend wider the more I moved. His fingers flexed over the inside of my thigh while his other hand held a tumbler glass of probably the finest Irish whiskey. When my eyes drifted down to his hand, he brought it up to my chin and yanked my face back to his. Gagged and tied to a bed at a lavish hotel that would charge for one night what most people would for an entire year. He didn’t hold back.

Squeezing roughly, his dark eyes danced with greed. This was the third time that this had happened, that he had had his hands on me without my approval. Every time he does, he takes a part of my soul and leaves an emotional scar with his departure.