KING(14)

A knock at the window made me jump. “Let me in, bitch!” Came a high-pitched voice from outside.

Nikki.

I scrambled over to the window to lift the latch. Nikki leapt up and stumbled into the room, falling onto the floor. Her greasy red hair was plastered to her forehead with sweat, her old faux-fur shawl that may have once been white, but was now an off gray color, was draped haphazardly over one shoulder.

“How did you know where I was?” I asked. I hadn’t seen Nikki since she took off on me hours ago when we first got to the party.

“That Bear guy told me. I totally wanted to sit on his face but he just took off on his bike with some Tyra Banks looking chick.”

There goes that option.

I helped Nikki up off the floor. “So how was it? How was he? I saw him downstairs earlier and holy hot man.” She adjusted the strap of her bag across her shoulder. “Did you do that thing with your tongue I told you to do?” She asked me with the same excitement as if she was asking if I rode the Ferris wheel at the carnival. “Did you make him come? Did he make you come? Tell me everything.”

I sighed, both defeated and relieved. “No. No one made anyone do anything. He just…left.”

Nikki looked me up and down, her expression turned from elation to annoyance. “No wonder he left. Have you seen what the f*ck you look like? I should’ve never let you come up here looking like that.”

I looked down at the plain gray tank top that I’d tied in the back to make it appear more formfitting and the tattered, sequined skirt that was missing most of the sequins. I knew I didn’t look great, but I didn’t have the resources to look great.

Or even good.

Nikki shook her head, gesturing wildly with her hands up and down at my body. “You look like a kid fresh off the playground whose been playing with her mama’s old clothes.”

She sniffled and adjusted her own denim skirt that barely covered her ass cheeks. Her green tank top had a bleach stain over her right boob.

“It doesn’t matter now. He’s gone,” I said bitterly. “Let’s get out of here.” I had to clear my head and come up with a new plan.

Which included getting away from Nikki.

“Not so fast, little one. What’s your hurry?” Nikki took a turn around the room and when she reached the door she turned the lock. “Let’s see what we can find in here,” she said playfully, opening the drawers of a dresser one by one, searching the contents, pushing aside socks and t-shirts.

“What the hell are you doing?” I asked. “We need to leave and leave now. You didn’t see the look on the guys face before, because if you did we would already be halfway across the state by now.”

“Oh shush, you’re so f*cking dramatic. What’s your hurry? Besides, this place has air conditioning,” Nikki said, fanning her pits. She picked up a photo with a thin plastic frame and turned it to me. “Sweet looking kid huh?” She ran her fingers over the picture of a little blond girl with curls smiling into the camera. For the first time since I’d met Nikki I saw her smile, although there was a lingering sadness behind it. She shook her head, set down the picture, and opened the bottom drawer, shuffling through some paperwork.

“Motherf*cking BINGO!” She shouted. When she lifted her hand from the drawer, she produced a huge stack of bills tied together with purple bands. She waved it in the air and my stomach flipped at the sight. That money could buy a lot of food.

It could buy the start of a whole new life.

The thought went out just as fast as it had come in, because there was no f*cking way I was about to steal it.

There is no way I am stealing from HIM.

I was desperate, not suicidal.

There was a loud bang followed by the rattling of the doorknob. “What the f*ck?” A voice on the other end of the door shouted. “Why is this locked?”

“We gotta go!” I shouted. Nikki grabbed another stack of bills from the drawer and darted for the window, shoving me aside before I could offer for her to go first, losing a few bills along the way.

Nikki barely had one leg out the window when the door flew off its hinges, sending the door frame splintering into a million little wooden pieces throughout the room. Bear, the man who’d sent me up here, stood in the doorway. We locked eyes for a split-second before he noticed the empty drawer, the loose bills on the floor, and the open window where Nikki was already halfway out.

Bear took one step into the room. Nikki reached into her purse and produced a small handgun I didn’t know she had.