Lola & the Millionaires: Part One (Sweet Omegaverse #2)(39)

I giggled and tripped over myself, catching my hand on the railing up to my door, the neighborhood spinning around me. “Shhh…people are sleeping.”

“Mmmkay. Be good, killer,” Zane said with a wave before throwing himself back into the seat, the door slamming like a gunshot behind him.

I hummed and rolled my shoulders back, trying to take steady steps up to the front door, as if I could conjure sobriety by willpower alone.

With Betty and Zane, my three drink limit was obliterated. I’d done my best to ward them off, but by the time we left Philia—my request—I was well and truly drunk. I pulled open the downstairs door and tsk’ed at the broken lock. David had pressured the landlord while I was signing the lease to have the street door’s lock fixed, but two months in and it had yet to change.

I slid against the stairwell wall as I dragged myself up to my floor. The lights overhead flickered and I paused, drawing in a deep breath and wondering if I could sleep like this, or if the nightmares would swallow me up if I was too weak to fight. I dug into my purse for my keys and undid the three locks, pulling out my phone and checking the time as I stepped inside. Was it too late to call Leo? His voice would settle my woozy heart before bed.

There was a message waiting, my phone screen the only illumination in the room as I shut the door behind me.

UNKNOWN 2:21 AM

u bein good showgirl?

My heart stopped and my phone slipped from my fingers, crashing to the floor with my purse. The room was dark, and my free hand hovered over the light switch, afraid to flip it and find I wasn’t alone.

“Look at you, Showgirl, look at the mess we made of you. Filthy girl, we sure made you scream.”

I heaved, bile surging up in my throat, and I raced to the bathroom through the dark, imagining the sound of feet chasing me with the crash of my heels on the floor. My knees hit the tile with a jarring ache and I threw up into the toilet, vomit burning like acid in my throat. Tears were already gathering in my eyes, and I braced myself for the panic attack.

Just breathe. Just stay awake. Get the lights on, Lola.

I was sick twice more before I was able to drag myself to the wall and flip the switch. In the half-second between my touching the switch and the light coming on, I imagined him standing there. Indy. Tall and skeletal, sneer stretching his lips, tattoos over his fingers as they dug into my throat.

The bathroom was empty, I was alone, surrounded by mildewy pink tile. I wiped my mouth with toilet paper and ignored the scratch in my throat as I wrestled my way out of my strappy heels. There was nothing like terror to sober you up, and adrenaline was racing through me, setting all my senses to a hyperalert state.

I was used to this. I could manage this. I sucked in a breath, and two more gasps came with it, my chest heaving and struggling as if I were running out of air. I pulled myself up on wobbling legs and braced myself against the doorframe as bright lights flashed at the back of my vision.

Breathe, Lola, I coached myself, although the voice was softer and lower, almost like Leo’s. I turned the light on in the hall and held my breath, my ears ringing as I listened for any stirring in the apartment. I tiptoed into my bedroom and flipped the switch, tried to scan the room to see if anything was out of place or moved, but my vision was still dizzy from drinking. I stared at the dark space under my bedframe, and at my partly open closet door, and waited to find the courage to check them.

Was he here? Had he snuck back into the city, the state, just to frighten me? Buzz was dead, but Indy was still out there, and now I knew for certain he hadn’t forgotten about me.

I sank to my knees and lowered my head to the wood floorboards, my breath skittering out of my chest as I saw the cardboard boxes stuffed beneath my bedframe, and remembered there was no space there. My closet came up empty too.

One by one, room by room, I turned on all the lights and reassured myself that I was alone. Indy was taunting me from an unknown number, but he wasn’t here in my apartment.

He doesn’t know where I live. He never did.

I was safe. I was safe. I was alone, and I was safe.

I didn’t sleep. Hours passed until my trembling left me sore and achy. The sky was turning gray and pink and I was still balled up on my couch, watching the door, and then the windows. My phone was in my hand and I debated calling Leo, or even Rake or Baby, a hundred times at least. Instead, I sat in my tiny apartment with every light on and waited for daylight. I was too scared to get into the shower, and when dawn came, I changed my clothes at racing speed, the sensation of eyes watching me impossible to shake.

I kept my phone close by, looked at the text every minute, half-hoping and half-afraid it would disappear.

When the first car horn of the morning blared on the road, I gathered up my purse and headed for the police station.





“So you can’t really do anything?” I said, sitting across the desk from one of the local officers.

“It’s…not a threatening text.” The woman wasn’t unsympathetic, or at least she was going to the trouble to try and appear sympathetic.

“Indy is a threatening man,” I said, raking my fingers through my hair in frustration. “I have a restraining order filed against him.”

“But you don’t have proof that this is from him,” the officer said.

“That’s… ‘Showgirl,’ that’s what he called me,” I said, my stomach sour at the nickname.