Chapter One – Laina #2
Things had settled into a routine. A part of me had thought Tessa would pop up and make trouble, but the woman had vanished after I’d told her to leave.
She and my dad hadn’t officially divorced, but they were separated.
A certain amount of time needed to pass before they could make the divorce official.
Things were good. I was happy. I’d be even happier if my guys could learn to get along and be in the same room as each other without two of them being at each other’s necks, but I didn’t want to rush things.
The guys would move at their own pace. Either they’d get over it or…
or they never would. All I knew was that I refused to decide between them.
I was in love with three different men. What a strange thing to think.
Lola spun me around so that my chest leaned against hers, a more intimate stance, and as she leaned in and swept some of my hair away from my face, I couldn’t help but wonder if this was for show, if her choice of a target was nearby, watching.
After all, Lola and I came together, so Lola and I would leave together. Whoever she chose to hunt tonight had to be okay with the thought of a threesome. Let’s be real: most men, when faced with two pretty girls, would love to be sandwiched between them.
“I think I found my guy,” she told me, her lips brushing against my ear, her breath hot on the side of my cheek.
“He offered me some pills. Supposedly ecstasy, but… I have my doubts. I’m going to pretend to take one.
Watch me. When I start acting sloppy, I need you to come over and suggest we go back to our hotel room. ”
A hotel room, because normally when Lola hunted, she hunted wearing a wig as a disguise. This particular hotel room, though it was a few hours away from home, would be cleaned up by Luciano men.
It paid to be friends with criminals who knew exactly what to do with dead bodies.
Lola leaned her head back, but she kept her body pressed against mine. “Unless you’re having second thoughts about this whole thing?” As she asked, her lips curled into a smile, probably because she already knew the answer.
Hell no. I wasn’t going to step back and say I’d changed my mind.
This was a night I’d been looking forward to for a long, long time.
I might’ve gotten a taste of blood when I used the clawed gauntlet Fang made me on the man who’d kidnapped me for Tessa, but this…
this was different. This was an actual hunt, and I was more ready for it than Lola could ever know.
All I did was smile and say, “Go put on your best show.”
She grinned back at me, licked her lower lip like she was getting ready to take a bite, and told me with a wink, “Time to take lessons from the master.” And then she pulled away from me and sauntered back to her chosen target, who, I noticed, was waiting for her on the edge of the crowd.
Most everyone was paying attention to Black Sacrament, but he only had eyes for her—and for me, now that he knew we were together.
Thirty or so feet between us, but I could see everything I needed to: somewhere between twenty and thirty years old, with the kind of generically handsome face that probably got him out of trouble.
Still, beneath that facade laid a predator; we weren’t side by side but I noticed the heavy glint in his beady eyes, the hunger that swelled inside him in anticipation of fucking someone like Lola.
I watched as she huddled closer to him, said something to him, and he smiled like the Cheshire Cat itself in response.
He reached into his pocket, pulled out a tiny baggie, and then handed Lola a pill, which he watched her take.
She then hooked her arm through his and pulled him into the crowd—but not before she glanced at me and spat out the pill, landing it on the dimly-lit floor.
Of course, it happened so fast, and the man was too eager to get in there and see his pill at work that he didn’t notice. Nobody did. Nobody saw Lola spit out that pill other than me.
And then it was a waiting game.
I didn’t mind. Though Lola and her chosen prey weren’t on the outskirts of the crowd anymore, I could still see them through the swaying people. Bits and pieces, flashes of them between the head-banging.
This was Lola’s first true hunt in a while. Her men preferred to be with her, but tonight was about us girls. Viper, Maddox, and Sylvester; none of them were with us right now. This hunt was between Lola and me.
And her prey, obviously.
Who knew getting a taste of the dark side wouldn’t be enough for me? If you took one look at the girl I was three years ago, you’d never guess this was where I’d end up. A girl who craved the darkness but looked like a, to use Fang’s words, cotton candy daydream.
I moved closer to the crowd after a while, joining them in their adoration for the band on the stage.
I’d listened to a few of their songs before the concert, so I recognized some of the ones they played.
As I swayed along with the hard beat, I watched Angel on stage sing her heart out while occasionally making googly eyes to the male lead…
and the other guitarist, and the drummer.
Shit. Lola was right. She was definitely banging them all.
With how much they seemed to be loved—quite the story, since not many bands could make a comeback after what happened with their last lead singer—I wondered if their fans already suspected they were an item.
Maybe most of them would be okay with it.
Or maybe it’d be Black Sacrament’s downfall, which was why they were keeping the full truth to themselves.
Most of the people in the crowd wore black, some even wore homemade masks that matched the ones the bandmates wore. The hardcore fans even mimicked the body paint—must be some kind of sweat-resistant paint, because I was personally sweating up a storm.
While keeping an eye on Lola and her prey, I did what everyone else around me was doing: getting into the music, bobbing my head with the beat, and every so often pumping a fist in the air. I didn’t feel alone, even though I was. In the crowd, even with my pink and blue hair, I blended in.
I wasn’t Laina Hawkins. I was just a girl vibing out. Maybe it was exactly what I’d be doing if I never would’ve gotten tangled up in the dark side.
It was like that for a while—me vibing, Lola doing her thing, the crowd paying attention only to the band on the stage—until something invisible nagged at me. Until the small hairs on the back of my neck stood up, an almost otherworldly sensation sweeping over me.
I felt like I was being watched. But with a quick glance around, I didn’t see anyone who stuck out like a sore thumb. Nobody holding a gun, pointing it at me, in revenge for the humiliation I handed to Tessa. No assassin or kidnapper trying to hurt me.
There was nothing, so maybe that unexplainable feeling was simply me being paranoid. After everything that happened to me, I didn’t think anyone could blame me for feeling uneasy. I spent so long with my guard up, constantly looking over my shoulder, that it was a habit to me.
It was probably all in my head. Only time would make me more normal.
Or I’d never be normal, and I’d slowly become more and more fucked up. Again, only time would tell.
Black Sacrament ran through their set list, and as the songs went on, I noticed Lola’s dancing becoming sloppier.
She was a master at acting drunk—or in this case, high.
Her smile became crooked, her eyelids took on a heavy, uneven blink, and she swayed with a gait that inspired me.
If I didn’t see her spit out that pill, I’d think she was high.
Damn, that woman was good. So good she was inspirational.
I might not have been a master at this game, at this hunt, but I was ninety-nine percent certain it was time for us to leave.
We’d be leaving the venue before the show officially ended, but that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing.
We’d avoid the inevitable traffic jam that would encase the parking lot and street after the show let out, which meant we’d reach our destination sooner.
And that meant we’d get down to business quicker. I didn’t know about Lola, but I for one was dying for this.
I spent so long wondering, imagining, craving. Having a taste of what it was like when I was using the clawed gauntlet… some people might’ve been born mad, but others, like Lola, were molded, shaped by the world and the people in it to become the animal she was.
Which one was I? Was I born like this—had my darkness always been hidden deep inside of me—or did the more recent events of my life help lead me down this path?
Did it even matter? No, I didn’t think it did.
In the end, it was the same. We wanted more than most people in this world could ever dream of, craved the things society outlawed.
But, just like every law-abiding citizen, we were still part of the same system.
Until the system got a complete overhaul, people like us would always exist.
I weaved through the crowd, coming upon Lola and her chosen prey. Let’s just call him Tod, for the sake of things. I lightly touched Lola’s arm, and Lola leaned her head back on Tod’s chest and grinned at me with that sloppy smile of hers.
“Hey,” she said, pulling me in toward her and Tod. “I was wondering when you’d come join the party.” She glanced at Tod and added, “She can be a stiff, but once she loosens up… the girl’s crazy.” And then she giggled like she had the world’s best secret stuffed inside her heart.
Lola turned so that her chest brushed against his, and in the process she set a hand on my hip and pulled me closer to her.
The way she gazed up at Tod, like he was just the man she was looking for, made his dark eyes glimmer with glee, and that glimmer only intensified when she suggested what she did next.