Chapter Fifteen – Angel
I kept Alexa informed of my, uh, let’s just call it gymnastics . My gymnastics with my guys. My boyfriends. I still couldn’t believe my first time with Priest was in his car. It wasn’t exactly the most comfortable thing, but man, it was hot. Both literally and figuratively.
“That makes two, right? Of course it does, I’m keeping track,” Alexa answered her own question. “That means you still have one more to go, right? The next time you see him, I say you take him by the hand and—”
Before Alexa could go on about what I should do, I cut in, “It’s not a race or anything. Just because I was with—” I had to stop myself from saying Priest and Bishop. “—the others doesn’t mean I need to hurry up and sleep with him, too.”
I’d gone for a walk before calling Alexa to tell her. It was early afternoon, and the sidewalks were busy. It was the same route I’d taken in the middle of the night, when Priest had taken my first kiss after saving me from a pair of guys with wandering eyes and bad thoughts. It was totally bizarre to me how different everything was during the day.
During the day, the sidewalks were jam-packed full of people. You were surrounded, every which way you looked by tons of strangers. Oddly enough, the presence of those strangers made me feel safer.
It’d only been an hour or so since Priest and I had… you know. Done the deed. Slept together in his car. About sixty minutes, not to mention a change of underwear—because, while Priest might think it was hot, after a while, the wetness got crusty, and then it was just gross—but that’s all. Just sixty minutes.
“Uh, yes, yes that’s exactly what it means,” Alexa said. It was just a regular call, so I held the phone to my ear. Didn’t want to let tons of strangers know I’d slept with two of my boyfriends and my best friend was pushing me to get with my third. A whole lot of information the world didn’t need to know.
“No, it’s not.”
“Yes, it is!” To say Alexa sounded exasperated would be an understatement. If she could reach through the phone and slap some sense into me, I bet she would. “You have three boyfriends, the perfect opportunity to get some anytime you want. Think of the foursomes you could have!” Quieter, she muttered, “Damn, I’m jealous.”
Think of the foursomes I could have. Jeez, she sounded like Priest. Life wasn’t just about sex. Sure, it was actually kind of fun—not to mention thrilling and addicting and all that—but that didn’t mean everything should automatically revolve around it. I mean, just because I’d slept with Bishop and now Priest didn’t mean Deacon was next.
Maybe Bishop would be. Or maybe Priest would be. Or, and this was far less likely, maybe I’d wait a while before having sex again.
I forced out a chuckle as I walked along. “Just because I have more than one boyfriend doesn’t mean,” I paused to lower my voice, “I’m going to have foursomes.” Priest had made jokes before, but that’s what I thought they were: jokes. I never actually thought they’d want to share me at the same time.
I mean, how would that even work? I knew how it might work, but the whole how of initiating and then actually doing —
“All I know is, if I were you, I’d be getting dicked down all the freaking time. Seriously, all the time. Like, I know you’re a prude, but, come on.”
“I’m not a prude.” I was a little insulted she’d call me that. How could a girl that had three boyfriends be a prude? And just because I’d never had sex or kissed a guy before all this didn’t make me a prude. I was just waiting for the right person.
Or people, in this case.
And besides, there was nothing wrong with being prudish. Being choosy with who you wanted to give yourself to; there was absolutely nothing wrong with it. You do you and all that. Whatever floated your boat. No one should judge anyone else for their choices when it came to things like that.
“Mags, you’re a prude, but that’s okay, I still love you.” In the background, I heard another girl’s voice; I assumed her roommate’s. “Hey, I’m gonna go grab dinner with Halsey.” Halsey, AKA her roomie. “Talk later, kay?”
“Yeah,” I said. “Have fun.” I hung up with a sigh, rounding the corner of the block. I’d just about circled it while talking to Alexa. I could see the Redborne’s familiar architecture coming into view.
I was seconds from picking up my pace to hurry back when a tall figure, dressed in black, stopped in front of me. At first, I thought it was just city manners—which was to say, someone being rude because that’s how everyone in this city seemed to be—but then my eyes focused on the face of the guy who’d blocked my path, and I faltered.
Leather jacket. Black pants. Big, face-obscuring sunglasses. This was the same guy who’d been staring at me from outside the salon.
My heart skipped a beat as I gazed up into those sunglasses. Was this guy following me? Maybe no walks alone in this city were safe, no matter what time of day it was .
“You and I need to talk,” he hissed, and before I could say or do anything, he grabbed my hand—the one without my phone—and started to drag me along, pulling me in the opposite direction of the Redborne.
“Let me go,” I said. “I’m not going anywhere with you. I don’t know you—”
He stopped, whirled on me, and tore off his sunglasses. His eyes were a bright, vibrant green, a hue that was almost familiar. “Take a long, hard look,” he advised me. “Do you really not know me? Because I sure as shit know you.” A gentle breeze blew past us, rustling his pitch-black hair. It was only two inches long, but it was long enough to look a little messy.
I replayed what he’d said in my head, and then I took in his appearance again.
The eyes. The hair. The six-foot-tall frame. The black leather jacket that had to be more of a fashion statement than protection against the weather.
I blinked, and for the quickest of seconds, I saw a man with his chin and lips painted black, a single white cross on the center of the mask hiding the rest of his face, the arms of the cross splitting through the eyeholes and the base of the cross ending just below his lips.
Holy shit. Pope ?
The recognition must’ve been plain on my face, because he put his sunglasses back on and started to pull me along again. “That’s what I thought.”
Even though he was Deacon’s brother, I didn’t know him, and I didn’t want to go anywhere with him, but he was strong, and his grip around my wrist was steel. I could’ve made a scene, but all I could think was: what if people found out who we were somehow? Pope might be desperate; he might not care that the label could go after him and sue him. I didn’t want any part of it.
“I don’t have anything to say to you,” I told him. “So why don’t you just let me go?”
“Nah. Like I said, you and I have to talk.” He tossed a glance over his shoulder at me, and maybe he picked up on how creepy this whole thing was, because he added, “Don’t you worry your pretty little head. We’re just going down the block to a cafe. We’re not going anywhere private. The last thing I’d want to do is put my brother’s girlfriend in a compromising position.”Though the words were sweet and thoughtful at face value, the way he said them made them sound the opposite.
As far as I knew, Deacon hadn’t spoken to Pope in a long time, so to hear that he knew I was Deacon’s girlfriend made me confused. “How did you know we were dating?” I asked, hurrying to walk beside him instead of behind him, though he did not let my wrist go, even when I matched his stride.
“I didn’t, but you just confirmed it,” he hissed out.
I clamped my mouth shut, not wanting to say anything else that might get me or Deacon into trouble. I could, I supposed, call the police. My phone was still in my other hand. But getting the police involved might lead to Pope spilling the beans on Black Sacrament. He didn’t know my name, but he could ruin it for his brother, Priest, and Bishop.
“All right, fine,” I whispered. “I’ll come with you. You don’t need to drag me along.”
Behind his glasses, I’d bet anything Pope narrowed his eyes at me, like he didn’t believe me, but in the end, his fingers loosened around my wrist, and he let me go.
I slipped my phone into my back pocket, wondering if it was a mistake to go anywhere with Pope. Honestly, I didn’t trust him. Granted, I only knew the rumors about him and why he’d been kicked out of Black Sacrament, but he was also Deacon’s brother.
Could he really be that bad?
Then again, Deacon had been pretty mean and rude when I’d first met him. It had taken a little while for him to get comfortable with me, to lower his walls and let me in. If Pope was anything like that, this talk might not be a talk in the strictest of sense.
He wasn’t lying when he said we were going to a nearby cafe. It was one of those rare cafes that had outside seating in the city, and by some twist of luck, we were able to get one of those tables.
Pope got us each a coffee. I didn’t go to drink it; I wasn’t a huge fan of coffee and I didn’t quite trust him. I couldn’t forget the whole reason he’d been kicked out of Black Sacrament was because of a drunk, drug-filled, sexist rant to a bunch of women that was caught on camera and circulated online.
I’d watched the video. Let’s just say someone who could say those things under the influence was probably thinking them while not inebriated and high.
“So, why are you stalking me?” I threw out the question before I thought better of it. It probably wasn’t a good idea to be so forward with someone who had lost everything and now viewed me as his replacement.
“Stalking?” he repeated, his brows furrowing as he took a sip from his coffee. “Is that what we’re calling it now?” Even his voice was like Deacon’s: low and rough, the kind of voice that came off as menacing without trying.
“Showing up everywhere I go? Yeah, that’s pretty much stalking.”
“Please. Everywhere? The hair place and today. That’s twice. You’d have to squint real hard to consider that stalking.” Pope leaned back. He’d taken off his sunglasses, folded them up, and placed them on the table, near his coffee cup.
I didn’t want to get into the semantics when it came to stalking. “What is it you think we need to talk about?”
“Hmm. I don’t know, maybe the fact that you’re stealing all of my hard work and using my brother. Let’s start there.” The hue of his emerald stare read he was not amused, and that he believed everything he was saying.
“I’m not stealing anything,” I was quick to say. “And I’m not using your brother.”
He lifted a single brow, and that single arched eyebrow spoke volumes. It was clear he did not believe me, so I didn’t know why he’d brought me here if he wasn’t going to believe a single word I said. “You’re riding on a horse I spent damn near my whole life training.”
A weird analogy, but whatever. I decided to tell him what I’d told the others in the beginning: “I didn’t ask for any of this. Heck, I didn’t even send in my own video. My sister did, so before you start to think you have me all figured out, maybe you need to check yourself.”
Wow, Alexa would be proud of me for that snark.
“And as for your brother,” I told him, “I care about him. I’d never lead him on or hurt him.”
“I want to believe you. I want to believe everything you’re saying, but if there’s one thing years in the spotlight has taught me, it’s that you can never trust anyone, especially not someone who’s new to all of this. You don’t know the games people play.”
My comeback was ready instantly: “And what game are you playing?”
Pope huffed, his lips curling into a frown. He really was a good-looking guy. He had the chiseled, square features Deacon had, only he was a year older—but he looked older than twenty-two. Years of hard partying tended to do that to you.
And then it hit me, the reason why Pope wanted to talk to me so badly. “You want back in. All this time, and you thought you’d be able to come back.”
He scowled, mimicking the look his brother often wore. He bared his teeth to me, like he was some sort of dog, an animal protecting its territory, and he leaned forward, dropping his voice low to whisper, “I just want you to know that whatever you think you have is temporary. This world will eat you up and spit you out, and by the time it’s done, you won’t recognize yourself. Is that really what you want?”
Trying to play on a fear of change, perhaps? A fear of the unknown? Joke was on him. I’d always dreamed of a life in the limelight. Was this what I thought it’d be or how I’d make it big? No. No, it wasn’t, but now that things were rolling, I was happy—happy with the state of things, happy with my three boyfriends, and happy that Pope was no longer in the picture.
“Maybe it changed you,” I said, “but I’m not you.”
Pope sneered. “You think you’re better than me or something? Is that it? Please.”
“That’s the difference between someone like you and someone like me. You think you’re better than other people, but that’s not ever a thought I’d have. Not everyone is like you. Now,” I got up, leaving my untouched coffee on the table, “I think I’m done with this conversation.” Heck, I was pretty sure I wasn’t supposed to see or talk to Pope at all.
I started to walk around the table, toward the exit of the outside seating area. A small iron fence sat between the outside cafe and the sidewalk. The sound of a chair scraping against the concrete ground filled my ears moments before a firm hand grabbed my wrist and stopped me from walking away.
As I whipped my head back to glare at him, Pope towered over me. He wasn’t quite as tall as, say, Priest, but he was hand-in-hand, height-wise, the same as Deacon. It was enough of a difference to make me feel small.
“If I were you,” he whispered as he loomed over me, pure, unadulterated venom in his voice, “I’d be very careful from now on. The next time you have a stalker, he might not be so nice.”
It only took me a second to realize his words were threatening. I didn’t have any smart remarks to say back to him; I could only stare at him and wonder when the next time I’d see him would be, and if he’d try to do something bad, like hurt me.
I didn’t know Pope, but the aura radiating around him was a dangerous one.
Pope flashed me a smile before he let me go, but it was more like a flashing of fang and a show of teeth than an actual smile. The kind of expression a predator would use when it was warning off something encroaching on its territory.
I didn’t stay one second longer than I had to. As soon as I was free, I booked it back to the Redborne, and all the while my heart beat so fast I thought it might just pop right out of my chest. My palms were clammy, and I felt like I wanted to be sick.
I hadn’t told anyone about the guy staring at me after I’d gotten my hair done, because I thought it was all in my head. Now that I knew who it was, and that it was most definitely not all in my imagination, I didn’t know what to do.
One thing was for sure: I couldn’t keep this to myself. I had to tell somebody. But who?
If I told Ramona, what would she do? Could she get me a restraining order against Pope or something? Would Pope even follow a restraining order?
If I told the guys, what could they do? They could offer to protect me from Pope, but would they even believe he’d threatened me? I didn’t know if my heart could take it if they didn’t believe me.
I didn’t know what to do, but as I hurried through the Redborne’s grand front vestibule, I knew I had to tell someone. My feet drew me deeper into the lobby, and I made a beeline to the lounge on the side, where red, velvety furniture was situated—a place I hadn’t seen anyone hang out, but that worked for me today.
This conversation… I didn’t want to have it in the suite upstairs, mostly because I didn’t want to tell all of the guys. Just one, and I’d leave it up to him to decide what to do next, since Pope was his brother.
I texted Deacon and told him to meet me in the lobby downstairs, that there was something I needed to talk to him about. Alone. He responded that he’d be downstairs in a few minutes, and that left me to wait.
I guess going for walks anywhere in the city was out. No matter what time of day it was, it seemed I attracted the wrong kind of attention regardless.
In less than five minutes, Deacon was walking out of the elevator. He spotted me and headed straight for me. His long black hair was messy, drawn into a low, loose ponytail, the shorter bits had escaped and now framed his square jaw. Even now, he looked like a rock star, all gruff and uncaring what other people thought about him.
He chose the velvet chair beside mine, his green eyes on me as he said, “What’s up?” I must’ve looked a little off, because after another moment, he added, “You okay?” His voice was naturally low, just like Pope’s, but unlike when I first met him, there was no underlying venom in it.
I could see how they were brothers, and because they were brothers, I was hoping that meant Deacon would know what to do here.
Best just get on with it. No use in beating around the bush.
“Your brother found me while I was walking back to the Redborne.” It was like my wrist could still feel his large, solid hand curled around it, and I fought against the shiver that made its way up my spine thanks to that ghostly memory.
He clearly wasn’t expecting that, because his eyes widened and he repeated, “My brother found you? What—what do you mean he found you?”
“I mean he must’ve been waiting for me or something, because it was like he appeared out of nowhere. He told me he wanted to talk to me. He didn’t really give me a choice.” The more I talked, the more pissed off Deacon grew, until he was seething in his chair next to me.
“He’s not supposed to talk to you,” Deacon muttered with a frown.
“I know, but he did. And, um, this isn’t the first time I saw him, either. The last time I got my hair touched up, he was outside the salon, on the other side of the street. He was watching me then, too.”
Deacon acted like he didn’t hear that part, too focused on what I’d said before. “What did he say to you?”
We were alone in this part of the lobby, with no one around. Granted, the lobby was quiet, but its overly-tall ceilings meant there was a lot of space for sound to get lost.
I shrugged. “Oh, you know. Just that I took his place and stole all his hard work and that I’m leading you on.” Under my breath, I said, “Still sounds like he cares about you, but I think this was mostly about him thinking I’m out to replace him.”
Deacon let out a groan and rubbed his hands down his face. “Goddamn it. I warned him to stay away from you—”
“Wait. What?”
“I saw him not that long ago. He messaged me and wanted to meet. I… I didn’t want to tell you or the others because I knew what everyone would say.” When I only st ared at him, he added, “You would’ve told me not to go see him.”
Hmm. He was probably right about that.
Once I got over the new information, I asked, “What did he say to you when you met up with him?” From the expression Deacon wore, I could assume none of it had been good. Pope had tried to go to his brother first, and then when he wouldn’t budge, he tried to come after me.
But why wait so long?
“Probably the same shit,” Deacon huffed as he shook his head. “He was worried you were playing me, using all of us to make it big. I tried to tell him you weren’t like that, but it was like his mind was already made up. Maybe he’s been hearing about B.S. trending and is jealous or something. I don’t know.”
“But why come to you? Why come to me?”
“Maybe to get inside our heads?” Deacon offered. “Maybe he views us as the weak links or something, I don’t know. I just can’t believe he had the balls to talk to you.”
“More than that. He basically dragged me to a cafe so we could sit down and talk. He didn’t really give me any choice in coming with him, and once the talk was done, he…” I bit the inside of my cheek. “He said the next time I have a stalker, he might not be so nice.”
Deacon sucked in a hard breath. “He pretty much said the same thing to me.”
“You don’t think he’d do anything, do you? You don’t think he’d try anything with me, would he? He’s your brother. I never met him before today, so I don’t know what he’s capable of.”
“No, he wouldn’t—” Deacon suddenly stopped, and his hesitancy did not make me feel better. A moment later, he said, “I don’t think he would. Then again, I thought he’d leave you alone. I didn’t think he’d actually find you and force you to go with him somewhere to talk.”
Yeah, it made me wonder what else he’d do, if he’d resort to other means in the future when he kept seeing and hearing about Black Sacrament and me.
“Do you think we should tell Ramona?” I asked.
“No. Not yet. If he tries something again, then we’ll go to her. For now, let’s just… let’s pretend none of this happened.”
“You don’t want to tell the guys about it?” For some reason, I thought that telling Deacon would mean he’d be the one to tell the others, so I wouldn’t have to. Keeping this a secret from Priest and Bishop didn’t feel right. Like we were lying to them.
And they were the last people I wanted to lie to.
Deacon shook his head once. “No. Let’s just keep it between us. If things escalate, then we’ll reevaluate. I’m sure everything will be fine. We’re probably just overthinking this. He’s my brother. He’d never do anything to jeopardize the future of B.S., even if he’s not in it anymore.” He spoke with such conviction, like he genuinely believed it—or maybe he was trying to convince himself of it.
Either way, as we got up and headed to the elevator together, I couldn’t shake the feeling that we hadn’t seen the last of Pope.