Chapter twenty two
Nadia
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You have this… glow. Like, I don’t know.” She tilts her head, studying me harder.
“Oh my god! You’re getting laid, aren’t you?” She gasps.
“How the fuck did you come to that conclusion?” I stiffen.
“That glow? It’s the glow of a woman who’s been freshly fucked. Hard. And good.” She smiles.
“Damn, how is it? Who is it?” She presses.
“I refuse to indulge this. It’s not even true.” Lie. It was very true.
“Oh, yeah? Then, how do you explain that hickey on the back of your neck?” She crosses her arms. Instinctively, my hand reaches out and touches my neck.
“Ha! Caught you. There is no hickey on the back of your neck.”
I blame this on Riven entirely. He loves putting hickeys all over me, but I forbade him from doing it anywhere easily visible. I thought he might’ve done it to fuck with me. But no, that’s just Isla.
“So, now that we’ve established that you are, in fact, getting dicked down, tell me who it is.” She asks eagerly.
“It’s just casual hooking up, Isla. Don’t get your hopes up. It doesn’t matter who it is, so forget it, okay? Not a word.” I make sure she sees how serious I am.
“Heard.” She puts her hands up, placatingly. _____
There was an abandoned parking garage just outside of Stonebridge. Used to be for a shopping mall, one phase of a plan to entice rich individuals to buy properties. But even the upper one percent didn’t want to reside anywhere close to the anarchy that was Stonebridge.
Instead, its new purpose was to be the ring for our illegal fights. There were many fights on tonight’s card, but only two that mattered to me. Abby’s and his.
Abby was a crowd favorite here. A killer in the ring and absolutely ruthless when using her fists. Her opponent didn’t stand a chance. Physically, they should’ve been evenly matched. Her opponent had an
inch or so of height on her, a little more reach too.
Both were lean and toned. But Abby took after Pop.
The Spencers had unmatched strength and a lethal punch.
So, I wasn’t surprised when the match ended within five minutes, with Abby adding another win to her impressive record.
In a few more years, she’d be undisputed and unbeatable, maybe even moving on to taking male opponents.
“I gotta bounce.” Deck found me leaning against a pillar in the back.
“Gotta pick up Isla.” He says. Isla was taking night classes at the community college in the next town over. He hands me some cash, my winnings from betting on Abby, and leaves without another word.
Abby was too busy to care about me, following her strict after-match cooling-down regimen.
I wouldn’t stick around much longer either; one more match and I was gone.
That match just so happened to be my rival’s, who I was currently in a situationship with.
Well, for me it’s a situationship. For him, he wants to be my boyfriend, so eager to define what this is between us.
As if it wasn’t obvious: we’re forbidden.
Something I’ve learned about Riven is that he’s always learning something about emotions and feelings. Where I am well-versed in cataloging even the tiniest of microexpressions in a person, Riven doesn’t understand them at all. I don’t think he has
ASPD, I would’ve seen the signs by now, but he’s definitely got something.
But there’s nothing wrong with him.
I would never admit this out loud, but Riven is fucking perfect. Not by conventional societal standards, but to me he is. For me, he is. I don’t have a type in guys or girls, but somehow he’s made himself my type.
It’s infuriating to no end.
“Long time, no see.” An arm is slung around my shoulder. Looking up, I find Dean.
Dean was an ex-hookup of mine. An LBC, obviously, and older than I was.
We were never anything serious, because commitment was something I didn’t do, but ever since I lost my virginity to him freshman year of high school, he felt like he had some weird claim on me.
Couldn’t be further from the truth, but he knew how to work his dick and wasn’t completely useless, so I let him be.
Everyone knew I was too untamable to be his.
“I feel like you’ve been avoiding me.”
“I wonder why.” I push his arm off me.
“Came to see my fight?” He palms my hip, his hands unwelcome and cold, which is funny because everyone calls me cold. But his hands don’t give me chills like a certain Phantom. His touch doesn’t haunt me long after they’re gone.
“Was just on my way out.” I lied.
“Stay. You know you’re my good luck charm.”
I wasn’t paying attention to him; that was my mistake.
I was too distracted by the man who just entered the cage.
He was dressed in nothing but black shorts with gray lines along the sides, a skull embroidered in the middle of the elastic.
He was jumping on his toes, light on his bare feet, and practicing his jabs, knuckles already wrapped.
His best friend, Shane Kovac, was in front of him, whispering things while acting as a punching bag.
It was always a welcome sight to see his tattoos, most of them you wouldn’t be able to see unless he was in the ring or naked.
Riven had more tats than me, all of his painstakingly beautiful and intricately designed.
One of his pecs, two full sleeves, the top piece of each moving to his back and intertwining to create a black-robed phantom with dragon wings holding a sword.
A mark all Phantoms carried. They had to have some sort of phantom, ghostly, shadowy figure tatted on them.
It was their protection. All the gangs had something like that.
A crown for the kingsmen, which was basic as fuck.
The LBC had two conjoined snakeheads snarling in opposite directions, forming what looked like a skull where they joined. Mine was at the back of my neck.
Point is, I didn’t catch him in time. Dean pressed a kiss to my cheek, daringly close to my lips. I may not have seen, but a certain Phantom did. He freezes his motions, glaring at Dean, not taking his eyes off him even when Shane shakes him.
“Well, fuck.” I mumble, pushing Dean away.
“You fighting Devereaux?” I ask.
“Yeah.” He jumps on his toes, warming up.
“Good luck,” I smirk, not at all caring that I just signed his death warrant.
The fight is brutal. The second he has the go-ahead, Riven is on Dean. Swarms him, doesn’t give him a chance to defend himself. Riven and Dean are pretty even height- and reach-wise, but Riven… his fighting style, the force behind his attack, it’s demented. Deranged. Psychotic.
I guess I bring that out in him.
Dean’s broken in multiple places, bloody everywhere. The ref stops the match when he collapses, but that doesn’t register in Riven’s head. He throws punch after punch, not caring how soaked his wraps are. I don’t stay to watch.
I get outta there as quick as possible, ignoring everyone in my path. Manage to get to my car and head back towards the east side. As I’m pulling up to Pop’s house, I get a text.
R.D.
Look what your boyfriend did.
He attaches a selfie of his torso and split lip. He’s barely got a bruise, and never mind the blood dripping all over him.
ME
I don’t have a boyfriend.
I don’t shut off the engine. All the lights are off in the house. Abby’s not back, nor is Deck since his car isn’t here. Pop’s truck is here, but his bike is gone. He’s always disappearing, but I don’t ask. He can keep his secrets so long as I can keep mine.
R.D.
Come kiss it better.
The location he adds is familiar. It’s the LBC safehouse I shouldn’t have exposed him to. Guess he’s in the mood for more trespassing.
_____
The front door is wide open when I arrive, the pitch-black darkness seeping out and intertwining with the shadows of the night, creating an almost eerie feeling. My footsteps are inaudible as I saunter through the cabin, my eyes quickly adjusting to the lack of light.
There’s no noise coming from upstairs nor downstairs, but judging from the wide open basement door, I only have one option. If he’s trying to scare me, he’s got another thing coming. If I were under any real threat, I’d have my knife, or better yet my gun, out and ready.
“This is a little excessive, is it not?” I take my time walking into the basement.
“The whole cloak and dagger show? You know you don’t scare me.” I stop at the base of the stairs, listening for any movement, but there is none.
Walking further in, I find a black padded stationary table. Something you would find in a tattoo shop rather than a medical office. Next to it, there’s a smaller table with a prepped tattoo gun and prepped ink pots, all neatly lined up. Two sets of handcuffs and a grey bandana.
That’s when I feel him behind me.
“What’s all this?” My fingers hover over the tattoo gun. His hands rest on my hips.
“It’s for you.” He says lightly, reaching for one of the handcuffs.
He’s off me in an instant. I elbow his stomach and use the momentum to push myself away. I get to the stairs, bolting halfway up when he trips me and I bust my nose on the hardwood.
“Fucking hell.”
My nails dig into the stairs, legs kicking at him.
He releases one of my feet, only to lock one of the cuffs on my ankles.
Looking back for a better vantage, I send a swift kick to his own fucking nose.
Handcuff hanging on me, I manage to get the rest of the way upstairs, running through the kitchen and towards the front door.
Only to be tackled to the ground once more.
He wraps some fabric around my throat, probably that fucking bandana, and pulls.
Hard. My air is cut off quicker than I remember, but in all fairness, it has been a while since someone’s choked the shit outta me.
I pull at the cloth with all my might, still grappling with him on the cold floors of the safehouse.