19. Phoenix
Phoenix
“I still think you fucking cheated, Firebird,” Maverick growls as we walk into the penthouse.
“I didn’t cheat,” I say. “I’m just sober.”
Maverick slants a look at me, a little bleary-eyed, and then growls something unintelligible and waves me off.
I feel wrung out, bone-deep tired in a way that no amount of sleep can fix.
Between the shit with Atticus earlier, coming up empty on finding anything, and then trying to keep up with those four on the ship, I need sleep and maybe a bubble bath.
Not necessarily in that order .
Today all of them hit on me, all of them flirted, all of them touched me, sending signal after signal that they wanted more. But none of them took it any further.
I don’t know what their game is—especially Con’s—but it’s driving me crazy. It’s like they have some agenda that I’m not privy to, something that’s keeping them from going as far as they want to. Or at least as far as they indicate they want to.
“If you all are done for the night, I think I’m going to go to bed,” I say with a soft smile, hoping one of them makes a joke about going with me and then follows through.
None of them do. With low murmurs, they all head to their own rooms. Only Storm stops long enough to kiss the top of my head before walking past me to go to his own room.
Despite the oppressing Georgia humidity and the constant thrum of desire just beneath my skin, I feel lighter than I have for the last couple of days.
I don’t know if it’s the time I spent on the boat with the guys—time when they weren’t preoccupied by other women—or something else altogether.
But maybe this year won’t be quite as awful as I had originally thought.
I might just survive this entire thing and make my escape to a new life unscathed.
Back in my room, all I want is that hot bath and a mind-numbing orgasm. Not necessarily in that order.
Maybe I’ll work off a little of this frustration the men have given me with the shower head attachment. Does it count as ‘touching myself’ if it’s technically the stream of water that is touching me?
The fantasies I have been harboring of each of the Titans play in my head one by one. Each of them is now deeper, more detailed and darker than anything I dreamed of before I came to live in the penthouse.
After watching 50 Shades , I fantasized about Con making me wear a vibrator in public so he could toy with me. That’s blossomed with higher stakes. If I’m a good girl, then he’ll make me come over and over. But if I’m bad, then he hands me to Atticus.
From everything I’ve seen, Atticus would take an unholy amount of joy in doling out corporal punishment.
Or…maybe if I’m really good, I’ll get Con and Maverick.
Every time I close my eyes, I’m haunted by a picture of what it would be like to be between the two.
Sometimes it’s not them— sometimes I fantasize about being chained to a bed with Atticus and Storm giving me a cocktail of pleasure and pain, the two mixed indelibly until I can’t tell them apart.
Each of these men has something dark in them, something that calls to me, and I have a feeling exploring it would be life-altering.
As I turn on the light to my bathroom, all of that warm, glowy desire and anticipation evaporates, curdling in my gut. Someone was in my room, and they left me a message.
“We’re waiting.”
The words are scribbled across the mirror in what looks to be permanent marker. Stretching out a finger that trembles, I touch it, then rub, trying to smear it, trying in vain to wipe it away .
Fuck. My stomach drops to the floor. Fuck. They were in here. In my room. Fucking hell.
My heart races so fast I can’t catch my breath. It feels like the walls are closing in. Did they touch my clothes? My bed? Did they stand here, watching me sleep? How long were they here before they left this warning?
The guys can’t see it. None of them even bother to knock when they walk into my room. I need to get rid of this immediately, especially with Atticus already having his suspicions after catching me snooping in his room.
A quick search under the sink shows nothing that will help me.
Cracking open the door to my bedroom, I cast my gaze around the main room. All the lights are off, and the room is absent of men. I close my eyes and whisper a short prayer, then slip out and close the door behind me.
On soft feet, I sneak into the hallway and find the linen closet that the maids use to store excess linens and cleaning supplies. It keeps things close for them and easy for us if we’re out of something .
A bottle of isopropyl alcohol sits on the shelf with first aid supplies, and I have a vague recollection of the head of housekeeping telling us about how she had to use it once to clean up a mess a kid had left on a table.
I don’t remember if it will work on mirrors, but I grab it, tucking it into my waistband just in case. Anything is worth a try.
As quietly as I can, I sneak back into the suite. Maverick stands in the kitchen with his back to me. He’s headfirst in the mammoth refrigerator, no doubt grabbing something to drink or eat. That man is always eating.
He must still be a little buzzed from the evening because he says nothing as I walk across the space toward my room. I don’t even think he sees me. I can’t risk him turning around, so as quickly and quietly as I can, I sneak past the kitchen and slither into my suite.
In the bathroom, I douse a cotton ball with alcohol and scrub. Thankfully, it acts like a charm and removes the marker.
I toss the cotton ball and slide down the wall until my butt hits the tiled floor.
The mirror is free of any traces of the mob’s entrance, but that doesn’t change the simple fact that they made it into our suite…
into my room…in the first place. Not just the resort, not just past security, but all the way past a secure elevator and into the executive suites.
A shuddering breath sighs out, and I drop my forehead to my knees, holding them tightly to my chest.
I give myself another thirty seconds to fall apart, and then I stand, strip, and walk into the shower.
I turn the spray as hot as I can and stand there until my skin is pruney and pink.
The water scalds my skin, but I don’t turn it down.
I need something to anchor me. Something to burn away the invisible fingerprints still clinging to my body.
They just proved that they can get to me anywhere. I’m not out of their reach, and there will be no safe haven until I find something to give them.
There’s nothing I can do about it now. Come tomorrow, though, I’m going to have to up my game and find a way to get the information they want.
Either way, I’ve done everything I can right now.
Bone-weary all of a sudden, I flip the light off and crawl into bed.
Sleep eludes me, an image of those words on the mirror making me toss and turn.
Soon though, I let my eyes close, and I try to think about anything other than the mob.
Anything other than their plans for me. Instead, I focus on the only other thing consuming me.
Why the hell did tonight feel like a date?
Each time I had a few minutes alone with one of the men, it felt like they were trying to romance me. Like they were trying to woo me into their beds…but why? I signed the contract. As far as they’re concerned, they own me. They can ask me to do anything, and I would do it.
I would enjoy doing it, although Con might believe it’s a punishment of some sort. If I didn’t need the money, and a way out of this mess with the mob, they wouldn’t need a contract to keep me here.
Just a reason to believe they really want me, as pathetic as that is.
Why bother trying to give me the fairy tale?
I don’t want the fairy tale. Fairy tales only work because they end happily ever after. Cinderella becomes a princess. She doesn’t return to her stepmother’s house and keep on slaving away .
If Cinderella didn’t get her happily ever after, how long would the memories of her dancing with the prince stay a happy memory? How long until those memories turned her heart bitter because for just a second, she got a taste of a life that she was never really going to have.
After I broke up with Con, I retreated from any attempt at having a relationship.
I have never been the kind of girl that a man wines and dines.
I’m not the kind of girl who gets chocolate and roses on Valentine’s Day or diamonds for Christmas.
No one has ever treated me like that, and I don’t expect they ever will.
And I’m okay with that. It’s just not who I am, and it’s not who I’m meant to be.
I wasn’t born with a Tiffany’s rattle in my crib.
I was born the trailer trash girl whose mother left and whose father loved less than he did gambling.
I’m the girl a guy takes out for a burger or bowling and then fucks against a wall and never calls again.
That’s the extent of the one or two dates I’ve had after Con, and truth be told… I prefer it that way.
A date like that ends up with sex in a car, in an alley, or in the bathroom of a bar. I know where I stand .
I know that it was no more than scratching a mutual itch, and ideally, both of us got what we needed from that interaction.
For a moment, I felt desired. I felt beautiful, and I was satisfied.
It was an even exchange. I know where I stand, and I know not to expect those types of guys to call again.
If I know they’re not going to call, I can’t be disappointed.
And yet here I am, filling my own head with silly dreams and letting myself get carried away by them. I can’t let myself believe in fairy tales. Not when I know how they end for girls like me. Not with glass slippers, but with broken heels and an Uber home in the rain.
If I let myself believe that this could possibly be something real, and it ends with nothing more than a wire transfer…
It will destroy me.
Maybe that’s their goal. Maybe that’s the game my Titans are playing.
It would make sense, given my history with Con.
They might want to fuck me, but they don’t want to keep me…
they just want to make me believe that I might be the one girl they ac tually want.
They want to put me on a pedestal just so they can watch me fall at their feet.
Maybe I shouldn’t feel guilty about getting the mob the information they require.
If the Titans are the type of men who would torture a woman just because they can, and play mind games designed to leave her broken, then maybe the idea of them killing women after they slept with them isn’t so farfetched.
I have to find out if that’s the case, and keep it from ever happening again.
I close my eyes and drift. I’m going to protect the next woman who falls into their trap…even if it means betraying them to the mob.
Even if it means never finding out if they could’ve loved me back.