I cringed because I’d forgotten. Darby had suggested I do a few classes for the other guys as a kind of icebreaker. Bonding time.
Hanging halfway out of the shower, Colt glanced between Darby and me.
“Yo-what?” he asked.
Darby stabbed a finger into his shoulder. “You heard me, cowboy, and don’t try to weasel out of it. It’s mandatory.”
“Says who?” Colt arched a defiant eyebrow.
“Says me,” Darby replied. “It’ll be good for you to learn how to be a little more flexible.”
Colt’s lips curled. “Bullshit. I’m plenty flexible. I can touch my toes, lick my nose, and Cal’s too. Watch me.” He looped both arms around his brother’s neck, then dragged him into the shower’s spray.
The two of them disappeared to the sound of Callum’s giggling protest, leaving Darby staring me down in tense silence.
“Yeah,” I confirmed. “Yoga. Soon.”
I slunk back to my room, dropped my tote inside the door, then toppled into bed. It took a bit of maneuvering tododge the blood and cum spots on my sheets, but I managed, fluffing my pillow then trying in vain to straighten the blanket before resigning myself to shoving it to the foot of the bed and lying uncovered and uncomfortable.
Light painted the ceiling, shifting in lazy stripes of neon and shadow. I watched the colors change while my body hummed with thoughts and sensations I couldn’t shake.
I had not been prepared for the intimacy of sex, and not just the part where I let someone enter my body. It was this afterward, the knowing that while I had gained so much, I’d also lost. In giving away my virginity, I’d destroyed the last barrier between myself and Maslow’s designs. What was novel now would soon become mundane, and I would be every bit the whore he bought out of Hell.
The lights bled from red to gold to electric blue while I squirmed, trying to ignore the dull ache in my ass and the stickiness on my skin. Contorting around the soiled sheets, I rolled onto my side and curled inward.
For better or worse, I’d done it. It was over.
So why did I feel like something had just begun?
CHAPTER
NINE
Beck
Sometimes I wondered why I paid for office space.
Long before the call, chain of emails, and dreadful visit from Ewing Livingston, my business had been in a downward spiral. I wasn’t the only demon who could do what I did. Not in the United States, and certainly not in Las Vegas. Iwasthe most established, which had become more of a hindrance than a help. Young people liked to deal with other young people. They shared similarly lofty ideas and risk tolerance. My methods were proven over centuries, but according to some, they were also antiquated.
Slowly but surely, I was being outmoded.
I’d considered retirement. I had the money and means to hole up somewhere for the next century, perhaps trading the Nevada desert for the Florida coast. Or I could roam the world for a while. Colette fancied the idea of a sabbatical and had amassed a collection of cruise brochures she usedto litter my desk, highlighting destinations like the Virgin Islands and Mexico.
She’d left one out today, in fact, advertising a Hot as Hell Singles Sailing that claimed it would help cruisers “Get Forked on the High Seas.” It was not subtle, and it was also not happening.
Wadding up the pamphlet, I tossed it into my under-desk trashcan, then swiveled toward the window to consider the view outside my third-floor office. A couple argued near the crosswalk, their voices muffled by the grimy glass, and a man lingered outside the pawnshop next door, counting bills with the jittery paranoia of someone who had more debts than time.
In the distance, the Strip gleamed like a mirage—bright, towering, and utterly indifferent. I’d always thought Vegas looked best after dark. Night veiled the harsh realities that daylight laid bare. Chief among them was the truth that had kept me anchored here for a hundred years: this was a city where people came to lose.
I reclined in the creaky wooden chair and inhaled the perpetual stink of old paper and dry rot. Behind me, Colette scratched a pen against a crossword, filling in answers that were probably wrong.
“What’s a nine-letter word for having leaves year-round?”
The interruption made me realize how long we’d languished in silence; I wasn’t sure either of us had spoken a word since lunch. Sitting up straight, I turned toward her.
The hellhound sprawled on a faded green couch. The dilapidated piece of furniture should have found the dumpster years ago, but Colette pled a case for it, claiming nothing else would be as comfortable. That was probably true considering the sagging cushions and busted springswere permanently molded to the shape of her ass. She spent most days stretched out there with her shoes off and a ballpoint pen in hand, butchering the Games & Puzzles section of the Las Vegas Review-Journal like she had something to prove.
I considered her question before replying, “Evergreen.”
