“Yeah, tell me.” My interest is definitely piqued.
“I own a sex club,” he mumbles sleepily as if he’s barely hanging on to life.
My eyes nearly bug out of my head. “Excuse me?”
“He does,” she says, speaking for him. “Him and his sister. His father passed it down to them.”
An entire minute goes by while I stare back and forth at the two of them, trying to decide which part of that sentence I got lost on, because she can’t actually be saying what I’m hearing.
“You heard it right,” Julian says as he pulls his jacket back on his shoulders. The stifling air of the elevator has grown colder in the past few minutes.
“You and your sister?” I ask with disgust. Thinking about my own sister, I can’t imagine.
“Don’t make it weird,” he argues. “It’s just a club.”
“He and Amelia have strict rules about what days they go in so they never see each other there,” Freya explains for him.
“I would hope so. And doyoufrequent this club?”
She gives me a huffy expression. “No, I don’t.”
“Why not?”
She shrugs. “First of all, I don’t have anyone to go with. And second of all, it’s none of your business.”
As she knocks my leg with hers, I can’t help the smile that stretches across my face. I like this girl a lot.
“What about you?” she asks. “Who’s upstairs in your apartment waiting for you?”
“No one,” I reply.
“You’re lying.”
“I’m not,” I argue. “I’ve yet to find anyone who can handle me.”
She rolls her eyes with a scoff. “Why? Because you’re such a killer in the bedroom?”
“No,” I say soberly. “Because I’m a mess.”
“Everyone’s a mess.”
“No, seriously. I’m really fucked.” There’s something about this scenario or being here with them like this that has me feeling comfortable enough to air all my dirty laundry. I’m not sure why, but I do. “I say the wrong thing all the time. I’m rude and chaotic and out of control. I don’t have a job. I’m surviving off a trust fund built from years and years of hard work from my father and my brother, but what do I do? I go from city to city, finding the most lethal, ruthless fighter, and I go head-to-head with him in an illegal street-fighting ring.
“I’m lucky I haven’t been killed yet. People who do far less dangerous things are killed every day. I can’t keep a regular girlfriend or boyfriend, because as soon as things start to feel boring, I pick afight and force them out of my life. My parents don’t know what to do with me. They had me after my brother died, and I think they wanted a perfect son to replace what they lost, but instead they got me. A flighty, chaotic troublemaker who likes violence too much and should not be trusted with an inheritance because I’m flying through it in record time.
“My other brother treats me like a son and can’t relate to me. I have no family. One friend. And enough problems to make a therapist lose their mind.”
With a loud huff, I lean back against the wall and stare straight ahead while no one says anything. I mean, what the fuck do you say after all that anyway?
The enclosed space grows awkwardly quiet. I don’t know what came over me. I never get so vulnerable and come out with stuff like that, but one hour stuck in a closed compartment with these two, and I’m letting everything out.
The air in the elevator grows thick with tension while everyone makes a concerted effortnotto look at each other. And while I’m busy regretting everything that just came out of my mouth, the other two fidget uncomfortably in their own corners of the space.
“So,” I say, finally breaking the silence. “You own a sex club with your sister, huh?”
Julian lifts his head and stares at me as if I’ve just started spouting Mandarin. Then, to my surprise, his stoic, cold expression changes. The hard-edged scowl melts into wrinkles and bright teeth and full, pink lips stretched into a pretty smile. Throwing his head back, he lets out a laugh that echoes in the tight compartment.
Freya starts up too, chuckling into her hand. Pulling her knees up, she tries to hide behind them as she loses herself in a fit of giggles.
