Page 26 of Violent Pawn

None of them are right.

At one point, I hang out by the bar to drink away whatever strange anxiety lingers inside me and receive a couple of offers to dance. The men are cute…but not good enough, so each offer ends with a headshake.

If he’s aiming to impress me, he sucks at it. Because I am not impressed that my Friday night fun has been limited to a single guy who had no right to touch me the way he did.

Disheartened by this whole experience, I stomp to the VIP stairs, admittingly doing the one thing I so rarely do: give up. If he’s going to creepily watch me, he may as well do it around our friends. Perhaps they’ll notice his tactics and take my side. His gaze is hot and heavy, passing across the brand stinging my neck since he left me.

By the time I make it upstairs, he’s on the couch beside Zeno, a fresh drink in his hand, which he toasts at my approach. “Had fun?”

Ignoring him, I stalk to the bar ready to burn this whole night away. Normally, I limit my drinking because it means dancing more of the sugars off the following day, but tonight the club is too packed for me to locate two fucks to give.

Someone joins me, and the rage is building like a tsunami ready to wash him away—until catching the feminine hands lowering onto the bar beside mine.

“Tonight’s boring.”

Vanessa laughs, propping her chin onto her fist. “I dunno, you seemed content with Nero.”

“I was fulfilling a bet we had going on through Sera’s wedding.”

Her hum melds with the freshly poured drink being slid across to me by the bartender. “So the dance meant nothing?”

“What do you want me to say?” That earlier rage that was prepared to make him go away unleashes on her, though at a fraction of the amount. “It was a dance, nothing more. No matter what he made it look like.”

Her free arm moves into my vicinity, but knowing what she’s doing, I lift my shoulder and angle myself away before she can touch his marks, which for some fucking reason haven’t faded.

She laughs, dropping her hand. “Noted. Well, no matter what you say, you two look good together. Your personalities complement each other.”

Twisting until my back is against the bar, I bring my glass between us, staring into the pink liquid rather than her—or the man distantly watching me from across the room. “He and I would murder each other before we got the chance to fuck.”

“So it’d be fantastic hate sex. Win-win.” She shrugs. “What’s wrong with Nero? He seems great.”

That’s half the issue. He seems great. Most men do, before they reveal their true colours. I’m sure half the men Papa had me murder seemed great in their everyday lives. Maybe they were polite bosses and decent husbands. Yet behind the mask was something much darker.

I’ve lived it once. I won’t live it again with Nero.

“Why are you pushing this?”

“Because getting into a relationship isn’t the end of the world.” She jerks her chin at the staircase across the VIP section. “You told me that—or some variation of it—right there. You let Zeno into Moscow and then got me to this club. You recall that? You locked us inside until we resolved our issues.”

I remember perfectly because Zeno left as a man who lost everything, and Vanessa was crying over giving him up. He’s been the only man besides her father to make her cry, but for reasons so opposite they’re from alternate universes. That’s how I knew Zeno was meant for her.

What she doesn’t understand is that happily ever after isn’t intended for everyone.

She gives me another small smile before returning to Zeno. I follow since there’s nowhere else to go, and end up in the chair across from them while Vanessa lands on Zeno’s lap.

A line of shots sits on the table in front of Nero, beside a few empty glasses.

He drinks a lot.

“You’ll feel those later.” I tip my own at his pile.

“Counting on it. You’re back early. No one good enough down there?” As the red lights pass over the couch, his eyes blend with the colour; an ocean of fire, igniting a short path between him and where he stares at my neck. “Your move, Petrov.”

16

NERO

Soft hands are on me, touching me, and they feel fucking amazing.