“Damn Mafia,” I muttered, turning on the car.
“Wh-what?” Trace asked.
“Shh.” I touched her cheek with the back of my hand and noticed a blood stain on my wrist.
I jerked away.
But it was too late.
I was tainted. And I’d touched her.
And I was reminded again of how different our worlds were. Mine was bloody. Hers was pure.
“It will be okay, Trace,” I whispered. “Tim won’t hurt you, and in the end, you’ll leave. It’s better this way. You’ll be safe. And everything…” My voice shook. “…everything will go back to normal.”
By the time I made it to Tim’s room, I was full-on sick. He opened his door and looked down. “For real?” The girls loved him because his Asian looks pegged him as an exotic, yet he still had the whole football-body thing going for him. He worshipped the Elect— Then again, we had so much shit on his family it wasn’t even funny. Homebody had signed his life in blood. He’d never be rid of us, and he knew it.
“Make it look real.” I placed her on the bed. “Nixon wants to make an example out of her.”
“Ah, so that’s what Phoenix’s text was about. He said she needed to be naked so…”
“Hell no!” I spat, damn-near punching him in the jaw. “It’s a setup, a simple lesson in who runs things. You actually touch her, and I’ll remove every finger on your right hand and sew them on backward. Feel me?”
Tim paled and nodded his head slowly. “So what? I just take some pictures of her lying here and stuff?”
My eyes narrowed. “Wait. Nixon hasn’t texted you to follow up?” Something felt wrong about it, but the last thing I wanted to do was argue with the boss, especially after he’d just shot someone in the head.
Tim’s text alert went off. “Never mind. I got instructions.”
So Nixon had set it up.
Bastard.
I hated him.
I wanted to kill him myself.
Then again, I was just as bad. I may not have made the order, but I’d carried out the command like a bitch. An innocent girl was going to wake up in the quarterback’s bed, rumors would spread, she’d be called a slut, and she’d come running back to the Elect for protection. And everyone would see that this world was one of our own creation, and it was out of the goodness of our hearts we let them live in it.
Tim sighed. “Just for tonight?”
“Yeah, come back around six thirty, alright?”
“Cool.” He licked his lips. “I’ll go stay down the hall. Text me the story I’m supposed to stick with before you leave in the morning, alright?”
“Great.” I nodded and moved out of the way as he left me alone in the room.
I’d never stayed before.
I usually gave Tim instructions, paid him well, considering he was technically on football scholarship, and went on my merry way.
But that’s the thing about the Mafia running a university. We had everyone in our pocket, including the quarterback who just happened to have been paid by the Abandonatos to win football games and do every damn thing we said.
Tonight. This night. I stayed.
Because leaving her there by herself made me feel like shit. I set her on the bed just as my phone rang. It was Nixon.
And I was too pissed at him to answer.
So I let it go to voicemail and tucked it back in my pocket.
How the hell did a person get so pretty? And why did it matter that her skin looked like velvet? Or that her lips were so red I wanted to taste them? Yeah, pretty sure kissing a girl while she was unconscious was frowned upon. Then again, so was undressing her.
Hating myself, I gently tugged off her clothes, leaving her in nothing but her bra and underwear and stared.
Like a complete stalker, lunatic, insane person.
My phone rang again.
I kept staring.
She moaned in her sleep.
And for the first time in years, I wanted to be different. If I had been born into a different family, lived a different life, I would have had a girl like that — a girl like her. One who was so damn innocent that when she saw French cuisine, her eyes got big.
A girl who probably didn’t know the difference between a merlot and a cab. I wanted a girl who got excited when she saw things for the first time, a girl unjaded.
I wanted Trace.
For no other reason than she wasn’t like anyone I’d ever known — and I’d only known her a few days.
Which again should prove the point.
I leaned down and kissed her cheek. “Pretty girl…” I closed my eyes. “…I’m so sorry, but you can’t stay here. You can’t be in our world. You’ll either die or wish you were dead. You’re already in too deep, and you don’t even know it.” I kissed her again, lingering so close that I could smell her shampoo.