Total pages in book: 145
Estimated words: 138274 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 691(@200wpm)___ 553(@250wpm)___ 461(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 138274 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 691(@200wpm)___ 553(@250wpm)___ 461(@300wpm)
His lean face was interesting rather than handsome, the hollows of his cheeks making his jaw seem extra prominent, those brows slashing across the tops of his deep eye sockets, his lips tight with the kind of disapproval that suggested at least he agreed with her opinion on Bathe.
And even as Shuli ordered a round for everyone, Nate stayed where he was on the outside of the sunken area, a watcher, not a participant.
Or more like a disapprovi-ant.
“I’m really glad you came out, Nalla. We never see you anymore.”
Lyric sat forward, so earnest, so lovely. And all Nalla could do was smile and nod as the music droned on.
Goddamn, she never should have come.
CHAPTER SIX
Not with a ten-foot pole. Nope. I like my balls where they are, thank you very much.”
In spite of the thump-bump-pump of the music, Nate overheard the pronouncement, but he didn’t bother deciphering which of the males seated on the couches below him was doing the talking. Standing over the sunken sectionals, draped in the dense black-blue lighting, his eyes were fixed across the VIP room to the opposite corner.
For one, because it was better than noticing that female—what the hell was she doing here, anyway? For another, the group of humans who were seated to the immediate right of the velvet-roped entrance was the reason he’d come.
Fun fact? He really didn’t want Nalla anywhere near them. Not that she was his business.
“You’re saying she’s not hot,” someone else said.
“Oh, she’s hot. Like, the slow-burn hot, the one you don’t notice first, but that’s got hidden talents, if you know what I mean.”
He continued to ignore the conversation, his focus locked and loaded on the silk-suited men who were lounging back like they owned Caldwell. No women with them, but that was a “yet” kind of thing. They were here for sex, scanning the room with restless, slicing stares, their bodies staying on those white leather sofas while their libidos roamed what he’d heard them call the buffet of bitches.
Classy. Real fucking classy.
Nate knew the men by name. Knew also that the one in the middle, who was too old to be in a place like this, surrounded by men fifteen years younger than him, was the one in charge.
It might be Shuli’s birthday, but Nate was here because he knew that every Thursday night, Mickey Trix’s uncle was in residence at this club: This was where Uncle, as everybody called him whether they were relatives or not, preemptively started the weekends, running his empire while he caught blow jobs from women half his age, his ego pretending like his biological clock wasn’t ticking—
“I’d do her.”
“Ha! You want to be on the run for the rest of your life? Her fucking father will kill you. Do you know who her—”
“Yeah, I know. And what if I was interested in mating?”
Chuckling followed, the we-share-a-secret kind. “You’re a slut. If you ever get mated, the world comes to an end.”
Nate glanced down. The three males in front of him were Shuli’s buddies, all aristocrats who had that same kind of money, those same kind of clothes, and those flashy watches and exotic cars. They were the set of partiers who referred to sunglasses as sunnies, who drank the liquor that was above the top shelf, and who dated human models before they mated the females their sires picked out just so they could stay in the will.
“You wouldn’t have the balls to try her.”
“I sure as shit would—”
“I would.”
One of the males turned around and looked up at Nate. “How ’bout you? You in?” Then the guy slapped the thigh of the high roller next to him. “He’s in. So come on, let’s see who has the cajones to ask her out.”
“What do we win?”
“What do you think,” the aristocrat drawled as he looked Nalla up and down. “If she dressed right, she’d be a bitcoin. She’s the prize.”
Nate’s molars gritted as he shifted his attention back to the “prize.” Nalla was sitting next to Rhamp’s sister, a total mismatch in those jeans and that parka. Then again, she never went to places like Bathe. And no, he didn’t agree with how she was being discussed, but he’d heard it before. Everybody had heard it before: Zsadist was going to kill anyone who got too close to his little girl.
So leave her the fuck alone.
It was good advice. And something he didn’t need to be reminded of.
Lowering his lids, he tried to make like he wasn’t staring. She’d already caught him twice—both out in front and in here—and given the way she’d just glared back at him, he had to approve of how much she obviously didn’t like him.
He so approved of her opinion.
So no, he absolutely wasn’t rememorizing everything about her, from the way her hair was pulled back into a ponytail, the blond, red, and auburn ends disappearing over her shoulder, a halo of loose curls framing her face… to how her features were strong ones, just like her father’s, especially her mouth. Her coloring was all Z’s, too, those yellow eyes like a cat’s in sunlight, her skin smooth and unmarked by freckles or moles.