as fuck, it’s a three-day weekend, and we have no plans ‘til tonight.” He stares. “Come back to bed.”
I take a deep breath and figure ‘fuck it.’ I shut and lock the door and drop onto the bed.
He doesn’t scoot closer like he did last night – if he even remembers doing so. This time he simply closes his eyes and falls fast asleep.
I lay there wishing away the confusion he’s planted inside me.
“Raven, let’s go.”
With a groan, I move back into my bathroom and stand on the toilet to look myself over.
The suit fits perfectly. Too perfectly.
It’s tight on my ass and forms to my every curve, showing off the curl of my hips in the openings. I’m a little too skinny for my liking, but I never have been able to hold any weight. All the walking around and mere lack of food didn’t help either.
Either way, not much is left to the imagination in this thing.
I turn to look over the back again and slip, falling against the wall.
I laugh, finding my footing as a loud bang hits the door.
“The fuck was that?” Royce shouts. “You good in there?”
“Yeah.” I chuckle then frown at the mirror. I left my hair down, hoping to cover myself some – and keep me warm since it’s fucking cold out – but now that I’m looking again, it almost makes me look more ... like her. Desperate. Willing.
I move to the bed and drop down, facing the ceiling.
It’s not the suit or the way it looks or how much it shows. It’s how every day when I look in the mirror, my mother stares back, mocking me with her nasty smirk. She’s like the dirty devil glued to my shoulder, constantly hissing in my ear reminding me who we are and what we’ll never be.
Some kids get pep talks of honesty and integrity, I get a prime hooker’s playbook on how to seduce a married man for blackmail money.
And while I imagine a lot of daughters are told how much their beauty matches their mother’s, I’m reminded how I’ll never measure up to mine.
I can admit she’s the far prettier version of me on any day. She’s got the sleek hair and big blue eyes, heavy makeup and heavier tits. For a woman who has used drugs for as long as I can remember, she somehow keeps herself up.
I told her once that she’d look like a troll eventually and she simply laughed and disagreed. She claims cocaine is nicer on the appearance than other drugs, which is why she ‘chose’ that over meth. Idiot. She calls it the soccer mom drug, swearing half the women in the suburbs – the wives of her clients – are all on a line or two a day.
When I asked why, if that were true, she couldn’t function the way they did, she gave me a black eye.
I had laughed and left for school.
I already knew the answer, I just wanted to piss her off.
A single line or two would never be enough for Ravina Carver. She needs an eight ball to keep her satisfied, and even then ... enough is never enough.
Sometimes though, say after a four-day binge with no sleep, she looks the part of the scavenger she is.
Those are usually the days she has heavy hands.
“Open the door,” Captain calls.
With a sigh, I pull myself from the comforter and do as he asks.
His attention immediately drops to my body and damn if mine doesn’t do the same.
I step back to have a better look at him standing there in nothing but a pair of grey and blue swim trunks.
Captain is ripped. Like ... ripped. Where Maddoc’s got that hard-earned tall and tapered effect of the three, Captain is broader, so his muscles are fuller, but he doesn’t have that hardened look. His body seems soft but strong, like he’d wrap you up tight and you’d involuntarily melt right there in his arms, beg him not to let go. He’ll keep a girl real warm tonight.
“Raven.”
I lift my eyes and he winks.
“You look good, too.”
I roll my eyes and when Royce steps beside him, I look him over just the same.
He’s the leaner of the three, but still has the definition of an athlete. He’s tight in the right areas, with biceps that flex with each movement. It’s the tattoos though that reel you in at the start. He screams bad bad bad and he knows it.