Starlet: A Dark Retelling - Cora Kenborn Page 0,12

Which is a good thing, because thanks to a certain waitress all I have left in my wallet are credit cards and condoms. Regrouping, I roll around what I’m going to say to Angel in my head as I bend over the table for my wallet.

It’s not there. I pat down my pockets. It’s not there.

I check again, because surely, I missed it. Surely, I’m not the idiot who drove to the middle of nowhere, spent all night at Satan’s pit stop, only to end up losing his wallet.

A red haze blots my mind as I rewind the last hour. I had my wallet when I walked in. I had it with me at the table because I took cash out of it when Angel came over, and I decided to swing my dick around. She served me that fucking shot, shoved her tits in my face, leaned over to grab the money…

Ding. Ding. Ding.

I push off the table so hard it rattles. “Fuck me.” I spin around, pure octane pumping through my veins. Fuck this bar. Fuck this waitress. Fuck my wallet.

And fuck my offer.

It just turned into an ultimatum.

As I tear through the kitchen, men in white aprons and bewildered faces glance up, unsure of whether to stop me or go back to doing their shit jobs. Most of them make the right choice, except for one exceptionally stupid asshole who steps in front of me.

“You can’t be back here.”

“Move.” I surprise myself at how calm my voice sounds when I’m two seconds away from punching this guy’s lights out. He starts to argue when a familiar pair of olive-green eyes steps in front of him, her fists balled at her side like she’s pissed I want to hit this guy.

Me.

The guy she ripped off.

“Can I fucking help you, Dick?” she hisses.

I’m on her before she can say a damn word. Wrapping my hand around her arm, I drag her out the back door as she stumbles behind me. It isn’t until the metal door slams behind us, and she realizes we’re alone in a dark alley, that she plants her feet and fights back.

“Are you insane? Let me go!” The words come out a little shrill as if her mind is working at twice the speed of her mouth. I can tell she’s calculating her best option for escape, and that’s why I anticipate her next move before she can make it.

“Oh, you do like to play dirty, don’t you?” With a sharp twist, I block her aim and swing her around, driving us both into the side of the building, “I just want to talk, cupcake, but if your knee gets within grazing distance of my dick again, I have no problem doing it with you face down on the ground.”

“I’ll scream,” she hisses, tugging on her pinned arms.

A deep laugh rumbles in my throat. “Oh, please do. And when the dishwater cavalry shows up, you can explain to them how you stole my wallet.”

She jerks against my hold again. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I didn’t take your goddamn wallet.”

It’s the response I expected. “No?” I arch an eyebrow. “What would you call it? Borrowing it?”

“So, I knocked you down a few notches and won twenty bucks because you have a god complex. So what? That just means you’re just another idiot with an inflated ego. You know, to make up for”—her eyes lower to the tight space between us, a smirk tugging at her mouth—“much smaller things.”

“Insults are the lowest form of retaliation. You can do better than that.”

“Fuck you.”

I smile. “See, now you’re not even trying.”

An infuriating hum rattles low in her throat. “If I had your wallet it’d be in my apron, and you have me pressed against a wall. There’s not a lot left to the imagination here, champ. If your wallet is as big as you seem to think it is, don’t you think we’d both feel it?”

That’s the second time she’s insulted my dick. Normally, I don’t let that kind of thing get to me, but something about this girl crosses all kinds of wires in my head.

I grind my teeth. “Cupcake, I’m going to tell you this one time, so I suggest you listen. Not only is my wallet really that big, you wouldn’t be able to walk after having it shoved in your…apron.” I can’t help but smirk when her lips part, and she lets out the smallest breath. “That’s why I think you would’ve