“It’s room stop-being-so-desperate,” I quipped.

“I haven’t seen you around, and we live on the same floor.”

I passed my room, too, reached the wide stairs, rounded them, and went down the other stairway, toward the second floor. She followed.

“I’m working,” I said finally.

“Well, I’m not.” She burst out laughing. “Poor Raphael, or whatever his name is. Vampire Girl helps him sometimes, but honestly, he’s lonelier than a virgin in a Panic! At the Disco concert. I go downtown every day in search of cute clothes and, like, a life. There are zero malls in this area. Total bore.”

So Lenora was still hanging out with fuckface. I made a mental note to remind both of them to keep their hands to themselves. My pulse began to drum against my throat.

Best friends since childhood, my ass. I’d seen how it ended between Knight and Luna. Spoiler: They weren’t very platonic since she’d started gurgling his cum on a daily basis.

I rounded the hallway, proceeding to the last stairway. Arabella could barely breathe, I moved so fast.

“C’mon, Spence. I’m lonely as hell.”

“Leave, then.”

She was the one who’d begged me to score her this gig when I dragged her ass to Indiana. I couldn’t even remember why I’d complied—something to do with pissing Len off, and knowing I’d have a steady girl to suck my cock in a place full of minors. Didn’t seem like such a bad deal at the time…

“I can’t,” she pouted, actually stomping her foot like a fucking three year old. “Something…someone is keeping me here.”

“Then stay and shut the fuck up. Those are your two options.”

“We used to be friends.” She clung to my arm.

I shook her off. “Correction: we were friendly—meaning I didn’t actively hate you. But the road from there to liking you was still a mile long and a mile wide. Then, you set a house on fire while I was in it and left me to rescue Drusilla. That homicide attempt put a little damper on our relationship.”

I reached the first floor. Stopped. I wasn’t going to go down to the cellar and reveal where I was working. Her chest rose and fell, and she shoved her rack in my face. Pushing her tits up, she knotted her arms over my shoulders and grinned. My dick was so soft I could knead it like fucking dough.

“I’ll make it good for you. Help you unwind. What do you say?”

That was an easy question.

“Fuck. No.” I pushed her arms aside.

For some stupid-ass reason, the idea of Len walking by and seeing this pissed me off. Not that I gave a shit, but I didn’t need the headache. And I really wasn’t going to let Arabella suck me off again, so any second wasted in her presence was time I wasn’t going to get back and could be used doing better things, like scratching my ass or staring at the wall.

“But I will throw you a bone.”

“Really?” Her eyes lit up.

“Relax. I said a bone, not a boner. If you find it in yourself not to bone Edgar Astalis, I promise not to fuck your little sister’s face when I’m back in Todos Santos.”

I had no intention of returning. Permanently, anyway. But Arabella wasn’t privy to that information, and there wasn’t one motherfucker in Todos Santos who’d put it past me to let a minor suck my cock.

“My sister is barely seventeen, you sick schmuck!” She scowled.

I shrugged. “Legal next year. Perfect timing. I’d hate to do the full house thing, but your mom seems easy, and knowing your entire household had sucked me off would be a trip. Stay away from Daddy Astalis, and go find someone else to play schoolgirl with.”

“You think I’m screwing Edgar Astalis?” There were tears in her eyes.

Maybe. Staring directly at her face seemed counterproductive. I wanted to eat today.

I curved an eyebrow. “Were you playing air hockey in there?”

“Jesus, you are pussy-whipped.” She snorted. “She really got in your head, huh?”

“Who?”

“Drusilla.”

Who the fuck thought it was a good idea to teach Arabella how to speak? I wanted to sue her nanny.

“You’re high. Take a hike.” I turned to leave. I stopped when I heard her voice, my back still to her.

“Yeah. The Astalises have this effect on people. Well, not Poppy. Poppy is a loser. But something about Drusilla and Edgar is irresistible, huh? They change people.”

I smirked, turning around and getting in her face.

“No one and nothing will change me. Don’t blame others for your lack of personality and the fact that your morals are looser than your pussy flaps. Now beat it, before your clothes aren’t the only thing missing from your room by the end of today.”

Arabella stared at me, dumbfounded. I bared my teeth and snapped my jaw. She took a step back, bumped into the stairway bannister, turned around, and ran in the other direction.

Students began to pour out of the cafeteria into the hall, and all of them chanced a look at the half-naked, psychotic girl in lingerie running around. I turned and strolled to my cellar before more people could figure out what I was doing.

Change, my ass.

I was the same bastard. I just happened to be getting some ass now.

At lunchtime, I walked downtown to meet Uncle Jaime, Dad’s best friend and my trust fund’s trustee. My parents didn’t want to handle that shit. Dad had worried Mom would grant me whatever I wished for, so he put his friend in charge. Jaime had flown all the way from Todos Santos to meet me, and it wasn’t that his schedule was wide open. He ran a hedge fund with Dad, Knight’s dad, and Luna Rexroth’s father. It’s that I’d told him it was important.

This part was tricky, because I needed to trust Jaime not to pass it forward. Luckily, he wasn’t the snitching type.

We met at a local Gregg’s. He ordered coffee, and I chose some type of weird pastry I had no plan to eat. I preferred eating alone somewhere quiet. I hated it when people witnessed me doing something so mundane.

“Yo.” I bumped my shoulder into his, and he grabbed me by the back of the neck and jerked me into a hug.

“Hello is the word you were looking for, punk. Hello, godson.”

We fell into our chairs. He had sandy blond hair, not unlike Fairhurst, but much friendlier features. His hair was buzzed close to the scalp, and he looked like California royalty, not some British douchebag who knew words no one knows the meaning of.

“Why am I here?” Jaime cut to the chase, taking a sip of his Americano.

“I need to break the piggy bank. Get access to my money,” I said flatly.

He nearly sprayed his coffee all over me. I remained seated, wide-legged, my fists shoved deep into the pockets of my pilot jacket.

“Are you high?” he wondered aloud. “This is not half a stick we’re talking about, son. It’s the whole goddamn trunk, and then some.”

“If you knew what I needed it for, you wouldn’t say that,” I said calmly, my eyes on him the entire time.

He stared at me, rigid with rage. “Try me.”

“First, you need to promise not to snitch to my parents.”

Uncle Jaime said nothing, like I knew he would. I took a contract I’d drafted all by myself from my backpack and slid it across the round, plastic table between us.