Page 1

Chapter

One

Trevanion B. Usher was having a great day.

He’d talked his way out of a speeding ticket, gotten a full refund on a pair of headphones without a receipt, and bought new eyeliner with an expired coupon. His mother had always told him that beauty faded but stupid was forever, so he had aimed high and set out to be beautiful for as long as he could and only let people think he was stupid.

The cop had honestly believed that Trev had gotten lost on his way to help orphans learn how to contour and was about to have massive diarrhea, hence the urgent speeds he’d been driving. The clerk at the electronics store had no problem accepting Trev was foolish enough to lose such a valuable receipt and talked down to him the entire time he was ringing up a cash refund. The cashier at the drugstore was stubborn at first, but she became desperate to do anything to make Trev go away when he started crying.

His mother had probably not meant for Trev to use her advice to get away with petty crimes, but hey, Trev did what he had to.

He always had a lie ready in case he got pulled over because the last thing he needed was cops searching his car since it was usually full of nice things that didn’t belong to him. He would happily pretend to be a complete idiot because he still wouldn’t be half as stupid as the clerk who gave him a refund on a stolen pair of headphones or the cashier who didn’t notice him stealing a new lipstick, mascara, and eyeshadow to go with the eyeliner he was crying over.

Shame was unknown to Trev.

It only got in his way, and he had no use for it. He would use everything at his disposal to get what he wanted, and that sometimes meant putting himself in pretty degrading positions. The payoff to these stunts was always worth it in the end. After all, it kept him out of jail, put money in his pocket, and he thought stolen makeup applied better than if he’d bought it legit.

He wasn’t rich by any means, but he had food in the fridge, clean clothes to wear, and he could put gas in his car. He had a job, but it was only part-time running merchandise to different vendors around the city for a local business. The merchandise was the kind that fell off the back of trucks, and Trev let one or two things fall into his front seat when it was good enough to sell or trick snotty clerks into giving him full refunds.

Trev used to dream about being a movie star or a singer when he was a kid. His mother had encouraged Trev to go to college and get a good education first. She hadn’t wanted him to give up on his dreams, but she’d been a practical woman who’d said he needed a firm foundation to stand on before reaching for the stars.

He dropped out his junior year of high school after she died from a stroke. Her death wrecked him and left him completely alone in the world. His father had died right after he was born in an awful car accident, and Trev had no memory of him. He’d only ever seen him in his mother’s photographs. He was a modestly attractive man with a dark olive complexion, black hair, and a fierce smile Trev saw sometimes when he looked in the mirror.

He saw his mother there too, and he was very grateful he favored her more because she had been the most beautiful woman in the entire world in his opinion. She was a gorgeous Black woman with dark amber eyes and warm brown skin. Trev saw her in his sharp cheekbones and full lips, and the rich curl of his dark hair currently dyed hot pink. His skin was lighter than hers, but its warm tones were echoes of his mother’s brown skin and not the olive hue of his father’s.

Trev’s eyes, however, were just like his—a piercing shade of icy blue framed with thick lashes.

Trev knew he was beautiful. He was also very clever, and he could sing too. His mother said she’d had a sister who was a great jazz singer, but she had died a long time ago. Any family his mother talked about seemed to be dead and long gone, and it had just been Trev and his mother versus the universe for as far back as he could remember.

Although losing his mother had devastated him, Trev refused to succumb to depression.

He had a plan, and that plan didn’t involve any time for feeling sorry for himself.

What he needed was money.

And lots of it.

Trev had charmed his way into working for an escort service as soon as he’d turned eighteen. He went on private dates, let himself be auctioned off at clubs, and never refused a job. He knew he only had so many years of youthful beauty that he could sell, and he didn’t care what it took. His childhood dreams of stardom were impossible to reach, but buying a new house? Getting settled in a real home with a working bathroom and hot water? Finishing high school one day and going to college like his mother had always wanted him to?

That was a dream he could make come true.

He just needed more money.

For years, he’d saved and scraped every penny that he could get his hands on. The escort gig was good while it lasted, but his clients kept complaining that they thought he was stealing from them. Since Trev was actually stealing from them, he had to quit to avoid the police getting involved. He had other escort type jobs here and there, usually heavier on the jobs bit and less so on the escorting, but he was sick of it.

Being fucked professionally wasn’t much fun when life was already doing such a grand job of it.

Even so, things weren’t always so bad.

Days like today were happening more and more often, and he thought of it as a sign that he was finally headed in the right direction. His current job wasn’t entirely legal, but he was in charge of his own schedule and he got to keep his clothes on. His boss respected Trev for his quick thinking and sharp wits, and she never treated him like some dumb pretty boy.

He was even talking to her about getting a full-time position at her store so he wouldn’t have to drive around stolen merchandise anymore, and he’d picked up some brochures for GED programs he could take online and be one step closer to his goal.

He missed his mother every day, and he still talked to her when he was home by himself. He hoped she was proud of him, that she saw how hard he was trying, and he maybe hoped more than a little bit that she wasn’t paying too much attention to the amount of his boxed wine and poppers consumption or how often he hit up hookup apps.

Trev was only human, and he was so damn lonely.

He had zero interest in dating, but he did have certain physical needs he liked having met on a regular basis. He preferred to hit ’em and quit ’em and move on to the next. The men he met were usually fine with that, though there were always a handful of the wannabe hero types who wanted to take care of him and save him from his woeful life in the slums.