Page 11 of Tempt Me

“Let’s play hide and seek! You need to find me, Daddy.”

I tried to quell my anger. I didn’t want to scare her. Even if she were in my fucking head, I would enjoy the time I got with her.

“Okay, where are you going, Xenia?”

Her laughter cocooned me, and her image bounced around my body. I was playing hide and seek with my dead daughter. Oh, how the mighty had fallen.

“One, two, three…” I began, listening to the direction the giggles were going.

“Ten. Ready or not, here I come.”

I walked around the graveyard searching for my Little Flower. She was nowhere to be found, of course, because she wasn’t fucking real, but I still searched. I came across the tree where I had found that woman with fiery blonde hair. People didn’t just hang out in a cemetery.

What had she been doing here?

I walked past the tree line and over to the fresh grave where I had first seen her. The inscription read, ‘Here lies Noah. Beloved son and brother. Gone too soon but not soon forgotten.’

Beloved son and brother, huh? The girl looked too young to be a mom, so that means she lost her brother then.

Xenia appeared from behind the grave. “Boo! You found me.”

Her smile was radiant as she disappeared, fading away like mist.

“Sleep tight, Little Flower. Sleep tight.”

Six

Innocence: The state, quality, or fact of being innocent of a crime or offense.

Who was really innocent anymore?

I walked around the living room of the stupid party. People were slurring their words, bumping into anything and everything, and Sasha was nowhere to be found.

Lance Bastion was a predator disguised as a fucking angel.

Could devils look like angels?

How the fuck was that even fair?

Lance was great friends with Ferdinand, and he constantly agitated me any chance he got. It was like elementary school, where idiot boys poked and chased the girls because they were too dumb to tell them they liked them. In Lance’s case, he was just too entitled to let go of anything he was told he couldn’t have.

“Well, well, well,” he slurred, falling into me and squishing me against the bar’s countertop. His breath reeked of cheap liquor, and he smelled like sweat, sex, and salt from the sea.

“Looks like the princess does indeed leave her tower. What, pray-tell, has you blessing us with your presence?”

His cat-like grin and beady eyes were mocking me, so I shoved him hard, my hands against his chest. He didn’t falter, just shoved his body into mine, his intent malicious as hell. He was pinning me painfully against the granite.

“Fuck off, ass wipe.” I glared at him. “I’m surprised your Daddy let you out after you sunk the charter. I guess he’s too busy fucking Elena to notice, huh?”

The instant regret felt sour in my mouth. Elena was his father’s mistress, and just like his mother, they were equally bitchy twats of the highest order. Elena, on the other hand, was getting Daddy’s money for big-ass gaudy jewels, and that meant little Lance was left without.

“Bitch. You always run your fucking mouth.”

The pressure from Lance and the counter on my spine brought tears to my eyes.

“Hey, get off, Bastion. I’m serious.”

He ignored me. His drunk, stinky breath and grimy fingers were toying with my hair and were way too close to my face.