“Curious, aren’t you?” he laughs. “Shit, Gauge, it’s all over your damn face. You’ve got no fucking idea who wants your ass so bad, and I’m loving it. Maybe I just won’t tell you and let you figure it out when I hand you over.”
I look at him coolly. “And maybe I’ll just tell you how sweet it is to feel the girl who never gave you the fucking time of day come all over my big cock?”
Blind, red rage billows over Barnes’s face, and he’s on me in the blink of an eye—hitting, kicking, swearing, and hissing like a caged animal as I grunt and try and take the blows.
“Barnes! Barnesy!” his mate Jay suddenly yells.
Barnes takes a breath, stepping back from me and wiping the spittle from his lips.
“Think of the payout, man!” Jay urges. “Think of that money, buddy.”
Barnes take a deep breath, breathing heavily and closing his eyes before he suddenly opens them and smiles at me.
“Fuck it, I think I’m going to enjoy watching you understand how fucked you really are.” He steps over to me, looking down at me with a grin on his face.
“Yeah, he’s a real good old friend of yours, this fucker. Misses you so bad he’s willing to give me five-hundred-thousand for your dumb ass.”
I frown, and I honestly have no fucking clue what he’s talking about—in fact, all I’m thinking about is where the hell Delphine is, when Barnes smiles down at me.
“You do remember your old pal Basher, right? Basher Bronson, from your hood back in East London?”
My jaw ticks.
Fuck.
I want to shrug it off, or smile, or make a joke to enrage Barnes some more. But that name from my past hits me like a right hook I never saw coming, and Barnes sees is straight off. He chuckles, shaking his head and grinning at me.
“Oh, I had an idea that would shut that fucking mouth of yours. Yeah, he found me recently, and my man, he is real happy to see you again. On his way over from England right now, actually.”
My face is grim, but I’m barely listening to Barnes. Because instead, I’m working out how to get the fuck out of here, because I have to. Barnes and his mates are a bunch of muppets, and I can take his little tantrum hits all fucking day. But Basher? Yeah, that’s another story. Basher is a legit player in the London scene now, and his guys are trained killers from war zones and mercenary schools. And his punishment for the day Asa and I fucked him proper and took off is not going to be a temper-tantrum.
Something dark swells and burns inside of me, but I suck in air, forcing myself to stay calm. If Basher gets his hands on me, I’m done. There’s no walking away from that, and if he gets his hands on what I love? On Delphine?
My eyes squeeze shut, rage shattering through me.
I can’t go there, and I can’t spiral. I need to focus on finding the weak link in this chain, and when I open my eyes, I realize the weak link is standing right in front of me.
The weak link here is Barnes.
He’s volatile, and unbalanced, and angry, and if I can make him even angrier, he’ll get sloppier. And sloppy means I can trip him up, and maybe, just maybe, I can figure out a way out of this shit.
“Oy, Barnes,” I say loudly, interrupting whatever shit is pouring out of his wanker mouth about “watching me bleed” or some bullshit tough guy shit like that.
He glares at me, clearly angry at being interrupted in front of his mates.
“What.”
“You know, she told me about your little, uh, problem.”
His eyes harden.
“Watch your mouth, shithead.”
No thanks.
“Oh, yeah, we laughed about that a lot. You know,” I grin and look over at his peanut gallery of buddies. “About how you have a hard time getting such a little dick hard?”
One of his guys snorts, but when Barnes whirls on them with fury in his eyes, they all go quiet.
“Yeah? Well, bitch is making shit up,” he hisses, swallowing. “Stupid bitch.”
I frown, shaking my head. “No, I don’t think so, mate. We had a good laugh about it. She called it ‘your shy little turtle.’”
Barnes’s face goes red, and I can see him start to shake with rage. Good. Let him get mad. Let him hit the boiling point and lose his shit, because when he does, it might just be the one shot I have of getting the drop on him.
…You know, if he doesn’t just fucking kill me first.
“Shut your mouth, Oliver.”
“Now, my question is, has it ever gone up for any bird?” I sigh. “Could just be repression, mate. Maybe if you just admitted that maybe you’d rather be playing for the other team, you’d be a lot happ—”
“Shut up!” he barks, and I grunt as the back of his hand slams across my mouth.
I turn spitting blood and laughing quietly.
“Oh c’mon, Barnes,” I grin. “Is it Jay? You know, I think you two would make a real cute—”
I grunt as his knee slams into my gut, doubling me over. Fuck, this better fucking work.
“Watch your fucking mouth, fuckhead.”
“My mouth, yeah… you know, that reminds me. Do you have any idea where my mouth was with her?”
This is nothing I’d usually do. Talking about Delphine like this is bordering on enraging, even for myself. But there’s a bigger picture here, and that’s what I focus when as I keep on pushing him as hard as I can.
Pushing people? Being that annoying cunt that just won’t shut the fuck up? I’m in my bloody element here. I lock onto that fury in Barnes’s eyes, and I just laser into it, hard. It’s clear to me that this thing with Delphine Barnes isn’t just a power thing, not after that comment about school. This dumb cunt likes her in this fucked up, toxic, unrequited way, and that’s the weak point I focus on.
“Oy, mate, I don’t think that girl has ever come so hard than with me. You know how she—oh, fuck, mate, I’m sorry. Yeah,” I grin widely at him. “Guess you don’t know that look she gets when she really wants it, do you? My bad.”
Barnes sputters, looking like a fucking strawberry he’s so red.
“Yeah, that ain’t true, dipshit! I fucked that girl so—”
“No, you didn’t.” I turn to his mates and shrug. “He didn’t.”
“I did so!”
“Jerking off into a sock and crying her name doesn’t count, mate.”
A few of his guys chuckle, and Barnes starts to spiral. He’s fuming fucking mad, and I know I’m close. He roars and punches me hard, but I just laugh.
“Fuck, mate, it’s gotta suck to wait so long for that girl and still get nothing.” I make a face. “Fuck, you haven’t been waiting, waiting, have you? You know, saving yourself? Just for little ole’ me to come in fuck her sideways?”
Barnes is shaking, his teeth bared like a maniac as he hauls back to hit me again.
“And mate, I have never seen a girl come so hard before. I mean it was like something out of porn, you know? She just kept begging for it and telling me to fuck her harder with my big dick. I swear, that girl has a dirty, dirty mind—”
The next hit comes so hard I see stars. I blink, falling to the ground before suddenly, Barnes’s hand is on my neck. I wince as he yanks me up, and suddenly, I’m choking around the cold metal barrel of a gun.