Page 121 of The Contract

My gaze snaps to the source. Two eyes slither over me like ants devouring spilled sugar on a countertop.

This guy makes Jabba the Hutt look like the hotter, fuckable sibling.

His face is a roadmap of bar fights and shitty decisions. But it’s the cold, slimy stare that makes me want to shower in bleach.

Every hair on my neck snaps to attention, because something sick and familiar coils in my gut, whispering that I know him from somewhere—and it’s nowhere good.

Brick-wall bouncer hesitates, jaw muscles flexing beneath thick skin. “The rules are clear, sir. She has no ID.”

He lied.

Why did he do that?

I can’t tell if he’s trying to screw me or somehow…save me.

“I’m all the ID this girl needs.” And then I feel it—his hand, warm and possessive, skimming my hip with a slow, deliberate claim.

Every instinct screams to pull away, to break contact, but my desperation to get through that damn door and make sure Mila’s okay roots me firmly in place.

“She’s with me,” the man says, voice scraping over my skin like rusted steel.

Oh, I’m definitely not fucking with him.

But right now? I guess I sort of am.

Because goddammit, he’s my only way in.

Somehow, he’s melted the bouncer’s impenetrable resolve into absolute fucking putty. Godzilla takes a stiff step backward, suddenly looking like Jabba might peel off his skin just to see how it fits.

A five-alarm bell blares in my skull, flooding my brain with more red flags than a used-car lot. I shift barely an inch—and his grip clamps down harder.

I know power.

And this guy? He radiates it like a branding iron—searing hot, blistering, and ready to scar.

Not the sexy, pulse-spiking kind that leaves you breathless and craving more. No, this is the other kind—the toxic, corrosive sort that coils around you like cyanide smoke, choking tighter with every passing second.

The kind that feels exactly like Jimmy the Step-monster.

My body remembers the drill.

Knows the crushing weight of anticipation.

It’s muscle memory now—bracing for impact, never knowing exactly when or how brutal it’ll come.

A flash of memory slices through the fog, sharp and violent. Jimmy’s fists clenched, knuckles bone-white, vibrating with fury you could taste before the first strike ever landed.

Then another. Sweat and whiskey saturating the air, thick enough to bleed through walls, floorboards—straight into me.

No matter how many showers I took, how hard I scrubbed, I could never scrape him completely off my skin.

And now, as this man’s grip tightens—not enough to bruise, just enough to remind me he’s calling the shots—every voice in my head screams one word: Run.

But running only makes it worse.

The bouncer clears his throat. “You’re with him?”

Like he’s tossing Gretel three breadcrumbs—three precious words—leading me straight toward escape.

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