Page 29 of Cost of Courting

Kent gives him a drink. I would have let him dehydrate.

We close up, and I lock the door, waving goodbye to Kent as he hops in his jeep.

“Selene.”

I shudder at the sound of his voice. “What do you want, Bailey?”

“You can’t be serious?”

I shrug. “Got nothing better to do with my time.”

“He’s a cold-blooded killer. Scum of the Earth.”

I snort a laugh. “Pot meet kettle.”

“Selene, don’t do this. You’re better than that.”

I scowl and shove his hand off me. “Yeah, I’m chasing after the guy who is fucking my sister. That’s so much better.”

“We weren’t fucking.”

I rock back on my heels, tossing my hair over my shoulder.

“That distinction makes it perfectly okay, then.”

I turn my head to find the three idiots from my childhood standing right there. More witnesses to my ultimate destruction and humiliation.

“I used to be a happy person. I used to have dreams and hopes. Oh, Bailey, I used to be a person who smiled and laughed. Now I’m furious and bitter. I hate who I’ve become. But I’ll be damned if I’ll turn into what you want me to be. Or worse, the scraps you leave me when you all leave.”

I shove him off me, and when the bike rocks up, I run over to it and hop on the back.

The four of them watch me.

I don’t look back. I can’t.

Benson sits on agold throne. It’s probably spray painted gold, but the sheer audacity of sitting on a throne and bullying your neighbours leaves me breathless with rage.

I hand the envelope of cash over to him.

“Who is he?”

“How the fuck should I know?” I mutter back.

His hand cracks out, slapping me across my right cheek. It promptly goes numb. I can taste blood, but I don’t dare react.

“Say that to me again, whore.”

“I don’t know who he is.”

He passes the envelope to Needles, a tall, skinny alpha who got his name because, unironically, he likes to tattoo people, or he did before he became Benson’s fetch and carry bitch.

Needles counts the money and murmurs the amount to Benson.

“You’re short!”

“I am not!”

The hand cracks against the left side of my face. Fuck, it hurts.

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