Page 15 of EverGreene
Well, shit. That was a lot to unpack. Thank Christ I never posted videos on the internet. My account was generic. No posts, no identifiable information, and all interactions were made on a burner phone I kept mainly for communication revolving around the other illegal activities I was involved in, which had quickly racked up over the last year. I only followed two people—Ever’s friend Katy and, recently, Ever—or at least, an account I thought was Ever.
“For fuck sakes. Are you wearing gray sweatpants?”
I glanced down at my pants. Damn, I’d meant to change. But with the way Ever was eye-fucking me, maybe I should be glad I hadn’t.
“Ugh! I can’t stay mad at you when it’s looking at me like that.”
Another glance down allowed me to catch the faintest outline of my cock straining against the cotton fabric. I’ll be damned, there was some truth to the whole gray sweatpant thing, after all. My lips formed a smirk that Ever couldn’t see but was nonetheless satisfying, and I lowered myself down into a squatting position, allowing the fabric to constrict around my groin area as my dick grew harder with each second Ever’s lust-filled eyes lingered on my crotch.
“Asshole.” I’d never heard a woman growl before, but I’ll be damned if that wasn’t the sound that came out of her as she enunciated every syllable of the word she also used when talking about me to our coworkers at the office.
I motioned at the parking lot behind me, pointing at her and then at myself, hoping I was being obvious enough with my request.
“You want me to leave with you?”
I nodded. Hesitation overcame me when she looked overher shoulder at the door behind her. She’d had a bad night. Returning to her friends wasn’t going to make it any better, especially since I knew Ever would stay for them, despite how much being in there made her skin crawl or how loudly her brain told her to run.
“I don’t know. I mean, my mom always told me not to get into cars with strangers.”
But riding their dick is okay?
I didn’t know how to mime to her that I wasn’t going to tie her up and throw her in my trunk, that she was safer with me than she was anywhere else on this planet. I’d been seeing to that since overhearing her whispered conversations with Shelby about that piece of shit she’d been forced to run halfway across the country to escape. So, I chose the most passive-aggressive approach I could think of, since that seemed to be what she responded to the most.
In the most “I don’t give two fucks what you do” kind of way, I could convey without actually saying those words, I shrugged my shoulders as if to say “suit yourself, stay in this dank alleyway with the overflowing dumpster” before turning my back to her and walking to the parking lot.
“Wait.” The soles of her sneakers sloshed across the damp pavement as she moved to catch up to me. “Fine. You can take me home. But if you even so much as look at me funny—and yes, despite the mask, I will know—I’ll use your own gift against you in a form of twisted irony I bet even you didn’t see coming when you sent it to me.” She fished inside the pocket of the zip-up hoodie she was wearing, producing the pepper spray I’d bought for her, which she’d attached to her house key and the key to her 4Runner.
Good girl.
I held up both of my hands in surrender, nodding at her in understanding. Ever slowly returned the pepper spray to herpocket, keeping her hand tucked inside in the event she needed to whip it out again. “I’m glad we understand each other.”
I wanted to laugh, but I knew the second I did, Ever would know who was behind the mask and all hell would break loose. We spent so much time together at the office, but the only time I ever laughed was when I was with her—granted, it was while we were in the midst of launching verbal grenades at each other, and she was almost always storming away from me at the time. Still, there was a chance, and I wasn’t going to fuck this up for myself.
“Man of few words, aren’t you? You know, the no-talking thing was only for the night of the party. You can talk to me now. In fact, it may work out better if you do.”
I shook my head, causing Ever’s face to fall slightly. She inspected me, her eyes taking in every feature she could see, which wasn’t much. Frustration soon crept in, causing the green hue of her irises to stand out—the same hue that succeeded in reducing me to a pathetic simp. That frustration was short-lived, however, when a thought crossed her mind so aggressively that I was surprised when the apparition of a light bulb didn’t simultaneously form over her head. Curious as to what had sparked this change in her demeanor, I followed her gaze to the nondescript sedan parked by itself off to the side, which she was inspecting so thoroughly that I recognized what she was doing: memorizing the license plate to try to identify me later.
Smart. But it wouldn’t work. That plate was fake, and the car wasn’t even mine. It belonged to Malachi and was used after our matches when it was rumored that police were in the area. Essentially, it was a getaway car. Frankly, it was a tad insulting that she thought I would be dense enough to drive my own car.
“Yup. This is the car of a serial killer.” She appraised theinterior when I opened the door and motioned for her to step inside. Her eyes roamed around the spotless white leather as though inspecting it for clues she wouldn’t find. “Is that bleach? Do I smell bleach?” Eyes widening in fear, she pulled out the pepper spray again just as I got in the driver’s seat, aiming it entirely the wrong way.
Okay. We were going to have to work on that.
Without taking my eyes off her, I held up both of my hands, slowly moving one to the steering wheel and the other toward the pepper spray, taking the base of it between my thumb and index finger and turning it around in her hand.
“I knew I had it turned the wrong way.”
I nodded.Sure, you did.
With Ever aiming the pepper spray at me as though she were holding me hostage, I started the car and began heading in the direction of the route I’d come to know so well. Not long after we left the parking lot, her phone rang. In my peripheral vision, I could see her fumbling with it while keeping a firm grip on the pepper spray. Despite her not having the call on speaker, I could still make out the sound of Katy’s voice on the other end asking her where the hell she was.
“I could give you three guesses, and you still wouldn’t get it right,” Ever responded, glancing up at me. “A certain someone showed up at the concert, and I’m currently in his car with him. Yes, he’s still wearing his mask. No, he still won’t talk to me. I don’t know. Maybe he has an unsexy, keep your panties on kind of voice like Gilbert Gottfried.”
She smirked, banking on my insecurities being enough for me to speak just to prove her wrong.Nice try, little bird. But I’ll always have the upper hand.I stole a glance at her partially exposed collarbone, noticing the tip of the tail of the bird tattoo that was inked there, which she kept hidden at the office from douchebags like my uncle, as thoughthirty-two percent of people in this country didn’t have one. Had we not had the night we had together, I wouldn’t have known it was there. But I did now. There was no unseeing it, and I’ll be damned if I wasn’t going to see it again.
“The glove box!” I turned my head to the seat next to me to see Ever’s face light up as she made that declaration. “I should check his glove box.”
I removed my hand from the steering wheel long enough to gesture at the glove box as though telling her to go ahead, doing everything in my power not to break out in laughter when Ever, faced with the conundrum of having to either put down the pepper spray or the phone in order to open it, was clearly experiencing an internal struggle. Ultimately, the pepper spray won out and was kept unwaveringly aimed at my head.
