Page 38 of EverGreene
“I’m running out of panties,” I answered my phone.
“That’s quite the personal problem you should fix. Good news for you, I’m not asking you for a pair of your underwear this time.”
Katy’s voice always became high-pitched whenever she was excited about something, and it only grew exponentiallyhigher in conjunction with her level of excitement. My eardrums winced along with the rest of me at her level of enthusiasm, meaning whatever it was she was about to tell me must be huge.
“We think we found him!”
In the background, I heard Jem’s voice correct her. “IthinkIfound him.”
“Jem and I found him.” Katy lowered her voice at the ‘and I’ part of her sentence.
“Found him as in him-him?” I asked. My pulse quickened inside my chest at such a vigorous pace that it felt as though I’d just run a dead sprint through the woods while being chased by the same masked man who couldn’t stick the landing when climbing through my window. “Do you know who he is? What does he look like?”
“Well, we don’t know all ofthat,” Katy said. “But we do know where he’s going to be tonight.”
“How? Do you know his name?”
“If we knew his name, I would have led with that. Well, his real name, anyway.”
“His real name? What does that mean?”
“Jem was on FightTok, watching hot guys in spandex duking it out as one does, when a certain masked man entered the picture. Ever, the mask, it’s spot on with the way you described it. And the best part, you’ll never guess what the man’s stage name or whatever they call it is.”
I opened my mouth to utter a slew of V words that came to mind—Victory Fists, Viscount VonGoodinbed, Vagina Slayer, but I was beaten to it by Katy.
“Vengeance! Hot masked man’s name is Vengeance. V!”
“Thank you,Sesame Street. I was completely stuck there for a minute.”
“As it turns out, he’s really good, and he has quite the fanbase.”
“Can you see his tattoos?”
“Hey, Jem, did you see tattoos on Ever’s new sex toy?”
“He had something. Trees or something.”
Trees. Fuck. It had to be him.
“Tag me in a comment. I need to see him for myself.”
“Jem’s on it. Word on the street is there’s a fight tonight.”
“Why is it word on the street? Aren’t things like these usually televised?”
Katy laughed. “You’re so cute and innocent. Sure, professional, regulated sporting events are usually heavily advertised and sometimes televised, but what V is involved in is a tad, shall we say, off the books.”
“Illegal? These fights are illegal?”
“Bingo. Hence, why you won’t see a billboard erected advertising them. Kind of makes him hotter, knowing he may be committing a felony, doesn’t it?”
“God help me, it kind of does.”
So, that’s where he ran off to. His big plans for the day. Maybe also why he was so afraid to show me his face. It seemed to be his schtick.
“Let’s go tonight.”
“I beg your pardon?”
