Total pages in book: 177
Estimated words: 176345 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 882(@200wpm)___ 705(@250wpm)___ 588(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 176345 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 882(@200wpm)___ 705(@250wpm)___ 588(@300wpm)
“By making her feel threatened?” Kai retorts.
Jason points at Kai, Nathan, and Milo. “You’re the one who sent those pictures!”
“So it’s true?” Felix’s grip on his gun tightens so harshly I can hear the metal crack. “They took lewd pictures of you and tried to shake you for money?”
“They did, but it was for a good reason,” I say.
“What good reason can anyone have? Tell me now, or I swear to God, I will put a bullet in all three.”
“They needed the money to save his sister from being taken by traffickers,” I explain.
Nathan grips my arm. “Hey.”
“I’m sorry, but I need to tell him the truth if you want him to leave without killing you all,” I say, and Nathan grinds his teeth, then nods and backs off again.
“All that is over now,” Kai says.
“Shut your damn mouth,” Felix quips.
“Hey, can’t we all relax?” Dylan muses. “Take a chill pill.”
“Don’t you even fucking start,” Kai retorts.
“Don’t start fighting again now,” I warn. “Or I’ll punch all of you back into your fucking rooms.”
Penelope sniggers behind her hand.
“So what is this, then? Some kind of relationship?” Alistair asks. “Like ours?”
My eyes narrow, and I look away as I softly mouth, “Um … I guess.”
“You guess?” Felix’s eye twitches.
Kai places a hand on my shoulder. “She’s ours.”
“Take your hands off my sis—”
“Felix.” Penelope interrupts him and places her hand on his shoulder too. “Don’t you see? They’re in love.”
The whole room goes quiet, and I feel like all the blood just drained from my body.
“What?” he says under his breath.
“Don’t you remember what it was like for us in the beginning?” Penelope muses. “The tension, the heat, the rage.”
“True, she’s like a fiery goddess,” Milo says with a big grin. “And I’m smitten.”
“Oh God,” I mutter, burying my face in my hands.
“Fuck me,” Felix grits. “You’re having sex with all of these dudes? Is that why they made those pictures?”
“Not all of them. Just Kai, Nathan, and Milo,” I reply, trying not to make it sound awkward.
“I actually intended to send the pictures to you,” Nathan quips with a smirk on his face.
Felix looks like he wants to bite his head off. “Swear to God, if you show those to anyone, you’re dead.”
“He hasn’t,” I say, lowering his hand. “And he wasn’t planning to,” I say, glaring at Nathan. “Right?”
“I won’t. Because all those delicious pictures are meant only for us,” he replies with a wink.
Felix snarls, “You motherf—”
“Ah. Stop.” I interrupt. “Enough. You’ve done enough. I’m not in trouble. I’m safe here.”
“Safe? This is your definition of safe?” he retorts.
“They care about me,” I say, swallowing away my apprehension to tell him the truth. “And I care about them.”
“Do you even know what they did?” he says through gritted teeth. “They bullied Penelope’s sister and then tried to attack her too.”
“Hey, I didn’t have a fucking choice, and you know that,” Nathan spits out. He glances at Dylan.
“Thanks to your father, who tried to extort my fucking parents by sending information to the police.”
“Let me know when you’re all done,” Alistair murmurs as he sinks down against a pillar and casually lights a cigarette.
“Hey, I’ve got nothing to do with this,” Dylan says, raising his hands. “Leave me out of it.”
“Oh, is that why you took my fucking eye?” Kai growls at him.
“You attempted to go after Penelope,” Dylan retorts, getting up in his face.
“It’s because of her Nathan lost his finger and got his legs broken. Of course I did. He’s a Phantom, and Phantoms protect each other,” Kai says as their foreheads collide.
“Stop it, all of you,” Penelope says. “I hate those boys as much as you do, but all this fighting is getting us nowhere.”
“She’s right,” I say. “Besides, did you forget Dad told us we’d get in trouble if he caught us again?”
“Right,” Dylan says in a long-drawn-out manner. “I forgot about that.”
“Why are we even fighting?” Alistair asks all of a sudden, taking another drag of his smoke. “If this is what she chose, isn’t it up to her to decide?”
Everyone looks at him, even Felix, even though he’s not amused by the concept of letting me decide for myself what I do.
So I cup his face and make him focus on me. “I know you want to protect me. But I can protect myself.”
“How, when you choose them?”
“You don’t know us the way she does,” Kai retorts.
“And I don’t fucking want to,” Felix replies, but then he sighs out loud when he looks at Lana. “But if you want to fucking be with them, that’s on you.”
I take a breath. “Thank you.”
“Soooo … no one’s going to shoot me, right?” Milo mutters.
I snort. “No, Milo, no one’s going to kill you today.”
“Not me,” Alistair murmurs from the pillar he’s seated against.
“Cool, cool, because I’ve taken enough bullets for a whole damn year.”