by Skye Darrel
Asher answers the door. Fully dressed. He’s off work this week, helping me set up an art studio in one of the town’s few modern office buildings.
My new studio isn’t far from the waterfront, with a great view, perfect to get those muses singing.
We also turned Pris’s old bedroom into an at-home studio, something Asher told me his sister would’ve wanted. Pris had never liked empty rooms.
I don’t anticipate I’ll be featured in any galleries soon, but with time, he tells me. I’m also working part-time as a graphics designer. Soon to be full time after the Gatsby deal.
The Novaks are pleased with Asher. My husband can be very pleasing without the barbed wire and guns.
“We’d love to have you as neighbors,” Asher says.
Handshakes all around and the Novaks are satisfied. They walk back to their car, while Asher puts his arm around me.
“I was hoping for a younger couple, doll face.”
“Excuse me?”
“Well, when we have kids, who’s gonna play with the little ones?”
“Plural, huh?”
“Yeah,” he says softly, and I know he’s thinking of Pris and Eugene. The moment passes. “Sorry, Natalie. The past is passed. You’re the best thing that’s happened to me all my life, and if they could see us now, they would know that too.”
“You’re sweet.”
“I’m being sweet for a reason.” He squeezes my bottom. “All that walking around over there must be tiring. You need a massage.”
“Oh my God, we just did it this morning.”
“So?” He leans into me. “I wasn’t joking, doll face. If I could be in your pussy all day long, I would.”
“Asher!” I raise my finger. “Behave. You’re chief of police. You can’t be acting like a teenager.”
He kisses the tip of my finger. “I’m not chief of anything in this house. “In here,” he growls, “I’m yours.”
I roll my eyes as we make our way to the new sofa, his hands wandering all over me. He strips off my coat, my blazer. He unbuttons my blouse before those greedy hands work their way up my skirt. Pretty soon he has me under him, his tongue teasing over my throat.
“I’m gonna make you cum every day. You better get used to it, Princess.”
“And if we make a baby? Are you still going to be all crazy?”
His eyes take on a fierce, hot glow, and he pulls me into his arms so I feel his very obvious erection. He grits his jaw. “Nothing gets me harder than the thought of my seed in your womb.”
“You’re being ridiculous.” But it’s a good ridiculous. A very good ridiculous.
I wrap my legs around him and feel his length rub inside me, my body writhing against his. I’d love to spend the whole day like this, but we have a busy day.
We’ll go out to my studio later. Then we’ll look up some contractors to add a baby room upstairs. Busy, busy. But the good kind of busy. I know the old saying, stop to smell the roses, and I do that every day. No matter what happens tomorrow, or next week, or next month, I know I’ll never be alone again. The first chapter of our new life begins, and I can’t wait to see what awaits.
“Everything okay?” he whispers.
I smile from my heart. “Perfect.”
A Note from the Author
Thank you so much for reading Bad Boy Rebel. While Natalie and Asher have found their Happily Ever After, more adventures await them in Salma’s Hope!
Cora and Eli will get their own book.
Meanwhile, keep turning the pages to read an excerpt from my standalone novel, Royce.
Best,
Skye
Royce
By Skye Darrel
He wore a suit the first time I saw him.
Filthy rich? Check. Devastatingly gorgeous? Sure.
Arrogant, in charge, and self-obsessed? Yeah.
He’s the king of bad boy alphaholes. First he has my cousin arrested for protesting his company’s greed. Then he threatens to shut down the hospital where I volunteer.
All he cares about is money.
He should be my enemy.
Until the day he says I belong to him. He takes off that suit and shows me everything underneath. Thick and hard all over. Everywhere huge. A beast of a man.
His obsession turns my way.
Like that’s supposed to make me blush? Maybe a little.
But we have no future together. We met as enemies, and we can never be lovers.
Did I mention I’m terminally ill? Lovers need a future and I don’t have one.
Unless he finds a cure. Yeah, that’ll be the day.
And who’s to say he won’t go back to being heartless?
Chapter 1
April
“Make every day your best,” Mr. Thompson says. The words are meant to cheer us, because this is Support Group after all, but his grim voice would make the Grim Reaper weep.
Thirteen of us are sitting in a circle, and every face in the room turns to me with special pity, like I’m a lost puppy or something. I hate this feeling.
My nineteenth birthday was last October, which makes me the youngest Grouper in attendance. The second youngest is Vivian Mendez, at forty-eight years old. I like Vivian. She always jokes that our Support Group is rather lackluster in the fun department compared to the Alcoholics Anonymous people who meet two doors down from our room.
“Laugh,” Vivian likes to say. “Every laugh is a middle finger to Death.”
I like her a lot.
Everyone else is in their sixties and seventies, and they rarely laugh.
Support Group treats me special on account of my age. The illness we share is so rare among teenagers that to have it at nineteen is like winning a mega lottery. A crap lottery, I guess.
But I’m at peace with my luck. The secret to peace is never asking why. It’s not that I’m blasé about my improbable and highly terrifying prognosis, I just choose not to wallow in pity because let’s face it, pity sucks.
I don’t even need a support group, but my parents make me come, especially Mom. According to her, taking an hour every Friday afternoon to discuss the possibility of dying is good for me.
It might help. Ya never know, right?
So every Friday I drive up to the Longwood Community Center and sit in a circle with Support Group. I’m all for not being depressed. I’m the last girl who wants to be depressed, believe me. Depression is no good for you. Totally not.
Make every day your best.
Big fan of that attitude.
Make every day your best because it could be your last. Let's drink to it, people. Oh wait, little ole' me isn't old enough to drink. Well then. Let's talk about dying and depression some more. Cool. Yep.
Still, if today really is my last I don't think I'd spend it in Support Group. I would spend it with my family—if no one else is available, I mean. A boyfriend would be nice, but the last time a boy paid me any attention was in high school. Besides, I couldn’t date a guy just because . . . hi, you look like someone I’d like to spend my last day with, so buy me dinner?
I do believe in love. Somewhere out there is the perfect guy for me. Not perfect—just perfect for me. I’ll always believe that.
I could also get a cat, but would it be fair to the cat?
“There’s always hope,” Mr. Thompson says again, interrupting my most profound thoughts. He means hope for a cure, not me meeting my true love, boy or cat.
As Mr. Thompson wraps up today’s session with another speech about the importance of staying positive and taking life day by day, my phone vibrates. I sneak a glance.
A text from Camila: Need your help.
I text back: Support Group.
Camila: Call me when you’re done? It’s an emergency.
Me: Okay.
Camila is my cousin, also nineteen. Her parents live five minutes away from mine, and we’ve been best friends since kindergarten. Neither of us had siblings so we grew up like sisters.
She goes to sc
hool in Baltimore, but classes bore her to death. Camila spends all her time at protests and rallies, calling herself a champion for justice, and she has a supernatural ability to turn any conversation into a political debate. She also has a habit of getting arrested. So when she says she has an emergency, I'm not feeling the best vibes.
Mr. Thompson finishes his speech about staying positive and Support Group ends.
As everyone gets up to leave, he pulls me aside. “How are you, April? You seemed distracted today.”
“I’m fine.” My favorite words.
“If anything’s bothering you, feel free to talk about it. That’s what Group is for.”
I give him the smile I give my parents when I don’t want to talk about anything. “I’m bother-free. Really.”
He doesn’t believe me, I can tell. “All right,” he says with a frown. “Til next Friday.”
“Yep.”
Walking to my car, I call my mom to tell her Support Group is over. Mom says she loves me, and we’re having buffalo chicken wings for dinner.
“Sounds delish.” I just want this call to end though. Camila’s emergency and all.
“Did you take your medication, honey?”
“Um, yes?”
“April.”
“I’ll take them now.” I don’t like the little white tablets that taste strangely like chalk. They give me a headache, and they’re no cure. But Mom insists I stick with them. Every little thing helps. “Love you too, Mom.”
Then I call Camila and I’m startled to hear her sob. My cousin and tears are strangers.
“They arrested me!”
“Cami, slow down. Tell me what happened, who arrested you? The police?”
“Not police.” She’s whispering. “Security. They locked me in a room—”
“What security?”
“Security guards at Royce Innovations. It’s a company. I was at this protest and . . . Can you drive up here?” She lowers her voice. “Please, April. I’ll explain everything. Don’t tell my parents, I’m begging you. You have to get me out.”
Hearing her freak out is freaking me out. “Okay, okay. Text me the address.”
Camila sends me an address in downtown Baltimore, followed by Hurry please.
I don’t know what this is about, but if my cousin doesn't want her parents to know then she must in big trouble.
It’s a long drive from the peaceful suburbs of southern Maryland to the not-so-peaceful city of Baltimore.
I get in my car and grip the steering wheel, my hands cramping so badly I can’t start the engine. Deep breaths, April. I fetch the pill bottle from my handbag and take a single white tablet with no water. Eventually my hands steady, and I slot my keys into the ignition.
Making every day my best.
Traffic grinds to a halt when I get off the highway. I drive slowly, following Camila’s address to a huge glass building with Royce Innovations written in metal letters over the front doors. The place looks newly constructed.
A crowd outside chants and waves signs about the evils of corporate greed. It’s definitely Camila’s kind of protest. I spot reporters and camera people too, and on the other side of the street, cops watch the whole scene with tense faces. Something big is going down.
I park one block away and pick my way through the jostling protesters. I could be at home eating ice cream in bed or catching some sun in the backyard. The things I do for Camila.
At the revolving doors, two uniformed security guards block my way.
“We’re closed to the public until further notice,” one says. “Employee access only.”
“You arrested my cousin,” I yell over the din. “Camila Petersen? I want to see her.”
One guard goes inside, a hand on his radio. He returns with a man who looks about fifty. Shaved head, stern face, and I’m guessing no sense of humor.
“Viktor Harlow, director of security,” he says, checking me over. “April Finch?”
“Yeah. Is Camila in trouble?”
“Follow me.”
We walk into an immense lobby, the white marble floor so polished I can see my reflection. Security guards are everywhere. Nervous people in business clothes, probably those employees mentioned earlier, talk in hushed voices.
Harlow leads me past an enormous front desk, where three receptionists are busy on their phones.
“What’s happening?” I ask.
“A protest. The building is in lockdown.”
“Yeah I noticed. But why?”
No answer.
“Where are you taking me?”
“The holding room.”
“You have a holding room?”
“Last year, we did not. This year, we added one. For the convenience of people such as your cousin.”
What did you do, Camila?
He brings me to a metal door at the back of the lobby, guarded by two beefy middle-aged men who look like they could break me in half. They wear the same military-style uniforms as the men out front, decked up with guns on their belts.
Not a good vibe at all.
There’s a keypad on the door. Harlow nods at the guards, who stand aside before he enters a code. I fidget my fingers.
The room inside is tiny, with no windows and glaring fluorescent lights. There’s a steel table with a backpack on top. Camila’s sitting there, holding her head. Streaks of mascara stain her cheeks and her eyes are red.
I turn on Harlow. “What did you do to her?”
“We detained her. Perfectly legal. We are well within our rights to detain a trespasser on our property.”
Harlow walks around the table, the lights gleaming off his scalp. “Your cousin used a fake ID badge to impersonate a reporter. One of our security officers attempted to question her. She assaulted him. Upon searching her backpack, we discovered an explosive device. Your cousin is nothing less than a terrorist.”
“I’m a protester!” Camila shouts.
She lunges out of her chair before I grab her by the shoulders. One look from me, and she sits again, her hands balled into fists.
I stare at Harlow and try to smile. Camila has done some crazy stuff over the years, but terrorism seems a stretch.
“There must be a misunderstanding,” I say politely.
Harlow’s face creases with harsh lines. “She planned to detonate a paint bomb to disrupt our press conference. We can’t release her, Ms. Finch. If it weren’t for the conference, I would have called the police already. We will be pressing charges.”
“May I have a word with her? In private?”
“As you wish.”
The man leaves us alone, and I sit beside my cousin.
“What happened, Cami?”
“I didn’t think I’d get caught,” she says.
Isn’t that how it always starts?
Camila tells me that Royce Innovations is an evil corporation that’s been buying up real estate in the city. Evicting the poor. Bringing in the rich. “The only thing they’re innovating is poverty,” she says. “They’re greedy and they don’t care about anyone. We have to stop them!”
“Cami, we’re not even from Baltimore.” I heave a sigh. “Shouldn’t you be starting your summer internship or something?”
“I’m fighting for the people,” she hisses.
“The people huh?”
“It’s not a joke!”
“Am I laughing?”
“Royce wants to tear down St. Jude Children’s Hospital so they can build a tech center. They’re monsters, April. St. Jude helped you remember?”
I remember, even if I don’t want to. I was fourteen when my symptoms started, and my parents took me to one specialist after another. Doctors gave me every test under the sun—blood work, MRI, spinal tap—and for five months I felt like a lab rat. No one could tell us what was wrong. Then my parents’ insurance company refused to pay for more exams.
My doctor sent me to St. Jude Children’s in Baltimore, where I had an EGM exam, at no cost because the hospital
was a nonprofit that welcomed hopeless cases like mine. I received the diagnosis that changed my life forever.
But that was five years ago and it’s not like I’m cured. Still, the hospital did help me, and I know they help other kids even less fortunate.
“We’ll talk about it later, Cami. Right now I’m saving your butt.”
Before she can argue, I get up and open the door.
Harlow’s standing in my face.
“My cousin made a mistake,” I say in my sweetest voice. “She won’t do it again. Can you please let her go?”
“No.”
“I want to speak with your boss.”
“That is not possible.”
“Let me speak to your boss or I’ll go outside and make a scene.”
Harlow narrows his eyes. “I beg your pardon?”
“I’ll tell the reporters you’re holding a girl against her will. I’ll make a big mess of your fancy press conference. Or you can get a higher-up to come here and we can work this out.”
He grimaces. Guess I hit a sore spot.
“Inform Mr. Royce,” he says to a security guard.
“Right away, sir—which Mr. Royce?”
“Which one do you think? Get Everett down here.”
I take a seat beside Camila while skull-faced Viktor Harlow stands near the door. I just hope this Everett guy is nothing like him.
Chapter 2
Everett
“Relax,” Sebastian tells me.
My brother, older than me by seven years, is slouched on the sofa in my office, playing a game on his phone like nothing is wrong. Sebastian is immune to anxiety. If the earth were about to explode, Sebastian would tell me to relax. He’s thirty-four years old and the poster boy for what a man child is.
