Lola & the Millionaires: Part One

by Kathryn Moon

  I nodded, stepping in with Leo at my back, and Rake met me halfway, his hips barely grazing against mine. One of his hands settled on my hip, the other slipping back to Leo to pull us closer together. Leo took my hands and draped them around Rake’s shoulders, holding them there with one touch while his free hand cradled Rake’s hips. The three of us moved in liquid unison, and with one deep breath I was drowning in Rake’s perfume, my head back against Leo’s shoulders where I fit perfectly.

  “Sin,” Leo said in my ear, kissing my pulse.

  Rake watched my eyes as his head dropped, resting his forehead against mine, his grip firm on my hip. I could see the alphas out of the corners of my eyes, Caleb and Cyrus dancing together on one side, Matthieu spinning Carolyn on the other. I smiled as I thought of Wes looming behind us all, serving glares to anyone who tried to join our close cluster.

  Rake’s scent drowned out any others, and if I closed my eyes I was alone with him and Leo. I relaxed in their holds, and Rake’s cheek brushed nearly to mine. I leaned into him, letting him mark me. His breath puffed against my skin.

  “My Lollipop,” he said, lips against my ear, tongue flicking out to taste and making me shiver.

  We stayed like that for three songs, until my body burned and my chest was tight with a new kind of discomfort. Rake’s hands never traveled, although Leo’s did plenty until my skin was so hot, I was ready for him to peel me out of my dress right on the dance floor. When the third song ended and Rake leaned back, my eyes finally opened again.

  His pupils were blown black and his tongue flicked out to graze over his bottom lip. I resisted the urge to lean in and steal my taste back from him, to catch some of his own. His chest heaved and he pressed forward once, let me feel the girth of his arousal against my stomach, and then he turned and dove between his two alphas. Caleb caught him in his arms immediately, and Cyrus was ready, taking Rake’s face in his hands and pulling their mouths together in the rough and demanding kiss of an alpha.

  I twisted to face Leo who looked smug and aroused.

  “Take me home,” I said, breathless.

  Twelve

  Lola

  “…Yeah, but he’s not showing any of the usual symptoms, you know?” Zane mused to Betty, waving a carrot stick in punctuation. “Like, he hasn’t started wearing a pocket square again.”

  “Whose pocket square are we judging?” I asked, pulling out the open chair at the cafeteria table with my coworkers.

  My photos from fashion week had gone over great with the team, and we’d spent the next week replicating some of the looks—easy to do when I had firsthand knowledge. Zane and Betty pulled me into their tiny clique, completing my orientation at the magazine and digging for details of fashion week. I knew it had to do, at least a little bit, with them wanting to keep an eye on the successful new girl. Their attitudes were still supportive, rather than competitive or shady, and I probably had Cyrus’ determination to use the team as a complete unit to thank for that.

  Betty and Zane exchanged a calculating look, and Zane shrugged briefly before Betty answered me.

  “Cyrus’, kind of. I think his pocket square phase was just a fashion thing, but he does tend to get a little extra when he’s dating someone new,” Betty explained to me. “And now he’s about a month overdue for a fling.”

  My eyebrows bounced. “You guys keep track of his romantic life?”

  “Not intentionally,” Zane assured me. “Cyrus is just…totally lacking in subtlety when he’s fallen in love. He gets more than usually giddy about it all, and like…whistles? Buys us lots of lunches, brings pastries in the morning, that kind of thing.”

  “Romance is his drug of choice,” Betty said with a nod.

  “He’s…a lot different than most alphas,” I said, pushing my grain salad around in its bowl. The Stanmore’s cafeteria was a culinary wonderland, with several booths set up around the room, one entirely devoted to a rotating calendar of award-winning chefs.

  Betty and Zane exchanged another look heavy with unspoken gossip before Zane leaned forward, pushing his tray aside to whisper across the small space to me.

  “Their whole pack is totally bizarre. Like, an open relationship pack? With an omega?” Zane hissed. “Rakim Oren must get off on shutting down his alpha’s relationships or something.”

  “He gave Wendy, what? Like, two months before pulling the plug on her and Cyrus?” Betty muttered, and Zane nodded.

  My head reeled at the new information, this twisted up version of Rake and Leo’s pack. “Wendy and Cyrus?”

  “Mmm. That was an explosive year at Designate, let me tell you. I swear I thought Wendy was going to cut Beauty altogether,” Zane said.

  I tried to imagine laid-back Cyrus with brutal Wendy and was surprised to find it was kind of easy. It also explained a lot about the meeting I’d sat in on between them. And Rake’s nerves about how Wendy would paint him to me. I didn’t buy the way Betty and Zane were talking about Rake though, not after spending the week with him. Instead, I wondered what Cyrus was thinking, getting involved with his boss.

  “Did Mr. Omega of the century hiss at you every time you looked at one of his alphas, Lo?” Betty asked, and Zane snickered.

  I swallowed and tried to keep my expression neutral, even though I realized I really didn’t like my nickname on Betty’s tongue.

  “I didn’t really run into them,” I lied, and hoped there weren’t any photos floating around of the party I’d been to on Saturday night. “And he’s…we got along okay, but I don’t know that I got a real glimpse of him in that setting and everything.” Lie. Rake was a sweetheart and I was already missing him.

  “What was the pay like?” Betty whispered.

  That, at least, I could boast about. I grinned at them both and nodded. “Extremely generous.”

  “Well, we can’t fault him there,” Zane said, shrugging and raising his bottle of kombucha. “To eccentric omegas, and to Lola buying the first round of drinks tonight.”

  “Here, here!” Betty cried.

  I bit my lip as I laughed. Damn you, Leo, for being out of town. Where was my excuse to get out of this?

  “You live in a shiiiiiit neighborhood, girl,” Zane cried, far too loud for the late hour. He was hanging out of the back of the ride-share we’d ordered from the club. His hair sat high on the top of his head in a ponytail I’d given him when he’d gotten sweaty dancing, and it swung forward, giving him the hysterical impression of bangs.

  I giggled and tripped over myself, catching my hand on the railing up to my door, the neighborhood spinning around me. “Shhh…people are sleeping.”

  “Mmmkay. Be good, killer,” Zane said with a wave before throwing himself back into the seat, the door slamming like a gunshot behind him.

  I hummed and rolled my shoulders back, trying to take steady steps up to the front door, as if I could conjure sobriety by willpower alone.

  With Betty and Zane, my three drink limit was obliterated. I’d done my best to ward them off, but by the time we left Philia—my request—I was well and truly drunk. I pulled open the downstairs door and tsk’ed at the broken lock. David had pressured the landlord while I was signing the lease to have the street door’s lock fixed, but two months in and it had yet to change.

  I slid against the stairwell wall as I dragged myself up to my floor. The lights overhead flickered and I paused, drawing in a deep breath and wondering if I could sleep like this, or if the nightmares would swallow me up if I was too weak to fight. I dug into my purse for my keys and undid the three locks, pulling out my phone and checking the time as I stepped inside. Was it too late to call Leo? His voice would settle my woozy heart before bed.

  There was a message waiting, my phone screen the only illumination in the room as I shut the door behind me.

  UNKNOWN 2:21 AM

  u bein good showgirl?

  My heart stopped and my phone slipped from my fingers, crashing to the floor with my purse. The room was dark, and my free hand hover
ed over the light switch, afraid to flip it and find I wasn’t alone.

  “Look at you, Showgirl, look at the mess we made of you. Filthy girl, we sure made you scream.”

  I heaved, bile surging up in my throat, and I raced to the bathroom through the dark, imagining the sound of feet chasing me with the crash of my heels on the floor. My knees hit the tile with a jarring ache and I threw up into the toilet, vomit burning like acid in my throat. Tears were already gathering in my eyes, and I braced myself for the panic attack.

  Just breathe. Just stay awake. Get the lights on, Lola.

  I was sick twice more before I was able to drag myself to the wall and flip the switch. In the half-second between my touching the switch and the light coming on, I imagined him standing there. Indy. Tall and skeletal, sneer stretching his lips, tattoos over his fingers as they dug into my throat.

  The bathroom was empty, I was alone, surrounded by mildewy pink tile. I wiped my mouth with toilet paper and ignored the scratch in my throat as I wrestled my way out of my strappy heels. There was nothing like terror to sober you up, and adrenaline was racing through me, setting all my senses to a hyperalert state.

  I was used to this. I could manage this. I sucked in a breath, and two more gasps came with it, my chest heaving and struggling as if I were running out of air. I pulled myself up on wobbling legs and braced myself against the doorframe as bright lights flashed at the back of my vision.

  Breathe, Lola, I coached myself, although the voice was softer and lower, almost like Leo’s. I turned the light on in the hall and held my breath, my ears ringing as I listened for any stirring in the apartment. I tiptoed into my bedroom and flipped the switch, tried to scan the room to see if anything was out of place or moved, but my vision was still dizzy from drinking. I stared at the dark space under my bedframe, and at my partly open closet door, and waited to find the courage to check them.

  Was he here? Had he snuck back into the city, the state, just to frighten me? Buzz was dead, but Indy was still out there, and now I knew for certain he hadn’t forgotten about me.

  I sank to my knees and lowered my head to the wood floorboards, my breath skittering out of my chest as I saw the cardboard boxes stuffed beneath my bedframe, and remembered there was no space there. My closet came up empty too.

  One by one, room by room, I turned on all the lights and reassured myself that I was alone. Indy was taunting me from an unknown number, but he wasn’t here in my apartment.

  He doesn’t know where I live. He never did.

  I was safe. I was safe. I was alone, and I was safe.

  I didn’t sleep. Hours passed until my trembling left me sore and achy. The sky was turning gray and pink and I was still balled up on my couch, watching the door, and then the windows. My phone was in my hand and I debated calling Leo, or even Rake or Baby, a hundred times at least. Instead, I sat in my tiny apartment with every light on and waited for daylight. I was too scared to get into the shower, and when dawn came, I changed my clothes at racing speed, the sensation of eyes watching me impossible to shake.

  I kept my phone close by, looked at the text every minute, half-hoping and half-afraid it would disappear.

  When the first car horn of the morning blared on the road, I gathered up my purse and headed for the police station.

  “So you can’t really do anything?” I said, sitting across the desk from one of the local officers.

  “It’s…not a threatening text.” The woman wasn’t unsympathetic, or at least she was going to the trouble to try and appear sympathetic.

  “Indy is a threatening man,” I said, raking my fingers through my hair in frustration. “I have a restraining order filed against him.”

  “But you don’t have proof that this is from him,” the officer said.

  “That’s… ‘Showgirl,’ that’s what he called me,” I said, my stomach sour at the nickname.

  The woman’s eyes narrowed and her lips pursed and I huffed a sigh, knowing exactly what she was thinking. Who didn’t try to call me Showgirl?

  “Look, I am going to pass this on to the detectives for the case. I just can’t do anything for you right now. It would take a lot more than something as innocuous as what was sent for us to pull the strings needed to find out where that number came from and what towers the text pinged.” The woman leaned forward on her elbows. “The asshole is tryin’ to rile you up, but he’s not giving any sign of intent, okay? You just keep ignoring him.”

  “Because he’s going to keep texting,” I supplied, staring her directly in the eye. “And I just have to…cope?”

  “Yes,” the officer said with a sharp nod, some of the sympathy vanishing out of her expression. “Cope. Report it. Hope that the investigation continues to develop without you ever hearing anything from any of us again except ‘ma’am, he’s in custody.’”

  She’s got bigger problems than reassuring a beta who landed herself into hot water with an alpha, all because she wanted a rough fuck and someone to tell her she was important.

  I swallowed and nodded at the officer, grabbing my bag and hugging it against my stomach as I pushed my chair back.

  “I wish you the best, Miss Barnes, honestly,” the officer said, her gaze wincing.

  I continued to nod as I left her desk. The station was busy and loud, and I was heading for the stairs when my phone buzzed in my bag. I wanted to be sick all over again, and I reached my hand into my purse as if I were expecting my phone to jump and bite me.

  Leo.

  I sagged with relief and swiped the screen without thinking.

  “Hey.”

  “Hey, gorgeous! I know I said I’d come grab you for breakfast, but my flight was canceled and the others are all filling up. I’ve chartered one for later today and I should be in by—”

  “Get yer fuckin’ hands off me, you goddamn motherfuckin’—” I shrank in on myself and pushed for the stairs as someone coming in with officers started to struggle and fight.

  Leo’s voice cut off abruptly at the sound of the fight in the background, and he was quiet as I made it to the staircase, the door banging shut behind me and cutting off the man’s cursing. “Lola? Where are you, gorgeous?”

  Lie, I thought. Lie, and say it was a TV show.

  “The police station,” I whispered, weariness suddenly crashing down on me. I hadn’t slept a wink. All the adrenaline of my panic was used up, and I was getting teary-eyed all over again now that I was leaving the police station with nothing to show for it. What had I expected, really? For them to magically track and jail Indy with just one lousy text?

  “You’re what?! Lola? What’s happened? Are you all right? Lola?”

  “I’m okay,” I said, but the words were completely undermined by the sudden crack in my voice as a sob worked its way up my throat. I forced it down again and stumbled down the steps.

  “Lola,” Leo breathed over the phone. “Tell me what happened, gorgeous.”

  “Um, no, I really am okay. I just…I got a text message and it—they can’t do anything about it. He’s not even in the state. It just flipped me out,” I said, my voice tightening to a squeak. “Tonight is fine.”

  Leo sighed audibly, and the animal inside of me that wanted to run, run, run nearly made me hang the call up.

  “You aren’t hurt?”

  “I’m not hurt.”

  “You know he’s not in the state?” I made a soft strangled sound at the back of my throat, and Leo continued. “Okay, Lola, you can say no, of course. Wherever you’ll be comfortable, that’s where you should go. But if you’d be willing to, I’d like for you to go to my house. Rake’s in town. I can even make sure the house is yours by yourself if you want. You’ll be safe there. But if you’d rather go to your apartment, I’ll be there as soon as I can. I’ll try and get an earlier flight.”

  It was on the tip of my tongue to refuse, to return to my apartment and try to force myself not to just sit and stare at the door all day. But that stupid broken lock on the street door
was taunting me. And if Rake was in town, he would be the kind of distracting presence that might get me to think about something else for five seconds. And I missed him. I missed Leo too, and the thought of being in his space, being surrounded by him in some way, was so tempting.

  “I’ll…I’ll go to your house, if you’re sure that’s okay,” I said. I’d made it down to the first-floor lobby and I stared out at the street, listening to Leo’s soft sigh.

  “Definitely okay, gorgeous. I’m texting you the address.”

  “Thank you,” I whispered over the line.

  “God, don’t thank me. I wish I was there with you.”

  I puffed a watery laugh. No fucking kidding. I would’ve given anything to have had Leo’s hand in mine while I sat across the desk from the officer. It scared me how easy it was to depend on him. Now all I wanted to do was to go somewhere that had traces of him.

  “I’ll be home soon, okay?”

  Thirteen

  Lola

  Leo’s house hadn’t seemed like a daunting thing, really. Even though I’d never been there before. Even though our relationship was still fairly new. Maybe I’d pictured something like David’s lovely apartment, something almost familiar. I hadn’t forgotten that Leo lived with five other men, but my brain hadn’t bothered painting a picture of what that might look like until the cab I’d grabbed pulled up to the six-story brownstone, sitting on the corner of a quiet neighborhood that surrounded a community park.

  Please let this secretly be a handful of apartments, I thought, staring up at the vast old brick building that looked as though it might’ve been a school of some kind at one point. The gate of black iron fence was cracked open, and I wondered if Leo and his pack didn’t worry about locking it or if Rake had left it open for me.