❝when you're ready, just say you're ready;
when all the baggage just ain't as heavy.
and the party's over, just don't forget me.
we'll change the pace, and we'll just go slow.❞

❘❘

TWO LINES DOWN, AND everything is blurry. I'm shaking, spiraling... smiling... holding a gun...

I can taste stars, and I can see sparks, and I can fucking fly.

"Is it good shit?" Julian graces me with that sonrisa irresistible—lazy and high. Fingertips trace up my bare hip and to my throat, higher, higher, higher, igniting every nerve in my body. All those white-hot pin needles puncture tender muscles, leaving a fresh sea breeze beneath paper skin. "Better than mine?"

I can't find my tongue, or my lips, or my lungs, or my fucking heartbeat.

"You are fucking beautiful, Neva."

I blink, but Julian swims in front of me in too many layers of smoke. A thousand, a million, an infinite veil of intoxicating lies.

I don't feel beautiful, but I don't even need to feel beautiful.

I need to feel like this.

My fingers dance down his neck, seizing warmth in every inch of exposed skin. I reel him into my body, and friction feels delicious, almost unbearably delicious, almost too hot... almost too much, almost too...

"Cuidado, mami," he warns, his voice low and raspy, just like that first fucking night. Just like that first fucking high. I remember thinking Julian was like gravel and smoke, and everything that burns...

...skinned knees, sore throat, tender wrists...

I blink again.

A cool smirk sweeps the embers and ashes from my veins.

Now, Julian is just midnight storms and black ice—still and sensual, like a night unloved and unforgiving. Letal.

My hips roll, and my fingers twitch over a trigger. As I grind on his cock under the sultry, sweet, stifling stare, I still don't feel beautiful. I feel fucking fierce.

Podría matarle.

En ese momento, there's finally something real about Julian. His lips are parting, his eyes are flashing, and his cheeks are flushing. Julian Rivera isn't immortal, or invincible, or forever.

I am.

"Neva." Agudo... y... severo, the warning cuts through the haze. "Cuidado."

"Oh, papi." As I press the gun to the side of his head gently, a smile toys at my lips. "¿Qué paso? Are you scared, Jules?"

Julian grins, and there's a wild threat written in the edges of his lips. Fingers tangle into my hair and yank, and as my back arches, teeth dig into my neck.

"Ah, Julian!" I jerk on top of him, gasping when his cock hits deep, deep, deep. "Julian..."

"You're too fucked up to think straight, mamita."

For a half a hiccuping heartbeat, I think I am too.

Because then I'm upside down, I'm swerving sideways, and every fragmented thought is derailing in different directions.

I sink into sheets and stare up into hazy eyes.

Thoughts don't exist; only we do. In a sensational stroke of pleasure, stripped free of fear and flaw.

No inhibitions. No reality.

A winning grin and a punishing thrust.

"Oh, pobrecita," Julian lulls, prying at my numb fingers until I'm staring up at a blurry skew of metal. "You think I'm scared of you?"

The words feel like little butterflies with ice-cold wings, soaking my lips; it isn't a caress, but a subtle sting that comes too close to the edge of a warning I should take. The buzz in my bloodstream spins, spikes, sprints, and I can't even place where my limbs are, or my head is, or my thoughts...or my...

"Now dime, Neva." Something cold grazes my cheek, crisp metal and ink bleeding together. "Was the nieve worth stealing?"

Is it worth this feeling?

A disorienting, dizzy dance through his sheets, chasing after smoky kisses and fiery fingertips. A restless high tracing veins from my head to my heart.

Everything is worth this feeling.

Why doesn't Julian feel the same way?

Why am I drowning, and he's just floating along the surface? Am I really beneath him, or are we lying next to each other?

A faint laugh flutters free, and I think it's me, but I only...hear...Julian. "It's for you, Neva."

Did I ask him something?

"What..." As Julian cups my cheeks with warm palms, I sigh wistfully. "What is for me, Jules?"

"We sell this," he soothes, "and I'll have the money to bring you anywhere. Everywhere."

Fear claws into my chest with every soft word that falls from his lips, dripping with the promise of una eternidad... like this.

I don't want to go anywhere or everywhere with Julian. I want to be here.

Julian hums, and I can fucking feel it in my bloodstream—crackling, spitting, sparking with every inch that he captures, with every murmur of the high that steals my breath and my body.

As he dips down, I wait for it to stop. Our lips meet softly, but it ripples into an intensity that scares me; it feels like a million shards of lightning ripping through my rib cage and jumpstarting my heart. I gasp in surprise, panting and panicking, pulling him closer or pushing him away.

It's too much.

His thrusts come quicker and longer, deep, deep, too deep, and when I throw my head back, I cling to him for survival. I claw at his back, desperate to break skin and muscle, to scrape and tear into him, to crawl into him, to be him, to be anywhere but there—trapped inside of my body, anchored by a trillion endless sensations.

I want it to stop.

I want every atom in my body to stop splitting...and I want my bones to stop grating and grinding...and I want my heart to stop throbbing...and I want my head to stop swimming and suffocating and sinking.

Everything spins and stings, and it just won't stop.

"Julian..." I whisper, or cry, or think.

Something inside of me unsheathes those icy daggers, blades of wintry wars and summer shadows, writhing and thrashing.

I can't stay still. I can't...I can't...I can't...

Julian breathes my name, the way only he seems to be able to, and when he groans, flames lick at my skin. Or it's his tongue, tracing lines that don't exist, from my cheek to my throat to my collarbone—to all the pieces that barely hold me together.

Because with every second, every single fracture starts to split and splice me. I can't make it stop. I can't get out, or say anything, or stop, stop, stop.

All the colors smash together, and all the sounds bleed into one, and suddenly, I'm nothing but shards of ice in a solstice symphony, shattering into a million jagged cries.

When I blink and blink and blink, and somehow, can barely find myself in my body, it's exhilarating.

"Neva."

I blink and blink and blink.

It's not exhilarating; it's blinding—how I'm forever ensnared in that one moment, lost in a wild euphoria.

"¿Estás bien, Neva?"

I'm not okay; I'm dizzy.

There's a soft, sensual song playing in the background, and for a second, I wonder how long it's been sifting through the hot room. For a wasted breath, I wonder why I feel like I am each syllable in the lost lyrics, drifting through speakers and sinking into skin.

Feathers dance across my cheek, wisps of smoke, whispers of cold air. "So beautiful."

I shiver.

"Are you cold?"

The soft pulse of music replaces my heartbeat.

"It's my party. I'll get high if I want to. Can't deny that I want you, but I'll lie if I have to."

"Neva, háblame."

"'Cause if you let me, here's what I'll do. I'll take care of you."

An eternity passes. As the subtle red flush of light dims in the room, as the song softens around us, as the night bleeds and breathes, I stop.

Everything around me...keeps...moving...

...but I come to a dead halt.

Why can't I die?

Even if every flutter of his fingers against my skin is a stroke of fire, even if every breathless promise is hot against my heart, even if every faint kiss sears my lips, I stay alive—abandoned by everything but smoky snowflakes.

Nada es para siempre.

"Mmmm. It's Sunday night," Julian drawls, and the sound of his voice churns through the chill. "I suppose the college girl isn't up to go out."

"I...I told you..." A sickness simmers, rising in my throat. "I have...class tomorrow."

"So we can stay in."

I blink slowly, searching for a threat or a challenge in his tone, but there's only this lovesick devotion that makes my stomach lurch. "You really want to stay in?"

"With you?" Julian snickers. "Yeah, I'd stay in."

Icy fingers clench at my heart. "We can do another line together."

I don't know if I really want it, but I think I might need it.

Julian kisses me softly. "If we do, you'll stay the night?"

I nod, but Julian is already twisting away from me gracefully. As he straightens and rolls his shoulders at the edge of the bed, my breathing hitches. I can't help but devour the vision hungrily—all the hazy light dusting over his body, clinging every trace of ink that paints his skin.

"Yeah," I breathe, "I'll stay the night."

"Are you sure you can handle more?"

When Julian reaches to the floor beside the bed, I know he's going for the brick of cocaine we'd broken into hours ago to test.

I don't think he cares if I can handle it, but I guess I don't care if I can handle it either.

"We'll take it slow," Julian promises. "Tenemos toda la noche, mami."

Julian Rivera doesn't waste away, or fall asleep, or fade with the darkness. The night is an endless sensual assault, soft and slow, slow, slow.

It starts heavy, and when I sink with the motions, we both melt into the fire that stirs between us—nails carving into skin, teeth digging into muscle, tongues tasting blood, fingers crushing bones.

Slow.

Sleep surrenders to us, or I start to surrender to the fluttering lashes... and the sated sighs... and the slow-burning summer soundtrack...

...to wistful winters and sleepy snowstorms...

Estoy cansado, but I just want him inside of me.

Something keeps us together, even as we drift apart through a snowy city, skidding and swerving on ice.

Smoke kisses my cheeks.

When my eyes flutter open, Julian is beside me, not inside of me, undressed and awake, burning a cigarette to the filter. I don't know how much time has passed—a second, a minute, an hour, a day.

"What...¿qué hora es?" I croak, blinking tiredly. "I think my class is at ten."

An inked anchor breaks through the smoke, those knuckles grazing my cheeks lightly. Julian places the cigarette to my lips, holds it there, and waits—almost lovingly.

Dazed, I close my eyes and take a drag.

"It's almost eight-thirty," Julian sighs, and when he pulls back, I climb to meet his lips, higher and higher and higher.

"I should go."

"Do you really have to leave?" Warm breath fans across my cheeks, sinks into my skin, and anchors me to his sheets. "Quiero que te quedes conmigo, Neva."

I smile, dizzy and derailed by Julian Rivera. "I guess I could stay."

The brunt force of his smile is heartbreaking. No longer high, but loose, easy, and completely victorious. "What about school?"

"School..." I murmur, reaching for him, or something... "I can skip."

❘❘

**Neva literally fell asleep with him inside of her. That's real. That's so fucking real.

There's a moment in this chapter when Neva literally wants everything to stop, when it's too intense, and she's trapped, and nothing feels good anymore. Remember that. That's also fucking real.

Neva is on a slippery slope, but I'd love to hear your opinions on this part before we move onto part III! Thanks so much for sticking with this story! ❄️