❝looking for drugs in all the wrong places. felt a change comin', but i couldn't face it.❞

❘❘

EVERY INCH OF MY SKIN feels hot under his icy gaze, but I refuse to back down. Never.

Javier seems to appraise the challenge with mild amusement. The edges of his smirk soften, toying into an unspoken appreciation—a silent surrender.

"Let me buy you a drink, Neva," he drawls, but beneath the warmth of a flirty offer, the demand is frigid. "Maybe we can talk business."

I shiver. "Business?"

"Mmm." Dark and deadly, his gaze holds me hostage, reeling me closer... inch... by... inch... "Since you're hanging out in my turf, we should draw some lines."

Hesitation steals me for half a heartbeat. I can't drag my eyes away; I can't stop myself from sinking into the slow, subtle warning.

"I didn't know it was your turf," I muster up a weak whisper, desperate to dispel the dizzy spell and find my footing again. Because I'm stumbling and... and I'm swaying... and I'm swimming in ice cold water, uncharted territory, someone else's city.

Someone else's country.

Javier shoots me a heartbreaking smile. A hand meets my hip; a laugh flutters free. "Of course you didn't, mami."

My knees buckle, and in some self-sabotaging submission, I let myself fall.

"Okay," I say, my voice strong. "Buy me a drink."

"Neva..." Dana slurs behind me. When his gaze flickers up over my head, I still. "You don't want to get fucked up with him."

No, I just want to be fucked by him.

Javier catches my chin in a warning hold. I don't spin or squirm or even breathe. Without glancing down at me, he simply snaps, "Dana, ya puedes irte. Your new dealer and I need to talk."

Suddenly, it's every woman for herself; Dana doesn't waste a second.

As soon as her footsteps fade into the faint music, Javier hums. We separate slowly, almost sensually, and my gaze traces from his cheeks to his jaw, peppered with dark, trimmed hair I want to touch. His fingers dance down my throat delicately, another soft sound of appreciation seizing me like a chokehold.

Cada momento es lento; cada movimiento está brumoso. Everything in the bar feels fainted and faded, like a distant track of a real world that just... doesn't... exist...

In some fucked up fantasy, la sensación es perfecta—a lethal cocktail of dangerous impulse and empty desire.

When I reach behind him to drop my phone on the bar, Javier doesn't say anything. When I grab his drink and tip it to my lips, something flashes in his eyes. It sends a shiver down my spine. "No tienes que comprarme un trago."

Amusement tugs at his lips, all the silent teasing melting into a sharp smirk. I twist back to touch him, my nails clawing into the warm, white t-shirt he's wearing, cut to all the right wrinkles and ripples; it bleeds a contrast to his dark skin that leaves me grasping breathlessly.

Under the dim, dying red light, Javier looks sinister.

"You are something," he says, his voice slow and soft, nothing like the frantic, offbeat thrum of my pulse. As he thumbs my bottom lip, my heart trips. "Mmm, must be able to get away with a lot."

I give him a secret smile. "Sometimes."

"How do you get yourself out of trouble, Neva?"

"It's an art," I breathe, stripping away the soft facade to close in on him. When our lips brush, there's a second of a gentle caress, and then it's harsh—clashing teeth, twisting tongues, bruising lips.

His fingers dig into my hip; an arm ropes around my waist. Javier reels me into his chest in one fierce motion, stealing a gasp with another hard kiss.

This is how.

Siempre.

When I pull away to catch my breath, lightheaded and a little lost, Javier sweeps both hands up to cup my cheeks. It's a subtle, sensual offer, yanking at every nerve in my body and spilling into the space between us with a million sparks. Dizzy and desperate, I can only meet his dark, dark, dark eyes with a small sigh. A blink.

And then everything is spinning.

A warm breeze spiraling, sanguine and sweaty, swimming in the strands of hair that swivel and splash around us like tendrils of loose smoke and stolen air. Fingertips against flesh, caressing and colliding, breaking bones and hearts that surrender and stutter inside us like wisps of breathless promises and crumbling cities.

Because suddenly, it's only ink and water, blood thinning into crystallized kisses that will always leave my body shaking, quivering, trembling with ice in my veins.

A door swings shut behind us—

—and I unravel like electricity, crackling and spitting fire to stay warm. Dragging my nails down his throat, tasting skin, inhaling sweat, letting something wild and free arrest me.

There's a raw collision, a grinding mess of grunts and groans, and as I thrash or flail or fumble to feel, we just crash.

I hit a cool surface, throw my head back, let every stroke and sensation cast me further and further from my own body. Hands slide up my dress and fingers find my face and lips memorize slivers of skin.

Everything is on fire.

"Yes, yes, te deseo. Please."

A snicker. "Such a needy princesita."

Dazed smiles and drunk kisses. "Mmm."

"Tan hermosa." A soft slur. Fingers inching higher and higher and higher and higher, flirting at the edge of my panties. "So wet."

"Sí, sí, sí."

Only fragments break the haze—fabric sliding away, heavy denim tearing free, clenching, grasping, crying out, breathlessly begging for something, something, something.

Anything.

It feels euphoric in some twisted, tender way.

When he rails into me, my heart implodes. A strangled sound rips from my throat, but I cling tighter to his neck, shaking with every single thrust that pushes me to the brink of breaking.

Like a sheet of ice, brittle, fragile, one splinter, one crack, one fucking fracture from shattering into a million shards of nothing.

"Yes, más," I gasp, some destructive part of me begging for an icy combustion. Because right now, there are no lines between cold and hot—only a frigid fire fluttering beneath my skin.

When lips descend over mine, something about it is so soothing, so lukewarm and gentle that I whimper. "Oh... I..."

Snickering softly, Javier jerks against me. We fumble into a fierce, frantic rhythm, each stroke faster and harder than the last. I moan, he grunts, and together, we tighten into a knotted sensation of slurring sighs, crying, clenching, and then disentangling us into separate strands of bliss.

Still.

We both still.

"Fuck," I rasp, swiping sweaty hair from my forehead. "I—"

"Hey!"

A sharp rap on the door sends me reeling back. I curse, shoving at his chest until he lets go. My feet touch the ground, and everything comes hurtling back at full force, wrenching me to the dirty tiles of a club bathroom.

Chingados, my head hurts.

"Hey, man, what are you doing?"

No, no, no. I know that voice.

Javier chuckles. "Nada."

"What the fuck, Half?"

Half.

"Goes by Half."

My stomach twists.

"Heard he's running his whole operation out of Rockaway. Tons of bulk shit. Worth millions."

All the breath leaves my lungs. Staggering away from him, I gasp for air, but he only shakes his head. "I'll be out in a minute."

That doesn't do anything.

Because he still comes barreling into the bathroom. As I frantically tug my dress down my bare thighs, my heart leaps up my throat.

His dark gaze lands on Javier, and then slowly, so fucking slowly, it drifts to me.

"I— I..." I don't know what to say. Did I just fuck someone that Julian and I stole from?

"I fucking knew it was you," he hisses, his eyes flashing with something violent. "I knew it. Neva, what the fuck are you doing here?"

I can't breathe.

I need to get out of here.

When I stumble, an arm darts out to pin the door shut. Suddenly trapped, fear clogs my throat. "I..."

"¿Qué haces?"

"Mickey..." My hands shake. Fuck, Mickey had been working with Julian to distract Half when we... when we... "Mickey, I— I didn't know... I didn't..."

"Do you just fuck anything that breathes?"

I wince. The impact hurts more than anything. "I—"

"Rio really likes you," Mickey blurts. "Fuck, he likes you so much more than you deserve."

My lips part in surprise. It all comes crashing down abruptly, a ceiling caving in, walls crumbling, the floor cracking beneath my feet. "You're... you're in love with him."

Mickey nearly flinches. "I'm—"

"I didn't do anything wrong," I try to say, but the words come out too quiet. "We're casual. We're... we're nothing."

This wasn't about being unfaithful to anyone; this was about fucking a man that we had stolen from.

"Fuck, you are so stupid."

Javier snickers behind me. "Beautiful and stupid. What a lethal combination."

"I'm not—" My voice cracks. "I'm not stupid."

"No, you just don't fucking think," Mickey hisses, stalking forward to back me into the sink. My fingers curl around cold porcelain. "Do you pay attention to anything else besides yourself? Do you consider anyone's feelings but your own?"

Feelings.

I just... didn't want to feel.

Or maybe I wanted to feel... too much.

Tears sting my eyes. Why is this my fault? Why is everything my fault?

"Mmm. I knew Rivera's girl was a slut, but damn," Javier whistles, "that was easy."

My heart stops. "What?"

When I peer up at him anxiously, another bout of nerves explode in my chest. My throat tightens around a sob, but neither of the two daunting figures soften.

"Oh, pobrecita," Javier coos, cocking his head to the side. "I know exactly who you are."

I stiffen.

Because Javier pulls my phone from his pocket with a lazy smile, and when he waves it teasingly, it flashes with his name. Julian. "Why don't you tell your man that you just fucked the competition?"

"No, but I— I didn't..." I shake my head, snatching the phone from his hand. "I didn't know."

"But I knew," he says with a shrug. "While you're at it, you can tell Rivera that I'll come for him. I know he stole my shit, but I didn't know he let his bitch make off with his stash too."

No. Panic slices through my vision, blinding me for a second. As everything continues to just crumble around me, I can't string together a single excuse.

It is my fault. Everything is my fault.

"I... I di—"

"Everybody up against the wall!"

Beyond the sudden shout that shakes the door, all the music cuts off into a chaotic jumble of shuffling and yelling and running.

I freeze.

"Don't move!"

The air around us ripples; the door swings open, slamming against the wall with a harsh crack. "Out! Now!"

In that hazy red glow, a silhouetted figure steps through the door, towering in all black and spewing something too fast for my brain to follow.

And then he's lunging for Javier, shouting something in Spanish, and I'm... I'm... hyperventilating.

"¡Al piso! ¡Ahora!"

I'm suddenly sprinting, and I'm slipping through the bathroom door, and I'm staggering into the dim hallway, and the letters are swimming across black fabric in that bold, white font.

ICE

A man shouts something, someone tumbles to the ground, and everything starts to blur, as people thrash and flail through the crowd of uniformed men—huddled masses of nameless, faceless people.

Except one. Dana.

...twisting on her heel, shouting something strangled and angry, knees buckling, eyes widening, being yanked forward and shoved against the wall...

"Identification. Now."

"I'm not—"

Another mangled mess of Spanish overwhelms her response, but the crowd breaks, and when the wave ripples, I swivel and bolt for the emergency exit at the end of the dark hallway.

Every woman for herself.

Cold and cruel, the betrayal stings like a biting winter wind, like a blizzard, like a stroke of snow and ice.

❘❘

**This one is HARD. This is so hard. I'm trying. This book is slowly coming to an end.