Page 82 of Collateral Love
“Whose is it, baby?” He chuckled and spanked my ass again.
“Don’t fucking play with me, YaYa, you know this shit is yours.”
Every time he grunted, moaned, or screamed my name, I remembered the love of my life was my best friend, and I felt powerful knowing a love like ours was hard to come by.
After we came down from our high, I snapped back to the task at hand.
Find Chanel.
The back room door down the hall was cracked open. I heard laughter. It was unmistakably hers. It was unlike anything I'd ever heard from my Baby Bear. It was light and soft. ButI also heard a man’s voice.
I stepped inside and froze.
Xavier King.
Of course.
Zayden and I worked overtime to keep them two from every meeting, and like a moth to a flame, they found one another anyway.
And the way Chanel looked at him? It was a problem waiting to happen.
I snapped.
“Channy, what the hell? You in here giggling with X?”
She sputtered. “It’s not—it’s just—we were playing a game?—”
Xavier’s smile widened at me. “Relax, YaYa. She’s good.”
Upstairs, I’d been reckless with Zayden.
Downstairs, I was calculated with Chanel.
Two different parts of me, both real.
Chanel didn’t need to know that while she danced with Xavier, I’d been in a bedroom with his brother, pinned to the bed, tasting sweat and danger and wanting more than I should.
She didn’t need to know that I felt something when Zayden looked at me, something I didn’t have the tools to handle yet.
She didn’t need to know I had already crossed lines she couldn’t imagine.
On the bus ride home, her head dropped onto my shoulder. I stroked her hair and pretended my pulse wasn’t still thrumming with memory.
She whispered, “Do you think X he likes me?”
I kept my voice flat. “Xavier likes anything that breathes.”
She elbowed me. “YaYa?—”
“I’m not joking,” I said quietly. “You’ve got a future. Don’t let him rewrite it.”
I didn’t tell her who I’d been sneaking off to see.
I didn’t tell her that wanting someone like that rewrote your insides.
Because I didn’t want her to become like me.
Camilla coveredus like she promised.
