Page 71 of The Devil We Crave
“Go ahead. Ask.”
Mom grins. “Am I that obvious?”
“You are one hundred percent that obvious.”
She laughs. “Fine, smart-ass. Any girl manage to sweep you off your feet yet?”
My gaze drifts across the quad in front of me to a figure sitting by herself on a bench, a book in her hands.
“I plead the fifth.”
Mom squeals in delight. “Ooh, that issoa yes!”
I chuckle. “It’s an ‘I decline to be compelled to incriminate myself’. Mom, you’re married to a mobster. You should probably know the fifth amendment.”
“Your father is also a pathologically truthful man, which means everythingyou knowabout bullshitting, you learned from yours truly.” She cocks a brow. “So… Who’s the girl? Is it serious?”
My eyes leave the screen again, zeroing in on where Yelena isnotreading Bastian Pierce’sFucked Sideways. The red stain creeping up her neck, the eager eyes, and the parted lips suggest she’s reading something a bit spicier than his commentary on modern culture, witty as it is.
I've also hacked all her online accounts, including her various eBook subscriptions. That's how I knowthat she’sactuallyreading the latest spicy BookTok romance that was recently reviewed by that Velvet Villainess chick who apparently might be a Knightsblood student.
I don’t know, and I don’t care. All I know is that whoever Velvet Villainess is, she’snotYelena De Luca.
Ergo, not on my radar.
Lucky her.
So, no. Yelena isnotcurrently reading Bastian Pierce, though I do know she loves his work. It’s just that it’s nice out, and she wants to read her filthy book about men in masks who ignore the word “no” outside without any judgement. Hence, her e-reader tucked between the open pages of her much more college-appropriate paperback.
The only reason knowing that Yelena is currently reading a scene involving “hand necklaces” and a guy in a neon stitch mask balls-deep in the heroine’s ass isn’t giving me a massive erection is the fact that mymotheris still talking to me.
“What?”
Mom sighs. “I asked if it was serious with this girl.”
Seriously becoming a problem?
Yes.
Seriously monopolizing literally all my attention even more than my previous “fascinations”?
Also yes.
Seriously,rapidly, gobbling up whatever restraint I have left that’s keeping me from putting on a mask and waking Yelena up in the middle night by sliding my dick into her sweet cunt?
Fuck fuckingyes.
But beyond that, I’m not sure how to begin to answer my mom’s question.
Luckily, before she presses the issue, I hear the slamming of a door somewhere in the background on her end.
“Oops!” she laughs. “Guess your fatherfinallymade it?—”
“Wherever thefuckyou are,” my dad’s voice booms from another room in the house, “it had better be without a stitch of clothing on, bent over with that sweet ass in the fucking air, so I can devour that pretty pussy.”
Jesus Christ.
Mom’s face goes crimson, then something sends the phone screen spinning nauseatingly around the kitchen before it lands looking up at the ceiling.
