Page 88 of Devious Lies (Cruel Crown)
He was staring at something.
I followed his line of sight to Emery. She wore the same black hoodie, unzipped, with a pair of oversized sweatpants. Something that resembled a shoelace—if it’d been chewed up by Rosco—held the sweats up at her waist, but she still found herself adjusting them every ten steps.
She was beautiful in a way that disgusted me. The type of beautiful nothing could conceal. Not sarcastic t-shirts that made no sense to anyone but her. Not that dollar store crap she called makeup on the days she even bothered. Not the oversized sweats she had to pull up every five seconds.
Just. Fucking. Beautiful.
Period.
End of statement.
Delilah spent hours at the hair salon, perfecting her balayage so it looked natural. Virginia still bore scars from a Brazilian Butt Lift she swore never happened, eve
n after she came back with a new ass and a figure the shape of a violin, claiming to have caught mono for a month. Chantilly caked herself in makeup, scanty dresses, and desperation that screamed for attention.
Meanwhile, Emery didn’t care.
She simply gave no fucks.
It made no sense because she was a fashion design major. She’d grown up in a world that told her appearances mattered and pursued a major that enforced the idea, yet she possessed no interest in succumbing to societal expectations.
So authentic.
So fresh.
So fucked up, I reminded myself.
The hood of Emery’s hoodie had been pulled over her head, but I knew it was Emery because her shirt read, “Selcouth,” this time in a sans serif font that took up the width of her chest. The chest I’d stared at a couple of nights ago.
So perky, her tits begged me to slap them and watch them bounce.
She’s twenty-two. Don’t give in, asswipe.
I did.
Tugging my phone out of my inner pocket, I opened up the dictionary app and typed in, “Selcouth.”
Adjective.
Unfamiliar, rare, strange, and yet marvelous.
She was selcouth like I was a rainbow-riding unicorn. For the record, I was well aware I was lying to myself. I knew I wanted Emery, but on account of her being a Winthrop and twenty-fucking-two, my dick could sit this one out.
When I glanced back up, Emery had pulled a full-body coat out of her bag. With a quantity of pockets that veered more on the side of functional than fashion, it had a cotton hood popping out of the thick wool.
She continued walking, and before I could stop myself, I placed two hundred-dollar bills on the table and left the diner out the front with my head down, hoping Brandon wouldn’t notice me.
Sanity, it turned out, was a deadbeat dad—it fled when you needed it the most.
When Emery turned left, I followed but kept my distance as I realized Brandon hadn’t been waiting for me. He’d been waiting for Emery, and now he was trailing her to wherever she was headed.
About four blocks from the hotel, which I walked in a suit not intended for walking in, Emery stopped in front of the tent city the Haling Cove city council had been trying for years to eradicate.
The suit pinched my skin. I watched Emery weave through tents like she owned the place. She didn’t. I knew this because, I did.
Rows of homeless men and women lived in tents in a vacant lot owned by yours truly. (Through a shell corporation, because making enemies of the city council wasn’t on the top of my to-do list, thank you very much.)
I knew many of these people first-hand from volunteering at the soup kitchen a few doors down. Since I’d arrived in town, I donated money for groceries and volunteered five times a week, usually during peak hours.
