I shake my head, dropping my hand from my face. “You’re going to ask me to stay and I don’t?—”
Lex’s head dips and his mouth covers mine, halting my words. My lips part in surprise and give him just enough room to dive into me. His tongue slips past and curls into my mouth, testing and teasing and stroking along my own. Sparks dance up and down my spine. My body sways into him, reminded of all the times he gave us pleasure.
Just as soon as I give in to the kiss, he ends it and pulls away.I will not whimper, I order myself, and I don’t—but it’s not easy. Lex presses his forehead to mine, his hands moving up until he cups my neck. Both of his palms are hot, burning into my skin as he breathes against my lips.
So close and yet so far. I lick my bottom lip, tasting him there.
“There’s more I have to tell you,” he whispers. “So many secrets, baby, but I promise—I swear to you—I will tell you everything.”
My pulse skyrockets. More? What more could there be? I part my lips to demand he tell me now, but he murmurs something soft, his thumbs stroking either side of my throat.
“Shhhh, no, baby, it’s okay, it’s okay,” he soothes me. “Don’t panic. Everything will be okay, I’ll make it okay.”
“Just tell me, Lex,” I practically beg. I can’t stand not knowing.
Lex blows out a breath and I smell something on his breath. Menthol? Was he smoking before he came back?
“I’ve met with your father,” he begins. I jolt and try to back up, to look at his face, but once more, he presses closer and hushes me. His hands never leave my throat, closing around me like a collar of sorts, keeping me pinned against him.
“It’s harder than you might think to stalk someone long-term,” he continues. “It requires money and resources and my aunt Gemma doesn’t have much of either—I had to make my own.”
“What does that have to do with my dad?”
“I’ll get there,” he assures me.
His fingers trail over my throbbing pulse and I press my thighs together. “It started with cheap cameras and a lot of walking to the other side of town, but there were days I couldn’t see you. Weeks would go by and I’d be going insane because I didn’t know what you were doing, who you were with, if you evenremembered me. After you moved schools, we never saw each other. We went to different parks. We had different friends. I… missed you.”
The crack forming in my chest aches with the words, but I don’t say anything. If I want answers, I need to learn to keep my lips shut and let him give them.
“I eventually moved into building computers out of parts. Pawn shops throw out a lot of junk and so do the second-hand stores. Gio and Nolan would go dumpster diving with me on the weekends—there was less supervision when all of the adults were working or otherwise occupied. Computers opened up a whole new world. I could find things. I could find information.”
My breath saws in and out of my chest as he keeps talking.
“It took me a while to name what I’d started doing—hacking. Slipping into other people’s accounts and finding out all of their dirty little secrets. I was nervous about leading people back to me or my aunt, so I never focused on anywhere too close by. The jobs started small and eventually, they got bigger.”
“Lex?”
He releases a slow breath as if the sound of his name is both heady and painful. “Yes, baby?”
“Are you… I mean…” I know they’re criminals—no one who hangs with Darrio Vargas can be anything but a criminal. I’d merely assumed, for so long, though, that they were little more than small-time drug dealers. Weed and maybe prescription pills. But what Lex is telling me is something more, it’s far bigger than small-town crime. “Are you in danger?”
Lex releases a laugh and the sound goes straight to my cunt. I tighten all over. What the fuck? Before I can really investigate my own body’s responses, Lex replies.
“Not at the moment, baby,” he says. “But I have been in the past and I could be in the future. I’ve gotten information forsome bad people, but I’ve kept my identity secure and hidden behind a pseudonym.”
“A pseudonym?” I ask. “What do you call yourself?”
The rumble from his chest is yet another sign of his amusement. My lashes flutter against my cheeks as my breath comes a bit faster. The sound makes the inside of my stomach clench down tight.
“Can you guess?”
I blink my eyes open and frown at him as he lifts his head and grins down at me. In an instant, I know.
“Scorpion King?” I ask.
He nods. “Well, just the Scorpion,” he admits. His head tilts as he gazes down at me. “Only Nolan and Gio know that about me.”
I frown at him. “How… do you do that?”
