Total pages in book: 137
Estimated words: 127201 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 636(@200wpm)___ 509(@250wpm)___ 424(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 127201 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 636(@200wpm)___ 509(@250wpm)___ 424(@300wpm)
“Your bodyguard’s so handsome, Nero! I’d let him guard my body any day,” cooed one of Nero’s friends, Arturo, as he giggled over his fourth margarita. Despite being as round as a donut and sporting a thick beard, he was somehow the most feminine of their group.
Nothing fazed Miguel at this point so he stayed silent as the stripper bent in half, showing off the thin fabric of the thong barely covering his asshole.
“Miguel is good at his job. He always knows what I need,” Nero said in an enigmatic tone, which prompted both the bearded guy and a thin dude with a shaved head, whose name Miguel hadn’t caught so far, to roar with laughter. The final member of their party, a muscular brunet with dark skin shining with gold dust and a meticulously shaped, thin mustache, smirked without meeting anyone’s eyes. He reached for a blue cocktail standing on the table in front of him and took a long sip.
The baldie shook his head and flicked a manicured hand. “You always need dick, so does he provide that too?”
Miguel sneered. “I can hear you, and I’ve got my limits.”
“What limits are those?” Arturo asked and leaned closer, rubbing his shoulder against Miguel’s with all the audacity of someone too drunk to experience fear. His face was the color of berry juice and so plump Miguel wondered whether his blood would taste of strawberries.
“Why don’t all of you stick to bothering men who want to fuck you, huh?” Miguel said with growing annoyance. He hated being a source of entertainment.
For a moment, the table was silent, with no annoying voices to blur out the mindless rhythm of loud music, but no good thing could last long.
“He’s just shy,” Nero said and patted Miguel’s cheek.
Like fuck. If Miguel wanted to, he would have found a way to fuck someone. He just didn’t care to bother with something so trivial. Sex would bring too many complications, require too much effort, and it wasn’t as though he needed distractions when his job involved wrestling a Caiman.
Baldie grinned. “Is that why you wear only black? To avoid attention?”
Miguel huffed. “I wear it in mourning of those I killed, and those I will kill in the future.”
Nero and his friends looked at one another before bursting with laughter.
“So edgy! I like it,” Arturo said and winked at him. Even the somber man smirked, though amusement didn’t quite reach his eyes.
“Oh, don’t be so dramatic,” Nero said, raising his voice as the music became louder, and sniggered with his set of sharpened teeth. “If you were really sorry, none of those people would have been dead.”
“Nero always says he regrets nothing,” Baldie said, and when he stretched, the balls of his nipple piercings pushed at the tight shirt from the inside.
“No. Nothing. Not a single kill. I’ve got no time for mourning when life is so short,” Nero said, his green eyes meeting Miguel’s.
If only he knew that his life would have been cut short weeks ago, were he not a convenient pawn in Miguel’s game...
“Exactly!” Arturo chimed in. “What do you do for fun, Miguel? Do you like dancing?”
Miguel frowned, trying to work out whether Arturo was trying to dance with him. There had been a time in his life when he’d danced almost every day, but that was long, long ago. “I don’t like to waste my time,” he said, hoping the topic could now die.
“Miguel barely even smiles,” Nero said, rocking his hips at the edge of the seat in a parody of dancing. But the motion, and the bulge poking at the fabric drew Miguel’s eyes in until he felt sweat on his upper lip.
“That’s good! The silent types with a dark past are the sexiest,” Arturo said and flicked his tongue against the straw while keeping his eyes on Miguel.
“Until they kill you,” Miguel added to get the guy off his back.
“I bet I could make you smile,” Baldie laughed.
Miguel could bet none of these brainless sluts would be acting this way if Nero wasn’t here to protect them from a broken nose. None of them were the type to carry a gun, yet it seemed they didn’t fear Nero’s sharp teeth, as if they were symbiotic birds, allowed to feast on the leftover meat in a predator’s teeth.
“No, that is my bet to make,” Nero said, stretching to show off his muscles. “I will make you smile, Miguel.”
Miguel was too bored to not entertain this. Anything he could beat Nero at was a win in his book. “Fine, let’s give it a month. What do I get when I win?”
Nero shrugged, and the caimans fighting on his bare chest flexed. “What do you want?”
Miguel’s brain went aflame. I want to meet your father wouldn’t cut it. Too suspicious. “I want to see your father’s caimans.” That way he could make it sound as if he was just a victim of morbid curiosity.