Death Layer (The Depraved Club) (19 page)

“You look like you could use a drink,” he growls, his voice
rich and husky.

I swallow hard, steeling myself in the face of such an
incredible, intimidating presence as his. With a miraculously steady hand, I
reach into the pocket of his black leather cut and close my fingers around the
cool steel flask. He raises a perfect eyebrow at me as I bring the flask to my
scarlet lips—trying hard not to think about the fact that his mouth just rested
where mine does now. I can tell that he’s intrigued, unused to being approached
so brazenly. The smoky whiskey sears my throat as I gulp down a huge swig and
hand the flask back to him with a mischievous grin.

“Thanks,” I say, flicking a tress of black hair over my bare
shoulder.

“My pleasure,” he smirks, placing his firm hands on the
points of my hips.

His pleasure is the first and only thing on his brain, I can
tell that for certain. But I’ve made up my mind not to fold so easily. I step
back from him, knocking his hands away.

“Sorry. I don’t think I happened to catch your name,” I say,
fighting hard to keep the quiver from my voice.

“Huh,” he laughs, eyeing me up and down, “This isn’t usually
a place where names are traded, babe.”

“Humor me,” I insist, all too aware of the fiery sensation
his gaze leaves in its wake as it rakes along my body.

“I’m Devlin,” he tells me, his voice full and sure, “Devlin
Vile.”

Jackpot.

“Hi Devlin,” I purr, letting down my guard just an inch,
“I’m Logan. Logan Farrah.”

“Well Logan,” Devlin goes on, closing the careful space I’ve
put between us, “Welcome to The Club. I’m glad you stumbled on our little
island paradise for the night. You’re gonna love it here. I’ll personally make
sure of that.”

“Oh, I bet you will,” I return.

Little does he know, of course, that my presence here is the
furthest thing from a stumble. I’m a woman on a mission. A mission that has
everything to do with him, as it turns out. But as I breathe in his
intoxicating presence—the towering form, the searing gaze, the smoky, spicy
scent of him—I decide that as long as I’m here, I may as well have a little bit
of fun. All work and no play has never done anyone any good, right?

Is it possible that this Devlin Vile could be good for me?
Or is that just the most dangerous kind of wishful thinking? Only one way to
find out, I muse to myself, and take a step toward him.

Chapter One

Boston, Massachusetts

One month earlier...

The sound of a sarcastic catcall tears my attention away
from the full length mirror. I turn to see my roommate Emma leaning against the
doorframe, grinning at my current getup.

“Hey, sexy mama,” she teases, “Can I get some of that?”

I frown at my reflection, all decked out in its unflattering
cap and gown. I’ve been trying to convince myself that the whole costume isn’t
really that terrible...but to no avail. I look like a giant green Easter Peep
that someone’s run through the microwave.

“You’re so lucky you don’t have to sit through graduation,”
I sigh, flicking my cap’s tattered tassel away from my face, “Maybe I can hire
a body double to go for me or something? Surely there’s a section on Craigslist
for that.”

“Or you could just skip the whole thing like a sensible
human being,” Emma shrugs, tucking her short blonde hair behind her ears.

“I wish,” I grumble, sinking onto my narrow bed in the
starchy, sweaty robe. “My parents would never speak to me again if I didn’t
show up.”

“Last time I checked,” Emma says, raising a fair eyebrow,
“They forfeited their right to this graduation nonsense when they refused to
pay for your education.”

She does have a point. By all rights, I should have no
qualms about ditching graduation despite my parents’ desires. I’m the one who
financed my degree through a half dozen scholarships (and about 50K in student
loan debt, of course). My mom and dad always told me when I was growing up that
they’d be more than happy to pay for my college education, provided that I
studied something “practical” like medicine or law. But when I decided to major
in marketing and communications instead, their offer of financial assistance
was snatched away right quick.

“Why would we pay for a degree that’s just going to leave
you jobless and living in our basement?” my mother had scoffed at the time.

And much to my chagrin, she seems to have had a valid
argument. I’m graduating from college at the end of the week, and I’ve spent
the better part of the past year sending out resume after resume to every media
and publishing outlet in the country. In that time, I’ve had exactly four
lackluster interviews and zero job offers. I’m about to step into the real
world with a boatload of debt, no job, and a rather fatalistic attitude about
my prospects. Just like my mother predicted way back when.

“Sorry, I shouldn’t have brought it up,” Emma sighs, sitting
down next to me on the bed. I watch as she tucks her slender legs beneath her,
nimble as a kitten. I’ve always been slightly covetous of my best friend’s tiny
frame. I’m a relatively tall young woman, 5’ 9” to be exact, and was an early
bloomer, as far as curves as concerned. I’ve come to love my fuller, voluptuous
figure, but I never heard the end of it from my mom when I was growing up. She
was born in Japan, and always boasted a super-slender figure. My older sister,
Juliet, inherited her body type, but I took after my English-born father. You
can’t pick your parents, and you certainly can’t pick what you get from them
out of the genetic grab bag.

“At least you’re graduating at the top of your program,”
Emma points out, “I don’t even think they bother to rank us in the Fine Arts
department, but if they did I certainly wouldn’t want to know about it.”

“That’s true,” I allow, “I did kind of kick this degree’s
ass, huh?”

“I’ll say!” Emma smiles, “You even managed to snag a minor
in psych like some kind of academic super hero.”

“To be fair,” I point out, “My psych classes were mostly
introductory. And all we did for the most part was fill out weird personality
quizzes and try to psychoanalyze our parents.”

“No wonder you had such an easy time of it. Think about all
the material you have there,” Emma smirks.

“Ha, ha,” I say, shrugging out of my ridiculous green gown,
“You’re a regular laugh riot, Emma Sanders.”

“I’m here all week,” she mugs, laying out across my bed.
“Aren’t you glad you’re going to be stuck with me for the foreseeable future?”

“I really am though,” I tell her sincerely.

Emma and I have been living together since sophomore year of
undergrad, when we were randomly assigned to the same dorm room. You’d think
there wouldn’t be much for us to talk about—she’s an abstract painter, I’m an
aspiring media type. But in a school overrun with Greek life and hard core
athletics, we were lucky to find each other. We stuck together for the rest of
our undergraduate careers, and just found a tiny two-bedroom apartment to share
after graduation. Emma’s already snagged a job as an artist’s assistant here in
Boston, and while I haven’t been so lucky job-wise, I’m determined not to move
back home with my parents. I don’t care if I have to sling coffee, or walk
dogs, or babysit some horrible rich kids. I’m going to make it work.

“Come on,” Emma says, rolling onto her feet, “It’s already
three minutes past five. I need a drink.”

“Yeah, OK,” I agree, gathering my long black hair into a bun
and securing it with my signature hair sticks—the only thing passed down to me
from my mother, besides raging social anxiety. “I could really use one, after today.”

Emma skirts off to find her purse as I drop into my desk
chair, absentmindedly checking my social media pages and favorite blogs. Not
much to see on Facebook and whatnot, but that follows. I don’t exactly have a
large group of friends. Or any group of friends, for that matter. There’s Emma,
sure, and some people from my study groups and classes, but not many people
that I’d consider honest-to-god friends, despite what Facebook might call them.
But to be honest, my lack of close friends makes perfect sense.

It’s sometimes said that sisters are built-in best friends.
And for me and my sister Juliet, this was absolutely true. At least, it was
when we were little. She’s two years older than me, and I absolutely idolized
her when we were growing up. Juliet was always leading me off on epic
adventures and insanely fun antics. Whether we were staging full-scale Spice
Girls musicals in our shared bedroom, teaching each other how to do cartwheels
in the backyard, or breaking into my mom’s makeup case for surreptitious (and
poorly executed) makeovers, there was never a dull moment with Juliet around.

But as we grew older, that adventurous spirit turned
rebellious. My mother was a strict taskmaster, and my father let her rule over
the household, and us girls, with an iron fist. She and Juliet butted heads
ceaselessly from the time my sister hit her teenage years. And the harder my
mom tried to hold on, the most desperate Juliet grew to fly away. By the time
she was seventeen, Juliet was totally out of control. Partying every night,
drinking and smoking, sleeping around—engaging in every bit of destructive
behavior imaginable. I begged her to be careful, to take care of herself. I
loved her more than anyone on Earth, but my love wasn’t enough to make her
stay.

The day she turned eighteen, Juliet ran off. She’d fallen in
with a local biker gang, a really hardcore group of guys. She left us a note
saying that she’d decided to join up with them as some sort of groupie, and
that we shouldn’t come looking for her. She was a legal adult, and too damn
stubborn to reconsider, so my parents had no choice but to let her go.

I was devastated by her abandonment, and resolved to never
be anything like her. I dove headfirst into my studies, my writing, and did my
best to put her out of mind. But no matter how well I did in school, how many
prizes I won, how many colleges I got into, no accomplishment was good enough
to dispel the ghost of my departed sister from my parents’ hearts. It wasn’t
until I went away to school that I finally felt free of her lingering, stifling
presence.

But as much as I hate to admit it, I’m still feeling the
impact of what Juliet did. Because of her betrayal, I keep my heart safely
locked away. I’m immediately suspicious of anyone who wants to be my friend,
and insanely selective about the guys I’ll even consider dating. I can’t stand
the thought of coming to love someone, the way I loved Juliet, and having them
leave me behind. I’ve sworn never to let myself get hurt like that again, and
so far I’ve managed just fine. I may not be the most popular girl in school, or
have the most notches in my bedpost, but at least I’m not vulnerable to
heartbreak.

Of course, being safe from heartbreak means being safe from
love, too...but that’s a conundrum to tackle another day.

I’m just about to close my laptop when a new email pops into
my inbox with a ding. I glance at the message, expecting some junky
advertisement for penis enlargement or the like. But the email’s subject line
makes my heart skip a beat.

Interview Request from Advance Media, Re: Logan Farrah

“Holy shit,” I whisper, hastily opening the message. I sent
my resume to the media giant Advance on a wishful whim a few months ago. Could
they seriously be reaching out to little ol’ me about an interview? I read the
email with bated breath.

Dear Ms. Farrah,

We have received your resume and are very impressed with
your scholastic record and achievements. If you are available, we would like to
schedule an interview with you in the coming days. One of our popular media
outlets is currently seeking editorial contributors. We think you would be a
wonderful fit for the online publication, FootSolider. If you are interested,
please let us know so that we can forward your information to FootSoldier’s
managing editor. We look forward to hearing from you—

I can’t even read the last few lines of text—my vision is
swimming with excited glee. I let out a squeal of joy, leaping out of my chair
and dancing ecstatically around my dorm room. In a flash, Emma is right back in
my doorway, staring perplexedly at me and I jump and jive all over the place.

“What the hell is going on?” she asks, befuddled by my
outburst.

“I just got an email from Advance Media!” I cry, clasping
Emma by the soldiers.

“Okay...?” she replies. Emma is not exactly the most
plugged-in person on the planet.

“They own, like, every blog and online publication on the
East Coast. At least the ones that are worth reading,” I babble on. “There’s an
opening at one site,
FootSolider
, and they want me to come in for an
interview!”

Emma may not have any interest in blogs, but even she
recognizes the word “interview”.

“Logan, that’s wonderful!” she cries, throwing her arms
around me, “I knew something was going to come through for you. You’re too
brilliant not to get snatched up.”

“Well, I haven’t been snatched up yet,” I laugh, “But I’ve
been reading
FootSoldier
for years. I really dig their aesthetic, and I
think my writing style is right up their alley.”

“In other words, they’d be crazy not to hire you,” Emma
grins.

“I’m definitely a good fit for the job,” I allow.

“Ugh. That modesty thing is going to be the death of you,”
Emma laughs, releasing me from her bear hug. “This calls for a celebratory
drink!”

“Weren’t we already going out for a drink?” I ask.

“Well yeah,” she shrugs, “But isn’t it nicer to be justified
in it?!”

“I’ll say,” I laugh, grabbing my purse and trailing Emma out
the door.

We step out into the warm May evening, arms linked. My body
feels weightless as we make our way through the streets of Boston. It’s like I
can breathe freely for the first time in months. Finally, I’ve got a lead on a
job that might actually pan out, a job I’d kill to have. Maybe I won’t have to
crash land into post-graduate life after all.