It’d been one of my most fucked up days to date. Not only had Linda and Madeline tilted my entire fucking world, but Lyla had shown up, letting me know she would never truly let go.

How the hell was I supposed to push away from a woman who wouldn’t let me? She was making this entirely too difficult, but it wasn’t like I fucking helped any. No, I went and told her she was practically my fucking crutch.

Christ.

What possessed me in that moment to say that to her was beyond me. Maybe it was because all I could think about was how beautiful she was, how her skin looked so soft under the gym lights and how her lips were calling out to me, to fucking make her mine, brand her with my shameful dysfunction.

With the soap, I lathered up my hand and washed my stomach as visions of Lyla kept passing through my mind.

I thought about her face, her breasts, her body.

My hand found my growing erection and without remorse, I stroked myself to the image of Lyla writhing underneath me, an image that had been branded in my brain.

I heard her little cries of pleasure, felt her grabbing hold of my ass, urging me deeper inside her. I growled and pumped my rigid cock. I just needed to think about her, and I was fucking hard.

Her laugh echoed through my head as my sore arm exerted itself by pumping my cock. I shouldn’t be thinking of her this way. I was only torturing myself, allowing myself to picture her in my mind constantly, but her beautiful face granted me little reprieve in this fucked up life of mine. She made me forget for a single moment in time.

I clung to the moment, riding it until I developed a new one. It was the one thing that made me not let Vinny push me over the edge, to finally take my life.

A groan escaped me as my stomach coiled, my balls tightened, my breathing hitched, and I came. With a couple more strokes, my orgasm eclipsed me, relieving me of the pressure that built up in my core. A short amount of relief fell over me but was quickly washed away when the slightly euphoric state I experienced ended.

In disgust, I placed my head on the tile of my shower and thought about my life.

Could I really go back to the Haze Room?

It wasn’t like I had a choice. If I didn’t show up to work on time, Jett would be at my door faster than I could shove a bottle of whiskey to my mouth.

Even though my mind was elsewhere, I knew there was only one place I could go, and it was the last place I ever wanted to be.

It was time to go back to the Haze Room.

***

The community center was already crawling with people signing up for a free membership and going on tours with the girls, who were dressed in khaki shorts and polos. It was almost comical to see the Jett Girls walking around in such normal clothes rather than their presentation outfits that consisted of bras, thongs, and smaller-than-scarves costumes.

Goldie sat at the front desk, greeting me with a smile, but instead of engaging in conversation, I just nodded and headed to my room. She really was the perfect person to greet people, a fucking ray of sunshine. Even though I hated to admit it, her smile had eased the tension in my shoulders.

She got up and followed me. “Hey,” she called, grabbing onto my shoulder to gather my attention.

“Ahh, fuck,” I mumbled while trying to pull away. Maybe I had spoken too soon about her easing some tension. Her grip on my arm sent shards of pain screaming through my body, thanks to Vinny’s thorough work.

“Whoa,” Goldie said while backing up a step. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” I replied, holding on to my cup of coffee a little tighter while the burn in my arm started to settle.

“Don’t lie to me,” Goldie said with her hands on her hips.

“Mind your own business,” I shot back, not wanting to get into it with her.

“You are my business. You’re my employee.”

 “I’m you’re employee? How do you figure that when I’m the manager of this damn place?”

I was actually rather interested in hearing Goldie’s explanation.

She bit her lip while she tried to nail down her train of thought. Her eyes lit up the minute she realized what she was going to say. I geared up for what I could only imagine would be an obnoxious response.

“You might be the manager, Kace, but Jett is the boss of this facility, and do you know who owns Jett? I do,” she said, pointing at herself. “That man can’t function without me turning his head in the right direction. Therefore, I control Jett, and that means I control you—”

“You control me, little one?” Jett asked, walking up behind her undetected.

“Gahh.” She gripped her chest, startled. Whipping around, she pushed Jett and said, “Don’t sneak up on me like that.”

“I have to if I’m going to keep you in check.” Jett smiled at her while he pulled her in by the waist.

They were so fucking nauseating.

“Keep me in check? As if I’m a loose cannon?”

Jett just raised an eyebrow, letting Goldie know he meant what he’d said. Surprisingly, she didn’t oppose but instead agreed and pulled him into her embrace.

She turned to me and said, “Still, I want to know what’s wrong even though you might not be my employee,” Goldie succumbed.

“You’re damn right I’m not your employee.”

I’d started to walk away when Jett called my name. I stopped and waited for him to say something to me. “See Vinny last night?”

“Who’s Vinny?” Goldie chirped.

“Don’t worry about it, both of you,” I responded and then took off to the Haze Room.

The lights were off, and the room was silent, almost eerie looking after the day we’d had yesterday. Outside of the room, kids bustled around me, their mothers chasing after them, throwing out warnings that were sure to be forgotten.

The smell of leather and wood hit me first. My senses were knocked to the ground, memories clouding my mind, vivid images of my boxing days flashing in an instant. That smell would always break me. It would always send a pang of regret, of what could have happened if I hadn’t put all my trust in another human.

“Why did you see Vinny?” Jett asked, shutting the door behind him. I turned around to see that he was sans his little minion and let out a long breath as I walked toward the bleachers, feeling every little ache and pain.

“Needed to get lost. Seeing Madeline yesterday was too much.”

“Did you make an agreement to stay away from your face?”

“Couldn’t entirely scare the new members of Justice, now could I?” I joked, but Jett didn’t find it the least bit funny.

“You still look like shit.”

“Tell me how you really feel,” I responded, sitting and sucking in wind when my side tightened around my ribs.

Jett sat next to me, resting his arms on his legs with his head bent as he spoke. “When are you going to stop beating yourself up?”

“Christ, Jett. Give it the fuck up. Just let me do my own thing. I promised I would be different around you guys, but what I do on my own time should stay my business.”

“You’re killing yourself,” Jett’s voice caught in his throat as his hands ran through his hair. “I can’t fucking lose you.”

Silence filled the room as Jett’s confession sunk in. He was the reason I was still on this earth, the reason I kept moving forward, but how much longer could I really go on? I felt my days were numbered.

“You need to let me go,” I admitted. “Life has become too much. My time is just around the corner. My fucking grave is calling out to me.” I dipped my head as my throat choked up and my eyes burned with tears.

“I can’t,” Jett whispered. “It’s selfish of me, but I can’t let you go, Kace.”

“Don’t you see I’m a shell of the man I used to be? Fuck, look at me, Jett.” He did as I said as a lonesome tear fell down my cheek. “Why would you want a sorry excuse for a man like myself to hang around? You’re hanging on to the past, to who I used to be.”