Yet we scaled each other’s walls. Because we recognized in each other what we know about ourselves. That we’re both hurting. Both alone. Both wanting someone who could understand.

I want Camille like I’ve never wanted anything in my life.

I want her to love me.

She’s the only one who knows me, so she’s the only one who can.

And I want to love her.

I’m fucking awful at it—I’ve never had any practice.

But I want to take all that passion and jealousy and obsession inside of me, and I want to give it all to her. I want to give her the best of me, whatever that might be.

I only hope it’s enough.

Camille is clinging to me with her whole body. She’s got her arms wrapped tightly around me and she’s whispering in my ear, “Nero . . . oh my god, Nero . . .”

Her thighs clamp around me. I feel her pussy squeezing me tight, clenching over and over as she starts to cum. I kiss her swollen lips, tasting the difference in her breath as her body dumps all the pleasure chemicals of a climax: serotonin, oxytocin, dopamine.

Camille’s mouth tastes better than any food I’ve ever eaten. It satisfies me and makes me ravenous, all at once.

I feel a rush of wetness around my cock from her climax. Her pussy relaxes just a little, so I can fuck her even deeper than before. I don’t want to stop. I want this to go on forever.

It’s impossible, though. I can’t believe I even lasted this long.

Camille is looking at me with those huge, dark eyes. Looking right into my eyes like she did the first time we kissed.

It’s her expression as much as her body that makes me cum. The way she looks at me, and the way she makes me feel. I explode. Absolutely fucking explode. The orgasm wrenches through me. It makes me cry out with a sound like a sob.

I collapse on top of her, pinning her down to the hood of the car, both my hands holding onto hers, our fingers interlocked on either side of her head. I bury my face in her neck, my body still shaking and twitching with the last of the orgasm.

Her legs are locked around my waist. I haven’t pulled out of her.

I can feel her heart beating on one side of her chest, and mine on the other. They’re just a couple of inches apart, separated by flesh and nothing else.

When I finally stand up, my cock is still so hard that it pulls out of her with a popping sound. Hot cum runs down the inside of her thigh.

“Is that okay? I should have asked,” I say.

“It’s fine,” Camille blushes. “We can be more careful next time.”

“I’ve never done that before,” I tell her. “Bare like that.”

“Me either,” she says.

I help her stand up and pull down the skirt of the dress. The underwear’s ruined.

Camille looks as dazed as I do. It’s not an unpleasant feeling. Actually, it’s peaceful. It’s completely silent in the garage, without any noise from the house above, or the city streets beyond.

There’s no awkwardness between us. We’ve separated physically, but I still feel connected to Camille.

She looks up at me, tucking one wild, dark curl back behind her ear.

“I have to ask you something, Nero,” she says.

“Anything,” I reply.

“Are you going to rob the vault at the Alliance Bank?”

“Yes,” I say, without hesitation.

“When?”

“In two weeks.”

She takes a deep breath. “I want in on it.”

“You want . . . what?”

“I want to help you rob the bank. I need the money. And also, FUCK Raymond Page.”

My heart rate, finally starting to slow down, begins to pick up again.

This isn’t a good idea. First of all, Camille has zero experience in criminal activity. Second, we’re both being tracked by a very nosy cop at the moment. And third, this is no Sunday picnic. This is grand larceny on the highest scale, stealing from a ruthless and well-connected grade-A asshole.

“What?” Camille says, her eyes searching my face. “You don’t think I can do it?”

I sigh. “I think you can do pretty much anything, Camille. But nobody can rob a bank without some chance of getting caught. Or shot. Or worse.”

“I could be a lookout?” Camille says. “I don’t need a full share. Just enough to help my brother and my dad.”

“I could give you money,” I tell her.

“No!” she cries. “I’m not looking for a handout. I just want a job.”

God, I can’t even look at her. Those big, dark eyes can make me do anything.

I’m dragging this out, because I don’t want to say yes.

Yet I already know I can’t refuse her.

“Alright,” I sigh. “But you have to do what I say for once.”

21

Camille

The weeks that follow are the most bizarre of my life.

Nero and I are planning an actual honest-to-god bank robbery. And every minute outside of that, whenever we’re alone together, we can’t keep our hands off each other.

What started in his garage has progressed to hooking up in his car, my car, his house, my house, the beach, an elevator, the bathroom at an Irish pub, and anywhere else we happen to find ourselves.

I never imagined I could feel something like this. This kind of obsession with someone.

When I’m not with Nero, I’m thinking about him. And when I am with him, I can’t tear my eyes away from him.

Everything he does turns me on. The way his forearm flexes when he’s shifting gears. The way he runs his hand through his hair. The wicked gleam in his eye when he looks at me. The way he grabs me and yanks me into his arms the second we’re alone together.

And the sex . . . dear god, I can’t even think about it without flushing from my scalp all the way down to my toes.

It gets better and better every time.

He’s a fucking magician with his hands. You can see it in the way he touches any object—when he’s tinkering with an engine, or just messing with something out of his pocket, like a lighter or a coin. He can make a quarter dance across his knuckles and then disappear, moving the metal as fluidly as water.

And when he puts those hands on my body . . . I melt like butter on hot toast. He makes me cum again and again, sometimes five or six times before he even starts fucking me.

It’s the only thing keeping me sane. Because I now have to do all the work that comes into the shop myself, while taking care of my dad and keeping watch on Vic.

School has started back up. Vic did finish his AP summer course as promised, and he’s been buckling down with his regular schoolwork. He works three shifts a week at the Stop n’ Shop, and he tells me he’s got $600 saved up for college, plus $240 for the mixing board he’s been dreaming of buying. I don’t even think he’s been hanging out with that shithead Andrew, though I haven’t asked him about it, because I don’t want to go full Gestapo on him.

A week ago, my dad went in for surgery to remove the lump in his lung. Now he’s doing radiation treatments three times a week, to make sure there’s nothing left behind. He’s in rough shape—totally unable to get up and down the stairs without me. He doesn’t want to eat, but I make shakes for him, and Patricia brought over her soup, too.