She had plenty of power over my ass. I was just a damn good con who knew how to hide it.

And power was a game I knew all too well. Once upon a time, my mom had dated a dude who’d stuck around long enough for me to actually remember his name. Artem. Russian. Well, obviously. Artem was not a piece of shit in the grand scheme of things. Maybe I’m not giving him enough credit. He was actually a father to me without doing the whole parenting crap. One thing he did was teach me how to play chess. The rules of chess were very simple: while it was true that the king was the most important piece in the game, he was also the weakest. The queen was the most powerful, and you best not forget that if you wanted to get ahead in life.

Jesse was pretty much the only pussy in this town that was completely forbidden to me, and yet, I found myself craving her more and more. It was a combination of a few things. Her defiance, her quiet strength, her wit, and her compassion toward others.

I found myself trudging to Café Diem despite my best efforts because I wanted to make up for not checking on her on her first day. And the day after. And the one after it.

It’s okay to judge me. I’m fucking judging myself, too.

It was surreal. Opening the door to my café without wanting to. Strolling between the busy tables without meaning to. Parking my ass on the stool by the counter, in front of Jesse and Gail, knowing I should be somewhere—hell, anywhere—else.

Gail’s bald head was shining like a marble, totally weird in contrast with her feminine, round face, and she wore a Stay Weird black T-shirt, red Chucks, and matching nail polish. Her lips were powder pink, against dramatic makeup. Jesse was wearing something, too, though I was too mesmerized by her moving, pouty lips to notice what it was.

“Tell me more about him,” Jesse probed, so focused on Gail she didn’t notice me. But Gail sure did. And she did that little let’s-fuck-things-up smirk of hers before she turned around back to Snowflake for an answer.

“He’s nice, I guess. Kind of strange, but that’s hardly a fault in my book.” Gail wiped steamy mugs fresh out of the dishwasher with a cloth and arranged them neatly behind her, against the white, exposed-brick wall. She better not have referred to me, because not only was I not nice nor strange, but I was also her fucking boss.

“Hale is super hot, though. Plus, he’s like this crazy philosopher dude. And he never hits on anyone, so he obviously likes you,” Gail sing-songed, her words shooting straight to my veins, heating my bloodstream.

Hale? Fucking Hale was here? Hitting on my Jesse? I mean, Jesse. Not mine. She wasn’t mine. Only, the small hole that opened in my chest didn’t agree with that last statement.

“Oh, I don’t date. I was just wondering what his story was. I caught him staring at me the other day. He wore the same FREE tank today. I just wondered what his deal was.” Jesse used her hip to shut a stainless steel fridge underneath her, where we kept the crushed ice. She prepared a smoothie for a surfer chick at the cash register. I was in awe of how natural she looked behind the counter. A part of me had still believed that Snowflake wouldn’t be able to fully settle into her job, and it was still early, but damn, she looked…normal. Although I was happy for her, a small, crazy, petty-ass part of me was pissed. Pissed that she no longer needed me like she thought she did.

I mentally started listing reasons why she needed to stay in the picture. My picture.

I gave her a job with flexible hours. I gave her security. I humored her with whatever she needed. But I also told her I was going to fuck other people. She not only accepted that, but also seemed to fit right into her role as a barista. Not that it bothered me that she didn’t need me as much as she thought.

Okay, yeah, it did bother me.

And it bothered me that it bothered me, because what kind of asshole wants others to be dependent on them simply to keep them close?

Me. That’s who.

“Famous Last Words” by My Chemical Romance played over “Crystallize” by Lindsey Stirling (we had a DJ drop ready-made music weekly because we couldn’t decide on playlists we liked), and Gail dug her phone out of her back pocket.

“Whoa!” My super emo employee held her cell phone in the air, her mouth forming into an O. I was still pretending to browse through my phone, pinching my eyebrows like it was important, and cursing Hale for figuring my shit out. I was ninety-nine percent sure he’d worked out my so-called angle and had decided to piss me off by hitting on the girl I had my eye on.