Little Girl

Prologue

SOL

Breathe in.

Breathe out.

I close my eyes and wait for the starter pistol's pop before diving into the pool. Swimming is in my DNA. It’s part of who I am, how I cope with my life. Swimming is the only constant I’ve ever known, and I’m unsure what I’ll do without the competition over the summer.

My arms arc, one over the other, flying through the water like a mermaid in dire need of breaching the ocean’s cocoon. My body pierces through it like I belong as I propel forward, kicking my feet steadily. At the end of the lane, I lift above the surface and inhale deeply before flipping around and heading back to where I started.

I’ve been captain of the girls’ swim team since my freshman year, and while it’s garnered me some enemies from the other competitors because I’m not popular enough or pretty enough, I’ve always had a single-minded focus.

To win the gold.

And I do.

Year after year. Swim meet after swim meet.

Before I know it, the race is concluded, and I’m hauling myself out of the water to the cheers of my coaches, some students who believe winning is everything, and a few of my teammates who haven’t known me long enough to hate me yet. Everything else happens as quickly as it always does. I’m congratulated, handed flowers, and led to the podium for me and the two runner-ups to stand. A gold medal gets placed over my head, I smile, shake hands, and pretend all is right in the world.

But nothing is right; nothing is what it seems.

And in the next second, another shot goes off, and my body jerks backwards. Fire burns through my side as I collapse in slow motion. My back hits the ground, my head bounces off the turf, and I stare up at the cloudless sky as the wind is knocked out of me.

Lifting my hand from where the pain appeared, I stare at my fingers, stained crimson with blood, and I wonder what just happened.

ONE

Sol

THREE MONTHS LATER.

Staring in the mirror on the back of my door, I examine my naked body, turning to the side to find the bullet's exit wound that ripped through my right flank a few months ago. If I remain idle for too long, I can still feel the moment of impact—the excruciating agony of someone’s anger being directed at me.

Not just anyone, either.

A girl I thought was my friend.

Vanessa Osborne was one of the few people I’d remained friends with over the years. She was always competitive about swimming, but while I thought it was all in good fun, she was biding her time. She held a secret hatred for me that she masked our entire high school career.

I don’t know why she snapped during our final meet; nobody does because she hasn’t uttered a word, and I think that’s what makes everything so much more difficult for me. I want to understand. I want to know what I did to cause such animosity.

For so many years, she was the only person I had to lean on. I told her all my secrets. The way my father ignored me, the way my mother treated me with restrained fury. She knew everything. And now, all I thought I knew is suddenly…gone.

Until the incident, I hadn’t recognized just how alone I had been. And now, in the middle of a huge city, surrounded by people every day, I feel so isolated. My father is CEO of Titan Pharmaceuticals and has a huge staff that is in and out of the house all the time, but he’s never mentally around for me. His mind is always on business.

My mother was a beauty queen back in her day, before all the plastic surgery and the constant drinking. Now, she reminisces with other women who were once in her circle and barely pays me any attention. When she does, it’s usually because I’ve done something to anger her. Like walking into a room she’s in.

My life isn’t all bad, however. I want for nothing, so long as it’s material. When it comes to love, I don’t even know what that feels like.

Sol! Hurry the hell up! My mother’s screeching voice carries through the house. Today is my first day back in the public eye since the shooting. It had been two weeks before my high school graduation—which I missed—and now that my first college semester is starting, so is swim practice.

I’m expected to be a Division One swimmer for my school, but honestly, after everything I’ve lost, I don’t know if my heart is in the competition anymore. It’s ruthless and cutthroat, and after the past few months of retraining my body, I realize how exhausted I am.

Dragging a black crop top over my head, I know my mother will throw a fit at the scar that will be visible, but I don’t care. Grabbing a pair of sweat shorts, I roll the waistband over a couple of times until they fit properly and aren’t falling off.

Before the shooting, I was always thin. I swam for hours daily, burning more calories than I could possibly eat, but since then, I’ve had to watch my caloric intake, and my mother has relished in that.

While I’ve slimmed down somewhat, especially in my waist and hips, my breasts have gone from an A cup to a B cup. I know I’ll lose them once I start working out again, but for now, I’m enjoying not looking like a flat board.

Knotting my hair on top of my head, I debate chopping off my long crimson locks—this is not the first time since it’s started growing so unruly over the last few months.

I never took the time to contemplate how deprived my existence was because I was doing what I loved, and that’s all that mattered. Now, though, it’s been driving my mother crazy that I enjoy my longer, thicker hair and that my boobs are bigger than hers.

Oh, for heaven’s sake, Sol. Seriously? I knew she’d hate my outfit; it’s why I chose it.

What? I’ll be putting my swimsuit on for practice, anyway. Nobody will care how I show up. They never have before.

The scar, she glares. Like I said, she’s all about appearances.

You never had a problem when I dressed like this before someone took a chunk of my liver. I goad her, primarily because if I piss her off enough, she’ll whine to my father, and then he’ll finally turn his eyes my way for five minutes. I’ve seen him twice since being shot.

He’s worse than a workaholic, and I didn’t fully comprehend how much worse until I wasn’t swimming every day. But now, I see it clearly.

You weren’t horribly disfigured and looking like a ragdoll. We need to chop that hair off already. Keeping my expression straight is hard in the face of her insults, but I manage.

Whatever. Walking out the door, I slide into the back seat of the limo she insists we take everywhere. I’d be perfectly fine driving myself, but Mother needs to put on a show for the world to see. Even though they haven’t seen her since her pageant glory days.

The press was overwhelming when we arrived. Thankfully, the university has excellent security and kept them away from me. It also helped that my mother was eagerly willing to spill my secrets to the vultures as they asked about my recovery and if I was even ready to return to the pool yet.

I don’t know how she responded to them, but I’d like to know the answers myself because as I stand on the diving board, a dozen other girls lined up on either side of me, I feel sick looking down into the clear blue water.

If I’m being truly honest, it’s the effect of the gunshot that I’m worried about. I’ve trained my body to move at the sound, but now, I have the added trauma of knowing what it feels like to actually be shot that I have to contend with.

Taking position on the board, I close my eyes and focus on how my body will slice through the water like fine wine straight out of the barrel. I hear the coach talking, the heavy breathing of the girl next to me, and the murmurs in the stands.

When the pistol fires, my body does what it’s supposed to, but my brain begs me to run away. The shock of the water hitting my flesh has my limbs performing muscle memory as I panic. Minutes that appear like hours pass, and when I’m back where I began, I feel sick. I glance around me to find looks of surprise on everyone’s faces. Peering over my shoulder, I notice all the other girls are neck and neck, still halfway down the length of the pool on their way back to where I am.

Maybe I didn’t swim? Maybe I flopped around like my beloved dog, Flounder, when I found him in the pound. Embarrassment hurls me past the coach and the swim team captain as I rush to the changing room.

I can’t be here. I can’t do this. I can’t be what I used to be. Fear surrounds me as I throw my clothes on, sling my bag over my shoulder, and race from the building.

Reporters attempt to stop me. My mother’s driver watches quizzically as I race away from him and into the street, getting lost in the throngs of people until I’m so turned around I don’t know where I am.

My ears buzz, and my eyes sting as I fight off tears. My side twinges with remembered pain as I frantically spin, trying to figure out where the hell I am. Slamming my back against a tree, I slide to the ground and bury my face in my knees as tears silently slide down my cheeks.

Noble

Staring at the screen as footage plays of the missing golden girl running off, I scratch my chin and wonder if I really want to take this job. Her father, Trident Titan, called almost as soon as the news had started reporting her sudden and shocking departure from swim practice.

That her? one of my partners, Duke Knight, questions.

Pretty, my other partner, Lorde Prince, comments as he passes behind me to the filing cabinet.

Too young, I mutter to the two of them. If not for her age, she’s got the ideal look we’re all attracted to in a woman.

Over eighteen, Duke shrugs as he leaves the office of our home. The man will fuck anyone willing and over the age of consent. I’ve envied that about him for years. I need an emotional connection with a woman, which means I’ve been miserably abstinent of late.

And Lorde, well, he goes along with whatever Duke or I want. He’s the most relaxed man I’ve ever met, but don’t cross him or those he loves because he can be downright vicious. That’s something we witnessed last year when a client lied to us, and I wound up with a bullet in my shoulder for my efforts.

We taking the job? Lorde leans against the filing cabinet behind the desk. I glimpse his reflection in the computer screen. His jaw is locked, and his eyes are fixated on her picture, roaming across her face with the gentleness of a caress.

Turning to face him, I decide to leave it up to him. Do you want to? His astonished gaze fights to meet mine, he is that entranced by the girl. Sol. It means sun, and it feels perfect for her with her sunset-red hair.

We could, he hedges.

But… I hear it in his tone.

I’ve spent years with both these men at my side. We’ve battled war together, lived together, shared women together our entire adult lives. So, more often than not, we all know what the other is thinking before a word is even spoken. And right now, I get the sense Lorde feels exactly as Duke does. That she’s pretty. Which for us is code for I want her. It always has been. It’s how we’ve chosen to share women.

Lorde scratches his jaw before saying, "She is pretty." Fuck. Now it lands squarely on my shoulders to agree or not.

I won’t lie, the woman-girl…Christ, girl-woman? She’s fucking stunning, and there’s an ache in my dick that’s been absent for far too long, but she’s young. Too young.

Spinning back to look at her image on the news—half hidden from the cameras, fear in her eyes, and curled into herself as she runs—I know I’ve already made my decision. Yeah…she’s pretty.

Lorde grunts at my reluctant admission.

Perfect little girl. Duke’s intentional word choice bounces around the room as he enters.

Motherfucker. He just had to go and say that.

Guess we’re taking the job then. Because Duke and Lorde are right; she’s gorgeous, and she’d make the most beautiful little girl for us. All we have to do is find her and help her see that we’re the right men to give her everything she needs in life because being our little girl is a forever gig. There won’t be any going back.

Picking up the phone, I give Titan a call. Yes? he snaps out.

This is Noble King. Duke hits the speaker button, so I put the receiver back in its cradle.

Mr. King, you’ll take the job? You’ll find my daughter? The anger in his tone must be fabricated because he doesn’t sound all that concerned about