Semua Bab Iron Veve's Kiss : Bab 1 - Bab 10

A hand grabbed a fist full of my hair, slamming me into the crumbling brick wall underneath the stairwell. His grip mirrored Hank’s—thumb digging into the same nerve cluster. Muscle memory kicked in: go limp, wait for the whiskey stench to waver, then knee the groin. But Freddy didn’t smell like Jim Beam. He smelled like the DHR office—cheap cologne over rot. A shadow flickered in my periphery—leather and restless motion—before Freddy yanked me back. Someone had been tailing me since third period, footsteps echoing mine a half-beat too slow.Pain spiderwebbed behind my eyes. Freddy’s breath clawed at my face—rotten meat and Juul pods. I’d take Hank’s belt over this. At least his violence had rules: scream too loud, get the buckle; cry too soft, get the hose. These boys? Their cruelty was a grenade with the pin long gone. “Miss us, Crazy Girl?” Eddie snickered, blocking the exit. Chip cracked his knuckles—a ritual as pathetic as their faux-gangster swagger. "Looks like our little

***Dru's POV***Louise’s Silverado reeked of gasoline and cigarettes—that acrid tang of chemical menthol clinging to the upholstery like a threat—but all I could smell was Dragon’s spearmint. Phantom and persistent, it clung to my collar where he’d gripped me—steady hands amid Hank’s rifle tremor. My wrist throbbed where Louise had dragged me into the truck, the skin still raw under his bandage. A kindness, flayed away. Louise hummed along to the static-riddled gospel station, her fingers drumming the wheel like she hadn’t just flicked her lighter into the gasoline pooling beneath Dragon’s throat. The spearmint sharpened, cool and green, and my pulse thrummed like it had when he’d leaned in, his breath a whisper of wild mint and rebellion: *“Princesa, respira (Princess, breathe.)”* “Ti bêl fi (Sweet girl),” she crooned, patting my knee. The pet name curdled, same as the milk she’d left spoiling in last summer’s heat. Her wedding band bit into the switch marks Hank had left last week.

***Dragon’s POV*** The screen door whined behind me, its sound as familiar as Mamá’s lectures. My boots tracked mud over her clean floor—just to piss her off—but the brown bag of árnica and *sábila* (aloe vera) in my grip felt heavier than it should. The bullet graze on my rib burned like hellfire, the bandage soaked through my shirt. Hank’s aim was as shitty as his parenting, but the asshole still nicked me good. “Más rápido que un cohete, mijo,” Mamá said, not turning around. (“Faster than a rocket, son.”) Her hands hovered over Dru’s bare back, the sheet pooled at her hips like a surrendered flag. I froze, the sudden stillness making the wound scream. The air turned to kerosene. I shifted, ribs screaming, and Mamá’s eyes snapped to the blood blooming on my shirt. “Mijo—” “Ella primero (“Her first.”),” I growled, bracing against the counter, my free hand pressing hard into my side. She gla

***Dru's POV*** Marisol stood on the porch, arms crossed, two tamales wrapped in foil clutched in her hand. Her stare pinned me like a butterfly to corkboard. *Shit.* I suddenly felt twelve again, caught trying to run away from Louise. She descended the steps slowly, her sandals crunching gravel, until she stood between us, her gaze flicking from Dragon’s smirk to my flushed face. “¡Basta, cabritos!” She thrust the tamales at me, still warm. “If you’re done taming Dragons, eat.” Her voice softened as she turned to him, finger jabbing the air. “And you—bring her back entera. No more heridas. (whole. No more wounds.)” Dragon dipped his head, uncharacteristically solemn. “Sí, jefita.” I hugged the tamales to my chest, the foil crinkling. “Thank you,” I said, the words too small for the ache in my throat. “You’ve done more for me in a few hours than anyone ever has my whole life.” Marisol’s stern mask cracked

***Big Danni's POV***The hum of cicadas outside swelled like a fever, their drone syncopated with the creak of the porch boards under my boots—boards warped by years of Gulf humidity, their peeling paint the same faded blue as Dragon’s childhood backpack. The walls were pocked with bullet holes from a raid in ’08, patched haphazardly with license plates (Louisiana, Texas, one rusty Mississippi) and prayer cards for saints even I didn’t recognize. But it was the garden that caught me off guard: Marisol’s herbs ran wild in the overgrown yard, rosemary and lemon balm tangling with spindly okra stalks. A handmade trellis of salvaged PVC pipes sagged under the weight of bitter melon vines, their yellow fruit bloated and splitting in the heat. She’d tried to pretty it up—cracked terracotta pots of aloe vera lined the steps, their serrated leaves dusted with pollen from the crape myrtle she’d planted. That tree hadn’t been a sapling when they’d fled New Orleans.