Page 78 of Lethal in Pink

She looks down at her legs, arching a dark brow. “Is that an observation or a complaint?”

“It’s an envy statement. I’ve been running all day.”

“Then stop talking and feed me,” she says, turning toward the stalls. “I’ve been running on iced coffee since noon.”

We wind through the crowd. Amiyah makes a dead-eyed beeline for the Korean corndog stall.

The guy running the fryer beams as soon as we step up, sliding a potato-crusted corndog smothered in sugar across the counter.

“Mi hija,” the guy says, shaking his head. “Where have you been? I haven't seen you in three weeks. I was starting to think you finally got tired of our food.”

Amiyah takes a massive bite. Hot mozzarella stretches six inches between her teeth and the stick. She catches the trailing cheese with her index finger, licking it off without breaking eye contact with me, and a sudden, sharp jolt hits low in my gut, dragging a heavy, immediate heat straight to my dick.

I have to stare straight at a glowing taco sign for three full seconds just to force my blood back where it belongs.

“Never,” she tells him around her bite, completely unapologetic. “School has just had me in a total chokehold. I’ve practically been going through withdrawals.”

“Ah,” the guy laughs, pointing a greasy spatula at her. “And now you’re back crawling. The good stuff always pulls you in.”

We hit the boba counter next. She gets something neon pink with popping boba; I order a black iced Americano that tastes like battery acid and costs six bucks. Worth every drop.

Three stalls down, outside a churro cart smelling of hot lard and burnt cinnamon, we stop so she can grab a paper bag of fresh churros.

Then we hit a burger stand for a heavy brown paper sack of double cheeseburgers and fries.

Suddenly, Amiyah stops dead in the middle of the crowded sidewalk, her hands juggling her corndog and boba cup, while I’m the one hauling the heavy brown paper sack of burgers, fries, and the bag of warm churros.

She shifts her drink and corndog precariously, then uses her elbow to nudge my black t-shirt.

She extends her pink quilted purse with its shiny gold accents toward me, dangling it by the strap.

I look at the bag, then back at her face. “What is this?”

“Hold it,” she says around a mouthful of corndog. “My hands are full.”

“You only have a corndog and a drink.”

“Yes, exactly. My hands are full.”

I take the pink quilted strap and sling it over my shoulder. It sits against my hip—an absurd, bright pink purse with gleaming gold hardware bouncing against my all-black outfit, right on top of my arms full of greasy takeout. The sheer audacity of her handing it over without asking makes a laugh catch in my throat. I bite the inside of my cheek, adjusting the strap like it’s a tactical rig over my wide-legged pants.

We keep walking down the crowded corridor of stalls, me hauling a mountain of food in one hand while rocking a high-fashion women's handbag across my chest. Amiyah launches into a ruthless takedown of our Property Law professor’s latest case brief, her hands moving dynamically as she tears apart the legal logic. I tell her about the stray kitten I’m still keeping an eye on at the clinic.

“She’s going to rule that household in a week,” I say. “Total alpha energy.”

Amiyah bursts out laughing.

It’s loud, sudden, and completely unhinged from her usual classroom composure. Her head tilts back, her eyes crinkling, the pink boba straw still wedged between her fingers. Out here on the crowded street, she laughs with her whole body.

I watch the way her hair catches the neon light as she talks, completely hooked, holding a mountain of grease-stained paper bags and her quilted purse while the crowd shoves past us.

The comedy club is a cramped, narrow hole-in-the-wall tucked between a thrift shop and a taco stand. We grab two metal folding chairs near the back. I dump our food trash under the seat and drop her quilted pink purse squarely in my lap as the house lights drop.

The comedian on stage is fast, working the room with brutal crowd work, but the noise just dissolves into a dull hum against the ringing in my ears. My focus keeps drifting sideways.

Every time the crowd surges or yells out a punchline, Amiyah’s hand blindly finds my forearm in the dark. Her fingers grip right through the cotton of my t-shirt, her nails digging sharp and hard into my skin during a brutal bit about dating apps. She doesn’t even realize she’s doing it—she’s just anchored to me, her grip tight enough to bruise.

It's agonizing. That blunt, unconscious pressure of her hand sends a slow, heavy drag of heat straight up my arm, turning every nerve ending under my skin raw. She sits through Property Law like she's made of ice and code, but here in the dark, she’s all friction and exposed pulse, radiating a warmth that makes it hard to pull a full breath into my chest. Every time she laughs and shifts against my shoulder, the scent of vanilla and sugar wraps around me like a trap I have no interest in escaping.