“Pride” excerpt | prologue
PROLOGUE
Dante’s throat seized as he tipped his head back—acid clawing its way up. His pulse thundered in his temples. He braced for the worst until the bartender’s shout pierced the blur.
“Last call!”
With a triumphant howl, Dante slammed his empty glass on the rail as laughter erupted around him. His so-called friends whooped and slapped him on the back, relishing his dramatic flair and, apparently, his credit card limit. Dante grinned as the blaze in his throat dimmed to a dull ember. The real inferno, however, was burning a hole in his bank statement.
He brushed the last drop from his lips with the back of his hand while the group lined up another round of shots. For a fleeting second, he wondered if one more would be worth it, then shook it off. He hadn’t spent an hour douching for nothing.
“I’m outta here!” he called. One friend flicked his head in Dante’s direction—then drained his shot without missing a beat. By the time the rest lifted their glasses, Dante had slipped out the door.
Outside, the West Hollywood air was cooler but still oppressive, nearly as stifling as the crowded bar. Dante ran a hand through damp hair and darted across Santa Monica Boulevard just as the signal turned green. His vision swayed between the paper lanterns overhead and the rainbow crosswalk beneath his feet, bile threatening to claw back up his throat. Above him, the lanterns glowed in ribbons of every color, casting a dizzying haze over the throng of revelers. A bachelorette party stumbled past him, the bride-to-be maintaining her green hue even as the colors shifted. His phone buzzed in his back pocket, and he ducked beneath the awning of an ATM to dodge the swaying foot traffic. The phone nearly flew from his slick grasp before he caught it, his heart thudding in his chest.
As Dante read the text canceling his late-night rendezvous, the jerk strolled by with his arm draped around another guy, utterly oblivious to Dante’s presence.
“Pfft,” he scoffed. “Whatever.” He knew the city was about to be flooded with new eye candy.
The farther Dante moved from the nightlife’s cacophony, the quieter everything became. Shadows from thin trees cast witchlike fingers along his path. City workers were already positioning metal barricades for the Pride festival that weekend. He gave a curt nod to a worker tightening a post, then angled toward Sunset—and down the alley. A rat scuttled past, its claws clicking on the asphalt, and the stench of spoiled garbage and curdled milk hit him like a wall.
Vaseline Alley, they called it. Dante didn’t know who “they” were, but for as long as he’d lived in WeHo, it'd always been called that. It was a one-lane corridor from one end of Boystown to the other.
“Over the cross streets and through the woods to grandmother’s house we go,” he thought, chuckling. Tonight, though, the cruising lanes lay deserted—and every back entrance stood dark.
Dante slipped his phone out again, his hands trembling. He tapped the little orange icon and sighed as that oh-so-familiar chirp signaled a new message. “Thank God for Grindr,” he muttered.
The profile picture was a headless, shirtless torso. Dante smirked and swiped open the chat.
“I want to see what your insides look like.”
The profile blinked “30 ft away.”
Dante hesitated, thumb hovering over “Reply.”
“Kinky,” he murmured—then replied, “When and where?” as a glass bottle clinked further down the alley. Drawn by the sound, he edged forward. In the distance, beneath the crimson glow of a lone bulb above an open door, stood a muscular silhouette. It slipped into the building’s shadows, and Dante followed without hesitation, letting the metal door clang shut behind him and snuffing out the red light.
“Hello?” he called into the blackness.
As his eyes adjusted, Dante inched forward and began to recognize his surroundings. Blazing Spurs had once been his main haunt—a cowboy-themed bar where gleaming go-go dancers in Stetsons slung themselves around ropes above the bar. Now, the only shimmer came from a puddle spreading beneath a leaky pipe. Peeling wallpaper that had burned a bright orange hung in ragged strips, fading to a dull beige. Dante’s chest tightened at the sight of plywood slapped across every ground-floor window, leaving only the second-floor panes to spill weak light. The floorboards reeked of stale beer…and he smelled something else: leather.
Before he knew it, Dante felt a leather-gloved hand tighten around his throat. He yanked free and went down hard, back-first. He kicked backward at the attacker, scrambled to his hands and knees, then shoved a stack of barstools between them.
Heart pounding, Dante lunged for the stairs. At the top, he sprinted along the balcony toward the windows overlooking the street. He slammed into the fixed pane of glass, but it didn’t budge. He patted every pocket—no phone. Then, a muffled chime from below. His phone. Dropped somewhere back on the first floor.
Dante held his breath.
Silence. No shuffle of boots. No whisper of leather. Just stale air and the distant hum of the city below.
Swallowing back bile, Dante pressed trembling palms against the cold glass. His breath fogged the pane as he forced himself to peer down. Below, the same bachelorette party lurched toward the building, oblivious to his screams.
He shoved both fists into the glass.
“Help!” he roared.
Silence—then a single head snapped up in the crowd below. The bachelorette glanced up, and for a brief moment, Dante thought she might have noticed him. Then she bent over and spewed her margarita onto her shoes. While one cackling friend swept her hair back, the other filmed the spectacle.
“Help me, you drunk bitches!” Dante shrieked, pounding the glass.
They never heard him.
They never saw the figure slip from the shadows behind him.
And they never saw his blood splash across the window.
