"Okay, I'm gonna take bets on you then," Lyla announced with a grin and Bella nodded along as she joined her.
"I'm gonna take bets on whether or not your tits will fall out of that bikini top while you’re up there," Di added. "We'll split the takings four ways when you win."
"On it," I agreed with a grin, grabbing the elasticated cable which kept the areas around the bull fenced off before jumping up onto the inflatable that surrounded it. "My turn," I called out to the guy running the show just as he was about to call another dude out of the crowd. He took one look at my lanyard and smiled before gesturing for me to climb on up.
I headed over to him first, kicking off my shoes and shrugging out of my cardigan before moving to hop up onto the bull.
There was a rope in front of me between the bull's shoulder blades and I took hold of it with my right hand as I clamped my thighs around its girthy belly. Years ago, when me and the Harlequin boys had first started climbing up to Sinners' Playground, we’d managed to get the mechanical bull there working. It was pretty much the only attraction we'd ever been able to give life to and we'd ridden on that thing more times than I could count before it gave up on life for good. So assuming I hadn't completely forgotten all of the tactics I used to employ to hand the guys their asses with my times, I was pretty sure I had this in the bag.
I looked up as the crowd of rowdy college dudes whooped and cheered and shouted shit about wanting to give me a real ride later and my gaze collided with a pair of very pissed off, very green eyes on the face of one scary bastard of a Badger.
"Rogue!" he yelled, and though the rest of his sentence was lost to me beneath the shouts of the crowd, it was easy enough for me to see he was telling me to get down. My gut lurched as I found him here and my pulse picked up as I wondered if he’d known I was here somehow or if it was just a coincidence. How did he always figure out how to find me? I hadn’t even brought my cellphone with me today so he couldn’t have tracked that.
I cupped a hand to my ear and shrugged innocently like I had no idea what he was saying and in that moment, the bull began to move beneath me.
I lost sight of Fox's angry ass face as I concentrated on winning some nice green money, rolling my hips and swaying along with the movements of the bull, making sure I didn't lock up and fall on my ass. The trick was to treat it like we were one and the same, me and the bull.
I found myself grinning and even laughing as the crowd whooped and cheered and the bull spun back and forth, jerking left and right and bucking up in an attempt to unseat me.
The longer I managed to stay on, the louder the crowd yelled for me and I managed to pick up the words of a chant. "Tits out! Tits out! Tits out!" I was guessing that was due to Di's little bet, but this bikini top was designer shit that JJ had bought for me and it was made to hold my girls until its dying breath. I wasn't going to be flashing anyone today, but I was willing to bet a certain Badger might be getting a little antsy at the tone of the crowd.
The bull got faster and faster and I kept rolling with it, clinging on as hard as I could until finally it jerked too hard and I was sent crashing to the inflatable mats beneath me.
I rolled onto my back laughing as I caught my breath, turning my head to look over at the timer and see if I'd managed to do it or not.
But instead of the timer, I found myself looking up at big, pissed off gang leader - oh no, wait, he wasn't the leader was he? Because daddy dearest was still running the show. So he was just a nobody liar.
I made a move to get up, but before I could, Fox grabbed my upper arms and hauled me up to stand before him.
"What the fuck do you think you're doing?" he demanded and I managed to get a look over his shoulder at my time.
Six minutes, twenty-three seconds. I won!
I yelled in triumph and managed to shove my way out of his grip before running over to the guy hosting the attraction to claim my fifty bucks.
He handed it over with a grin that died a sudden death as his gaze shifted behind me and I felt Fox moving up close again.
I snatched my prize, grabbed my shoes and cardigan and huffed irritably as I went in search of the other girls who were splitting up the take from the bets and laughing together towards the back of the crowd.
Di threw her arms around me in congratulations as she handed over a fistful of cash and I grinned triumphantly.
"How's your wrestling skills, babe?" Lyla asked. "Because they've got a jello wrestling pit over there and-"
"No fucking way," Fox snapped, catching up to me again and grabbing my wrist.
I squealed in protest as he dragged me away from my friends, carving a path through the crowd and pulling me around one of the huge speakers before shoving me up against the back of it so that I could feel the heavy thump of the bass vibrating through my core.
"What part of you're mine are you failing to grasp?" he demanded angrily, his entire body rigid with tension.
"Christ, I was riding a mechanical bull, not a cock. What's your damn problem?" I demanded.
"My problem is the fact that you're half naked. More than half in fact. And every motherfucker in this place is looking at you and wanting to sink his cock into you. And I don't want them looking," he demanded, tugging his tank off and forcing it over my head.
I refused to play ball so my arms were left pinned to my sides as I stood there in the grey material, scowling at him.
"How did you even find me anyway?" I demanded.
"I saw you leave your trailer. I knew those girls would be working this party so it wasn't hard to figure out," he snapped.
"What do you mean, you saw me?" I asked, because there was no way I would have missed his big ass skulking about.
"We're going home," he said forcefully, ignoring my question and making me all kinds of suspicious.
"Bye then," I replied, making a move to step away but he just pushed me back to my spot against the speaker.
"I meant you and me," he growled.
"No. I have a job here today." I forced an arm through his stupid tank and yanked the lanyard out to show him. "I'm not missing out on easy money just because you can't hack the idea of other men looking at me. That's a you problem, not a me problem."
"I'll give you three times the money you're earning here if you want it," he snarled, pulling a roll of cash from his pocket and shoving it into my hand. It had to be at least five hundred dollars in small notes and I scowled down at it for a long moment before schooling my expression and looking back up at him.
"Then what?" I asked, softening my voice as I stepped closer to him. "Can I wear the bikini at home?"
"Yes," he replied, his gaze dipping to look down the front of the shirt he'd forced on me.
"And what if I wanted to earn some more of your money? How much would you give me to fuck me?" I asked.
"What?" he growled.
"Well you seem to want to pay for my time, so I have to assume you think it’s for sale. So how much am I worth to you? A grand? Two? Ten?" My fingers balled around the cash he'd given me as his brows knitted together and he didn't seem to grasp my point at all.
Fox hunted for an answer and I slammed my shoulder into him as I forced my way past.
"Wrong answer, dipshit," I snarled as I jogged into the crowd before he could catch me again and threw the handful of cash he'd given me into the air.
The people all around us screamed in excitement and dove for it, making sure he had no chance of catching me as I raced away to the far side of the lagoon.
I yanked his stupid shirt back off, tore it right up the centre and threw that away from me too, only stopping when I made it to the jello wrestling pit where two girls were fighting in the red slime to the mad cheers of the crowd.
I blew out a frustrated breath, turned around abruptly and smacked straight into Chase, knocking his arm hard enough to make him spill the shot he'd been holding onto his bare chest where it ran down over his abs in a trail of golden brown.
"What the fuck, g
host?" he growled.
"Don't tell me you're all stalking me now too?" I snapped in return. "I'm gonna overdose on big dick energy if this goes on much longer."
"What the fuck are you talking about?" Chase grumbled, looking down at his chest like the alcohol on his skin was the biggest problem in the world to him right now. "I'm fucking covered now," he cursed.
I glanced over my shoulder and spotted Fox pushing through the crowd hot on my heels with a face like thunder.
"Well, waste not want not," I said, quickly turning back to Chase and leaning forward to lick the spilled drink off of his skin.
He fell utterly still as I pressed my tongue to the tight muscles at the base of his abdomen, dragging it up between the centre of his abs and tasting the sweetness of his skin beneath the bitterness of the tequila.
I reached up to grip his shoulders as my tongue collected the last drops from his chest and I looked up into his blue eyes with a guilty smirk. His lips were parted in surprise and for once there wasn't a snarky word spilling from his mouth, just heat in his eyes and tension in his Trojan like body.
"Sorry about that, Ace, but I needed a distraction and it looks like you're it." I pressed a kiss to his cheek then darted away right as Fox roared some kind of animalistic threat and slammed straight into him.
Chase managed to keep his feet, shoving Fox back just as hard and he started yelling at Fox to calm the fuck down and calling me a crazy bitch while Fox threatened to rip his balls off if he ever touched me like that again.
I mentally high fived myself for that combination of a brilliant plan and getting myself a free drink and turned to run. But just before I could manage it, a long, taloned hand snatched hold of my wrist and I was whirled around to find Rosie Morgan glaring at me in all her fake haired glory. Yeah, yeah, I was a hypocritical unicorn haired bitch, but who cared?
"Did I just see you trying to get your hooks into my man?" she demanded in a shrill voice, her cheeks inflating like a puffer fish and giving me the desire to smack them to make them pop.
"Err, technically, he just served me a drink in an unorthodox-"
Rosie lunged at me and I jerked back, but before she could actually do anything about the fury etched into her heavily painted features, JJ appeared and caught her around the waist, hauling her back.
"Getting into fights, pretty girl?" he asked me with a grin, ignoring the way Rosie was trying to squirm free and come at me.
"Nah," I replied. "It's just a misunderstanding. Rosie thinks I'm after her boyfriend-"
"I'm not her boyfriend," Chase said as he and Fox finished up their scrap, seeming to have realised that I’d been provoking them and came to loom over me like a pair of sun blocking assholes.
"Chasey!" Rosie shrieked. "You said if I let you do that thing to my ass then you'd marry me-"
"I said, I might be tempted to marry you. I'd need to do it a few more times to be sure," he corrected and I shuddered. Gross. I did not want to hear about that.
Rosie's face fell like she actually had believed he was gonna marry her and I almost felt bad until I remembered what an unsufferable twat she was. "But, Chasey-"
"Why don't you go get yourself a corndog while we deal with getting Rogue out of here?" he suggested, pulling a roll of cash from his pocket and waving a five dollar bill at her like she was a kid and he was offering her candy money.
"Should I do that thing with it, like-"
"Not today, Rosie," he replied, hiding a smirk. "Just fuck off for a bit, yeah? I'll come find you when I want you."
Rosie shot me a final poisonous look, snatched the five dollars and strutted away.
"Well, I guess I'll be off too," I tried but the three of them surrounded me, blocking my escape and I huffed out a breath.
"Where's my shirt?" Fox demanded.
"I lost it," I replied. "Besides, you've checked out my tits like six times since you caught up to me, so I don't know why you're complaining about my outfit choices."
Chase laughed loudly while JJ grinned and checked them out too.
"Every other girl here is wearing a bikini, Fox," JJ reasoned. "You can't seriously expect her to cover up all the time."
"Yeah," I agreed. "And I'm not the one flashing my nipples at everyone," I added, pointing between Fox and Chase. "JJ is the only one of us with any kind of decency."
"I don't know about that, pretty girl," JJ said in a low voice that had me thinking about the way his body felt against mine and wondering why the hell he was wearing a shirt after all.
"Last call for the raft race!" a voice boomed over the speaker system and I looked up with interest. "This is the biggest competition of the day - winning team gets three hundred and fifty dollars!"
There was a lot of cheering from the crowd as people moved away towards the starting point and I bounced up and down on the balls of my feet eagerly.
"Come on, we can be a team," I suggested. "I'll be the captain and if we win, I'll split the winnings with you. You'll all get five bucks each."
"It's teams of two, not four," Fox replied, seeming like he was actually considering it and I grinned widely.
"See – you’re tempted! Please don't drag me out of here. I'm earning my own money and I'm actually having fun," I said, giving him the big eyes.
"You've already been paid for your day promoting. The Granvilles will never even know if you leave now," he replied.
"I'm not talking about their money," I said, rolling my eyes and pulling the cash I'd made today from my pocket. I had the bet money from the rodeo bull and about another two hundred dollars which I'd liberated from several pockets.
"You do know you shouldn't be thieving on Harlequin turf without paying us a cut, right?" Fox asked pissily and Chase snorted a laugh.
I sighed dramatically and tugged a single dollar from my take before tucking it down the front of Fox’s shorts, making him grunt with a mixture of irritation and surprise.
"Consider my debt paid," I said with a grin and JJ chuckled.
"Fine," Fox conceded. "Let's go do this dumb race then if you're so determined to earn your own money. But if I catch any more guys staring at you, I reserve the right to break their faces."
"Perfect,” I said ignoring the face breaking because that was up to him. “You and JJ can be a team. I'm with Chase."
"What?" they all asked simultaneously and I just rolled my eyes as I grabbed Chase's hand and tugged him after me towards the race.
"Everyone knows Chase is the only one who cares about winning this thing as much as I do. You two are dead weight I don't need to carry. If you wanna try and prove me wrong on that then feel free to team up and try to beat us. Just promise me you won't cry over it when we win.”
I tugged on Chase's hand harder to make him hurry up, ignoring Fox and JJ’s protests and slipping through the crowd before jogging towards the girl who was taking sign ups. She wrote our names down while Chase acted like he didn’t want to be here though not making any attempt to leave all the same and she directed us towards the piles of equipment they'd provided to build the rafts.
We moved down the sandy shore to the edge of the lagoon and stopped before a pile which contained four big, blue barrels, six long wooden poles, a bunch of old plastic bottles, other random bits of trash and a long coil of rope.
I bit my lip as I looked over our options, releasing Chase’s hand and trying to work out which would be the fastest method of putting a raft together while the other teams all did the same around us.
Thanks to our little run down here, by the time Fox and JJ made it to the line up, they were positioned six places along from us, but of course Fox just made the dudes beside us move with a glower and a death threat.
"I think we should try and make a small raft," I said, glancing over my shoulder and finding Chase placing a cigarette between his lips.
I huffed out a breath of frustration and whirled on him, plucking it from his lips just as he raised his lighter and tossing it away with a growl.
&nb
sp; "Get your head in the game, Cohen," I snapped.
"It's a dumb raft and a couple hundred bucks," he said with a frown and a shrug that said he gave no shits about winning this thing, but fuck that. I knew him even if he wanted me to think he’d changed. Chase was the most pettily competitive motherfucker I’d met in my entire life, he just needed a little motivation to remember why he wanted to win so bad.
"No. It's the chance to beat Fox into the dirt and rub our victory in his face."
"And JJ's," Chase added flatly but there was the hint of a smile at the corner of his lips.
I glanced at the douchebags in question and found the two of them discussing their own tactics. Despite their supposed lack of interest in doing this with me, they sure looked like they wanted to try and beat us now.
"Yeah. But we all know you like coming out on top," I taunted.
It might have been a long time since I'd been a part of the way these boys functioned, but I knew that much wouldn't have changed. Chase hated being told what to do and he always went at life like he had a damn point to prove.
"The prize is still bullshit," he muttered, but his gaze had shifted to the equipment we'd been given and I could see those little cogs in his brain working out how we should do this.
"What do you want to win then?" I demanded as the girl announcing the game finished blathering on about rules and started counting down from ten to signal the start of it.
"A favour," he said, his lips pulling up into an evil little smile.
"Done. But I'm keeping all the cash." I held my hand out to take his and he snorted a laugh as he slapped his palm against mine.
The whistle blew and we dove into action, grabbing barrels and kicking the empty bottles aside.
We made quick work of lashing two of the barrels between four of the wooden poles and we quickly tied off the ropes while all around us the other teams were working to connect all four of their barrels together.
"You'd better hope that they don't sink under your round ass, little one," Chase teased as the two of us lifted the thing up and ran it down to the edge of the water.
"My ass won't be the issue, macho man," I pointed out. "Perhaps you shouldn't have spent so much time bulking up. You really could have taken the preparation for this race more seriously."
Sinners' Playground Page 51
