TRIGGERED: A Romantic Suspense Bundle (5 Books)

by Evie Nichole

  He shook his head. “You like making me feel guilty?”

  “You lied a lot, Jason. And I’m pretty sure you got me drunk the first time we met so you could pump me for information about my ex-boyfriend. Also you stalked me.”

  “In an official government capacity, though.”

  “Jason.”

  “Right, right. I know. I’m sorry.”

  “It’s still creepy, Jason.”

  “I know, you’re right.”

  “I know I am,” she said, raising her chin snobbishly.

  “You’re a smug asshole, you know that?”

  “Wow, someone doesn’t want to get laid again.”

  He looked at her in over-dramatic horror, eyes wide, slapping his hands to the side of his face. “Oh no! I take it all back! I didn’t mean a word of it!! Please, please, anything but that!!”

  She moved across the bed to grab one of her pillows, but he was too fast for her. Just as her hand closed around the case, his arms closed around her waist and he pulled her on top of him, rolling over to straddle her. He started tickling her sides as she whacked him everywhere she could with the pillow. Soon she was crying from laughter, gasping for air.

  “Okay, uncle. UNCLE!”

  He rolled over onto his side, laughing from his belly, tears in his own eyes. She was laughing, too. She gave him one last smack with the pillow and sighed.

  “Okay, I’m starving,” she said, sitting up.

  “Bagels?” he asked, and she nodded enthusiastically.

  “That’s the best idea I’ve heard all day.”

  “You woke up less than an hour ago.”

  “Yes, and?” She looked at him, straight-faced. He just shook his head.

  ***

  They brought their bagels back to her building and went up to the roof to eat them, stopping at her apartment along the way for a blanket, a pot of coffee, and two mugs.

  Monica found herself marveling at how easy it was to spend time with him. It felt surreal when she thought about the reasons they had met and that she had basically hated him less than a week ago. Though, she had to admit, she’d never fully hated him. I hope he never does anything truly heinous if I can forgive him this easily. She’d promised herself, and Zoe, that any future betrayal, or secret involving danger, or general shitty behavior was an official deal breaker for both of them. They’d pinky-sworn it.

  They settled onto the blanket, staring around them at buildings of alternating heights and wispy white clouds. She was halfway through her bagel when she remembered their conversation in the bedroom.

  “You still owe me information,” she said, trying to decide if the cloud directly above her looked more like a palm tree or a toilet plunger.

  He nodded, swallowing a huge mouthful of his bagel.

  “You are correct, ma’am. Okay, I’ve worked as a farmhand, technically, for my grandpa. I worked at an ice cream shop and a Mexican restaurant. I can’t make your huevos rancheros for you, but I can correct your pronunciation of it.”

  She grinned up at the clouds, her eyes closed, feeling the sun on her face; the temperature was just right this morning.

  “I’ve still got my appendix, but I’ve broken six different bones at six different times.”

  “Oh my god.”

  “Three of them involved a skateboard and that is the reason I no longer own a skateboard. I also cross the street when one comes toward me on the sidewalk.”

  She giggled. “Took you three times to figure it out though. You learn the hard way.”

  “I like to think of it as not giving up. Anyway, I got my nose broken once, doing my parents’ obstacle course. I broke my leg skiing five years ago, and I broke my ankle running from enemy fire three years ago.”

  “You were in combat?” she asked, looking at him, concerned.

  “Briefly. But that’s a different conversation. Like I said, I lived in almost every state. Also lived in Paris for about a year. Was deployed a few places in the Middle East. I’ve been to Australia, too. And I have a spotless legal record.”

  “Goody goody,” she teased. “Is it ever surreal to you to learn so much information about a person who doesn’t know you exist and who especially doesn’t know you know so much about them?”

  “Most of the time they become, like, names and numbers, data sets, you know? Sometimes, though, yeah. I worked a case last year involving this guy who had so much in common with my dad. I got a little spooked that it might be him, even though I had pictures of him and everything. And sometimes there are people who just seem so interesting that I feel like I want to get to know them, to hear their stories. Then it’s really hard to disconnect.”

  She nodded, appreciating his answer. She looked out over the skyline of the city, thinking about all of the people in all of the rooms in all of the buildings she could and couldn’t see. It made her feel strange and disconnected from the world.

  “It’s kind of like reading fiction, sometimes, even though I know all the information is factual. They become like characters in a story that I connect with sometimes, get invested in, and that I don’t care about other times, and that are completely forgettable. It’s always weird when you’re invested in a story and then it ends. You feel like you’ve met this great person or these people, and discovered this great world, and then all of a sudden it’s gone and it really never existed before.

  “But these people’s worlds do exist and they are real.”

  “Right, but I can’t enter their worlds for real, you know. Most of the time I wouldn’t if I could. And I can’t get to know them….Well, most of the time.” They made eye contact and he winked.

  “Pick up a lot of girls this way?” She tossed her balled up bagel wrapper toward his head, and he ducked into it, head-butting it back toward her. It landed just beside her.

  “Airball!” she announced to all of the rooftops within hearing distance.

  They were silent for a few minutes. She watched a man walk around watering his rooftop garden for a while; he bent to smell each plant before watering it with a large, metal watering can. She glanced at Jason, and he had laid back with his hands behind his head, his eyes were closed as he basked in the sun.

  “I know what you mean,” she said thoughtfully, turning back to watch the gardener; he had pulled out what she assumed were pruning shears, though he was too far away to tell. He walked around to a few of the plants he’d watered and she saw branches and leaves fall to the ground as he worked.

  “What about?”

  “Well, part of what I do is marketing. And there’s a lot of psychology in that, you know. Figuring out what sells, what works for people, what elicits emotional responses. And then figuring out basically how to play on those things, to…um…”

  “Manipulate them?”

  “Yeah, sort of. I don’t know. I think about it when I walk by a new billboard or flip through a magazine. I see all the ways the composition, the wording, the colors, the content are meant to make you believe certain things, feel certain things, and then want certain things. Then I think about all these people who buy products and wonder if they’re being taken advantage of, and stuff like that.”

  “How does that tie into getting to know strangers without actually getting to know them?”

  “Well, when I think about that, I realize how different my specific set of knowledge is, and how many people in the world don’t have it. Not that they’re dumb, or ignorant; they just have different sets of knowledge. Everyone’s life is so distinct. Individual. It’s surreal to me to think that when I’m sitting here, so engrossed in everything going on in my own life, there are people all around me who are completely engrossed in their lives, in totally different things. People I may never meet. I’ll never know everything about them, or what thoughts we share, what we have in common, or how profoundly different they are from me.”

  She was staring blankly, now, living in her thoughts. He was quiet for a while, and then he said, “You know, I know exactly what you
mean. I understand you pretty well, I think, and it’s making me feel like I do when I think about the fact that space is never-ending.”

  “Heebie jeebies?”

  “I couldn’t have said it better myself.”

  She laughed loudly, throwing her head back to give into it fully. She felt him sit up and looked over at him; he leaned in and kissed her lightly.

  “Did I mention I like you?” he asked.

  ***

  It was Sunday, though they had both forgotten the specific day, knowing only that it was the weekend and they were free to explore their now consummated enjoyment of each other to its fullest extent. They sat on her couch, her legs draped over his, the end credits of the film they’d just finished paused on the screen.

  “Hands down the best buddy cop film of all time,” she said, exasperated.

  “I believe you,” he said, amused.

  “But you’ve never seen it!”

  “I don’t watch cop movies. Or military movies. Or FBI or CIA movies. No Bond either.”

  “Why?” she teased, “Because you live it? Because you’re a real life spy and the movies don’t live up to it?”

  “No, because I like true stories. Documentaries. I’ll watch true crime documentaries until my eyes fall out.”

  She nodded with a look that said ‘I get that, but I still don’t understand.’ “True crimes are the best,” she said. “And conspiracy theories!”

  “I can get into those sometimes. Most of the time they’re either too ridiculous or—”

  She interrupted him, talking rapid-fire. “Too true to life and you get scared that people are onto you and your spy buddies who know all of the secrets!”

  “Or they’re too impossible to be true.”

  “Oh.” She looked sincerely disappointed.

  “Do you believe in conspiracy theories?”

  “I don’t know,” she said, with a sigh. “It’s like aliens. It seems like maybe they could be true, but it also seems like people could just have really overactive imaginations.”

  “That’s why I like real stories. It’s much more interesting to me to see what people actually do.”

  “I don’t know. I get really excited by the endless possibilities in the human imagination.”

  “That’s the artist in you,” he said, sensibly.

  “Like time travel and living in space. If they’re possible, if they exist or could one day exist, they don’t yet, you know. But people have made movies and shows and books about them. There are limits to reality.”

  “Touché,” he said, looking impressed.

  “Okay, so you either pick the next movie and I pick where we order lunch from, or vice versa.”

  “Hmmmm. I’ll choose lunch,” he said, crossing his arms to punctuate his decision.

  “Fine. Let’s see, I think I need to subject you to some fantasy. She flipped through options on her subscription streaming service.

  He leaned up, bringing his mouth close to her ear. She smiled, proud that she hadn’t flinched and pleased to feel him so close to her. “If you wanted to role play, all you had to do was say so,” he whispered, his breath on her ear and neck. She closed her eyes as a shiver ran down her spine. She sat the remote on the table and turned to him slowly, maintaining her cool for as long as she could. His face was still right next to hers, so as she turned, their lips met easily, moving together in a more familiar way, testing the boundaries of their exploration. She ran her tongue along the inside of his lip, pleased at his “mmm” response. He bit her lower lip with just enough pressure to make her gasp. She turned around full, throwing her leg over him to straddle him once again, and holding his face in both of her hands. His hands found her waist and then slid confidently to her ass, squeezing it as she rocked against him.

  She kissed his ear, taking the lobe in between her teeth. Then she whispered, “You’ll be the good cop and I’ll be the bad cop,” and moved her mouth to his neck, biting it firmly and sucking the flesh into her mouth. He growled low in his throat and wrapped his arms tightly around her, lifting her and swinging her over so she was lying on her back on the couch.

  “How about, I’m the bad cop and you’re also the bad cop.” She giggled, struggling playfully with him, trying to find his ticklish spot. Her legs locked around his waist, but he grabbed her arms, raising them over her head with one hand. With the other, he reached down between them to rub her over the cotton shorts she’d put on when they’d come down from the roof. She gasped and moaned, rocking against his hand. She hadn’t wanted to give up her control so easily, but it wasn’t easy when he made it feel so good.

  She opened her eyes and guided her pelvis upward to rub on the spot where she knew his cock should be. She felt it through her shorts and repeated the motion, distracting him momentarily from playing with her. She slid her hands out from his grasp, rocking forward and knocking him backwards, off balance. She pushed on his chest to get him all the way down, adjusting her legs so she was on top of him. He started to reach for her, but she looked at him firmly and said, “Don’t.” He stopped instantly, placing his hands above his head, mirroring the position he’d had her in a moment ago.

  She slid her hands up under his shirt, finding his nipples with her fingers, rolling them and flicking them until she felt his hips begin to thrust in response. She dragged her fingertips down his torso, scooting herself back on his legs, and started to undo his jeans.

  A screeching buzz made both of them jump, gasping and looking around. Monica took a deep breath, closing her eyes. “It’s my buzzer. Let’s just ignore it.”

  She went back to unzipping his pants, grazing his bulge with her knuckles as she did so, feeling a pulse in her clit as he moaned quietly.

  There was another buzz, and they both jumped again. “What the hell?” she said, irritated, standing up and crossing to the window overlooking the street.

  “Shit, it’s Zoe,” she said, turning to him, her arousal fading fast. “Oh, it’s Sunday, isn’t it?”

  Jason sat up, thinking for a moment. “Yep. Yes, it is.”

  “We have a lunch-dinner date thing,” Monica whined. She normally loved her afternoons with Zoe, but her best friend in the entire world should know that she was right in the middle of some damn good foreplay.

  “I’m going to let her up, okay?” she asked.

  She was already buzzing the door before he said, “No problem.”

  She quickly straightened her ponytail, and he buttoned his pants and pulled his shirt down, sitting up. He crossed his leg, throwing an arm across the back of the couch; she was reminded of the multiple occasions when she’d gotten the impression he was faking how relaxed he was.

  Monica opened the door before Zoe could knock.

  “Were you still asleep, Mo? You’ve really got to stop regressing back to college—”

  She stopped mid-sentence, her mouth hanging open ridiculously at the sight of Jason on the couch. She recovered quickly, regaining her easy stride. One thing Zoe was good at was adjusting to unexpected changes.

  “I see the interrogation went well,” she said, winking a Monica. She crossed toward the couch, and Jason stood up to shake her hand.

  “So you’re the spy?” Zoe said, always one to test her limits with new people. Monica cringed, wishing Zoe’s tact was a little more intact.

  “That’s me,” Jason said easily, and Monica felt a sense of relief. It was a good sign if he could keep up with Zoe.

  “I guess you’re the third wheel today,” Zoe said, kicking her shoes under the coffee table and walking around to sit on the couch. She smiled at both of them, acknowledging her tease.

  “I’m a lucky guy,” Jason said without missing a beat, looking at Monica with a truly happy smile.

  Zoe looked at him seriously for a long moment, and then looked at Monica. “I like him, Mo.”

  Monica shook her head, still standing by in the middle of the room only a few feet from the door. “I do, too, Zo.”

  Zoe grinned
. “Oh, well, I can go if you want me to. I’ll hate you forever for ditching me for a boy, but I can do it.”

  Monica hated to admit that she was tempted to kick her best friend out, but she was spared the necessity of doing so.

  “Absolutely not. If anyone leaves, I do,” Jason said, starting to stand up.

  She shook her head and clicked her teeth at both of them like an exasperated mother. “You’re both staying. My house, my rules.”

  “Fine, mom,” Zoe said, sticking her tongue out. Jason laughed heartily.

  “Okay,” Monica said, clapping her hands together much like Jason had in the bedroom that morning. “Jason’s been awarded the responsibility of choosing lunch, and I will humbly bestow my film-selecting duty to you, Zoe.”

  “Excellent. He’s getting pizza, right?” Zoe asked, tucking her legs underneath her and grabbing the remote.

  “If he knows what’s good for him,” Monica agreed, winking at Jason who gave them a dramatic sigh and then asked for the appropriate menu.

  Chapter 14

  “I ordered both the cuisine you requested and the specific restaurant; you owe me.” Jason held up two slices of pizza topped with black olives and sardines. Both of the women looked at them with the utmost disgust.

  “I take it back,” Zoe said, plugging her nose for effect. “I hate him.”

  Monica, pouting and slumping in defeat, concurred, “Me too.”

  “Where’s your sense of adventure? Come on!” He sort of jiggled the slices at them and they both cringed as if the tiny fish were going to jump off their cheesy beds and attack them.

  “Fine,” Monica said, taking one of the slices and inspecting it warily.

  “Uggghhhh,” Zoe groaned, taking one as well.

  “Bottoms up,” Monica said, holding out her slice to toast it with Zoe’s. They both took boldly large bites and Jason guffawed at the looks on their faces.

  When they’d swallowed, he asked, “Well?”

  “I feel like a feral cat,” Zoe said, plugging her nose once more and dropping her slice back into the box on the table.

  “That’s great, Zoe, but what do you think of the pizza?” Monica elbowed her friend in the ribs.