by Heather Long
At Jasper’s command, the other man swallowed and extended one arm, and then with some effort and more than a little pain, he did the other. It took him a minute, but Jasper was patient while he spread his palms against the floor.
“I’m going to do you a favor,” Jasper said, all reasonable and shit. “Your guys are out, so no one is going to hear you scream. We’re getting you some ice so if you’re fast about it, you might be able to fix the problem. That seems fair, right?”
Fuck, this was going to be messy. I jerked my head at one of the rats, and they went to get some ice.
Meeks’ expression tightened and his lips thinned, but all he said was, “Fair.”
“Probably should thank me,” Jasper suggested thinly. “Because I don’t have to do you a solid.”
The malice in his glare when he looked at Jasper promised all kinds of retribution. Goddammit. Just fucking do it and get it over with. One would think he’d learned to not play with his prey.
“Thank you, Hawk,” Meeks ground out between his teeth like the bitter words poisoned him, even as he gave them air.
“You’re very welcome,” Jasper told him a split second before the knife came down and severed his trigger finger.
I’d give Meeks credit.
He didn’t scream.
Much.
Chapter 21
Emersyn
“You don’t have to stay with me,” I told Freddie as he walked me up the stairs, and he grasped his chest with both hands.
“Boo-Boo, you’re gonna hurt my feelings.” The melodramatic note made me roll my eyes. “Besides, do you know how long I’ve waited to get alone with you and your perfect pussy again?”
We were in the hallway, and I paused to look at him. “You’ve never been alone with my perfect pussy.”
“So now would be the time to start, right?” He leered so playfully, I couldn’t help laughing. It was the most ridiculous expression. “Besides, I’ve got excellent conversational skills and more—I can cook.”
“Really?” The flip from playful leering to just plain playful was refreshing. Everyone else was so stoic. Like Kestrel. He was supposed to be my ally. I’d trusted him, and I still wanted to trust him. When he said if he could let me go, he would, I believed him.
Yet, here we were.
Then there was Vaughn. My whole body heated at the thought of him. He flirted and soothed. His voice could melt me, even when I wanted to punch him for laughing at me. Rome was…a mystery. His art though, that took my breath away. Jasper was so damn controlling. The image of his kiss seared through me. Then there was Liam—he was more of a mystery than Rome.
Beyond all of them? Doc.
I didn’t understand any of them. At the door to my room, I put a hand on Freddie’s chest so he wouldn’t follow me inside. “I’ll be out after I shower.”
“Awww, no free looks at that pretty pussy? I promise, I won’t touch.”
I snorted. “Keep asking like that, and you’ll never see it.”
Just as I closed the door, he said “Yes!” with great vehemence.
I pulled the door open again and eyed him. “Why are you so happy?”
He grinned, arms folded and looking cocky as hell as he leaned against the doorframe. “Because you just told me how I could get to see it again. I just have to stop asking.”
My mouth opened, but he seemed so damn pleased with himself, that I didn’t have it in me to burst his bubble. With a shake of my head, I closed the door and headed for the bathroom. I paused only long enough to take a change of clothes in with me. I was soaked through with sweat, and I needed a shower.
Fifteen minutes later with my wet hair pulled into a braid and dressed in clean clothes, I found Freddie sprawled on Kestrel’s bed, studying his phone. He glanced over at me as I opened the door and then sat up.
“Damn, I was hoping for a little towel and flash.” He winked as if to let me know he wasn’t remotely serious, which I appreciated. Still, I shook my head and padded for the door. I’d left off shoes and put on thick socks.
I didn’t expect a chance to blow out of here yet. I didn’t even know when Doc would manage it, but I planned to trust him as much as I could trust anyone in this place. I was halfway down the hall before Freddie caught up to me.
“Maybe we should hang out up here?” he suggested, and I hesitated.
Did he want to stay here because he didn’t want to let me go downstairs? Was something wrong? Jasper had taken off like a bat out of hell the moment Kestrel knocked on the door. One minute, he was burning me alive with his kiss, and the next, he was glaring at me like I’d committed a crime.
“I’m hungry,” I said. “And I want to go watch something on the television.”
“Oh.” Freddie scratched at his smooth jaw like he had scruff. “Yeah, and you don’t have a TV in your room. I do, but my room looks like shit. Not to mention I’m not in the mood for having my balls chopped off. Jasper has one in his. Tell you what, come on.” He caught my hand in his and half pulled me down the hall.
“I don’t want to go to Jasper’s room,” I argued. My body protested the lie. I wanted more than Jasper’s room, but I had zero intention of chasing him down after his reaction in the studio.
“Trust me, I don’t either,” Freddie assured me as he guided me down the hall. “I don’t feel like having him wring my neck. Though that’s a step up from having my balls removed.” He checked a door, then pulled a slender case out of his back pocket and knelt down at the door with a pair of picks.
That’s what they were. Lockpicks.
He slid them in, and a moment later, the tumblers gave.
The door opened to another bedroom, this one as neat as Kestrel’s, as colorful as mine, but with darker woods and heavier blues. There was a huge desk with tools scattered over it and slouchy chairs, as well as a video game system and a huge television.
The door had been locked.
“Here,” Freddie said, thrusting a remote control at me. “Make yourself comfortable and stay here, okay? I’m gonna run down and get you food.” He was halfway out the door before he slid to a stop and looked at me. “What do you want?”
I needed to carb up after that dance, but right now, I didn’t want anything fancy. “Whose room is this?”
“Tell me what you want to eat, and I’ll tell you whose room it is.” Freddie waggled his eyebrows at me, and I sighed. Glancing over the room, I paused on a familiar T-shirt.
“It’s Vaughn’s.”
“Wow, you’re amazing. How did you even guess that? Or did you guess? You know, never mind. I forgot, never play poker with you. Um…food?” Freddie sounded more disgruntled than impressed.
“I really don’t need to eat.” Yes, I’d said I was hungry, but I wasn’t starving. Eating after a workout was just an old habit. I’d only been here a few weeks, and my real life seemed so far away.
Freddie squinted at me. “Yeah, that doesn’t work for me. You’re not some weirdo herbivore or anything, right?”
I picked up Vaughn’s shirt. It smelled like him. “You don’t know?” That was curious. “Rome knows my favorite dance shoe.”
“Rome’s got champion stalker tendencies and he likes art. Dance is art, you know? He used to hit some of the magazine stands over on 20th, they had the best one. The artsier ones. Me, I was more into the tabloids and skin rags.” A faint rush of pink touched his ears as he rubbed the back of his neck. “You never posed for any of those, right?”
“No,” I said and sank down into the soft bean bag chair. It was huge, kind of like a nest, and I sank into it.
“Damn.”
“I’m not an herbivore,” I clarified. “So as long as it’s not spoiled or made out of something I can’t identify, I’ll eat it.”
He gave a little half nod and closed the door behind him. The lock tumblers secured, and I leaned back in the chair, pressing Vaughn’s shirt to my nose. It took a minute longer than I expected, but the thump of Freddie hitting a wall made me l
augh. He was probably asking himself if I had posed for a magazine.
I probably shouldn’t tease him. I couldn’t help it. Freddie was funny. I pointed the remote at the television and turned it on, then skimmed the channel for the news.
They never turned the news on downstairs.
I was half asleep when the door opened and light spilled in the room. I smothered a yawn and tried to sit up. I hadn’t meant to go to sleep, but this floofy chair was the most comfortable thing I’d ever sat in before. It was like a ginormous body pillow that hugged.
And smelled like Vaughn. Not that the latter had anything to do with my interest or why I was still holding his shirt.
“Did you have to kill the cow or something yourself?” The flippant question was meant for Freddie, because not only had he not come back, it had easily been a couple of hours. The news channels had offered me glimpses of the outside world, but it had been far too early in the day for anything local. I had watched a gameshow and then found reruns of Law and Order.
It was one of the staples of road life. No matter what town we were in, someone had it on, and the shows from the beginning cracked me up ’cause they were still using pagers. There was an episode still playing, but I forgot all about it when Vaughn half turned toward me and then suddenly whipped his shirt off and rubbed at his face.
I’d turned off the light switch when I’d decided Freddie had forgotten about me. The light from the television still played over the ripple of muscle Vaughn bared. Since he was half turned away, I was free to ogle. Not that I should’ve been, but he had this habit of losing his shirts around me.
“I didn’t know you were in here,” he said in that melodious, panty-melting voice of his, and I sighed. Right. Not my room. Not invited.
“Freddie was gonna get me food, but I wanted to go down and watch television, but I’m assuming whatever dragged Jasper away meant that I shouldn’t be down there ’cause he stashed me in here.”
He cut a look over his shoulder at me. It was a quick one, and the flickering light seemed to turn his eyes into twin shadows. “The door was locked.” Before I could comment or defend that, he shook his head. “Fucking Freddie. It’s fine, Dove. You make yourself comfortable. I’m going to shower, and then I’m going to get you food.”
“I don’t have to intrude…”
He waved me back to my seat as he strode past me, but the distinct smell of copper and sweat rolled off him as he passed. The sweat I’d expect, but the copper was almost too thick. I twisted in the seat and caught sight of his arm just as the door closed.
His blood-streaked arm.
Heart clenching, I faced the television again.
The swift way he’d removed his shirt. How he’d turned his back—kept it to me. That didn’t mean he’d done something, but maybe something had been done to him. I worried at a bit of a hangnail on my thumb and glanced at the television as the water cut on in the bathroom.
The rumble through the pipes reminded me of my room. It came out cold and took a minute to get warmer. The show had segued to commercials, and I glanced at the bathroom again. If it were me and I was bleeding and hurt, Vaughn would help. But he also hadn’t asked for any help.
I twisted his shirt in my hands and then tried to focus on the advertisement for sinus medication. The list of things that it could cause included a stroke. Yeah, that was comforting.
“Just go knock on the door,” I told myself. If he was really hurt, I could go get one of the others or Doc.
A little kernel of hope burst inside of me. Doc had been there earlier. Before I danced. He’d said he would help, then they’d all left. But it seemed ages ago. The next commercial was for dog food, and I shoved out of the comfy pillow chair. My muscles protested. I’d stiffened up in the time since I’d just lounged in here.
I was probably dehydrated too. That was a problem for later Emersyn. I was capable of going down to get stuff for Vaughn if he needed it too. I knocked on the door.
It was a timid as fuck little knock, and I rolled my eyes at myself. How was he supposed to hear it over the sound of the water in the shower?
Blowing out a breath, I raised my hand for a second knock and then…
You know what? Fuck it. They’d all marched in and out of my bathroom, bedroom, and everything else. At this point, they’d probably all seen me naked at one point or another. I’d been wearing Vaughn’s shirt, for fuck’s sake.
Turnabout was fair play.
I’d take that truth to my grave. Twisting the knob, I opened the door. The light made me squint, and the wash of steamy air hit me. The first thing I saw were his discarded clothes on the back of the toilet. The yellow, sleeveless tank top poking out from beneath his jeans was streaked in orange. The coppery scent was still there, but faded beneath the scent of rich musky soap that was intensely familiar.
The water splashing drew my attention, and it was the first time I realized that Vaughn’s shower curtain was clear vinyl and the full outline of his back tapering down to his bare ass was visible where he leaned with one hand against the tile wall as the water spilled over him. All the moisture dried up in my mouth.
Holy shit.
I mean, I’d known he was cut. That much had been obvious every time he took his shirt off, but this was something else altogether. Muscles bunched and moved in his legs as he rolled his head around. Tracking my gaze up to where his hand was visible against the white tile, I froze.
The red around his hands and staining along the back of them had me jerking my attention back to the shirt. He pulled his hand away, and a bloody handprint remained.
“Are you hurt?”
Vaughn twisted and stared over his shoulder at me as he raked that bloodied hand through his hair. The streaks on his face had my heart twisting. “What are you doing in here, Dove?”
Shifting my weight from one foot to the other, I forced myself to meet his gaze. “You were bleeding, or someone was.”
I glanced over at his discarded clothes again. The way he’d abruptly ripped off his shirt and turned away from me. He hadn’t expected to find me in his room. The rush to the shower.
When I returned my gaze to him, he’d turned to face me fully, and no matter how hard I tried not to glance down, the semi-hard cock jutting out from between his thighs was unmistakable.
The fact it had a silver studs piercing it riveted me when I damn well knew better than to stare. Fuck. I’d seen naked people before. Nudity and dancing went hand in hand. Staring was rude, but when I looked up, Vaughn just grinned at me. The ruddy flush of color to his cheeks from the heated water just added to the appeal of that smile.
He certainly wasn’t ashamed of his body. Not that he had any reason to be. His deep red hair was plastered to his skull and seemed darker still in the bright light. The pale brown, nearly topaz eyes of his gleamed. “See something you like, Dove?”
I could lie.
But really, what was the point? My nipples were pin points of hardness beneath the oversized shirt I was wearing, and my panties were damp from far more than the humidity in the air. I licked my lips as I locked my gaze on him again.
“You’re a beautiful man.”
Surprise flickered across his features as if he hadn’t expected my answer, but it didn’t diminish his delight in the slightest. Then because he dragged the curtain to the side, allowing me an unimpeded view, I drank in the sight of the tattoos all over him. His thighs were nearly as colorful as his arms. Each time he raised a hand to his hair, the shield on his biceps flexed. More and more, the rivulets of water began to run clear as the ruddy brownish stain from the blood washed away.
“The water’s hot if you want to join me.”
That offer tempted me way more than it should. But instead of backing down, I pushed deeper into the room and then closed the bathroom door and leaned against it. Arms folded, I watched as he filled one palm of his hand with a couple of pumps of shampoo. Then he worked it into his hair.
The bloody handprint on t
he wall had already begun to rinse away as water splashed off him. Some of it spattered the floor, but he made no move to close the curtain or obstruct my view.
What the hell was I doing?
A part of me tried to tell myself I was searching for injuries, but I really wasn’t a big fan of lying to myself.
To others? Sure.
To me? Not so much.
Only a few hours ago, I’d been making out with one of his friends, and my lips tingled at the memory. I’d been climbing Jasper like a pole, and now I was considering a repeat experience, only with significant less clothing and a new pole.
Though to be fair, Vaughn would probably be the thickest pole I’d ever worked. As if he could read my mind, his dick grew thicker and harder. Fuck me.
I closed my eyes and forced my head to lean back against the door. “I’ll go.”
“You don’t have to leave,” he said. “I don’t mind you watching me, Dove. Just promise to let me do the same sometime.”
I snorted. “You guys watch me all the time.”
“True.”
I really did love the way the smooth, sensuous nature of his voice rolled over me like a caress, wearing away all the brittle, broken edges. A part of me could listen to him all day long.
“Open your eyes, Dove,” he beckoned, and I didn’t argue or even try to resist the compulsion. He ran soapy hands over his broad chest and then to his dick. Every stroke had my attention. He watched me with an intensity that seared into me as I watched him, and when I met his gaze again, I almost said fuck it. “You ever had a man with a piercing, Dove?”
“No,” I told him honestly. Not that I really wanted to discuss prior lovers.
Just, no.
A shiver went through me.
He let out a sigh. “So I’d be your first?”
There was something about the way he said ‘first’ that had my toes curling. Firsts didn’t have a lot of meaning for me.
But the more he washed his dick, the harder it grew, and I kind of wondered how that would feel pushing into me.
“Yes,” I admitted. “Though it remains to be seen if I’m even interested in trying it.”
