by Eva Ashwood
“I want to ride my bike to wherever you plan to keep me,” I respond, trying to sound firm about it.
“No,” Sloan says immediately. “Not happening.”
“What? Why not?”
“You think we’re that stupid?” He narrows his eyes, leveling a flat look at me.
“What am I gonna do, run off?” I snap. “Flee across the border to Mexico? You’ve got my dad by the balls for whatever reason. I’m not going to abandon him.”
He just shakes his head and keeps walking back to the car, and the other two follow suit, leaving me there seething.
“We’ll send someone to pick it up and bring it to the house later,” Levi offers, like it’s some kind of olive branch.
I flip off his back and sigh, following them to the car. I don’t have any other choice, clearly.
The car ride is at least pretty short, and Rory seems to have finally exhausted himself of flirtatious jokes. Either that or he’s just resting until he gets his second wind, but I’m fine with the silence either way. It’s better than the teasing.
I keep my arms folded and stare out the window, but I don’t recognize the neighborhood at all. The trees and houses that whip by are a good distraction from my three captors, and I focus on the scenery instead of them, still stewing in anger and worry.
This is so fucked up. The Black Rose gang shouldn’t be able to control people’s lives like this. They shouldn’t be able to get away with basically forcing Dad to do their dirty work.
It’s bullshit, and the fact that I have no choice but to go along with them if I want to keep Dad safe makes me want to hit something. Preferably one of their faces. Or all three of them. I’m not picky.
But my rage isn’t productive, and it won’t do anything to help Dad with the problem he has now.
Maybe there is something I can do to help though.
These men said they’re keeping me as collateral. From the sounds of it, I’ll be living with all three of them. I have no idea exactly what that will entail or how much freedom I might have in this new arrangement, but I do know one thing.
I’ll be behind enemy lines.
They’re all thinking of me as a captive, a pawn. But maybe, if I’m smart and play my cards right, I can be something else too.
A spy.
I don’t know too much about the Black Roses, except that their business is dangerous and illegal, and most people in Fairview Heights are afraid of them. But maybe this will be a chance for me to find out more about how they operate. Maybe I can find some weakness in their organization or dig up some dirt on them that I can use as leverage.
Determination settles into my chest at the thought, slowing my pounding heart and clearing my head a little.
If no one stands up to these assholes, they’ll just keep walking all over us. They’ll make demands and back them up with the threat of violence, and who’s going to stop them? Who’s to say that even after Dad completes this job for them, they’ll actually let him go?
They could keep insisting that he owes them, demanding more and more until they finally kill him anyway when he’s no longer useful.
These men clearly have no honor. So the only way to ensure our protection is to learn their secrets, figure out what makes them tick.
And then I can make them pay for all of this.
I can find a way to bring the Black Roses down.
4
After another ten minutes of driving, we pull up to a house, and it’s just as annoying as everything else about these guys.
The place is gorgeous, for one thing. Big and expensive, set back from the street with a sprawling lawn that they probably have no idea how to maintain themselves. I highly doubt any of them spend their weekends out under the sun pushing a lawnmower, the way I remember my dad doing on Saturdays in the spring and summer.
They have their fancy-ass cars with the tinted windows, this fucking mansion of a house, everything they could ever want, probably, and they still throw their power around to wreck people’s lives. People like my dad, who has just been trying to earn a fucking living with his fights, since that’s the thing he knows best.
It makes me sick, and I glare up at the house as we get out of the car once again. I grab my bags from the trunk, my posture and facial expression daring one of the men to try to take them from me, and for once none of them take the bait.
Levi takes charge once we’re inside. “Come on,” he says. “I’ll show you your room.”
Gritting my teeth, I follow him up the stairs without a word.
Of course the room is as nice as the rest of the house. There’s a big bed in the center, the headboard placed under a window with the curtains drawn. In the daylight, it probably lets in a lot of light, filling the large space with sunshine.
I hate it anyway.
There’s a dresser off to one side, a desk against the opposite wall, with a large, comfortable looking chair pulled up to it. A door next to the desk stands open, and I peek in to see an attached bathroom, complete with a tub that’s clean and big enough to soak in.
“Are there cameras in here?” I ask him, dropping my bags on the floor and turning my glare on him. “So you three can get a free show to go along with me being held prisoner here? I mean, why else would you have a girl come live with the three of you, unless you’re expecting something?”
He frowns and then snorts, but it’s not an amused sound. “Trust me, Mercy, none of us are that hard up for pussy. I can get laid anytime I want.”
His rich brown eyes have been neutral so far, but they turn heated as he looks at me, his gaze practically burning my skin.
Immediately, I’m reminded of our hookup. I couldn’t stop thinking about it for days afterward, and it’s featured in an embarrassingly high number of my fantasies over the past year. I’ve made myself come with my own fingers more times than I can count thinking of his big hands on my waist, and the way he loomed over me and drove into me hard and fast enough to take my breath away.
My face flushes at the memory of it, and I dart my tongue out to lick my lips. And then on the heels of all that comes the realization that he’s probably hooked up with countless other girls since then.
Irritation flares in me, and I can’t tell if I’m irritated at him for the girls he’s fucked or at myself for caring. Maybe it’s a bit of both, but either way, I shove the emotion down.
I shouldn’t care.
It shouldn’t fucking matter who he sleeps with, and the last thing I should be doing in this situation is thinking about it.
“Yeah, I bet,” I snap, rolling my eyes. “You must go through girls pretty fucking quick, since none of them want to come back for seconds.”
Levi’s eyes narrow, and he steps closer to me. Instinctively, I step back, ending up with my back against the wall between the desk and the bathroom door. He’s got me boxed in, but I don’t let him see that it bothers me.
When he drops his head, it brings his lips so close to kissing me, ghosting right over the skin of my cheek at the corner of my mouth, and I hold my breath, shivering a little when his fingers brush against my arm.
As much as I’m telling myself not to react, my body gives me away, and Levi chuckles under his breath, those deep brown eyes boring right into mine.
“Sure seems like you want seconds,” he murmurs, and even the tone of his voice is enough to make me ache with something that feels suspiciously like yearning.
I don’t let it set in though. Instead, I reach for the anger that’s always close enough to the surface and use it to clear my head. I shove Levi’s chest and step away from the wall, rolling my eyes and praying my face isn’t as red as it feels like it is.
Fuck, I wish my body didn’t want him. This would be so much fucking easier.
Levi just smirks and lets me move farther away. “Let me give you a tour,” he says, dropping it for the moment. Thank god.
The rest of the house is big and well stocked, though I notice nothing is over the top or la
vish. It’s got everything three guys in their early twenties could possibly need. They each have their own rooms with attached bathrooms, and there’s an extra bathroom for guests. The living room has a large, flat screen TV against one wall with every imaginable gaming console hooked up to it.
There’s a large gym in what used to be an unfinished basement, Levi explains, and he shows me the equipment, including weights and machines and a few heavy bags hanging from the ceiling. I perk up a little at the sight of those. At least I can keep up with my training while I’m stuck here. That’s something.
We head back upstairs and go into the kitchen. Even I have to admit it’s beautiful. All the appliances are shiny and silver and new, a long way away from the beat up old oven and refrigerator in our kitchen back home that Dad found at a yard sale a few years ago and has been repairing diligently ever since.
Sloan and Rory are both in the kitchen when we enter, the former leaning against the counter while Rory rummages in the fridge. Sloan seems content to ignore me as Levi points out the toaster, the microwave, and the fancy coffee maker that you just have to put the little pods in.
“You want a drink, Mercy?” Rory asks, gesturing to the well-stocked bar cart in the corner. I never told any of these guys my name, and they never told me theirs, but I guess we’re long past the point of official introductions.
“No,” I say shortly. “I’m going to bed.”
He looks at me for a second like he’s giving me a chance to change my mind. But even though a drink actually sounds really good right now, I don’t.
After a moment, Rory shrugs, and I turn on my heel and head back up the stairs. None of them try to stop me, and I can hear the sound of them talking in the kitchen as I take the stairs two at a time to get back to my room and close the door behind me.
I undress and shower, washing the day off me, but it’s not like it goes away. The suds swirl down the drain, and I dry off and pull on clothes to sleep in, but my mind is still going a mile a minute.
I’m worried about my dad. Worried about whatever it is that the Black Roses want him to do, and even more worried about what will happen if he can’t do it.
I’m also super conscious of the three guys who are presumably still downstairs in the kitchen. Even with a whole floor between us, I can’t get them out of my mind.
They’ve all gotten under my skin, albeit for very different reasons, and I find myself dreading having to face them in the morning—and for however many days after that until my dad pays off his debt.
Despite the longer shower, my thoughts haven’t settled at all as I turn off the light and crawl into the unfamiliar bed.
The mattress is comfortable, and the pillows are plush, but no matter how long I toss and turn, I can’t get to sleep.
5
I must have dozed off sometime in the early hours of the morning, because I wake up with the sun streaming into the room, sprawled out on the bed.
Clearly, I kicked the covers off at some point in the night because they’re bunched at the foot of the bed, half hanging down to the floor.
I lie there for a second, letting the events of the night come back to me.
Fuck. It all really happened.
It’s all real, and not some kind of messed up bad dream. It feels silly to admit, but a part of me definitely hoped that I would wake up back in my creaky old bed at Dad’s house, and none of this would have happened. Like a nightmare fading away when you wake up and realize it’s not something you have to deal with in real life.
No such luck.
I blink slowly, trying to will my hazy, half-asleep brain to come back online, when the reality of the situation asserts itself once more in the form of the bedroom door opening and Rory walking right into the room.
He stops in the doorway, and I can feel his gaze raking over me.
I’m just in a tank top and panties, the way I usually sleep, and he’s getting a fucking eyeful.
Rory whistles, low and amused, and I spring out of bed, suddenly wide awake. My beat-up old suitcase is open right next to the bed. I reach for the first thing I can get my hands on, a shoe, and chuck it at him, going for another when he ducks the first, laughing.
“Get the fuck out!” I snap, and he obeys, still cackling like an idiot as he closes the door behind him.
Furious, I throw on clothes, barely paying attention to what I’m yanking on, and march down the stairs just a moment later.
All three of the guys are in the kitchen, drinking coffee and lounging against the counters like apex predators, and I stop in the doorway, hands balled into fists.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” I demand. “Just because I’m stuck living with you, that doesn’t mean I’m your fucking property. I knew the Black Roses were into some shit, but I didn’t think you were that shady. Are you dealing in human trafficking now? Finding sex slaves or whatever-the-fuck that you can do whatever you want with?”
I’m breathing hard, eyes narrowed as fury courses through me, and Rory is still fucking laughing. Levi’s eyebrows are in his hairline, and if I didn’t know any better, I’d say he looks impressed with the force of my rant.
Sloan just looks pissed, but I haven’t seen a different facial expression on him yet.
As if he can sense me thinking of him, the blond man pushes away from the counter, setting his cup down before stalking over to me and getting in my face. “You should consider yourself fucking lucky to be stuck living with us,” he snaps, brow furrowed and steely gray eyes narrowed to match mine. It’s impossible to miss the way he emphasizes the word living. “Shit could have turned out way worse for you and your father.”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” I snap right back, rage making me reckless.
I know exactly what he means, but I don’t want to admit it. I don’t want him to think I’m intimidated by him for a second, even if he is taller and broader than me, like he’s made of pure fucking muscle.
Instead of answering me, he just shakes his head, and I huff, my anger climbing. “My dad could fucking take you,” I spit out. “I could fucking take you.”
Sloan snorts, and it’s a dismissive sound. “Trust me, princess, the only way you’d get me on my back is if I’ve got my cock inside you.”
Before I get a chance to tell him to shove his cock up his own ass, he stalks past me out of the kitchen and disappears into the rest of the house, leaving me with Levi and Rory. My hands are balled up into fists, and my jaw is clenched so hard I swear I’m about to crack a fucking tooth.
Levi still isn’t saying anything, but Rory holds up his hands. “I didn’t mean to upset you, Your Highness,” he says, in that same kind of half-joking, half-serious way he’s been talking since I met him. He does a little bow that makes me want to kick him in the balls, but even that comes off as kind of charming, the asshole.
“Why were you in my room in the first place?” I press my lips together, folding my arms and glaring at him.
“I just came up to ask what kind of stuff you want for the kitchen,” he answers. “Since you’ll probably be here for a while, I figured I’d make sure you have some things you like. You know, snacks, coffee, tea, that sort of stuff?”
I open my mouth and then close it, taken aback by that explanation. He’s actually trying to do something nice for me? What the hell?
It throws me off balance because I wasn’t expecting it. Last night, I would have said for sure that they intended to make me eat whatever they wanted me to eat, holding over my head that I was lucky they hadn’t killed me and my dad or whatever, basically like Sloan did just a few minutes ago.
But Rory’s standing there looking honest and earnest, as if he actually wants to know what kind of food I’d like in the house. I’m not sure what to do with that, so I fall back on old habits and give him a flippant answer.
“Sure. Let me give you a list.”
He gestures me to the white board that’s stuck to one of the doors of the double sided fridge, and
I take the marker and start to write whatever comes to mind. Random shit that I’ve seen in weird stores or heard about from watching cooking shows when nothing else is on.
Matcha, goat jerky, gochujang, finger limes, frogs legs, pickled peppers, spam, frozen calamari.
I add more random condiments and then step back to look at Rory, almost daring him to complain about the list.
He just laughs like he always does, his green eyes glittering. “You’re so weird,” he says, but he’s grinning even as he speaks.
I don’t like it. I especially don’t like the way his expression warms a little as he looks at me.
Even with me throwing shit at him and giving him a hard time, he still looks at me like he wants to devour me, and I don’t know how to deal with that.
I hate living here. I hate this whole situation.
I hate him.
It would be so much easier to do that if he hated me back.
6
Later that day, I’m in my room with the door closed. I’d never admit that I’m hiding, but well… I’m kind of hiding.
I don’t know what to do with these guys or how to act around them, so I figure it’s better if I keep some distance between me and them until I can figure out a plan or something.
I dig around in the pocket of my jeans from last night and find my phone, pulling it out so I can text my dad and make sure he’s okay. I should have done it earlier, but the stand-off in the kitchen distracted me. I’m also not entirely sure I’m allowed to be in contact with him while he does whatever “favor” the Black Roses are demanding of him. But no one has explicitly told me not to, so I figure I’ll just do what I want to until someone tells me otherwise.
I fire off a quick text asking how he’s doing and if there’s anything I can do to help him, then sit cross legged on the bed, waiting for a reply. It comes back after a few minutes, short and to the point.
DAD: I’m fine. I’ll get this done as fast as I can and get you out of there, but I’ll probably be unreachable for a while. Love you, kiddo. I’m so fucking sorry.
