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The sound of my name in his mouth made the pulse beat harder. I looked at his face in the shadows and I was greedy. I didn’t care about drugs or dead bodies. I wanted to know everything, everything.
He held his hand out, waiting.
“Why do you have No Time tattooed on your hand?” I asked him.
“I’ll tell you after I fix your car.”
Damn. Blackmail. “How do I know you won’t use my car to stash drugs? Or commit a crime?”
“Because I promise not to.”
“Say it,” I said, trying to stretch time, trying to get just one more minute.
He sighed, and I saw his green eyes flash with irritation. “I promise I won’t use your car to stash drugs or commit a crime,” he said.
Oh, God. I had the crazy impulse to lean over and kiss him.
To cover it, I reached into my pocket and fumbled out my keys, sliding my car key off the key ring. I held it out to him. “It’s—”
“I know which one it is.” He took it from me, his fingers sliding over mine—deliberately, I thought. I tried not to show the shiver that went down my body. “Good night, Olivia.”
Belatedly, I remembered my manners. “Thank you,” I said. “For the ride.”
“Anytime.”
I grabbed the handle, opened the door, and got out of the car. I pulled my books to my chest and made a dash through the rain to the outside steps of Shady Oaks. I didn’t stop until I was under the overhang, ready to climb the steps to my apartment.
He should have gotten out, too. He lived in the same building, after all.
But when I turned and looked back, he was still sitting in the car, watching me. Just like I knew he would be.
Three
Devon
All my life, I’ve been dirty.
I was born dirty, in a rundown apartment, to two people with no money who hated each other. My brother and I ran wild on the streets of LA like stray cats, and we grew from dirty kids into dirty teenagers. I got my first car at sixteen, a used Datsun with half the floor rusted out, and I stole the money to get it.
I drove the Datsun until it wouldn’t go anymore, and then I got an ancient Chevy that looked like it had been junked from a 90’s TV show. I could drive that car over LA’s freeways better than just about any new car, and I never got tired of doing it. It was the only talent I had. While other guys my age were going to college and learning to be bankers and doctors and lawyers, I was becoming what you’d call a skilled driver. It was a profitable skill, if you knew who to sell it to.
Dad left when I was two. Mom died when I was sixteen. My brother Cavan, who was eighteen when Mom died, took off instead of looking after me. I didn’t blame him, but that left me. Alone. And, as always, dirty.
This morning, I was tired. I’d been up late last night, fixing my neighbor’s car. It was a pretty simple fix with just a few parts. But her shocks were going, she needed brake pads—I could go on and on. I’d patched the car up the best I could so she wouldn’t have to stand at a bus stop in the rain again, then slid the key through the mail slot on her door, imagining her on the other side somewhere, lying in bed. Maybe naked.
It was a really nice image. I pictured it instead of the car I was working on right now, my hands moving automatically as a movie played in my head. Olivia, my neighbor, with her hair down. Those dark curls around her face and her shoulders. That slender body naked, riding me. Her head thrown back, her eyes closed, her tits thrust forward as she came.
I hadn’t fixed her car to fuck her. But there was no rule against picturing it. In detail.
When I heard my name, I put the wrench I was holding on my chest and rolled out from beneath the car. It was Charlie Jensen, owner of Jensen’s Garage and my boss, who preferred, inexplicably, to be called Chaz.
Chaz was standing in the dirty concrete garage bay, looking down at me from his hard, fat face. “Devon Wilder,” he said. “My brother wants to see you.”
I squinted up at him. “Right now?”
“No, when the Queen takes tea,” Chaz said. “Of course right fucking now.”
I rolled myself up and tossed the wrench into a nearby toolbox. Chaz was a dick, and he had a stupid nickname, but he was sweetness and light compared to his brother. Gray Jensen—that was his actual name, Gray, not a nickname—was mean and cold and not quite stupid. He was the kind of guy I would normally avoid, but unfortunately I couldn’t. I had my reasons.
