Kasen shrugs, his face cruel in a way that makes me hate him even more than I did. He’s not just controlling, he’s arrogant and egotistical and pure fucking evil, I’m sure of it. “This dude is after you, love, so my guess is he thinks you did the dirty work. If I could take the claim, I would, I’m just that good of a guy. But someone saw what you did. That’s the threat they are leaving for you.”
He talks to me like I’m vapid, and I want to lash out and slap him or at least knee him in the junk again. Physical violence would make me feel better right about now.
“You reckon it’s the Breakers?” River asks, joining Bodhi behind the bar. I almost forgot he was here, my rage too focused on Kasen.
“Has to be. Unless you have some other fuckers after you, sunshine?” Bodhi asks, a slightly sly look on his face. “Do you?” His glare intensifies, if it’s even possible.
I stare back at him, not liking the way he makes me feel so uneasy. “No,” I answer with determination. Bodhi was at the beach watching me like a creeper, but he doesn’t know about the shit I found in Mum’s safe. At least I don’t think he does. He wouldn’t have been able to see me and what I was doing inside the van. They have no idea this couldbe related to what happened to her, and I have no intention of telling them what I know.
Fuck them, why should I after the stunt Kasen just pulled.
I know I have no choice but to accept his manipulative offer for help, because right now, I don’t want this psycho stalker to find me before I have a chance to work out what is going on. Or to be sent to jail. Time safely locked up in their place will give me time to work out who was blackmailing my mum, and if it could be the same person who is now after me.
“Why would someone else be after me? My life isn’t that interesting.” I brush it off. “I told you, it doesn’t matter if you paid off the Southern Breakers, they will come after me anyway. That’s how they operate. You probably just angered them more by turning up there and paying off my debts. What’s fifty grand when you can have some girl working for you earning you thousands each week.”
River’s eyes narrow to slits. His normally handsome face contorting in a way I don’t like. I know he’s seen the videos, and it fills me with disgust to know what he must think of me now. But there is no escaping this chaos I got myself into, so I might as well face it head on and own it. I tilt my chin higher, ready for whatever he’s about to say.
“So, what, they threaten you, graffiti shit, to get you to come back?” he asks, sounding genuinely confused.
Kasen runs a hand through his hair. “I don’t buy it. Those other thugs were damn near beating you to death. They were going to drag you back with force. They wouldn’t mess around with games. This creep is toying with you. This feels more personal.”
“He’s fucking fast too,” Bodhi adds swiping at a bloody spot on his forehead. “Cut me with a blade of some sort.”
“A blade meant for you.” Kasen steps closer, and I take a couple of hurried steps back, not liking the deranged look in his eyes.
“We don’t know that,” I whisper, but even I know it had to be. Someone is after me for something I did.
“No, our birdie is still hiding shit from us.” Kasen captures my wrists so quickly I don’t have time to dodge him. He holds them hostage in front of me. “Time you tell us the truth, all of it. Or do I search the van for your secrets?”
My heart races like wild. It will take him all of a few minutes to find what I stashed in the van, but I don’t want to give him the satisfaction of telling him what I know. “Fuck you,” I spit.
He tosses the keys that were in my hands toward Bodhi. “Go check out the van, boys.” His voice booms through the empty bar, and I actually flinch with how much he sounds like his dad.
My back presses into the wall as he moves my hands to pin them over my head. “Why are you doing this to me?” I whimper.
His face is too close to me, so close I can feel his breath on my neck. He leans his lips even closer, hovering just over my ear. “Because I protect what is mine, even if they need protection from themselves.”
Goosebumps scatter down my arms. I can’t be this close to him, it messes with my head and my body. My swimmer bottoms are now soaking wet, when I know with everything I have in my soul I hate this man. Hate the way he’s trying to control me and the force he thinks he has over me. “You’re actually crazy, you know that, right, Kasen? The power has gone to your head,” I spit back at him, trying to buck him off me.
Kasen’s eyes lock with mine. They are so damn dark tonight they send a shiver right the way through me. Not in a bad scare-the-shit-out-of-me kind of way, more like they send a wave of excitement through me they shouldn’t. I’m so screwed up, I’m actually turned on by the way he’s holding me. “When it comes to you, birdie, yeah, I probably am.”
Oh, dear God, I can’t look away. I should, but my eyes stay locked with his while my heart races out of my chest. His body is so warm pressed into mine. I find myself moving in closer, basking in his heat, my nipples pebbled hard, begging for contact, even though I know it’s a terrible idea.
He shifts so his thigh pushes between my legs, forcing me to balance on my toes uncomfortably.
My breathing hitches and my head spins, my body suddenly on fire all over.
“Deny it all you want, call me crazy if it makes you feel better about yourself, but we both know you’re hot for me. Your pussy is dripping, I can smell it.” He tilts his head, making him look even more deranged as he inhales. “I bet if I ran a finger under your swimmers, I would find a pool of arousal ready just for me.”
Sweat beads on my forehead and trickles down my back. I shove at him again, trying to get him to drop his hold on me. He’s lost it. But the truth is, I know it’s me who really has, because he’s right. And his dirty words do nothing to ease the ache now forming between my legs. I want him so badly it hurts, but I’m not silly enough to give in to infatuation. Not with this man. “You just threatened to send me to jail if I didn’t do what you wanted.” My words come out in a breathy whisper, not with anger and fight like I want them to. Damn, his body’s so close to me it’s disarming my shields, making me weak.
He keeps one hand holding my wrists above my head while the other glides over my body, feeling its way over my breasts and my stomach, down between my legs, leaving a trail of goosebumps as he goes. I suck in a shaky breath. I should shove him off me. Should definitely knee him in the junk, but I don’t. I’m frozen to the spot. I want him to touch me. “You need to know how serious I am, birdie.” His fingers drift lower, between my legs.
I keep my eyes on his. It’s almost a silent challenge between us, him pushing me, daring me to stop him. But I won’t because I don’t actually want to. Fifteen-year-old me is high-fiving herself. Kasen Throne wants little old me. It’s not in my head. It’s very real, and my needy body shifts so he has better access to my core, almost desperate to know what it would feel like to have the king’s fingers inside of me.
Kasen runs a finger under the hemline of my swimmer bottoms, testing me, and I swear to God I’m so damn on edge I’m about to cum from the small movement alone. “K,” I warn.
“Yeah, birdie?” he challenges me, his brow raised and lips quirked cruelly.
