Page 28 of Rent an Enforcer

“Fuck,” he breathes while he grips my thighs, guiding my rhythm. “Just like that. Ride me just like that.”

So I do. The SUV rocks with every thrust, and somewhere in the back of my mind, I’m aware that anyone walking past this vehicle knows exactly what’s happening inside.

Do I care? No. Do I stop? Hell, no.

His mouth finds my neck, my collarbone, then slips between my breasts where my shirt has been shoved up. His hands are everywhere—hips, waist, ass, pulling me down harder on him.

“I can feel you getting close,” he groans against my throat, his breath across my skin. “You’re squeezing me so tight. Come on. Give it to me.”

“I—” My fingers dig into his shoulders. “Oh god, I’m⁠—”

“That’s it. Come all over my cock. Right here in this parking lot.”

It hits me like a freight train. Fast, enormous. I bury my face in his neck to muffle the sound because apparently, I have some standards left, even if they’re minimal. He follows seconds later, hands clamping on my hips, pulling me down one last time as he groans my name into my hair.

We stay like that for a minute, breathing hard, tangled together in the driver’s seat in a parking lot at two in the afternoon. His forehead is against my shoulder, and my heart is trying to escape through my rib cage. Somewhere inside the pharmacy, people are having a completely normal day. Meanwhile, here I am, redefining my relationship with firearms.

“That was...” He makes a sound that might be a chuckle. “I need you to not develop a habit.”

“A habit of what? Shooting people?”

“Shooting people and then...” He gestures vaguely at the current state of affairs in the driver’s seat.

“But it was hot, right? You have to admit it was a little hot.”

“It was a little hot,” he admits.

“I knew it.”

“Don’t let it go to your head.”

“Too late. It’s fully in my head,” I happily confirm. “I’m going to think about this every time I see a gun now. Is that weird? It’s probably weird.”

“We need to go.” He’s trying to be serious, but he’s failing. That almost-smile is starting to creep its way across his face. “I need to call Dorian. The guy you shot is one of Castellano’s guys.”

The name doesn’t mean much to me, but the way he says it tells me it will. “Is that bad?”

“It’s complicated.” He shifts me gently off his lap and back into the passenger seat. “We’ll talk about it at home. Are you okay? For real?”

Am I? I should be falling apart, right? Every manual ever written about people like me says I should be spiraling into the worst panic attack of my life right now.

Instead, I feel like I could run through a wall. “I’m okay,” I confirm. “Actually, I’m kind of great.”

He only shakes his head and puts the car in drive before pulling out of the lot. I spend the ride looking at my hands. They’re completely steady now. The girl who can’t hold a carton of milk when she sees a mullet just put a bullet in a man, and her hands are steady.

I don’t understand myself. I’ve never understood myself. But for the first time, I think I might actually like whoever the hell I am.

12

TRISTAN

I wonder what it’s like to sleep soundly. Peacefully. The way a person sleeps when they’ve never done a bad thing in their life.

I’m sure there was a time, years ago, when I could pass out the way Stella does, curled up on her side like she is now. Nothing gets through to her, though I’m doing my best to make sure there’s no reason for her to wake up. I wouldn’t disturb her for anything.

For now, it’s enough to watch her. Her hand is tucked under her cheek, and her hair is everywhere—spilled across the pillow, stark red against white. Her breathing is slow and even, and there’s something close to a smile tipping the corners of her mouth. What is she dreaming about?

Socks is on his cushion in the corner, asleep in a ball with one ear folded under his head. He’s allowed to sleep in here with her so long as we keep the door closed, since I’m not trying to run another extraction mission anytime soon. Early morning light is coming through the window, pale and gray. The house is quiet enough that I hear the birds in the trees outside and the slow tick of a clock in the kitchen. I’ve never noticed that sound before, probably because I’m rarely still long enough to notice.