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After another brutal workout that leaves me numb, I strip out of my basketball shorts and grab a shower. The steam shrouds me and the water pounds over my head as I brace against the wall.
This shift in awareness has left me floundering in all my plans. There’s nothing else I’ve wanted for ten years than to see the Landrys stripped down to the bone, but now I’m hesitating. I can’t. I’m not giving this up. But realizing how much I want Maisy makes this harder.
I’m still pissed at her. She still broke a promise she made. Turned her back on our friendship. For so long that broken promise cut me deep.
Then the heavy-lidded look on her face after I tore away from the searing kiss floats to the surface.
Releasing a heavy sigh of resignation, I press my forehead to the tile and thump a fist against the wall to distract myself. Damn it. I’m so fucked.
I imagine her sweet floral and coconut scent, the way her skin tastes, and I’m a goddamn pathetic goner. Reaching down, I groan as I circle my fist around my erection. My cock swells as I remember how her tongue slid against mine with no hesitation, so fucking eager. If I’d kept kissing her, I would’ve slipped a hand beneath her skirt—no underwear again, I hope with a thrum of excitement racing down my spine—and found her pussy wet and glistening for me. Another rough sound passes my parted lips and my breathing grows heavy as I stroke my dick.
She’s not afraid of me and still runs headfirst into danger once she sets her mind to it. God, why does it make me so hard that she’s still defiant and wild?
Licking my lips, my eyelids fall to half mast as I stroke myself while the heat builds low in my gut. I picture everything at once, her on her knees until they’re red and raw while I fuck her face, her lithe body arched in pleasure as she rides me in the back seat of my Charger, twisting her around on her hands and knees as I take her from behind with that damn school skirt flipped up to reveal her ass begging for my palm to slap it mercilessly until she’s crying out, her flushed skin tender. I want Maisy every way my fantasies paint her.
“Fuck,” I bite out as I come, the orgasm rushing through me.
I stand there for a moment, watching my release swirl down the drain. My throat is thick when I swallow. The guilt is only a mild throb, unlike how it used to be in the times I’ve given into my weakness for her and allowed fantasies to take over. I shut off the water and get out, scrubbing my body with the towel until my skin feels raw, as if I could wipe away jerking off to thoughts of her. No matter how hard I drag the towel over myself, it doesn’t work.
Maisy Landry is branded on my fucking skin and she won’t be erased without a fight.
My phone rings once I’m dressed. It’s late on the east coast, but Colton and the rest of the Crows keep odd hours to carry out their misdeeds. I answer as I collapse on the couch, the apartment lit only by the dim glow of my laptop screen.
“Yeah?”
“Would it kill you to say hello?” Colt snarks.
“Probably.” His husky laughter sounds at my blunt tone. “What’s up?”
“No dice, they didn’t have plates to run.”
“Shit. Figures.”
“They’re professional for sure. They know the tricks to avoid CCTV and mask themselves when they can’t. I lost their route when I tried to track it.”
My fingers ball into a fist and my lip curls. Damn it. I need to figure out who was following me so I know what I’m dealing with now that someone is aware of my presence in Ridgeview.
“You’ll have to lure them out on purpose to find out who they are.”
“Or I’ll just keep following the money. They’ll keep coming out of the shadows to protect the empires they’ve built for themselves on the blood of others.”
Colt hums in agreement. I put the phone on speaker and set it on the coffee table next to the laptop. The browser window I left open makes me hesitate. It’s Maisy’s Instagram page. I scrub a hand over my mouth as anxiety digs its claws into me. It unsettles me that she made it out of town without me knowing about it.
“Did your alerts go off when Maisy flew to Paris?” I ask hoarsely, fighting back the weird feeling in my gut.
There’s a long pause. “No. She’s not in Ridgeview?”
“No. She went to Paris with her friends while they elope or some shit.”
Colt barks out a laugh and mutters, “Bishop. That suave little shit gives me a run for my money sometimes.”
Who the fuck is that? A vague memory of the cocky asshole who knew how to fight better than anyone in Holden’s amateur fight ring last year tugs at the back of my mind. I wait for Colton to elaborate, but he moves on, keyboard keys clacking faintly.
“Don’t worry about it. I’ll know when they’re back.”
The unease crowding my chest doesn’t go away. If people know I’m digging around to unravel the secrets of the elite and powerful in Ridgeview, they could know she was with me the other day. Even her last name won’t stop the greedy bastards
from making sure their pecking order remains intact. It doesn’t make sense, but I have to make sure she’s safe. I can’t drop everything here and fly out to France, but I have the connections to make it happen.
