Better When He's Bad

CHAPTER 7 Bax

I NEVER MET A girl who was more stubborn, more complicated, or more fun to rile up than this one. She came by that redheaded temper naturally. I tried twice to get her to let me buy her a pair of pants that would actually fit her tiny waist and long-ass legs, but she just gave me a dirty look and wandered off. I wasn’t sure if it was because she was mad I wanted to spend blood money on her, or because she was pissed I didn’t like her tomboy look. It didn’t really bother me, I could see she was hiding in plain sight now, and I felt it was like my duty as a red-blooded male to get her over it. After getting just a peek at what she was covering up with all those ugly, baggy clothes, I knew it wasn’t right for her to feel like she had to blend into the drab and dreary of all that was the Point.

She wandered off to get a little breathing room and I added some plain black pants, a couple T-shirts, and a normal person-sized black sweater to the hoodie, jeans, and package of T-shirts I grabbed for myself. I was going to have to swing by my place in the city and grab some stuff if I was going to be hanging out in the burbs for the foreseeable future, and she was just going to have to deal with me trying to drag her out of her prickly shell. It was fun to watch her wind up so tight she looked like she was going to snap. I liked the flush under her freckles and the way her pretty pink mouth got all red. I liked the way her green eyes went almost black, and most of all, I liked how new and untouched she seemed, like everything I did to her, every way I touched her, was a new experience. It made all the other bad shit going on seem inconsequential.

I met her at the cash register and noticed she was refusing to look at me or talk to me. I laughed a little under my breath, which had the cashier passing a nervous look back and forth between the two of us. I wish I had snagged some lacy, frilly underwear to throw into the pile just to set her off, but it was too late as I grabbed the paper bag and followed her out of the store.

“What kind of chick doesn’t want to shop?”

She glared at me over her shoulder and tossed that fiery hair to the side. Man, I couldn’t wait to get my hands all tangled up in it and bury my face in it. It was like flames, red and orange, spinning and twirling around her pale face.

“This . . .”—she wagged a finger between her and me—“is already convoluted, scary, and out of control. You very well might want to hurt my brother, I have a sinking feeling you might end up hurting me, and none of that means you get to take me shopping like I’m your girlfriend or something.”

“You don’t have anything, Copper-Top.”

She made a face at me and I grinned at her.

“I have my pride. I have my brother. And I have enough sense to know that the deeper in with you I get, the worse off I’m going to be when you decide I’ve served my purpose.”

I just shook my head at her and went to move around her because she came to a screeching halt in front of me. I went to open the trunk of the Runner when I finally noticed what had made her go so still. I put a hand on the curve of her back and looked at the guy leaning against the side of my car. I swore out loud and handed her the bag and the keys.

“Give me just a second.”

She went to grab for me, but five years of anger and resentment had just surged to the surface. I heard her call my name, saw the guy’s eyes widen as he pushed off my baby and tensed for the blow that was coming from my wildly thrown fist. There wasn’t a lot of force behind it because my side was still jacked up and I could feel more blood start to leak out of the bandage. He shook his face and lifted a hand to work his jaw back and forth.

“Not even out a month and you’re ready to go back for assault on an officer?” I wanted to take that stupid badge on his belt and cram it down his throat. I made a move to lunge for him again, but a pair of tiny hands planted in the center of my chest and shoved me back.

“Knock it off? Are you nuts? Wait, don’t answer that because clearly the answer is yes!”

I looked down at her and back up at the smirking cop and felt my hands curl into tight fists.

“Dovie, this is Officer Titus King . . . otherwise known as the asshole that arrested me and let me rot for five fucking years.”

Titus gave me a steady look and then switched his attention to Dovie. I stepped around her and got back in his face.

“You have some nerve looking for me.”

He held up his hands in a helpless gesture and took a step back. “I heard you were out. I wanted to tell you that Gus has been asking after you since you went away. I thought maybe you would be interested in some honest employment for once in your life.”

“Oh, now you’re interested in helping me out?”

I wanted to get my hands around his throat and squeeze until his head popped. He sighed and put his hand on the butt of the pistol riding low on his hip. He was done letting me vent, the message was clear.

“You were caught red-handed, Shane. What in the hell was I supposed to do? You were in the car, you and you alone. Race wasn’t there, Novak, as always, had pristine hands and a rock-solid alibi, and it was just you, the Aston Martin, and enough incriminating evidence to put you away for a fuck of a lot longer than five years. You’re lucky that’s all you got. The owner of the car died. You do remember that, right?”

I wanted to punch him again, but Dovie didn’t need to hear all the gory details of what Race and I were into before it all blew up in our faces.

“Get bent, King. I don’t need this from you. I’m not on parole, I don’t need a babysitter.”

“You’re right, but you need a goddamn guardian angel the way you live. Go see Gus, Bax. For once in your life make the right choice. I don’t want to put you back in prison.”

I glared at him and tossed the bag in the car and inclined my head toward Dovie. “Get in the car, Copper-Top.” She opened her mouth like she was going to argue, but I just looked at her until she snapped her mouth shut and did what I said.

Once she was out of earshot, I stepped up to Titus. It was an even match; he was an inch taller than me but just as wide, and thicker with muscles used for protection and security rather than mayhem and destruction. We had the same dark hair and similar builds, but his old man must have had blue eyes, because where mine were as black as night, his were the color of the sky on a summer day. Sharing a mother hadn’t made us identical, but there was no missing we were related and shared blood when we were this close to each other.

“I’m going back to jail over my dead body, Titus. Know it.”

He reached out and clamped a hand on my shoulder before I could dodge it.

“That’s what scares the shit out of me, you prick. Mom’s barely hanging in there. Novak wants you dead, or worse, and I know he wants me dead. Race is in the wind, and what, you’re fighting again and running around with some chick who looks barely legal? You can’t stay out of trouble if you try, and I’m going to have to bury you. You think I want that?”

I shook him off and shoved him back with a hand on his beefy shoulder.

“I’m not scared of Novak. I’ll find Race and figure this all out. She’s totally legal and Race’s sister. I’m not running around with her, Benny trashed her place and is hounding her trying to find Race. Mom isn’t my problem, you are not my problem. You lost your right to worry about me when you snapped those handcuffs on me, Titus.”

I went to yank open the door when his words stopped me.

“So you’ll forgive Race, keep an eye on his sister, even though he’s the one that set you up, but you won’t forgive me for doing my job?”

I looked at my half brother, the only person in the world besides Race who had ever tried to save me from myself. Titus and I were never really close. There was a six-year age gap between us and he had always been one to follow the rules, to toe the line as much as anyone could when fighting for survival. When I was ten, he had decided to leave me and Mom and go live with a friend of his on the Hill so he could switch schools and get out of the slums. As an adult, I didn’t blame him, but as a kid, I felt abandoned and alone. My mom’s care fell solely onto my young shoulders and it didn’t seem fair Titus got to go live the dream, while I became a criminal to keep up and keep alive.

“Your job sucks, Officer King.”

“Detective King.”

“Blow me.” I opened the door and slid in next to Dovie. She was looking out the window and twisting her hands together. She wanted to ask me about all of it, I could feel it rolling off of her, but she kept her pretty mouth shut.

“Go see Gus, Bax.”

Titus’s voice was barely audible over the roar of the powerful motor of my car.

A drive that should take twenty minutes only took ten as I raced back to the little house in the burbs. Going there with Dovie made me hate it less each time I walked in the front door. She was like some kind of balm that made all the ravaged and torn pieces of my soul feel less raw. I plopped all the grocery bags down in the kitchen and looked at her where she was leaning against the fridge.

“We need to put this away.” My voice was harsher than normal.

She let her head fall back and I wanted to run my tongue all along the length of her neck.

“Tell me about the night you got arrested.”

“No.”

“Yes. I need to understand how Race set you up.”

“I don’t even understand it.”

“That cop, who is he to you?”

“No one.”

“Bax.”

I growled—actually growled—and stomped over to her. I put my palms on the freezer so that she was caged in my arms. I don’t know if I wanted to scare her, intimidate her, or just fall into those forest-colored eyes and leave the harsh reality of who I was behind for just a minute.

“I need to know,” she said.

Probably, but I didn’t want to be the one to tell her. She reached up between us and put her hands on both of my bristly cheeks. I couldn’t look away from the lure of the pleading in her evergreen-tinted gaze.

“Race called me that night and said Novak had a job. An Aston Martin Vanquish up on the Hill. I didn’t want to do it. Those cars are high end, which means security is top-notch. I told him no, not only because it was risky, but because we were supposed to be working on getting out of the game. Novak was taking bigger risks, calling on Race for more and more errands, and it was all getting too deep and too tangled.”

I was breathing hard and drifting back in time, even though she was trying to hold me on to the present.

“Race called me back a couple hours later and told me I didn’t understand. We had to get the car. We didn’t have a choice. Either I went or he was going to have to go alone. Race is great with security systems, with car alarms, the LoJack and the digital systems that cops can override, but he’s not a thief. He’s not a car guy, so if he had to go on his own, it would’ve ended badly.”

I blinked, trying to make sense of it still. “I should’ve asked, Why? Why that car? Why that night? Why it HAD to get done, but I didn’t want Race to risk his neck for no reason, so I met him on the Hill and went to work.”

I pulled away from her and walked over to lean against the sink.

“Race was weird, nervous and twitchy. I kept asking what was going on with him but he kept telling me we just needed the car, Novak was being really specific about it. We got in the gate, got through the security on the garage, and the car was there, all shiny and beautiful, just like it was supposed to be. I would be a liar if I didn’t say I was looking forward to taking it, to getting behind the wheel.”

I could still see the perfect black paint and smell the flawless leather interior. I let my head drop and closed my eyes. I had to rub the back of my neck to keep going.

“I told Race to do his thing, get me in the car, but he just looked at me. I knew something was wrong, that it wasn’t just a simple boost. Before I knew it, we’re in the house and forcing the guy that lived there, some rich old bastard, into the car and heading back down to the District to meet Novak. I kept asking what was going on, who the old guy was, but Race just kept saying he was sorry and that I didn’t understand. He kept saying over and over he would pay me back, but I didn’t know what he meant. We get to the meet-up spot, Novak is there, Benny is there, and the old guy is freaking out. I wanted to hand the keys over, get out and never look back, and the next thing I know the cops are there, like every cop in the damn city descends on us. Bullets start flying, everyone scatters, and Race vanished as I took off in the car.

“I remember my blood pumping, the smell of rubber burning, sirens, and the look of sorrow on Race’s face as I tried to outrun the cops. I would’ve made it too, would’ve disappeared in the night and gotten away scot-free but I was worried about ditching Race, distracted by the entire shit show, and I lost control, skidded, and slammed the car into a telephone pole, knocking myself silly and giving the cops plenty of time to catch up to me.

“I asked the cop that pulled me out of the car where Race was, trying to figure out what was going on. Over and over again I screamed at the cop why. Titus was the arresting officer, he’s also my half brother. He put me in the back of the police cruiser, told me the old guy was dead, I was getting arrested for grand theft auto and evading arrest, and I would be lucky if I didn’t have kidnapping and accessory-to-murder charges leveled at me. I asked to talk to Race. I needed to know how things had gone so bad, why we had jacked the old man, what was going on, and Titus just told me I would understand later. He’s the only reason I did a five-year term and not a fifteen.”

I cleared my throat and finally lifted my head to look back up at her. She had tears in her eyes and looked as uneasy as I felt. I didn’t want her to feel sorry for me. I did bad shit and got caught. That was just part of the game. It was the betrayal from the only person in life I had ever totally trusted that twisted me up and left a bad taste in my mouth.

“Titus knew where the deal was going down. Race called him. He sent me to prison on purpose, I need to know why. He let Novak kill that man, facilitated it. I need to figure out if he’s gone, turned into one of them or not. Race was working his own angle that night. I need to know what it was.”

She whispered my name and moved so she could squeeze herself between me and the counter, which was still littered with the groceries we never put away. She put one arm around my neck and the other over where my heart was thudding in my chest.

“He must have had a good reason. You’re his best friend. He didn’t become one of them, because he came after me as soon as you went away. It all has to be tied together. Race isn’t a bad guy, and I don’t think you really are either.”

She was wrong. Pressing her hard into the counter, I used my forearm to send the grocery bags flying to the floor. They rattled and clanged across the tiles as I grabbed her around her tiny waist and lifted her onto the counter so we were eye-to-eye and I could insert myself between her legs.

“You’re wrong. If he set me up because he was too stupid to get out from under Novak, or because he was scared or caught up in something nasty, I’ll destroy him and I won’t regret it.”

She didn’t look away from me, and like it was a sign from up above telling me I had done my time and deserved just a few moments with this precious, difficult girl, I noticed one of the boxes of condoms had survived the crash to the floor and was still on the counter within reach.

“So tell me, Bax, what reason could Race give that will make this all okay? Is there one? Really?”

I felt my jaw clench and the corner of my eye twitch. I had spent five years thinking that very thing and the only answer I had come up with that was acceptable was, “If it was all just Race trying to save me from myself, like he always seemed to be doing, I can understand that.”

“I don’t think you will—destroy him, I mean. I don’t think you could live with yourself if you did.”

She didn’t know me well enough to say that, but I was about to show her just how far and how fast I was willing to go when I wanted something. She had no idea the devastation I could bring with very little effort. I was good at it. I reveled in it more often than not.

I saw her suck in a breath as I hooked a finger under the top button of her top and popped it open. I lifted an eyebrow to see if she was going to say anything, and when she didn’t, I gripped both sides of her shirt in my fists and ruined it by pulling it apart. The tiny plastic buttons pinged off the appliances and the floor. She made a face at me that had her wrinkling up her freckled nose. How on earth had I thought she was boring? She was like sunshine and warmth all wrapped up in a porcelain package blessed with the greatest tits I had ever seen. I never would’ve thought I was a freckle guy, but damn, I sure liked hers.

“You know that was my only shirt.”

I tugged it down her arms and tossed the remnants out of my way. Her bra followed, leaving her bare from the waist up and looking like an ivory-skinned dream. I had seen a lot of hot girls in my time, girls who made a living based on how pretty they could look, how sexy they came across to the opposite sex, but none of them held a candle to Dovie and her primitive and untouched beauty.

“I threw a couple T-shirts in with my junk while you were pouting.”

I got my hands under the gap at the top of her too-big pants and worked the fastener open and got the zipper down. I felt the baby-soft skin of her abdomen quiver against the back of my battered knuckles, but she lifted her hips without a question when I urged her up so I could get the rest of her clothes off, leaving her totally naked and pinned to the counter in front of me. Her hands were resting on either side of her naked thighs, her green eyes were huge in her face, and she was chewing on her bottom lip hard enough that I saw a drop of blood. She was all kinds of virtuousness and way too good for all the things I was bound to do to her.

“You are going to regret this when I prove to you everything you think about me is wrong.”

She lifted a hand and traced the star next to my eye with the dull edge of her fingernail.

“No, I’m not. You are not a mistake.”

Maybe I would just have to show her.

I yanked her with greedy hands and very little finesse to the very edge of the counter so she was pressed up as tightly as she could be with my erection. I put my hands on her bare ass and kissed her, not like you kissed a woman you wanted to seduce, but like a woman you wanted to own and imprint yourself on forever. There was something heady, powerful about having her totally naked and at my mercy while I was still fully clothed and looming over her. I wasn’t into all that power and domination crap, but with her, man, I could play lord and master all day long if she was into it.

I got one of my hands wrapped in her mass of curly hair and bent her back over my arm so that all her softness was grinding into my hardness. I moved my tongue in and out of her mouth, used my teeth on her, held her still while I ate her up and sucked her in. She felt so good, so clean and pristine, I wanted to mark her up from her head to her toes. She whimpered a little when I got a little overzealous sucking on her bottom lip, and moved to wrap her long legs around my waist.

She tugged my shirt up and off over my head, letting it fall with hers to the littered and now messy kitchen floor. I saw her eyes immediately go to my side where blood was slowly leaking out from under the thick bandage she had put there earlier. I saw the hesitation flash in her gaze and caught her hand as she went to reach for it. I turned it palm side up and put a kiss there. She jerked her eyes up to mine as I closed her fingers over the gesture.

“Don’t. That’s just part of being me.”

She wanted to say something, to argue, but there was no way I was letting her get distracted from the point I was trying to make, or the point that was trying to poke out over the edge of my pants. I took her other hand and put it on the buckle of my belt. I didn’t give her a chance to go back to my injury. I pressed her back as far as she would go, arching her delicate spine across my arm where it was braced behind her and thrusting her flat-out perfect breasts up and into my eagerly waiting mouth. She was the sweetest thing I had ever had my lips on. I loved the way her nipples pebbled up on my tongue like a berry. I felt her fingernails dig into my scalp on the back of my shoulder. She said my name on a breathless murmur, and I didn’t even care that she called me Shane.

I moved my legs farther apart, forcing her legs open wider and got a hand down between us to see if she was ready for me. She was so small down there, all damp and coiled like she was ready to fire at the barest touch. She felt like silk and cream, I had to fight back a groan when she clutched down on my fingers. I ran my tongue across the hollow between her breasts, gobbled up her skin, put red sucking marks on every freckle I could find. By the time I got to the tip of her other breast, she was grinding against my stroking fingers and pulling me closer with her heels in my ass.

Her hair was engulfing the arm I was using to hold her up, and the hand I had put on my dick earlier had lost its way and was clutching at my ribs. I was going to send her over the edge, take her apart before I got to lose myself in her alabaster body. She snapped her eyes open and pulled on my chin with one hand until I looked up at her. I pressed my thumb down hard on her clit and watched her break apart right before my eyes. It was awesome. It was powerful. It gave me a rush that topped taking any car I could ever remember. She was just that delicate and fragile-looking under my broken hands. I never really cared about what I gave the chicks I was with before her, but for some reason, I felt like anytime she let me get my hands on her, I had to make it count.

“Shane . . .” Her voice was a whisper. Her eyes heavy-lidded and satiated. She roused herself enough to get her hands on my belt and work the heavy buckle open. She flicked it to the side and pulled the zipper down. I had to grunt a little and help her out because her body pressed up against mine and her little whimpers of pleasure had my cock ready to break free of the fabric on its own, and the teeth of my fly were its mortal enemy. I got my pants open and let her wiggle them down around my hips and ass along with my boxers. I was still way more covered than she was, but the checkered flags tattooed along either side of my groin were suddenly on display. They seemed to have her full and undivided attention, as did my raging erection, standing proudly between the two of them.

I grunted at her and bent her over so I could reach across her to get the box of condoms. When I leaned against her and all her wet heat pressed against my naked cock, I almost blacked out.

I swore and looked down at her. She lifted a rusty eyebrow at me and twined her arms around my neck. The hard tips of her breasts pressed into my chest and her thighs clasped me to her core like she was never going to let me go. I got out a rubber and ripped the package open with my teeth. It was a little tricky making room between where we were pressed together to get it all situated, but I really didn’t want to separate from where her body felt like it was trying to melt me into her, make me a part of her forever.

I put my hands flat on the counter on either side of her head where her hair was spread out around her like a blanket of fire. I watched her as I put just the tip in, just the faintest hint of my cock inside her fluttering opening.

A small grin kicked up the corner of her mouth and I wanted to kiss it off of her.

“This is the finish line?”

I had never been with anyone like her, felt like someone else was my very own. I knew I wasn’t her first, but when I pushed into her, seated myself into her burning core, I swore she was brand-new and all mine. She arched up against me and I didn’t have to worry about kissing her smile because she attacked my mouth like a wild woman. She slid her tongue along the roof of my mouth and clamped her legs around my sides, which was murder on my wound but drove me all the way into her, and had us both gasping at the burn and pulse of the contact. I pulled away from the bite of her teeth and buried my nose in the curve of her neck. The clasp and pull of her body had me losing control and thrusting into her so hard, I moved both of us across the countertop. She was totally splayed flat and her head was hanging off the other side of it.

I felt her hands dig into my shoulders, felt her chest heave against and retreat from mine. She was slick, and tight, grinding against me and fluttering all along my anxious dick. I had zero finesse, zero tact, and zero interest in anything but getting to the end. I bit the tendon in her shoulder where her vein was throbbing under my mouth. She threw her head violently to the side, muttered something way too nasty to come out of that too-pretty mouth, and I felt all her inner muscles clamp down on me and try and keep me from ever leaving her. That was it for me.

I grabbed her hips hard enough that there would no doubt be marks when I let her go, and pounded into her. I’d hooked up more than my fair share since getting my freedom back, but none of it was like this. I felt desperate, needy, wanting. I could feel every part of her—her skin, her mouth, her hair, her inner walls milking and working me over. There was no holding out, no making it last and making sure she got as good as I was getting. I said her name like it was a curse and pulled her back across the counter so we were plastered together, front to front. I kissed the living shit out of her as I came harder than I ever had in my life. I kissed her until neither of us could breathe. Kissed her until she was pulling at my ears to get me to let her go. Kissed her until I felt her start to shimmy and quake around my dick. Kissed her until I sent her back over the edge while I tried to get my wits and rationality back. I kissed her like I knew there were only a limited number of times she was going to let me do it, and I was going to make each one a memory.

It took a minute for both of us to catch our breath, to come back down. I pulled my head up from her neck and dropped my forehead down so it was touching hers.

“That . . .” My voice sounded like I was gargling with acid. “That is the finish line.”

She snorted out a cute little laugh and opened her mouth to reply when a phone trilled from somewhere on the floor. I sighed and pulled out of her. I situated myself as best as I could and reached down to the pile of discarded clothes. I handed her my shirt and dug around until I found her phone. She hopped off the counter and picked her way around the carnage of the groceries on the floor. I made my way to the bathroom to situate my junk and to look at my seriously throbbing side.

The cut looked like it was seeping and oozing, but there was a decent crust of a scab starting to build up on the edges of it. Since Dovie wouldn’t help, I popped the lid off one of the tubes of superglue and slimed the burning liquid over the nasty cut myself. It felt like pouring boiling oil on my skin, but the blood stopped as soon as the clear liquid started to dry. I was probably going to end up with a raging infection and it wouldn’t be gangsters or my life of crime that ended up doing me in. It would be gangrene.

I was washing my hands and throwing the wreckage of the bandage in the trash when she propped herself up in the doorway. My shirt covered most of her up, but it was hard to look away from those legs when I knew she was naked underneath.

“That was the group home I work at. One of the other monitors got sick and they need me to cover. I usually only stay every other weekend, but they need me to stay over tonight and tomorrow.”

That meant I wouldn’t see her until sometime Monday. Why that made me annoyed I didn’t know. I nodded at her and ran my hands roughly over my short hair.

“All right. Give me a minute to clean up the kitchen and I’ll take you. Like I said, I bought you some stuff to get by for a few days, so you can grab that and get ready.”

She gave me a look that I swore was colored with disappointment, but then she just nodded and turned on her heel.

“Cool. I’ll help you clean up.”

I watched her walk away. Somewhere in the part of my chest that I had long thought was an empty and hollow cavern, I felt a twist and a wrenching feeling that her walking away was something that I needed to get good with her doing . . . more for her sake than my own.