Wet Work: A Dark Bad Boy Romance Read online

  When I closed the door behind him, I leaned against it with my shoulder and sighed. Mark didn’t understand. Of course, he wouldn’t. No one did. I knew I was going to lose my job, but the part that used to care so much had died along with my love and respect for the ocean. All that was left was a shell that looked and sounded like me.

  I shouldered myself off the door and trudged upstairs, dropping the robe to the floor as I entered my bedroom. The room smelled of sweat and desperation. I fell into bed and stared at the ceiling. I was coming apart, and I didn’t know how to hold myself together. The only time I felt anything was when I was with Pax. Paxton. Paxton Park. He was the only one who knew how to reach me, how to make me feel better.

  I wanted to call him, to hear his voice… but I didn’t want him to see me like this. Maybe I did have a bit of self-respect left. I resolved to get up, shower, and make myself presentable. Then I would clean this dump I was living in, and then I would call him. He would come over and hold me until the darkness faded away. Or maybe he would make love to me and burn the darkness out of me with the heat of passion.

  But as I lay there, I knew I wasn’t going to do any of those things. Nothing could reach me. I was numb. I slid my hand between my thighs and touched myself, hoping to feel something, anything. I remembered Pax in my bed, his cock sliding into my wetness and how it made me feel alive. As my finger danced and touched, caressing me in all the familiar ways, I imagined it was Pax that was touching me. I gripped my breast, twisting it to the edge of pain as his big, strong hands handled me roughly.

  As he plunged into me, my fingers slid inside, and I moaned softly, my back arching in pleasure as he thrust into me. His breath was hot on my neck as he whispered into my ear how he understood and would protect me from the darkness.

  I gasped as my orgasm begun to swell within me, my fingers touching and caressing. He gasped, his own orgasm taking him as I came, the pleasure rolling through me as I keened softly in pleasure, waiting, waiting, then relaxed with a sigh.

  I lay there; panting softly, as I slowly drew my fingers up my body. I sighed again and could already feel sleep pulling at me, the darkness temporarily banished. I rolled over to my side and stared at the wall, tears leaking from my eyes to dampen my pillow, until sleep claimed me and I slid into blissful darkness.

  Chapter Twenty

  The club was starting to doubt my loyalty. Even though it hurt, I could see where they were coming from. I’d had one job when I’d followed Leah to that scummy bar, and I’d failed. I hadn’t gotten anything that would help the MC stop the impending gang wars.

  A lot had happened since then that they couldn’t use or even know about. Like the fact that Leah was becoming more than just a job at this point, though what I wasn’t sure exactly. I cared for her well-being and a desire to protect her, but I still needed to use her for information. Of course, I was sure she was fine. Women were strange creatures, with mood swings where something looked terrible to them one day and was fine the next.

  I picked up the phone and dialed her number. The phone rang for so long I was sure it would go to voicemail. It was the end of the day, but still business hours, and I figured she was busy doing whatever it was she did.

  “Hello?” She sounded distracted, her voice husky as if she’d been sleeping.

  I frowned. “How’re you doing?”

  She hesitated for just long enough to make me think that her following answer was a lie.

  “I’m alright, how are you?”

  “Am I bothering you?” I asked, not answering her return question.

  “No, I can talk.”

  She sounded distant and switched off. I’d expected her bubbly personality to leak through the phone the way it had before. I’d expected the energized, positive Leah. Instead, it felt like she wasn’t interested in hearing from me.

  “I just wanted to know if you want to come out to have drinks with me tonight.”

  I was making it sound like a date. The idea, of course, was that she thought so, but with her off responses, it made me feel like I was the one that was out of line.

  “I don’t think it’s a good idea. I’m tired. I think I’m just going to stay in tonight.” I nodded even though she couldn’t see me. “Thank you for calling, though,” she said, and the line went dead.

  I looked at my phone. That was weird. This was very different from the Leah I thought I’d come to know. It wasn’t the first time I’d been surprised by her, though. Every time I’d seen her, she was different. From sad and guarded, to energized, to sexy as hell, to a meltdown. Everything about her was unpredictable. Maybe this was the same.

  I needed to see her, though. She’d rejected the idea of going out, but she hadn’t rejected me. Not outright. Maybe it would be a good idea to surprise her with a night in, instead. Of course, it would be better to leave her alone altogether. But doing nothing wasn’t going to save my reputation at the club or stop gang wars. There wasn’t a choice.

  I left my apartment and went shopping. I found wine—the good kind, not the crap I would have bought for any other woman—and finger foods. I wanted it to be classy, with crackers and cheese, not takeaways. Leah was a girl with class, and she needed to be treated that way. Besides, if I wanted her to talk to me at all, I needed to show her that she was important to me.

  It wouldn’t be too hard to make that happen, either. She was important to me already in a way I wasn’t sure I understood. I hesitated to call it an attraction. Sure, she was hot as hell and sex with her was phenomenal. I would fuck her in a heartbeat. But I needed more from her than sex would give me, and I was going to woo it out of her if that was what it took. Desperate? Yeah, I was getting that way. Everything I’d tried had been a dry hole. She was my last hope to find out if the body in the bag was Jonas. She’d seen his face. Jonas had a nasty scar on his chin from a bar fight that ended up with him being cut with a broken bottle. I was pinning everything on her having seen that scar, or having seen there was no scar.

  I headed to her house. By the time I would get there, she should be home. When I parked in front of her home, her car was there. I smiled that she was home. It was the first step in getting what I needed from her, and hopefully what I wanted, too.

  I unstrapped the small cheese tray and bottle of wine from the bitch perch on my bike, balancing the tray in one hand with the cold bottle under my arm as I rang the doorbell. No answer. I rang it again. I glanced at her car. She should be home unless someone else had picked her up. Or maybe she was busy with someone else.

  The thought was stupid, and I pushed it away. Why was I worried about someone else? She wasn’t mine. Besides, I had a lot of charm, and I could get anyone I wanted. There was no reason to be unsure about this. I rang the doorbell a third time, leaning on the button. Nothing.

  “Fuck,” I muttered and started to turn away when the door opened.

  “Pax.” Her voice wasn’t surprised. I turned around, and I was shocked to see what she looked like.

  Her blonde hair was stringy and tangled like she hadn’t washed or brushed it for a while. She wore sweats that looked like they came from her college with Indiana State emblazoned on the front across her breasts. Her eyes had dark circles underneath them, and she smelled like alcohol. She had no makeup on. I didn’t care about makeup, but she didn’t just look unkempt, she looked drained and pale.

  “Are you alright?” I asked. I knew that it was the wrong thing to say, but shit, she didn’t look good.

  “I’m fine.”

  That was a lie. I held up the tray and the wine I’d brought and she looked at them without any emotion on her face. “I thought I would make your night in more interesting.”

  She looked back up at me for a moment, and I thought she was going to tell me to leave. Instead of telling me off, though, she nodded and stepped aside to let me in.

  “That’s very considerate of you, thank you.” Her voice was like she was on automatic. I was getting worried. I walked into the house and pu
t the tray and wine on the counter. Leah produced two small plates and a pair of wine glasses.

  “I know you don’t really drink,” I started, “but a good wine isn’t the same as guzzling Salty’s.”

  Leah nodded. I could smell the alcohol on her. I hadn’t known her for a very long time, but this wasn’t who I thought she was.

  “I could do with a drink,” she said.

  I realized that she hadn’t rejected me earlier when she’d said she didn’t want to spend a night out. She didn’t look all right, and pressing her for details now made me think that it would worsen her state. I was a selfish son of a bitch, but I had limits. Besides, if I pissed her off, or drove her even further into whatever was eating her, it would make it that much more difficult to find out what she knew.

  I sat six small cubes of cheese—one of each kind—on both plates then poured us each a glass of wine. Wine sucked, and I never drank it, but it was what women liked, so I was taking one for the team. Leah took her glass and downed half.

  “That bad, huh?” I asked as I refilled her glass. She looked at me and nodded slightly. I picked up my plate and wine as she did the same. I decided that it would be better just to spend some time together first, to ease her into the mood to talk.

  When I sat, I lifted my wine glass. “Here’s to forgetting.”

  She made a sound of approval and clinked her glass against mine before swallowing down half again. I took a sip and schooled my face into approval even though I thought it tasted like shit.

  “Not bad,” I lied as I got up and brought the bottle back, topped off her glass, then sat the bottle in easy reach. I’d cut her off before she got sloshed, but if the wine provided a little lubrication, then that was what I was going to give her.

  “I didn’t think I would be in the mood for company,” she murmured into her glass. “But it’s nice that you’re here.”

  She popped a bit of cheese into her mouth. “Thank you,” she said, as she chewed.

  I nodded and stuck a cube in my mouth too. I smiled even though it tasted like ass. “You’re welcome,” I said after I swallowed. “Sometimes it’s just nice to have someone around.”

  I was being a suck up. I was being an asshole. I was being a reliable friend and confidante to set her up for my own use. But I needed this. She had no idea what was at stake. She never would. Judging by her reactions, though, she wasn’t taking my presence as an advance toward a relationship. I wouldn’t hurt her too much when I ended up leaving.

  That was the only relief this situation brought.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  I had no idea what to do with her and things were a lot worse than I thought. The conversation was almost non-existent, but the silence wasn’t awkward. It was as if she was content with the nothingness of it all. I had the feeling she might have given up, or if she hadn’t yet, it was close. I didn’t know how to deal with that. My duties in life had only ever been to survive, to help my brothers in the club to survive, and to get the information that would make that possible. Even though it wasn’t always easy, it was never as hard as this.

  It had never been my duty to make sure someone was mentally sound and emotionally taken care of. There was no danger for Leah, physically. It was all so emotional, and I was completely out of my depth.

  “I know you’re trying to forget about what’s bothering you,” I said after I’d made every possible attempt at small talk. Her eyes were guarded when she turned them me. “I just want you to know that I’m here if you want to talk about anything. You want to tell me about the body you found? It might help.”

  I was dying to ask her details about the body. If she could tell me anything about what he looked like—the color of his hair or if there had been a scar on his chin—it would help me identify the body as Jonas. I had my convictions, but I needed proof. I needed to know for sure, though, and I needed her help. There was no other way of knowing, seeing that the police didn’t know yet.

  “There’s nothing to talk about. I’ve told you everything.”

  I shook my head. “You really haven’t. You haven’t told me what he looked like. What clothes was he wearing? Maybe if you told me you could get it out of your system.”

  She looked at me like I was a ghoul, her eyes going wide and her already pale skin become even more so. She began to shake her head, starting small but getting more violent.

  “Hey! Hey! It’s okay.” I said softly, taking her hand. “I’m just trying to help. Tell me what can I do to make this better for you.”

  I didn’t usually ask people things like that. I didn’t usually care. I shouldn’t care now. A part of me screamed that I was getting myself into trouble. But another part argued that I wanted to care, and I hadn’t been in a place where I felt that in a very long time.

  She looked at me, her big eyes deep and blue, and it looked like she was going to cry. Her expression was heartbreaking. “Will you help me forget?”

  Her voice was thin and scared, like a child who realized the monsters under the bed were real. I didn’t know how she wanted me to do that, but I wanted to tell her that I could, that I would.

  I nodded. “Yes. How?”

  She swallowed hard as if she had to contain herself, and then she leaned forward and kissed me. It was the last thing I’d expected. The kiss was urgent almost immediately. Her mouth was hot on mine as she took control. It was the complete the opposite of what I thought would happen and it caught me by surprise.

  For a moment, I didn’t respond the way I normally would, and she broke the kiss, looking at me with eyes that had so much hurt, and now, rejection.

  “You don’t want me?” she asked, and I could hear the panic and anguish creeping into her voice.

  I was starting to catch on. She was using the sex as an escape. I didn’t understand it, but better with me than someone else. Not only would I get to fuck her, but it also helped her to trust me so maybe she would open up a little.

  I grabbed her face with both hands and pulled her into me again. I kissed her with the same urgency as she’d offered me, taking what she gave me and gave it back to her. She was trying to ride out the storm, and I was the guy that was going to fuck her through it.

  She didn’t take very long before she started tugging at her clothes. Her shirt came off, and she wasn’t wearing a bra underneath. Her breasts were perfect and natural and even better than I remembered. I put my hands on them, tweaked and tugged at her nipples, kissed her and licked her. She closed her eyes and threw herself into the passion until there was nothing left but what we were doing.

  I got rid of my shirt and my pants, and when I pulled her pants down she was wet and glistening, her body begging for mine. I shoved her roughly back on the couch and settled between her legs. She looked at me with a mixture of lust, pain, and hope, and it made my blood roar. I entered her with a lunge. She gasped out as I plunged in, twisting on the couch as her back arched. I pulled back and drove into her again as she grabbed my arms and moaned softly. I drove into her again, then again, her mouth twisting into a sneer as she grabbed my hair and pulled me down into a torrid kiss. As we kissed, I continued to thrust into her. She arched her back more, forcing her hips up as she forced her head into the gap between the back and seat cushions. I struggled to keep thrusting, the angle was wrong with one knee on the couch and a foot on the floor.

  It was the most intense sex I’d ever had as we snarled at each other, grasping and pulling, bucking and thrusting, demanding more and getting it. She wailed, long and loud, as she twisted and then clamped down around me. I couldn’t hold against her push, and we tumbled to the floor with a bump. Having her fall on me as she orgasmed was the sexiest thing that had ever happened to me. And it wasn’t just fucking, either. There was so much emotion behind it; I was starting to see why women got so attached. I couldn’t remember the last time, if ever, sex had meant this much to me.

  She was like a machine and began to thrust on my hardness, growling down at me, her face intense a
s she stared into my eyes. For the first time tonight she looked alive, her teeth bared in a snarl before she flattened herself to me, taking my lips and thrusting her tongue into my mouth.

  I tangled my hands in her hair and held her in the kiss. I felt her try to pull back, straining against my hold, but then she relaxed and kissed me even harder.

  She reared up, her hands on my chest as she thrust, her breasts swinging with her motion. Her face began to distort; her eyes closing, and her lips opening until her face twisted in anguish. She tipped her head down, pulling her chin into her chest as she shuddered and her face melted in sweet agony. She sat on me; her body alive with motion until she released the breath she’d been holding with an explosive exhale.

  She collapsed on top of me, panting with her release and efforts as she took my lips, kissing me thoroughly as I began to thrust into her again. I hadn’t come yet, but I wasn’t far off. Taking her fill from my lips, she leaned back, stilling my hips before smiling at me then rising to her feet.