Dirty Sex (13 page)

a splash of deep blue over golden brown skin and then there was a fist

connecting with my stomach.

I indulged myself with enough time to fill my lungs before

I punched the fucker back. In an instant, Carson was hauling him

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backward and Reese was in front of me. She was pretending to stop

me, but she didn’t have to try hard.

“Hey, stop it,” Carson said. “Everybody cool down, all right?”

“Yeah, fine.” I wasn’t even that heated up. Just annoyed.

“Whatever. Let me go.” The boyfriend shrugged Carson off.

“All right. I think it’s time for you to go,” Reese told the guy. She

kept a cursory hand on my shoulder as she turned to look at him.

“That bitch attacked my girlfriend,” he protested loudly.

“No, she didn’t, baby,” the girl finally spoke up.

“Listen to your girlfriend,” I advised him a little unnecessarily.

He moved too fast for anyone to stop him. He tackled me and we

slammed into the wall. Actually, I slammed into the wall. Behind me,

I felt the drywall give way. The girlfriend screamed. Carson picked

the kid up unceremoniously and dragged him out of the office. The

girlfriend watched them go looking all distraught and shit.

“Fuck, Coop. Are you okay?” Reese rushed over and pulled me

up. “Yeah, yeah. I’m fine.” But she wasn’t even looking at me, just

staring at the wall. It was going to be a bitch to fix that. I turned to check

out the hole. It was six inches wide at least, but instead of the dark hole

with wood beams that I was expecting, I saw the glint of gold.

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Get her out of here, Reese.” I stepped in front of the hole so the

girl couldn’t see.

“Yeah, okay.” Reese’s face was a mixture of confusion and slow

comprehension. The girl looked even more baffled as Reese led her out

of the office and hopefully out of the house. I locked the door behind

them and started pacing, looking everywhere except that hole. There

was no way. I just imagined it. When there was a subtle knock at the

door, I jumped.

“Who, uh…” What followed who? “Who is it?” I asked.

“It’s me.” Reese.

“Are you alone?”

“Yeah, of course.” I could feel her glaring though the heavy wood.

It took me a minute to unlock the door and open it. The second

Reese was in, I locked it again. We stared at each other, both waiting for

the other to look at the wall.

“Are you okay?” Reese cautiously turned me around and brushed

off my shirt. Anything for a distraction.

“My shoulder is kind of sore.”

“Unbutton your shirt.” Her heels clicked on the floor as she walked

to the windows and pulled the curtains closed. Without the bright lights

set up outside, the room was nearly dark. Only a small lamp on the desk

afforded any light. Clumsily, I started unbuttoning. Reese pulled the

shirt from my pants and finished opening it. Meticulously, she pulled it

off my shoulders and pushed aside the ribbed tank top I was wearing to

examine my back.

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“I’m sure it’s fine, Reese.”

“You’re going to bruise.” Her fingertips traced over my skin. I

could feel goose bumps raise on my back and arms. “Why did you let

him hit you?”

“I didn’t expect the tackle.”

Reese pulled my tank top back into place. “Maybe, but you should

have expected the first hit. The one we walked in on.”

“What were you doing here anyway?” I took the shirt she handed

me and slowly put it on.

“We were getting more alcohol.” With a twitch of her wrist, she

pointed at the liquor cabinet. “Why did you let him hit you?” She was

relentless.

“I didn’t let him.” I unbuttoned my pants to tuck my shirt back in.

Reese wasn’t looking at my face anymore. Her gaze was lower. Much

lower. “I just got…distracted.”

“Oh,” was all she said.

“Should we?” I waited for her to say it.

“Look at the wall?”

“Yeah. There’s no way.”

“Right, yeah. It’s probably some electrical unit or something.”

Reese could always be counted on for logic.

“Or something. Yeah.” My stunning intellect shone through.

We slowly turned and looked. It was so not an electrical unit. I

pulled away some of the drywall. Reese reached in and, with a loud

clunk, extracted a gold bar.

❖

Ryan was sprawled in an armchair. Reese and I were on the couch.

We all had big mugs of coffee to compensate for the fact that it was six

in the morning and we hadn’t slept.

“Did you guys have a good time?” Ryan pulled his St. Christopher

necklace out of his shirt and slid it back and forth on the chain.

“Uh huh.” I blinked through gritty eyes. Sleep wasn’t in my near

future.

“Yeah.” Reese’s long eyelashes drooped.

“You both seem kind of out of it.” He was way too observant.

Reese shot me a look and I nodded toward the stairs. We couldn’t talk

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there. At least five other people were asleep in the rooms surrounding

us.

“Come here, Ryan. We want to show you something.” I stood and

started for the stairs. It didn’t take the twins long to follow me.

“What’s up? Where are you taking me?”

“Just wait,” Reese said. At the door of Christopher’s office, she

handed me the key. Where she’d been keeping it in that dress, I’d never

know.“Guys, this is a little weird. Is this about the fight last night?” Ryan

slouched against the doorframe while I unlocked and pushed open the

door. We filed in and Reese locked the door again.

“Whoa. Hole in the wall,” Ryan remarked casually. “Guess we’ll

have to patch—” He walked closer, examined it, then turned back to us.

“You’re fucking with me.”

“I found your money.” It was supposed to be funny. It wasn’t, just

weak.

“We wanted to tell you last night, but we thought it was best to

keep it on the down low,” Reese offered in explanation.

Ryan slumped to the couch. “How much is in there?”

“We don’t know.” Reese perched on the arm of the couch next to

him.

“What are we going to do?” Ryan knew we didn’t have any

answers.

“No idea.” I was just along for the ride.

“Who else knows?” He was straight up shocked, but at least he

was thinking.

“The girl I was with might.”

“Kristin,” Reese supplied. At least someone caught her name.

“Let me guess.” Ryan looked at me half proud and half annoyed.

“Her boyfriend isn’t too happy.”

“She didn’t tell me she had a boyfriend.” That sounded pathetic.

“Any chance she’ll tell him and he’ll want to teach us an expensive

lesson?” He really tried to not sound like an asshole.

“I think you’re giving the girls Cooper hooks up with way too

much credit,” Reese said.

“Fuck, Ryan.” I ignored Reese. “I don’t think she even saw, but I

don’t know, okay? How about being happy I found your money?” They

just glared. “Right. What’s the plan?”

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They made some meaningful eye contact with each other. “How

do you feel about Mexico?” I wasn’t sure if Ryan was kidding.

“Let’s see how much is in there,” I said. “Make sure it’s worth it.”

They seemed to think that was a good idea. Ryan went to get a

couple hammers from the garage. Then we started to pull the drywall

down. Reese said it made her hands hurt. I didn’t see how that was

possible. All you had to do was put the hammer in the wall and pull. It

was messy as hell.

“There better be a lot in there. ’Cause I am so not cleaning this

up.” I wasn’t too worried. We’d already removed quite a few feet from

the wall and more gold was still visible.

“We’re doing all the work. If it needs to be put back, Princess

Reese can do it.”

Reese looked up at the sound of her name. The midnight blue

dress she was wearing was pristine. Ryan and I were head to toe white

powder.

“Maybe you should have changed clothes,” she said.

“Fuck you.” Maybe I was a little cranky.

“Okay, I think we can start pulling the bars out,” Ryan said to shut

us up.

“All right.” I set my hammer down. Ryan started handing me bars

one at a time so I could stack them on the desk. “These are fuckin’

heavy.”

“Don’t you watch movies? Of course they’re fuckin’ heavy.” Reese

picked one up off the desk. “Oh my God. How much do they weigh?”

“Why don’t you do some research, princess?” I leaned over and

turned the computer in front of her on.

After all of the bars were out of the wall, Ryan and I started

counting them. Reese was super helpful. She kept updating us while

we counted.

“What’s a troy ounce? How do you convert that to pounds? I think

this website has today’s gold prices. Why is it listed for New York and

London? I don’t see how the price in Singapore is going to help me.”

“Reese, would you please just shut up?” I asked after I lost count

at twenty again.

“Ryan, she’s being mean.”

“Reese, I love you,” Ryan said. “But if you don’t shut up I might

kill you.”

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“Fine.”

Ryan and I each counted in absolute silence. “You done?” I asked

after my second count.

“Yeah, I counted three times.” Ryan said. “You?”

“Got the same both times.”

“So how many?” Reese asked. We told her.

“How much is it worth?” Ryan asked.

Reese typed, deleted, and typed again, shaking her head. With a

low whistle, she leaned back. “Thirty-four million.”

❖

“What else do we need?” The front hall of the twins’ place was

piled with duffle bags of clothes, pillows, blankets, a small bag with

Ryan’s handguns, grocery bags of junk food, and water. Off to the side

there was a neat pyramid of gold bars.

It was scorching in the foyer. Actually, it was scorching

everywhere. At two o’clock in the afternoon, the temperature outside

was approaching its triple digit height. I wondered why the air-

conditioner wasn’t on.

Reese ignored me. She ran her hands through her hair and pulled

it up off her skin. Beads of sweat stood out on her neck.

“You look good, Reese.” She let go of her hair.

“Are you sure we need to take two cars?” Reese pretended not to

hear my comment.

“I don’t think either car will hold that much weight.” I thought she

went to Yale. Didn’t they teach common sense there? “We don’t want

them riding suspiciously low.”

“I just think we should try it.”

“It won’t work,” I said. “Do you want your precious Mercedes

scraping the pavement?”

“What about Ryan’s?”

“His is lifted.”

“Whatever.” She walked out and returned a couple minutes later

with a bottle of cold water.

“Thanks for bringing one for me.” Sometimes I thought Reese just

couldn’t hear me.

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AShley BArtlett

“We need to pick up your stuff. Ready to face your mother?” She

knew I was putting off saying good-bye to my mom. At my grimace,

Reese laughed. “You are such a mama’s boy.”

“So?” I sauntered closer and made a show of leaning down to look

in her eyes. If she thought I wasn’t going to play up the whole being

taller than her thing, she was crazy.

A delicate fist gripped my polo shirt and yanked me closer. “It’s

kind of pathetic, you know?”

“And?” I could smell the sweet tang of her sweat. “You’re sexy

when you’re all sweaty.”

“We need to talk.”

“About my mother?” I wasn’t pretending to be confused. It was all

real. Maybe the heat was making me stupid.

“You know, we don’t have to bring you with us.” She wasn’t

asking, just telling me. I nodded. “And you know we don’t have to give

you a cut.”

“I didn’t think you were.”

Reese looked at me like I was an idiot. “We are.” That was a

surprise. It was probably going to be out of Ryan’s half. “So if you want

your cut, you play by our rules.” She pulled me even closer.

“What rules?”

“Stop hitting on me. Stop looking at me like I’m a piece of meat.

Don’t act like you’re calling the shots because you’re not.”

I pretended to consider her rules. After a second, I brushed her hair

away from her ear so I could lean close and whisper, “If I give up my

cut, can I still hit on you?”

The grip on my shirt eased up and Reese snaked a hand behind

my neck. Her cheek pressed against mine. “No,” she murmured. I was

breathing hard, but I think she was too. With every breath, I could feel

her tits brush against me.

I backed away like it was no big deal. “All right, buttercup, but it

goes both ways.” Indolently, I tugged my sweat-dampened polo over

my head to reveal an equally damp tank top.

“Believe me, it won’t be a struggle.”

It would for me. Not that I was going to tell her that.

Thankfully, Ryan walked in two minutes later. I didn’t think I

could glare disdainfully much longer.

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Dirty Sex

“Cell phones for everybody.” He tossed each of us a pre-paid cell

phone.