Driven to the Edge: A Bad Boy Hitman Romance (5 page)

I
direct
Alicia to pull off I-15 in a little town called Jean, Nevada just over the state line. It’s pretty typical for this part of the state: a couple prominent casinos, a couple truck stops, assorted other buildings. After coasting around a bit, I select the Desert Vista Motel, a quiet single-story joint that’s all orange stucco and potted cacti.

It’s significantly below market for the Maybach, but I figure the hotel staff will just assume I’m some rich playboy with a hooker. We are about an hour outside of Vegas, after all.

People in this part of the world don’t ask questions.

I use a different fake ID to rent the room, just in case Los Angeles has already figured out Jake Hawthorne is a criminal. I ask for Suite J on the far end of the strip of rooms. That way we only have one neighbor in the unlikely event this place fills up at night.

I pay cash.

Lucky for Alicia, the room has two double beds. If there had only been one, I’m definitely not the kind of guy to offer her my bed and sleep on the floor.

The room is basic: orange and dark blue and sandy pink tones, two beds and a table and a TV mounted in the corner of the room. The bathroom has a door, at least. The whole room has a whiff of cigarette smoke about it, despite being a nonsmoking unit. Go figure.

The Maybach is far more secure than this dump, so apart from one of my sigs and some ammo, I leave everything important in the car. My little silver suitcase has a toiletry bag and a change of clothes, chargers, the usual bits and pieces. I travel light.

I lead Alicia into the room and let her choose her bed.

“Am I going to have to zip-tie you to the headboard?”

I unpack my toiletry bag in the bathroom, contemplate shaving. I wait for her response.

“No.” She sounds sullen, but I think she’s telling the truth.

“Do you want a shower?”

Again, I’m happy to let her have all the creature comforts in the world if she’ll just fucking behave. This is why I never take hostages. They’re so much work.

I poke my head out of the bathroom. Alicia’s sitting on the edge of her bed, staring down at her black high heels. She looks exhausted. And shit, the day she’s having, I can’t blame her.

“Here,” I say. “I’ll run a bath for you.”

I slip into the bathroom--which has way too many awful shades of dusty pink for my liking--and plug the tub. I pick a temperature a bit cooler than I usually like it. The sound of running water rushing through my ears, I stroll out of the bathtub and step out of my shoes.

Alicia hasn’t moved. She stares up at me sullenly from her spot on the bed. I put my hands up, as if offended.

“What? I’m not a complete monster.”

She tilts her head up and looks me in the eye.

“I don’t get you.”

Her voice has an odd, questioning quality. Like she’s wondering it more aloud to herself than to me.

“There’s nothing to get,” I explain, my voice calm and easygoing. “If you behave, I have no issue with you. Hell, I’ll even treat you real nice. But up until pretty recently, you haven’t behaved so well.”

I sit down on my own mattress, right across from her. I put on my biggest, brightest smile for her, the kind that makes all the girls weak in the knees.

“As long as I know you aren’t going to try to wiggle out the bathroom window, you and I will get along fine.”

Alicia meets my eyes, but there’s a guarded wariness in her stare. I can’t blame her.

She really has been through a lot.

That gives me an idea.

I hold up a finger to her, then gesture to the telephone.

“Look, I don’t know how to convince you I’m not some murderer. But you’ve had a very stressful day. How about a drink to cool your jets?”

Alicia gives me a look that could cut a man so deep he’d bleed.

“My jets don’t need cooling,” she says, flatly.

“Suit yourself.”

I pick up the phone and ask if the front desk manager could wrangle a bottle of tequila from the liquor store across the street. It takes the promise of a huge tip, but he acquiesces. I have my ways with people. And when my ways don’t work, money talks.

The desk clerk drops the bottle off with an awkward smile a few minutes later. When I turn back to the room, Alicia is heading toward the bathroom.

“Hey,” I start. “Not just yet.”

Surprisingly, she stops. She’s getting used to obeying me. This is progress. Given a little longer, I could probably convince her to do so much for me...

She stops in the bathroom doorway, still fully dressed, a hand pressed against the doorframe. Even as exhausted as I know she must be, she’s beautiful. Her hair’s gone a little wispy, hanging around her expressive face in loose tangles. I feel a momentary impulse to reach out and gently brush it behind her ear. To comfort her. Even though I’m the reason she’s in this state to begin with.

Aren’t human emotions funny things.

Gesturing with the bottle of tequila, I lay out the ground rules for her:

“I’m not against giving you a little private time so long as you don’t misbehave. But I’m also not going to take unnecessary chances. For all I know you’ve got a shiv or a phone or something hidden away in your clothes. They stay out here with me.”

Alicia’s eyes widen. She whips her head back and forth quickly.

“No,” she says. “Absolutely not. You’re out of your fucking mind. I am not getting naked out here in front of you.”

I flash her an angelic smile.

“I won’t look,” I lie. “But I’m afraid you aren’t in a position to negotiate.”

I can see the consideration pass over Alicia’s features. She looks frustrated, disgusted, and then something I can’t place passes over her eyes, a strangely thoughtful look.

“Fine.” She says it like a man off to the gallows.

Alicia strips artlessly, like an exhausted person staggering home from the bar. There’s nothing seductive or sexy about it at all. And yet something about the bare, tired honesty of her actions causes a stir within me.

She starts with the sheath dress, pulling it up and over her head. Underneath, she’s wearing a black camisole that hugs every inch of her compactly curvy frame, leaving little to the imagination. Her panties are black, boyshort style, hugging her hips in a way I find myself quite liking.

Alicia meets my eye. I swear to God for a second she’s almost smiling.

“You said you wouldn’t peek, so this is as good as you get.”

She throws the dress into a heap at my feet.

“That’s not the deal,” I protest.

“You were worried about me hiding something in here. Does it look like this cami and underwear could hide anything?”

I take a good, long look. I start at her feet, then wander my eyes up her shapely legs, up the pert curve of her ass, then the dip of her waist and the lines of the camisole, leading up to her bare shoulders and the tasteful hint of cleavage.

No, there’s no chance she’s hiding anything in there other than a pair of perfectly-proportioned breasts that I can’t wait to feel in my hands...

I calm myself down, focus on her face again.

“Fine,” I spit. “Deal.”

She strolls into the bathroom and shuts the door. I pull the stopper from the bottle of tequila.

Between the drive, the people I killed, and having to manage a hostage in addition to my own life, I feel like I’ve earned a drink.

I
hate to admit it
, but for a split second, I’m grateful. When I sink into the hot bath Jake ran for me, I feel some of my tension just bleed away. Then I remember who drew the bath for me and feel my anger rush back anew.

It took a lot out of me to smile at him, to wiggle out of my dress in front of him, to give him a good long look at my body. I’m not sure if it worked. But he looked. And he looked for a
long
time.

At some point, I made the conscious decision to seduce him. Either to ensure he keeps me alive, or to distract him long enough to get free. Preferably the latter, but if the opportunity doesn’t present itself, the former will do.

Warm water lapping at my skin, I sink down into the bath up to my chin. The tub’s huge. I could disappear under the surface if I wanted. For a moment I’m tempted. I have the fleeting fantasy of
maybe if I dunk my head underwater all of this will go away.

I used to get that feeling after I lost my photography studio. But it never helped then, either. So I know it won’t help now.

Wiping water droplets off my face, I close my eyes and try to formulate a more coherent plan. I’m a planner by nature, or at least I try to be. Having a step-by-step process to follow helps me when I get overwhelmed. So I try to break my current situation down into something that can be managed step by step.

Step one: I’ve got to get Jake to either trust me or like me.

Step two: I’ve got to get the fuck out of here.

And those steps can be broken down yet further.

How do I get Jake to trust and like me? Build intimacy. Let him in. Act scared and vulnerable. Let him feel like he’s in charge. These aren’t things I’ve ever done before, but it’s amazing what the human brain is capable of when backed into a corner.

I’d have never considered myself an actress. But now I have the chance.

And I think it might be easier if I start things off with a drink of that tequila.

I steel myself for what I’m about to do. It isn’t easy, exposing myself to a stranger. Let alone a stranger who’s a known dangerous quantity. It’s true Jake hasn’t done anything to specifically hurt me yet, but I don’t doubt that he would in a heartbeat if he felt like it was the only option.

I’ve got to take that option away.

So I’ll have a bit of his booze. Let him think I’m way drunker than I am. And if that gets him relaxed, good.

But first I have to work up the courage to call out and ask for that drink.

It takes a few minutes.

“Hey!” I finally yell out. “About that tequila...”

Jake shows up on the other side of the door. I can see the outline of his feet in the crack below it. Oddly enough, he doesn’t come straight inside. Preserving my modesty? After everything that came before? I could almost laugh.

“What about it?”

“You haven’t finished it, have you?”

I hear him loose a short laugh. Then he opens up the bathroom door and peers at me through a crack in it.

I meet his eyes from the waterline, sunk down low in the bath.

“I think maybe I could use some relaxing after all.”

He considers me from the hallway, obvious mistrust written all over his face, but he comes inside. I let my head loll back in the water, tracking him with my eyes.

For a minute, it looks like he might say something. But he doesn’t. Instead, he grabs one of the little plastic-wrapped cups off the bathroom counter and tears the wrapping away. He pours a generous amount of tequila into the cup, then dangles it down toward me.

Slow and deliberate, I reach up from the bath, my arm dripping with water, and take the cup from him. I let my damp fingers glide against his. Though I imagine it doesn’t quite reach my eyes, I twitch a little half-smile up toward him.

“Thanks.”

I force a small gulp of the drink down. It burns all the way down my throat. I haven’t had tequila since one memorable night in art school several years back, but I actively avoid dredging those memories up.

I can feel Jake watching me, studying the ripple-distorted angles of my body beneath the water’s surface. He’s been looking since I met him, of course. But it’s more important he look now.

Hoping it looks unintentional, I sit up enough to reveal a glimpse of my collarbone and shoulders, tipping another drink up to my mouth.

I stay quiet, not wanting to risk an awkward conversation. Given I haven’t eaten for a while, the combination of warm water and tequila has me feeling fairly light-headed in a short amount of time. I haven’t even finished half my glass before I feel a nice, content buzz humming through my veins.

That’s about all I want, though. I can’t risk actually getting drunk. I can’t actually lose control of myself.

I take another calculated risk. I decide to be the one to break the silence.

“I mean what I said earlier. I’m done trying to run.”

I peer up at Jake, whose face is partially shadowed in the bathroom’s dim light. He looks thoughtful and far-away, like it isn’t me he’s thinking about. Which is probably a good thing.

“Good idea,” he says, only a little sarcastic.

I try my hand at seeing things from his point of view.

“I feel like you’ve probably got a plan,” I say. “A plan that didn’t originally involve hauling a hostage all over the desert. It must be... frustrating.”

Now he’s looking right at me.

“You have no fucking idea,” he says, deadpan.

“Do I get to find out what you’re heading to Vegas for?”

“First off, you’re my hostage, not my partner. Second off, who says we’re headed to Vegas?”

“It’s the only logical destination given where we’ve stopped.”

“... Fair enough.”

Jake takes a swig from the bottle. He licks his lips, doesn’t grimace the way I did. I wonder if he’s a habitual drinker or if there’s just something heavy weighing on his mind.

I lean back in the bath and cross my legs, water rippling away from them. The move works: his eyes lock onto my legs, traveling as far up them as he can before my skin disappears below the water.

It feels strangely empowering, doing this to a man on purpose. It’s not the type of person I usually am. But then again, I haven’t even dipped my toe in the dating pool since Erik fucked my business over and left me. Not because I felt like I couldn’t move on, but because I had to throw myself entirely into work.

So... empowering, but also intimidating.

I let him think the tequila is having more of an effect on me than it is. I laugh suddenly, and when his eyebrows raise in question, I just shake my head.

“Just remembered something,” I say, quiet and cryptic.

“Oh yeah?”

“Last time I drank tequila. It was back when I was at Cal Arts. Messy.”

Jake considers me with an ever-growing smirk on his mouth.

“You don’t strike me as a partier,” he says.

“Maybe not anymore. But oh, back in the day.”

“Back in the day? You aren’t that old.”

I laugh again, this time throwing my head back, water splattering off my hair. Jake takes a step into the bathroom, and for a moment it looks like he might reach out to touch me. I steel myself for it, waiting. But instead he sits down on the floor beside the bathtub.

To refill my drink.

Oh.

He leans over and tops up my tequila. I take an obliging sip, trying to look like I’m swigging more down than I am in reality.

It’ll be harder to fool him when he’s this close.

Relaxing back in the bathtub, trying not to stare at Jake sitting beside me, I take another swig of the tart, burning liquor. Something occurs to me that sets me laughing, my shoulders shuddering.

Jake tilts his head, watching me curiously.

Finally, he asks. He can’t contain his curiosity.

“What?”

I tilt my glass toward him, smiling in a way I hope is shy and a little flirtatious.

“Looks like I did end up having a drink with you back at the hotel.”

It takes a moment for him to catch on, then he’s laughing too. He lifts the bottle up and leans forward, as if to refill it again, but hesitates. He stops right near me, the bottle hovering over my glass, his face mere inches from mine.

My heart pounds in my chest so loud that I swear he must be able to hear it.

Should I go for it?

Should I kiss him?

I’m too afraid to initiate the contact, even though it would mean my plan is working. I can’t quite make myself do it. But I slip my tongue out, licking my bottom lip, and leave my lips parted a moment, breathing shallowly.

Jake, his eyes all dilated, the smoky gunpowder smell of him right up close to me, finally leans in and closes the distance between us. He’s kissing me before I even understand what’s going on. Maybe I got a little drunker than I intended.

For such a violent, controlling man, Jake is a slow and methodical kisser. He merely closes his mouth over mine, testing, teasing, before plunging his tongue in. He takes it slow, exploring the interior of my mouth, the smoky-tart taste of tequila dancing on our tongues.

Within seconds, I feel light-headed. He’s an incredible kisser. I hadn’t anticipated enjoying this at all.

I feel myself groan into his mouth, a flutter of shame reddening my cheeks. I’m losing control. Pretty soon I won’t have the upper hand here.

Jake sets the tequila down and reaches up, twisting a hand through my damp hair. He anchors my head in place, kissing me hard, then trails his mouth down my chin, reaching my jaw. His hot tongue gliding across my jawline, I throw my head back, losing myself in the sensation. My eyelids flutter; my pulse stop-starts.

I can’t remember the last time someone kissed me like this.

Possibly never.

As his mouth explores mine, Jake’s hand explores my body. He starts at my hairline, brushing over my hair, then drags his fingers along the lines of my shoulder and clavicle. He shrugs out of his suit jacket in a hurry, then rolls up a sleeve so he can dip his hand below the surface of the water.

In the hot bath, I feel his fingertips graze my knuckle. I gasp, jerking reflexively in the water, and a low chuckle sounds in the back of Jake’s throat. The sound of it isn’t entirely un-menacing, and that yanks me out of the moment. I remember who he is now: my captor. A murderer. I can’t let myself enjoy this too much.

But then his hand squeezes my breast, his strong fingers massaging over my skin. I whimper and lean up into his hand, my body betraying my attempts to stay stoic.

I can’t help but remember my last night with Erik, the last time I’d let a man touch me like that. Our last night together was wild, euphoric, the desperate clawing of two people trying to salvage a relationship on the brink of falling apart. Then I found out he wasn’t as invested in fixing things as I thought.

First Erik, now Jake... what’s wrong with me?

Jake’s strong hand working my breast, his mouth on my neck, the tequila buzz warming me all over, I give in and let myself enjoy it. Even if this seduction is a means to an end, there’s no reason I can’t close my eyes and enjoy the feeling in my body, right?

It feels wrong. But it also feels
so good.

Jake’s hand travels further down--just like my dream, my hazy mind reminds me--and his fingers brush against my slit, sending an electric jolt through my entire body. I stifle a gasp in my arm, thrashing in the tub, and Jake lets out another one of those low, predatory laughs.

He’s leaning over me in the bathtub now, sleeves rolled up to his elbows, but I’m sloshing water onto his expensive dress shirt anyway. He doesn’t seem to care. His stubble grazes my cheek as he kisses me, devours me, his fingers probing just a bit inside me...

I shudder, clutching my knees together. It’s been so long since I let someone do this. I know I won’t be able to last long. I can’t feel how wet I am due to the bathwater, but my body is thrumming, eager for any hint of a touch from Jake.

To be fair, my body has wanted Jake from the beginning. It was just my own sense of ethics and common sense that held me back.

Now I give in, arching my hips up as his fingers delve inside me, dipping in slowly, pressing in just to the first knuckle, just enough to hint at what’s to come.

Then his thumb brushes my clit, a light and gentle touch. I shudder all over, biting down hard, clenching my teeth.

Jake begins to work up a rhythm with his hand, two fingers pumping inside me alternating with well-timed pressure on my clit from his thumb. I rock back and forth in the tub, the hot water peaking my temperature even higher as the flames of arousal kindle in my stomach.

Panting quietly, I toss my head back and am startled to find Jake looking directly into my eyes. That dark intensity of his stare freezes me in place, mouth open, breathing hard. I feel like I can’t move, like I can’t even breathe.

Jake stares me down as his hand works over my sex, driving me into a fever. He’s still piercing my eyes with his when the sudden crash of my orgasm tears through me, a violent surge that sends water sloshing out onto the floor as I thrash against Jake’s hand. I can see the desire in Jake’s eyes, just how bad he wants me. It sends a whole new series of shudders through me.

I cry out, burying my wet face in his dry neck. Jake holds my head in place with his free hand. I can smell him, that gunpowder and aftershave scent. In that moment, I’ve never smelled anything sexier. There’s something so impossibly controlling and masculine about him that I feel like I should hate it, but I don’t.

I crash back down to earth, breathing hard.

Jake’s smirking at me again. He leans down and nips my ear, a gentle kiss to the shell of it.

“That ought to relax you,” he purrs into my ear. Then he kisses me one last time--lewdly, full of tongue--before he disappears and leaves me alone in the bathtub, wondering how that all just happened, my thighs still shaking, my body still aching with need for him.