Page 20 of Executing Malice (Jefferson Rejects #4)

LEILA

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“Stay here,” I snap at him as I hurriedly brush a hand down my skirt and over my hair.

He doesn’t say anything, nor does he stop me when I locate the thin, gold thread of light outlining a rectangle in the far wall. I’m praying I don’t smell like sex and sweat as I sprint to greet the client.

I plaster on my mandatory smile and slip out, careful not to open the door too wide.

Three faces smile back as I rush to my kiosk and get to work with my channel sore and my clit tender. Sitting is definitely a challenge, but I manage not to wiggle too much as I help the last person and watch them pass over the threshold.

Only when the door has closed behind them and no one else comes in do I jump to my feet and hurry to release the crazy man in the staffroom.

It does dawn on me for a flicker of a second that this could have been his motives from the beginning; get me hooked on him and lure me to the safe to rob the bank. It would be the perfect cover. I just left him alone in there for over twenty minutes.

Granted, he can’t actually go anywhere from there. Even the bathroom doesn’t have a window. Plus, the safe is locked and only Mr. Haberman has access. If he dies unexpectedly, the entire town will be screwed because no one else has the passcodes.

Nevertheless, I shove open the door, half expecting him to be kneeling at the safe with a stethoscope.

He’s not.

He’s standing in front of me. Cargo pants fastened. Helmet in place. A still figure cloaked in shadows.

The sight of him has my heart flipping in my chest even as heat swells in my cheeks.

“Get out of there,” I grumble, more irritated with myself than him.

With the slowest swagger, he ambles up to me and stops when I have to tip my head back. My reflection stares back at me from the glossy surface of his visor. Wide-eyed. Flushed. The face of someone who’s in way over her head.

“That is not what you said when I had my cock in your tight pussy.”

The low simmer of blood beneath the skin on my face rises to a boil. I feel it burn behind my eyes.

I can’t see his expression, but I would bet my last dollar he’s grinning .

“Asshole,” I mutter, and have to turn away when my own lips twitch.

I get about three feet when I’m captured by a single arm hooked around my waist. It yanks me back into all those muscles and heat.

“Are you offering?” he drawls thickly into my ear.

Despite my annoyance with him, I giggle.

Giggle.

The sound is so ridiculous I want to die of shame, but his fingers are creeping around the hem of my sweater. Slipping beneath the soft wool to glide along the elastic of my skirt.

“We can go back. I’ll bend you over and make you take my cock in your ass.”

The appendage in question is rock hard, wedged between us. It burns through both sets of clothes to scorch my lower back.

“I’m ... I’m at work,” I stammer. “If we’re caught—”

“I’ll marry you,” he offers without missing a beat. “No shotgun required.”

My head jerks up and I’m caught in the plastic dividing us. Keeping me from seeing his seriousness because this guy is too much. He’s moving too quickly and all wrong. Scary bit of all, I don’t think he’s joking .

“What’s...?” I stop myself from asking what’s wrong with him. “You don’t know me.”

“Wrong.” His arm tightens around me even though I haven’t moved. “I know everything about you, Leila.”

I find myself turning in his hold, placing myself face to face with my stalker. “I don’t know you. I haven’t even seen your face. You’re talking about babies and ... and marriage. You can’t be serious.”

“You have no idea how serious I am.” One big, gloved hand cups the back of my skull and pulls me closer. “I’m keeping you. Even if I have to kidnap you, lock you up and keep you until you change your mind. Even if you run. Even if you try to kill me. I will never let you go again.”

I wait for fear.

I wait for the bells to warn me I’m in danger.

Everything he just said is terrifying. Psychopathic behavior. It’s the kind of energy women get warned to run from.

Why aren’t I running?

Why can’t I pull away?

There isn’t a cell in my body willing to detach from him.

“You’re crazy,” is the best my brain can manage, apparently.

His shoulders twitch with his low chuckle. “No. I’m worse.”

I swallow thickly. “What’s worse? ”

“Yours,” he answers smoothly. “I’m your monster.”

“Are you going to hurt me?”

His fingers tighten in my hair. “Yes. I’m going to break and bleed you. I’m going to make you cry and beg. And you will thank me when I put you together again.”

God, he really is crazy. Crazy and dangerous. But honestly, I don’t know if that makes it better. It seems to, because I’m still making no move to get away from him.

Maybe it’s a trauma response.

Maybe I’m so desperate for love and human connection that this is acceptable in my mind. It definitely needs a deeper investigation, but he’s pulling the ribbon from my hair.

The strip of crimson releases with a hiss, unraveling my braid. The strands tumble around my shoulders in twisted coils. Without a word, it’s stuffed into his pocket.

“My ribbon,” I mumble stupidly, because that’s the concern right now it seems.

“Mine now.”

I open my mouth to tell him I want it back when he goes rigid against me. His head snaps up in the direction of the windows.

“Shit.”

I spin to see what has his attention and expel my own curse .

Reed.

Even from the back, his uniform is unmistakable in the afternoon sun. The light glints off his neatly trimmed strands, tinting the brown to the color of wet sand with a hint of gold.

He’s been sidetracked by Opal and Ezra Bingley. It must be serious; Reed is in his Superman pose. That usually means business.

But I have my own problems.

Without thinking it through, I grab my biker and shove him in the direction of the kiosk. I’m not paying too much attention while keeping an eye on my brother’s back. But I get biker-man under the desk just as Reed finishes with several official bobs of his head.

“Ow!” biker man mutters when the back of his helmet thumps against the edge of my desk as he tries to crawl in backwards.

“Shut it and get under there!” I snap.

“You keep bossing me around like this and I might get a boner.”

I shouldn’t laugh, but goddamn it.

“Keep quiet,” I grumble, trying to smother my grin.

“Yes ma’am.”

I wait until he’s wedged under before dragging my chair over and dropping into it. I’m forced to draw back when he grunts and fights to find a comfortable position in the confined space with the helmet.

“Take it off,” I hiss.

“Your fake brother is just outside. Now is not the time to get me naked.”

I roll my eyes. “Oh my God, I meant the helmet!”

He grunts again but reaches under his chin. “I already told you I would marry you. There’s no need to hide me like a dirty secret.”

“He’ll ask too many questions,” I mutter.

He pauses. “Are you ashamed of us?”

Good Lord.

“There is no us, weirdo. Now, hurry up.”

I don’t get to watch him unmask when the bell jingles and Reed strolls in.

“Hey stranger,” he says with his usual grin.

I wiggle in my chair and shift to pull myself further under the desk.

There’s no possible way for him to see the biker.

The kiosk is a long stretch of counter with two stations broken by a single median in the center.

There’s definitely enough room down there for a smaller person, but the man hunched at my feet isn’t small.

He’s a damn mountain. Muscles on top of muscles with a chest as wide as the ocean and hard as granite.

Concealing him isn’t impossible as long as he doesn’t hit the underside with his head. Or sneeze.

I pray for the best and fix my practiced smile in place as Reed ambles closer.

“Hey!” I gather and shuffle already neatly stacked papers. “What are you doing here?”

Reed, still grinning, quirks a brow. “Can’t I come see you at work?”

My brain stutters with the first brush of big hands against my calves. They ignore the subtle twitch of my leg and start a journey upwards, taking the hem of my skirt up over my knees. Over my thighs. I instinctively clamp them together.

“Of course you can. It’s just the middle of the afternoon. I figured you’d be busy.”

Reed stops when there is only the desk between us. The sun catches the badge pinned to his chest and the silver glints with a stubborn sheen that nearly blinds me.

“It’s a pretty slow day for crime,” Reed states with a downward twist of his lips.

I start to arch my eyebrows when unyielding, demanding palms clamp down on my firmly closed knees and force them apart. Wide. I don’t have to look down to know he has a clear, uninterrupted view of my white panties and the wet stain his cum is creating at the crotch .

Heat radiates beneath my cheeks, even as I kick out.

Not hard. Enough to nudge the asshole with the toes of my slippers.

My efforts are met with a tug of my knees pulling me to the edge of my seat, forcing me to a partial recline that probably isn’t weird, but feels wrong when Reed is standing right there.

Crap, Reed.

I should probably say something to him.

“Are you allowed to say that?” My fingers sink into thick strands and tug when my biker nuzzles the soft flesh of my inner thigh. When he plants a hot, moist kiss as high up as he can without leaving his cramped space. “Aren’t you jinxing yourself?”

The bottom of my chair is grabbed and I’m pulled deeper under. I have to pretend to shift and adjust to evade suspicion, but Reed has turned his head in the direction of the windows overlooking the streets. He has his hands on his belt while he watches the passing crowd.

“I’m ready to commit some crime just to have something to do,” he says wistfully.

I try to nod sympathetically, but I’m more concerned by the broad shoulders wedging themselves between my sprawled legs and the head demanding entrance.