Page 1 of Defiant
Chapter One – Jaz
Now, I know what you’re thinking: I tend to make a lot of mistakes. Would I ever learn from them? The answer, unfortunately for me, was probably not.
Bull-headed, rash, stubborn beyond all belief. When I found something to obsess over, something I believed was right, I couldn’t let it go. I kept digging even if I didn’t like the direction my hole went. I was the kind of kid who, when hurt, kept picking at the scabs and reopening the wounds. It’s just how I was.
Getting onto a stranger’s motorcycle in the brisk air of a Midpark winter’s day? Not my best decision, but it would take some time before I knew whether it beat my decision to go to that party with Archer.
Yeah, you know what? I was still pissed about that. The more I thought about what happened—what could’ve happened, if Jacob hall, my private investigator, hadn’t stepped in and saved me—the more infuriated I grew.
I could’ve been raped—by every person at that party. They could’ve taken pictures of me and spread it around the internet. Those rich kids…Brittany and her crew—oh, I’d make sure they got theirs. This was not something I could just blink and let go; it would fester inside of me until I broke those rich kids.
It would be hard. I was under no illusions there. To beat those cruel kids, I’d have to learn to play the game their way, but I didn’t care. I’d do whatever I had to.
First thing was first, though. I had to get out of my current predicament.
The last thing I’d expected this morning as Mom dropped me off at school was to be approached by some leather-wearing, tattooed stranger who radiated danger. I supposed I could’ve made a scene, could’ve done something—there were cameras aplenty outside—but when he said he knew where my mom was, that she was alone in that big house all day…
What could I have done? I couldn’t put my mom in danger. She was…she was all I had left, really. Even if my dad was alive out there, even if I found out who he was, it wouldn’t change the fact that my mom and I were as close as a mother and daughter could be. We’d been together for the last eighteen years, surviving in this cold, harsh world, and I didn’t want anything to tear us apart.
Or see her hurt by a maniac with a tattoo wrapping around the sides of his shaven head.
I wasn’t stupid. I knew I put myself in danger by going with this guy, but what else could I do?
I currently sat behind him on his bike, my arms wrapped around his stomach. My long black hair whipped around behind me in the cold wind, and I buried my face against the back of his leather jacket to block out as much wind as I could. The body I held onto was relaxed, as if he threatened people to go with him every day of his life.
It was also a muscular body, beneath the leather, but I wasn’t going to focus on that.
We all knew what happened the last time I let myself swoon over a body, and the handsome face attached to it. Archer…I still couldn’t believe he played me like that. The whole time I’d fallen over my feet, blushed and daydreamed, about a guy with a girlfriend. I mean, who the hell did that? That was just wrong. It was disgusting and rude and cruel all at the same time. Even if he crawled to me on his knees and begged forgiveness—which I knew he never would—the only thing I’d do was laugh.
Laugh because there would be no forgiveness where I was concerned. Laugh because I planned on making him just as miserable as I was going to make Brittany.
Someone had spiked my drink at that party, so just to be safe, I was going to make every single one of them pay.
You know, if this guy didn’t stab me twenty times and toss my body into a ditch somewhere, first.
The ride wasn’t too long, which surprised me. Not even twenty minutes later, he pulled us off the road and into a parking lot of a hotel. We were on the outskirts of Midpark, therefore the hotel looked like it was on the lower side of fancy. A two-story place, where he apparently already had a room paid for, for the minute he turned off his bike and kicked the stand out, he was dragging me to a room on the second floor.
We passed not another soul; whoever was working the front desk wasn’t there, so no one saw how rough this guy handled me. His fingers curled around my wrist too tightly, but I was too wound up to feel the pain.
I mean, if I was going to die here, get wrapped up in half a dozen trash bags and tossed out into the dumpster in the back, why bother being afraid? What good would it do me? A stupid way to look at it, but with everything going on in my life, that’s how I chose to view it.
With one hand on my wrist, the leather-clad guy stopped before a door, reaching into his pocket with his free hand to bring out the room key. Once we were inside, he pushed me in, finally letting me go. I stumbled a bit, but the moment I caught myself, I whirled on him, my intent to question him—but then I saw the unmade bed, the sheets, and I quieted.
Please don’t tell me I made it out of Friday’s party unscathed only to end up here, being taken advantage of while I was awake and in my right mind enough to live through it…
Shit. It never even occurred to me: this guy could work for one of the Midpark brats, to use Jacob’s description of them. He could be a hired goon.
I swallowed when he shut the door behind him, leaning his back on it, his blue eyes startlingly intense, their color as clear and as vibrant as the waters in the Caribbean. Beautiful eyes set in a face that could kill. The sides of his head were shaved short, revealing the thick tribal tattoo curling up his spine and around his skull, while the top of his head held a few inches of brown hair, messy and unkempt thanks to the bike ride. He didn’t look too much older than me, but age didn’t matter when you were dealing with the rich.
He cocked his head, a slow smirk spreading on his face. Even though my heart was already beating a million times a minute, that smirk made it beat faster. “Jazmine Smith,” he spoke, his voice low, rough, and scratchy. Kind of like his appearance.
Never had I seen someone wear a leather jacket so well.
“It’s Jaz,” I said, my hands tightening around my backpack’s straps over my shoulders as I remembered the knife in his jacket. He could pull that shiny, sharp thing on me, and then it would all be over.
A bad way to go. I wasn’t ready.
The smirk broke into a full-fledged smile, and he threw the deadbolt in the lock, along with the chain before moving away from the door, grinning as he repeated, “Jaz. I like it. I’m Dante, but you can call me Storm if you want.”
