Page 55 of Wicked Sin

If only he knew what I did last night.

I touch my fingers to my lips. Luke’s gaze follows and settles in there, hot and searching. Does he want the kiss to disappear from both of our memories? Or would he do it again if everything were different?

But he clears his throat and looks away, not revealing anything about how he feels.Because he doesn’t feel anything other than confusion and annoyance that I kissed him. He thinks that I used him for sex and I don’t understand boundaries.

I am a hot mess, and right now I’m his mess, and he has a job to do. Which means handling my hot mess of a family.

There is no reason in the world he should want to kiss me again.

I need to get over myself.

“Go,” I say, putting on an air of indifference. “I’ll be fine.”

He frowns. “I won’t be long.”

“I’ll befine. It’ll be nice to have some breathing room after a few days of forced captivity.” He narrows his eyes at me, and I laugh lightly. “That was a joke, Vasquez.”

“Jokes are funny,Reid.”

That makes me smile for real. “Triple lock the doors, barricade me in my willing prison cell. I’m going to watchHouse Hunters Internationaland judge people for their bad taste.”

After he leaves, I make toast and coffee and watch a few episodes of reality TV. The house is too quiet, though, and my pulse is racing.

I try to do some cognitive behavior therapy self-talk, which helps enough to keep the panic at bay. I give myself options for self-care. Tea, a shower, or reading a book.

The shower wins out, although it’s fast and not very relaxing because I decide to leave the door open so I can still hear the rest of the house. The silence is both terrifying and reassuring.

After I’m scrubbed clean, I sprawl out on my bed. Naked. Damp. Scared and, I realize to my surprise, horny again.

Fucking brains. They’re wild things, giving us all sorts of intense coping strategies for getting through life.

I squeeze my eyes shut and slide my fingers against my pussy. Just a rub at first, pressure to grind against.

This time I don’t fight the fantasy. I need to come, and I need it to happen fast. Imaginary Luke holds me down, his fingers thrusting inside me as he whispers lurid, dirty promises in my ear. Dark, twisted promises I wish someone would keep in real life, but I’m not that lucky.

With a sharp, gasping cry, I come on my hand. His hand. His words, my words. My fantasy in his house.

Flopping my arms wide, I let my breath recover. I stare at the ceiling and wonder where I could have made other choices—anything else—to avoid having ended up here.

When I get up, slowly, and get dressed, I notice the pager Wilson gave me in the bottom of my bag. It has a message.

Your sisters are in L.A. kicking up a shitstorm about your missing person case. Don’t worry. Cole is going to keep them contained.

As soon as I read it, it disappears. Wilson told me the pager would send him a data packet back, letting him know I’d received the message.

Well, at least I know the pager works. How the rest of that is going to go…who the fuck knows.

19

Luke

The first stopI make is the W Hotel, where the Dashford Reid sisters and their protective John Cena-look-a-like husbands see me in a suite on the top floor.

I’m not going to stay long, so I don’t sit down after Cole Parker introduces me to the others. His wife Hailey. Curvy, pretty, and very quiet. Looks at me with undisguised suspicion. Her younger sister Alison, who looks more like Taylor, but with a frank innocence that hits me right in the chest.That’s what Taylor might look like if she hadn’t bore the brunt of the fucked-up family life.

But they all have to know. Don’t they?

And finally Scott Mayfair, Alison’s husband. Much older, and vaguely familiar looking in that way that a lot of military guys are. Even if we’ve never met, I can spot a fellow service member at a hundred yards.

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