Page 313 of Dirty Discipline, Vol. 2

Daddy’s Little Convict by Maren Smith

Chapter One

Tabby was eighteen when she was arrested. Eighteen exactly, since she was arrested on the eve of her birthday. At twenty minutes after midnight, which was twelve minutes past the moment when she’d taken her first breath, according to her mother and her birth certificate, Tabitha Markle was officially booked. All she’d wanted was to celebrate her birthday. All her best friend had wanted was to steal a car and go joy-riding. If only she’d told her so before Tabby had gotten in the car.

Honestly, when Kaylah pulled up in front of Tabby’s house and honked the horn of that candy-red Trans-Am, she did give the car a second look. Kaylah usually drove a clunky, accidentally two-tone, thirty-something hatchback that more often than not needed a push to get going. Tabby knew that hatchback very well. She’d been the one pushing it—oh, at least once a week since she’d turned fifteen.

And yet, when she asked, “Where’d you get the ride?” and Kaylah answered, “Rental car,” she was tickled, not suspicious. She hopped into the passenger seat, happy that her friend had gone to such an extent—an expensive car, no less—just to take her out for her birthday.

They went to the bars to try the new fake IDs Kaylah had in her purse. They probably didn’t work. Small towns like this? Yeah, no. The bartender knew everybody. She was pretty sure hers was a virgin daiquiri, but she was happy to sit at the bar, sipping on it, enjoying the strawberries and whipped cream while she watched Kaylah dance up the floor with first one guy, then another, and then another after him.

Men fought over Kaylah. Nobody fought over Tabby, but that was all right. She was pretty in her own way. It was just that nobody was as pretty as Kaylah, and they’d been friends since kindergarten. So really, there was no point in getting jealous about it now.

They danced the night away. Or at least, Kaylah did. Every once in a while, Kaylah’s man of the moment offered up his wingman for Tabby to dance with, but she wasn’t good at dancing. So she sat at the bar, making small talk with all the best wingmen while Kaylah danced, and Kaylah laughed and finally, Kaylah decided it was time to forget the bar scene and go cruising. All the way up to Lover’s Point, which honestly overlooked the county dump and smelled like it, but it was rarely ever patrolled by police.

So off they went, Kaylah driving, revving the engine of that rental car and tearing up the roads much faster than Tabby would ever have done with a car she didn’t own. Perhaps even, especially not in a car she didn’t own. But she laughed with Kaylah and the two guys her friend thought most suitable to make out with, and not wanting to be a Debbie Downer, she kept her tongue behind her teeth and held onto the Oh-Shit handle, especially going around these tight, winding desert-mountain curves.

Out of town and into scrub land they went, where sagebrush and yucca plants far outnumbered the juniper trees. And the crumbling rock of these prehistoric lake beds jutted, just black shadows against the starlit backdrop of night, until the headlights hit them.

“Watch out for deer,” she said.

From the backseat, one of the boys scoffed, “You’re more likely to hit a cow.”

“Watch out for those too,” Tabby drawled.

Everybody laughed and Kaylah just went faster, right up until flashing red and blue lights lit up the interior of their sportscar as the patrol car they hadn’t noticed tucked among the roadside scrub came racing up behind them.

“Fuck,” one of the guys in the backseat said.

“Uh oh,” Tabby said, craning her head to see through the back window.

Kaylah glanced in the rearview mirror and frowned, her brown eyes narrowing. She wasn’t slowing down.

“Pull over,” Tabby sighed. “I’ll help pay the ticket.”

Her friend neither answered her nor pulled over. Her head shook slightly back and forth and then a corner of her mouth quirked in only the slightest of smiles.

The wail of the police siren went off behind them and over the horn, they were ordered, “Pull over right now.”

Kaylah floored the gas pedal and the car shot forward, picking up speed each time she shifted higher. The engine roared, but not louder than Tabby.

“What are you doing?! You’re going to get us in so much trouble!”

“Pull over! Are you crazy?!” one of the guys from the back ordered.

“We’re not pulling over.” Kaylah raced into the next curve twenty miles over the speed limit and Tabby could feel the centrifugal force pulling the car out of their lane and almost all the way off the road on the other side. Halfway through the curve, headlights popped out from behind the mountain rock and hit them square in the eyes.

Tabby screamed. So did the guys in the backseat, jumping to grab onto both the car and each other.

Kaylah swerved off the road to get around the oncoming car, and then swerved back onto the road, driving into a roadside rut that briefly sent them airborne before all four tires bounced back down on the road. Kaylah got the car back under control with an expertise that left Tabby blinking. Grateful, but still surprised.

“What are you doing?” she pleaded. “Please just pull over!”

Tight-lipped, her best friend glanced between her and the road. “I can’t.”

“Why not?”

Even more tight-lipped, Kaylah sighed and frowned, and finally confessed. “Because I didn’t rent the car… I stole it.”

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