by Ann Denton
When a helicopter full of men with guns land on our private island, me and my guys do the only logical thing you can do.
Hide.
Naked and Afraid gets a whole new meaning for me. And it’s not a funny, laugh at the idiots on TV kinda deal. It’s a shivering WTF is happening awful feeling.
The bad guys head straight for Heather and her harem at the pool.
Time to panic. Time to call for—
These gangster jerk offs cut off our phone and internet somehow, so I can’t call for a rescue from some super-hot, suped-up ex-marines.
I’m just gonna have to rescue Heather and her guys the old-fashioned way … kicking ass and taking names.
This should go well.
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright
Signup for My Newsletter
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Afterword
Acknowledgments
More Books
Connect and Get Sneak Peeks
About Me
Copyright © 2019 Ann Denton
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed “Attention: Permissions Coordinator,” at the address below.
Le Rue Publishing
320 South Boston Avenue, Suite 1030
Tulsa, OK 74103
www.LeRuePublishing.com
ISBN: 978-1-7335960-2-2
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Chapter One
Katie
"We're all gonna die!" I whimper, standing naked in my villa’s living room, frozen in place as I watch the helicopter hover outside my window. The man with the gun in his hand jumps from the helicopter and rolls through the grass on the lawn stretching between me and the next villa, not caring that he’s mussing his expensive-looking suit. Thankfully he rolls away from me; thankfully the windows are tinted; thankfully it’s pretty dark outside.
My mind races a mile a minute as I watch him. I have no idea who this guy with the gun is, but things don't look good. I mean, why the motherfuck is a guy with a gun on our island? Heather rented this entire fucking rock. No one else should be here. Wrong island? Like a Bugs Bunny—should have turned left at Albuquerque—situation? With GPS … no fucking way. There’s no way some whack job messed up and came to the wrong island in the Caribbean. I watch as the helicopter lands a little bit further out in an open patch of grass and Suit’s friends hop out. I see two more of them, both wearing sports jackets and sporting stubble, all carrying guns like this is some badass hot mafia romance novel.
Fuck. Normally, I love those novels. Not anymore.
Thoughts of the mafia drag my mind to Peter Brown, the gambling asshole from Heather’s harem competition. That asswipe got rejected and is currently hiding in the rain forest like a coward because he owes some bad dudes a lotta cash. Are these mafia hotties here for him? They wouldn’t fly down here for a measly thirty grand, would they? The helicopter ride alone would cost that? Did he gamble more than that? Shit, shit, fucking shit. I'm struck dumb.
This is so outside my concept of reality. I don't even know what to do. I don't know how to handle it. I'm stark naked in my villa, breasts covered in cum from the most awesome sex of my life, staring at gangsters pouring out of this helicopter like clowns pour out of a clown car. Is this a giant joke? Like, is Heather pulling a prank on me? She has enough cash to do shit like this now that she won the lotto. A parrot squawks in the palm trees as I try to gauge if Heather would try to give me a heart attack for a laugh. Is this retaliation for the puke pod things? Could she pull something like this off so fast? I mean, she is crazier than an outhouse rat. It’s a possibility.
But then Suit checks his weapon. He pulls out the magazine, inspects it, pops it back in. He aims and fires into the trees and a red, dead parrot falls to the ground. Holy shitballs! Those guns are real? Those guns are real! I gulp; my stomach shrinks and sinks all the way to my toes. I try to will myself to move my body and hide, but apparently fight or flight is not auto-programmed into my limbs. I'm a buck-naked brunette rag-doll.
Luckily, my guys don't seem to have the same hang up. Alec, my massive, muscled Hispanic pilot, scoops me up around the waist and silently hauls me back to the bedroom. Inside, Kenneth—my brown-haired, Michelin award-winning orgasm king of the kitchen—is just pulling a shirt down over his happy trail. Danny is back in his tennis-pro, Ken doll wannabe clothes already. Kenneth slips on his shoes as Alec pushes me across the room.
"Get in the closet,” Alec orders, his voice gruff and angry. “All of you.”
Danny comes across the room and walks toward the closet with me. He takes my hand and caresses my face. He spends a moment staring into my eyes with his gorgeous blue blinkers to calm me down—he’s fucking insightful for a lying, little baby sometimes—then he leads me into the closet, to all the extra dresses in plastic I ordered for Heather. I kept them in my villa because that girl and her makeup have a way of ruining anything new and beautiful within a five-foot radius. Now those dresses form a ten-foot wall of glittery, shimmery, potential protection. Tears form in my eyes at that thought. Protection? Those dresses are all that’s gonna stop Suit and his friends? I’m a dead woman.
Alec shoves me into the clothes like some two-bit whore he’s hiding from his wife. Danny stumbles in behind me, still holding my hand. Alec and Kenneth join us, crouching so their heads can’t be seen above the hanging bar. And it takes a second before I realize Alec is still naked. Huh. For the first time, I can’t enjoy the view. What a fucking depressing last thought. Those glutes should be sending me into a tailspin. Instead of wishing I could bite down on them for fun, right now I’m considering biting down to muffle the scream that’s lodged in my throat.
Next to me, Danny scratches his nose, and just that slight movement makes the plastic on the dresses rustle as loud as that M&M packet in the movie theater that I timed wrong once. The very second the mood music cut out, I ripped and poured. It sounded like a damned rockslide and people turned and glared at me. It was humiliating on so many levels because it was during a Harry Potter movie. People take that shit seriously. Fuck. And that’s what Danny rustling the plastic sounds like now.
Kenneth shoots a hand across my torso and grabs Danny’s hand to stop the scratching. He a
nd Alec shush Danny. And I know I should be silent. But … my brain. It’s broken. "I need my clothes," I whisper frantically. Because, for some reason, that’s what I can focus on. The fact that I’m naked. Kenneth and Danny aren’t. So, I shouldn’t be. Alec followed me into the living room, so he isn’t dressed either, but my mind doesn’t really process that. It’s reverting to simple things. Simple problems. Like clothes. I reach out to grab something off the hanger to at least cover myself up, but Kenneth's arm clotheslines me smashing into my neck. I gasp. Alec’s hand smacks over my lips and I’m forced to gulp.
"Shhh," Kenneth scolds.
Glass smashes in the vicinity of the living room. I swallow hard. Looks like mafia hotties aren’t inclined to knock.
My heart starts up as fast as a racehorse; it’s out the door and across the island before I take my next breath. So, I crouch naked, heartless, and about to piss myself in the closet while strange men with guns enter my villa.
Alec’s hard chest presses against my back. The sexual tingles he normally gives me just turn into scared shivers. I clench my teeth, close my eyes, and cover my face with my hands. Some people have fight mode. Others have flight mode. I’ve never been in a near-death situation before. Fight or flight? Nope. Apparently, my fucking response is ostrich mode—squeeze my eyes shut then hope for the best.
Danny squeezes my hand. "It's gonna be okay—“ there’s a thwack sound—”ow!” Danny exclaims. "My balls!"
My eyes click open a quarter of an inch, just in time to see Kenneth smack his hand over Danny's mouth as Danny’s free hand covers his balls. Kenneth’s slightly shorter than Danny, so he has to reach up to block the blond guy’s mouth. But he presses Danny back against the wall with such force, with such venom in his brown eyes, that the young tennis coach just freezes and holds still.
Click clack.
We all stop breathing.
I crouch naked and afraid. Stuck in my closet. Listening to the click clack of shoes in the living room. Part of me wonders if this is what cows feel like in the slaughterhouse. Do they know the end is near? Do they feel trapped? Just waiting for it? I'm never eating meat again. My entire body heats up and then goes cold and hot and cold and hot. I feel like a toddler toy. On-off. On-off. My nervous system is on the fritz. Because it doesn't know how to process impending death.
My hands clench and I can feel the panic attack creeping up my spine. I don't want to be the one to blow this cover, weak and pathetic as it is. I don't want to be the reason these armed men find us here. I've no idea who they are or what they're doing, but I know men don't jump out of helicopters with guns without intending to use them. That would be stupid—like turning on the grill in the backyard and just leaving it to flame. It would be like heating oil to fry crappie caught in the lake then just letting the pot bubble on the bank. It would be like Heather wearing four-inch heels around her house. You only strap on fuck me heels if you plan to use them. Just like guns. They’re weapons with a purpose.
I turn away from Danny, whose mouth is still covered by Kenneth’s hand. Danny looks ready to puke and Kenneth looks like he might take Danny out himself. I think that’s just his stress reaction to the situation. But still, neither of their faces are helping me. I need calm. I turn a little and raise my eyes to Alec, hoping against hope that he can do something to help me. He’s done the near-death thing before, right? I mean, former fighter pilot, craves the rush—he’s gotta be better at this than a kinky chef or an almost Olympian, right?
Alec’s deep brown eyes dig into me. His gaze is alert but steady. And I cling to his gaze because it grounds me. My free hand reaches backward and digs into his thigh as our eyes build a bridge and say things to one another.
“I don’t want this to be it.”
“It won’t.”
“You promise?”
“I’ll keep you safe.”
We have an entire unspoken conversation wherein my face says “I’m freaking out!” and his frown says, “Calm the fuck down.” And then he slowly gestures at his chest, careful not to nudge the plastic-wrapped dresses next to us. My eyes flicker down. I watch how he takes a slow, deliberate inhale. My eyes flicker up as he silently exhales. I mimic him. I try to shut out the world. I try not to focus on anything else. I try to forget Kenneth and Danny beside me. And I zero in on Alec’s eyes and his mouth as he breathes calmly. I try to merge with him at that moment.
It almost works. The way a broken window on your car almost works when you duct tape it to the roof. That is to say, I can’t fucking do it. A broken window isn’t a very good window with fucking grey tape blocking the view—especially when it can’t even open. It’s just a fucked up broken shard of stabbiness covered in goo on the outside. That’s me—goo and all. I end up raking my nails into Alec’s thigh. I dig deeper and harder. My body trembles like a leaf, like a guitar chord, like a motherfucking blender.
Of course, that's when the low-level muttering and the rough scratch of shoes enter my bedroom. I can't make out what the gunmen say, but I do hear three distinct voices. Alec clutches me closer as we hear the bedsheets ripped off the bed. A box is kicked over with a thump. I hear the screech of a parrot outside as my sliding glass door is slowly opened and someone steps onto my patio.
"Not here," a man's voice growls in a low accent that I can’t place.
"They must just have left—the room is smelling of sex." Another mystery stranger speaks in an accent as the drawers in my dresser are opened and shut. I close my eyes again. I squeeze the lids hard.
God in heaven if you get me out of this, I promise—my brain cuts off. I can't think of anything big enough to promise God in exchange for my life. Fuck me. You promise your soul to the devil to get what you want. But what the hell do you promise the deity? Why isn’t there a fucking book or movie about what to promise in this damned forsaken moment?
The closet door opens.
People always say when you're in a life ending moment, you see your life flash before your eyes. Some people piss themselves. But no one's ever told me about how you clench your asshole so hard that you can feel it all the way up your spine in that moment where you think you’re about to die. My entire body goes rigid.
In contrast, Alec loosens his grip on me. I'm not sure if that means he's ready to shove me out of the closet as a sacrifice or if he's gonna jump out at these guys and try and tackle them. We didn't discuss tactics. Why didn't we discuss tactics? This is poor planning on our part. Instead of whacking Danny in the balls, we should have been discussing tactics. I’m super disappointed in myself. I’m the planner. I should have planned.
Swoosh. The man pushes aside some of the suits on the opposite side of the closet.
The hairs on my neck rise. And I feel like a cat in an alley. I can feel the gaze of the mafia man looking around the closet, even though I can't see him and even though I’m pretty certain he can’t see me in my hiding spot.
Because I have to hold perfectly still, suddenly holding still becomes the hardest thing in the entire universe. I curse myself. Katie Ann. Don’t you motherfucking move, you half-wit Okie. You shoe-chewing slice of white bread! I strain every piece of willpower within me trying not to move. I even try not to breathe.
Time stretches out. Seconds become minutes, become hours, become eons. It is literally 1.3 billion years later when the asshole with the gun leaves and clicks the closet door shut behind him.
No sooner has the lock clicked, then Danny turns to all of us. "I really have to fart.”
My mouth drops open. He did not just say that with a gangster/private army dude/hitman on the other side of the door!
“Not funny,” Kenneth grumbles in a whisper so low that I half-think I imagine it.
Danny bites his lip. "Not joking,” he whispers.
"Well, hold it," Alec orders gruffly. I look at him. He doesn't swing his eyes away from the door, his entire body is still focused on the potential threat outside our tiny space.
"I've been holding it," Danny w
himpers, running a hand through his blond hair.
"Just a little longer," Alec instructs.
“Who are they?” I whisper.
He shrugs. “Not military. Cartel?”
Kenneth shakes his head. “Lots of cartel members have met down here before. It didn’t look like them from the bathroom window. A suit? No. Cartel go full on bullet-proof vest.”
“I think they might be after Peter Brown,” I whisper as I hear my bedroom door close. Holy shit. These guys are leaving. We may actually survive the night. My heart is too exhausted to beat happily, it just pitters pathetically, tripping over itself as it slows down. “I mean, he had that huge debt, right? What if there’s more that I didn’t find out about? What if he promised them more than the thirty grand?” My heart starts to pick up the pace again. If the guys with guns are leaving, where are they going? Heather’s out at the pool with the guys. Fuck. Fuck.
Danny bumps my shoulder, and I look over. His face is strained. His shuffling moves one of the dresses and makes a small rustling noise. Just the tiniest brush of plastic. But Alec and Kenneth both turn and glare.
It's an intense few seconds, but nowhere near as tense as when Gunmetal George inspected the closet. The tension is only broken when a loud, whoopee-cushion worthy squeak erupts.