by Brogan Riley
I know my dad wants us to be safe. We never argue about my lack of freedom. It’s just that I want a little normalcy in life, like a boyfriend, or girlfriends, or wandering in the town centre without the breath of one of his boys on the back of my neck.
There are very strict rules in the compound. Secrecy. Lies. Numerous fake identities.
I’m pretty good at lying. I’m damn good at hiding.
I’m perfect at staying alive.
I’m not good at living a normal life.
Dante
I turn on the radio and she stares out the window. Romantic music starts playing.
Chantal turns her face to mine. “Are you renting or do you own your place?” she asks like it’s our first date.
I like the delicate atmosphere in my car. Only me and her and the motorway in the grey drizzle of early spring. “I’m renting.”
“You have a family or something?”
“No.”
Her eyes fix onto mine, full of concern. “No? No parents? No siblings?” She tilts her head. “No wife?”
“You’re nosey.” I reduce speed, deviate from the motorway, and crawl along a deserted asphalt road that crosses the woods.
The car jumps over the bumps and cracks.
“I’m just trying to be polite,” she says.
“Okay. I have an ex wife. She and I got divorced five years ago. No parents, no siblings. I’m an orphan. I grew up in foster care.”
“That’s horrible.”
The vegetation thins and lowers. On both sides of the road rise two-story Victorian houses. I change the gears and drive faster. “Horrible?”
She sucks in a breath. “I mean… There’s been nobody to love you. That’s not something I’d call a pleasant life situation.”
“My ex tried really hard.”
“You didn’t make it easy for her, huh?”
“I guess she wasn’t my dream wife.” I reduce speed, crawling over the bridge connecting the old part of the city with the modern one. “Tell me about your family.”
I have wonderful parents and four sisters. I’ve never been married. I’ve never had time for this shit called a relationship. I graduated from the best police academy in the country. I’ve been busy achieving my goals.
I want Chantal to feel compassion toward me. That will help us bond. She’ll be more willing to open up to me.
I’m fucking interested in her, but I have a job to do. The ex-wife trick always works. The women I’ve come across as an undercover cop always opened up to me.
“My mom is a sheriff,” she says.
“Where exactly?”
“Very far from here.”
Alright, we can continue with this masquerade. “Fiona Michaels, right? Her husband is called Tyler.”
The kid stops breathing for a moment. “Angela Brown and Tony Brown. Fiona Michaels died a few years ago.”
“Bullshit.”
Fiona Michaels just chopped and dyed her hair and bought coloured contact lenses. She’s the sheriff in the Alaskan middle of nowhere. The people who live there are either old or they mind their own business—twenty-one of them in total. I suspect Liberator keeps her there to provide him with information.
The little shit rolls her eyes. “I am a Roman Catholic. I’m not allowed to lie.”
“What about stealing?”
“I lost my wallet. I liked the necklace. End of story.”
She’s good.
I want to break her. I mean I want to bend her over the table. Yeah, her ass would be naked, red from light spanking, and very sweaty. Her cunt would be drenched, greedy for my rock-hard cock.
My hard dick wants inside her. I’d fuck her fast and hard, make her whimper, make her beg for more.
I park in front of a two story Victorian building with a white façade. It accommodates my apartment. Chantal is the first to get off. I jump out and gesture for her to walk up the stairs leading to the double door. Her ass sways gracefully with each step. I jerk my hand up. I almost slap her.
Fuck me.
I almost grab her ass.
She stops and I open the door for her with a five-digit code. We enter the house.
“Upstairs,” I rasp.
She nods. We climb the carpeted stairs, her intoxicating smell making a ravenous beast out of me. I grunt quietly and I take the keys out. I open the white door and let her into my apartment.
“It’s very nice,” she says.
“Where do you live?”
“In Alaska.”
“Like hell. You’re from Scotland.”
“I’ve never been to Scotland.”
“So why do you speak with a Scottish accent, huh?”
“I love watching movies about Scotland, you know. It’s always like a never-ending movie marathon, the Scottish dialect all the time.”
She’s started drowning. Good, that’s what I wanted to achieve.
We walk into the kitchen and I switch the light on. Chantal sits down on a bar stool and clenches her hands on the narrow white table. Her face is pale and her lower lip quivers.
“I don’t bite,” I say.
“I know, but…”
“But?” I open the fridge and take a bottle of apple juice out. “We’ll eat something nice and talk, that’s all.”
“I have to go, Dante.”
I freeze the moment the sound of my name rolls off her tongue. It’s honeyed like I’m her sweet sin, her sweet dream.
“Talk to me, Chantal.” I pour us two glasses of juice.
“What do you want to know? I’m eighteen. I’m reasonably happy. I’m not allowed to talk with older men.” She puts her hands on her thighs neatly like a nun.
She’s never been with a man. Her body screams it out silently but fuck me, do I love it.
“I’m thirty-eight.” It just pours out of me.
“Twenty years.” She flops from the bar stool. “That’s a big gap, Dante.”
Fucking hell. I feel like a grandpa. I don’t want to be an older man to her. I just want to be a man to her. “They say ‘Love has no age’ or something like that.”
I heard it somewhere, from someone. From my younger sister probably. She married a biker four years ago. She’s happy as far as I know. I called her old man a criminal and she hasn’t spoken to me for a year and half.
Chantal chuckles, but her eyes turn glassy. “I can’t, Dante.”
“You can’t talk to me? Or you can’t love me?”
I feel stunned. I didn’t just say that. Why would I? This is a masquerade not reality.
I’m doing my job. Chantal is a suspect, the tool I’m using to get to Liberator.
I don’t love.
I don’t do relationships.
I’m working hard to remove the Arachnid Conclave from the face of the earth once and for all.
This little shit standing in front of me means nothing to me.
I feel like a hand of a hurricane has swept me off the floor, and bright clarity explodes in my head.
She is everything to me.
Her eyes widen, her palms facing the ceiling. Her body stirs.
Her body is mine. Her soul is mine.
She. Is. Mine. I fucking want to own her.
Chapter 4
Chantal
His eyes lock onto mine, and I drown in the brooding navy depths of his gaze. It’s as though a mask of ruthlessness has fallen off his face and the true him has emerged from the bottom of his soul.
He’s lost someone important to him. I know what the delicate shimmery sadness radiating from his gaze means. Fiona’s eyes are sometimes like that. In such moments, the name Jessica may escape her mouth and a tear may roll down her cheek.
What if I were a thirty-year-old hairdresser born into an average family?
What if he were a thirty-year-old mechanic born into an average family?
We could touch. We could kiss.
We could fall in love.
We could be honest with each other.
In
stead, we keep feeding each other with lies.
We’re forbidden to each other.
I watch him shake off his jacket and throw it over a metal bar stool topped with a grey leather seat. This is an open plan kitchen with white furniture and teal walls. An industrial lamp casts a bright light. Three modern rugs cover the grey tiled floor. They’re soft underfoot and have stripes of vibrant colours.
A furrow appears between Dante’s eyes as though he’s lost in thought. He rolls up the sleeves of his shirt and removes the tail, tossing it on top of his jacket. Perfect muscles bulge under the inked skin on his forearms.
I shake off my hoody and throw it on top of his jacket, my movements dreamy. It’s as though a puff of magical air has invaded my nostrils and more of the magic has wrapped around us.
Dante puts his hand on the back of his neck and smiles at me.
I put my hands on my hips and sway in a seductive invitation.
He chuckles. I emit a low moan.
We drift in a kind of primal dance, and it seems like our souls are already connected. The air thickens between us, pulsates with fever, and chants like tribal drums. Or is it my mind that’s chanting?
Dante
I can’t stand the wall of air separating us. I lunge at her like a hungry predator.
Suddenly, I have her body pressed into mine. I brace her slender waist with my hands and lift her off the floor. Her arms and legs wrap around me.
Our gazes connect for one burning moment.
Her plump lips touch mine. The feather-light kiss causes electricity to shoot down my spine.
A second is like an eternity. Her tantalizing musk diffuses into me and intoxicates me; it’s nothing like anything I’ve experienced before.
She tears her mouth off mine.
I agonise.
I need her.
I’d kill for one night with her.
I die but I’m brought back to life. My mind lights up.
I am fucking in love for the first time in my life.
My forehead rests against hers and I breathe in her jasmine youth.
My hand travels up her spine and I grip the back of her neck. “Kiss me.”
She presses her lips against mine, giving me life. Then she tears her mouth off mine, giving me death.
I don’t want to be dead anymore. I’ve been dead for a very long time; I’ve been dead since that fatal sunny afternoon. I need Chantal’s life to keep me alive.
“I said kiss me,” I growl.
She arches her eyebrows as I tuck a wisp of hair behind her ear. “I need to tell you something,” she whispers.
“Later.”
I feel fucking insane. I need those wet hot lips of hers to be pressed against mine for eternity.
“I hacked into his files one night,” she murmurs despite my growl, primal fear coating her voice.
“What?”
“My dad’s. Those about the Arachnid Conclave.” Her body trembles against mine. “They’re sick fucks. Sick psychopaths. Depraved. Evil.” She draws in a convulsive breath. “I still have nightmares about them.”
Her words tear their way through the haze in my head. “I want to destroy them, baby girl, and burn them down so that there’ll be only ashes left.”
Her tiny hands cup my face. “So does my dad.”
“I need to talk to him.”
“I can’t, Dante.”
God, no other woman has said my name like that. Only her. Like she’s been my beloved wife for eternity.
I wrap my arms around her and draw her even closer to me. “Only me. No other cops, I promise.” I kiss her on the top of her head and inhale her. She smells like spring, like fierce youth, like freedom. “Chantal, come on, you can trust me.”
“Okay.”
“Okay?”
“Okay.” She bobs her head.
Now, I just want to forget that I’m a cop and she’s a criminal’s daughter. I want to be an average guy. Average guys fall in love and have plans. Average guys buy engagement rings, plant a tree, build a house. Average guys have kids. I’ve always wanted to have a bunch of kids. It kind of contradicts my love for freedom and variety or maybe I just realised I had such needs.
The little shit seems to have the power of unleashing my suppressed longing for something stable in life.
I press my lips against hers, the sense of duty evaporating from me. There’s only me and her, the hot cocoon of our desire. Her sigh. My growl. The forbidden strawberry flavour of her lips, the timid wetness of her little tongue.
I kiss her deeper and she moans into my mouth, her little fingers pulling my shirt out of my trousers. Her shy hands slip under the fabric and she runs them up my back.
I shiver under her delicate touch.
I brace her waist and slam her on the wall.
I’m a fucking animal. I have no brain, just my need to take possession of her and wreck her.
I grab her ass cheek and rub my hard on against her crotch as though I’m already inside her. She tears her mouth off and draws in a startled breath. I don’t stop. My mouth grazes along the curve of her neck. I bite and lick, forcing sweet gasps from her throat.
Her arms wrap around my neck and she sinks her fingers into my hair. My mouth closes hers. We don’t just kiss. My tongue is fucking her mouth while I keep rubbing my erection against her crotch. Fuck. I need inside her.
I pull back, my hands on her hips, and I trip over a rug. Chantal squeals with her arms flapping. We land on the floor. I tumble us over so she’s on her back and I’m on top of her.
Her gleaming eyes lock onto mine.
Fuck. I’ve never seen anything more beautiful than her in this moment. Her cheeks are pink, lips swollen from my kisses.
“You’re not going anywhere,” I say.
She chuckles. “Did you just ask me to move in with you?”
“Maybe.”
“Maybe I don’t want to live with you.” She rolls her eyes.
I tickle the side of her chest with my fingers and she squirms beneath me. “Say yes.”
“No.”
I tickle her with more intensity. She giggles, squeals quietly, and wiggles beneath me.
I crush her tiny frame with mine and latch my mouth on hers. My hand slips under her wrapped top. I stroke her breast through the lacy fabric of her bra. Cup C at least.
Full and delicious.
“I’ll cook something,” I say into her ear, “and we’ll watch a movie.”
“Brush our teeth and go to bed?”
“Have a bath together first.”
“I’m not a slut, Dante.”
“I know.”
“And then we’ll sleep in one bed?”
“Why not?”
I don’t know whether this is a magical reality or a sweet dream. I know I don’t want it to end. I could kiss her for eternity.
She crosses her ankles behind my back and I kiss her tenderly. Because we have this one-evening eternity, right?
I ease my weight onto my elbow and run my fingers through her hair. It’s thick and velvety to the touch. It smells like my every dream.
“I like this fantasy,” Chantal whispers.
“Hush.”
I lower my head and indulge myself in her shy kisses. Her heels dig into my lower back. Her folded knees spread. I slide my hand between our bodies and pull the zip in her jeans down.
A bang tears through the air. My muscles tense up. Adrenaline fills my veins.
I jump away from Chantal, rising to my feet in one motion. A hard long item slams on the back of my skull. I see blackness in front of my eyes. Chantal growls but the sound comes to my ears like I’m underwater. I rotate my body and see blurry figures pouring into my kitchen.
“Don’t hurt him, Tyler,” Chantal yells, but her voice is like an echo.
I sweep my arm and punch one of them in the face. Blood gushes from his nose. Two of them throw themselves at me and we all tumble down onto the floor. My eyes flick over my surroundings. There are too
many of them—five on one. And they know how to fight. They’re killing machines.
I work out a lot. I can knock out three men in a fair fight, but the load of bodies immobilising me must have some fucking super powers.
I try to wriggle out, slamming my forehead on the one’s with a bald head. He growls and slams his forehead on mine in return. His blood floods my eyes. I see stars. Then I see nothing.
They kick me and punch me until I feel nothing. I drift off into oblivion.
Chantal
They tie his wrists behind his back. He’s unconscious, but the blood is still gushing from his nose.
“Please, turn him over so he’s on his side,” I plead. “He may choke to death.”
They don’t pay attention.
Tears blind me. “Why did you do that? He didn’t want to hurt me.”
“You’re going back to the compound,” Tyler hisses. Blood dribbles from his nose. He sweeps his long blond hair down his back as his intensely blue eyes shoot lightning towards me. “Your father will ground you, you’ll see, you kleptomaniac.”
“Fuck off,” I growl. “I don’t kill anyone at least.”
Tyler shakes his head, grunting, as Priest throws his arm around my back. “You okay, little squirrel?” Priest asks gently with his rough voice. He is a big, rough, and bald-headed beast.
I nod. “Yes.” I fix my pleading eyes onto Priest’s and put on the most pleading of my expressions. “What are you going to do with Dante?”
“Don’t think about it,” Priest says.
“None of your business,” Tyler adds.
“He just wants to talk to Dad,” I squeak and pull at Priest’s arm.
He is melting. I’m his favourite kid in the compound and he’s my favourite uncle.
“Not gonna happen,” Tyler says.
I take a shaky breath. “He said only him. No other cops. He just wants to talk to Dad.”
Tyler shakes his head. “I don’t give a fuck. He is a cop. Whatever his agenda is, it means only trouble for us. So I’m really sorry, but no way in hell, Chantal.”
They know exactly what Dante’s agenda is. It’s just that I’m not allowed to know anything, ever.
“Tyler,” I growl. “He is like us. He wants the same as us. Be a good brother and listen to me for once.”
His right eye twitches. Yes, I’m on the right track.