HUNTED: A Bad Boy Romance (Books 1-5)

by Kira Matthison

  “I can’t.”

  “Come here.”

  Come here. I wanted to. Those two words had so much more to them, and I wanted to do everything he meant: slide into his arms, let him undress me, let him touch me. I wanted to touch him. I wanted to make him groan again, know that he was losing himself in this. I wanted to drive him to the brink of all his self-control.

  Whore. I could practically hear Adrian’s voice in my head, and it was like ice water.

  “I can’t,” I told Jack flatly. I turned to leave.

  He caught my hand and pulled me back as he stood. His body was too close, too solid to ignore, and his eyes burned down into mine as he dragged his thumb over my lips.

  “What are you afraid of?” The words were just for me, so knowing that I felt my cheeks heat again. “You like it when I touch you.”

  “I have to go,” I whispered.

  “Why? Because you’ll fuck me if you don’t?” I tried to pull away, and his arm tightened around my waist. “I’d make you scream my name,” he promised, so supremely self-assured that I wanted to punch him. “I’d have you with your legs wrapped around my waist, coming with me inside you. I’d have you coming again while you rode me.” His voice was rough at that, and I saw the flare of lust in his eyes. “I want to see that gorgeous ass while I take you from behind, too. You’re perfect. I want to see your body.”

  “I said I have to go!”

  “Adrian doesn’t make you feel like this, does he?”

  I shoved him as hard as I could, and stumbled when he moved easily, releasing me with a cocky grin. He bent his head like he was tipping an imaginary hat and slid past me to the door, closing it with a last grin at me.

  “You don’t know anything about me!” I yelled at the closed door. “Nothing, you hear me? And as soon as I figure all of this out, I’m not going to be sorry at all to see you out of my life!”

  He didn’t respond, until…

  I could hear him laughing. At me.

  “I mean it!” I picked up the nearest thing at hand and hurled it at the door.

  He only laughed harder at that. “I’ll be right out here.” His voice was like whiskey, warming me and making my lips part. “You know…if you want anything.”

  I stared at the door, furious, trying to come up with any response at all.

  But he’d won this round, and we both knew it. I went to bed under a comforter that smelled like him, in a shirt that reminded me none of this was normal, with the memory of his hands on my skin and his hips against mine. I clenched my hands in the pillow to keep myself from giving in to the same temptation from the night before, but all I managed was to make it almost impossible to sleep.

  And when I dreamed—I dreamed of him.

  When I woke, it was to him banging on the door, and I sat up warily, steeling myself for his taunts. But his face was almost as wary as mine when he came into the room.

  “Do you know someone named Damien?”

  “I…yes.” I scratched my head. “Yes, actually. He’s a friend of Adrian’s.” Sleep was still fading and I rubbed my forehead, trying very hard to forget what I’d been dreaming about. “Why?”

  “Because,” Jack said grimly, “Adrian has just accused him of murdering you.”

  Book 3: Deceit

  Chapter 15

  Jack

  “What?” She scrambled up to stare at me. “That’s…impossible.”

  “It’s not. It’s what he did.”

  “You don’t understand.” She shook her head. “We’ve all been friends for years. Damien is one of the people Adrian cares about the most. He would never accuse him of something like this—anyone who knows Damien knows he would never hurt me. He would never hurt anyone.”

  I opened my mouth to say that Lara, too, was supposed to be someone Adrian cared for. She was supposed to be someone he would never hurt. The fact that she’d only reject it made me furious.

  Then again…we still didn’t have proof. I leaned against the wall and tried to calm down.

  “Look. Say you’d never met any of these people, right? You were reading about this in the paper.”

  She paused. “Okay.”

  “And you read a story about a woman who’d gone missing, and the last person who saw her had apparently been in love with her for years. He was her first love, and he never gave up on her.”

  “He wasn’t still…” Her face drained of blood. “Wait. How do you know that? About Damien?”

  “It’s all in Adrian’s statement. Everyone knows.” She flinched at the last part, and I cursed myself. I shouldn’t have said that.

  “I hoped everyone would forget that. Now he’s never going to let it go.”

  “Well, if he’s loved you this long—”

  “Not Damien.” Her shoulders hunched. “Adrian.”

  I hesitated. “I’m sorry?”

  “He was always so worried when I hung out with Damien.”

  “Let me tell you, the more I hear about Adrian, the more he sounds just great.” My voice was dripping with sarcasm, but I settled back against the wall at her furious stare.

  “You don’t understand. Adrian had to fill his father’s shoes when he came into the company.” She got up and pushed her way past me out of the room. She was limping slightly from the scrape on her leg. “The older generation never accepted him. He had to be pristine. That his fiancée cheating on him with his friend was something he couldn’t even have suggested. It would have ruined his credibility.”

  I was more of the opinion that Adrian had been a paranoid asshole, but hey, what did I know? I trailed her into the kitchen where she took down a mug and poured herself coffee, and tried not to notice how natural this all seemed, and how at home she was here now.

  I didn’t want her to notice it, either. I sighed.

  “Look, he’d been trying to get her to leave Adrian, right? As in, his boss?”

  “He never really—he wasn’t—he didn’t think I would really…” She shook her head.

  “I see.” It was painfully clear that Damien had known just how far down the rabbit hole Lara was. I was beginning to feel kind of sorry for the guy. “Look. Lara, I’m not asking you to believe Adrian’s right. I mean—you’re not dead. But think how’s going to look: this guy was hopelessly in love with you, and in the hour and a half Adrian was gone, this guy shows up, talks to you, leaves via the staircase for some reason—”

  “The elevators were broken,” she said impatiently.

  “Well, he came up on them.”

  “I don’t know why. Adrian was very insistent that he had to use the stairs.” She shrugged and took a sip of her coffee. She paused when she saw the look on my face. “What?”

  “Do you really not see it?”

  “Not see what?” She was impatient now.

  “I…” Jesus, I hated telling her these things.

  I should hate her for making me tell her. For God’s sake, how much clearer could it possibly be, what was happening here? She was being stupid.

  And yet, all I could think was how much I didn’t want to be the one destroying her faith in the world piece by piece. I’d seen where she’d grown up, I’d seen the bruises on her arms, and it was clear that somehow, Lara Thomas had managed to retain her belief that the world was actually a good place. The more I saw of her, the more that belief seemed like the only thing keeping her together, and that should have infuriated me.

  It was, instead, oddly charming. I came to take her hand and lead her to the couch. “Sit down.”

  “What’s happening?”

  “I’m explaining this, and you’re not going to like it. Come on.” I waited for her to sit, and pulled over one of the chairs from the kitchen table. “Okay. The person who hired me promised that the video surveillance would be off on the staircase.” I didn’t like reminding her how I’d been involved, but there was nothing for it. “Whoever it was, this makes sense, right? They’d want to make sure people could get in and out without seeing them.”<
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  “Damien would never—”

  “Let me finish. As you can tell from the accusation, it looks pretty suspicious that Damien came to see you and then left via a different route, taking the stairs down Lord knows how many floors. Right?”

  She was silent.

  I’d take it. “So everyone knows he was there in the very brief window between when Adrian left and when he came back. And no one saw him leave, and no one saw you leave, but you were both gone when Adrian returned.”

  She was frowning.

  “So it really does look like Damien did it. And it makes sense that whoever wanted you killed, they would have someone to pin it on.”

  She was looking at me like she was sure this was a trap.

  Well, I supposed it was.

  “Okay,” she said in a very small voice. “So?”

  I sighed. “So, who told you to make sure Damien used that route?”

  She went still. Her fingers were wrapped so tightly around the cup that the nails were completely white.

  “No.”

  “Lara, he did.”

  “No.” She shook her head and thrust the coffee cup at me as she looked around herself for new clothes. “I am not going to let him get away with this. I am not going to let whoever did this get away with it. They’ve lied to him. They’ve told him Damien would hurt, but he never word.”

  “For the love of—how long are you going to make excuses for him?” The chair tipped. It took all of my self control to set the cup down on the table rather than throw it.

  She had frozen, staring at me.

  “He beats you, Lara. He was trying to control who you saw, who you talked to. He hired me to kill you. Everything points to it. You knew from the second I said it that it was true, and yet you’ve spent the whole time since I told you trying to come up with a way it won’t be.”

  “What the hell else do you want me to do?”

  “Accept it!”

  Her chin jutted. “I’ll accept it when I see proof. In the meantime, I am going to go get Damien out of jail.”

  “No!”

  She stopped. “No?”

  “This was probably his plan all along, but don’t you think he’s just waiting for you to get pulled out of the woodwork to save your friend?”

  “So what’s the alternative, just let Damien rot in jail?”

  “He’ll get out, it’s not like there’s any evidence.”

  “Adrian is going to have the best lawyers. If he believes Damien did it—” She saw the look on my face and glared “—and don’t tell me he doesn’t—then he’ll make Damien’s life hell.”

  “There is no way you’re getting out of this alive!”

  “You think he’s going to kill me now that he’s made a big stink and gotten a whole bunch of media and I turn up not dead? Everyone’s going to be watching.”

  “For a few months,” I told her brutally. “And he’s gonna be real nice when you come back. He is, don’t doubt that for a second. He’s going to be the best fiancé any woman ever had. He’s going to apologize for hitting that night. He’s going to offer to call it off. He’s going to promise you he’ll be better. But not one word you’ve said about him, and not one thing I’ve seen, has shown me that he’ll do anything other than kill you. Someday, somehow. He’s going to lose his temper, and he’s going to kill you. The best you can hope for is a life of tiptoeing around, trying not to make him angry.”

  She went white as a sheet, and I regretted all of it.

  “Lara, please. Please, just listen to me. Adrian has planned this, and I don’t know what I can do to protect you.”

  She considered, and then she lifted her chin.

  “That’s very kind of you, but you don’t need to protect me. And I’m not going to let Damien be held for a crime I know he didn’t commit.”

  She turned and marched into the bedroom to change, and I sank my face into my hands. Of all the stupid, irrational…

  …loyal, courageous things to do.

  I sighed.

  “Are you really going to go in my clothes, or should we stop somewhere first to buy you something?”

  She popped her head around the door. “You’re coming with me?”

  She sounded hopeful, and it warmed my heart. Dammit.

  “Yes.”

  “I…yeah, I would like something to wear. Thanks.”

  “Okay. Come on.”

  I was going to regret this.

  Chapter 16

  Lara

  “Yes?” The man at the desk looked up at me.

  “I, uh…” I looked around for Jack, and regretted agreeing when he suggested waiting outside. I didn’t know how to say this without sounding ridiculous. “I’m alive.”

  “I’m sorry?” The main raised an eyebrow.

  “Oh, I—right. I’m Lara Thomas. You have a man in custody for murdering me, but I’m not dead.” That didn’t seem to be sufficient, so I tacked on, “His name is Damien Kane.”

  “Oh.” The man’s eyes widened. “I, uh…one moment, stay there and I’ll—actually, why don’t you come with me and I’ll, uh—yes. This way.” He waved his hands to usher me into the station, babbling as he went. I caught something about coffee, and something else about his supervisor’s whereabouts and settled for smiling and nodding whenever he broke off and looked at me.

  He deposited me in an empty interrogation room and went away, and I began to wonder if this had been exactly as bad an idea as Jack thought. I sat, twiddling my thumbs, and considered my options.

  And that was when it occurred to me that I had absolutely no idea what I was going to say when that man’s boss showed up. I’d had some idea that they would look at me and decide I was, indeed, alive, at which point I would be allowed to go.

  But I’d been reported missing. Here I now was, without even an ID to my name, and they were almost certainly going to ask me where I had been. I couldn’t get to my ID without Adrian. I couldn’t get to my phone without Adrian. I couldn’t even get to my money or any legal help, as I had no money of my own and our lawyer had known Adrian’s family longer than I’d been alive. It all hinged on whether or not I was willing to go back to him.

  I wasn’t.

  The door opened and I jerked around.

  “Miss Thomas?” The man who came around the door was short and balding, and his eyes were piercingly intelligent.

  Just my luck.

  “Yes?”

  “Officer Villanueva. It’s good to meet you.” He held out a hand.

  I shook it timidly.

  “It is also…” He took his seat and looked at me. “Very good to see you alive and well,” he finished. “Now, we do have a few questions.”

  I sat rigid. I needed not to protest yet.

  He waited for me to say something and looked down at the papers.

  “Now, it’s clear you are not dead and that, thus, the murder charges against Mr. Kane are not verifiable. However, did Mr. Kane abduct you? Did he harm you?”

  “No.” I shook my head.

  “I see. So, on the night that he came to visit you—you did see him, yes?”

  “Yes. Adrian had said that he would be by to collect something about work. I gave him the folder and he left.” I remembered something else. “Oh, and—Adrian had told me that the elevator was broken. He insisted that I tell Damien to take the stairs.”

  Officer Villanueva looked at me as if he wasn’t quite sure what this had to do with anything.

  “That’s why you didn’t see him leave on the security cameras.”

  “Ah.” He pressed his fingers together and looked at me. “And…how did you know that the security cameras were off in the stairwell?”

  Jack told me. But I couldn’t mention him, and—fool that I was—I hadn’t read the articles about Adrian’s allegations.

  “Well, since you didn’t see him leave—or me—but you did know he was there, clearly you could see him on one set, but not the other.”

  “Ah.” He settled
back in his chair. His tone indicated that he might not entirely believe me. “And that leads us to another question, Miss Thomas—where have you been for the past several days?”

  Now we came to it, and all I had was bravado.

  “I’d really rather not answer that.”

  He blinked at me. “Miss Thomas, your fiancée reported you missing. Your family—”

  “When did he report me missing?”

  “Hmm? Oh. Ah, well, when he accused Mr. Kane of murdering you.”

  “I had been gone for two days at that point.”

  “I’m not sure quite what point you’re trying to make, Miss Thomas.”

  He wanted to make sure I was dead, and then when he couldn’t, he gambled that I’d stay hidden rather than come for Damien.

  But I had no proof.

  “I just wondered why he didn’t do it sooner,” I said simply.

  “Ah. You know, oftentimes the family will wait.”

  “Mmm.” I clasped my hands in my lap to keep them from shaking.

  “Miss Thomas, do you believe you are in any danger?”

  The question was sudden, and I froze.

  “If you were in danger, you know you could tell us.”

  I looked over into his face and saw that he genuinely did want to do his job. He wanted to make the world a better place, and keep people from being kidnapped and murdered. I wanted to tell him everything.

  But he didn’t know what he was up against, and, equally bad, I worried what he might do when he heard about Jack.

  I paused. Since when was I worried about a hit man getting his comeuppance?

  I didn’t have time to think about that right now.

  “I know,” I said simply. “I just, ah…I have to go. But you’ll release Mr. Kane?”

  “Actually…” His mouth quirked. “We had no evidence with which to charge Mr. Kane. We were, of course, investigating, but he was only under suspicion. He’s been informed that he is no longer under suspicion for murder, and I’m given to understand that he’s on his way down here.”