BAD INFLUENCE: A Dark Bad Boy Romance

by Callie Pierce

  “Go ahead. I’m sure they’d love to make a donut run.”

  She continued to hold the phone in her hand for a while longer, clutching it too tightly, her gaze boring into him. Then she seemed to give up and dropped it back down. “What do you want?”

  “To talk to you. To see you.”

  “To piss me off. To antagonize me. Is that about right?”

  Cobra sidled up to the counter and ground his cigarette out against the surface before flicking it into a nearby trash can. “Maybe I came down to buy a cookie.”

  “So buy a damned cookie and get out.”

  “I save your ass and you’re going to make me pay for my own cookie?”

  Ashleigh leaned over the counter toward him.

  That was the thing with her. When she was mad, she could scream and shout and go red in the face. She used to wake up the whole building when she was telling him off.

  But when he really did something asinine, whenever she was really, truly upset, she would drop her voice down so low that he could barely hear her. And the absence of volume and emotion made her words all the more potent.

  “I can’t afford to give things away. I had a jackass boyfriend, you see, who took all my money and skipped town and left me flat broke. And now I have rent and utilities and daycare fees and a shit ton of other bills piling up. So if you want a cookie, yeah, you’re going to pay for it.”

  Cobra felt a needle prick of guilt at her words. But what he felt most was the heat of her skin and the brush of her breath on his cheek. He itched to feel her pressed against him again, to go back to that time when they were still together, running around like every corner of the town belonged to them and only them.

  He missed waking up with his face buried in her hair, smelling her shampoo. He missed the thousand times he’d grabbed her and felt her melt into him, eager and greedy for his touch.

  It hadn’t gone away, that magnetism. He knew she felt it too. It was too powerful a thing to be one-sided. Everything they’d had years ago was still there, waiting to be reawakened. All she needed was a little nudge.

  He grabbed her head and pulled her to him, meeting her lips with a demanding kiss. She seemed startled. Her lips parted automatically, and he took the moment to delve into that warm, wet cavern, darting his tongue over hers. He relished the velvety texture of her lips against his as he explored her mouth, refamiliarizing himself with territory he’d once known so well.

  She didn’t resist at first. It was like nothing had changed, like the years dividing them hadn’t even existed. For a few blissful seconds he was twenty again, hovering over the top of her on the mattress in their shared apartment, kissing her awake like he would almost every morning.

  Then she pulled away—not gradually, but sharply, all at once. One second her mouth was there and the next it wasn’t. Her green eyes met his, shocked and livid.

  She slapped him. Hard. Right across the cheek. Hard enough to make his head ring from the impact.

  He pulled back, but he couldn’t help but grin a little.

  “What in the hell do you think—where do you get off—,” she sputtered, too angry to string words together in to a coherent sentence.

  “Oh, come on,” he exclaimed, reaching for her hand.

  She withdrew it violently before he could even touch it.

  “You know there’s still something between us, baby. We were good together. And we could still be good together. You felt that. I know you did.”

  “Yeah, I felt your snake tongue down my throat, if that’s what you mean. How stupid are you? I tell you I want nothing to do with you, and you think that’s an invitation to kiss me?”

  “You put up this act all you want, Ashleigh, but I see right through it. I left because I fucking had to, not because I wanted to. You and me, we were always like this.” He held up his crossed fingers to her. “We can start over. Pick up where we left off.”

  “Christ, you sound like a daytime soap. But this isn’t television. I live in the real world, Alex, with real bills and real problems. Your lines aren’t going to work on me. I don’t have time to waste on soul-searching to find some way to forgive you. I picked up the pieces and I moved on. You should do the same.”

  Cobra didn’t answer her. It was clear to him that he wasn’t going to make her see the truth. Not today, at least. She’d always been stubborn, always one to hold a grudge.

  But she was still here. He didn’t believe much in fate, but if there was ever a clear sign, here it was. He had a chance to make it right with her, to recover what he thought he’d lost forever when Jasper had gotten ahold of him.

  She should have moved on after he’d left. There was nothing for her in this town—no family, no friends. Just memories. But she’d stayed, and maybe it was because of him, because she wanted him to find her.

  Ashleigh was damn stubborn, but she would forgive him. He would make her understand why he’d left. And then everything would be right again.

  “By move on, I mean get the hell out of my bakery and don’t come back,” she clarified, her tone caustic.

  “I haven’t decided what cookie I want yet,” he mocked. He couldn’t resist. There was something irresistible about her when she was pissed off, or there was some sadistic part of him that enjoyed her frustration.

  She grabbed something sprinkled with nuts, shoved it into a white paper bag, and thrust it over the counter at him.

  He took it, smiling pleasantly. “What’s the damage?”

  “It’s on the house, with the condition that you skulk off to wherever the hell you were before last night and leave me to live my life in peace.”

  “And if I don’t agree to that condition?”

  “I file a restraining order,” she hissed, “and then the next time you pull this shit, they lock you up so you’re no longer a problem.”

  “I’ll think about it. See you around.” He blew her a kiss and sauntered out the door.

  As soon as the bell jingled and the heavy glass door slammed closed behind him, he turned his thoughts back to Jasper. There was no way in hell Ashleigh’s bakery had anything to with his drug operation.

  Either the kingpin was confused or there was something he was missing. Either way, things were looking suspicious. And after last night, he wasn’t about to take the chance of Ashleigh getting caught in the crossfire.

  He’d call for backup. Axel, Ajax, and Zane—three of the Devils who’d run some business out of the area where Jasper was based—had agreed to help him do whatever he needed to do to take care of things. Between the four of them, he knew they’d get things sorted out.

  He cast a glance back at Ashleigh’s bakery. What he wouldn’t give to have her again, to take her back to the house he was staying at and explore every inch of her, to see how much she’d really changed. She’d come around, he knew. Eventually she’d see.

  He had a feeling that coming back like this, getting tangled up with Jasper again, was him coming full circle. It was a chance to eliminate the drug lord, whose shadow he’d lived in for too long.

  There was a feeling of finality in this return. A sense in him that this would all end with him facing down the man who’d set in motion the last hellish years of his life, and his transformation from Alex to Cobra.

  He was better now. Stronger. Capable of protecting what was his. He wasn’t the same scared little shit whose only option was to run. He was a man now. Jasper had threatened him, forced him to abandon his girl and his life with her. The drug lord owed him for that, and Cobra intended to collect.

  And once that had been set straight, and the wrong repaid, there would be nothing standing in the way of sharing his life with Ashleigh.

  God, it was good to see her again.

  Chapter 5

  Ashleigh

  Ashleigh paused, her hand hovering on the car door latch. She stole one final glance at herself in her rearview mirror, trying to assess how she looked.

  Like shit. Still. The coffee hadn’t helped her at
all. And she didn’t have time to run to the drugstore for concealer. She had to open the bakery soon or she’d start the morning behind, and she couldn’t handle that stress on top of everything else.

  It hadn’t been a good night. Alex coming back to town had left her head spinning, and she’d agonized until the early hours of the morning about how she wanted to handle things. Sure, she’d told him that she wanted nothing to do with him and that he should just fuck off, but part of her wanted him to stay.

  As much as she wanted to lie to herself about that kiss—that he’d forced it on her, that she felt nothing—she knew there had been a spark there. The taste of him was addictive, and she wanted more. The past be damned.

  For the first few hours of lying awake she’d almost convinced herself to take him back and just see what happened. It would be like letting go and letting gravity do its work, she thought. Because her attraction to him seemed like a natural law of the universe—a force beyond her power to control. She’d missed him so much for those first months.

  Not that she wasn’t still pissed at him.

  She’d shaken herself out of those plans, though, when Penny had come to crawl into her bed, claiming she’d had a bad dream. Ashleigh had stroked her little girl’s red curls until she’d drifted back off to sleep, Penny’s tiny body curled against her side.

  Alex may not have been good for her, Ashleigh thought, but she was a big girl capable of dealing with the fallout.

  Alex definitely would not be good for Penny. He was too rough, too wild. He wasn’t a father—only a baby daddy—and she was determined to keep it that way. She wasn’t about to let him into her life only to have him walk back out. She could survive another heartbreak, but she wouldn’t put Penny through that.

  That should have been the end of it. But the decision to keep Alex out of her life, even when he was so close, had unsettled her. She’d tossed and turned for hours, desperately trying to devise a way to reconcile everything—her lingering anger at him, her desire to be with him, her need to protect Penny.

  And now she saw the price for her fitful night. Deep, bruise-colored rings under her eyes, a thin spider web of red over the whites of her eyes, and a dead stare fit for the walking dead. She’d seen better days.

  She turned from the mirror and forced herself to leave the car. No time to worry about it now. There was too much to do. She was almost looking forward to losing herself in the monotony of her morning routine, making up the doughs and batters she would need for the batches of sweets scheduled for the day.

  She made the trek from the parking lot to the street her bakery was on, already starting to break down and organize the tasks she’d have to accomplish in her mind. But as she rounded the corner onto the street, she found herself face to face with Alex. Again.

  He was in the middle of a call, phone pressed to his ear. “I don’t know, six or seven,” he was saying. He locked eyes with her, and the warning she saw flashing there was enough to arrest her in her tracks. “I have no idea.”

  Ashleigh tried to shake herself from the paralysis his dangerous expression had induced. She stalked over to him, fuming. What in the hell was he doing here again? Christ, did she have to bash him over the head with a frying pan before he got the message?

  “You need to leave,” she spat, “this instant—“

  He raised his brow at her, seeming to dare her to continue. There was an intensity in his expression that seemed to hold some kind of power over her, because her words died in her throat.

  “You might have to,” Alex replied to whatever had been said. “I don’t know what the fuck is going on here, but it doesn’t smell right to me. Okay, man, thanks. See you soon.” Alex hung up the phone and slipped it back into his cut.

  Something caught the corner of Ashleigh’s eye. She shifted her attention from Alex to the door of the bakery, searching for whatever detail had set her off. The glass was cracked a little, the door pushed open, and part of the welcome mat caught in the door….

  Her heart seemed to stop in her chest. She’d locked up last night. Hadn’t she? Yes, of course she did. She always locked up. It was a habit. When the door closed behind her for the night, she would reach back and give the handle a little tug just to feel the resistance of the deadbolt. It was one of the little rituals she’d developed over the years, something that gave her reassurance.

  So why was the door open?

  “Ashleigh,” Alex began, but she ignored him.

  She flung the door back and hurried inside, her eyes searching the whole place over, checking for signs of damage. Nothing had been shattered or rearranged—not that she could tell. She rushed over to the cash register. It looked completely undamaged.

  She fumbled for her keys, searching for the little stubby one that would unlock the register. The money had to be there. She couldn’t be short this week. She hadn’t had a chance to run to the bank yet to make her cash deposit.

  God, why hadn’t she sprung for the credit card reader? Why had she opted for the cash-only model? If it was gone, she had no rent money for the apartment or the bakery, no grocery money, nothing for the heating or electric…. The whole life that she’d sweated and bled to build for herself would collapse like a house of cards. There was no room for error in her life, not yet.

  The drawer sprung open with its characteristic shudder. She nearly collapsed to her knees in relief. It was all there, the neat stacks of bills. She thumbed through the larger bills quickly just to reassure herself that a would-be thief hadn’t tried to pad the stacks with paper so his crime would go unnoticed. No, not a bill was missing.

  The bell on the front door jangled, and in came Alex, followed by three dangerous-looking men. They were all dressed like Alex, in some combination of well-worn leather and denim. Most were unshaven, with a few days’ worth of stubble lining their chins. One was massive, at least a few inches taller than Alex—who certainly wasn’t short. He looked to be a body builder, judging by the size of his muscles and his wedge-like chest. The two others were about Alex’s height, though they looked a little leaner.

  Ashleigh’s attention was immediately drawn to the vests they wore. When the leaner one turned to glance back out the door, she saw the emblem on his back—a grinning red devil’s face with “War Devils” emblazoned between its horns.

  She shook her head to herself. She didn’t have time to deal with whoever Alex had gotten himself mixed up with or whatever mess he’d likely made. She needed to make sure she wasn’t missing anything. She continued her careful inspection of her workspace, trying to mentally inventory all the most expensive pieces of equipment that she owned.

  “Ash, it looks like there was a break-in,” Alex informed her.

  “No shit, Sherlock,” she muttered. “I saw the door. What the hell are you doing here? And who are your friends? No, you know what, don’t answer that. Just…please, leave me the hell alone.”

  Alex didn’t seem to be paying attention to her. He’d started touching along the paneling of the wall. His tall friend shouldered his way behind the counter and began pulling wire racks of ready baked goods out. The two others began kicking at tiles.

  Ashleigh let loose a growl of frustration and stormed over to the basement steps that led down to the bakery’s storage room. She couldn’t deal with this right now. She couldn’t deal with him. “If you creeps aren’t out of here when I get back, I’m calling the cops,” she snapped, and headed down the stairs.

  She couldn’t believe him. She wanted to go full shrieking-harpy on Alex for letting his friends tear through her place like that. She didn’t know what they were looking for and she didn’t want to know. The less questions she asked, the better; she’d learned that long ago with Alex. And she didn’t want to start anything with guys connected to a MC. That was just asking for trouble.

  She would just hope that they wouldn’t find whatever it was they were looking for and move on. She could clean up afterwards, maybe file an insurance claim.

  She
stopped at the bottom of the steps, fumbling for the light switch. The design was terrible. There was no way to turn the light on from the top of the stairs, so she ended up feeling her way down the steps and groping blindly in the dark for a few minutes. As soon as she had the money for it, she planned to hire an electrician to rewire the whole thing.

  She flipped the light on and froze, a scream catching in her throat.

  Every cupboard, every shelf, every crate that she had storing dry ingredients had been smashed to pieces on the basement floor. There was flour everywhere—so much that in places it almost looked like snow. Whoever had done this had used some force, because there wasn’t a piece of her cupboards left larger than her forearm.