BAD INFLUENCE: A Dark Bad Boy Romance

by Callie Pierce

  “Meet you in the bedroom?” he breathed into her ear. “You think you’re in charge here?”

  Ashleigh heaved a sigh of mock frustration. At least, she hoped it sounded like frustration. With his hand teasing her like that, she wasn’t so sure that it didn’t just sound like desire.

  “You’ve got a smoking hot woman telling you to meet her in bed naked, and you’re going to argue with her?”

  Alex pressed a kiss to her neck. “You’re right,” he growled throatily. “What am I thinking?”

  Alex moved back, giving her enough space to slip out and hurry down the hall ahead of him. She heard his footsteps not far behind her, and the rustle of leather and fabric as he followed her instructions.

  Ashleigh hit the bed first. Alex was right behind her, his chest bare now. She could see every line of his musculature, and every white, angry ridge of the hundred or so small scars that he’d picked up since he’d left. They’d barely caught her eye before, but now she found herself tracing them, trying to make sense of them.

  Alex climbed onto the bed and straddled her immediately. He smoothed his hands down the length of her arms all the way to her wrists and, as he always did, trapped them in his manacle-like hands. He pulled them above her head. Instead of simply lying there this time, Ashleigh dragged her right hand out of his grip and lifted it to his chest, where she traced a long hairline half-crescent, a mark that cut his left pec in half.

  “Did Jasper give this to you too?” she asked.

  Alex caught her wrist again and pressed a kiss to it. “No,” he murmured, then pressed another kiss against the inside of her wrist before drawing it back up over her head. “I’ve had some close calls in the past couple of years.”

  Ashleigh continued to study the web of small scars. Most of them were faint enough to be nearly unnoticeable. But it was strange that she hadn’t noticed this before. Her mind drifted back to the confrontation with Jasper, his latest “close call.” She didn’t know why she was getting hung up on this now, but it suddenly occurred to her that not every one of those incidents could have gone as smoothly as things had today.

  “Did you lose anyone?” she asked. “Anyone you knew?”

  “Shit, Ash.” Alex released her wrists and rolled over onto the other side of the bed. “Are we doing this now? What happened to this?” Alex gestured to his hard-on.

  Ashleigh propped herself up onto her side. She hesitated, then reached over and continued to trace his scars. “It’s just…you seem really close to those guys. And you deal with people like Jasper long enough….”

  Alex sighed heavily. “Yeah, we’ve lost a couple of brothers over the years.” He glanced over at Ashleigh. “What brought this up?”

  Ashleigh shrugged. “I just wanted to know. I know those guys risked their lives for me. I just wondered how often things like this happen, and if they ever turn bad.”

  “Oh, they turn bad,” Alex said. “We’ve all lost someone close. You never quite get over it. But it’s blood that binds us together, and anytime our blood gets spilled, it just fires us up. Losing someone just makes you that much more determined to do every damn thing you can anytime you can to make sure you don’t lose another.”

  Ashleigh let his words settle into her. She knew now that he’d grown so much, but this was the first time she felt it run so deep. A younger Alex would have sworn vendettas, would have pursued revenge at any cost for revenge’s sake. That’s what she’d thought this affair with Jasper had been from the very beginning. She’d been so sure that Alex was obsessed with ferreting the drug lord out just so he could pay him back for the torture.

  But the fierce loyalty Alex had just described didn’t hinge on blindly defending his honor and paying down all his debts. It was about protection. That was why he’d been so determined and so invested in this.

  That was why his automatic instinct had been to dive for her, to protect her, even when he couldn’t have known how Jasper would react in the heat of the moment. He’d wanted to end the kingpin and his empire so that he could know for sure that he and Ashleigh were safe.

  Ashleigh crawled on top of him. She started lightly kissing down his chest.

  “I’m not all torn up inside,” Alex assured her. She could hear the eye roll in his voice. “You don’t have to worry about me.”

  Ashleigh brushed her fingers lightly over his chest hair as she continued to trail kisses down to this groin. “I know,” she told him between her caresses.

  “Then why do I feel like you’re trying to kiss it all better?”

  “Because you’re ridiculous?” she suggested. Then she continued, more seriously, “I’ve been too hung up on who I thought you were when you left. On what you did to me and Penny, on our pain and suffering.” Ashleigh swept a hand down his abdomen. “I didn’t even think about how you’ve suffered too. About what you’ve been through.”

  Alex drew Ashleigh up to him, lifting her under her arms until she was laying on top of him, her knees bent on either side of his chest, his cock just barely brushing against her panties. He gazed up at her with his arresting blue eyes. They were filled to the brim with raw emotion—relief and joy and a fierce possessiveness that she could only define as love.

  Seeing him look at her like that filled her with the same emotions, and with such sudden, breathtaking force that she could feel her eyes filling with tears again.

  “Don’t you worry about me,” Alex repeated.

  Ashleigh smiled through the tears and buried her head against his neck.

  She felt Alex’s hands stroking down her body, caressing her, stoking the hot need in her core back to a fever pitch. He ran his hands over her ass, creating a delicious friction through the fabric. She maneuvered her hips against his hands, urging him on, as she continued to press kisses against his neck.

  Alex tugged her panties down and pulled her hips down onto him, pushing deep into her. Ashleigh shuddered pleasurably as she felt him enter her, stretching her and filling her. She clenched around him automatically, and her hips thrust back against him, trying to draw him in deeper.

  Ashleigh pulled away from his neck, arching her back as she felt him bottom out. Her emotions were mixing in with her libido, and in that moment, with him buried so deep inside her, his sturdy body beneath her like a solid foundation, the pleasure she felt running through her seemed like a confirmation that this was right. That they were meant for each other.

  Alex guided her hips forth and back, urging her to fall into an easy rhythm. She slid up and down him, feeling the weight of her breasts swaying beneath her. Alex’s hands dug into her hips harder and harder as she moved, picking up momentum, changing her slow tempo into a more demanding pace.

  She barely need Alex’s hands on her hips. Her body was taking over as the desire between her legs turned to a tight, insistent pinch. It was a sharp driving need that her pumping hips instinctively moved to sate. Her breaths grew shorter as she worked to build up enough friction, to find that sweet spot in her that would unravel her and send her tumbling over the edge.

  She could feel him getting closer, his cock swelling and expanding so that it felt even bigger and stretched her even more. With every upward stroke she felt her body trying to milk him, contracting around him until she could feel his pulse in her, and his own heavy breathing in her ears.

  Close to their peaks, in the midst of her frenzied thrusting, Alex tilted her hips up slightly as she rose off him, and when she slammed back down, the angle just slightly changed and his shaft connected with that sensitive spot of hers. Her world seemed to split apart with that contact, breaking into bright stars and an uplifting swell that carried her off in a rush of endorphins. Her body arched, her toes curled, and her nails dug deep into Alex’s shoulder.

  Her climax was all that Alex needed to come, too. He grunted and emptied himself into her, his hands holding her tightly against him.

  She collapsed on top of him, sinking against his chest, waiting for her breathing to even back out.
Alex ran his hands lightly up and down her back, caressing her, as he softened inside her.

  They lay there quietly for a while, no sound but their breathing. After a few moments Ashleigh gently extracted herself and shifted over to his side, curling in against him. He wrapped an arm around her shoulders and held her tight.

  Maybe it was just the endorphins rushing through her. But as she lay there next to him, it seemed that for the first time in a long time, all was right with the world.

  Chapter 27

  Ashleigh

  “So what now?” Alex asked after a while. He turned his head toward her, fixing her with his cool gaze. There was no expectation or challenge there. He was asking her a simple question, and his even demeanor seemed to be his way of showing her that he would accept her answer.

  Ashleigh sighed and cuddled closer to him. “I suppose I should pick up Penny, especially since I don’t have to worry about being seen out with her anymore. I don’t, right?”

  “No,” Alex reassured her. “Even if Jasper’s guys pick up on what went down—and I’m guessing they won’t, since we have one of the guys who was there with Jasper telling everyone that everything is fine—even if someone catches on, their priority is going to be settling their score with the War Devils, not coming after you.” Alex hesitated for a moment. “You want me to run you to your car?”

  “In a bit,” Ashleigh murmured. “I’m not quite ready to go over there just yet.”

  Another short silence stretched between them. Then Alex asked casually, his words almost too calm, “So I take it you’re going to head back to your place with Penny.”

  “Yeah,” Ashleigh said. “She needs fresh clothes, and I’m sure she’s missed her room.”

  Alex looked like he wanted to say more, but he seemed to swallow those words and instead turned his head back the other way so that she could no longer see his expression. “Well, I’ll be around,” he said noncommittally. “I’ll keep you updated on how things are going—”

  “Are you going to be staying here still? Didn’t you say this was one of the guys’ places?”

  “Just until I can find a place of my own to stay. I’m planning on sticking around for a while.”

  It was Ashleigh’s turn to hesitate. She knew by now that he wanted to be in her life. But what she was about to say stuck in her throat all the same. Because she wanted him in her life too, and if she’d somehow screwed things up between them by telling him that she needed space, she’d never forgive herself.

  “Well, I was kind of thinking…maybe you could just stay with me.” The words tumbled out of her mouth quickly. “I mean, just until we get things figured out. I mean, until you get things figured out.”

  Alex’s head pivoted back to her, a look of surprise in his eyes. “You mean that you want me to come stay with you and Penny? But I thought—“

  “I never should have kept her from you,” Ashleigh told him. “You were right. You had every right to know. I thought that I was protecting her, but that didn’t mean that I should have kept her hidden from you. Even when I thought that you’d just up and left me, you still deserved to know that you’re a father. It was selfish of me—“

  “No, Ash,” Alex cut her off, crushing her against his side. “You were just trying to do what was best for her. I mean, hell, I know I’m not exactly anyone’s top pick for a father. You said it yourself—you were almost shot today because of what I got myself involved in.”

  “What you got yourself involved in—the War Devils—they’re the whole reason we’re alive. It was never you, Alex, only shit luck that almost ruined our lives. The first time you were in the wrong place at the wrong time, and this time it was me. I just happened to pick the wrong spot to start a business.”

  Ashleigh shook her head softly to herself. “If you hadn’t happened across Jasper that day…God, I keep trying to imagine what we could have had. Things still would have been tight, and I know we would have struggled, but Penny would have had a father around. We could have made it work, really work.”

  Alex turned onto his side and draped an arm across her body, pulling her in further against him, molding her stomach and hips into him. “That’s life,” he told her. He pressed a kiss to the crown of her head, nuzzling into her red curls. “You can’t get hung up on what was. It pisses me off that I missed so much of Penny’s life. I wish I could have been there. I wish I could have known her from the moment she was born. But there’s nothing I can do to change that now.”

  “But you can get to know her now,” Ashleigh murmured. “That’s what I mean, Alex. I think we should take this slow, but I want this. I want us. And I want you to be a part of Penny’s life.”

  Alex’s lips broke into a small smile. “I’m glad,” he told her. “This isn’t about me. It’s about doing what’s best for her however I can. If that means we have to back off and take this slow, I’ll back right off. I’d rather die than hurt her.”

  Ashleigh smiled back at him. She shifted her attention his stomach and the slow rise and fall of his diaphragm. Starting at his navel, she began walking her two fingers slowly up his chest, stealing a few playful glances as she did so. “I know,” she told him confidently.

  Alex watched her fingers playing across his chest for a few more moments. Then he began tentatively, “What made you change your mind? I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m happy. I missed you so damned much, and after this week I don’t know how well I’d handle being away from you again. But before, fuck, you sounded as if you didn’t want me within ten miles of you and Penny.”

  Ashleigh let her hand drop lightly onto his chest. She pressed her palm against his warm skin and felt the regularity of his heartbeat; the sensation was strangely soothing. “I was upset and I wasn’t thinking clearly. I’ve had some time now to reassess and get my priorities straight.”

  She paused, casting a smirk up at him, and added, “It might also have something to do with you acting as a human shield during a shootout. But I can’t be sure.”

  Alex rolled his eyes dramatically. “Well, if that was all it took….”

  Chapter 28

  Cobra

  Cobra glanced reflexively over his shoulder. He wasn’t sure what he expected to find on the streets of the little suburb now. Maybe it was just an old habit.

  Though it seemed to him that Ashleigh’s friend Nancy couldn’t have picked a deader, uneventful place to live.

  Cobra had walked with Ashleigh up to Nancy’s front door at her insistence. She wanted to clear the air and make sure that Nancy didn’t think she was being harassed by an abusive ex. Cobra hadn’t thought it was too good of an idea, given his last interaction with the woman, but Ashleigh had insisted, and he figured it was better not to argue with her.

  They were going with the cover story that the break-in at the bakery had actually been the work of a persistent stalker, and that Cobra, who just happened to be back in town, had stepped in to help Ashleigh out. They planned to tell Nancy that Ashleigh had been reluctant to go to the police since she’d been receiving death threats, and that she’d gone to stay with Cobra for a bit so that she could feel safer, and that Cobra had eventually convinced her to go to the authorities.

  It sounded like a cock-and-bull story to him, but again, Cobra wasn’t going to contradict Ashleigh here. She had to do what she thought was best to preserve her relationships, and if that meant that he had to lie through his teeth along with her, that was what he was going to do.

  Still, he couldn’t help but fidget nervously, shifting from foot to foot as they waited for Nancy to come to the door.

  “Relax,” Ashleigh murmured back to him. “She’s not getting her shotgun. You don’t have to get ready to duck and cover.”

  Cobra snorted. “Says you. I don’t think she’s too fond of me.”

  “Coming!” Nancy called from inside the house. “Katie, honey, go get Penny’s bag please. Oh good Lord, what have you done to the cat?”

  Cobra heard a chorus of high-pitched
giggles. He cast a skeptical look at Ashleigh.

  Ashleigh’s look mirrored his. She shrugged to him.

  At last the door swung open, revealing a frazzled-looking Nancy—her hair wild and her eyes a little wide. “Ashleigh, sweetie, how are—what is he doing here?” The woman’s suddenly cold eyes flickered to Cobra, her posture turning wary.

  “Nancy, this is Alex, Penny’s father. He’s here because I think he didn’t make the best impression earlier, and you deserve a full explanation.”

  Cobra stood quietly behind Ashleigh as she detailed what had happened over the last few days. She stuck as close to the truth as she could without giving away the true details, something that impressed Cobra. He realized she was trying to be as honest with Nancy as she possibly could.

  Ashleigh detailed the first few incidents, the destruction of her storage space, her total loss as to what to do. She even described how, after running into him, she’d started to consider the possibility of mending their estranged relationship.