Braver (Runaway)

by Lexie Ray

  “Can’t leave my car,” he said, leaning against it. I suspected it was the only thing holding him up.

  For the first time, I noticed that it was a Porsche. I gave a low whistle, rubbing my hand over the silver paint job.

  “This is a really nice car,” I said. “Why’d you bring it to this part of town? You’re lucky it didn’t get jacked while you were inside the club.”

  “Didn’t plan on it,” Liam slurred. “Just happened.”

  “How about I drive you and your car home, if you’re that concerned?” I asked, rattling the keys. “You’ll get home safe and you won’t have to worry about the Porsche.”

  “Do you know how to drive manual?” he asked, his eyes closing and his head nodding.

  The funny thing was, I did. The boys in Granny’s neighborhood were obsessed with cars, and it wasn’t manly to succumb to the ease of an automatic. They liked control behind the wheel, revving their engines at each other along the street. A good friend in high school had taught me on his very own car.

  “I think I can manage,” I said, eyeing the sleek vehicle. In fact, it was going to be a pleasure to drive this.

  I helped Liam around to the passenger’s side and eased him in. The interior of the car was all leather. I expected as much as I leaned over him, buckling him in.

  “Cocoa?”

  I whipped my head around to see Casey, holding our bags and looking concerned by my compromising position.

  “Hey, Casey,” I said, jogging over and relieving her of my stuff. “Sorry about leaving you in there.”

  Casey’s eyes left my face and looked around me to the car, where Liam was waiting. I followed her gaze and watched as his head lolled. He never would’ve made it home if he were behind the wheel.

  “I thought you said you weren’t doing this kind of thing anymore,” she said, her brow knitted together in concern.

  I laughed, waving my hands as if to clear the air. “No, no, no,” I said. “I’m not doing that. I swear I’m not. I just saw him getting into his car. He was going to drive himself home, and I just couldn’t let him. Not in the state he was in.”

  Casey looked less than convinced. “I know what it’s like to think that some patrons are cute sometimes,” she said. “But whatever he said, whatever he offered you, you don’t have to go home with him.”

  “It’s not a matter of going home with him,” I said, shaking my head. “I’m done with that shit. I told you. He’s too messed up to drive. I just want to see him back okay. I think I owe him that.”

  “You don’t owe anybody anything,” Casey said. “And you don’t owe me any explanations. I just want you to be careful and not do anything you don’t want to do.”

  I gave my roommate an impromptu hug to reassure her almost as much to reassure myself.

  “Thank you for looking out for me,” I said. “I’ll be home before you know it.”

  I hopped in the car with Liam, whose head lolled up against the window.

  “No falling asleep on me,” I said, patting his knee. “You need to tell me how to get you home.”

  I started the Porsche, the engine roaring to life. I touched the gearshift tentatively. It would be like riding a bike, right? I hoped so.

  Liam lifted one heavy arm and pointed, so I took a right out of the parking lot. He mumbled something.

  “What was that, Liam?” I asked, raising my voice a little so he’d do the same. “I didn’t hear you.”

  “I said, you’re going the wrong way,” he slurred.

  I stifled a laugh and went around the block before pointing us in the opposite direction. It had been so long since I’d driven a car, but it was something you’d never forget, I was beginning to realize. I might be rusty, dumping the clutch a little too much, but keeping it straight was easy enough. The challenge was coaxing out directions from the very inebriated man beside me.

  “You need to tell me if I’m going the right way,” I said, making my voice clearer than it had to be.

  “Not right,” he said, making me tap the brakes and look for the next street I could turn onto to get around the block again. “Not right what she did to me.”

  “What was that?” I asked, fighting the urge to look at Liam. I needed to keep my eyes on the road.

  “She screwed me over,” he breathed, his voice barely audible over the Porsche’s purring. “After everything.”

  Where was all of this coming from? A red light halted our tentative progress, and I took the opportunity to look at Liam. His face was propped up against the window, and he was holding his tie in his hands. It must have slipped out from beneath his collar. The expression on his face — or what I could see of his face — was pure misery.

  The light turned green, and I focused on the road.

  “Does any of this look familiar?” I asked. “Are we headed toward your home?”

  “In my own home,” Liam hissed. “That’s where she took him.”

  I frowned. What was he talking about?

  “I’m afraid I’m not following you,” I said. “But are we going the right way? Can you give me the name of the street where you live?”

  I didn’t have much hope of finding it as unfamiliar as I was with this part of the city. But if I saw the right street sign, I could turn onto it.

  “I’m never going to say his name,” Liam said. “I don’t care what he was to me. He’s nothing, now. And neither is she.”

  “Okay,” I said. “You don’t have to say their names. That’s okay. But you do need to tell me where you live so we can get you home.”

  “I know I did wrong,” Liam continued. “I lived at work. That’s all I did unless I was seeing her. But she understood. She said she did. That’s how I made my money. I had to be there to see it through.”

  “You have to do things for yourself,” I agreed, not understanding what we were talking about. But I’d be screwed if he passed out before he told me about our destination.

  “That’s what she said,” he exclaimed. “But she didn’t mean it. She never meant anything.”

  I was beginning to discern that we were talking girl troubles. Was that why Liam was at the strip club tonight? He said in the parking lot that he hadn’t meant to come — and not in his Porsche. Did he stop in on a whim to have some fun? Or was it an act of desperation to blow off steam and numb the pain from whatever he was talking about right now?

  “Turn left here,” Liam slurred, pointing as we passed a street. I eyed the name and went around the block until we were headed back in the right direction. At least he was conscious of where we needed to go, even if he was mumbling about strange stuff.

  “That’s the last time for me,” he said. “I’m never doing that again.”

  “It’s easy to think that,” I said, just trying to keep him talking, so he didn’t go to sleep. “But you’re stronger than you think.”

  “Nope,” Liam said, shaking his head. “Not. This is it for me. I’m through with women.”

  “Don’t give up on us just because of one bad apple,” I said, trying not to smile. “We’re not all the same.”

  “I thought I loved her,” he said, his voice clear for the first time before he rolled down the window and vomited out of the moving car.

  I gritted my teeth and slowed down to a crawl, wincing in sympathy as he emptied his gut onto the roadway.

  “Get it all out,” I coaxed. “You’ll feel a lot better.”

  “Goddamn tequila,” Liam said, sitting back down and wiping his mouth on the sleeve of his suit jacket. “Gets me every freaking time and I keep crawling back.”

  “Maybe one day you’ll learn your lesson,” I said, smiling.

  He shook his head. “Never do. Not with tequila, not with her.”

  Curiosity got the better of me as I revved the engine and changed gears. “Who is she?”

  “Fiancée,” Liam said. “Well, was. Not anymore.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” I said. “Maybe it wasn’t meant to be.”

>   “Maybe,” he repeated. “Who knows?”

  He pointed to the entrance of a looming building, so I turned. I jumped as he reached for my leg, but it was only to fumble at the key fob, which, I discovered, contained a button to open the gate to the entrance.

  “Is this where you live?” I asked.

  “Valet,” he said instead, pointing.

  I pulled up next to the building’s front doors and rolled down the window. The attendant recoiled in surprise, then recovered his composure. I realized I was still wearing my stripper makeup and flushed in embarrassment.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “Liam wasn’t feeling well and I offered to drive him home.”

  “That’s quite all right, miss,” the attendant said. “I’ll take the car.”

  He held the door open for me, and I climbed out. “You know, if you can,” I started, “he kind of puked all down the other side of it. I think he had enough tequila to eat away that nice paint job. Would you mind rinsing it off or something?”

  “Of course,” the attendant said.

  I grabbed my bag and caught up to Liam just as he took a spill in front of the door, collapsing on the ground.

  “Hey, now,” I said. “You can’t give up. You’re almost there.”

  “There’s no point,” he said. “No point anymore.”

  “Of course there is,” I said, hauling him to his feet and looping his arm over my shoulders. “We’ll get you cleaned up and to bed. That’ll be better.”

  The doorman sighed and shook his head as we entered.

  “Never seen a man who’s had a little too much to drink?” I demanded, feeling protective of Liam.

  “Of course I have,” the doorman said. “We just all knew it was a matter of time before Mr. Henry got to this point. He’s suffered a lot of heartaches.”

  I frowned. Mr. Henry. Liam Henry. The name was so familiar it made me twitchy.

  “Can you get him up to his room yourself?” the doorman asked. “I can help.”

  “We’ll manage, but thank you,” I said. “Just punch the right floor on the elevator, would you?”

  “Of course.”

  Liam moved his legs but wasn’t very responsive otherwise as I carted him to the elevator. I was worried about dragging the right room number out of him, but was surprised to find only one room once the elevator opened its door.

  “Penthouse?” I asked, looking down at him. “Lucky thing. Don’t tell me there’s not point. I’d go home to a penthouse every night of the week, if I could.”

  Liam grunted and scratched at his suit jacket pocket. I retrieved another set of keys in there and found the right one to fit the door.

  I gasped as we entered. The entire outer wall was glass, offering a breathtaking view of the twinkling city lights. It looked otherworldly, as if the stars had taken up residence on the earth just for one night.

  I turned on a light switch with one elbow and gasped again. The penthouse was magnificent from head to toe. The floor had been painted with a smooth, white enamel, giving the entire place a modern feel. The furniture was sparse but looked comfortable, giving the space just the right touch.

  I wanted to ogle my surroundings some more, but I had to focus on getting Liam cleaned up. He’d managed to puke a little on himself, and the stench of the tequila wafting up from it was making me gag. I managed to get us to what I hoped was his room before letting him fall to the bed.

  “I’m going to get these stinky clothes off of you,” I called up to him as I removed his shoes. “Better not get any ideas, though.”

  He groaned, and I knew that sex was the absolute last thing on his mind.

  I got him out of his suit, then remembered, with a flush, that I’d made him come earlier at the club. I knew sleeping in sticky underwear couldn’t be comfortable. Or at least that’s what I told myself as I eased his fitted boxer briefs off of his body. I tried not to stare at his very nice endowment that I’d been grinding against earlier. It wouldn’t be polite, since he was fast asleep.

  The shirt came off next, and I couldn’t stop drinking in the sight of his muscles. This was a man who took good care of himself other than tonight. I knew that each cut and each bulge was the result of hard work and many hours put in the gym. I leaned forward to catch a whiff of his skin, feeling guilty, and then covered my mouth. He still smelled of vomit, and it seemed like the tequila was leaving him through his pores.

  I located a bathroom and filled a small basin with warm water. Nabbing one of the soft, fluffy washcloths, I returned to the bedroom and began bathing him. I knew it would be too difficult to get him into the shower.

  “I just want to make sure you sleep comfortably,” I sang out, trying to convince myself as much as tell him. Maybe all I wanted was an excuse to run my hands over his body.

  His cock twitched when I reached the lower half of his body, wringing out the cloth as I went. I dabbed around it before taking a deep breath before wrapping the washcloth around it to clean it thoroughly. I bit my lip as he moaned in his sleep and pressed my legs together. This was too sexy for me to bear.

  “Fuck yeah,” he breathed, hardening in my hand.

  I put the washcloth back in the basin before moving on to his legs, trying not to look at his needy erection. It was enormous.

  “Tease,” he whispered, sounding disappointed as I neglected that region.

  “Maybe next time,” I joked, getting up and taking the basin and washcloth back to the bathroom.

  When I returned, he was snoring in earnest. I covered him as best as I could and turned to leave, but he grabbed my hand weakly.

  “Stay,” he said, not opening his eyes. “You got me home. I can do this much for you. It’s late.”

  “I’ll be fine,” I protested, freeing my hand before setting it back down on the bed.

  “There’s a spare room,” he murmured. “It’ll be fine. Please. I’d feel terrible.”

  “Well, if I can keep you from feeling more terrible than you already do, I’ll stay,” I said, smiling.

  His snore was my only answer.

  I was pretty tired, but the spare bedroom down the hall without any trouble. The bed was just as comfortable as it looked, I discovered as I flopped down on it.

  I couldn’t help but think about how sexy Liam had been, reclined on the bed and accepting my attentions with the washcloth. Biting my lip so I’d be quiet, I slipped my hand into my jeans and rubbed my damp pussy through my panties. I’d been aching for release ever since I gave Liam the lap dances back at the strip club.

  It came easily with how turned on I was, only mere minutes before my climax swept over me, taking my breath, making me whimper even though the source of my fantasies was sleeping just down the hall. It was the sweetest orgasm, a perfect way to mark my attraction to Liam.

  Panting, I flipped on the lamp next to the bed and noticed a glossy magazine. Picking it up, hoping a little reading would send me straight into slumber, I stared at it instead.

  When I saw the cover, it all clicked. Of course I recognized him. How could I have not known? Liam Henry. One of the youngest and hottest millionaires in the city. His face had been staring at me all month from newsstands and magazine racks, just as it smoldered now.

  That’s who I’d gone home with and who I was pleasuring myself over. A freaking millionaire.

  Chapter 6

  I awoke with someone shaking my shoulder. Slitting my eyes open, I realized it was Liam. I sat up.

  “What is it?” I asked, rubbing my eyes and trying to get alert as fast as possible. “What’s wrong?”

  “Did anyone see you with me last night?” he demanded. “Anyone at all?” He was dressed in a robe, I noted with disappointment, thinking about washing him last night.

  I frowned at him. “What do you mean?” I asked. “You were at a strip club. That’s a public place. Maybe people were more interested in the stage than you, but you could’ve been seen.”

  “Shit,” he breathed, pulling at his hair. “I’m
so stupid.”

  I tapped his face on the magazine. “Is that what all this was about?” I asked, looking up at him. “Stupid that Mr. Millionaire shows up at a seedy strip club?” My voice hardened. “Stupid that he took a stripper home with him?”

  Liam scoffed. The sweet man from last night was nowhere to be found. He was all business, now.

  “If I’d have taken you home, you would’ve been sleeping in my bed,” he said.