by Rie Warren
RIDE
Carolina Bad Boys, Novella
In Between the Covers
RIE WARREN
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
RIDE
Copyright © 2014 by Rie Warren
Excerpt from Steele, Into Your Heart copyright © 2014 by Rie Warren
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author except for the use of brief quotations.
https://www.riewarren.com
Warren, Rie.
RIDE / Rie Warren – 1st ed
1.New Adult—Fiction. 2. Enemies to Lovers—Fiction. 3. Bikers—Fiction. 4. Erotica—Fiction. I. Title
ASIN: B00PSMR26K
Cover Design
By Rie Warren
Editing
By Gilly Wright http://www.gillywright.com
Note to readers
This is the full, sexy, New Adult version of RIDE, the novella featured in Stone, At Your Service, Carolina Bad Boys #1. There are some minor changes, and a whole lotta additional hot bad boy/good girl content for your pleasure.
To those who are new to the CBBs series, RIDE is standalone. Find the rest of the details on the full CBBs erotic romance series following the story, as well as the first chapter from book #3, Steele, Into Your Heart.
Now hold onto your seats, folks, because we’re in for one wild ride. Welcome back, Jase and Avery!
Chapter One
Avery
MY BACKPACK WAS HEAVY, full of textbooks. The duffel slung over my arm was too stuffed to zip and pieces of paper peeked out.
I was achy between my legs. Sore. Shame hit me so hard and fast I wanted to crawl all the way inside my sweater and hide. Hurt extended from my heart to my head to the bruises on my hips.
I rode the three blocks to the off-campus townhouse complex on my bicycle. The seat rubbed against me. I rose off the padded saddle. My bike was wobbly. I was shaky.
I followed the directions on the tab of paper I’d snagged off the first “room for rent” flyer in the college hub I found. Tears had clogged my throat all day. They still hadn’t abated. Reaching the two-story house not too far away from Texas A&M, I hit my brakes. With my bicycle locked into the stand, I shouldered the only belongings I cared about as I pressed the doorbell.
Another twinge of fear hit my belly.
I didn’t have a choice. I had to get out of the dorms. My RA had laughed at me.
The door opened and I peered up. And up. I encountered an insolent grin. Gold-brown eyes. Shaggy brown-bronze hair. A tattoo circled his left bicep. Another trailed up his neck. The last one—that I could see—curled around his right arm all the way down to his wrist in black ink.
Not this. Anything but this. It was only the second week of fall term, for God’s sake!
Jase Everly stepped outside, and his long arms framed the open door. Muscles I hadn’t even studied in Gray’s Anatomy stood out on his forearms. His smile widened. He licked the perfect bow of his lips as he took in my geek-girl-fitting sweater and the way I shuffled away from him.
I started down the steps, but he grabbed my wrist in the strong grip of his rough fingertips.
Jase was the famous senior. The one and only all the girls wanted to screw. The buff, badass, mysterious asshole who took what he wanted without a single care in the world.
I was a lowly sophomore. He was college lore. A total man-whore by all accounts.
“Skittish much?” he asked.
I eyed my escape route, wondering how fast I could unchain my bike. If I could break free of his hold, that was, which drew me closer to him by the second.
The bags I held grew heavy. My wrist ached where he gripped me. I hated feeling weak. I hated that I couldn’t shake this guy off. I hated even knowing who he was.
As a matter of fact, I hated Jase on contact—like a contagious disease.
“Pissed more like,” I hissed. A blast of self-protectiveness surged inside me.
“You wanted a room, right?”
“Not with you.”
Jase Everly. How could this be happening to me? He was the naughty playboy prince of Texas A&M. What girls didn’t say about him out loud, guys whispered like he was a god of fucking and the fucking king of the campus.
“Well, well, well. The little nerd has a tongue.” He tweaked the sloppy bun of my hair so it fell into my eyes. “I like it.”
I yanked my hand free.
“I don’t like you.” I backed off the steps and tried to open my bike lock in clumsy motions.
“Shit.” I heard him mutter.
Shit is right. The shittest day of my life. I chuckled. Shittiest, rather. God, in Jase’s company for two minutes and already my grammar turned bad. No telling how bad he’d make me in other ways if I stuck around. And why did the key for my bike lock have to jam on me right then?
“Something funny?”
“No.” I laid my forehead against my bike seat. “No. There’s really nothing funny about today at all.”
“Hey.” His fingers folding over mine stilled me.
I flinched from the contact.
Jase dropped down on his heels beside me. “Hey.” He reached over to touch my face.
When I cringed, he slid back.
“I’m just looking for a roomie. I’m not gonna hurt you in any way.” He motioned to my bags. “Let’s get this shit inside. You hungry?”
I hadn’t been able to keep food down in twelve hours. I needed a bath, a shower, a full-body scrub. I needed to forget. I needed someplace safe, and Jase was the least safe man I’d ever seen.
Standing up, he pulled my bags off of me. It was an easy, slinky motion he did without missing a beat. He ducked his head toward the door.
“C’mon.” He gave me his palm—a warm firm grip—and tugged me to my feet. “No lie. I’ve got dinner burning on the stove, precious. So if you don’t hop-to, it’ll be a disaster, and we can’t have that happenin’, can we?”
“I can’t move.”
My feet stuck in place. I was rattled to my bones, shivering in my skin, and I wanted my hand back from his solid grasp.
He felt so strong, too capable. And moving in with a cocky guy like him was not a good idea.
“Sure you can. One foot then the other.” He started up the steps and jerked his head forward. “Like this.” Jase ushered me inside the door. “There’s a room for you. You can lock the door from the inside. I don’t have a key. You’ll be even safer there than inside that ugly sweater of yours.”
Part of me crawled further inside myself. The other part lashed out. “And you could do with putting on a few more clothes!”
“Sweet. A temper. I like that. Where the hell did you come from?” A dimple slid into his cheek as he grinned at me. It matched the cleft on his chin.
Hate.
“The dorms.”
“No shit? That’s fucking terrifying. No wonder you’re shaking.”
Jace booted the door shut behind us.
Chapter Two
Jase
ANOTHER DAY, ANOTHER DOLLAR. Wasn’t that a line in a movie? It wasn’t just my life, right?
Ho-hum, humdrum, but not as—many people expected—full of hos.
And it wasn’t just a dollar.
It was a bank account full of bucks to go with my former rich
kid drifter existence.
That was until a petite, pretty, innocent girl turned up on my doorstep one hour ago. Didn’t I just feel like Daddy Warbucks. And I shall dub thee Little Orphan Fannie.
I read a lot of books. I watched a lot of movies. I did my life like it was a business transaction at the ripe old age of twenty-one-and-a-half.
I’d seen the girl many a time. That’s what happened when a sexy chick like her tried to hide. Seek and you shall find. Her long blonde hair and snapping sapphire eyes were unforgettable. She worked at the Starbucks on campus. Of course she did.
Word to the wise, women. We want what’s hiding in plain sight.
I leaned against the counter as the lasagna bubbled in the oven. I dug out my Zippo, lit a Red and blew fat gray smoke rings toward the ceiling.
My phone rang. I ignored it. First time ever. Fuck work, fuck studies, fuck college, and most of all, fuck my father.
I just lost three hundred bucks.
I heard the water running upstairs, the bathtub filling.
The thought of my new roomie naked with water dripping all over her body captured my interest like no woman had for months.
It was a siren call to me.
After stubbing out the smoke on the sole of my boot, I tossed it outside.
Filthy habit. No worse than any of my others.
She’d need clean towels. She’d seemed one small step away from collapsing on my doorstep, not to mention it looked like she’d brought the bare minimum with her. The load of towels in the dryer I’d washed earlier, fabric fucking softener and all, was still warm. I folded them in threes like my mom had taught me. A boy is not a man until he can take care of himself.
It was the least I could do. I was considerate like that. So considerate in fact I thought about the girl, soft and warm and naked in my arms, the entire time I finished the laundry.
Carrying a stack upstairs, I hesitated outside the bathroom. Images of the wet, slippery girl—the woman—overrode my calm cool senses as I heard water splashing behind the closed door. I wanted to have a little look-see. I wouldn’t have testosterone pumping through my veins if I didn’t. But I’d promised her locked doors so I was going to do the gentlemanly thing . . . for a change.
I knocked on the door with two knuckles. “Yo. Clean towels.”
I heard another splash and a yelp followed by a moan. Bending down, I placed the towels on the floor. I raised my hand against the door, so desperate to see what she was doing inside. After a fleeting moment of indecision, I raced down the stairs and away from temptation.
Fuckin’ A. She was here for an hour and already testing my willpower.
I sat on the bottom step.
My head fell into my hands, and—surprise—my forehead was sweaty. My cock shoved up so hard in my jeans it nearly ripped through the zipper. I squeezed myself so hard tears stung in my eyes.
No one got to me.
No one got to know me.
I wasn’t available. I didn’t date. I was not take-home-to-parents material.
I definitely didn’t do roommates like this.
But suddenly there was a girl upstairs in my bathroom, and I didn’t want her to be anywhere else.
I took out another smoke. I lit it. I walked to the front door and blew the fumes outside. Her bicycle was chained next my Harley, which hogged the curbside.
Cute.
I didn’t even know her name. In the past, I’d glanced over her nametag when I’d picked up my straight black Venti coffee. Yet I’d let her move in, no questions asked. I’d carried her damn bags inside.
As soon as I’d seen her chin wobble, my knees faltered.
Little bird. A broken bird. A woman inside waiting to come out like the fiery Phoenix to match her beautiful looks and the viperish words she’d spat at me.
I finished my smoke. The butt landed in my next-door neighbor’s plant pot. Oops.
Back inside, I heard the timer ding on the oven. I took out the lasagna, bubbling and piping hot. I set the table for two. A first.
“Soup’s on!” I shouted up the stairs.
There was no reply.
I drummed my fingers on the banister and counted to ten. Okay, I only counted to three before I bounded up the steps. Her door was cracked, and I listened to her talking on the phone instead of curbing my instincts that time.
Yeah, I eavesdropped on that shit like nobody’s business.
“Jase Everly,” she hissed.
Guess she knew who I was, then.
“No. No. No, Benny! It is not like that. Trust me. He’s a man-slut.”
For some reason her waspy words didn’t bother me one bit. I kinda had it coming, considering the rumor mill about my bad rep that followed me around campus.
“Yes. Yes. Fine. He’s hot.”
Thank God for that.
“Still a man whore.”
Fuck my life.
“No, Benny. I’m not going out tonight. Besides, he’s making dinner.”
Damn right I am.
Her shadow crossed the room. “I know. I can’t tell you.” Her voice lowered. “I just had to get off campus. I didn’t know I’d end up here.”
I rapped on the door before I heard any more whispered words about my supposed reputation. “Hey. Dinner’s getting cold.”
When she came downstairs a few minutes after me, she was draped in some kind of hideous wool sweater—a bit too much considering it was only September in Texas—yoga pants swamped by said sweater, and bare feet. Her hair was a damp dark blonde pile on top of her head, and her eyes shimmered when she dared to look up.
Sitting across from me, she put her napkin in her lap and held the fork in her hand. But she didn’t take a single bite. The air around us drew tight as an elastic band. It felt electric. I wondered why she hid all the time. Why she’d run out of the dorms. Why she’d landed on my doorstep.
“Tuck in,” I said as she sat across from me. “You’re too skinny.”
What a damn lie. The girl had some serious curves from what I could make out. Even the bulky sweater couldn’t conceal a pair of generous tits and nice sized hips to grip. Her face turned red as she looked down at the melted cheese on the simmering lasagna on her plate.
Maybe she wasn’t skinny, but she was small in a way that had more to do with her timidity. She looked like I could break her, like she’d blow away in a gust of wind or disappear altogether if anyone so much as said boo to her.
The ugly sweater she wore, which swallowed all those sexy curves, made her look like a lost little girl.
“We’re sitting here until you clean your plate.” I blew across my fork and took a bite. Not bad, if I did say so myself.
Her eyes shined with anger when her gaze finally locked on mine. “You’re not my dad.”
“Good thing, too. Considering what I heard earlier. Good bath?”
She half stood from the table. “I can’t believe you just said that!”
“Get used to it. No filter. Probably why I keep losing roommates. If you don’t eat, I’ll have to tie you up and force-feed you. The tying up part could be fun, come to think of it.”
“You’re insane.”
Just then her stomach grumbled.
I snorted. “And you’re hungry. So sit down and eat already.” I chewed and swallowed another bite.
She growled something under her breath and those unreal blue eyes—cobalt, maybe—flashed again. But she sat her pretty ass down and took a bite of pasta.
She moaned.
I groaned.
The stilted dinner was steeped in sudden desire as I stared at her and she returned the favor.
Not gonna happen, Everly.
I watched every bite disappear between her lips while vaguely remembering to eat myself.
Once she cleaned her plate and drained her glass of water, she sat back. “Why are you doing this?”
“What? Eating? One of the basic human functions.”
“Helping me.” Her voice was tiny, almost a
s muffled as her body inside the baggy sweater.
“I have knight in shining armor syndrome.”
“Well, I’m not a damsel in distress who needs your help.” Her chair scuttled back. “I’m not a charity case either. I need to pay you.”
I got paid plenty, nightly and handsomely. I didn’t need her money. I only took in roommates because occasionally—very seldom—I wanted other people around.
“The money’s not an issue,” I said.
“So what is, with you?”
“Let’s start with this: Who’s Benny?”
She laughed. Pretty sound. It made her whole face brighten. I wasn’t sure I liked her laughing at me though.
My scowl deepened. “You know, you seem to have a habit of laughing at the most inappropriate moments.” That wasn’t totally what annoyed me. What bothered me was I seemed to get a hard-on around her at the most inappropriate moments, too.
“Benny is Bethenny.”
“Is she your girlfriend?”
“Yes.”
My eyebrows shot up. Who’d have thunk it?
“Oh! Oh, no. Not like that. Just my friend. I’m not a lesbian,” she said all-matter-of-fact.
“Hmm.” I hummed in satisfaction, having one detail cleared up. “Good. Something just occurred to me, though, roomie.”
Her gaze swam to mine. Those deep blue irises darkened. A bloom of color spread across the cheeks in her heart-shaped face.
This innocent minx would be any man’s dream. I wondered if she even had a clue.
“What?”
I leaned closer. “What’s your name, darlin’?”
For the first time she didn’t hurry to put distance between us. There were only inches between our faces when she breathed out, “Avery. Avery Greene.”
Ave. And green. She was definitely green. Innocent. Sexy.
Pushing back my chair, I snapped the growing thread of attraction. “You already know who I am.”
“Jase Everly.” Her voice was hard.
“Exactly. So you can expect dinner, darlin’, and we can be roommates, but there won’t be any romance goin’ on here.”