by Lisa Ladew
He grabbed her elbow and steered her to the house. Fuck. His hand on her arm was warm, the connection making her hyper-aware of his big body next to hers. She almost wanted to—
No. No!
Up on the porch, in the front door, all three of them, and then the door locked behind them. Mac flipped on the lights right away, because, like he’d asked for, all the windows were boarded over with plywood like a hurricane was coming. Hurricane Sneaky-as-fuck.
Mac spoke, and his voice was strange, dead, like it had been in the truck when he’d been on the phone. “Like you said, you’re a prisoner here, so act like it. Behave and I won’t take you to jail. This will be much more comfortable.”
She couldn’t help herself. “Oh, so your promise is no fucking good now? Now I only get to stay out of jail if I don’t try to run from you? This is fucked up, you know,” she said, dropping her voice and hissing at him. “If you weren’t the fucking cops, I would call the fucking cops.” She shook her head and repeated herself. “This is fucked up.”
“I know,” he said, and he headed away from her, his shoulders tight, his being defeated.
Good. She took a look around, interested in spite of herself to see the inside of his house. It wasn’t at all what she’d expected. The house itself was ordinary enough. Open living area, connected dining and kitchen area just past where she was, hallway leading, presumably, to a bedroom. Stairs leading to a basement.
But the decorating? That was completely off the wall. A large, expensive shelving unit covered most of one side of the room, it’s back covered with a horribly ugly, red, spiky fabric that made her eyes hurt. On each shelf was a hodge-podge of toys, cheap toys, with not even an inch between each one. On each of the other walls of the room was more of that fabric, each cut baby-blanket size and hung on a point, diamond-shaped. She’d never seen anything like it in her life. No pictures on the walls. No other decorations. Nothing. It was like the place was a temple for ugly shit, instead of a home. It did remind her of one thing.
She walked slowly through the living area, nodding her head like it made sense, then peeked around an entry wall, then looked at Bruin, since she didn’t want to look at Mac. They were both sitting at the kitchen table, like it had been a rough day and they were exhausted. “Is it in here?” she asked, pointing down the hallway.
“Is what in there?” Mac answered.
Still looking at Bruin, she answered him. “You know, the casket for the dead 80s groupie who obviously decorated this house.” She frowned, then sniffed the air. “What is that? Hairspray? Is someone gonna scream through here and do a guitar solo?”
Bruin snorted, then clapped Mac on the back, almost forcing him face-first onto the table. “See!” he said, chuckling.
Rogue didn’t wait for an answer or an invite. She took a slow tour through the house. Bedroom, yes, she’d already seen it from the house across the way. Another bedroom over here, completely empty. Not even a spare bed. Kitchen clean, but-yep, she opened the fridge and there wasn’t a thing inside it but two bottles of ketchup, a jar of mayo, and an empty Corona box. Stellar. If they got together, their babies would starve, since neither one of them could cook and cold pizza, beer, and French fries aren’t good for babies. Only adults got to poison themselves with that shit.
She froze, hand on the fridge handle. Babies? What in the actual fuck, Rogue? He’s your captor, not your fucking boyfriend. At the very least, he’s your arresting officer, whether he’s actually arrested you or not. Close the fridge. Keep walking. Down the steps. Basement has a couch and a TV. No decorations down here, except for one picture on a spindly little end table, but it was faced toward the wall.
Mom-gorgeous, Dad-hot and obviously related to Mac, big bro about five, little sis about three. Was she looking at Mac as a child? He had been a total towhead, and absolutely adorable. And the arm he had slung around his little sis’s shoulders said they’d been the best of friends. She put the picture down carefully, not wanting to know anything about him.
She looked around. What now? She didn’t know exactly what Mac’s plan was. Maybe keep her here until she had a change of heart? Yeah, right, she wasn’t big on Stockholm Syndrome. She had to imagine there was an investigation underway in the murder of Denton Smith, even though no one had asked her about it yet. Maybe that’s why she was here.
She checked the windows, but none of them were big enough to crawl out of, so no wonder she hadn’t been followed by one of the men. She was about to head upstairs when she heard them talking.
“What do you think she would like?” Mac was whispering to Bruin.
“I don’t know, what do you think? She’s your mate.”
Rogue swallowed hard at that word. She shook her head and looked around, panic setting in. She had to get out of here. Before she found out what that word meant. Before she bought into all of it.
But there was no way out down here unless she could tunnel through concrete.
Upstairs, Mac was speaking again. “Let’s just get one of everything. One pizza. Some Chinese, one of everything on the menu, subs, Italian. What else?”
“Ooh, how about three pizzas, everything else you said, plus Thai food, burgers, and a couple of things from the Mediterranean place.”
“Yeah, sounds good. She’ll have to like something.”
Rogue was hungry, and slightly touched that they seemed to care what she would like.
Mac spoke again and Rogue frowned at the vulnerability she heard in his voice. It sounded so out of place from what she knew of the man. “Ah, are you ok with staying here tonight? I need someone with me, but I don’t trust anyone else.”
Bruin sounded like he was smiling. “I’m here as long as you need me.”
“Thanks, B, you really are a good friend.”
Rogue couldn’t resist. She bounded up the stairs, hoping they would be hugging. They weren’t, but Bruin had his arm on Mac’s shoulder. Good enough.
“Ah shit,” she said, holding her hands up and backing down the stairs slowly. “Did I interrupt something? You two need to hang a tie on the railing or something next time. Try not to be too loud, ok? I’ll take a nap or something until you’re done.”
She disappeared, laughing softly to herself. She was 100% for people loving whoever they wanted to, as long as everyone was a consenting adult, but she also would take any opportunity to slam Mac.
She leaned softly against the wall at the bottom of the stairs, one ear cocked to the two men above her.
Neither of them said a word for so long, she lost interest. She sat on the couch and looked around the basement.
What now?
Chapter 31
Two hours later, tummy full, following the men up the stairs, she watched Bruin and Mac maneuver the couch from the basement up into the living room, faces red and sweaty. They’d already brought up the TV and TV stand, and even moved that strange shelf with all the cheap little toys on it into the empty bedroom. Mac had been strange when he’d done it, tight-lipped and edgy, making her wonder what those toys were to him. They’d made her follow them around so she didn’t disappear out the front door. Fun times.
“A little to the left,” she told them. “No, right. Now lift it over your heads, now drop it. That’s it, right on the ol’ noggins.”
They lowered the couch in front of the only exit left in the house. Rogue stood and walked over to them, hands on hips. “Now that just won’t do. You’ve got every window boarded over, even the doors going to the back patio, and now you’ve got the couch in front of the front door? What if there’s a fire? We’re all gonna flash fry in here. I’m gonna call the fucking fire inspector. Or your boss. Who is your boss, anyway? How do I even know that this shit is kosher? People who are actually working within the boundaries of the law don’t bring other people to their house and then board up the windows and put couches in front of the door.” She looked around, exaggerating her movements. “This is really the beginnings of some fucked up cult, isn’t it. You got J
im Jones stashed somewhere? Is that what’s next? Am I gonna get a lecture on the benefits of cyanide mixed in with my Kool-Aid?” She rounded on him, bitch face on. “Fuck you, Princess.”
Mac gave her a long-suffering look. “Why don’t you go back to not talking to me?”
Oh no, he did not. Rogue let him have it. Both fucking barrels. “Seriously? You just said that shit to me when I’m locked in your fucking house like some plaything? This isn’t legal, you know. Or ethical. But hey, my commentary’s not welcome, so why don’t you just let me go? You don’t even have to take me back to Chicago. Just let me walk out the door. I won’t say a fucking word. You’ll never see me again. Oh? You don’t want to do that? Then you’re going to hear every. Thought. That. Pops. Into. My. Head. Especially if you won’t like it.”
She stalked off, knocking an open container of kung pao chicken off the table just cuz she felt like it, then headed back to the only bedroom with a fucking bed in it. “This is my room, and nobody better come in here or I’ll slice their fucking balls off.” She slammed the door.
But boredom drove her back out into the living room an hour later. She was tired, but not tired enough to let her kidnappers get some rest. Sure, she’d come with them willingly, in order to save her own hide, but she still didn’t want to be here. She’d stay up till they let her go if she had to. Time to stir up some shit.
She found them both sitting on the couch watching something apparently called Cake Apprentice. All the teams had to do a scene from Rapunzel, and two had pretty decent fondant towers with flowing blond hair going, while the third team was eating spilled cake off the floor in between defeated whispers to the camera.
She found the remote next to the TV and snatched it up, then planted her butt right between the two men. Fucked if she was gonna sit on the floor. “Screw this,” she said. “Let’s see what else is on.” She flipped through the channels, landing on Paw Patrol, then threw a look at the big guy. “This is your kind of show, isn’t it, Bruno?” He bobbed his head and she snorted. “Figures.” A couple more clicks and Keeping up with the Kardashians was on. Kim’s face filled the screen. Rogue glanced over at Mac. “You’d do her, wouldn’t you, you sick fucker, tell the truth now.” Before he could respond she clicked off of it. She felt a look pass between the two men behind her head. Nice. What next?
“Ahh, Nightmare on Elm Street. I didn’t know they were doing a remake.” She dropped the remote onto her lap and curled her legs under her, then settled in to watch.
“Popcorn,” she said, snapping her fingers at Mac, not taking her eyes off the movie.
“What?”
“Popcorn, I want popcorn.”
Another look between the two men. “I don’t have any popcorn.”
“Then go get me some leftovers. Wontons. Something crunchy.”
Mac didn’t move, but before she could rip into him, Bruin shifted on the other side of the couch. When Rogue looked at him, he had his face covered and was peeking between two of his fingers at the TV. It wasn’t even a super-bloody part. She looked at Mac incredulously, popping her thumb out to point at Bruin. “Is he for real?”
Mac leaned forward slightly to look at him, then settled back in his seat. “He purrs, you know.”
Rogue smiled. Gossip. She could do gossip. As long as Bruin told her something about Mac at some point. “Purrs?”
“Yeah, we went to the Honey Depot, this restaurant out on 41, and as soon as we walked in, he started purring. Sounded like a lawnmower on high idle.”
“Weird as shit.”
Rogue turned the volume up, screams filling the room, causing Bruin’s hands to tighten over his face.
She snapped her fingers at Mac again. “Food, you were getting me food.”
“Turn the TV down.”
“Ha, make me.”
He looked at her then, strangely, pointedly, and she couldn’t keep herself from glancing at him to see the exact expression on his face. It was clear as the clothes on his body. Lust. He wanted to make her. And he wanted her to want him to make her.
Oh shit. Her core swelled at the naughty images that flitted through her brain, blood rushing to her clit until sex was all she could think of. Not just any sex. Sex with Mac. Hard. Hot. Sweaty. Fucked up against the wall until you screamed kind of sex. She couldn’t tear her eyes away from him, especially when she saw her own thoughts reflected in his gaze. He bit his lower lip, then licked his top one, their stares locked together.
He reached for her hand that was holding the remote, grabbing her by the wrist and wrenching the thing out of her hand, then turned the volume down.
Then dismissed her.
He stared at the TV as he spoke, flipping through the channels. “We’re watching Cake Apprentice. It’s Bruin’s favorite show and he’s missing it. You want food, get it yourself.”
Ah fuck. Beat at her own game. Rogue clenched her legs together and squirmed in her seat, unable to think of anything but Mac, naked, holding her wrists above her head, using her body.
***
Mac hadn’t heard a word the people on the show had said. His dick was pounding in his pants and all he could think about was relieving the pressure, somehow, before he did something stupid and tried to kiss Rogue. Or talk to her. Fuck, she was mean.
Don’t forget the sexiest woman he’d ever met. Even mean, she did it for him. Everything about her, even her fuck-you attitude. He was a sick fucker because everything she said, even the mean shit, maybe especially the mean shit, made him want to press her up against the wall and rip her clothes off her. When she’d turned on Paw Patrol and asked Bruin if it was his favorite show? Rhen help him, he’d barely been able to keep from pulling her back to his room caveman-style.
And she was so close to him! Her normally sharp, clean scent was condensed somehow, sweeter, thick like syrup, filling his nostrils, making him too aware of her next to him. One reach and he could have a hand on her leg. One slide and that hand could be on her pussy. Even if she pulled one of those knives out of the holsters strapped on her forearms and buried it in his arm, it would still be worth it. He hadn’t taken them from her, and he wouldn’t, because, shit, that wasn’t something you did to your mate.
He gritted his teeth and stuck his hands under his thighs. Keep control of yourself, Mac. You have to keep control.
But what in the hell? The cushion his leg was half on shifted slightly as she leaned over to him. Fuck, don’t pant, whatever you do, don’t pant.
Her breast brushed his arm and his eyes rolled back in his head. “I really want you to get me some food,” she whispered, her face and voice soft.
He would. He would get her any of it. Carry the fridge right over here next to the couch so she could pick what she wanted without moving. He couldn’t cook worth a damn, but he’d take a course. Hire a chef. Anything she wanted.
Mac shook his head. She was playing him. And he was about as playable as they came when it came to her. Fuck. How to keep himself from giving in? He still had hope in his heart that they were gonna end up together, or she wouldn’t even be here, and he wanted to get her food, he really did, but not while she was playing him. And that’s all she was doing. She didn’t want him.
She leaned in closer, her soft skin yielding against his arm. She didn’t have a bra on! He swallowed, hearing the dry click in his throat. Had she taken it off? Was it lying on his bedroom floor right now? Or had she not had one on earlier? He remembered watching her boobs move while he’d been sitting on her couch and her standing over him, but he hadn’t realized she might not be wearing a bra. He licked his lips.
She leaned in closer to him. “If you don’t get me some food, I’m going to ask Bruin to get me some, and if he does, I’ll be ever so grateful to him. He’s handsome you know, big. I really dig that strong silent type.”
Mac lost it, just fucking lost it right there. A savage growl ripped from his throat and he took Rogue’s wrists in both hands, standing and yanking her up with him. He pointed at Br
uin. “You get her food and I’ll kick your ass, I don’t give a shit how big you are.”
Bruin didn’t even look surprised. He held up his hands, palms out. “Food? No way. I don’t even know what ‘food’ is.”
Fuck! Mac pulled Rogue into the kitchen, trying to ignore her nearness, praying for the words to make himself clear, his hand still clamped around her wrist. “Look, Roe, you can’t do that. You just can’t. I know what you’re doing, and I know why you’re doing it, but that shit ain’t smart and if you’d just listen-”
She cut him off, a finger over his lips. He clamped his tongue between his teeth to keep it in his mouth.
“My name is Rogue, not Roe.”
Her scent was flaring so strongly, it made his eyes water. So sweet, he needed some milk. It smelled so good he had to fight from pushing her against the counter and taking her lips with his mouth, tasting her, motherfucking consuming her.
He nodded. “No Roe. Fine.” He narrowed his eyes and looked at her sideways. “So, what’s your real name? Poppy? Begonia? Zinnia?” Anything to get him back on firm footing.
She frowned.
He tried again, ignoring the pounding in his dick. “Chrysanthemum? Basil? Blossom?”
Her face drained of its color, shock and dismay in her expression, more every time he tried again, and it was the most emotion he’d seen out of her yet that wasn’t anger. He smiled just a little. “You wondering how I know it’s a plant name? I’ll tell you. All you have to do is ask. Or at least act like you want to know.”
She pulled her wrists free from his grip. “Fuck this. And fuck you.” She stalked out of the kitchen, turning back to look at him long enough to say, “I’m going to bed. Call me if you ever decide kidnapping is a bad look for you.” She went down the hall, then yelled, “Oh, I forgot, it’s not kidnapping when you’re a cop. Cops get to do whatever the hell they please.”