Back Off: Reed Security: Book One

by Robin Leaf

  I loosen my grip on her and turn her around. The right side of her face is dark red, turning purple and beginning to swell, right under her eye.

  I don’t know if I’ve ever had a moment where I felt a white-hot rage burn inside of me… not before now. It’s not until I feel arms pull on me that I realize that I’ve got the freak pinned up against the portable with my hand wrapped around his throat and his feet eight inches off the ground. I drop him at Fionn’s insistence, watching him crumple in the sand and try to catch his breath.

  “Go,” Fionn says. “I got him. Get them out of here.”

  I grab a stunned Cristiana by the arm and quickly make our way back out to the beach, followed by Charlene and Layla.

  “Will you go pack my stuff and take it to my car?” I ask my sister.

  She nods, grabbing Layla and heading toward her party still in full swing.

  There are a few members of Cristiana’s family left, so we head their direction. She shakes out of the hold I have on her arm and walks quickly toward the guy I assume is her older brother.

  “Hey, Na-na,” he slurs. Great, he’s drunk.

  When he stumbles over and sees her face, he tilts it to get a better look, then turns his angry eyes my way. He pushes past her, stepping up to me.

  “Did this pinche gringo do this to you?” he asks through clenched teeth.

  I think he’s going for threatening, but honestly, his drunkenness kills any ounce of possible intimidation. Well, that and the fact that he’s six inches shorter and about fifty pounds lighter than I am. What might intimidate me is the five other guys surrounding us, waiting for the signal to jump in and help their friend, except they are just as drunk as this guy.

  I can’t help but smile. “No, but your friend did.”

  He spins around, taking stock of who’s surrounding us, looking ready to drunkenly fight every last one of them. They lean away from him just in case he starts swinging.

  “Ricky,” she calls and promptly gets ignored. “Enrique,” Cristiana snaps, placing a hand on his forearm to pull him back. “It was Frankie.”

  He stumbles, blinking her into focus. His eyebrows go down and he shakes his head. “No, he left with Beto and Luis.”

  Crossing her arms over her chest, she fumes, “Funny how he just grabbed me as I came out of the baño and said he was going quebrar mi panocha, and when I told him there was no way he would do any damage with his verga pequeñita, he hit me.” She smirks. “Pero le metí una patada el culo.”

  I have no idea what she said in Spanish about what the jerk said to her, but the way her brother smiles proudly, I’m pretty sure she told him how she kicked Frankie’s ass.

  One of the guys starts shouting in Spanish and takes off running, which makes the others follow.

  “We’ll take care of him, Nana.” Enrique grabs his sister and pushes her toward me, looking at me with pleading eyes. “Por favor, get her out of here.” And he takes off in the direction everyone else runs.

  It would piss me off that he just trusts some guy he doesn’t know to take care of his sister, but I get why he did it when I see the reason they took off. Fionn leads her attacker out of the dunes. When he sees the mob of pissed off Hispanic guys rushing toward them, Fionn drops Frankie in the sand and moves our way.

  Cristiana attempts to pull out of my hold, so I lean down, placing my shoulder in her abdomen, and lift her in a firefighter hold.

  “Put me down, güero. I can’t let my brother –”

  “Your brother will be fine,” I say calmly, walking past my sister’s party, up the hill, and all the way to my car with her over my shoulder.

  Somehow, her hand makes it to my ass, which she might try to tell me was unintended, except for the fact that it lingered a bit too long to pull off as an accidental touch, and there was definite cupping.

  I put her down and open the passenger door. She folds her arms over her chest, and the attitude in her stance tells me she won’t go easily.

  Good girl.

  “You can’t leave your sister’s party.”

  It’s not what I expected her to say.

  I put one hand on the roof while the other holds the door open and lean down to look her in the eye.

  “My priority is getting you home safely to your parents. That won’t happen if you’re counting on any of those guys to drive you there in one piece.”

  She glares at me for a long time, debating.

  “I can get my sister to drive you,” I nod in the direction we just left, “but that means she will have to leave her party.” Standing up straight, I look away from her and add, “You really need to ice that eye.”

  She huffs and sits in the seat, fumbling with the seatbelt.

  I slam the door and smile quickly before walking around the front to get in on my side. I start the car, and it rumbles to life. God, I love that sound.

  As I back out of the parking space, I notice her body language. She again has her arms folded across her chest, and she is positioned as far away from me as possible looking out the passenger window and biting her thumb. I pull out of the lot, hoping she’ll soon tell me where I’m going, but I decide to give her a few minutes to breathe.

  Guilt creeps its way into my brain, realizing how fucking serious things could have been, as if they weren’t bad enough. She probably is realizing it, too.

  I glance her direction. The sun is hitting her just right, allowing a light to reflect off her hair and making it look like embers framing her face. It’s also making her skin appear all glowy and… lickable.

  Damn, she’s pretty.

  “You okay?” I ask gently.

  Her head whips to look at me. “I’m fine,” she retorts, like a seasoned smartass. “Are you?”

  Feisty. I kinda like this chick.

  I decide to see if I can get her fired up.

  “Well,” I smirk, “if you’re sitting there wondering how to thank me –”

  “Thank you?” she snorts. “Why the hell would I thank you?”

  “For starters,” I casually look in the rearview, “I kinda saved your ass back there.”

  “I don’t know what movie you were watching, but the one I starred in had you saving Frankie’s sorry ass… not mine.” She crosses her leg over the other, and the movement makes me notice how toned her thigh is. “I saved myself, güero, don’t you forget that.”

  I hate to admit she’s right, so I think fast.

  “I saved you from killing him, which saves you from becoming someone’s bitch in jail.”

  “Aye, pinche pendejo,” she says under her breath before turning my direction, leaning against the door. “First of all, I’d never be someone’s bitch. I’d have all the bitches. They’d all be lining up to be my bitches, too, fighting each other for the privilege of even standing next to me.” I bite my cheeks to keep from smiling. “Secondly, I don’t need some white boy with a fucking hero complex thinking I owe him for saving me.”

  Just when I was starting to really like her…

  I roll my tongue around, trying to keep the words I really want to say in my mouth, and take a slow, deep breath.

  “I don’t think –”

  “Riding around in your fucking purple-ass, gas-drinking muscle car, rumbling through the parking lot at school, blaring your classic-rock music. Might as well just show everyone your verga gigante since you’re trying to prove you have one.”

  I fight a smile and pat the dashboard. “Her name is Princess. And she doesn’t like it when you talk about her.”

  She rolls her eyes. “You’re one of those guys who names his estúpido car.” She turns to glare at me. “I bet you’re going into the military, too.” When I clench my jaw, she notices. “See, I knew it. Dios mio. Could you be any more of a cliché?”

  I shoot a glance her direction, trying to keep my eyes off her chest as it moves up and down, and throw my right arm over my steering wheel.

  “Are you done?”

  She again crosses her arms. “Güe
ro, I can go all night.”

  I have to stop my smile, since what she said could be… misinterpreted. If it weren’t for what she just went through, I would turn on the charm and say something flirty back, and I never flirt. I’m smart enough to know that right now is not the time to start.

  “Can you at least give me directions between insults?”

  “Oh, please. I haven’t even insulted you yet.” I feel her eyes look me up and down. “The truth can’t be an insult.”

  I put in my Van Halen cassette, and “Drop Dead Legs” begins to play. Oh, what a perfect song for the girl next to me. This is one of my favorites, and I imagine from now on, every time I hear it, I’ll think of this moment, of her in my car, with her perfect skin glowing from the sunlight.

  Otherwise, we ride in silence, except for the directions she gives, for a few miles. I somehow feel I need to do more for her… get her talking. It’s just not exactly something I’m comfortable doing. But I feel I gotta try, so I turn the music down.

  “You told your brother Frankie said something to you, but I didn’t understand it.” My eyes slide over to hers, and I soften my voice. “What did he say?”

  She blinks a few times and turns away from me, thumb going to her teeth again. It must be what she does when she’s uncomfortable.

  “When I came out of the bathroom, he grabbed me from behind. Told me that I’d been teasing him all day, and he was taking what belonged to him.” She swallows. “He said…” she pulls her arm tighter, like she’s hugging herself. “He said that he was going to destroy…” she closes her eyes, “my vagina and make it so no other man would ever want me.”

  I grip the steering wheel so tightly, I feel my fingers start to go numb.

  “He threatened to…”

  “I told him there was no way he could ever destroy anything with his tiny…” she nods to her crotch, “…you know, and that’s when turned me around and hit me.”

  The way she gets nervous working around saying the word “dick” would have made me chuckle if the situation wasn’t so serious.

  “Which gave you the opportunity to –”

  “Kick the living shit right out of him, yes.” Her mouth curves up at the corners around her thumb. “Enrique trains with my cousin, who is an MMA fighter, and one day when I was hanging out with them at the gym, they taught me some things.”

  “See, so you are lethal, and I did save you from killing him.” I smile. “And now, you get the honor of riding in my fucking awesome, purple-ass, gas-drinking muscle car.”

  She rolls her eyes. “Oh my God. Just stop.”

  “Stop what?”

  She turns to look out the window again. “I don’t need your charity.”

  “Charity? What the fuck does that –”

  “It means I can take care of myself, güero.”

  The light turns red, and when I stop, I turn and face her. “I’m sure you can, but just because I help you doesn’t mean it’s charity. Strong people need help sometimes, and accepting it doesn’t make it charity. It means people do nice shit, because that’s the way it’s supposed to be. You can’t do everything all the time without anyone else.” I turn back to rest both hands on the wheel. “It makes for a lonely existence.” The light changes, and I shift into first and take off. “And by the way, my name is Noah.”

  Four

  Cristiana

  Yes, güero, I know your name. Not only did your sister mention it at least four hundred times today, but I heard Fionn call to you when I first saw your gorgeous ass two months ago, back when you were just a random senior walking to your car. I mean the car caught my eye, but then… santa mierda. When I saw you…

  And now… Now, you’re my savior.

  I’ll never admit it out loud, but you did save me, hermoso pendejo. But not from what you think you did.

  I again have to shake off the tears forming in my eyes from what happened coming out of that bathroom. I almost… shit… if I had given into my fear instead of running my smart ass mouth… I’d be a statistic.

  Yeah, my mouth is what saved me today.

  But so did this white knight.

  I’m not that girl. I’m not the chica in the eighties John Hughes movies who gets saved by her crush in the end. I’m just not. I don’t need to be saved, nor have I ever wanted to be.

  But I have to admit his timing was perfect. Thank God he was there to stop me. Not from killing Frankie, but from completely losing my shit.

  I can’t thank him. I have to stay strong. If I go thanking him, I’m afraid whatever ounce of strength I have left will fly right out the window. I’ll crawl into his lap and cry on his perfect chest and never want to leave. Cue up the sappy eighties love song.

  He’s not in my plan.

  At least the smell of this gas guzzler is covering up his perfect scent. When he carried me to the car, I got a good nose full of sunscreen and fabric softener with a slight hint of what is simply Noah, that natural, slightly salty scent of his that God graced upon him. I get a whiff every couple of minutes. It makes me want to shove my nose in his perfect neck and just inhale… deeply.

  God, why did I just let him carry me off that beach like a helpless female? I didn’t even fight back. What the hell is wrong with me? It took everything in me not to smack his perfect ass. I did touch it though, totally on accident… kinda. It was like my hand was drawn to it like… well, like a moth to a flame.

  I need to get away from this pinche hottie.

  Thank God he just pulled in front of my house.

  I grab the handle and force open the door, which groans in protest.

  “I guess I will say thank you for the ride,” I mutter quickly, getting out of the car.

  As I slam the door, I hear him turn off the car, and his car door opens.

  I look at him over the roof. “What are you doing?”

  He slams his door closed, expressionless. I imagine those blue eyes behind the mirrored sunglasses are studying me. That’s all he seems to do… watch me, like I’m some sort of stupid science project for him.

  After a full ten-second stare-down, his lips curl slightly in an obvious attempt to force a nicer expression.

  “I’m going to walk you inside and explain what happened.”

  “I’m capable of telling my parents what happened.”

  “I’m sure you are very capable of a lot, but capable and willing are two different things.” He pulls his sunglasses down slowly, and those blue eyes laser into mine, like he’s trying to see into my brain. “Something tells me you won’t tell the truth.”

  How can he fucking know that?

  I bite my lips together to try to hold back the bitchy comment that’s dying to spew out of my mouth.

  “I am not going to lie,” I say slowly.

  And I’m not. I mean I was planning to omit a little of the truth, but that’s not the same as lying.

  He leans his hands on his roof, raises his eyebrow, and continues to stare at me for what feels like ten minutes. I’m not backing down. He wants a staring contest? Well, I’m the best. I narrow my eyes and summon all the attitude I can. Nope, I won’t look away. He finally knocks once on the car before pushing off and heading around it toward me.

  Ha, güero, I win.

  He walks close enough to take my hand, and for a fleeting moment, part of me is a bit disappointed that he doesn’t. The breeze catches his scent and delivers it to my nose, which just pisses me off even more. Why does he have to look like that and smell so fucking good?

  Luckily, the closer we get to the house, the sweeter the air smells. The scent of vanilla mixed with cinnamon and chocolate fill the air, masking the scent of Noah. Thank God for Mama. She told me before we left for the beach that she was going to try out some new recipes for the panadería today; the only day the bakery is closed, and my mother is still working.

  Hopefully she’ll be too wrapped up in baking to notice my face.

  Right.

  I grab the doorknob and take a dee
p breath before entering the chaos of my house, sending up a quick prayer that my little brother is at least wearing clothes.

  I clear the threshold, feeling Noah behind me as he turns to shut the door. The shouts from the other room indicate my brothers are again wrestling, probably over some toy. I turn to head toward the kitchen, and one of them, Rafi, zooms past me, giggling. Matty comes out of their room, screaming and chasing our brother, but stops short at the sight of the tall, blue-eyed stranger standing behind me. His eyes widen, and he backs up a step. I silently thank God for hearing part of my prayer. He’s at least wearing shorts today. Rafi comes to investigate why Matty isn’t chasing him anymore and walks right up to our guest.

  “Who are you?” Rafi asks, poking a finger in Noah’s stomach.

  Noah smiles, and I swear… I’ve never seen him full-on smile before, and it about knocks me on my ass. Jesus, he’s gorgeous. I turn away to hide my face, which I’m sure is all red now.

  “I’m –”

  “Rafaél… Mateo… it’s too quiet. What are you doing?” my mother shouts in Spanish from the kitchen.

  “Nothing, Mama, Nana brought a man home,” Rafi tattles back in Spanish, since it’s the only language Mama knows.

  Rafi takes off running again, while Matty continues to stare with an open mouth for a couple of seconds before he follows.

  I glance at Noah before making my way to the kitchen and run into Mama rounding the corner, wiping her hands on a dish towel. She looks up at Noah.

  “Cristiana,” she says, nodding toward Noah and finally focusing on me, “who is this?” She pulls her hand out of the towel and grabs my chin. “And, oh my God, what happened to your face?”

  “Mama, this is Noah –”

  Her eyebrows almost meet in the middle, and I see she’s no longer listening to me. She pulls me behind her and steps up to Noah, and judging by the way he quickly backs up and holds up his hands, he knows she’s going to start swinging that towel.

  “I didn’t do it, I swear,” he defends, putting his arms protectively in front of him.