by C. L. Stone
“Wait, wait,” I said, sitting up, holding my hands out. “Pinching a wallet is one thing. I’m supposed to put it back?”
Marc nodded. “In his pocket.”
My mouth unhinged. “Why do I think this isn’t as simple as it sounds?”
“It is as simple as it sounds,” Marc said. “This is it. We go in, find out what’s going on and get back out. You and Brandon will stay at the party and make sure he stays there. We’ll take care of the rest.”
“So you were nagging at me for stealing wallets, and offering me a job to steal a wallet so you can steal his drugs?”
“We just want to look at what he’s doing. We don’t want to touch it.”
“Well, forgive me if I don’t believe you. Who in the world is curious enough to break in and look at something and not want to steal it, or use it, or whatever? What kind of job is this? How does this make money for you?”
“Don’t worry about that,” Marc said. “All we want is information.”
“What’s in it for me if I do?”
Marc pursed his lips, he glanced at his companions. Raven shrugged at him. Marc turned back to me. “You do us this favor, we’ll get you a job. A real one. We’ve already agreed to pay your rent for a month, but we’ll get you a job where you won’t have to steal wallets any more. You can get a real apartment, too.”
“Who would hire me?”
Marc tilted his head at me, as if surprised I would ask the question. “Pick a place.”
“What?”
“Where do you want to work?”
“You can’t just get me a job anywhere. I have to apply. And there’s interviews.”
Marc leaned in on me again. He reached out, dropping a hand on my knee, and stared me right in the face. “If you do this, help us, you can name the place you want to work, and I can guarantee you, you’ll have a job there. I can’t do the work for you, but you’ll have a job.”
I couldn’t believe this. I was sure I must have been dreaming. Maybe I thunked my head and was still back in the hotel room, just not having woken up yet. “How can I trust you?”
Marc flinched. He sighed, pulled out his phone from his back pocket. He dialed a number and held it out to me. “Talk to the manager at the hotel,” he said. “Ask him to confirm your room is reserved.”
“What?”
He held out the phone to me. I took it.
“Hello?” The voice was Colby. “Who is this?”
“It’s ... Kayli,” I said. Marc made hand gestures to me to keep going. “I was just calling to ask about the room—”
“Oh yeah. Yes, we got it for the next four weeks. Your room is reserved. Listen, I’m sorry I fussed at you before. I just ... you know how it is around here.”
“It’s fine,” I said, but I lost him after he said four weeks. I hadn’t even finished talking to these guys yet and they had already kept their first promise? I didn’t know how to respond to that. “Could you do me a favor, Colby?”
“Sure.”
“Can you tell my brother I may be a little late coming home today? And let him know that it was paid?”
“I’ll leave a note under the door.”
I hung up on Colby and turned back to Marc. “How did you do that? Why?”
“We told you we would,” Marc said, determination settling into his eyes. He needed me to believe this. “I’m not playing with you right now, Kayli. This is your chance to get out of the gutter before something bad happens to you. You’ve had a rough start, I get that. You went to a shitty downtown school, and got tossed around a lot. Your dad’s a drunk. Your mom’s dead. That’s fucked up. From what I understand, you take care of your brother, and you do your best. Well, here’s fate for you giving you a leg up. Pickpocket, but this time, do it for the good side. Work with us this one time, and I guarantee you, that you’ll never need to pickpocket again. You’ll always have a job. I’ll make sure.”
My heart thundered under my chest. I had a hard time controlling my breathing to look as cool as I was pretending to be. He could have been offering me solid gold. A job. I had no idea where to start with that. I was willing to take anything before.
I still wasn’t sure I believed it, but now that I could walk out of their apartment, and possibly never see them again and still had my rent paid for a month ... what would I do with the next month? What happened when Jack drank all the money I earned? Would I just start this endless cycle again? Maybe Marc was right. I didn’t want to steal forever. “I just need something until Wil gets into college,” I said. “If you know of anything ... I mean, as long as he can keep going to school. That’s all I need. I can take care of myself from there.”
Marc’s once intense smile softened. His eyes lit up. Raven next to him started smiling, too. When I glanced back at Corey and Brandon, they had the same stupid look. Kevin looked pleased.
I groaned, rolling my eyes. “Will you idiots stop grinning like that? Just tell me what I need to do.”
“There is no name calling on my team,” a voice said, the severity and sternness catching me me off-guard.
It took me a moment to identify who had spoken, because lips around me didn’t move and the voice didn’t fit any of the boys in front of me. It was only when heads shifted to the second hallway, the one where the boss was supposedly busy and behind a closed door, that I realized they knew who had spoken.
The door was open, exposing a tall man, with longer jet black hair, parted down the middle, and the ends hanging around his chin. He shoved it back with his fingers as if used to his hair being in the way. He wore black-rimmed glasses on his face. He had an olive complexion which made me think he was as foreign as Raven, but more Mediterranean or perhaps Native American. He had strong, thickly muscled shoulders and a defined, tight abdomen that looked like he spent every moment flexing to strengthen it. He had a birthmark on his lower right hip. There was a trail of hair running from just above his belly button, right down to his crotch.
His exposed crotch.
Outside of the glasses, he wasn’t wearing a stitch of clothing. His length was partially erect, and already impressive, as if he rolled out of bed with morning wood and wasn’t even going to bother waiting for it to go away before baring himself to everyone.
I’d seen a few naked men in my life, mostly from movies and the few times I’d been exposed to the internet. There were guys at school who liked to expose their genitals to me if they thought they could get some attention. Only a handful of times did I ever get close to my boyfriends and their body parts. I thought at first I could play it cool with this new guy standing naked in front of me and divert my eyes in the causal way that I wanted to.
But I simply couldn’t take my eyes off of him. I couldn’t stop staring at the definition of his sculpted body, the defining lines of his collarbone and the matching indents on the sides of his hips.
Not to mention his penis.
“Dude,” Brandon barked at him. “Get some pants on, will you? We’ve got a girl here.”
The naked man inhaled sharply, and looked me square in the eye, as if asking me if I was offended. The darkest eyes, almond shaped, dragged my attention from his body up to his face, challenging me and at the same time telling me the answers to questions I was asking without saying a word.
He studied me just as much as I studied him. His eyes swept over me in the shorts, the boots, the way my hair hung around my cheeks and down my shoulders to almost chest length. His eyes stayed at my chest and hips for so long that I felt a swell in my breasts and genitals and the warm wave of a blush as if I’d been the one naked instead of him. Slowly, his eyes reclaimed my face with a determination that nearly knocked me over. He angled his head. There was the slight rise of a heavy, dark eyebrow. I wasn’t who he was expecting, I presumed. However, he didn’t seem displeased.
And suddenly his entire face blanked, becoming unreadable.
“She’s seen one before,” he said, toneless and as cool as water, and yet every syllable
was with precision.
A finger poked at my temple, pulling my attention away. Marc smirked at me. “Pervert,” he said.
I gasped, and made hand signals where my voice wasn’t going to work. Gesturing to the man, like this wasn’t my fault. Me? He’s the one walking around naked!
The nude man turned, heading for the kitchen. He grabbed a box out of the cabinet and walked back to his room. He paused at the door, and his eyes once again retrieved my attention. “You and I are going to talk later,” he said, his voice now smoky and severe, and he closed the door behind himself.
The last view I had of him was his butt, and with the way the light played and the shadows, I caught a dimple.
Marc planted a palm on his eye. “For Christ’s sake.”
Raven only smirked and shrugged, looking right at me. “Enjoy the view while you can, right?”
I unhinged my mouth from hanging open so I could talk. “I take it that’s the boss?”
Marc sighed. “Yeah. That’s Axel.”
I did a double take. “Did you just say Axel?”
“Yeah.”
I absently rubbed at a tiny spot on my cheek. “So ... you guys live together?”
“Marc, and I, and Axel live here,” Raven said. “The twins live down the hall.”
“I’ve got my own house,” Kevin said.
I glanced back at Brandon and Corey. Corey smiled, happy, his face all lit up in a pleasant way. His brother merely looked curious as to what I wanted.
“Huh,” I said. I didn’t mean to make my tone sound like I didn’t believe him, but I’d just stumbled into this odd place. Still, I was starting to be really amused. And they’d paid my rent. And they were going to help me find a job. All I had to do was pickpocket some old guy? I didn’t know what lottery ticket fate was ringing up for me, but I thought I could get used to this. And if I woke up and this was a dream, I’d be really pissed off. “So tell me who this old guy is I’m supposed to pickpocket?”
Marc lit up again. “You’ll do it?”
“I guess I don’t have anything else better to do at the moment. As long as you keep your promises.”
“Start dreaming up where you want to work,” he said. “I’ll make it happen.”
“And I want to know what it is we’re taking a peek at,” I said.
He looked at the others, who seemed to shrug in unison. “Okay.”
“And I want to be able to hit Raven without him hitting me back.”
“Hey,” Raven said.
“Done,” Marc said.
I reached out, slapping at Raven’s thigh hard. Raven lifted his hand like he was going to pop me back when Brandon snapped an arm out, taking his hand and squeezing it, yanking it back until Raven twisted himself off the coffee table to ease the pressure and then writhed onto the floor. “Let go. Shit. Okay, okay.”
“Hey,” I said to Brandon, admiring his technique. “How’d you do that?”
Brandon released Raven and smirked. “Stick around. You might learn something.”
COREY
Raven collected himself off the floor and the group started to talk all at once for a moment.
A sharp ring interrupted the din, and the group silenced, turning to Kevin.
Kevin fished out a cell phone. He took one look at the screen and pressed the button. He stood quickly, rushing to the front door. “Hey. Everything okay?” He stepped out into the hallway, shutting the door behind himself.
“Mindy’s calling again.” Corey said.
Marc nodded. “She’s doing that a lot more lately.”
“Is that bad?” I asked. “Why do you guys say that like you don’t like it?”
Marc shook me off. “It’s not bad. It’s just they’ve been getting really close. He’s been a bit distracted. No big deal. Happens, right?”
I shrugged. I wasn’t exactly sure what he was worried Kevin would get distracted from.
Marc started going over the information for me to catch me up on their plan. The location of the party was a fancy house. It was an informal party, but by informal, they also meant snooty and out of my league. They had an overview of the house, a few pictures of the place and the grounds. A photo of the target; a faded image from a security camera. The house itself looked like one of the estate properties further down the peninsula. It probably cost a million dollars.
“How am I supposed to walk into a place like that?” I asked.
“You’re going as Brandon’s girlfriend,” Marc said. “He’s got an invitation.”
I turned on Brandon. “How’d you get one of those?”
Brandon shrugged. “I’m a nice guy.”
“Okay, well, despite it being a casual party, they’re not going to let a girl like me walk in there.”
“Why not?” Marc asked.
I squinted at him, unsure how to reply. Did he want me to say out loud that I was a poor girl wearing clothes I bought on clearance five years ago? “Outside of the million other reasons why, let’s just say I don’t really fit in.”
“We’ll fix that,” Marc said. “In fact, Brandon, you want to come with me? We’ll pick up a few things.”
"I'm going," Raven said.
“You’re staying,” Marc said. “Axel’s busy. You need to stay with her.”
“I don’t need a babysitter,” I said. “Where are you going?”
“We’re getting supplies and lunch. You want anything in particular?”
If he wanted my opinion and was paying, I’d tell him. “Anything but Chinese.” And bananas. And oatmeal. I wanted to mention those out loud but I got the impression he was talking about picking up fast food.
“Pizza it is.” He pointed at Corey. “Staying?”
Corey had been buried in his phone. He picked his head up. “Yeah.”
“Did you even hear me?”
“I’m staying,” Corey said.
“Okay.” Marc patted his pockets as if checking to make sure he still had his wallet and phone and keys, and did it while looking at me.
“I didn’t take it,” I said blankly.
He smirked. “I’ll be back. Don’t go anywhere, Bambi.” He reached out, patting my cheek. I karate chopped at his elbow to get him to quit. He avoided it and chopped me back lightly on the shoulder. "Too slow." He walked out with Brandon following him.
I shifted to sit back on the couch, crossing my arms over my chest.
Raven stood up, stretching his arms over his head until the bottom of his black tank shirt stretched up over his abdomen, revealing his belly button. I tried to pretend I was just looking at him in general instead of the deep hip lines as thick torso muscles bulged. There was a continuation of some tattoos but I couldn’t figure out what it was.
Raven smirked at me and walked out of the room before I had a chance to comment and defend myself. Great. I was starting to look like a complete pervert.
That left me alone on the couch with Corey. I studied him as he poked at his phone. The difference in the eyes between him and his brother was astounding. He was as tall as his brother, taller than both Raven and Marc, perhaps even Axel. The twins had wide shoulders and seemed to be lean in the torso, sturdy powerhouses. Corey’s cerulean eyes were brighter by far. His whole face was friendlier, too. Softer with smiles that lit up his eyes.
I leaned into his arm on purpose. "Texting your girlfriend?" I asked.
Corey glanced up, his blond eyebrows rising. "What? No. No girlfriend."
"What's so interesting?"
He glanced around the room and blanched as if realizing he was alone with me. "Uh, nothing. Just work."
"Where do you work?"
His lips moved like he had an answer but he wasn’t sure he wanted to respond.
I smirked. “I don’t bite.”
He laughed a little. “Are you sure?”
Did he worry I’d fight with him like I did with Raven? I tucked my hands together over my stomach and sat back, trying to look friendly. “So what are you working on?”
My eyebrows shifted up. “You’d trust me not to tell? You don’t even know me.”
“Doesn’t mean your promise isn’t any good.” He sat back, leaning against my arm. “I’ve put together a new phone app. I was just checking to see how the reviews were going.”
“Oh,” I said, blinking at the screen. I’d never owned a cell phone. If I ever had one on me, it belonged to a boyfriend I was dating at the time. I looked at the alien screen on Corey’s. “You create phone apps? What kind of app?”
“A video game,” he said. “A small one.”
I leaned over him, letting my arm wedge under his so I could study his phone better, checking the title of one he pointed to. “Castle Zombie Defense?”
“It’s like a castle defense game, except you have to defend it against zombies.”
“You did it? By yourself?”
He shrugged, his shoulder digging into mine a little. “I had some extra time between other projects. The hardest part was learning the 3D software. After about a week, I got the hang of it though ...”
I sat up sharply. “You learned how to do this on your own in a week?”
He blinked those cerulean eyes at me. “Well, I had to learn about video game structure. The software itself has a lot of elements already in place, so there was some coding I didn’t have to piece together myself.”
“Did you take a class?”
He shrugged. “I mean I took some, but they didn’t really dive into this sort of thing. I stopped going because it was faster if I learned it on my own. There’s one I want to take next semester, but I may just attend the more interesting lectures. It’s usually quicker just to pick up a book and learn.”
“But that’s amazing,” I said. “Why didn’t you want anyone to know?”
“I don’t want the other guys to know,” he said. “I mean I don’t care if they know but ... I don’t know. I just feel weird about mentioning it. They think I’m too involved in video games and that it’s distracting.”
“So you told me?”
He smiled a little. “Unless you want to tell me it’s a waste of time.”