Disengaged: A Dangerously Forbidden Love Affair (7 page)

“Where did he get it from?” my dad asked as we watched Slayton talk to the men below. I even thought I saw a grin on his lips.

“I don’t know. Maybe the man who asked him to fight.”

My father slammed his eyes closed like he’d just heard tragic news. “Malcolm.”

“This is bad?” I asked. And a received a ‘no shit, little girl,’ glance. 

“Malcolm runs all the fights, the bets.”

“Why did he call you a Unicorn?”

His face went white, then flushed with anger. A look that had me flinching back before I found my courage.

“How do you know that boy?” he snapped. “Are you playing me?”

“He took me,” I snapped. My father didn’t deserve to hear that Slayton took me to save me, that he had stood guard over me since. No, he deserved to feel the sick, regretful feeling I saw take over his stare.

“I manage bets,” he said hoarsely. “I gather a pool of people to bet then send in a fool to place the bet. If we lose—it’s harder to collect because the guy placing the bet is never sure who organized it all.

“You owe them two hundred thousand dollars?” I asked.

He swayed his head. “It was more,” he glanced to his side at me. “I’ve worked hard to get it down that low. I have to bet to do so.”

“You have to win,” I said shortly. I knew he wasn’t trying to get out of this. He was trying to float. I’d heard of him doing this my whole life.

My dad gripped my arm. “As soon as this is paid we’re getting out of here. I’m done.”

It was a lie. I didn’t even have to look deep in his stare to know so. My gut told me that every good intention he said would be slaughtered by the demons he found comfort in.

“And what about this Zee guy? What was that stuff?”

My father cursed as he stared down at Slayton and the others, angry that I knew about any of the people he dealt with.

“I told you I needed cash. Zee’s people ask me to hold their stash sometimes. Easy money.”

Oh shit, he’d just robbed Peter to pay Paul!

“And they do the fight-betting thing too?”

He didn’t answer me, so I shoved him.

“No,” he grunted. “Whores. Sex slaves. And the drugs to make them ready to give it up.”

I almost hurled. Doom had never felt heavier. What made it all worse was this man, of all people on the planet, should protect me. Keep me far from anything that even looked this dangerous. He didn’t. He pulled me out of the only home and town I knew and planted me in the middle of hell. An offering to the evil he courted.

My father let me suffer for long minutes as we watched the men below. “He touch you?”

I would’ve refused to answer him if I had the chance. Instead, a pound on the door had us both jumping and the familiar demon of fear staked it’s claim on me again.

SEVEN

I double-checked to make sure no one had left the car below before I moved. My father gripped my arm, but I jerked it away and crawled far from the window then stood as the pounding went on.

I was almost to it when I heard. “Ember. Job or no job!”

Mrs. Jin.

My father, who had found the same relief I had charged toward the door and barely cracked it before he hissed. “No job.”

I don’t know what clicked with me. If it was a whispered understanding from a divine source I’d never understand, or if I was finally falling into place with this underworld, but I knew right then I needed to back up Slayton’s story to those men below.

He’d told them I stayed with someone in this building. It was how he made it inside without any trouble. How he kept my dad in check without throwing up red flags. I didn’t know how long those men had been watching my place, but it was too odd they called moments after my dad came back. Like it was a test or something.

“Job, job!” I said desperately pushing the door open. My father almost hit me but held back when Mrs. Jin pushed her way in and stood between us. She was in her mid-forties, all of four feet tall, but mean as hell. She let most people believe her English was bad, and she noticed little, but I knew better. She was the first and only friend I had in the city, as sad as that may be.

We’d had a lot of long talks about boldness and pride. I was sure it was her that had called the law on my dad when it sounded like a war at our place.

She ignored my father, the overturned lamp, the obvious tension in the air as she went on to scold me. “Sick yesterday. Late today. No job. You go with me or no job. Done. No free ride. Work.”

It took me a second to move into action; it wasn’t until she shrilled, “Shoes” at me that I did move. I rushed to find them. I always forgot half my things when I left because I was partially asleep and more than likely late, but this time, I pushed a few hundreds and my phone in my pocket along with my only key.

My father went to chase me, but Mrs. Jin railed him with her native tongue. I doubted anything she was saying held much weight but the way she said it, how she fussed all around him had him discombobulated.

I tossed a hurt glance at my father as I made it to Mrs. Jin’s side. She gripped my arm then pulled me to the hall. In the elevator, she prowled around me looking me up and down. She usually did so once she pulled me away from my father and his darker moods. This time, her expression was full of curiosity, dismay.

“You glow. Why?” she asked with a tense brow.

I was sure whatever glow I had was vanquished by the red blush that eased down my body as every touch, every stare Slayton had given me over the last twenty-four hours slammed into the forefront of my mind.

I wanted to prepare her for what was going on outside, tell her not to freak if we were approached and if anyone asked to say I stayed with her. But my mind was too scrambled. I had butterflies, not the ‘I’m in trouble’ kind but the ones you have just before you know you’re going to see a boy that can steal your breath with a glance.

Once outside, I heard the distant conversation and someone’s laugh halt. Mrs. Jin eyed Slayton’s bike, then gripped my arm and pulled me down our familiar path. Most days we walked together, but I had gotten lazy recently and slept past my alarm. Which in hindsight is exactly how I ended up with Slayton in the first place.

Slayton tapped the side of the Escalade he was at then turned and strolled toward us.

“No trouble,” Mrs. Jin said as her tiny hand swatted toward him.

“I know him,” I said quietly trying to spare her. “Those guys think I stay with you,” I said just before Slayton made it to us.

Mrs. Jin said something that sounded like a curse. Then when Slayton was by us, she reached up and patted him on the chest like he was a choirboy she was saying hello to. Someone she knew well and had accepted.

“We work,” she said quietly, not eyeing the Escalade but clearly aware we were all being watched.

“I’m taking her,” Slayton said.

“Not safe,” Mrs. Jin said with a critical eye landing on his bike.

Slayton’s top lip twitched, almost into a grin.

“We eat, then she works,” Slayton said with a tick of his head, a sign for me to come to him.

“Safe?” Mrs. Jin asked him with a warm smile, but her voice was anything but. She was a feisty woman, to say the least. Her one word was a demand. She was telling him he better keep me whole. Slayton passed a kind, shallow nod her way.

The Escalade moved away from the curb then drove on. Mrs. Jin lost her fake smile. “No work, no pay,” she said as she moved away from me, shaking her head, set on her path to the bus we would take, that dropped us off two blocks from her shop.

Slayton stared after her a bit bemused then slowly his gaze moved to me.

“Wa—was it clean enough?” I asked trying to look relaxed not for his benefit but anyone who might still be watching.

He stepped closer, his hand moved possessively around my waist as his gaze searched mine. “Hungry?”

“For words,” I said honestly.

He leaned into me and landed a soft kiss below my ear then whispered. “Not now.”

I dipped my head in defeat; he leaned back, brushed his lips across my forehead then pulled me to his bike.

This time, when I climbed behind him on his bike and formed my body around his and closed my eyes I let myself pretend we were running away from whatever this was. I didn’t care that I didn’t know him. The truth of the matter was he had done what my father constantly failed at doing; he protected me. The shameful part of it all was that I would forgive my father like I was raised to do. Then we’d ride this cycle of doom once more, until one of us was long gone from this world.

When Slayton stopped the bike again we were outside the same deli we had dinner at the night before. No one was there, but the second he parked his bike a dim light clicked on, a sleepy waitress unlocked the door and let us in. She locked the door behind us, gave me a shy grin and patted his chest, then vanished into the back.

We didn’t sit at the bar this time, but moved all the way to the back booth. At first I was glad he didn’t sit opposite of me, that I didn’t have to stare into the intensity of him. But then I realized I was flush against him. His hand dropped innocently to my thigh but the reaction of my body, the pooling desire I felt rushing to my core would’ve told you it was anything but.

“Are you helping me or playing me?” I asked in a whisper as I slowly looked up at him. Absorbing the addicting, angelic features I would never get enough of.

After a pause, he answered, “Helping.”

“Why?” I asked when I finally gathered enough nerve to look into his eyes. I felt myself needing—wanting to lean closer, to fall into him, this new dark rush in my life. I held back, which only scrambled my thoughts and forced me to hear my heart drumming in my ears. The intensity of his presence, undivided attention, was stroking every nerve in my body.

Slowly, too slowly, he reached to the side of my face, his thumb traced the bottom of my eye as his narrowed like he was looking into the sun. “Those eyes,” he said in a deep, smooth tone. “You’re beautiful. Innocent.”

I pressed my lips together, and I steadied my breath. “Because I’m pretty, that’s why? You’re risking your life and sparing my father because of that?”

I wasn’t trying to sound cold, or even ungrateful. But I wanted to know that my life was not spared for something as superficial as the way I looked, a momentary appearance of mine that would fade in time.

He leaned back stunned by the brashness emerging from the meek persona he’d known me to have. “No.”

“What is it then? What do I not know?”

“A lot,” he murmured, as he turned forward and propped his feet up on the opposite booth seat, and stared into the dark dining room.

He’d grazed a nerve of mine. The one my father likes to bump against. God help me, I could not sit there and take it.

“I’m not a pretty face, or stupid. I know my father has issues.”

Slayton glanced to my side as his body stiffened.

“But no, I don’t understand how bad they are or how dangerous.” I lifted my chin. “I know you paid some of his debt. And I know you had to fight because of it.”

He smirked which only made me angrier.

“What?” I asked moving away from him, being on the defense was helping to clear my head.

He glanced over me, trying to take the emotion out of his eyes but failing. “I fought because I collected a payment Vinnie was hunting. Then I claimed he was wrong about you. I made a fool of our crew. Fair punishment.”

“M-me?”

He clenched his jaw. “They didn’t know if you were Bloom’s piece of ass or his daughter. Just that he kept you on lock down. When he didn’t pay, we needed to push him. It was either you or his blood.”

Ice-cold fear rushed through me as ruthless reality overshadowed this infatuation I had for Slayton.

“You—you were coming to kill me?”

Slayton glared into nothing. “They sent me to back up Vinnie on the job, to be his enforcer.” His eyes darkened. “Your dad is hardly the biggest Unicorn, but he was growing. Getting harder to manage. Rumored to be linking with other crime circles. A message had to be sent.”

To say I felt dread, entrapped, was an understatement. I always knew my father was a stranger that I’d never really understand. But hearing this made me feel dirty. It broke my heart knowing he did it all to himself. That he had a chance to live straight, more than one, and this is where he was.

“But then they just believed I was your girl?” I was clicking into survival mode again. I didn’t trust those men I’d seen last night.

“No,” he slowly turned his gaze to me. “That’s why they made me fight.”

I shook my head silently saying I didn’t understand.

Resentment flashed in his expression. “They knew I wouldn’t have fought unless it was real. Unless I was telling the truth about you.” When I leaned forward hanging on his every comment, soaking in the priceless words that he was slow to give me, he hesitated. “I told them never again a while ago. Hard limit.”

“And they were just good with that?”

He was slow to answer. “Worth more alive than dead.”

My mouth fell open. I didn’t understand why he risked so much for me. I really didn’t. How could he threaten an already turbulent standpoint between him and those men? All I could muster was his conscience had gotten the best of him. That one look at me told him I was blameless when it came to this world he was in. Which only slammed guilt on top of all my other sparring emotions.

“Do they believe you now?” I asked shakily.

Slayton grazed his teeth across his bottom lip. “There’s no honor among thieves.” His gray stare trickled over me. “We’re not out of the woods yet.”

“He’ll never pay you back,” I said as tears welled in my eyes. “My dad doesn’t even realize what he’s doing, much less is he able to stop. Me being here may have sobered him a bit, but it won’t last.”

He only stared.

“I can’t let you risk your life for me, a stranger.”

Anger washed down his expression as he looked away.

The seconds passed by, the tension between us built. “Why would you want to if all I do is make you feel that way?”

He breathed a smile. A true smile, one that only made him all the harder to look at because it redefined the word beauty. It would have stolen my breath if there weren’t a degree of anger and disdain; I was beginning to understand he was writhing in it. “What way is that, little girl?”

“I’m not a little girl,” I hissed. I went to build my argument but shut up when the waitress came out and set steaming cups of coffee down. The whole time she set things up behind the counter we didn’t say a word.

When she vanished into the kitchen, he spoke. “Your life is in danger. Your father made sure it was, two-fold. If you want to live, you roll with this.”

“This,” I whispered.

He leaned closer to me, studied my searching gaze then brushed his lips across mine. I shuddered in response, so did he. The next thing I knew our kiss was deep and he’d pulled me to straddle his lap. “You make me crazy,” he growled as he kissed down my neck.

The admission that I had any kind of power over him turned me into a vixen. I’d forgotten we were not alone, that I had no idea who was watching or wasn’t. I rushed my hands down his chest and fumbled with his belt. I felt the anticipation, the dare—the danger casting a euphoric haze over me. I couldn’t get close enough to this mysterious boy. I couldn’t feel enough, taste enough. The second I had his cock in my hand, when I felt him rock up into my touch and hiss with pleasure, the sensations building inside of me made me quake.

“Take me somewhere,” I breathed against his neck.

With a grunt, he lifted me from the table and carried me away. I had no idea where we went, but it wasn’t far and once he opened whatever door we moved through he slammed it closed.

It was dark, but I could smell the cleaning supplies. I all but crawled up his tall frame as I waved into him. Each time I did his fingers gripped my ass all the tighter. A beat later he sat me down on a table, trusting him I laid back when he urged me to. My thighs were wrapped snuggly around his hips. Right then, sin or not, I wanted him inside me. I wanted to use this enigmatic power of seduction I had over him to give him the same high he had given me before—I wanted him to see stars.