Kid Page 10

  “Baby,” he warned.

  I closed my eyes tight and tried to stay quiet.

  Alex inserted his fingers into me again, continuing his fierce tempo, in and out, until I was on the verge of an explosion. He had his palm pressed up against my clit as his thumb massaged the outer part of my lips. It was thigh trembling, combining that with his fingers stroking, and curling deep inside of me, was all it took for me to come undone.

  My whole body tensed as passion and heat washed over me. It lasted too briefly as the intensity became too much, and just having Alex inside me caused an overwhelming tingle. I closed my legs tightly and trapped him there. The aftershocks of the orgasm rippled through me.

  Alex stayed still as he waited for my breathing to return to normal. He gently removed his fingers, but I was still sensitive, and even the slightest brush of his knuckles caused a tickle.

  After a moment, when my heart slowed down, I opened my eyes and looked up at him. He was smiling at me—no it wasn’t just a smile, it was an arrogant grin. His impossible clear blues were gleaming with smugness and extreme satisfaction.

  “Do you see it now?” He rolled the pad of his thumb over my lips and gave me a strong taste of myself. “And I haven’t even fucked you yet.”

  Since the lock, all Alex and I ever did was stay in his room. Len would complain about us being hermits and how we weren’t much fun anymore. But by the fifth day of our self-imposed isolation, everyone accepted the new situation and backed off. It gave me unlimited freedom to draw lazy patterns across Alex’s skin and outline each one of his intricate tattoos.

  Sprawled out on the bed with his hands behind his head, he had his eyes closed, enjoying the soft, yet chaste touch. The PG-13 affection was the only thing he was allowing me to do. After the fantastic time he had given me, I wanted to return the favor, but he told me that’s not why he did it and wasn’t looking for reimbursement.

  It didn’t matter how much I tried to convince him that I wanted to touch him, he wouldn’t let me.

  “What’s this one mean?” I asked, tracing the tattoo on the upper right side of his chest.

  It was hard to grasp without knowing what it was. In one aspect, it looked like a tribal tattoo. It was a crescent moon, and on the top part of it had a circular shape with lines going in and out of it. The whole thing was complicated, confusing, and fitting of Alex.

  He raised his head up to see where I was pointing. “It’s a Celtic design. I got it when I was fifteen.”

  “Fifteen?” I gaped at him. “Your parent’s let you get a tattoo at fifteen?”

  “No, of course not,” he said, lying back down. “Those pompous assholes shit themselves when they found out. I was an embarrassment to them, and my mom made me go to confessional three times a week for a month to cleanse that fucking sin.”

  He was gritting his teeth to restrain his anger. It shocked me that he was openly talking about his parents. The family issue had been such a secret. Nobody wanted to discuss it, and anytime they did, Alex would give them a stern look for them to drop it.

  “I’m not much of a religious person,” I said, propping my elbows on his chest. “Susan got into Christianity for a while, and we would go to church on Sundays, but that ended when she met her husband.”

  Even God took a backseat to Terry.

  “Susan?” Alex asked, cocking his head to the side.

  “That’s my mom,” I said sadly, shrugging my shoulders.

  It’d been awhile since I spoke her name out loud. The heartache was creeping up and reminding me of the moment she turned her back on me at the police station.

  It happened a year ago, I’d just turned sixteen, and I was in custody on charges of assault and battery. It was surprisingly hot that day. I remember how the sweat had made the blood stains a deeper red on my pale pink tank top. The cops called my mom at work to come pick me up.

  When she arrived, three hours later, I could see the bitter coldness and hate in her eyes. She chose to see Terry first. He filled her head with a bunch of lies, and she believed every word. I wasn’t her daughter anymore.

  She collaborated with his account of the events and pressed charges against me.

  Thankfully, since I was a minor, and it was my first offense, I got three months of probation and two hundred hours of community service. When I turned eighteen, the charges will disappear from my record.

  Not that it mattered anymore. It’s not as though I was planning on going to college, and despite Alex’s jar, the one he had stashed in a vent above the refrigerator, Susan and Terry ruined that future for me.

  “Can I ask you something?” Alex sat up on the bed and broke me out of that miserable memory.

  The panic seeped in. “Um, that depends on how personal it is.”

  He smiled weakly, seeing right through me. I wasn’t good at concealing my feelings. Especially from him. “How bad does something have to be for you to run away from home?”

  My inner voice screamed at me, telling me to hide and avoid his question. The gates were closed and tightly locked, why open them? The flood of hurt would only take me under and drown me.

  Except, it didn’t.

  The one little detail that I had shared about my mom was painful, but it didn’t end me. Alex lessened the impact. I needed to tell him everything.

  “Bad,” I said. “But I was smart enough to leave before it crossed that point between bad and pretty fricken bad.”

  “How bad is that?” The look in his eyes told me that he would kill anyone who tried to harm me, and as tempting as it was to have Terry’s head blown off, I didn’t want Alex to be the one to pull the trigger. “Baby.” He brushed the hair away from my shoulders, and it sent chills down my spine. “You know that you can tell me anything.”

  “I know.” I chose my words carefully. “My mom wasn’t holding up her end of the bargain by protecting me. I decided it was time to protect myself. If that meant living out on the streets, then so be it.”

  “How was she not protecting you?” Alex placed a few small, innocent kisses on my neck and collarbone. It was enough coaxing to keep me talking, but even he knew whatever I said wasn’t going to be good.

  I took a big, steady breath and finally said it out loud. “My stepdad would sometimes sneak into my room at night.”

  “Did he fucking put his hands on you?” Alex reached for his gun. “Did he?”

  “No, babe.” I grabbed his hand before he could get to the Colt and held it firmly in my lap. The last thing I needed was him out there raising hell. “I left before anything could happen. Okay? I’m fine. Please, trust me.”

  “Are you sure?” he asked, his eyes glancing at me, assessing for bruises and outward scars, and then quickly back over at his gun. “Don’t you hold anything back from me.”

  “I’m not. It’s fine—I’m fine. Look, listen.” Giving him kisses, I hoped to redirect his attention. It worked. “Can I ask you a question now?”

  “Sure.”

  “Why did you leave home?”

  It was a taboo subject for him, but he broached mine. It was only fair.

  “Who said I did?” he asked, suspicion heavily laced in his tone.

  Oh, shit!

  This truth will not end well for somebody, but I couldn’t pretend that it was just a guess. Alex would see right through my lies and never trust me again.

  I bit my lip, looking away from his penetrating gaze, and answered quietly, “Len.”

  “That motherfucker.” He shook his head and laughed. “What else did the big mouth tell you?”

  “Umm. Well, Len also happened to mention that your parents are rich. Is that true?”

  “Yup,” Alex said, rubbing his forehead. “Richer than fucking God himself.”

  There was so much bitterness there, and I was afraid that I stepped over the line. It was such a double-edged sword. I wanted to know more about Alex, and why a guy like him would choose a life of crime over endless amounts of money, but I didn’t want to have hi
m resent me for it. I wasn’t his therapist; I had only been his girlfriend for a week.

  But the questions were plaguing me: what would make a man hate his family so much that he would leave them? What man would give up money and a life of luxury for guns and a life of poverty?

  I knew my reasoning for running away from home was self-preservation. Terry was getting braver with each passing day. If I didn’t leave, no vase to his skull was going to stop him.

  Was it self-preservation for Alex or something else? Something far more damaging and beyond repair?

  Fortunately, I was smart enough to know when to quit.

  “We don’t have to talk about this if you don’t want to,” I said, rising from the bed.

  Alex gripped me by the waist and yanked me down. He pressed his chest up against my back, his warmth making me dizzy. Wrapping his arms around me, he rested his chin on my shoulder. We sat there for a moment, not saying a word, just listening to each other breathe, in and out, until we were both in matching rhythms.

  “I’m sorry for being a dick,” he said. “The last thing I want is for you to feel like you can’t ask me about my parents. If anyone has a right to know about my past, it’s you.”

  “Are you saying that I have unlimited access?” I said slowly, so he didn’t misconstrue my words.

  “Only you.”

  “Okay,” I said, clapping my hands together in mocked anticipation. “What do I want to know? Oh, I know. What’s your father like?”

  In my head, I imagined him as beautiful as Alex, with dark hair and blue eyes. He had to be charming. What kind of job would he have? My guess, he was a banker or an entrepreneur.

  “He’s a senator in Missouri.”

  I blinked a few times, fucking floored by what he was telling me. “You’re kidding?”

  He chuckled. “I wish I was.”

  Turning my body around to get a good look at him, I expected to see him smiling or winking, something of that effect to let me know that he was full of shit, but he wasn’t. There was an unknown somberness behind those eyes.

  For whatever reason, Alex wasn’t proud of his father’s political status.

  “But senators don’t make that much money…I mean, do they?”

  “The crooked ones do, but it so happens that my mom is an oil heiress,” he said with a shrug. “Or so the story goes.”

  “This is so wild. How is this possible?” I stammered. “How does the son of a US senator become a convicted felon?”

  “It was the better choice.”

  “Better than what?”

  As he went to answer me, there was a loud banging on the door, and I jumped twenty feet into the air. Figuratively.

  “What the hell?” I said, clutching my chest as my heart pounded hard against it.

  “Come on, fuckers!” Len shouted through the thin plywood. “Stop screwing like bunnies and get out here! We’re partying in an hour.”

  “Fuck off,” Alex yelled back.

  Len laughed. “Just put on some clothes, you horny bastards, and get out here.”

  Well, it was official, our alone time was over, and the sex jokes were likely to ensue.

  Wonderful.

  Alex groaned and buried his face in my hair. “You know he’s not going to go away.”

  “I know,” I said, standing up and holding my hands out to him. “So, let’s get out of here, and go someplace where it’s just you and me.”

  He raised his eyebrow. “And where do you suggest we go?”

  Glancing down at the roll of tape on the table next to the Colt, I smiled. “Let’s go pop my cherry.”

  We walked down the sidewalk in Old Town Scottsdale hand in hand. From an outsider’s perspective, we could be just two young people enjoying an evening out with no criminal intent in mind. Except, both of us was scoping out cars to boost and one of us had a gun stashed in his back waistband.

  It was a busy Saturday night and filled with a lot of drunken idiots. Alex said those circumstances were perfect for crooks like us. By the time a person realized their vehicle was gone, after thirty to forty minutes of searching for it, the car would be at a garage in West Phoenix chopped up, shipped out, and sold as parts.

  Grand theft auto was something Alex fell into with his friends when he was around twelve years old. They got tired of playing the video game, and as a bunch of Richie Rich kids, bored out of their minds, they felt entitled and untouchable.

  My guy was a straight-up thrill seeker. He tried bungee jumping and skydiving, but nothing brought him more pleasure and fulfillment than sliding into someone’s wheels and dodging the pursuing cops.

  After a few, unfortunate arrests, he knew he had to slow down and get his act together. Otherwise, he would spend the rest of his life behind bars fantasizing about his glory days.

  He created six basic rules, some he learned through experiences of many blunders and many successes. This fail-proof system was what kept his ass out of jail. I listened to him as he told me, but mostly, I was bouncing on my toes with excitement, itching for some action.

  From my point of view, every car we passed was ripe for the picking. I was so sure that each one was going to be ‘the one’ that he wanted me to boost, but Alex was picky.

  There was always something wrong with the cars, and if it didn’t align with the stars above, or match up with all of Alex’s strict criteria, it was a no go.

  My heart smiled when we came across a red BMW. I wanted it. It was the first thing that caught my eye when we got there, but Alex wouldn’t go near it. He said it was too close to a restaurant and had an alarm system.

  That was rules three and four: Location and security.

  After we ate dinner, I nudged him towards this crazy lifted 4x4 truck. Alex would have to lift me up just to get me into that monster. He said it was too much of a liability.

  Rule number five: the ease of the drive.

  We came across an old black Mustang that matched all six of Alex’s requirements. It had to be a sure winner, but again, he said no. It was a classic car, and he couldn’t bear to see it stripped and chopped.

  Made up rule number seven: nostalgia.

  By our third lap around the busy block, he got me all excited over a silver compact car. It was cute and tiny, something that I could drive with no problem. But of course, Alex didn’t like it. He said it was a four-cylinder engine, and we wouldn’t have a chance in hell out-running the cops in that thing.

  Rule number six: the getaway.

  I was fed up.

  “Seriously, Alex. Are we going to steal anything tonight?” I asked as my frustration carried over to an unsuspecting security guard’s ears.

  Alex grinned tightly at him. “My girl can’t handle her tequila.”

  The security guard rolled his eyes. Alex grabbed my hand and walked away as casually as possible.

  My face inflamed with embarrassment, I gave Alex a sheepish smile. “Sorry.”

  “Baby, I know you’re getting antsy, but what was rule number one?”

  “Don’t be overly eager.”

  “Exactly. For instance, what if I asked you to steal that car?” He pointed over to a white Camry. “What would be the first thing you do?”

  The list of rules came to mind, and I tried to remember them one by one.

  “Um. I don’t know. Check underneath the car for a LoJack?”

  “So, you would get down on your hands and knees to look under a car with that guy standing right there watching you?” Alex gestured towards a man who was a few feet from us.

  I closed my eyes and groaned. “Right. I forgot. Rule number two: always be aware of your surroundings.”

  “That’s why we’re not stealing anything tonight and probably won’t for a couple of weeks. We need to get you comfortable with just the act of stealing first.”

  “I’m comfortable. I swear. I stole that roll of tape with no problem, didn’t I?”

  “Did you?” he asked skeptically.

  Jerking my hand out
from his grasp, I stopped in the middle of the sidewalk and crossed my arms over my chest. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  He laughed, pulling my head to him, and kissing the top of it. “Nothing. It doesn’t mean anything.”

  “No!” I stuck my heels in and refused his advances to keep walking. “Tell me what you mean by that.”

  “Don’t get mad,” he said with his hands up and palms facing me. “You almost got caught shoplifting the tape.”

  I shook my head, stunned in disbelief. “What? No, I didn’t—hello, I walked out of the hardware store with no problem.”

  “Baby.” He caressed the side of my cheek. “I had to pay off the cashier.”

  “No, you didn’t,” I said, my heart breaking into a million pieces. “Did you?”

  “I had to. The guy knew something was up. He was about to ask you to lift up your shirt when I slipped him a hundred.”

  “So, I didn’t steal anything?” It crushed me. “In fact, that hardware store owes us, like what, fifty rolls of tape?”

  “If it makes you feel any better, I doubt that hundred dollars went to the store.”

  “Ugh,” I said, throwing my hands up in the air and trouncing down the street, furious and deflated.

  The one time I’d done anything crazy, except for trying to steal Alex’s car, wasn’t anything worth mentioning. I wasn’t unique or badass. No, I was playing criminal with the help of my felon boyfriend.

  Alex grabbed me by the arm and pulled me off to the side. A couple who was following close behind us walked passed with curious expressions. Alex stared them down. They gripped each other close and picked up their pace. He watched them until he couldn’t see them anymore. The suspicious scowl and intimidating gaze disappeared when he turned to face me again.

  He was beautiful.

  “Listen, baby. It wasn’t about getting the tape for free. I just wanted to see if you had the guts to do it.” He locked his eyes on mine as his hands palmed and fondled my breasts. My shirt was nothing but a spaghetti-strap tank top with no bra. The slightest roll of his thumbs triggered my nipples to harden. “I was pleasantly surprised to see how horny it made you.”