37. Bay
THIRTY-SEVEN
bay
“You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me,” Nessa grinds out, slamming the chip-painted door to my Chevy Caprice and scanning the overly pretentious mansion with floor-to-ceiling windows wrapping around the house. Sitting on top of a steeped hill, it overlooks the oceanfront like a fortress, searching out any enemy who might try to sneak up and attack the place. “Is this even real?”
My eyes follow cement stairs leading the way up, with men and women dressed in casual and fancy attire scattered every which way, red Solo cups and something to smoke between their fingers above, and my pulse races.
“I think we just walked through hell,” I mutter, propping my hip along my fender.
“I’d say heaven,” Nessa replies, coming around to stand at my side. “You drove us to the right house, right?”
Jaguars.
Mercedes Benzs.
Audis.
And Aston Martins.
“Yeah.”
“I can’t believe Levi let us come here.”
“He has no other choice but to allow me to play 007 that might get me double-o killed if I don’t play my cards right.”
Nessa loops her arm with mine just as a group of three girls exits a Beamer and begins to make their way up to the house, glancing over at us to give us the stink-eye and disapproval that the white trailer park trash is here.
“I want her bag,” Nessa mutters in my ear as we follow. “Wanna put twenty on it that I’ll have it by the end of the night?”
“I know you can do it by the end of the night.” I notice the blue bag she’s eyeing and smile. “Don’t get caught, eh? You’re still on probation.”
Nessa pulls back her long blonde hair and drops it to her other shoulder. “I don’t know what that means.”
“Bitch, do not get in trouble here. We’re here to play a role and?—”
“I think you’re playin’ yours a little too good,” she retorts as we hit the steps and begin the three-tiered walk up. “You got two of the three practically on their knees for you.”
Guilt fills my chest, but I shove that shit aside.
All’s fair in love and war.
But there is no love.
Just like.
And sex.
But definitely always war.
“Then steal me an Oscar because I’m gonna be putting in work tonight,” I tell her.
Nessa pulls me closer. “Just don’t get hurt.”
We stride inside the mansion, “Need To Know” by Doja Cat blaring through the space. The place is packed.
A dance floor is to our right, in a room that looks like it could be a living room with a roaring fireplace and industrial lighting over sectional couches that have been pushed back with bodies already on it.
The kitchen is on the left, and ahead is a huge balcony full of folks with red Solo cups and something to smoke between their fingers.
“Easy way to find them,” Nessa starts. “Is to dance. It’s like a rite of passage. They can sense their picked mate out or something.”
My brows knit. “What the fuck—” She pulls me to the right and along the edge of couples dancing, spinning me around in her heels and singing to the song. Her fingers wrap around my chin, meeting her eyes, and she already knows.
She knows I’m not comfortable here, and that she’s the only one of the two of us who can push back an uneasy feeling and act like it’s normal.
“We’re the two hottest bitches here,” she tells me over the music, then leans in, smelling of some expensive perfume that she stole from somewhere. “And we’re South Shore. Enough said.”
Right.
She lifts our arms and begins moving her hips sensuously, and I try to follow her lead.
We’re South Shore. Enough said.
This is for home.
This is for Dad, Ellie, Mae, and Levi.
I’m the link. The key.
I’m on the inside and the only person who has been put in this position who didn’t end up dead after every meeting with the boys.
I have to do this, no other way about it.
Swaying my hips, I block out everything in my head. I watch Nessa mindlessly smile, enjoying herself at a boujee party where she could do worse with her looks than anyone else here.
Maybe I should’ve handed this job off to her, but I immediately don’t like the idea of her kissing Reeve. And disturbingly enough, I hate the fact that the next name that comes to mind is Torin.
Fucking Torin Wildes.
I hate admitting that he gets under my skin. That my body melts at his every touch and those tawny brown eyes hold nostalgic memories of wishing I were his and not Matteo’s all those years ago.
Often, I find myself wondering what would’ve happened if I had been courageous enough to leave with Torin. To allow and trust him enough to keep me safe.
It would’ve pissed Levi off, that much I know for sure.
But Torin mirrors me in so many ways that it’s easy to understand him and hard to stand him.
A firm body presses into my spine, dispatching the thrill of catching one of the big fish I knew I’d see tonight.
And I already know who it is.
I can smell the sea and the undertones of fresh linens off his body. The possessive yet soft brush of his palm along my hip before he lines his groin to the top of my ass.
My body charges, inclining toward him on impulse. I’m desperate for his touch, always.
He creates a red-hot fire boiling inside me that I thought was dead. My mind practically pants after him and it’s stupid disgusting.
“McQueen,” he rustles around the shell of my ear. His warm words and breath cause a shudder to erupt from my body. “I need to stop seeing you dressed like this without me making sure no one fucking touches it.”
Nessa catches Reeve at my back, but he doesn’t seem to notice or care. His face nestles into the crook of my shoulder and neck, and she nods, giving me her subtle goodbye but that she’ll be around.
“Where is your friend going?”
Or maybe he does notice.
“Going to go talk to a guy she saw when we walked in,” I reply, still swaying my hips to the beat.
“Really? You’ve both been here for approximately four minutes.”
Why am I not surprised he saw me come in?
“Some of us know exactly what we want,” I divulge, feeling the brush of his lips against my heated skin.
“That one of them being you?”
“Sometimes. What are you doing lurking around?”
“Waiting for you.” My lips mindlessly curl at his admission. “When are you going to turn around to kiss me?” His fingers slightly dig into my jeaned pelvis.
Without much effort on my part, I slowly pivot, while Reeve keeps his greedy hands on me, pulling me closer so I’m flush against his chest.
And I fucking swoon, people.
That effortless smirk that lines his cushy lips runs all the way up my body like an inferno. His hazel eyes, which are locked and loaded on me, develop nothing but the need for him to take me somewhere and press kisses and drag of his tongue all over my body.
I want to run my fingers through the thick locks of his sandy blonde hair and expose his neck so I can just suck on him.
“Why do you look like you want to fuck me?” Reeve quips, a wider lift of his mouth alluding that he approves of the action and idea. “Did Torin not do a good enough job when you ran into him last time?”
“He didn’t fuck me,” I reply, keeping my eyes locked on his. “But he wanted to.”
Reeve steps closer, if that’s even possible, biting on the inside of his bottom lip. “Yeah? Then what are you waiting for, McQueen?”
You.
The word lodges in my throat because my secret agent persona took off the moment I fell into Reeve Stanton’s gaze.
It won’t betray him.
It won’t break his heart either.
Because he has one.
The goal is to bring Emilio down by getting closer to the boys so that it doesn’t look obvious.
But, what I didn’t factor in was Reeve.
I already knew Torin was going to be a pain in my ass. That he was going to try to claim me for his own. Yet, I didn’t expect him to watch me fuck his best friend in the backseat of his car either.
I hoist myself up onto my tiptoes, towing the space along with me when I ask, “Do you have somewhere we can go?”
His fingers immediately interlace with mine as he pulls me from the dance floor and through the packed set of people surrounding it.
I saw the black marbled stairs leading upstairs, expecting to go up them, but we move around toward the back of the house and through the dining space adjoining the kitchen.
I’m not able to fully examine it because Reeve is guiding me down a decently sized hallway and through the threshold of a door, where red LED lights are framing the edge of the walls, illuminating downward on random band posters, pictures from an old Polaroid, and a tall shelf full of records and CDs on top. In the middle of the ceiling is a black quilt with two skeletons holding each other closely right above a mattress.
Fuck.
This screams Reeve.
I hear the soft click of the door close before I’m promptly twirled around and gently shoved back into it.
Reeve comes down at the same spot he was in on the dance floor, but this time, his mouth latches onto my already warmed skin and teases the flesh there.
“I like your room,” I mutter, finding a Staind poster over his mattress. There’s no frame, just a box spring and mattress shoved in the corner. “Why does it look like you just moved in?”
“Because I don’t give a fuck about furniture. And I only need a mattress to fuck you on.” His fingers begin undoing the button of my jeans while his tongue licks and tastes my neck like it’s a sweet treat. “You’re the only girl I’ve ever brought in here.”
Oh my God, please tell me he’s lying.
“Why?”
My pants are heaved over my ass and Reeve wastes no time sliding his fingers down between my pelvis and the fabric of my panties. “Because I don’t like anyone like I like you.”
I’m done.
There’s no hidden agenda with Reeve. He doesn’t fuck around. He’s vulnerable and that’s a sign of strength. Of being able to show his cards, but confident enough to give you the choice to use them against him or not.
I literally vow to myself at that moment that Reeve will never be mentally or physically harmed by me. That I will protect this man like I do my own family.
I’ve never, ever had a man treat me like he does.
And I will appreciate and cherish that.
“Get used to it,” he orders placidly, with some tightness to it. As if he can sense how I’m not even sure this is possible. “I’m gonna make you mine, and there isn’t shit anyone is gonna do about it. Not even you.”
I could kick myself in the vagina for asking him my next question, but I have to know. “What about Torin?”
“What about him?”
“We both know he’s a dick.”
“He is,” he replies. “But he’s not gonna fuck up what I’m working toward. And he sure as hell isn’t going to take you away from me.”
I pull back from him a little because this can’t be about his dick. “What if he…” I meet Reeve’s lucid hazel eyes, expecting him to be slightly exasperated about talking through this.
“What if he what?”
“Torin has been on me for years.”
“And?”
“And…what am I supposed to do with that? With this ?”
Reeve hoists a playful brow. “Wanna find out?”
He doesn’t wait for my answer. The pad of his finger grazes my clit as he slowly circles the sensitive nub over and over again.
“He’s my brother. He’s my best friend, and I hate him most of the time. If he wants you, he better work. If he wants to fuck you, he better treat you right and know that the only fucking reason he can is because I trust him with my life. I share a soul with that motherfucker. And it’s because I like you so much, Bay Bay McQueen, that I will inevitably give you anything you want. Even if it’s him…and me.”
“Just had to make sure you threw yourself in there, huh?”
“You can bet your wet-ass pussy, baby, that I would. I didn’t say I was gonna give you the fuck away. He’s got me fucked up if that’s what he believes.”
“I don’t know what he believes.”
“You wanna think about Torin right now?” Reeve straightens his spine and pulls his boyish expression from my cheek to peer down at me darkly. “Or do you wanna think about me? You got me all alone for the first time, baby. What are you gonna do about it?”
My desire for this man shuts up everything residing in it before my palms find his chest and shove, jumping up his body and wrapping my thighs around his hips. “You on the bottom.”
Reeve smiles up at me just before my mouth clashes with his. My tongue demands access, and he quickly obliges, meeting each thrust and sweep with a veracity of his own.
He kisses me like he has all the time in the world. As if nothing else could ever stand in our way. It’s this consuming bubble that I wouldn’t mind spending the rest of my life in.
When he gets us to his bed, he slowly sits down along the edge, keeping me in his arms and lap as his hands roam and learn every curve of me as if he’s never touched me before.
After a few more seconds of intoxicating bliss, I wiggle from his hold and rise to stand on my wobbly feet. “Take off your pants,” I order, removing my shirt and shoving down the rest of my jeans. Reeve does what I ask, watching me the whole time as I strip down into just my bra and panties.
When he’s all boxers and annoyingly lying there with his shirt still on, I narrow my eyes.
“What?” he asks innocently. “I was waiting to see if you were going to keep your tits from me or not because then I was going to do the same.”
“You know what I want.”
Reeve holds my gaze the whole time when he unhurriedly rips his black shirt over his head. Messing up his hair, he rakes his fingers through it, and I notice a silver ring on his right hand.
“What’s that for?” I point at his hand and Reeve looks down at it.
“My dad’s ring.”
I give him a weak smile and pad over to him, standing between his parted thighs. “You miss him?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m sorry.”
Reeve reaches for the thin waistband of my underwear and slowly pulls them down. “Me too, baby. But I’m even more sorry that you’re not riding my dick yet, so...put me out of my misery, eh?”
I shake my head, slipping out of them and placing my hands on Reeve’s naked shoulders. “I wanna suck you off first.”
I swear I see Reeve’s eyes darken before he’s shaking his head at me now. “Be easy on me, baby. It’s been a few days since I had you and I want to feel you come around me.”
He reaches for his jeans and rips out a foil packet from the pocket. I must be out of my damn mind.
Really, I am.
Because the next thing I know I’m plucking it from his fingers and tossing it over my shoulder, discarding it like a dumbass. “I’m on the pill.”
“Fuck…” His chest shakes as he watches me with an intensity so heavy that it makes my pussy clench. “I think you’re trying to kill me, McQueen.”
I lean in and wrap my arms around his neck. “Never you, Reevie. I’ll always keep you safe.”