32. Harper
THIRTY-TWO
HARPER
Okay, so maybe I was overdoing the whole payback thing. But Angel had been aloof and acting like a prick the entire day, and I was dead set on getting him back for it.
I just hadn’t expected such a perfect opportunity to present itself so soon.
When we pulled into the parking garage of the asylum, I had no sooner un-straddled the bike and slipped off the helmet than none other than that asshole who caused Nash grief my first night here wandered around the corner, two other guys with masks dangling from their hands in tow.
Angel growled like a fucking dog under his breath, and I almost burst out in uncontrollable laughter. The way these men acted toward one another, you’d think someone ran over someone else’s dog or something.
"Ayyyye, if it isn’t Pretty Boy. And you brought the resident plaything with you, too." Jackal shot me a wink, and I rolled my eyes in return. Suddenly, an idea struck, and my lips curled in a smirk that would have made Nash proud.
Time to play, fucker.
"Oh, look, if it isn’t Jackalope. Who are these characters, your backup dancers?" I gestured to the men on either side of him and shot them my best flirty smile.
"Har har, bitch," he growled back, his eyes narrowing. "You’ve only got one Skeleton Man with you, and there are three of us." He stepped forward, his eyes trailing over me in a manner that made me sick to my stomach. "Shouldn’t you be a little nicer to us?"
The one on the left shoved Jackal out of the way and offered me his hand, which I accepted with no small amount of wariness. "Dingo’s the name. This here’s Coyote. A little feral, but a decent mate. Don’t mind Jackal; he’s all bark and no bite."
The man had an Aussie accent thicker than chowder, but he did seem harmless compared to the threatening aura his friend gave off. I shook the offered hand and smiled back. " Harper. I’m with—well, you know who I’m with, obviously." I threw a surreptitious wink over my shoulder at Angel and grinned as a plan formulated in my mind. "Angel and I are a thing."
"Untrue," Angel warned, his eyes narrowing to slits as he stepped up beside me. "Don’t tell your new friend lies, Harper."
"Lies?" I asked innocently, hands behind my back as I thrust out my chest and batted my eyelashes at the third man in their little trio. "That’s not what he told the guy who hit on me at the diner today."
A hand closed around my mouth, and I felt a second one press insistently at the small of my back. "That’s enough chatter for today, I think. Time to go back upstairs, brat."
Dingo chuckled as I waggled my fingers at the guys on my way by, but Angel was stopped when the big, burly wildman set a hand on his shoulder. "You might wanna put a leash on that one, Pretty Boy. She’s gonna get herself into trouble if she keeps playing with fire."
He held out a leash and collar, and I was stunned when he set it in Angel’s outstretched hand and patted it lovingly. Angel muttered a quiet thanks and shook his head in disbelief as the three Neons, now all laughing at our expense, kick started their dirtbikes, threw on their masks, and headed out of the garage for who knew what kind of business.
The baseball bats slung over their shoulders and guns tucked in their waistbands and holsters signaled it was nothing good.
"I can’t fucking believe you," Angel snarled, his hand moving from the small of my back to my hair, wrapping my ponytail around his fist and using it to haul me along until we were around the corner from his bike and the two abandoned helmets.
The breath whooshed out of me as he slammed me against the wall, his eyes wide and feral now, filled with heated anger I had seen only once before when he turned on Nash the other night.
So why did that rage turn me on so fucking much?
I rubbed my thighs together as he brought his face inches from mine, nose to nose, those violet eyes searing their way into my fucking soul.
"You’re pushing your luck, Harper. And I’m about at my wit's end with your games."
I lifted a hand and ran it down his arm that caged me in on the other side, my neck arched back as I stared up at him, towering over me like some sort of sentient god-being from the movies.
Fuck, he was tall.
"Do I win a prize if I play nice?" I rasped, under some sort of fucking spell I was powerless against.
"Quit that," he growled, his hot breath fanning against my lips. "Put away those fuck me eyes and grow up. Not everyone is going to bend to your will just because you’ve got a pussy."
"You know, Angel," I whispered, letting my eyelids lower suggestively as I watched his Adam’s apple bob, "I could always tell when you were hiding something from me." My lips parted, and I saw him lean in another inch, our lips almost touching now. "What’s your deep, dark secret, Angel?" I leaned forward and let my lips graze his as I spoke. "You’ll feel better if you tell me."
"You play games with someone you don’t know anymore, brat," he snarled, yanking on my ponytail.
I’m embarrassed to say I let out a little moan at the pain. Fuck, he couldn’t know that I liked it rough. It wasn’t like he could read my mind.
The blush that crept up his throat, though, told me I wasn’t the only one affected right now.
Let’s see how far we can take this game.
"Fuck, Angel, do it again."
"Get bent," he spat in disgust, and I slipped from his grip and ducked around him, leaning against the nearest car.
"Should I get bent right here? Forward, or backward?" I splayed my hands out on the hood of the green Lamborghini, slowly presenting my ass to him as I shot a wink over my shoulder. "What way do you want me, Angel?"
"I don’t want you," he whispered, even as he stepped toward me, his hands twitching at his side, the leash and collar still dangling from his grip. "I don’t."
"You’re a bad liar," I teased, rolling onto my back, taunting him as I kicked a foot up and rested it on his shoulder in a move that a gymnast would envy. "Come on, Angel. Are you scared of me?" A single finger dragged along the hood of the car as Angel leaned in closer, his hand closing around my ankle, sending a shockwave of anticipation down my spine. "I don’t stand a chance against a man like you."
"You’re playing with fire, Harper. And you’re gonna get burned."
His words said no, but his eyes were filled with a different kind of heat now. I wanted to make him admit he wasn’t as strong as he thought. That he was just as affected by me as I was by him.
And the only way I could do that was by breaking through to him with the only weapon they couldn’t take from me.
My body.
In a single breath, I hooked my ankle around the back of his neck and yanked him toward me, using the shock to destabilize him until he fell forward and landed atop me, his hands on either side of my head, my leg thrown over his shoulder at the knee, the other pinned beneath us, his obviously hard cock pressed against my core.
The position was so obscene, if we hadn’t been wearing any clothes, I would have been three seconds from an orgasm. If someone stumbled across us now, here, they’d think we were in fucking heat or something.
Fuck, I would kill to feel him just once.
"Harper," he whispered, his hair falling around us like a shield, hiding us from the rest of the world. "I don’t want to fuck you."
"You’re a terrible liar," I countered, and my hands wrapped around his neck as I yanked his mouth to mine, breathing in the warmth of his tongue as I shattered the glass wall between us and gave in.
His body moved against mine, and fuck all if it wasn’t like poetry in motion. My leg fell from his shoulder and he climbed on top of the car with me, all fire and gasoline as we made out like we needed each other to breathe. His lips pressed insistently against mine, moving like water as we gasped for air between shifts in position. His cock pressed insistently against my core, and I groaned, rocking up into him when those hands clasped a collar around my throat. I didn’t even complain when I felt him attach the leash, either. And when he jerked on it as his teeth nipped my bottom lip, I thought I was going to come right there on a stranger’s car, fully clothed, like a fucking bitch.
"Angel," I moaned, so loud now it would be impossible to mistake our actions for anything less salacious if you were within three hundred feet. The way his face flushed at the sound proved he knew it, too. "Fuck, yes."
I heard a slow clap echoing in the distance, and we froze like deer in the headlights, both of us turning our gaze to none other than Nash, standing in a corner, that cocky smile on his lips as he waggled his brows at us.
Fuck. Of all the people to catch us, it had to be him.
"Nice to see you’re still interested in women, brother. I was beginning to think you’d turned into a eunuch." He whistled low as he circled us like a predator, neither of us moving from our position. "And a leash, too? I didn’t know you were into the kinky shit, Angel."
Angel shoved off me in a flash and tossed the leash into Nash’s hands, growling under his breath about making assumptions and minding his business .
And just like that, Angel disappeared, a bucket of cold water dumped on our heads, leaving me with a wet pair of panties, and the man who’d pushed me away the night before holding my leash and collar in his grip.
With a sadistic smile, Nash tugged on the leash, pleased when I tripped over my own feet to keep up with him.
"Come on, Harpie girl. Be a good bitch and I won’t have to get ugly."
Why did his words only serve to turn me on more?