Page 17 of Filthy Devil

“Until she wasn’t?” she guesses.

I hum before I inhale a deep breath, then let it out slowly, my eyes finding hers and keeping her attention. There is nobody else I want to look at right now. There is just James, and I know it’s fucking wrong.

“Until she made a mistake too big to apologize for with words. She knew that. She accepted it, and she was good with it as long as she knew we had your back.”

“Are you telling me that she’s dead?” she asks.

Reaching out, I wrap my fingers around her waist, squeezing her there. “I’m not telling you a fuckin’ thing, James. But know that she wasn’t a piece of shit, and she wasn’t just some whore. At the same time, she always wanted better for you.”

I take a step backward but don’t turn around and walk away as much as I want to. Instead, I do what I promised Atomic and King I would do. I protect her. Holding out my hand, my palm facing upward, I wait for her to slip her fingers inside.

She does it almost as if it’s an instinctual thing.

She hasn’t thought about it.

My hand is offered, and her body takes that offer.

I could take advantage, but I think I’ve already done enough of that.

“Go upstairs, get ready, and we’ll go shopping. The rest of the shit, we’ll figure it out as we go.”

JAMES

Wearingmy jean shorts and Nash’s T-shirt, my brown hair thrown up into a messy bun, I wrap my arms around this man as his bike moves through the streets. I don’t even know where I am. What city we are in. I know I’m near the ocean, so I assume it’s on the Gulf Coast somewhere.

The bike pulls onto a dirt road and then glides through a gated area. The gate is open, and the guard is nowhere to be seen. We stop when we reach a building. I’m not sure what is going on. We aren’t at a store or a mall. It’s just a big square concrete block building.

Nash kills the bike’s engine, then he lifts his leg, disengages from the bike, and stands to the side, holding out his hand for me. I slip my fingers in his. He grips them, wrapping his hand around me tightly as he waits for me to climb off his bike as well.

When he takes a step forward, I tug on his hand. He stops and turns his head to look over his shoulder at me. Sinking my teeth into my bottom lip, I worry it for a moment, then let out a heavy breath.

“Where are we going?” I chance asking.

He gives me a smirk, then clears his throat. “Shopping, but we can’t do that on the bike.”

And without another word, he tugs on me, and together, we move toward the building, but before we walk inside, he diverts us to the left and toward an old pickup truck. It doesn’t look beat up and ghetto, though.

Instead, it looks vintage. Like he’s had it since day one, or maybe he just bought it and has taken care of it. I’m not sure, and I’m not sure it matters. He stops at the passenger door, then opens it and waits for me to climb inside.

“Why are you going to buy me things?” I ask before I climb inside.

He tips his chin slightly, his eyes searching mine before he releases my hand. Lifting his finger to my chin, he tips my head backward. His eyes find mine. They hold them, and my breath hitches.

Then he shifts forward, and his lips almost touch mine, but unfortunately, they don’t. I can’t deny that I want his mouth to touch mine. I want him to consume me and fuck me like he did earlier today.

I ache between my thighs just thinking about him there. I know I set out to manipulate him, but the way I want him to slide back inside of me, I can’t help but wonder if he’s the one with all of the control.

“Nash,” I exhale when he doesn’t answer me.

Then he slides his hand to my cheek, cupping me there as his gaze searches mine. My entire body trembles as his thumb slides across my bottom lip. His eyes darken. It’s sexy, beautiful even.

“You have nothing with you, James. You need clothes and all the shit that comes with that. Even if we don’t know where you’re going to be sent or what you’re going to be doing, you still need something to wear and something to wash your hair with.”

I really do need both of those things, along with makeup and shoes. I need everything. I’ve never started completely from scratch before, not even when I decided to leave my parents’ home. This is beyond anything I’ve ever experienced, and I’m not quite sure how to handle it.

“I have nothing to give you to pay you back,” I whisper.

He snorts. “Yeah, sweetheart. I know. Don’t worry about that shit yet.”

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