Page 23 of Wicked Sins

A bolt of anger shoots through me. I slam on brakes so hard, she goes flying forward. If she hadn’t buckled up, she’d have a broken head right now. Instead, her seat belt snaps tight.

Her phone disappears with a thud into her footwell. “What the hell?” she gasps, yanking at the belt digging into her chest. With a whip of her head that sends her dark hair flying, she glances into the road behind us. “You could have killed us!”

“There was no one behind me,” I say calmly. Then, pointing to her cellphone where it lies between her feet, I add, “Pick it up. Delete his number.”

“Fuck you!” she spits out and starts fumbling with the buckle of her seat belt. “Let me out!”

“I have to drive you back home,” I say, my voice a dead monotone as I put the SUV into gear and pull off smoothly. “So that’s what I’m gonna do.”

She punches my shoulder, then again. Again.

I let her. Better she takes that frustration out on me than she lets Dad have it. I know for a fact he’d draw her over his lap and let her have his belt.

He’s done it with me and Emma plenty.

“Delete it, Candy.”

“Go to hell.”

Again, I slam on the brakes.

Again, Candy jerks forward. This time, she lets out a strangled scream and redoubles her efforts to take off the belt.

This time, she succeeds.

But I lock the door before she can wrench it open. I have full control over the locks from the driver’s seat. She’d need a brick and a strong throwing arm to get out of here.

Her hands are in fists, and she pummels them into me when I reach over and grab her phone from the footwell.

But her phone’s locked, and it’s the kind that needs a pin or her fingerprint to unlock it.

“Pin.”

“Burn in hell.”

“Pin.”

She doesn’t reply.

I grab a fistful of her hair and yank back her head. She lets out a flabbergasted gasp, grabbing my wrist, but as soon as I twist my hand, she freezes up. Her face contorts with pain, but it smooths out when I hold the phone in front of her.

“Unlock it.”

Her finger trembles when she lifts it, but she unlocks her phone without a fight. I release her hair, and she draws back from me, huddling in the corner like a kicked dog as I hunt through her contacts.

There are surprisingly few of them, and most of them are girls and things like ‘bakery’ or ‘vet’.

I delete Sean’s number. I have a strong urge to scan the rest of her phone, looking for other clues to who this stranger is that’s suddenly become such an integral part of my life, but then a car streams past me laying on its horn, and I toss the phone into her lap.

“You’ll thank me later, darling,” I say.

Chapter Nine

Candy

My heart is pounding so hard, it should be coming right out of my chest. I ease open my bedroom door and pad into the hallway on my socks, my sneakers dangling from my hands.

I’m normally fast asleep by this time, but there’s so much adrenaline pumping through my veins, I’m literally vibrating. I pad down the hall and take the stairs one at a time, keeping as close to the wall as possible; I haven’t lived in this house long enough to know which of them squeak.

---