Page 49 of Cruel Charming Psychos (Necessary Evils 2)

“Do you know how to change a tire? Because this one is flat.” She kicks the front, passenger tire.

“I’m sure you can guess that I have absolutely no idea how to change a tire. I broke down once and paid some guy a thousand dollars to fix it for me.”

“That doesn’t surprise me.” She places a hand on each of her hips. “Changing a tire is easy, but that’s not going to do us a whole lot of good with smoke coming from the engine. And since the dumbass that pulled out in front of us didn’t have the decency to stop, we’re going to be stuck here for a while, so we are absolutely fucked.”

“Yeah…” I exhale as I drop my head.

This is bad, like real bad. Emily was only supposed to bekidnappedfor a few hours, and now there’s no way we’re getting back to the Hamptons before nightfall. She’s going to be with those men for at least a night and I feel awful about putting her in that position, even if I know they’re not going to hurt her. She doesn’t know that, though. That’s what terrifies me. She’s a fighter and if she thinks her life is in danger just when she decided it’s worth living, those men might be in trouble.

* * *

I had to walk a mile to get enough service to make a phone call and the road service company claims it’ll be at least three hours until they can make it out to tow us back to the Hamptons. Not great.

By the time I get back to the car, the sun has completely abandoned us, leaving us in the dark and it’s getting cold. It starts getting cold in New York about the same time it stops getting hot. It’s almost like we don’t have autumn. We go straight from summer to winter. Straight from heaven into the coldest reaches of hell.

Addison lies in the backseat with the back door propped open. When she notices me approaching, she raises up to lean on her elbows. I make my way to the car and lean down to meet her gaze.

“Did you have any luck?”

“It’s going to be three hours.”

“Are you fucking kidding me?” She sits up and wipes her forehead with the back of her palm. “That’s too long. We have to find another way.”

“The only other option is to go to the road and try to wave down someone, but do you really want to hitchhike in today’s climate?”

“You’re too nonchalant about this,” she says. “The longer we’re here, the longer Emily is in danger. We have to find her.”

I crawl into the car and place a hand on her shoulder to comfort her. “We’re going to find her. Whoever took her took her for a reason and it probably has something to do with my dad.”

“Why did we think we could get away from him? He has to be stopped.”

“We’re going to stop him. We’re going to get to the bottom of everything and we’re going to get my family out of my life and when we do, we can start a new life somewhere.” I reach for the cusp of her chin and angle her head so I’m staring right into her eyes. “Now that we have some free time…”

She eyes me suspiciously. “What are you doing, Nick?”

“We might as well make the best of the situation we’ve found ourselves in. We can’t go anywhere and nobody’s going to rescue us, so I was thinking we could finish what we started in the bathroom.”

“Seriously?” she scowls. “Your sister was just kidnapped and you’re thinking about your dick?”

“The heart wants what the heart wants,” I say, and it comes out far too sly. “I’m sorry. It’s just that my mind is racing and I-”

“You just want the world to shut up?”

“Yeah, something like that.”

She reaches for the back of my head and pulls me into a kiss. It’s real and it does the trick, my mind goes elsewhere. The world completely shuts up. The voices in my head screaming that I’m the worst person in the world, they disappear until all I can think about is getting out of these clothes.

She reaches for the buttons of my shirt and undoes them quickly. Her hands are soft on my chest as she caresses me gently. I drop my head and lap my tongue over the side of her neck, planting short kisses along the path to the base of her ear. Her hands crawl underneath the back of my shirt, climbing up my back. Her fingers dig into the flesh of my skin as she tries to pull me deeper into her, craving something more.

And the fucking worst feeling comes crashing over me, the voices come back, screaming louder than before. She deserves to know the truth and keeping it from her right now will feel like taking advantage of her. We need to be able to trust each other. Even if that means getting another case of painful blue balls.

“I have a confession,” I say between ragged breaths. “It’s probably not the right time to say anything at all, but I can’t keep this to myself anymore.”

“Can you at least finish before saying anything that’s going to ruin the mood?”

I grit my teeth and shake my head. “I paid someone to kidnap Emily.”

“You did what?” she screams before swinging at me with a closed fist, hitting me right in the eye socket.

---