Page 39 of Along for the Ride

I turn back to Leana. “Now your eyes. Look at something beyond me. Focus on it. Count the ridges in the bark for all I care, but keep those eyes open and fixed.”

Her sexy lower lip is loose and relaxed. Coupled with the vacant stare, the blood, and the fresh marks on her neck, she looks pretty fucking dead. She’s a fucking masterpiece.

And I’m hard again.

Jesus.Calm down, boy.

Is this a new kink for me? Why’s my dick aching like this?

“Give me that phone,” I tell Gentry.

He hands it to me, and I snap a picture for...personal reasons. I look down at her once more, my hand across my chin. I kneel beside her, and she flinches from my touch as I grind her hair in the dirt, making it all messy. Yes, now she’s perfect.

I lean down to the shell of her ear. “Don’t breathe, little thief,” I whisper. When I stand, I bring up the camera and count her down from three so she can hold her breath. For all intents and purposes, she looks dead, so I start recording. “Here’s your proof, Georgie.” I zoom in on her neck as I narrate. “Gentry’s a little bitch who couldn’t finish strangling her, but don’t you worry your ugly head about it, boss. I took care of her.” I move the camera to the cut in her breast and mentally tell her to keep still. If she moves now, this was all for nothing.

A light breeze kicks sand toward her face, and I’m certain she’ll flinch when the grit collides with her glassy eyes. She doesn’t, and I breathe a silent sigh of relief. Her acting isn’t so bad after all. She just needed the right teacher. Someone who has seen enough dead people to know how they should look. Someone like me.

* * *

Leana

I don’t dare moveor breathe until Karson pockets the phone. I sit up on my elbows, and the sticky film of blood makes my skin feel tingly. The wind sends a draft across my bare breast. Remembering how exposed I am, I turn the shirt around backward to cover myself. “I appreciate the help, but was this really necessary?”

Karson shrugs.

“Let me see it,” I say, putting my hand out for the phone. He hands it to me, and I watch the clip. I look dead. Really fucking dead. Dirt and twigs decorate my blonde hair as it fans around my head. I don’t even recognize my blue eyes. I touch the fresh marks on my throat. “Did you really have to do this?”

Karson squats down, and a terrifying darkness slides across his eyes. “It was either that or be killed in ways I couldn’t conjure.” He leans down and licks the blood from the pool that formed at the base of my throat. His warm tongue brushes across my skin and sends flutters through me that shouldn’t exist. “God, you taste like the thing that made the angel that became the devil fall.”

I push him away. “Poetic.”

“Don’t be a dick, thief.” He stands up and wipes his hands on his jeans, smearing dirt down the denim.

Gentry comes over and lends me his hand so he can help me to my feet. He pulls me into his chest, not caring about the blood covering me. “I’m sorry,” he whispers, tracing the handprint he left on my neck. “I’ll make up for every moment of hurt with twice the pleasure.”

“You didn’t have a choice.”

Gentry’s harsh glare lands on his brother. “None of this would have happened if someone had kept his big fucking mouth shut.”

Karson lifts his chest. “You know, if the roles were reversed, this wouldn’t...No, you know what? This would never happen to me. This isn’t take-your-whore-to-work week. I never would have brought her along.”

“Call her a whore again and I’ll castrate you,” Gentry says.

“It’s fine,” I say, and it is. His words don’t offend me. I’ve been called worse.

Gentry shakes his head. “No, it’s not fine. You’re an extension of me, which means he’s coming at me when he calls you names. If anyone is going to call you that, it’s me, and the word ‘good’ will come before it because you’re my good little whore.” He points his glare at Karson. “Mine.”

My heart thunders in my chest at his words. It also shuts down Karson, which is a major pro. But now, covered in blood and dirt, all I can think about is a hot shower.

Gentry stomps toward the SUV, but I turn to Karson before I follow him. I have a question, and I need the answer before I climb into the car with them again. “Did you tell your boss about me?”

Karson shoves his hands in his pockets and rams the toe of his shoe against the grass. He looks into the distance and shakes his head. “What does it matter? That’s the conclusion Gentry immediately jumped to, so it must be true. He’s always right, isn’t he?”

Before I can press him further, he joins Gentry in the SUV. I’m not convinced he was the one who ratted me out, but that’s an unsettling thought. If Karson didn’t tell their boss...who did?

ChapterSeventeen

Gentry

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