Thrill Ride Read online

  “Good.” I sigh with relief. “Do you know where he went?” I ask the more reasonable man.

  “Errand,” he says simply, avoiding eye contact. “There’s some cereal if you’re hungry. He should be back soon.”

  “Thanks, but I, ah, I think I’m going to go take a shower. Is there running water?” I ask.

  “Sure,” Van responds. “It’s just going to be cold.”

  “Great,” I say before I spin on my heel and jog back up the steps.

  Hopefully, by the time I get out, Hendrix will be back, and we’ll be ready to catch our flight and start our new life together.

  Chapter 18

  Hendrix

  The lights are all off at Libby’s apartment, so I’m guessing that means her roommate is still asleep. There’s no way to know for sure since his car is most likely still parked right across the street from the bank.

  Wonder what the police will think about that? Maybe Carter will even become a suspect, which would be great.

  I try to figure out the best way to get inside, since it’s not like I have a lock-picking kit on me. If I bust the window, that will definitely wake up the roommate and possibly other neighbors, which means I could get caught.

  So instead of breaking in, I decide to go the simpler route—I knock on the door.

  It opens almost immediately, telling me I was wrong—Carter wasn’t asleep. He’s fully dressed and pointing a gun at me.

  Motherfucker.

  “Where is she?” he asks with a clenched jaw. And it pisses me off that he’s acting so goddamn protective over Libby. The damn gun is also crossing one hell of a line.

  “None of your fucking business,” I respond.

  “Turn around slowly and put your hands behind your back,” he orders.

  “No.”

  “Do you want me to put a hole through your chest? Because I will. Gladly!” he shouts.

  “What the fuck is your problem? You pissed off that Libby doesn’t want you? I told her you had a thing for her, but she couldn’t see it because she doesn’t even see you, man.”

  “She didn’t come home last night, so what the fuck did you do to her?” Carter asks. “If you hurt her…”

  “Why would I hurt her?” I snap at him. “Not that it’s any of your business, but I just came to get her shit.”

  “What the hell does that mean?”

  “It means she’s moving out,” I explain to the poor fool. “So, put the gun down before I take it from you and shove it down your throat!”

  “You’re under arrest,” he says. “I’m a fucking federal agent, and even if we don’t have shit on you for the robberies, I’m taking you in for kidnapping.”

  Arrest? Federal agent?

  No.

  Fuck no.

  “You’re lying,” I say, unable to believe this wimp in glasses could be a goddamn agent.

  Holding the gun steady with one hand, he moves his jacket back with the other to show me the shiny badge clipped to his belt.

  Son of a motherfucking bitch.

  “Libby…” I start to say as the world begins caving in around me.

  “She doesn’t give a shit about you! She never wanted to fucking touch you, but she was doing her job. It was all fake!”

  “No!” I say because I don’t believe him. Libby cares about me. Last night, with her…there’s no way she was pretending. She loves me.

  Doesn’t she?

  Or was she just playing a role?

  Playing me?

  She did know when and where to fucking find me.

  The federal bastards have been tracking me. They’re on to us, all because I fucking fell for Libby!

  Acting fast to catch him off guard, I raise my right foot and kick the fucker right in the nuts, shoving him to the floor. Following him down, I bend his arm with the gun in it backward while he groans in agony until he finally drops the piece. That’s when I snatch it up and point it right back at his fucking face.

  Libby

  “Hey! There you are!” I say in relief when Hendrix walks into the kitchen an hour or so after I got out of the shower.

  Without a word, he comes over and wraps me in a hug, one that is so tight and constrictive I can barely breathe.

  “Are you ready?” Van asks him while he squeezes me even tighter.

  “I’ve got a car parked a few blocks away. Just give us a few minutes,” Hendrix responds, his tone flat and colder than I’ve ever heard it. “There’s something I need to do first.”

  He picks me up, not unlike last night, throwing me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes, and then we’re moving through the house.

  “Make it quick! Fifteen minutes. That’s all the time we can spare and it’s still cutting it short!” Van yells after us.

  “What are you doing?” I ask from upside down, staring at his perfect ass. “Van’s right. We should get going.”

  “Not yet,” Hendrix mutters.

  There’s darkness and some steps, his heavy footsteps echoing loudly as a slight scent of mildew hits me.

  Finally, Hendrix sets my feet back on the ground and I realize we’re in the basement.

  “What are we doing down here?” I question him yet again.

  “Hold out your wrists,” he orders.

  “Why?”

  “Don’t you trust me?” he asks, and it almost sounds sarcastic, like it’s a trick question.

  “Of course I trust you,” I say, holding my arms out.

  “You do? You trust me?” Hendrix repeats as he wraps something coarse around my left wrist, then my right.

  “Yes,” I tell him honestly. “I’m giving up my entire life to leave with you. If that’s not trust, then I don’t know what is.”

  “Right,” Hendrix mutters. “So trust me now, Libby.”

  “Okay,” I agree.

  “Raise your arms.”

  I do as he instructed and then there’s a tug upward so that I’m standing on my tippy toes. A moment later, I’m hanging above the ground.

  “Hendrix?” I ask, starting to get concerned.

  “Shh,” he says as his strong hands slide up my sides, underneath my shirt to cup my breasts through my bra before lowering to undo my pants. My head falls back when I feel Hendrix’s lips on my stomach, then my pelvis before he jerks my pants and panties down to swipe his tongue over my slit.

  “God, I love this pussy.” He groans. “Need to taste it one more time,” he says before he spreads my legs further apart to lick my center furiously.

  “Yes! Oh my god, yes!” I scream as he laps at my clit. He consumes me until I surrender to him, my legs trembling, the rest of my body going limp, hanging only by a hook or whatever it is holding me up from the ceiling.

  I barely notice as Hendrix removes my shoes to get my pants and panties all the way off, or when he grabs my ass and wraps my legs around his waist. I only start to come back down and squirm when I feel the press of his hard cock at my entrance.

  He slams inside me without warning, making both of us cry out. Then he goes still, deep inside of me, giving me time to adjust to his size.

  “Fuck, I love this pussy. So much that it almost cost me everything,” Hendrix growls as he pulls back and then thrusts inside me even deeper than before.

  His words barely penetrate my need for more of him. When he pulls out, I squirm on the hook and beg for him to return. “Please. Harder.”

  Hendrix squeezes my ass cheeks almost painfully as he starts moving, pounding inside of me, staying just long enough to tease me and make me want more before pulling out again and again.

  “Don’t stop!” I urge him as his rhythm speeds up and the hot, liquid pressure builds up inside of me until I’m right on the edge of exploding into pleasure again.

  When Hendrix’s mouth lowers to suck and bite my nipple, I splinter apart with a shout of his name, my pussy clamping down and trying its best to milk his cock.

  “How was that?” Hendrix eventually asks against my ear while his cock is s
till buried inside of me. “It’s only fair I got to fuck you nice and hard one last time after how hard you fucked me.”

  “Wh-what?” I ask as I try to recover from the amazing orgasms to figure out what he’s talking about. “One last time?” I repeat in concern.

  “I wanted a life with you, Libby,” Hendrix whispers against my ear. “We could’ve spent the rest of our lives together. But you had to go and fuck me over.”

  “Hendrix?”

  His teeth scrape over the shell of my ear before he asks, “Do you think our son or daughter will turn out like you or like me?”

  “What do you mean, our…our son or daughter?” I question as he starts fucking me again, this time, nice and slow. Too slow.

  “After I come inside of you,” he begins to answer, raising his voice with each word. “Do you think our kid will grow up to be a cop like you or a robber like me?”

  “Oh God,” I mutter in understanding.

  He knows. I don’t know how, but he found out!

  And for the first time since meeting him, I’m terrified of what he’s going to do to me.

  “Hendrix,” I start, struggling against the rope that suddenly feels constraining and not just a kinky sex game. “How…”

  “How did I find out you were a fucking cop?” he finishes for me. “I broke into your apartment. Took down your ‘roommate’ and did a little search. It was all there on his laptop. Everywhere I’ve been going, notes from my nights with you. Did you tell Carter you sucked my dick? I didn’t see any mention of that in his notes.”

  “I fell for you,” I tell him as moisture fills my eyes. “I fell…I want to be with you.”

  “Now how the fuck do you expect me to believe that?” he shouts at me. “I honestly had no idea someone would go so far undercover to bring us down. Or should I say, under the covers…”

  “I’m…I’m so sorry. I was…I was gonna tell you,” I explain through the sobs.

  “Sure you were. Too bad I found out first.”

  “Carter?” I ask as tear after tear slips down my cheeks.

  “He’s alive,” he assures me. “I’m a bank robber, not a murderer, unless it’s to save your ass! Were you fucking him too? He was awful protective of you.”

  “No!”

  “Well, the two of you did a helluva job breaking me. Never saw it coming. Bravo on making me chase you,” Hendrix grits out. “Otherwise, I would’ve bent you over and fucked you that first night on a case of beer and never looked at you twice.”

  “Hendrix…”

  “Fucking around with you has been fun, I can admit that. Maybe I’ll even knock you up. That’s your worst fear, right? You know what mine was? You.”

  “Hendrix…” I say again, through the sniffles.

  “Oh fuck. Here it comes, Libby,” he tells me before he shoves his cock deeper inside of me and swivels his hips, making me gasp because it feels good, and it shouldn’t. I shouldn’t want him inside of me, but I don’t want him to stop because when he does, it’s over. He’s going to leave, and I’ll never see him again.

  “Please don’t leave me,” I beg him as he takes a step back. His shaft slides out of me and I feel moisture seeping down my thighs.

  “You’re gonna regret the day you decided to try and bring me and my boys down because we’re always one fucking step ahead of you assholes!” he says as I hear the sound of him zipping up his pants.

  “Your father made a deal, Hendrix!” I exclaim, to stop him from leaving. “They’re letting him out early!”

  “You’re full of shit!” he yells back. “There’s no way my father would ever screw us over! He always warned me a woman would.”

  “I met him…in prison,” I say in a rush through the sniffles. “He told us…about you…and women…and Harper’s.”

  “I don’t believe you. I don’t believe any of the shit that comes out of your mouth!” Hendrix shouts at me.

  “I love you,” I sob, because I can’t think of anything else to stop him from leaving me.

  “Fuck!” Hendrix yells, his voice sounding a little further away.

  “Hendrix, wait!” I call out.

  “Fuck you, Libby,” he growls at me before I hear his footsteps on the stairs. “Have a nice life.”

  Chapter 19

  Hendrix

  “Where’s Libby?” is the first thing Van asks when I return to the kitchen.

  “Is all the money packed in the luggage?” I ask, avoiding his question.

  “Yes.”

  “Good, then let’s go,” I tell him.

  “Libby?” Van says again.

  “She’s staying here.”

  “What? Why? What’s going on?” Van asks.

  “Holy fuck,” Sawyer mutters. “You found shit on her, didn’t you? I fucking knew it!”

  “We need to go!” I yell at them.

  “Goddamn it,” Van grumbles. “Sawyer is right. How bad is it? She a cop?”

  “Yes,” I answer through gritted teeth.

  “If she stays here, she could rat us out!” Sawyer says.

  “We’ll be gone before that happens.”

  “How can you be so sure?” Van asks.

  “Because I restrained her, down in the basement. She’s not going anywhere.”

  Swiping a hand over his face, Van mutters, “Jesus.”

  “I knew we couldn’t trust her, you stupid son of a bitch!” Sawyer exclaims. “You were so damn blind even when we tried to tell you!”

  “Look, I took care of it, okay?” I tell him. “Now let’s get the fuck out of here. We’ve got bigger shit to worry about anyway. My Pop rolled on us.”

  “No way,” Van says. “He wouldn’t.”

  “Libby told me that he made a deal and that she met with him at the prison. And I believe her because the last time I saw him, he knew I had met someone and let it slip that she was blonde. She said he’s getting out early…”

  “Could’ve been a lucky guess about being blonde,” Van argues. “And your Pop doesn’t even know any details of our heists. How could he get time off for anything to do with us?”

  “Yeah, he doesn’t know shit about the jobs, but he knows us. He knows me, and he coached her on how to fucking manipulate me!” I say in outrage, still angry as fuck because all this time I thought Libby cared about me while it was nothing but her getting close for her undercover operation. I feel like such a fucking idiot for not seeing it, especially after all this time. My Pop warned me not to trust women. Or anyone else, not even him.

  “Come on,” I tell them, stomping over to the back door and grabbing one of the waiting suitcases. “We need to see if the pilot is ready and get the fuck off of American soil.”

  “If we go down,” Sawyer starts, “I’ll never fucking forgive you.”

  “We’re not going down,” I tell him. “Now grab a suitcase and move your ass!”

  The truth is, I don’t have a fucking clue if the plan we’ve been working on for ten years is gonna work or if we’re all going to end up behind bars before the end of the day. All we can do is try to get as far away as possible. Even if that means leaving everything and everyone else behind.

  Chapter 20

  Libby

  Oh god. Everything is all screwed up and it’s my fault.

  I should’ve just told Hendrix the truth. And I did try last night, after we made love, but the words never came. I knew he would be upset and angry at me so I kept my mouth shut, hoping everything would work itself out once we got on the plane.

  Now I’m so fucked, with Hendrix and my career.

  And Carter is probably so pissed because I failed. I just hope Hendrix didn’t hurt him too badly.

  He’s never gonna forgive me. Neither of them, but especially Hendrix.

  After a few minutes of hanging in the dark basement limply, trying to pull my wrists free and failing, I give up. I know I should keep trying, but I can’t.

  All I can think about is how much I’ve hurt Hendrix. He was crushed. Sure, he was
angry at me, which is understandable given the circumstances. But then I had to go and shove the final dagger into his heart, telling him about his father. That was the fatal blow that pushed him away.

  That, or me telling him I love him at the most inopportune time. It’s the truth. I do love Hendrix and I have for a while now, probably ever since he killed Lester to save me.

  I’ll tell him that when he comes back. I’ll tell him everything.

  If he comes back.

  Seconds, minutes, and hours pass, yet there are no sounds in the house, other than my crying. My arms go numb, and at some point, I even close my eyes to try and drift off to sleep, hoping I can at least dream things didn’t get all fucked up.

  Eventually, there’s a pounding on what I assume is the front door upstairs, then glass breaking.

  “Libby?”

  Oh, thank god! It’s Carter! I don’t know how the hell he got this address, but I’m so damn glad he did.

  “Carter!” I yell back through the sniffles. “Carter! I’m down here!” I shout louder, even though my throat is sore from sobbing for so long.

  Finally, I hear footsteps on the stairs and then a light shines over my face, blinding me.

  “Libby?” he asks. “Oh my god. Libby!”

  “Help…help me down,” I say to him. More tears fall as he gets my wrists off the hook and lowers me to the ground. “Jesus, Libby.”

  Carter wraps his jacket around me and then holds me as I cry on him.

  “Libby, I need to let you go and find my phone. We have to call this in.”

  “How? How did you know wh-where to find me?” I ask through the hiccups.

  “Hendrix,” he grits out.

  “W-what?”

  “He beat the shit out of me, knocked me out cold. When I woke up, there was a piece of paper beside me with this address. Since you didn’t come home and he wouldn’t tell me where you were, I thought you could be here and in danger. We…we need to get you to the hospital.”

  “No.”

  “Libby…”