rth ring, and Miles gave him a quick rundown and location. “Then my timing’s good,” he finished when the cop said he wasn’t far. “See you in a few.” Snapping the phone shut, he released his hold and stepped back from Mateo, hoping he’d be dumb enough to try and run. He was, and Miles took great pleasure in tripping him to the dirty asphalt and pinning him face down with a foot planted on his back.
“Tsk, such language,” he admonished with a shake of his head.
“It’s his word against mine! You can’t hold me on that,” Mateo shouted as soon as Jake got out of his SUV.
Jake sauntered over to the back door, ignoring the kid’s frantic outburst while checking it out before turning back to Miles with a raised brow. Pulling out cuffs, he glanced at Mateo with casual indifference. “I can haul your ass in and keep you for twenty-four hours while checking out Cavenaugh’s side of the story.” He ran a hand through his brown hair, a gesture Miles recognized as one of frustration before Jake addressed him. “You must’ve stopped them before any damage was done.”
Frustration and anger rippled under Miles’ skin. He didn’t want to waste Jake’s time, but didn’t want Mateo walking away either. “He assaulted a volunteer at the shelter and came at me with that.” He pointed to the crowbar and knife. “His buddy wielded the knife.”
“No, I didn’t, you fuckin’ liar!”
“You’ve had a busy night away from the gym. Did you witness the other assault?” Jake asked as he hauled Mateo’s hands behind him and snapped on the cuffs.
Fisting his hands on his hips, Miles shook his head in regret. “I only saw his back, not enough to give a positive I.D.” Getting in Mateo’s face, he gave the kid one last warning in a voice gone deadly soft. “You won’t walk away a third time. Remember that and forget about your brother. He’s better off where he is than with a fuck-up like you.” He turned to Jake. “I say we ruin his evening by hauling him in anyway, but it’s up to you.”
“What the hell, I was just going to head home and relax. Let’s at least get your statement in writing to add to the record I’m sure he already has. Come on, punk, let’s go for a ride.”
It would be little recompense for Martha, but at least it was something, Miles thought as he followed. He’d just make sure he kept a closer eye on the shelter, and Hope, from now on.
Chapter 8
“Be careful getting off,” Miles warned Hope as she slid off his motorcycle with the vibrations from the powerful motor still pulsing between her legs.
It wasn’t the risk of burning her leg on the exhaust that worried her, but his reaction to her newly denuded state. If there was one thing she’d learned about Miles since this started, it was his determination to stay in control. How many times had she heard Sandie and Krista say the guys didn’t like it when they took it upon themselves to act without permission? Of course, her friends seemed to enjoy Zach’s and Dax’s retaliations, and Hope’s response this morning to the light graze of her own fingers over the bare skin of her labia had her tied up in knots anticipating Miles’ searing touch.
She’d spent the remainder of yesterday afternoon and last night cursing her so-called friends for the painful removal of her pubic hair by wax, never imagining their spa treatment would entail such discomfort. The aloe vera cream the technician gave her to take home and apply helped a lot, but relief from the throbbing burn hadn’t come until early this morning, giving her just a few hours to get used to the constant stimulating sensation of her exposed flesh rubbing against her silk panties. Hope had never imagined how much removing that barrier would enhance the sense of touch, or how sensitive that hidden skin was.
The late afternoon sun had already lowered to an amber glow on the western horizon, but the balmy temperature remained in the low eighties and hinted at a perfect evening for a cruise. That meant the shivers tightening her muscles as Miles led her down the wood-planked pier were from a combination of nerves and excitement. Since he’d been silent about the plans for this evening, other than to let her know Jackson, Julie and maybe the Carlson brothers would be joining them, that accounted for the nerves. Her excitement stemmed from the hope he would finally take this journey into his alternative sexual lifestyle another step further and give her the part of himself he’d been holding back. Given the heightened pleasure she’d already attained under his tutelage, Hope ought to be content and ready to end this. Maybe after tonight, after she’d gotten a glimpse of this BDSM decked-out yacht and had something she could share on girls’ night equal to the scenes she’d been listening to for weeks, her urges would be appeased, and life could go back to normal.
“You’re quiet this evening,” Miles commented, guiding her around scattered glass fragments from a broken bottle.
Hope tossed him a teasing grin. “You’re always quiet.”
He shrugged, but a rare hint of humor tugged at his lips. “I talk when I have something to say.” Pointing toward the largest boat still moored in a slot, he said with pride, “That’s ours.”
“Wow.” The girls’ descriptions didn’t do the three-tiered mega yacht justice. Miles helped her onto the shiny teak decking and she leaned into him to brace against the slow rocking of the large vessel. “I’m not much for the water,” she explained when he cocked his head in question.
“Let’s see if we can change that.” He waved to Jackson, whom Hope had just noticed sitting behind a glass windshield. She assumed he sat at the helm from the two plush seats in front of a dash of foreign-looking controls and steering column.
“I didn’t know he was our captain for this evening.”
“None of my friends were strangers to manning a boat, so it was a simple matter of acclimating ourselves to the size.” Miles halted at the open door to the helm and nodded at Jackson. “What’d you hear from Troy and Trevor?”
“Just Trevor can make it, but his guest backed out at the last minute.” Both men’s eyes shifted to Hope, but she couldn’t decipher what their look meant until Jackson said, with a twinkle in his eyes that belied his put-upon sigh, “I guess that means I have to suffer through watching how much Julie enjoys an extra pair of hands.”
A warm flush stole over Hope’s face as his meaning sank in and she wondered if Miles expected her to also welcome another person to join them in a scene. When she cast a swift look up at him, the only confirmation he offered was a simple statement and small shrug of those wide shoulders. “It’ll be up to you.”
“There he is now.” Jackson nodded toward the pier when he spotted Trevor headed their way then smiled at Hope. “Julie’s down in the galley, if you want to join her while I get us underway.”
“Fixing something to eat, I hope.”
Hope gave Miles a surprised look, his comment taking her mind off the mention of including Trevor. “You just downed a double cheeseburger on the way here.”
“And your point would be?”
“Where do you put it all?” She may not have had the privilege of seeing him naked yet, but she’d felt every inch of that body pressed against hers and knew there wasn’t an ounce of extra weight on him.
“I have a good metabolism.” He nodded toward the open staircase that led to the lowest deck situated just beyond the large, center enclosed space behind the helm. “Down those stairs and to the left.”
“Thanks.”
Trevor leaped aboard the yacht as Hope turned away on legs still rubbery from the choice Miles had given her about including the other man. At an inch or two over six foot, with wavy, light brown hair that matched the short whiskers giving his face a scruffy, sexy appearance, Trevor was the easy-going one of the group and had always been friendly toward her. Since Miles had yet to fuck her, the offer of including another man in whatever scene he had planned for tonight didn’t immediately appeal to Hope, regardless of his attractiveness. But, as she took the few stairs down to the lower level, she wondered if that might not be the best way to keep her focused on an end goal for this relationship, to prevent her from drawing out their agreement for
longer than would be wise if she wanted to keep both Miles and her friends from discovering she had killed her fiancé.
The bullet wound to her side sealing her exoneration in Craig’s death, was the main factor that changed the initial involuntary manslaughter charge the police wanted, after learning where she’d been just prior to returning home to an enraged fiancé, to self-defense. But her pain and suffering from Craig’s surprise attack the minute she stepped through the door hadn’t excused her actions with her parents, or later, her friends. Over the grueling weeks of questions and mortifying accusations from all sides, it had become crystal clear for the first time in Hope’s life how much stock her parents put into appearances, not to mention their plans she make a ‘good match’ when she married. Love, she’d been told when she tried explaining she’d been having second thoughts about Craig because of her lack of feelings, had nothing to do with it. And nothing, in their eyes, excused the shame she’d brought on them by getting caught going to ‘such a place’ or by having the poor manners to kill her well-known, influential fiancé during her struggle to escape his assault. We’ll never be able to hold our heads up in society after this, her mother had bemoaned for weeks afterward. Both her parents, followed by her friends, showed more concern about how her actions reflected on them, and what people in their circles would think, than about the trauma and injury she’d suffered.
Hope’s biggest fear was getting the same reaction from the new people in her life, of having to deal with probing questions that might affect her job if her actions in Atlanta became known. Was she being unfair to judge her friends because of what others had done? Given their traumas they’d had to cope with, the answer would probably be yes. That was something she would have to give more consideration to if her feelings and lust couldn’t be appeased with this short affair, something else to put on the back burner to deal with later, just not today.
“There you are.” Julie smiled at Hope as she entered the galley kitchen. “I’ve just put a casserole in the oven, but it’s still frozen so it’ll be a while. Two elderly sisters, who are regular clients of Jackson’s, like to pay him with food, and I’ve yet to taste anything that wasn’t delicious.” Leaning against the counter, Julie crossed her arms and eyed Hope with a gleam in her striking purple eyes. “So, things are going good with you and Miles?”