Love in New York (American Boyfriend Book 5) Read online

  Well, if she was going to play me, it wouldn’t come easy. Getting a man mixed up with Wolf Staten was no small feat.

  “Last time we met, I promised you we’d fuck like rabbits,” I said. “Now, here you are.”

  She looked hurt. She didn’t like when I spoke like that. She put her drink down and walked straight back to the door she’d entered through. Her hand was on the knob. If I didn’t say something fast, she’d walk right out.

  “Wait,” I said. “Don’t go. I shouldn’t have said that.”

  “That’s twice you’ve said that to me, like I’m nothing more than a fifty-dollar slut looking to get fucked.”

  “You’re right. I was out of line. You had every right to slap me last time.”

  She looked relieved. I was cutting her some slack, which was what she needed. She came back to her seat.

  “Last time we met, you were a massive dick,” she said.

  “I know,” I said. “I can’t help it. I was born with it.”

  She shook her head. God, I could have died looking into those eyes. She was like an angel from heaven.

  “You just can’t stop yourself, can you?”

  I shook my head.

  She sighed. Then she said, mostly to herself, “size isn’t everything.”

  I laughed. I couldn’t believe it. “Was that a joke? Was that a joke from the girl who smacked the shit out of me last time we met?”

  She blushed. God, she looked pretty when she blushed..

  “You were asking for it.”

  “Yes, I was,” I said. “And you didn’t have any trouble dishing it out.”

  She shrugged. “I can give you more if you want.”

  “Please don’t. This face is all I’ve got going for me.”

  She looked me over, taking in my leathers, my wet hair.

  “I’m sure it’s not the only thing.”

  I laughed again. She was working it. Don’t think for a second I didn’t know exactly what was going on. The thing was, I wanted to get played by her.

  “What’s your name?” I said.

  “You first,” she said.

  I shook my head. The poor thing. She had no idea what she was getting into. She was like a lamb to the slaughter. She’d just escaped Wolf. Little did she realize, she was tangling herself with a monster ten times worse.

  Believe me when I tell you, whatever she was running from, whatever Wolf tried to force her to do, I would make it look like child’s play. The things I wanted to do to her, she’d cry out for mercy, she’d scream my name, and the more she begged, the harder I’d come.

  If it was Wolf’s bedroom antics she was fleeing, she was in for a rude awakening. I was a piston-fired, turbo-charged, orgasm machine. I out-fucked a herd of stallions. I out-pumped a locomotive. If she came to me hoping for mercy, she wouldn’t find any.

  She thought she was playing me? Please.

  She had something I wanted, and I was going to have it.

  I put my drink down.

  “My name’s Jackson,” I said. “Jackson Jones.”

  “Jackson Jones?”

  “Jackson-motherfucking-Jones,” I repeated, grinning.

  She smiled, and I swear there was a hint of seduction in those lips.

  “I’ve got a question for you, Jackson-motherfucking-Jones.”

  She could ask anything she liked. All I could think of was bending her over the counter and sliding my bare cock inside her, filling her with my hot semen.

  I wanted to fill her so full of my come it would drip down her legs for weeks. I wanted skin to skin, full contact, wet orgasm. I wanted to put a baby inside her. And in exchange for my help, she was going to let me.

  “What is it?” I said.

  She hesitated. She was scared. I could tell she’d been crying. I felt a pang of pity for her, but the desire flooding my veins was stronger.

  “Last time, you said you didn’t give a fuck about Wolf Staten.”

  “I remember.”

  “Well, my question is, did you mean that?”

  I let out a little laugh. My words were coming back to haunt me. I’d played it cocky and now she was calling me on it.

  “That depends,” I said.

  “On what?”

  “On what’s in it for me.”

  She looked deeply into my eyes as if trying to read my soul. She was on the verge of tears. She needed my help or she was dead. We both knew it. It had taken a lot for her to ask my help, she was a proud woman and I respected her for that.

  But I wouldn’t help her for free. That’s not the way it worked. I needed something from her, and I needed her to offer it.

  “Well then,” she said, “I guess I have one more question for you.”

  “Ask what you want. Believe me, I’ve got nothing to hide.”

  She looked into my eyes. “Are you a good man, Jackson Jones?”

  It wasn’t a game. It was a serious question and she meant it. Her life depended on it. I looked around the bar. The bartender was cleaning glasses. The other patrons had scarcely noticed her.

  “No one’s ever accused me of being a good man.”

  “But you know the answer,” she insisted. “Deep down, you know. If you were to die today, what would people say? Would they say you were good?”

  I looked into those deep, sapphire eyes. They were hypnotizing. She had a strange power over me, a force of attraction that was otherworldly. Maybe it was because death was on my mind, mortality. I don’t know, but something about her felt surreal, like she’d been sent from another world.

  As my eyes drank her in, a burning rage coursed through me like molten metal. I wanted to own her, to dominate her, to make her mine. My property.

  I wanted to plunge my cock so deep inside her she’d never even think of another man again. I wanted her to remember my name to her dying day. I wanted to ruin her for all others. It shocked me how violent my passion for her was. I’d never felt that for anyone.

  The simplicity of her question made me answer honestly.

  “All I can tell you,” I said, “is that for all the bad I’ve done, I never meant any harm.”

  It wasn’t like me to say that. She’d disarmed me. I never gave anyone a glimpse of my true self. It was yet another surprise.

  She nodded, as if it was the answer she’d been seeking. She smiled, and it broke my heart to see that smile. She had the face of an angel, and I was going to ruin her.

  I wanted to know what had happened to her. The details. What had Wolf and Los Lobos done that she’d finally made a run for it? I’d kill them, all twelve of them, or die trying. She didn’t know it yet, but I’d already made up my mind.

  And then she said it, those four words I’d been waiting my entire life to hear. I didn’t even know it until I heard them.

  “Will you help me?”

  I’ll tell you right now, there are moments in my life I always knew would come. Even as a boy, I knew my destiny would lead to this, a fork in the road, where the decision I made would decide the man I was to be. Everything else in my life would fade in comparison to the importance of this question.

  If I said yes, it would mean the end of me. Instinctively, I checked the gun at my hip. Los Lobos, The Wolves. Every one of them would hunt me down until I was dead.

  It would only end in one way.

  And I didn’t care. I’d give her what she needed. I had to. But she’d give me what I needed too. A life for a life.

  “I’ll warn you right now,” I said, “any help from me won’t come free. Bad things will happen if I get involved. You’ll regret it. I swear to you.”

  “Will you hurt me?” she said.

  I wanted to tell her something different. I wanted to tell her I was the man she deserved, someone who would save her and ask nothing in return. I wanted to say I’d take her away to a life of happiness and safety. I wanted to tell her she’d have everything she deserved. But I couldn’t. I was a lot of things, but I was no liar.

  “I’ll destr
oy you,” I said. “I’ll take the one thing you’ve got to give, and I’ll drink it up like a desert drinks the rain. I’ll ravage you until you beg me to stop. And then, just when you think you can’t take anymore, I’ll ravage you again.”

  I’d given her fair warning. If she still wanted my help, it was on her now. I’d told her I’d take everything she had. But I hadn’t told her the one thing I wanted most. I hadn’t told her she’d give me a son.

  She looked at me. She looked around the bar. She turned and looked back at the door, weighing the alternative. Then she answered.

  “I don’t have a choice,” she said. “You can take what you want. You can use me to the last drop. Just help me.”

  “All right,” I said. “But when the dust settles, remember it was you who came to me.”

  “I’ll remember.”

  “And I warned you.”

  “I won’t forget.”

  “You asked if I’m a good man. The truth is, I’m not.”

  Chapter 4

  Faith

  What I’m about to tell you, it isn’t pretty.

  Can I adequately explain it? No.

  Can I put it in a way that will make me come across as anything other than a complete whore? I doubt it.

  But the truth is more important than perceptions, and the truth is what happened to me, the decisions that led to that fateful night, and the consequences I’ll have to live with for the rest of my life.

  So, the truth.

  The truth is, I’d been standing in that motel parking lot for over an hour when Jackson pulled in. All I knew was that I was still in Nevada, and that wasn’t far enough.

  It was raining and I was soaked to the skin. I was shivering. I had nowhere to go, no one to turn to. I took shelter under a big tree and I waited.

  I’d know him when I saw him—that’s what I told myself. I just had to wait. God would help me. He had to.

  And all I had to do was throw away everything I’d ever hoped for, sacrifice myself on the altar of fate, and pray I didn’t get into something even worse than the life I was trying to escape.

  It sounds crazy, and maybe it was, but until you’re in that situation, you can’t understand the fear that led me to that parking lot.

  Wolf Staten was a powerful man. A ruthless man. He made the rules, and my job was to obey. Earlier that night, he’d told me he was going to lock me up in a secret apartment of his villa. No one but him would ever look at me again. He said it was because he loved me so much, because I was so precious to him.

  And a part of me wanted to believe him. As a girl I’d always dreamed of being someone’s princess, of being so desired by a man that he couldn’t bear the thought of other men looking at me.

  But my life with Wolf wasn’t that. The way he treated me was not the way a prince treated a princess. The longer I stayed, the worse it got. The jealousy and possessiveness eclipsed all else. The violence finally knocked reality into me.

  There was no room for love in that place. Even locked inside a prison, he’d find reasons to punish me, to brutalize me. And if I ever had his child, that baby’s life would be a living hell.

  That’s what gave me the courage to take my life into my own hands. Scarcely two hours earlier, I slipped out of the party he threw in my honor. It was supposed to be my farewell to the world, the last time anyone but him would ever see me.

  Fuck. That.

  Fuck all of them.

  Everyone at that party, all twelve members of Los Lobos, all our so-called friends, knew. And none of them even batted an eye. None of them raised a finger. In fact, they approved of it. Such was life with Los Lobos.

  I’d heard rumors of the men locking away their families, treating their women like prisoners and slaves. I’d refused to believe it. Now I knew it was true. Wolf wanted me to live the rest of my life in a windowless bunker.

  Like I already said. Fuck. That.

  When I fled the mountaintop villa, I had no idea where I was going. I ran through the forest like a deer hunted by dogs. I fell on the rocks. I slid down the gullies. And when I reached the highway, I didn’t care who picked me up. I didn’t care what direction they were headed. I didn’t ask. I just climbed in and sat silently. I would go anywhere, with anyone. Nothing could be as bad as the life planned for me.

  Los Lobos was not a nice gang to be mixed up with. They earn their livelihood off the pain and suffering of others. They were the worst kind of criminals. And the fact I was dating their leader was no one’s fault but my own. It was my own deeds, my own mistakes, that got me into that place. And it would be my own decisions that would get me out. That’s why I decided to do anything that needed to be done to escape. Anything.

  Slipping into the clutches of Los Lobos had been so simple. And once I was in, there was no way back out. I’d seen the warning signs. I’d realized my mistake long before. Wolf cheated on me, beat me, routinely degraded and humiliated me in front of his gang members. He robbed me of all power, silenced my voice, and when he found out I wanted to leave, he built a concrete compound to keep me prisoner.

  Until that night. The night I broke free. I couldn’t change the past, but I could change the future.

  Within hours of making my decision, I was outside the motel. I didn’t have a penny to my name, no clothes, no belongings, no plan. It was only a matter of time before Wolf’s henchmen found me and forced me back to the hell of their world. I could feel my chance at freedom slipping away with every second that passed.

  In desperation, I decided to do the only thing I could do. I threw myself at the mercy of fate. I opened myself, made myself vulnerable, and let God decide the outcome.

  I asked for the help of a stranger.

  All I needed was one good man. One man who was willing to stand up for me. He didn’t have to fight Wolf. He just had to help me escape, give me a ride to the city, or better yet, the border. I’d give him everything he asked in return. There had to be a man willing to do that. And if there wasn’t, so be it. Let me die. At least I’d die fighting.

  A number of men walked in and out of the bar. Truckers, pulling in from the highway after a long haul, or workers, looking for a beer after a long shift. Others looked like drifters, gamblers, criminals, or nothing at all.

  They were all men, and I didn’t know what to make of them. Which of them would help me? How would I choose?

  I thought I’d know when I saw him, but I was beginning to have doubts. What if there was no one?

  I had only one thing to offer. There’s only one thing men want from a woman in my position. But what if they didn’t want me? What if they rejected me?

  Maybe that would be for the best. Giving up my body went against everything I believed, everything I held sacred. The only thing that made me even consider it, was the thought of a life of slavery at the hands of Wolf Staten. If the price of freedom was my body, I would pay.

  And then he arrived. He rolled into the lot on a motorcycle as if chased by the devil himself. I only got a brief glimpse, but I saw enough to know he was the man I was looking for. Muscular build, tattoos on his arms and chest, a shadow of stubble. He was fiercely handsome, but that wasn’t even one of my criteria. I couldn’t afford to be picky. That was a luxury I didn’t have. What I was looking for was a real man. A man who would do what needed to be done, whatever that was.

  The way this guy walked, the confidence in his stride, the determination on his face, told me I’d found my man.

  And there was something else. I’d seen him before. I remembered it instantly. He’d taunted me, challenged me, and told me he didn’t give a shit about Wolf Staten.

  Now, all I had to do was go through with it.

  I had to ruin myself, offer up my body, throw away my beliefs, risk my life.

  No problem, right?

  Chapter 5

  Jackson

  What chance did I have?

  My cock raged for her pussy. She was an image from my own secret fantasies. I wanted to pinch myself j
ust to check I wasn’t dreaming. I couldn’t have designed a better creature for my seduction.

  Her blue eyes seemed to drink me in. I ached for her. This beautiful, delicate creature was going to be mine. She was straight up offering herself.

  A gift.

  I was going to possess her, body and soul, and fill the emptiness of my life with something beautiful—something terrible, and tragic, and heavenly.

  She needed help—real help. The kind of help that could get a man killed. She needed me.

  But there was something else.

  I needed her. I needed her like my life depended on it.

  Little did she know, but I was going to take more from her than she ever dreamed. She said she’d give me everything. If only she knew what I had in mind. Whatever price she thought she was paying, she was wrong. She wouldn’t just be mine for the night, she would be mine forever, in ways she couldn’t imagine.

  “So you’ve run out on Wolf?” I said.

  She nodded.

  “It’s not going to be easy to get away from him.”

  “I know.”

  “The rest of Los Lobos will join the hunt.”

  “What choice do I have?” she said, her emotion rising to the surface.

  “Relax. You did the right thing. You can’t live your life under the thumb of a man like that.”

  “I just couldn’t take it anymore,” she said, tears filling her eyes.

  “It’s all right,” I said. “Do you have a plan?”

  “I was going to run for the border. I’ll figure something once I’m across.”

  “You don’t know where you’ll go?”

  “I don’t have anywhere.”

  “Do you have any money?”

  She shook her head.

  “That’s a terrible plan,” I said. “You won’t get far at all. He’ll find you.”

  “That’s not your problem. Just drive me to the border and forget all about me. You’ll have everything you want from me by then.”