Michael scoffed. "Why would I want to protect her? What has she done to benefit us? Nothing. I just don't think you need to kill her."

"Are ya getting' soft on us, boss?"

"She's still here somewhere." One of them motioned to the window where I had been sitting. I cursed and tried to slip into my car without being noticed, but it was too late. They had seen me. "Get her!"

I dove into the car, seeing the flash of metal as a gun was pulled out from a jacket. The driver's door was yanked from my grasp and I was pulled out on to the asphalt, hitting my head. The next few events pa.s.sed in a dizzy haze, but a gunshot was fired, one of the thugs. .h.i.t the ground next to me, and I was picked up.

When I next realized what was going on, I was on the back of a motorcycle. "What? Who? Where?" I muttered, clinging to whoever was sitting in front of me. I recognized his smell and could feel the ripple of muscle beneath leather and flannel. "Lawrence?" I muttered.

He didn't respond and I realized he probably couldn't hear me over the roar of the engine. I had no idea where he was taking me, but it wasn't like I could escape now. I would just have to wait until we stopped.

The ride was a confusing mix of emotions. First and foremost, I was terrified. Not just a little apprehension about the situation, but complete utter terror. I was on the back of a motorcycle with a strange man who I had never met until now and who was I had been researching and trying to imprison for three years.

The more I thought about this situation, the worse it seemed. But if I drifted away from those thoughts, I found myself focused on my arms around his waist and my hands clasped over his abs, feeling them expand with his breaths.

The vibrating hum of the bike was soothing and I could almost see why people rode these things. My hair whipped behind, strands pulling loose from the braid. I reached up with one hand and pulled the hair tie out and wrapped it around my wrist. I then pressed my face into his back, letting the wind, the feel of the bike, the feel of him, take me away.

Then I remembered who it was and fear overtook me again-but almost a pleasant fear, the fear of the unknown and the exciting.

We arrived at an apartment building on the other side of town. It wasn't anything particularly exciting or fancy. Just a normal building with normal apartments. A normal parking garage, a normal keypad entry, a normal everything, actually. I followed the elusive biker into his building and up to his apartment without question or comment, hoping everything would make sense in the near future.

He unlocked the door to apartment 30C and held the door open for me to enter first. I took a few hesitant steps in, pulling my wind-whipped bird's nest of hair into a ponytail. He turned on the light to reveal a nice, but spa.r.s.ely-furnished apartment. I was standing in a combined living/dining room.

I could see a kitchen in one corner and, through a door to my right, I a.s.sumed I would find a bedroom and bathroom. He hurried into the kitchen. "Make yourself comfortable. Can I get you anything to drink? Tea, water, beer, lemonade?"

"No, thanks," I murmured. This whole situation felt completely surreal. Who actually gets whisked away by a wildly attractive man she hates on his motorcycle and taken to his apartment where he offers you a drink? No threatening, no raping, no murdering, no mugging. Did this man understand how things were supposed to work in this situation? I decided there was only one way to find out for sure. I came around the couch and into the kitchen. "What do you want with me?"

"I told you already. I want to keep you safe. I want to make sure the thugs who work for me don't kill you."

"If you are so considered with my safety, why do those thugs even work for you?" I demanded.

He sighed. "Because I don't really have a choice. Would you rather have a large group of organized criminals, or a large group of unorganized, self-serving criminals? I have managed to convince them that they are best served staying in the group than going outside it so I can keep this crime to a minimum."

"A minimum?" I scoffed. "Even one death is too many."

"And I agree."

"Even one crime is too many. No one should feel like they are in danger of anything in this city. Why can't you set your men to doing things actually beneficial for the rest of the community instead of pillaging like highwaymen of time gone by?"

"Because they need to feed their families and honest work doesn't make them any money. These are men who couldn't afford to get a college degree and do not have the history or knowledge to get a job that will support them, let alone their wives and children. At least this way, they can afford to care for themselves."

"And I'm sure you take the biggest slice of the pie."

He raised one eyebrow at me and gestured around his apartment. "And what, exactly, am I doing with all my criminally-gained wealth?"

I glared at him, not sure what else to do when I knew I had been beaten. He gave me a gla.s.s of ice water and sat down in the armchair. I took a seat on the couch and sipped at the water, continuing to glare at him over the edge of the gla.s.s. He rolled his eyes. "You do not need to be so afraid of me. I don't think I've done anything to harm you, and in fact I shot a man in your defense, which, to be clear, is not something I'm in the habit of doing."

"Why should I trust you? I've done all this research on you and I know what and who you are. I have no reason to trust you at all." Before he could answer, my phone rang.

"h.e.l.lo?"

"h.e.l.lo, I'm with emergency services. Miss Pruitt?"

"Yes?"

"You live at 517 Harrocourt Lane?"

"Yes, why? Who is this?"

"Are you safe right now?"

"Yes, why? What is going on?"

"A neighbor reported smoke and flames at your house and we wanted to make sure you are okay."

"What? What is going on?"

"I don't know much more besides that. I know the firefighters were able to put out the flames before the whole house was destroyed, but a lot of it was. I'm sorry for your loss. Is there anyone else living in the house?"

"No, just me. I live alone."

"Very good then. Do you need transportation to your house?"

"No, I'm good. Thank you." I hung up the phone and stared at Michael Lawrence.

"Your house?"

I nodded once, shoulders drooping. Two huge realizations crashing down on me: I had gotten myself in way over my head, and Lawrence had saved my life.

The next week pa.s.sed in a blurry haze of talking to insurance people, trying to salvage things from my house, and buying what essentials I needed. Fortunately my bedroom had escaped the fire mostly unscathed, so I was able to get my laptop and some clothes that didn't smell entirely of smoke. The charred remains of my life-my happy years, my childhood, Dad-lay scattered through the yard and house. I found the flag I received at my father's funeral, mostly burned through.

I clutched it to my chest and looked up at Michael Lawrence, who had been around for this whole process, shirking his responsibilities as the king of a motorcycle gang. In the s.p.a.ce of two days I came to depend on him-somehow. I told myself it was because he was indirectly responsible for this whole mess and therefore he needed to shoulder the backlash. Or that he was there when I heard the news, so he was in some way tied to this whole mess. But in my quiet, rational moments, I knew it was because I didn't want him to leave me.

To make matters even worse, I had been staying at his apartment. He didn't really give me the option of where to stay, and I didn't question the situation. He was completely honorable and respectable. He made up the couch to be slept on, but let me use his bed. As soon as I shut the bedroom door he didn't open it until I did so myself in the morning.

If my father could see me now.

I felt nothing but shame for the situation until I looked into his eyes and I couldn't think of anything that could be more right. Sometimes I felt like I was this desperate high school student all over again, hung up on some guy without him even noticing me. Then I could catch him looking at me, hurriedly turning away when I saw him.

I even had the completely unholy thought one night that I was happy my house burned down so that I could spend time with him. Somehow my world spun on a dime and instead of being obsessed with the villainous Michael Lawrence, I was obsessed with the romantic, heroic Michael Lawrence. He was... charming, to put it mildly.

He somehow knew what I needed during this time. He gave me all the s.p.a.ce and closeness and support I could need as I tried to readjust my thinking and figure out where to live, how to live, what my life meant anymore.

I realized that everything I thought I knew about my life and how it would play out was completely wrong. I was so far from right that I was falling for the guy I believed, up until then, had killed my father.

The more I got to know Michael, the more I realized he couldn't hurt a fly. h.e.l.l, I had seen him capture a fly in the house with a plastic cup and release it outside. He had a tank of fish he cared for like a mother with her newborn. He complained that his apartment wouldn't let him have anything except house plants and fish because he really wanted to rescue a puppy. And his greatest desire in life was to have a little girl he could dote on. This whole "tough guy biker boss" was just a front. I asked him about this persona once as we drank wine from the bottle and watched c.r.a.ppy sitcoms from our teenage years.

"Because of an accident more than anything. When I was seventeen I started working on my bike. I had somehow managed to convince my mother I could have a bike if I bought one cheap and fixed it up.

"It is the same bike I still have. I invested basically everything I saved into that hunk of metal. It was beautiful-still is beautiful-and when I rode it, other people took notice. Specifically the CCA.

"Soon I was approached by them. They were an unruly mess of men who didn't seem to have any motive or idea of what they were doing with their lives or why they even existed. They were basically Vikings, or maybe pirates, and it disgusted me.

"I tried to reform them, shape them up a little, but because I was the newbie that didn't go over so well. But being nineteen, I had a ma.s.sive temper and I lost it one day and knocked their leader out with one punch. Since then, I've been the boss." He sighed. "But because of that incident they think I'm some brute and if I don't keep up that persona they will go on a rampage again."

I wasn't really surprised by this. After all, I had been living with him for the better part of two weeks now and not only was he supremely gentle, respectable, and honorable, but he was also one of the most bookish guys I had ever met.

He was working on his second bachelor's degree online just because he could. I hadn't seen anyone go through as many books in two weeks as this guy did. I didn't even know it was possible to read that fast. No wonder he talked with the elegance and eloquence of a 19th century orator. Guy practically spoke like Shakespeare wrote sometimes. How could I have been so wrong about him? And how could this feel so right so immediately? Whatever "this" was.

I looked at him out of the corner of my eye. "So... What happened to my father?" I asked as calmly and carefully as I could.

He stared at his hands. "What I hope doesn't happen to you."

"What do you mean?"

He continued to stare at his hands, the floor, his feet, my feet, basically anywhere that wasn't my eyes. "You probably know that he was investigating my gang, much like you are. Well, the men decided to take matters into their own hands to get him off their back. I told them to leave the man alone, he had a daughter and was a good man, but they didn't listen to me at all." His voice was low and anguished. I want to reach out and comfort him, but I didn't know how, or if I should. "I don't want that to happen to anyone, especially not you."

A red flush crept my face and I stammered an excuse to head to bed and rushed out of the room as awkwardly as humanly possible.

I stumbled out of bed, b.u.t.toning up the oversized flannel shirt I was sleeping in a few nights later. I slipped out of the room in search of a gla.s.s of water, wearing nothing except panties and the flannel shirt.

The floor lamp in the living room was still on. That wasn't unusual-Michael fell asleep all the time still reading. The guy even wore gla.s.ses when he was reading; how far from the stereotype was he? I went over to the turn off the lamp and realized he was still awake. Immediately I pulled the flannel closed around my neck, hurriedly b.u.t.toning it up completely. We shared an awkward moment of avoiding each other's gazes.

"Sorry," he muttered. "I was just sitting here thinking and got lost in thought. You need something?"

"I was, uh, just looking for some water. Got, uh, thirsty."

"Sure let me get that for you."

"No, it's fine," I said moving before he could get up. "You want anything?"

"Some water too, I guess."

I got two gla.s.ses from the counter drain rack and filled them. I glanced down at myself and ran a hand through my hair. Didn't seem like too bad a case of bedhead. I unb.u.t.toned one of the b.u.t.tons, feeling a heat rising through my body. We were adults-full-blooded, consenting adults. Why were we being such children about this?

I brought back the gla.s.ses and handed him one, bending over slightly in his line of vision. He wasn't wearing a shirt and I could see the stark outline of his muscle, flexing and relaxing as he reached for the gla.s.s. I sipped my water, watching him over the edge of the gla.s.s. He pulled his own gla.s.s away from his lips and licked them. Our eyes met for a long moment. I stood up and walked over to him, hips swaying.

"This is wrong," he said weakly as I straddled his lap, knees tucked between his thighs and the arms of the chair.

"Maybe it is," I said, running a hand through his thick black hair. "But I've always had a bad boy fantasy."

He chuckled huskily, his hand going to the b.u.t.tons of my shirt. "I'm not a bad boy."

I swatted his hand away, drawing my fingers down his chest to the waistband of his jeans. "You smell like one."

"What does that even mean?" he asked, but I answered him with a kiss. His mouth tasted like heat and excitement and antic.i.p.ation, his body pressed up against mine-warm, solid, masculine. Suddenly I could feel his hands on my bare thighs, moving up my body, over my shirt, almost completely encircling my waist.

I broke away from the kiss and unb.u.t.toned another b.u.t.ton on my shirt, and another, and then his hands were there, impatient, intruding, but entirely welcome. Before I could react fully my shirt was across the room and his lips were back on mine, his hands running up and down my back.

Somehow, entangled like this-despite everything else, despite everything believed-somehow this felt more right than all my research, all my writing, all my years of grief and agony and worry. Those seemed to completely wash away as his lips moved away from my mouth and down my neck, sending shivers down my spine. I began using my hands again and started undoing his belt and jeans, searching.

Before I could find what I was looking for, he picked me up like I weighed nothing. I squealed in surprise and he carried me back into the bedroom and we fell on to the bed, me underneath him. He ripped off his jeans and I was finally able to appreciate his entirely naked body. He was gorgeous; there was no other word to describe him.

Then he was kissing me, kissing every part of me. My back arched as my arousal grew. "Michael," I moaned, begging for more. He grinned at me wickedly and slowed his pa.s.sionate exploration of my body.

I whimpered as he gently fondled, caressed, and touched me, finding every part of my body-even the parts I was ashamed of-and loving them. I had never felt more valued, more loved, more special, especially since Dad had died. In his hands I was worth more than I had ever been and I never wanted the sensation to end.

He pulled my wet panties off my hips and slowly slid them down my thighs. Impatient, I used my foot to flick them off and throw them to the floor. I shuddered in pleasure as he redirected his attention toward my lower half. Before I even knew what was going on we were rocking together, our bodies moving as one, pushing and pulling against each other, as natural as the tides or the movements of the sun across the sky. Our hands found one other and our fingers intertwined, such a youthful and innocent grip in this moment of pa.s.sion and release.

Eventually our movements slowed and stopped, our breath coming fast and heavy as we try to catch it, our fingers still wrapped around each other's. He smiles at me and I smile back and then laugh, turning away, almost embarra.s.sed. He kissed me again, slowly, tenderly, gently, as he does everything.

In the morning I lay sprawled on the bed, his arm still around me. He was awake and I turned smiled up at him and snuggled against his chest, our bare skin warm together. "Hi."

"h.e.l.lo."

"This is nice," I said.

He nodded. "Yeah..."

"What's wrong?" I asked, raising myself up on to my elbow.

"It's just... how can I go back to the CCA now?"

I scowled and turned away from him. "f.u.c.k them."

"Like I f.u.c.ked you?" he said playfully, putting his arms around my waist and kissing the spot where my neck and shoulder met.

I shivered in delight. "No, not like that. Although that would be interesting."

He laughed into my skin. "Yes, I suppose it would. I doubt I would enjoy it as much."

"Well that's rea.s.suring, I suppose." I turned back to face him. "Why does it matter so much?"

"Because what else do they have? What else do I have?"

Our romance did not leave his apartment much. It would be dangerous if we were seen together, so we mostly stayed in bed, to be perfectly honest. He would dash out to pick up groceries or movies and we would stay in his bed, snuggled up together or kissing or f.u.c.king.

Our days and nights pa.s.sed into one joyful stream of pleasure and peace as we got to know one another more, body and soul. I learned about his brave mother, who raised him on her own even though she got pregnant at sixteen. And I told him about my biological parents and the tragedy that happened when I was seven.

He held me when I cried.

His head was on my chest and I was stroking his hair. "You know that soon we will have to part ways," he said.

"What? Why?" I demanded.

"Because I cannot stay holed up in here with you forever-no matter how much I want to. I have, we both have, responsibilities in the outside world."

"So? Leave them behind. Run away with me. We are both smart, skilled people. We can find some place new, some place better, where we can be free to do whatever we want. Get out of this cramped city and find our own lives."