Let Me: New Adult Dark Romance (Vengeful Book 1) Read online

  The girl nods. “Yeah,” she says, tugging down her shirt, as if it isn’t far enough down already. I can see the top of one brown nipple. “I’m at U of T for IT.”

  I give her a half-smile. “Good for you,” I say absentmindedly. “If you need a job when you graduate, look me up.” She won’t be able to find my information anywhere on the internet. I made sure of that long ago.

  She looks like she might faint but then she seems to remember that no matter her dreams, she’s our waitress right now. She coughs, her eyes sliding to Benji. He smiles coldly at her, impatient.

  “What can I get you two to drink?” she finally asks.

  “Vodka, on the rocks,” I order.

  Benji gets water.

  I notice he doesn’t drink nearly as much as he used to. And he used to drink a lot. Comes with being a club owner, I guess. When she walks away, Benji checks out her ass and I shake my head.

  “Look, man, if you don’t get in Riley tonight, take that ass.”

  I roll my eyes and say nothing, drum my fingers on the table. “Why don’t you? And why aren’t you drinking?”

  He’s been out six months, and it’s the first time I’ve thought to ask.

  Benji’s face darkens. “Trust me, you don’t want me to drink.” He hooks his arms around the booth, black shirtsleeves riding up. I catch a glimpse of one of his tattoos again, on his inner forearm. Benji has always looked mean: dark hair, dark hazel eyes, usually dressed in dark clothes. He bought the best money could buy, in black or blue. Not too different from Riley in that way, although her spending money was vastly different from Benji’s.

  But now, out of prison, his face still smooth shaven, but his hair a little longer, those tattoos, his muscles more defined than before, he looks downright demonic. It’s not just how he looks. It’s how he carries himself, too. He really would fuck someone up without thinking twice.

  He did fuck someone up without thinking twice.

  The waitress sets down our drinks, and looks at Benji, as if seeing him for the first time.

  “You sure you don’t want a drink?” she prods.

  I seize my opportunity. “Come on, Benji, take a drink for—” I turn to her, “—what’s your name, Miss?”

  She flashes me a lipsticked smile. “Tia,” she answers, looking back at Benji, cocking her head.

  Benji relaxes further into the booth. “Sure, Tia,” he says smoothly, meeting her gaze. “Bring me rum and Coke.”

  She nods, delighted, as if it was her that convinced him, and leaves to get our drinks. She doesn’t know Benji never does anything unless he wants to.

  I watch her go, enjoying the view.

  I catch a glimpse of Riley as I do. For one second, I almost forgot she was here. My hands tighten around my glass, and I hear Benji chuckle darkly, and then he mutters, “Shit,” and I stand up.

  Riley is leaning into some guy I’ve never seen before, and his hand is on the small of her back. He’s got tattoos all up and down his arms and a silver watch that’s nearly as big as his hands. His hand goes lower, and she leans in closer toward him, away from the bar, until her bare legs are practically in the guy’s lap.

  “Who the fuck is that?” Benji asks.

  I glance at him, but I can’t take my eyes off of Riley for long. “I don’t know. You don’t recognize him?” As usual, I wonder: Is it him? From the video? But I don’t dare ask that out loud. I don’t want to think about that.

  “No.” Benji takes a deep breath. “But look, we can’t just go—”

  “She doesn’t even know that guy,” I point out, flinging my hand in her direction. Riley is laughing and nuzzling her nose into this guy’s tight, black shirt, and he’s smiling, too smoothly, his hand now on her ass.

  “We don’t know that. And it’s never stopped her before. Besides, she’s an adult, Caden,” Benji says, but he doesn’t sound like he’s really opposed to beating this guy’s ass anyhow.

  I take a breath and sit back down.

  He’s right.

  I suddenly don’t even remember why the fuck I’m here. What the fuck am I doing? I fucking hate that girl. For what she did to Jack. For trying to do it with me, too. I keep repeating that in my head. As if saying it enough will convince me that it’s true.

  I down the rest of my vodka. The waitress returns, sets the drink down in front of Benji, and he drinks it quickly. Too quickly.

  Then he smiles and jerks his head.

  The dance floor is being set up, couches are arranged around it, and women wearing just a little more than nothing flood the floor. The music that had been playing on autopilot stops, and the DJ across the room starts. The lights dim.

  And Riley Larson drags this guy onto the dance floor, and starts grinding her ass against him, lost in the bodies writhing around her. Lost, except to me. Because I see everything.

  She lifts her hands up, lost in the music, and I almost smile to see her like that. She shouldered the burden of my brother’s possessiveness for far too long. I heard far more arguments than I ever stepped in for. I wanted her to fight for herself. And she did, in her own way. But she always bowed to him. Until the very end.

  Seeing her alive like this almost makes me happy for her.

  But then that guy’s hands are on her bare thighs and she tilts her head back, resting against his shoulder, and he’s pressing into her ass.

  “Come on,” Benji says, standing to his feet. I see more than a few female eyes turn our way in the dim lights of the club. I get up, and we walk to the couches on the edge of the dance floor, sit beside one another at one, and immediately get more drinks.

  It doesn’t take long and Benji is drinking like he used to. He’s already got a girl on his lap, his hands running up her back, knotting in her hair.

  Suddenly, there’s a woman in front of me, long blonde hair and sheer black garter on, visible under her short red dress. She dips her head, indicating my lap. My hands are resting on my thighs and I nod, make room for her.

  I don’t know her, and she doesn’t know me, but isn’t that the point of this place?

  It’s Riley’s point, apparently. I can still see her, beyond this girl’s tits in my face. See her turn around, pull the guy into her, his hands cupping her ass.

  I hate it, but I feel myself growing hard despite it. What the fuck is wrong with me?

  The girl on top of me grinds against me, murmuring in my ear. She smells sweet, and her skin is so soft, and when she presses her chest into my face, I bite.

  She laughs, but it’s a nervous laugh.

  I let go of her, grab her ass almost hard enough to bruise, to see if she likes it. To see if she can handle what I like. For a moment, there’s fear in her blue eyes, but then she presses into me again and right there, in the couches around the dance floor, I nuzzle her dress down, take her little hard nipple in my mouth and suck it.

  She throws her head back, her neck exposed, and then I see Riley.

  The guy’s hands are under her dress, and she’s tilting her head back and fucking moaning. I can’t hear it, but I see her mouth open, her eyes closed, this guy finger-fucking her on the dance floor.

  “Are you okay?” the girl on my lap whispers in my ear, but I push her off, barely registering that she stumbles in her heels. I don’t care. I storm through the writhing dancers, ignoring Benji calling my name at my back.

  I grab Riley’s arm, twist her out of the man’s grip, who is at first surprised, and then pissed off.

  Riley frowns, rears her fist back like she’s going to punch me—and I’m sure she would if I were someone else—and then she realizes it’s me.

  She goes stiff in my arms, and her lips part, confusion on her face.

  “What the fuck?” the guy asks, eyes blazing.

  I look down at his hands. Think of them all over her. Inside of her. “Fuck off,” I growl, and then I steer Riley around, through the crowd.

  “What the fuck are you doing, Caden?” she hisses, loudly.

  I tur
n to her, my hand still around her arm.

  “You want him?” I ask, then step closer to her, so she can hear me. There are bodies jostling all around us, around her, and I want to get her out. Away from these assholes.

  But I know better.

  I know she would tear them apart. She’s done it to me. To my brother.

  “If you want him, go fuck him,” I say, jerking my head at the guy who is watching us, bewildered. But I’m half a foot taller than he is, and he makes no move toward me. “Make another video, why don’t you?”

  I lean in closer, my words against her ear. She smells so good. Like lavender. And that scent that’s just her. I bite back a groan.

  “If you want him, Riley, give yourself to him.”

  She doesn’t move. I hear her breath catch. And when I pull her arm again, she goes with me.

  Fourteen

  Present

  What the actual fuck am I doing?

  Caden has my arm, and he’s pulling me through the throng of people in the club, away from the guy I’d just met that I was drunk enough to grind all over. I don’t regret it, he was hot enough, but what the hell is Caden even doing here? And why is he taking me from the club?

  But the most important question of all is, Why the fuck am I letting him?

  His back muscles shift beneath his crisp white shirt and people part for him, women ogling him, and he pulls me outside, past the bouncer who says nothing, and into the streets. I remember that Benji owns a bar. Shade. It’s not too far from this one. These thugs probably all know him, and Caden.

  We keep going, me being strung along behind him, and then he turns into an alley and my breath catches, just a moment, as I think about the guys from the night before.

  But this is Caden.

  I let him pull me in.

  He pushes my back against the wall, his hands on either side of me, trapping me. He’s glaring down at me, breathing hard, and there’s murder in his eyes. I think, really, that as much as he wants me, he wants to kill me, too.

  I don’t know if I blame him.

  “What are you doing?” I manage to ask, but it comes out like a gasp.

  He’s panting, his eyes on my lips. “What the fuck were you doing?”

  “I was…I was dancing. Why are you even…” I shake my head, trying to think through the rum in my veins. “Why are you even here?”

  “I told you to get the fuck out of this city—”

  “I don’t listen very well,” I interrupt, and then his hand is grazing my jaw.

  “You don’t, do you?” he murmurs, leaning in closer to me. His hand trails down my throat, stopping above my collarbone. “You don’t listen at all.”

  I swallow, and he smiles at that, but it isn’t a warm smile. It’s cold. Chilling. I shiver under his hand.

  “Let me go,” I say. But I’m not even sure I mean it. I’m not sure I want him to let me go.

  He doesn’t, as if he knows.

  “Who was that?” he asks, and I know he’s referring to the guy in the club.

  I feel my face warm when I say, “I don’t know. I just met him.” I know what he’s thinking. I know he’s wondering if I would make another video with him. I know he’s probably calling me a slut and a thousand other things in his head. He never really cared how many men a woman fucked. I heard him say as much with Benji. It’s the video, it’s who he thinks sent it to Jack. I know he’s thinking these things, but I don’t look away. I don’t move.

  His fingers curl around my throat. He leans closer, his mouth hovering over mine. He smells like vodka and mint. It’s a familiar scent. He smelled like that, before. On that night. As if maybe if he got drunk, he could forget about how wrong it was. How wrong we were. But then he got to blame me for that, too, anyway. He might hate himself for wanting me, but he hates me a little more.

  “You just met him?” he repeats, cutting off my thoughts. His voice is flat. But no, not quite flat. Angry.

  “What’s it to you?” I ask, trying to feign an anger I don’t quite feel. Because seeing him like this, his eyes dilated, his nostrils flaring just a little, it reminds me of that night, too. How close we were. It wasn’t gentle. I never wanted it to be. I was still angry then. He seemed angry, too. Because, wrong or not, we were always angry. Maybe for different reasons, but always the same emotion coursing through our veins. It linked us. As much as he interfered with Jack and me, I noticed it. It wasn’t because he thought he was a hero. It was because he was always pissed. Just like I was. Just like Jack was. Fuck, we were fucked up.

  But then he moves his hand from my throat, and he takes a step back, and I feel the rush of cool air where his body was.

  “Nothing,” he says, throwing up his hands, finally answering my question. “Nothing, Riley. It’s nothing to me who you spread your legs for anymore.”

  I step away from the wall, angry all over again. “And, what? You’ve been celibate these past three years? I’m sure you were being hunted down back there.” I jerk my head toward the club.

  A smile plays on his lips. Still cold. “Hunted down?” he asks quietly.

  I just shake my head.

  “What if I had been?” he presses, coming close once again. But I can’t think with him here. He’s too close, and he smells so damn good. His eyes are blue and beautiful, and his jaw is clenched and he’s freshly shaven. A lock of wavy, dark blonde hair falls over his brow.

  This is stupid. This is fucked up.

  “I’m leaving.” I turn to go, ready to walk back to the stupid condo and go to bed alone, again, and not think about Caden or Adam or Rolland or any stupid fucking boy in my life.

  But he grabs my arm and spins me around, pulling me to his chest. My fingers splay against his shirt, catching myself. I don’t move. Not for a long, long while. I just tip my head back and stare up at him, but what I see staring back makes me feel like less than nothing. Like an actual, honest-to-God murderer and not a girl who just couldn’t stand up for herself.

  Not a girl that got fucked over by Caden’s fuck of a father.

  His grip is tight on my arms, and then he slips his hands around my back, and he’s actually holding me against him, but I shake my head, confused.

  “What if I had been?” he asks again. “What if I had been hunted down?” He uses my words.

  I swallow, trying to think, trying not to see the flecks of silver in his beautiful blue eyes. They’re so light they’re like chips of ice. He was always colder than Jack in his own way. Always more serious. Always more intense. If Jack was a demon, he was the devil.

  I liked him all the more for it.

  “I-I don’t know,” I manage to say, “I guess that’s…”

  “That’s what, Riley?” His fingers dig into my back. I feel him against me, and I want to collapse into his arms. I want to press my lips against his. But he hates me. Even if right now, he’s forgotten it, just a little. Even if he wants me in this moment, when he’s a little drunk, a heady mix of anger and jealousy, he still hates me.

  “Would you have minded?” he asks, before I can find the words to speak. “Would you have minded if any girl wanted me inside of her? Because they did, Riley. They fucking did.”

  I feel anger, white and hot, rush into my veins, but I still can’t speak. I can’t tell him that thought makes me sick.

  “Caden!” Benji’s voice breaks my chance. But the words weren’t coming anyway.

  Caden’s spell is broken too, it would seem.

  He lets me go, nearly shoves me off of him, and we both turn to see Benji stalking toward us, his hands in his pockets, looking as indifferent and cold as always.

  “What are you guys doing down here?” His eyes roam over the alley, as if suggesting that whatever we’re doing, we shouldn’t be doing it here.

  Caden takes another step away from me. “Let’s go,” he says, and he brushes past Benji, jostling him a little. I see Benji’s eyes darken. They’re nearly black in the flicker of light that spills into this alleyway, bla
ck with little chips of emeralds.

  “Why so soon?” he asks quietly, and I see Caden tense.

  I wrap my arms around myself and shake my head. “I’m leaving.”

  I walk past Benji, but he grabs my wrist, unraveling my arms from across my body, his grip strong. He yanks me around and I face him, frowning.

  He’s wearing all black, as he usually is, and he smells like he’s been drinking rum. I can’t really judge him, because I’ve been doing the same. But he’s clearly drunk. Or close to. He’s not stumbling but his eyes are unfocused, and I know he wouldn’t have touched me unless he was drunk. He hates me as much as Caden. Probably more.

  “Let go of me,” I say, trying to keep the fear out of my voice. Behind Benji, I see Caden, watching his friend with an unreadable expression on his face. Something about this makes me nervous. But they aren’t Rolland. They aren’t my mother’s boyfriends.

  I keep telling myself that as I face Benji.

  “Why?” Benji asks, cocking his head to the side. “Why would I do that?”

  “Benji,” Caden warns, his voice low.

  But Benji ignores him. “You sure looked like you wanted some dick tonight,” he says, tugging me closer. “Why’re you leaving Caden so soon? I thought you might want to thank him, for last night.”

  My eyes go wide. “Thank him?” I hiss. “Fuck you, Benji.” I make to pull my wrist from him, but he only grips me tighter and his smile widens.

  “I really like that attitude you’ve got, Riley. I’ve always liked it.” He glances over at Caden, who takes a step closer to his friend. “Always envied Caden a little for that. Jack, too.”

  That name is like a blow to the heart. I can barely breathe.

  “Let her go, Benji.” Caden’s fists are clenched.

  “Aw, come on. Don’t you guys want to have some fun?” Benji raises a dark brow, looking between me and Caden.