Thorn
Jess scowled over at me, folding her arms across her chest. “Are you seriously going to do that all day?” she asked.
I looked up mildly from the message that I was in the process of typing out on my phone, ceasing tapping my pen as I did so. “Keep doing what?” I asked.
“Tapping that pen,” she snapped. “You're driving me nuts.”
I gave her a surprised look and then glanced down at the pen in my hand, twirling it deftly around my fingers for a moment. “Sorry,” I said, sounding almost sheepish. “Didn't realize I was doing it.”
“Well, stop,” she said crossly. “It's bad enough that I have to sit here with nothing to do all day, waiting for this phone call so that I can get out of this stupid situation, but it's another thing to have what practically amounts to torture: you incessantly tapping that pen against the armrest.”
I rolled my eyes at my dramatic whine. “I'm sure there's worse things I could be doing,” I pointed out before turning my eyes back towards my phone. But I set the pen down off to the side. She was being much more patient than I'd expected her to be, and I appreciated that. She hadn't even asked very many questions about my conversation with Dorian, although I was sure I'd been obvious enough about the fact that I really didn't want to talk about any of it with her.
“What do you do when you're not transporting illegal packages across the country anyway?” Jess asked suddenly, probably desperate to do something. Her phone was dead, and I imagined she must be bored out of her mind.
I smiled a little, amused by the question, but didn't look up. “Just normal things,” I said vaguely.
“Things like what?” she pressed.
“I ride my bike. Get drinks with my friends. Work.”
“What kind of work?”
I raised an eyebrow over at her, deciding to tease her a little. “Do you really want to know?”
She blushed and ducked her head. “Probably not,” she admitted.
I laughed, delighted that I had gotten exactly the reaction that I'd expected from her. “I work as a bouncer,” I said. “It's all strictly legal.”
“Then how'd you get mixed up in all of this?”
I shrugged, trying to figure out how much I could really tell her. But the thing was, there wasn't much to tell. “I guess I just happened to be in the right place at the right time,” I said. “And I needed the money, so...”
“You need money badly enough that you're willing to do something illegal?' she asked skeptically.
“It's not really illegal,” I insisted. “I'm delivering a package from one friend to a ... friend-of-a-friend. Nothing wrong in that.”
“Except that the package contains guns, and somehow Katia Sin is involved,” Jess concluded.
“That doesn't mean anything,” I said. “The packages contain bits of plastic that could be assembled into who-knows-what, and I'm delivering them to Gabi Gonzalez. As far as I'm concerned, Katia has nothing to do with it.” It was exactly the story that I'd stick to if I was caught in this mess. Not that I anticipated being caught, though.
“You'd have a hard time proving that one in court,” she said, rolling her eyes. “You know exactly what you're doing.”
I was silent for a long moment, thinking back to the phone call with Dorian that morning.
Before I could respond to her accusations, though, there was a knock on the door. I blinked and then shrugged. It was probably housekeeping or something like that. I had already arranged to stay for another night since I wasn't sure when exactly Gabi would contact me.
I rose and went over to the door, pocketing my phone as I went. When I opened the door, a posh-looking man stood outside, scowling at me. He was wearing a well-tailored suit — I'd seen enough of them to know that what he was wearing had to have cost an arm and a leg. And his hair was styled so that it swooped off to the side in a cascading wave. He had a thin, pale face and was the opposite of me in nearly every way.
“Hello?” I asked, wondering just who the hell he was. He definitely didn't work at the motel, that was for sure.
Jess came up behind me and made a noise of surprise, pushing me off to the side a little. “Emmanuel, what are you doing here?” I wasn't entirely sure how to read the tone of her voice. She sounded at once relieved but also nervous.
Emmanuel looked back and forth between the two of us, his eyes finally settling on Jess. “Who is this?” he asked, sounding scandalized.
Jess gave me an almost fearful look, clearly uncertain how to proceed.
“This is none of your business,” I snapped, making to close the door.
Emmanuel stuck a foot out in front of the door, though, and even though I knew I could force the door shut anyway — the man was practically a twig — the last thing I needed was for him to complain down at the reception desk. Or worse, to go to the police and tell them about the strange man in the room with his not-quite-girlfriend.
“I thought you were just on vacation,” Emmanuel said accusingly to Jess. “And now I find you alone in a room with a man who… Well, to be honest, either you have something you've been hiding from me or else you've been, I don't know, kidnapped or something! Tell me the truth.”
Jess gave me another fearful look, and he looked triumphant. “That's it, I'm calling the police,” he announced, already pulling out his phone.
I wanted to reach out to smack the phone out of his hands, but surprisingly enough, Jess beat me to it. “There's nothing to get the police involved with,” she said icily, and I gave her a surprised look. She tossed her head haughtily, and I wondered how this brave, arrogant woman pretended to be so meek and humble most of the time. “Emmanuel, this is Thorn. I decided that since you weren't ready to call me your girlfriend, it was time to find someone who wasn't afraid to be seen in public with me.” She gave him a challenging look, and I was almost ready to applaud her, having seen how upset she was talking to the man the night before.
Emmanuel sneered at her. “And this is who you picked? This hulking brute? Don't lie to me; I know that's not your type.”
“How would you know?” Jess asked. “You've never once asked me about anything that I like. It's always been about what you like and about what you want. You pick where we go on our dates, which aren't really dates I guess since we were never actually dating. You pick who I'm allowed to socialize with. You control every aspect of my life. Maybe that's why I'm not more spontaneous, because you don't let me be spontaneous. Did you ever think of that?”
“I don't believe you,” Emmanuel said, shaking his head, his arms folded across his chest. “I don't know who this man is, and I don’t know why you feel the need to protect him, but I don't believe you.”
“It's not any of your business,” Jess said, scowling at him and mimicking his posture. “We're not dating. I can do whatever I want to do with whomever I choose.”
“Darling, if you're in a bad situation, you should let me help you out,” Emmanuel said, his tone disgustingly condescending. I wanted to intervene, maybe to throw a few punches because how dare he treat Jess like that. But I held back, letting her work things out for herself.
“What, you don't believe me? I'm sleeping with Thorn,” Jess declared. To my surprise, she turned towards me, twisting her fists into the front of my shirt and yanking me down into a surprisingly heated kiss.
It was as though all the tension of the previous few days was spilling over into the kiss. Our tongues battled against one another's, and our teeth clashed furiously. There was almost too much pressure where our lips collided with one another's, but neither of us wanted to ease off and give the other person control of the kiss. Jess's hands stayed fisted in my shirt, and I brought my own hands up to cup the back of her head, tilting it at an angle to give me better access as I licked and sucked and thoroughly explored every inch of her warm, wet mouth.
The kiss seemed to last forever, but it was probably only a minute or so before she was pulling away and fixing Emmanuel with a triumphant look. “See?” she asked, and I was pleasantly surprised to hear that she was a little out of breath. “I'm telling you, we're sleeping together. Now if you wouldn't mind, I have better things to do than talk to you right now. I don't even know how you found me.”
“You didn't sound okay on the phone last night,” Emmanuel said, his eyes blazing furiously. “You sounded like you might need help — like you might not even be in a situation where you could ask for help without ... repercussions.” His eyes slid towards me for a moment. “But Jess, do you really mean to tell me that you're totally okay with this? He's not ... beating you or anything like that? Tell me the truth.”
Jess laughed a little. “He's not beating me,” she said. “I wouldn't have kissed him if he was. I wouldn't be in that sort of situation.” She sneered at Emmanuel. “Do you really think I'm that attractive, that a man like him would be that desperate to get into a relationship with me? Do you really think I'm the type of woman who would be kidnapped? I'm mousy and plain, aren't I? You've said it yourself.”
“Well, of course you are,” Emmanuel said matter-of-factly, “but—” Whatever he was about to say, he was interrupted by my punching him in the face.
“I've had enough,” I snapped, scowling down at him where he huddled, a hand pressed against his face. “Don't you dare talk to Jess like that. In fact, don't you dare talk to her again. I'm sorry that you were too spineless to call her your girlfriend when you had the chance, but that door has closed. She's mine now.”
I didn't really know where the anger was coming from, and I definitely didn't know where my words were coming from, but I couldn't deny that it'd been an incredible kiss. It took a lot for a woman to catch me by surprise the way that Jess just had, and I was undeniably aroused by what had just happened.
Jess was staring back and forth between Emmanuel and I, looking momentarily bewildered, as though she could hardly comprehend what had just happened. “Go home, Emmanuel,” she finally managed to choke out. “Just...go home.”