Chapter 16

Auralie

I do not get another Coke first.

Logan puts the fire out and takes me back into the trailer where he fucks me again. Well, actually, he has me fuck him, rolling to his back and having me straddle him.

“Ride me, Auralie,” he commands with glittering eyes.

And I do.

I sink down onto that gorgeous cock, and I ride him until both of us are gasping and shaking and practically seizing it’s so good. After I come and he comes and our breath regulates—he’s still planted inside of me although I feel him starting to go soft because I don’t feel as full—he says something that surprises me.

“We fucked up.” His warm palms resting on my thighs are meant to feel reassuring, but his words are chastising.

“What do you mean?” I ask fearfully, feeling the weight of catastrophe hanging over us.

“We had unprotected sex,” he mutters. With eyes locked on me somberly, he adds, “I never do stupid shit like that. Twice now… out of control with you and taking risks that are just plain idiotic.”

I can’t tell if he’s pissed at himself, me, or both of us, but I hesitantly say, “Logan… I’ve never been tested, but I’ve never had unprotected sex before either, so I’m confident I’m safe. But I’d be lying to you if I said I was out of control like you and didn’t think about it. Because I did think about it… when I told you I wasn’t a virgin, I figured you’d be fucking me pretty quickly. I did nothing to slow this down. I let you slide into me without a worry.”

Logan swallows as he understands what I’m trying to say. “You trusted I wouldn’t expose you to anything.”

“Yes,” I whispered. “I trusted you.”

And I did.

Apparently, he trusts me, even though I’ve proven myself to be a liar and exposed myself as someone who routinely cheats in life. But he trusts me because he says as he lifts me off his dick and rolls me to his side, “Then we’re good. We’ll keep fucking without condoms, because I have to say, baby… that was fucking amazing.”

I giggle and nod, very happy with this mutual understanding, but then something occurs to me. Logan goes to The Silo, and he does so to fuck random women. Does this mean he’s giving that up? Or will he continue to do that but just wear condoms with other women?

The thought of him being with someone else causes my chest to constrict painfully, and yet I really can’t say anything about it because I have a con to pull off. That means I’ll be back in The Silo soon with random dick down my throat.

That thought causes nausea to well up inside of me.

“Okay, tell me about Magnus,” Logan says as he leans up briefly in the bed to pull the sheets and blanket up over us. He lies back down on his side facing me and waits patiently for me to put this all together.

“Probably about ten years ago, my father went to work for Magnus,” I say, telling him how it all started. “And by work for him, I mean he helped Magnus pull off some longer cons, and yes… he made more money than he was doing on his own. We were struggling, trying to make enough money to survive. By that time, my dad had been living that life so long, he had no real work experience. I wasn’t able to do much with going to school. Going to work for Magnus, who had what seemed like a bazillion cons just waiting to be tapped, just seemed like the natural thing to do. It was like money growing on trees for us.”

“You said your dad did apartment management,” Logan points out, and yes, I did tell him that at dinner that first night we went out.

I give him a wry grimace. “Yeah… that wasn’t exactly true. He managed an apartment scam.”

“Oh-kay,” he says slowly with a disbelieving shake to his head. “I’m going in. What does that mean?”

“He’d take an ad out on like Craig’s List, and list an apartment for rent. Take first and last month’s deposits. When the people show up to move in, they find out that the apartment is not for rent and is, in fact, owned by someone else.”

“Jesus,” he mutters in astonishment. “The stupidity of people sometimes. Did you ever feel guilt for what you were doing?”

“Sometimes,” I tell him simply while holding his stare without an embarrassed lowering of my eyes. “Sometimes not. It was my way of life. It was how I helped pay things like the electric bill and put food on the table. It’s all I knew.”

Logan looks at me in such a way… almost as if he’s terribly sad for the way I’ve lived my life. I think he’s conveying to me, I have to wonder what you could have become had you been taught a value’s-based way to lead your life.

I answer him out loud. “I wonder all the time what I could have been.”

He gives me a soft smile, leaning in to kiss me gently before pulling back. “I still don’t get what Magnus could do for your dad that he couldn’t do for himself?”

“Magnus could pull off more complex stuff… that requires set up and time, usually other people involved. It also has a better payout. For example, Magnus had a pretty big mystery shopping con going. He’d send a fraudulent check to a mystery shopper, enough to buy a nice item, but more than the price of said item. Mystery shopper deposits the check. Part of the mystery shopper’s agreement is that they had to return the difference by wire immediately upon purchase and they were being timed on responsiveness. This ensured the mystery shopper would purchase the item quickly and then wire the difference back.”

“Money gets wired and picked up,” he hazards a guess, “before the fraudulent check bounces.”

“Yup,” I say in a matter-of-fact tone. “Magnus had my dad manage those more complex cons. He’s always been good with numbers and multi-tasking. It was almost like a management position for Magnus. And when I say manage those cons, I mean Magnus had hundreds of grifters working for him all over the city. They paid him commissions, and he got rich from their labor with none of the risk.”

“And your dad oversaw all the cons being run and tallied the money for Magnus?” he sums it up.

“Yeah… that’s what he was supposed to do,” I affirm bitterly, and that leads us up to what brought me into his life.

“What did your dad do?”

I shift my body, curl my arm under the pillow where my head is resting, and tilt my head so I can maintain eye contact with him. “I mentioned I wanted out. I was tired of that type of life, and, unlike my dad, I was still young enough I could do something different. I wanted to go to college, but I had no clue what I wanted to be. I just knew I didn’t want to scrape by with that type of life.”

“You said they both agreed to let you out.”

I nod. “My dad very happily, actually proud I wanted to go to college. Magnus wasn’t so happy because I was good at what I did, but he had plenty of people working for him. I was just getting ready to enroll in college when I came home to the apartment I shared with Dad and found Magnus and one of his goons there with my dad. Apparently, my dad’s books weren’t quite adding up, and Magnus assumed he stole from him.”

“Did he?” he asks.

“Yeah… later told me he skimmed just enough to help me with tuition. But he was so good at moving and hiding money, and cooking the spreadsheets to reflect what he wanted, Magnus really couldn’t pinpoint it so he couldn’t know for sure my dad stole from him.”

“But I’m guessing he wasn’t letting it go,” he surmises.

“Nope. Wasn’t letting it pass. My dad got roughed up, and I immediately offered to make it up to Magnus. I walked right into his trap.”

“His trap?”

“He had this con already cooked up,” I explain as I shift my legs, which causes my shin to brush against his. His eyes darken just from that slight touch, and tingles shoot up my spine in response.

While Logan’s eyes say, I want to fuck you again, I try to ignore it so I can finish my explanation. “Magnus found out about this club and was going to sell off a fake virgin. He needed someone who looked young, sweet, and virginal to serve as shill.”

“Did he even know your dad took money or was it a stab in the dark?” he asks in wonder.

“I think it was a stab in the dark,” I murmur glumly, but I’m very impressed that Logan’s sort of got Magnus figured out a bit. “But I wasn’t about to take the chance.”

“Chance with what?”

“That my dad would go poof,” I say simply.

“Excuse me?”

“My friend, Gus… the one who ran scams with me on the street? Well, he skimmed money off the top before he paid Magnus his share, and poof… he just disappeared.”

He blinks at me in surprise. “You’re saying Magnus killed him?”

I laugh darkly and try to keep the venom in my voice to a minimum. “Magnus doesn’t have the balls to do his own dirty work, but yes… I’m saying Magnus ordered it. He has plenty of muscle who will gladly carry out those orders.”

“And you think he’d kill your dad?” he asks, understanding my need to see this con through to the end in one bright, clarifying moment.

“I do,” I whisper. “I think he’d do it. Oddly, I think he’d hate it, but he’d do it. At least, that was his very clear threat to me if I don’t hold up my end of the bargain.”

Logan’s silent for a moment, trying to digest what I’ve told him, but it’s really pretty simple in my opinion. My father’s life is at stake, and I’m willing to perpetuate a pretty big fraud to ensure he remains safe.

“It’s the only reason I’d ever get on my knees and suck a stranger off, Logan,” I say apologetically, because while I know I’m a rotten person for doing this, I don’t want him to be disappointed in my choices. His eyes jerk to mine, and I hate that they’re holding pain for me. “I’m not that type of girl. I might have done a hell of a lot of cheating and lying in my life, but I’ve never peddled my body like that. I hope you believe me.”

He doesn’t speak but rather reacts. His arms shoot out and wrap around me, pulling me in close to him. My face settles in the crook of his neck, and one of his large hands comes to the back of my head to hold me there. “Hey… don’t even go there. I know exactly what type of girl you are, and you’re a survivor. Nothing more.”

“I’m sorry I lied to you,” I mumble against him, my lips gliding over his skin. “I never wanted to do that.”

“I get it,” he reassures me, and sadly, I know one reason he gets it is because he’s hidden things from me. But that’s a discussion for another time.

We lay silent for a few moments, but then he asks, “How exactly were you going to get past the fact you are, in fact, not a virgin?”

“Simple,” I say softly. “Magnus has fake medical records proclaiming my hymen’s intact, and I’m merely going to drug the mark before we can get to the sex part. By the time he wakes up, Magnus and I will be long gone from Wyoming.”

“Someone losing that type of money will come after you both,” he points out darkly.

Pulling back so he can see my face, I give him censuring look and ask, “You really think his name is Magnus Albright? He’ll never be found because he’s a shadow and he goes by many names.”

“Jesus fuck,” he grumbles as he pushes himself up and pull his arms away from me. Logan holds himself up on one elbow and looks down at me, his other hand coming up to push some hair off my face. “I don’t even fucking know your last name. I’ve fucked the shit out of you, going to do that again and again, and I don’t know your last name.”

Sadness fills me up, and I shrug. “You don’t know any of the last names of the women you fuck from The Silo, I’m guessing.”

He winces and I know that cut deep.

Bending down, he drags his lips across mine and cups his palm to my face. “Yeah, but the difference is I want to know yours. Want to know every damn thing about you, and even things you don’t know about yourself.”

I blink at him, astonished by the fervor in his tone, yet still on guard as he’s asking something that a good con artist never gives up.

“What’s your last name, baby?” he pushes at me, and I have no control over my reaction. I’ve got years and years ingrained in me to hold myself aloof from personal attachments, and I know my eyes go a bit frosty.

“It’s never a good idea for someone like me to give my full name,” I say coolly.

He jerks in surprise over my refusal, and then narrows his eyes at me. “You still have my cum puddled warm inside of you, but you don’t trust me enough to tell me your last name?”

I hold silent.

And then he understands why, commanding me. “You are not going through with this con.”

“I have to,” I say with a sigh of regret. “My dad’s life is at stake.”

“We’ll find another way to get you both out of this,” he responds resolutely as he leans back over me, putting his hand down on the mattress beside my ribs so I’m caged in.

He’s displaying his dominance over me, in a classic alpha move to get me to come to heel.

“You are absolutely not going back into The Silo to suck cock unless it’s my cock,” he adds on with a grunt.

Caveman.

“There is no other way,” I say in exasperation. “My dad can’t just walk away. He knows no other type of life. No other way to support himself. This is it for him. He’s stuck in that world. He’s stuck working for Magnus. If I want my dad to live, I have to pull this off and ensure Magnus gets his money.”

I’m not prepared for what he says next. “I’ll put in the winning bid.”

And I can read the look on his face clearly, and it makes me wince. Why not? Wouldn’t be the first time I’d bought pussy.

“Are you fucking out of your mind?” I snap at him, putting my hands to his chest to try to push him away from me. “You couldn’t possibly have that type of money.”

He gives me a condescending laugh. “What are you going to fetch? A hundred thousand? Five hundred thousand?”

I roll my eyes at him, but remind him resolutely. “It’s more than a fly fisherman can afford.”

He doesn’t debate this with me, but instead says with utter confidence, “I’ll figure something out, but you are not going through with this.”

“Yes. I. Am,” I punctuate through gritted teeth. “My father is all I have in this world, and there’s not a damn thing you can do to stop me from doing what’s necessary to make sure I don’t lose him. You have no idea the type of man Magnus is, and—”

Logan moves so suddenly, I can’t do anything but suck in my breath in shock.

Throwing his leg over me, he moves to straddle my chest but holds his weight off me. His legs have me pinned at my upper arms. He puts his palms on the pillow beside my head before hunching over and putting that beautiful face all up in my space.

“Tired of listening to you tell me we can’t fix this another way,” he growls at me. “Tired of you thinking you’re going to go back in that Silo and let another man touch you.”

“Get off—”

“Tired of listening to you period,” he says with a grin. He flexes his hips so that his dick, which is now brutally hard, brushes against my lips.

My eyes flare wide with surprise, but I restrain myself from opening my mouth to take him in. It’s what I really want to do, but, instead, I give him a loathsome glare that doesn’t come close to hitting the mark because he laughs at me.

“Open up, Auralie,” he whispers with a grin, pushing the tip of his cock against my closed lips. “Let me fill that pretty mouth up.”

Lust sizzles in Logan’s eyes and I feel myself falling prey to it, but I refuse to give in. Besides, something about arguing with him and the hard fucking that occurs because of it is too good to pass up. So I remain stubborn. “This doesn’t change—”

The minute my mouth opens, he pushes forward and fills my mouth with his cock, stopping before he butts against the back of my throat. I suck against him reactively, and he groans his approval. My mouth is stretched wide and I’m rendered speechless—which I think he likes very much at this moment—and God help me, but that excites the hell out of me.

I can’t talk, but I let him know what I’m thinking in this very moment. My eyes level warmly on his. I’m going to let you fuck my mouth, Logan, but this conversation isn’t over by a long shot.

He grins at me. Rising up on his knees a bit for better leverage, he begins a slow pumping in and out of my mouth. Once he rises, I note my hands are free so I bring them up and sink my nails into his ass—hard.

“Fuck that hurts,” he complains, but he doesn’t miss a stroke. And then he smiles down at me almost evilly. “But that’s okay… I’m only going to fuck your mouth for a few minutes… just enough to get your jaw sore. Then I’m going to flip you over and tan your backside for even doubting that I can get us out of this mess.”

I moan against his cock, not knowing if it’s because I’m turned on by what he just said or that he cares enough about me to help me through this.