Shane (Mallick Brothers 1)

The girl jerked back like someone had struck her and Helen smiled slightly. “I’m assuming you won’t be staying for dessert,” she said and the girl nodded, thanked Helen for dinner, and all but ran from the room.

“Ma, seriously?” Ryan called a couple minutes later after, I imagined, he followed his girl outside and got the scoop. “She was a nice girl.”

“Yeah, what were you thinking bringing a nice girl here?” Helen called back and was met with silence because they all knew she was right. If the entire family was in the blood-spilling, dirty money business, it really wasn’t meant for normal chicks. Hence the ex-con Mark brought home and the fact that I was, essentially, a paid escort. And Fee, well, I guess running a phone sex business gave her a certain kind of edge.

Shane walked in a minute later, reaching for my hand and slapping the cash from his brothers down into it. He looked at his mother with a smirk. “Aren’t we a little old to still be cock blocking us?”

“Oh, please. He wasn’t getting past first base with her and you know it,” Helen laughed.

“Got a point,” Shane agreed. “Can I steal Lea or are you not done interrogating her?”

Helen’s head tilted, her eyes keen. “Well, I have all the time in the world to get to know all about her, right?” she asked and I could see Fee pressing her lips together, knowing where that was going. “Since you two seem to be a bit more serious than I realized.”

“Ma…”

“Of course,” I rushed to say, not willing to give up the ruse yet.

Helen gave me a smile that said she wasn’t fooled, but was willing to see how far we were willing to take it. “Then by all means, steal her.”

“Your mom knows exactly what is going on here,” I told him as we moved into the hall.

“She knows I have never had a serious girlfriend,” he corrected. “So she’s looking for holes in our story. The sooner I got you out of there, the better. You saw what she did to Eli and Ryan.”

“But you already ate,” I declared. “And there was no chance of me fucking you anyway.”

Shane’s head jerked to look at me as another male voice started laughing heartily, drawing my attention. I found Mark standing in the middle of the hallway just outside the family room, like he was moving toward the kitchen but my words stopped him dead.

“Gotta love the honesty,” Mark said with a nod as he moved away.

“No chance, huh?” Shane asked, taking my words as a challenge.

I turned to him fully, straightening to my full height and keeping eye contact. “Not the slightest.”

“Wanna put some money on that?”

“Gentleman’s bet,” I suggested.

“Oh, baby,” he said, moving toward me, making me back up until the wall prevented any further retreat. He closed in on me, the whole front of his body pressing into me, making my breath catch, making an undeniable spark of desire start deep in my core. His arm raised, elbow planted somewhere beside my ear, his forearm arched over my head, his head ducked to look me in the eye. “No one would ever accuse me of being a gentleman.”

My chest felt compressed under the realization of what he was. Trouble. With a capital T. It seeped out of his pores. It was like an aura around him. Not just because he was a criminal, a violent bastard, and that everything about him screamed ‘womanizer’. No, he was trouble because he was a continuation of a fucked up cycle for me.

He was just another on the assembly line of bad choices.

Hot? Check.

Foul-mouthed? Check.

Sexy as all get out? Check.

Dangerous? Check.

Sure to fuck up my life even more than it already was? Yeah, I was going to go ahead and put a big fat check right there too.

Thank God I didn’t tell him where I lived. If he just showed up at my door one night, I was pretty sure there would be no denying him.

“See?” I said, swallowing a little hard. “There’s another strike against you.”

“How so?”

“I’m in a good guy phase.”

To that, his lips tipped up in a somewhat condescending smirk. “Baby, I give that a week.”

I lowered my eyes at him. “Why?”

“‘Cause you ain’t exactly a good girl.”

With that, he pushed off the wall and away from me, going to go sit with his brothers. As for me, I took a couple slow, deep breaths, trying to calm my sex drive.

Then, deciding both the kitchen and the family room were dangerous, I followed the sound of little girl laughter outside where I found the girls playing in their new playhouse.

“Can I join your club?”

“That depends,” Becca said, mustering all the authority she had in her five-year old body. Which was a surprising amount.

“On?”

“If you think boys stink.”