The Bad Judgment Series: The Complete Series (30 page)

“Do you have any idea what you mean to me?” he asked.

“I thought I did,” I said, shakily.

“Everything,” he said. “I mean it, Nicole. I might never get back to my company, to my sister, to my beautiful house and all of that money. But it would be okay. I would be okay. Because I’m with you, now. And my definition of what constitutes ‘my life’ has changed drastically since I met you,” he said, and tucked some of my hair behind my ear.

I smiled up at him then.

“Do you remember when you said that to me?” Walker asked, finally smiling back. “About
your
definition? At the garage after we went to my office?”

“Of course I do,” I said, blushing at the memory. I’d been so afraid to admit it, to say out loud that I loved him. I’d been so afraid that he wouldn’t, couldn’t, love me back.

And so here we were again.

“Do you still feel that way about me?” he asked, looking at me intensely.

“You know that I do.”

“I didn’t feel it just now, back there,” he said, motioning to where I’d been on my knees moments earlier. “I felt like you were pushing me away.”

He sat down on the bed and patted next to him; I sat down, still feeling unbalanced and shaky.

“Please don’t do that to me ever again,” he said. “You’re the first person I’ve ever had in my life that I feel like I can connect to in bed. Emotionally, I mean.” He took a quick sideways look at me and grabbed my hand, lacing his fingers through mine. “You’re the only one I’ve ever felt that with, Nicole. If you make me come to manipulate me, or if I did that to you…that would destroy the very essence of what we are.”

I felt ashamed and I felt the tears coming again. What he said was true for me too: when we had sex, I felt like he was completing me. The lonely ache I’d had with me my whole life was obliterated.

“It was what you said about the tattoos. And my hair,” I sniffled, trying to get back to the root of my anxiety. “I still don’t understand what you were saying.”

He kissed the top of my head gently. “Watching you get your tattoos made me hard, Nicole. It made me hard because it showed me, again, the lengths you will go to for me. Just like your hair. I prefer your natural hair. I loved your natural, unadorned skin. But you’ve shown me, time and again, how loyal you are.

“And that is everything that I want from you. Everything I want, probably everything that I don’t deserve to have.”

I put my hand on his unshaven cheek and rubbed it, my fear and insecurity falling away. “You have my loyalty. Forever,” I said, forcing myself to be honest and brave. “And you deserve it. You deserve it because I love you, and because you’re a good man. I would do anything for you.”

“You’ve already done enough,” he said. “Too much. You’ve given up too much to be with me.”

“That’s not how I see it,” I said, and shrugged. “And a few minutes ago, when I thought that maybe you didn’t love me, or that you didn’t love the real me — how I felt shows me everything I need to know about how important you are in my life.” I sighed and looked at him. “I love you, Walker. Nothing else matters to me. I need to feel that you love me, all the time. It’s my center. It keeps me strong. If I can’t feel it, it’s like I get dizzy, out of control. That would topple me over, with everything else that’s going on.

“If we don’t make sense, none of this makes sense.”

“I know,” he said quietly, pulling me into his arms. “I feel exactly the same way. Except instead of dizzy, I felt enraged and out of control.” He was so gentle with me now, so loving, it was hard to reconcile how angry he’d been only moments earlier. But I guess I was on the same mood pendulum, swinging back and forth — because all that insecurity was gone now. I felt calm, complete. All I needed was him, to understand him, for things to be right between us.

“Aw, Nic. We had our first fight.” He kissed the top of my head. “Let’s never have another one.”

“Deal,” I said, not taking my face out of his chest. “We have too many people trying to kill us and frame us. We don’t have time. And my heart can’t take it.”

“Plus, it just sort of sucks,” he added. He ruffled my hair. “So…I have something to show you,” he said, and there was a new eagerness to his voice that surprised me. He stood up.

“What?” I asked. We hadn’t been apart in weeks. How could he have something new to show me?

“Close your eyes,” he said.

I frowned at him but obediently closed them. I heard him rustling in front of me, but I couldn’t tell what he was doing.

“Okay, open them,” he said. His back was to me, and the wrapping from the tattoo was on the table. I looked at him. He’d gotten an enormous tattoo across his finely muscled back, written in gorgeous script:

NICOLE

“You got my name tattooed on your back?” I screeched, in disbelief and pleasure.

He turned around and grinned at me. “Uh-huh,” he said. He came and kneeled before me on the bed. “So you don’t need to doubt my commitment to you, okay? Not ever. No matter what color your hair is. That may change, but this tattoo is about as permanent as it gets.”

He had a huge smile on his face, one that brought joy to my heart. He was thrilled with his tattoo. He was thrilled with it and it was my name.
Broden Walker just tattooed my name across his back,
I thought, dreamily. I grinned right back at him.

Oh my God, we were so in love.

“Thank you,” I said. My heart was so full I thought it might burst, right there on our crappy bed in the Majestic Hotel.

He kissed me, tenderly, and I wrapped my legs around him. He looked over at the clock. “We have to get going soon,” he said. “I want to see who’s coming out of that office.”

“We have five minutes,” I said, and he arched an eyebrow at me.

“You really think we can take care of business that quickly?” he asked.

“I just want to feel you inside me,” I said. I wanted to erase the last sexual encounter we’d had from both of our memories. I kissed his mouth, letting my tongue connect with his, and I could feel him getting hard against me again. He undid my bra and ran his hands all over me, still carefully avoiding my tattoos. He stood up and took off the rest of his clothes and I did the same, quickly, wanting to feel his whole body up against mine. He grabbed a condom and we went back on the bed, and he was above me, his huge muscles covered by his new tattoo. I looked at his blue eyes, framed by thick dark lashes, and the buzz cut that he now sported.

“Walker,” I pleaded, my breath coming fast and hot. I had an ache, deep inside, and I needed to feel him all the way in me, to finally vanquish the fight that we’d had, the awkwardness. I wanted him to own me, to make me come so hard I forgot about everything except him and the power between us. He kissed me again and he leaned up off of me, holding himself up from the bed with his straining, huge biceps. He held my eyes as he flexed his hips and pulsed into me once, twice, three times. I put my hands on his glorious ass and tried to push him all the way into me; he continued to tease me, pulling back out and thrusting in. His thrusts were getting deeper. I could feel him start to lose control, and I relished it.

“Fuck me hard, baby. Please,” I begged, our eyes locked, and squeezed his ass again. He pulled all the way out one more time, and then he slammed all the way into me, hard, filling me to the hilt.

“Fuck,” he said, in a choked voice, almost like he was about to come already. I pulled him in deeper and I started rocking his hips back and forth, grinding my clitoris against his base. He scooted up and grabbed my knees, lifting my legs and continuing to pound into me. Each stroke brought ripples of sensation through me. He pulled out and for a moment my world went blank; then he put his mouth directly on my clit and sucked it, hard, until I was screaming and panting his name. Then he moved back, laying me gently on the bed, and took my hands in his, lifting them over my head. And then he slid all the way back into me, so deep I could feel his balls slap against me. He held my gaze as we both cried out, shattering, his body filling mine until I rippled and quaked around him, screaming his name. My orgasm shook the bed. Walker kept pumping himself into me, getting everything out, as he fucked me so hard that it should have hurt.

But it didn’t. Not any of it. My body loved his as I much as I loved him. He collapsed on top of me and I gently stroked his back, careful not to touch the newly added letters.

“Nic,” he mumbled against my ear.

“What, baby?” I cooed, shivering. I was tingling from a post-orgasmic, post my-boyfriend-tattooed-my-name-to-his-back glow.

“Maybe it won’t be the worst thing for you to get your period. Then we can get some freakin’ rest,” he said, leaning over and kissing me. Our tongues touched again and my whole body tingled.

“You better rest up,” I said. “This is where dating a younger woman might break down for you, old man. I could do that all night.”

“Well, so could I, young lady,” he growled, pulling me on top of him. He sprung to life beneath me and even though I was sore, I ached for him again. “In fact, maybe we should take another five minutes before we go. I need to teach you that age is just a number.”

“I’m an eager learner,” I said, rocking against him.

“And an honor student,” Walker reminded me, darkly. “Now spread your legs a little, baby.”

A
fter we’d showered
, careful not to saturate our new tattoos, we used the ointment that Roxie had given us. Then we got dressed and got ready to go back out. Walker had cut some viewing holes into the trash bags on the windows and was monitoring the street through his binoculars. I was still in the bathroom, brushing my damp hair, shaky from too much sex. I put some makeup on, more mascara than I usually wore, and eyeliner.

I put the mascara wand down and looked at myself. I barely recognized the girl I saw in the mirror; I still wasn’t used to her yet. My hair was a bleached, white blond, and barely grazed the bottom of my ears. I had on black mascara and black eyeliner, not a lot, but enough so that my brown eyes stood out, looking edgy and different. I had on a white tank top and jean shorts. The dark green cross stood out starkly on my arm. I stared at it, fascinated, as though it wasn't a part of me. I grabbed a compact — the same one Tammy had given me, back in Boston, and I turned around to inspect the tattoo on the back of my neck. It was hard to see, but I caught a glimpse of it. It was an Egyptian hieroglyph in the shape of an eye.

“You trying to have eyes in the back of your head?” Finn had asked me.

“I’m trying to watch my back,” I said, and he’d grinned at me. He had dark circles under his eyes and a smoker’s cough. He was too young to have dark circles like that; he looked like maybe he had some idea of what I was talking about.

I sighed and put the compact back on the counter.
Tammy.
The last time I’d been at the law firm, her desk had been dark and empty. David had told me she’d taken vacation days….

…and then he tried to get me into a car that blew up moments later.

I wish I could call her from my TracFone. Just to see if she was safe. But Walker had warned me that contacting anyone from home right now would put them in danger. We hadn’t spoken to Richie, Adrian, anyone. It made my heart hurt, thinking about Tammy, thinking about my dad and my little brothers. I hoped they were safe. Walker had at least warned Adrian before we’d left, even though he’d been oblique. He’d just told her to take a long, hot vacation with her boyfriend.

She must have known something wasn’t right. Walker hated her boyfriend.

I went back out to the room. “See anything?” I asked, desperately hoping the answer was no.

“I don’t think so. But we can’t have long. We probably only have a day’s lead on them, and that runs out soon,” Walker said. He checked the time: four-forty-five pm. “Let’s go. I need to see who Lester Max has got running this office.”

He grabbed the duct tape off the table and shoved it deep into the pocket of his cargo shorts and did the same thing with the walkie-talkie. Then he put his handgun securely in his waistband, covering it with the hem of his shirt. He reached out to me with the arm that was now covered with the sleeve tattoo. I took his hand but just stood there, gaping at him.

“What?” he asked, and smiled at me.

“You look dangerous. And hot,” I said, fanning myself.

“Don’t you ever get enough?” he growled playfully, and squeezed my hand while other parts of me squeezed deep inside.

We’d almost left the room when he turned to me once more.

“Nic,” he said, and his voice was serious now, “I’m not going to ask you to bring the other gun right now. It would be even more dangerous, because you don’t know how to use it. But that ends tonight. You have to learn to defend yourself. If we got separated, you’d have to be able to hold people off. Or shoot them,” he said, apologetically.

“Can you teach me how to shoot them so I don’t kill them?” I asked, trying to be brave.

“Of course,” he said. “And because you’re an A student, I know you’ll get it right.”

We saw Louise in the lobby. “We’re going out,” Walker said. “Feel free to get in touch if you need me.”

“I need you, all right,” Louise said, grumpily observing our obvious post-sex glow.
She might have even heard us,
I thought, and my face flamed, imagining myself screaming Walker’s name all afternoon.

He was going to have to start clamping his hand over my mouth. Because Lord knew I wasn’t going to be able to stop screaming. Not with
that
, I thought, looking at his cargo shorts. I looked up and saw Louise watching me. My face turned redder, if possible.

She shook her head at me. “Be careful out there,” she admonished. “Lots of people on the streets need cash. They have heroin to shoot and dealers to pay. If you have people looking for you, they’ll be able to find lots of help.”

Walker thanked her — I still couldn’t look at her without blushing — and we headed out into the late afternoon heat.

“What about Roxie and Finn?” I asked. Their shop was centrally located, right around the corner from the main strip.

“I paid them off,” he said. “I gave them extra cash and told them if we got out of here in one piece, they’d have a lot more coming their way. I knew it was risky, getting your real name tattooed on me like that. So I made it worth Roxie’s while.”

“You’re going to have to offer more to Louise then, too,” I said. “All these extra people on the payroll are making me nervous.”

“I have a feeling this isn’t Louise’s first rodeo,” Walker said. “She gets it. And she knows she’ll get more, the longer we stay safe.”

“How much money do we have left?” I asked, worried.

“Enough for right now,” Walker said. “And it should be enough for part two of our plan.”

“There’s a part two?” I asked, somewhat incredulously, as he guided me down the crowded sidewalk. “And since when did we actually have a plan?”

“Later, Mrs. White,” he said. “I’ll tell you later.”

There were lots of people out now, heading to the bars or home after work. The South Beach dress style was very different from Boston. Most of the men wore linen suits or polo shirts, fitted tightly around their muscled biceps; the women wore short, colorful dresses and peep-toed high heels, their perfectly pedicured toes flashing in the sun. In Boston after work, it was a sea of neutral or black suits and pumps. In the winter, we wore boots and huge coats to work, very utilitarian and practically the opposite of sexy. Boston had more of a hot chocolate-carbohydrate-puffy coat vibe, so that we didn’t freeze and starve to death in the winter.

Clearly, South Beach was much sexier.

I still vastly preferred Boston. You love what you know, I guess. It becomes part of who you are, for better or for worse. Looking at all the tanned, toned people around me, I guessed that they’d never known the vagaries of a harsh New England winter. They probably thought we were all crazy for choosing to live like that.

They’d be right. But we
did
have the best sports teams.

I squeezed Walker’s hand. Thinking of home made my heart ache, but I pushed it from my mind as we turned the corner. I could tell that Walker was carefully watching all around us, trying to ascertain if we were being followed or not. It had only been a little while — less than two weeks, if I was still keeping track properly — since Mandy had died. We hadn’t seen anyone following us since then. Even though everything was crazy, that was at least a relief. It was a stark contrast to what the last few weeks had been like back home, where we’d had someone listening in on us and following our every move. I was still incredibly paranoid, but at least I didn’t have to write out every sentence to Walker.

The office building that housed the South Beach subsidiary of Blue Securities was within view now. The street wasn’t as crowded here. It seemed like this was a less bustling part of the downtown district. It was seedier, and that seemed appropriate when I thought of Lester Max.

We stopped outside of the building. “What’s the play, here?” I asked, watching Walker. His jaw was clenched and I could almost see the wheels inside his head turning, like he was making a plan and weighing the options.

Just then, a man came out of the entryway. “Hold the door,” Walker called.

The man held it open with his foot, not even looking at us, as he put on aviator sunglasses.

“Thanks,” Walker said, and we went in. There were offices on either side and a central staircase; the building seemed mostly empty and quiet. Walker immediately turned to the left, heading towards the Blue Securities door and I tugged at his hand, trying to get him to stop without saying anything.

He turned to look at me, just before he grabbed the door handle.

“What are you doing?” I hiss-whispered at him.

“Finding out what’s going on with my company,” he said, and his voice was firm. “Now, play along, Mrs. White. I might need you to duct tape some stuff.”

I looked at him, exasperated. I didn’t have time to wonder about what I might need to duct tape because he knocked once on the door and then opened it. As soon as the door opened, a bell rang, to alert whoever was inside that someone was coming in.

“Hello?” a woman’s voice called, and as Walker and I went through the threshold, I was shocked and not at all delighted by who we found sitting behind the desk.

It was April. Young, auburn-haired, drop-dead gorgeous, curvaceous April, secretary to none other than Lester Max.