Risking it All (Crossing the Line, #1)(42)

desperate noises falling from her lips.

He couldn’t leave her unfinished any longer. It was killing him. He took his heavy arousal in his hand, gritting his teeth as he led it between her legs. When his hard length slipped against her bare *, without a single barrier between them, his knees almost gave out. He had to do this quick or being inside her would become a necessity.

“Bowen, hurry. Please.”

“Shh. I’m going to take care of you so good. You f*cking know I am.” He found her clit with the head of his cock and picked up where his hand had left off, rubbing quick, tight circles around her sensitive nub. It felt like heaven and hell.

The most painful torture he could have devised for himself and yet he would kill anyone who tried to stop this from happening. “Come on, I want to feel that wet little shake of yours. The one I tasted with my mouth last night. Tasted so damn good, baby.”

“Oh, God…I’m going to—”

“Good girl, let it go. All over your man.”

Bowen got a hand over her mouth just in time to catch her hoarse cry. Pride and pain dueled inside him, common sense trying to battle its way to the surface.

The job was done for him when he heard loud

talking

outside

the

booth.

Immediately, his hands flew to Sera, tugging her panties back into place. Then in a movement so painful he wanted to shout every obscenity in the book, he zipped his jeans back into place over his raging erection. Drawing in deep breaths, he fell back onto the stool, taking Sera with him.

Just as two preteen boys yanked open the curtain.

“We’ll be out in a minute.” He jerked his thumb at them. “Scram.”

The curtain fell back down, but not before he heard, “Bro, they was totally screwing in there.”

I wish, kid.

Bowen turned back to find Sera watching him, chewing on her bottom lip. “You okay?”

His breath shuddered out. “I’m pretty damn far from okay, Ladybug.”

Sera’s lips trembled, he suspected with the need to laugh. Instead, she reached into her purse and removed a couple dollar bills, feeding them into the slot.

“Smile.”





CHAPTER FOURTEEN


By the time Bowen and Sera dragged themselves away from the boardwalk, the sun had started dipping low in the distance, forming light patterns on the water. They’d collected so many tickets from winning arcade games, they’d started looping them around their necks like scarves. After lugging the tangled heaps to the counter, they’d agreed to exchange the tickets for the ugliest prize they could find, making Bowen the proud new owner of a fringed leather vest that said “Greased Lightning” on the back.

He never wanted to leave. As they drove back toward Bensonhurst, reality intruding with every mile, he wanted to whip the car around and go back to Coney Island. He wanted to stay there in the sunshine with Sera playing stupid games and riding kiddie rides they were way too old to ride. For this one too-brief day, he’d been someone else.

Someone better. But as soon as the streets became familiar again, passing along the outside of his window, he turned back into his father, heir to the criminal throne. A throne of garbage and barbed wire. One he didn’t want, but didn’t know how to separate from.

As they pulled up in front of his building, his cell phone buzzed in the cupholder. He checked the screen and cursed. Wayne. The last person he wanted to talk to with Sera sitting beside him, head lolling against the seat drowsily. Trusting him to get her home safe. All day long, they’d been a normal couple, but answering this call would end that with a quickness. Still, Wayne never let himself be avoided for long, and speaking to him over the phone was better than in person.

He pressed the talk button with a sigh.

“Yeah?”

Loud music and voices greeted him before the older man spoke. “Now, that ain’t no way to answer the phone.”

Bowen ignored the pinch of irritation.

He’d stopped taking Wayne’s bullshit last time they spoke, and he couldn’t take a step back now. “Hell, I probably use the wrong fork in restaurants, too, Wayne. Is this a f*cking etiquette lesson?

I’m busy.”

An extended silence passed. “Busy doing what?”

“Practicing my origami.” He closed his

eyes

when

Sera

shifted

uncomfortably in the passenger seat, the perfect ease between them ruined.

“What’s it to you?”

Wayne’s humorous chuckle reached down the phone, sounding like a warning. “I’m down at Marco’s with some of the boys. You’ve got to show your face once in a while, kid. They need a leader. When they don’t have one, they get restless and start acting on their own. You know what I’m saying?”

Bowen knew all too well what Wayne meant. The local guys who’d first been employed by his father, and now him, needed babysitting around the clock.

They didn’t have jobs to keep them occupied, and spending time with their families didn’t exactly appear to be a priority. No, they weren’t the type to sit tight and wait for a call about a job.

They felt the constant need to prove themselves. Bowen was ashamed to admit he might have felt that at one time in his life, when he’d been too young to know better. Not now.