Wicked Ride

  I'm a patient man as she eats two and drinks a bottle of Coke to chase it down. I eat four and drink a beer, but when that's done, I stand up from my chair slightly to pick it up and turn it to face her.

  "Now tell me... all of it," I demand as I sit back down.

  I almost hope she hesitates because I would love nothing more than to drag her ass back to bed, spank it lava red, and fuck some obedience into her.

  But she launches into her story without any qualms. She knows I need the entirety of it because she already exposed her big lie.

  "I'm a grifter," are her first words, and I can't say this surprises me. The minute I learned she wasn't a virgin, I knew it was a con, but still...

  "Unbelievable," I muse, intrigued as I'd never met one. At least, I don't think I have.

  "Well, I used to be. Was raised to be one from an early age," she says with a wry smile.

  "Wait a minute," I butt in. "How old are you?"

  "Twenty-five," she says with some shame in her eyes. "I'm sorry I lied to you."

  "Because a twenty-five-year-old virgin isn't believable," I conclude, and again, I'm oddly more relieved than pissed. Somehow, an eight-year age difference is more palatable than a thirteen-year one.

  "Right," she says and then continues. "My parents were both con artists, so it's all I knew. I told you before, my mom died when I was ten, but it's not like she was a great role model. It was just my dad and me. His name is Mickey, by the way, and we just did what we had to do to survive."

  I can't help it. I'm fucking fascinated. "I don't understand. I mean... what does a con artist do? Did your dad have a job? You said he did apartment management. Did you work? Or is all you do is scam money? Christ... did you even go to school?"

  She laughs at me. In the firelight, she's never looked more beautiful. "We weren't homeless, and yes... I went to school. But grifting is a hard life, and it's not a rich one. Well, unless you do it on the level that Magnus does."

  "You can tell me about him later." I wave an impatient hand because I want to know every tiny detail of this little criminal's life. I can't figure out if I'm appalled or slightly titillated by the cunning she obviously possesses. "Tell me what your life was like growing up."

  Auralie plays with the lip of her empty Coke bottle. If I were a gentleman, I'd offer to get her another, but I am not and I don't because I want to hear her story.

  She blows a puff of breath out and looks at me. "I was rolling trick dice in alleyways when I was nine. By the time I was twelve, I could run a flawless change-raising scam and none would be the wiser."

  "Change raising?" I ask confused.

  "It's a typical street short con. I go up to someone and ask if they have change for a ten. The con runs by passing bills or change back and forth, confusing the person as to what's going on. I'd walk away with twenty."

  I whistle low through my teeth, and I'm very confused. I am truly appalled and yet oddly fascinated at the same time, but it's kind of hard to place blame on her. She was a child.

  "As I got older, the cons got a little more complex. Still short, as I didn't have the means to run a long con, but my friend Gus and I would often run a mugging scam."

  I raise my eyebrows, but before I can ask what that means, she provides me the answer.

  "I'd see a woman walking, always a tourist and a dumb one at that, who didn't keep a good grip on her purse. I'd sneak up, snatch her purse, and run."

  "Holy shit," I say in shock that she'd resort to common thievery.

  "Calm down, Officer," she mocks me with a wave of her hand. "My friend, Gus, would "play" the Good Samaritan and give chase. I'd duck down a quick alley; he'd catch up to me and wrestle me for the purse. I'd be "overpowered" and then I'd take off running so I didn't get caught, gladly giving up the purse. He'd return it to the tourist, who would be so grateful she'd give him money for his help."

  "You're fucking kidding me?" I ask, totally in shock that this sweet woman could be so devious.

  "When I got older--became an adult--I did things that would disgust you," she says softly, her gaze finally falling.

  Even though my stomach turns at the thought of what she might reveal, I reach across the expanse between us and take her hand in mine. "I assure you, nothing you can say will disgust me. I'd already figured you were conning someone out of money for fake virginity."

  She gives me a sad smile, and with a small voice says, "I'd go into a bar and find a lonely looking guy with a wedding ring..."

  I have to swallow hard to suppress the growl that wants to come out.

  "I'd flirt... get him interested. If he were local, I'd flirt harder. He'd have a few drinks and get bold, and then we'd make plans to go to a hotel together, because even though he loved his wife, he was still hot and horny for a young girl he met in a bar."

  She stops, plays with the bottle some more, and I realize she's embarrassed.

  "Go on, Auralie," I tell her gently. "Let me hear it."

  "We'd go outside... wait for a cab, and I'd let him kiss me. I'd get him in a compromising position, and then Gus would come up on us and start taking pictures. The mark would notice and get upset, asking Gus what he was doing. Gus would admit to being hired by the man's wife who suspected he was cheating--"

  "But the wife really didn't?" I ask for clarification.

  "No," she says with a wry smile. "I was just really good at picking marks who I knew had probably cheated on their wives and so it would not seem out of character for the wife to have hired an investigator."

  God, that's fucking insidious.

  "At any rate, inevitably, the man would offer Gus "more money than the wife paid" in exchange for the pictures. One time we got five hundred in exchange for the SD card in the camera."

  "Damn," I say in wonder, as I had no clue this shit went on. I mean, why would I? My life in Chicago was charmed. "And you did this every day?"

  She shrugs noncommittally, I think perhaps feeling she's said too much and has put me off. So I try to get her back on track to something that would be easier to talk about. "You said you were looking at going to college?"

  "Yes," she says with a quavering voice. "I told my dad and Magnus I wanted out. Dad let me happily go. Magnus wasn't so easy to convince, but he ultimately agreed."

  "How does Magnus fit into your life?" I ask.

  "Well, that's an interesting story," she tells me, "but I'd like another Coke first."

  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 tru
sted 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.