Twisted Desire (The Twisted Series) (29 page)

Yes, cheating ex-boyfriend, Hunter, and slutty
bitch-who-stole-him, Maddie; each of them with a snot-nosed kid in their arms.

“Oh, it’s just you.”  A breath of air releases from her
lungs.

“Hey, Aliah.  How are you doing?”  Hunter looks
really interested in the subject.

The stabbing pain in her gut eases slightly.  “Really
good, actually,” she answers, surprised by how true it is.  She glances up
at Harley and smiles.

“You look good,” Hunter admits.

Maddie’s elbow comes jabbing out and lands against Hunter’s
side.  She tries to keep a straight face, but fails miserably.  Her
eyes bug out of her head and her lips pucker in distress.

“Thanks,” Aliah answers.

Harley smirks and covers his mouth with a hand, trying to
hide his amusement.  His forehead wrinkles as he glances at the
ground.  He looks incredibly sexy.

Maddie huffs as she puts her squirming little girl
down.  The toddler instantly takes off toward the street.  “Oh!”

Aliah grabs onto the little girl’s hand before she makes it two
steps away.  Then she crouches close to the ground to pay her a visit on
her level.  “Careful, sweetheart.”

“Melody Rae,” Maddie snaps.  “Her name is Melody Rae.”

“Ah, yes.  How could I forget,” Aliah mumbles,
remembering how painful it was the day they’d named their children.

Maddie scoops her troublemaking child away from Aliah, who
manages to smile softly at the overreaction.

“And this is Darien,” Hunter informs her.

The introduction seems to upset the boy.  He instantly
starts to whine and throws his toy phone onto the ground.  Hunter tries to
rock him, but he looks very sleepy and refuses to stop crying.  His wails
grow more impatient by the second.

When Maddie doesn’t move to pick up the toy, Aliah does,
crouching down at the same time as Harley.  Their eyes meet and he holds
her gaze.

“I’ve got it.”  Harley takes the toy phone from Aliah’s
hand and flashes it to the little boy, effectively stealing Darien’s attention.

Harley hands the phone to Hunter’s boy.  The little guy
promptly throws it back on the ground wearing an oversized smile.

“Oh, I see how this goes,” Harley says with a chuckle, as he
retrieves the phone again.  This time, after he hands it to the boy, he
finds a smiling Darien reaching the colorful toy back out to him.

“Is it for me?” Harley asks him.

The boy’s smile is adorable.

Harley glances at Aliah, then shrugs a shoulder, taking the
toy phone from the kid.  No matter how big and bad Harley looks, even this
little dude can see how sweet he is under that hard exterior.

“Hello?” he answers.

The kid is pleased.  His father?  Not so
much.  Hunter rips the phone out of Harley’s hand and forces it into
Darien’s.  It’s promptly tossed onto the ground and the boy resumes
screaming.

When Darien is handed to his mother, he quiets down oh so slightly,
but starts to make an attempt to wiggle out of Maddie’s arms.  With her
arms now full, she struggles to keep them from poking each other’s eyes out.

“It’s past their bed time,” Hunter says, trying to explain
their bad behavior.

Darien breaks free from his mother’s arms and runs for the
street.

“Darien,” Maddie shrieks.

Aliah swiftly scoops the boy into her arms, just sparing him
from the curb.  The boy looks her right in the eye, shocked by her
closeness.  It stuns her too, when she notices the dark hair and hazel
eyes.  There is no doubt that this little boy is Hunter’s kid.

Hunter instantly grabs Darien and lifts him onto his
hip.  “Since when did you like kids?”  He looks suddenly angry with
her, even though she’s done nothing wrong.

Darien instantly starts screaming again, sparing her a
response.

Aliah presses her lips together.  “He wants to go, I
think.”

Maddie lowers her wiggly daughter to the ground again, but
refuses to release her hand.  Neither of them look very happy at the
moment.

“Yes.  Go.  We should,” Hunter admits, looking
awkwardly between Aliah and his baby momma.

Aliah nods, feeling only half as awkward as him.  She
watches Hunter lift his daughter onto his only free hip and smirks when she
notices how Hunter lifts his chin in an attempt to match the height of Aliah’s
bigger, buffer new man when he passes him.  As he walks off, both of his
kids start wailing.

Maddie looks exhausted, but she doesn’t speak a word of
it.  Nor does she follow after Hunter to give him a hand.

“Aliah?  Can I ask you something?” Maddie starts.

“Go for it.”

Maddie delivers a pointed glare and her tone turns
glacial.  “Alone.”

Aliah glances at Harley, who’s now a spectacle among them.

“I’ll just be over here if you need me,” he says, without
needing to be told.  He strolls farther down the sidewalk, glad to put
some distance between him and the noisy kids.

“Who’s your new friend?” she asks expectantly.

Now Aliah feels incredibly rude.  “Oh!  This is
my… Harley,” she says, stumbling over her words.  She still hasn’t said
it, even though they’ve played around with words all day.

“Oh.  I thought he looked like someone else I
know.”  Maddie points at the nearest bus stop where Harley’s service
guarantee is plastered next to his handsome face.”

“Oh.  Right.  Yeah, that’s him.  Harley is
his middle name,” she admits, not even a little embarrassed by the size of his
advertisement.

“I’m being serious here,” Maddie says, leaning into Aliah to
keep their conversation somewhat private.  “Tell me why you would want to
date a manipulative old man like him when you’re still young and beautiful.”

Funny.
  She had never looked at him that
way.  Harley has never made her do anything she didn’t want to and, to be
frank, he takes quite good care of himself.  Hunter has put a little
weight on himself, and she’d wager that Harley is a good deal more buff than
him, with a strong angular jaw and a face that oozes masculinity.  She
thinks of Harley like a fine wine.  He only seems to get better with age.

Maddie must be jealous!

Aliah can’t help but smirk, as Maddie tries to hide her
assessment of Harley’s fine ass.  Aliah checks it out too.  She
really loves his ass; two round globes of muscle that look even better
naked.  She can’t wait to get him naked.

“I’ve always had a thing for older men,” Aliah admits, with
a smirk.  It’s more of a joke than anything.  There is no excuse
necessary.  Harley is an incredibly attractive man.  He exudes sex
appeal and even his gaze is dangerously sexy.  He’s like sex on a stick. 
A really tall, handsome, dangerous stick.

Just as she says it, Harley turns and meets her eyes,
scorching her with a glance.  She can’t stop smiling, but just as quickly,
he glances down at the ground.  He’s trying really hard to mind his own
business.

“He makes me happy,” Aliah admits softly, still staring at
him with a smile covering her face.

Aliah can’t believe she’s just said that out loud, let alone
to big-mouthed Maddie.  The two of them lock eyes.  Maddie looks just
as surprised as her.  She hopes no one else has heard her.  With
another glance at Harley, she can tell that he hasn’t.

Maddie smiles.  “Your secret is safe with me.”

That would be a first.

As the days pass, Harley grows more frustrated by the fact
that he can’t solve the mystery of who is following Aliah and why.  He’s
slowed down and cut back his efforts on Aliah’s case so he can work on others,
but he’s afraid it’s only giving the criminals a chance to regroup.

No concrete evidence has surfaced and the crazy lady has
outright denied it was her.  Brandee Hawkins now claims that her problem
was solved the day Harley pulled Aliah away from Cavanagh’s bar.  Harley
isn’t too quick to believe such nonsense.

He takes a drink from his mug, as the front door chimes at
the Thorncliffe Café.  Aliah is late.  She must have had a busy day
at work.  She hurries to where he’s sitting and leans into him for a kiss.

“Hey.  Sorry I’m late.  What is it you wanted to
talk to me about?”

Harley scratches at his head.  “I’ve been thinking
about what you said about Jillian.”

“You mean, how I think she’s a total nut job?”

“You never said that.”

“Oh, right.” Aliah smiles.

“I have noticed she’s been acting kind of odd ever since
I’ve taken on your case.  When I told her that we’re – you know –
together, she didn’t seem very happy about it.”  Harley pauses, in
thought.  “Maybe I should see what she’s up to.”

“I like the sound of that idea.  Thank you.”

“What did you just say?”  The shock on his face is
priceless.

“Thank you,” she mumbles, again.

He’s not going to let this one pass so easily.  “I
didn’t quite hear you.  You’re going to have to speak up.”

“I said thank you.  I’m not as heartless as you let
on.  Thank you for trusting me.  Thank you, Harley.  Is that
good?  Thank you.”

“Okay, okay,” he says with a laugh.  “You’re welcome.”

He denies the satisfaction he feels when she opens up to
him.  But it’s true; they’ve formed a bond of trust in what little time
they’ve share together.  He only hopes it’ll hold against the dangers that
lie ahead.

Later that night, he puts his plan into action.  But
not before finding a little surprise text from Aliah that makes for damn sure
that he doesn’t pull an all-nighter this night.  It has him looking
forward to their
stay-in
plans for the evening.  He doesn’t remove
his eyes from her provocative photo, until his phone starts ringing.

“David here,” he answers.

“She’s just exited the building,” the man voices.

Harley had hired a fellow detective to keep an eye on his
dear
friend,
Jillian.  “I’m just around the block.  I can take it from
here, thanks.”  He ends the call and pulls his motorcycle around the
block, until Jillian pulls out of his parking lot well past closing time.

What the hell is she doing at work afterhours?

He keeps his distance, with his headlights turned low, but
follows close enough behind her to know that it’s Brandee Hawkins she runs into
outside the mall entrance.

Coincidence? 
I think not.
  His lead was
good, even though Harley was hoping it wasn’t.

The way she keeps looking over her shoulder tells him it’s
not an unexpected friendly meeting.  Harley turns off his headlights and
rolls forward until he has an unobstructed view of them.  They chat for a
minute and then enter the mall together.  He parks his bike and walks
quickly toward the entrance, seeing nothing but red.

Harley’s so enveloped in deceit that he doesn’t notice the
two men making a dash for him.  The scrawny one hollers out, but not until
the other has his big fat arms wrapped around his neck.  He’s yanked
aside, and feels his faced being crushed against the brick wall.  He can
feel the blood trickling from his nose, but he’s far from giving up.

David H. Gates never gives up.

“Your girl thinks she’s so smart,” the skinny guy cackles.

Harley stands still for a minute, ready to strike, as he
considers the safety of his
girl
.  Are they talking about his
daughter or his woman?  He doesn’t even know.  Before he bashes their
heads in, he’s going to have to hang onto his temper and bleed a little
information out of them.  He has a couple of ideas in mind.

Without a second thought, he opts for plan B, head butting
the big guy behind him.  As the man stumbles backward, Harley knocks him
out cold with a right hook.  The big guy drops to the cement with a
sickening thud.  The scrawny man is so caught up in the moment, he forgets
to run.

His head-start is nothing a few paces won’t fix. 
Harley runs after him and quickly reaches out.  He grabs onto the back of
his jacket and yanks him backward.  “Where do you think you’re going?”

The man is close to crying, a dirty, wily man who he won’t
give a smidgen of trust to.  Harley readjusts his grip on the front of his
shirt and gives it a twist before he lifts him up to make his threat.  His
fisted hand presses against the man’s throat, pinning him to the brick wall of
the building.

“You’re going to tell me what
girl
you’re referring
to, or I’m going to beat you within an inch of your life.  I might just do
that anyway.”

“I can’t.  If I tell you, I don’t get paid.  I
have a family to feed,” the man whines.

Harley doesn’t believe him.  From the stench of body
odor, combined with the the stale splash of beer on his breath, he knows no
woman in her right mind would let that man into her home; especially a house
with children.

“Wrong answer.”  Harley drops a heavy fist, connecting
with his face.