Chapter 22: Lockpick Seduction
The bottle of Blanton’s felt heavier than it should have, half-empty and damning in her hand. The amber liquid swirled, catching the flicker of a dying sandalwood candle. She’d wanted to erase the trace of him, the warmth he’d left in the glass, the phantom feel of his thumb on her cheek. Dumping it down the sink felt childish, but necessary. A statement. A tiny line in the sand.
As the whiskey vanished with a final, defiant glug, her phone buzzed against the marble countertop. Not a call. A text. The screen glowed, casting a cold blue light on the smooth surface. The name made her throat tighten.
Dex.
No preamble. Just two words.
Dex: Garage. Now.
Then, a second later, another, the text alert vibrating again with an insect-like urgency.
Dex: Run all you want, princess. I always collect what's mine.
She stared at the words. Collect. The word felt sharp, like a hook. She’d been an object in his text to Cole. Now she was a possession to be reacquired. The anger from the dock was gone, replaced by a low, humming fear that settled in her bones. This wasn’t a game anymore. The playfulness in Cole’s eyes had been a shield for this—the steel core of whatever pact existed between them.
Her thumb hovered over the screen.Block? Call the police? She imagined explaining it. Two men I willingly went home with are now making vaguely threatening demands. The officer’s bored, skeptical face swam in her mind. She wouldn’t even believe herself.
A soft, scraping sound came from the direction of her front door.
She froze, the bottle still in her hand. It was a subtle noise, metal on metal. Not a knock.
Her apartment was on the second floor. The hallway was secure. Or it was supposed to be.
The scrape came again, followed by a faint, familiar click. The deadbolt.
He’s coming in.
The thought was ice water. She backed away from the kitchen island, her bare feet silent on the polished concrete floor. The balcony door was still ajar from earlier, the city’s night air seeping in, but five stories was not an exit. The only other way out was the door now being breached.
The latch turned. The door swung open slowly, not with a kick, but with a deliberate, almost polite push.
Cole stood framed in the doorway. He didn’t stride in. He just leaned against the jamb, his shaggy hair falling over one blue eye. He’d changed into a clean black t-shirt and his usual leather jacket. He looked infuriatingly calm. His eyes swept over the apartment, taking in the high ceilings, the carefully curated art on the walls, the vulnerable openness of it all. They landed on her, standing in the kitchen, clutching the empty whiskey bottle like a club.
“Hey there, baby,” he said, his voice a low murmur that carried easily across the space. “Ready to go?” He stepped inside, closing the door behind him with a soft but final click. The lock engaged.
“Get out.” The words came out strained. “I mean it, Cole. I will call the cops. This is breaking and entering.”
He turned to face her, leaning against the wall beside the painting. His posture was relaxed, but his eyes were watchful. “He sent the texts, yeah?”
She didn’t answer.
“Yeah,” Cole answered for her. “He’s not a patient guy, Dex. Less patient when he thinks he’s being disobeyed.” He pushed off the wall and took a few steps toward the kitchen island, stopping just on the other side. The bottle in her hand was the only thing between them. “You poured my whiskey out. That’s cold, Jade.”
“What do you want?”
“I want you to be smart. You’re holding a glass bottle. You’re thinking you could maybe crack me over the head with it if you had to. You won’t. You’re not built for that. And even if you did, then what? Dex would come. And he wouldn’t text first.” He nodded toward her phone. “He gets mean when he waits. I’m not being poetic. I’m stating a fact.”
The fear tightened, constricting her breath. “This isn’t adventure. This is… this is terror.”
A flicker of something—annoyance? pity?—crossed his face. “It’s only terror if you’re on the outside. You stepped in. You’re in the room now. The rules are different.”
“What rules?” she nearly shouted. “You don’t get to just make up rules!”
“We didn’t,” he said, his voice dropping, losing its casual edge. “They were always there. You just agreed to them without reading the fine print.” He glanced at his own watch, a heavy, utilitarian thing on his wrist. “It’s 11:47. His garage is a thirteen-minute ride if you hit the lights right. Less if I drive.”
“I’m not getting on your bike.”
“You can walk in with me, looking like the fierce, complicated woman who makes her own terrible choices, or I can tell him you needed convincing. He’ll come up here himself. And his version of convincing…” Cole let the sentence hang, his gaze drifting meaningfully around her pristine apartment. “It’s messier.”
“I’ve made it clear, to both of you. Many times. I don't want to play your games. I don’t know your ‘rules’.” She said. “When I moved her a month ago, you pretended to be the ‘nice’ upstairs neighbor, while Dex brooded in the parking lot. How am I to blame for you fucked up possession?”
Cole didn’t move from his lean against the kitchen island. He just stared, his blue eyes tracing the furious line of her jaw, the defiant grip on the empty bottle. A slow, unsettling smile touched his lips, devoid of any warmth or charm.
“You’re not to blame for the possession, baby,” he said, his voice a low, conspiratorial rumble that seemed to absorb the city’s hum from the open balcony door. “You’re to blame for making it so fucking enjoyable.” He pushed off the counter, the legs of his boots scraping the concrete floor. “Now, are you walking out that door, or am I carrying you?” The flickering candlelight caught the hard set of his jaw. “His patience ran out five minutes ago.”
“ You’re not my fucking boyfriends. Neither of you can tell me what to do.”
Cole watched her, the empty bottle still raised in her white-knuckled grip, and his smile didn’t waver. It just changed, turning inward and bitter at the edges.
“Boyfriends,” he repeated, the word a flat, dull thing in the quiet loft. He gave a soft, humorless chuckle and shook his head. “You still think this is about dating.” He took a single, deliberate step forward, and the space between them crackled. “We’re not asking you to choose which one gets to take you to brunch, Jade.”
He nodded toward the balcony, where the distant growl of a motorcycle threaded through the open door. “That’s his bike. He’s not at the garage waiting. He’s circling the block. Every pass, his temper gets shorter. My job was to bring you down. Gently.” Another step. The kitchen island was the only thing separating them now. “You’re making ‘gently’ real fucking difficult.”
“So leave,” she spat, her voice trembling with a fury that felt like her last defense. “Tell him I wasn’t home. Tell him I’m a bitch. I don’t care.”
“I could,” Cole said, his head tilting. “But then I’d be lying to him. And I don’t do that.” He reached across the island, not for her, but for her phone where it lay next to the candle. He picked it up, studied the screen with Dex’s texts, then looked back at her. “You called the tune, remember? This is just the second verse.”
He tossed the phone back onto the counter. It clattered against the marble. “You have thirty seconds to put on real shoes. Then we leave.”
“Or what?”
He didn’t answer with words. He simply moved, too fast for her to react. He rounded the island, and his hand closed around her wrist. His grip wasn’t brutal, but it was unbreakable, a steel clamp that made the bones protest. The whiskey bottle tumbled from her other hand, hitting the concrete floor with a thud but not shattering. It rolled away under a chair.
“Or I make it look like you tripped,” he said, his voice low and close to her ear. His other hand came up, not to strike, but to brush her wild curls back from her face, a grotesque parody of tenderness. “And then I carry you down. Your choice, always. But the options are narrowing.”
The scent of him—leather, engine grease, and the faint, clean smell of his soap—filled her senses. It was the smell of the storage room, of the thrilling, dangerous blur of that night. The memory disconnected her anger, leaving only a cold, penetrating fear. He meant it. Every word.
She stopped struggling. The fight drained out of her, leaving her limbs heavy.
Cole felt the change instantly. His grip on her wrist softened, became merely firm. He looked down at her bare feet, then back at her face, reading the surrender there. “Shoes,” he said again, quieter now. “Boots. Something that can handle a garage floor.”
She pulled her wrist from his grasp, and he let her go. She walked on numb legs to the small closet by the door, her back to him. She could feel his eyes on her, watching, assessing. She pulled on a pair of scuffed leather ankle boots, her fingers fumbling with the zippers.
When she turned around, he was holding his own black leather jacket, the one she’d worn earlier. He held it out to her, not offering help, just presenting it. “It’s cold. The garage is colder.”
She stared at it, this symbol of a choice she’d already made hours ago. Taking it now felt like signing a contract. She put it on. The weight was familiar, the lingering warmth from his body both a comfort and a violation.
“Good,” he said, and it sounded almost like praise. He opened the apartment door, holding it for her. The hallway was empty, sterile under the fluorescent lights. “After you.”
She walked past him, the boots feeling foreign on her feet. He followed, pulling the door shut behind them. The lock clicked with finality. She was outside her sanctuary, escorted by her captor.
They descended the stairs in silence. Her mind raced, a frantic search for an exit that wasn’t there. A neighbor, a noise, anything. The building was quiet, asleep.
The lobby was empty. The night air outside was a slap, sharp and smelling of rain and city exhaust. Parked at the curb, idling with a low, impatient rumble, was Dex’s black Harley. He sat astride it, a silhouette carved from shadow and streetlight.
He didn’t look at her. His gaze was fixed on Cole, a silent question hanging in the air.
Cole gave a slight, almost imperceptible nod. “Told you I’d get her,” he said, his voice casual, as if fetching a misplaced parcel.
Dex’s helmeted head turned slowly toward Jade. The visor was down, hiding his eyes, but she felt the weight of his stare. He revved the engine once, a throaty command that echoed off the building facades. Then he jerked his head toward the back of his bike.
Cole’s hand pressed against the small of her back, guiding her forward. “You’re with me,” he murmured, steering her past Dex’s bike toward the opposite side of the street. Another motorcycle, a vintage Triumph painted a deep charcoal, was leaned against a street sign. “Safer this way,” Cole added, his tone leaving no room for debate.
He swung a leg over the Triumph, kick-started it with a single, efficient motion, and looked at her waiting by the curb. The engine settled into a smoother, lighter purr compared to the Harley’s growl. He reached into a saddlebag and pulled out a spare helmet.
He held it out. “Put it on.”
This was the moment. She could scream. She could run. She could throw the helmet into the street. She looked at Dex, a still and menacing statue on his machine. She looked at Cole, his expression unreadable behind the visor of his own helmet. The city around them was a canyon of indifference.
Her hands were cold. She took the helmet. The foam lining was cool against her skin. She fastened the chin strap, the click of the buckle loud in her ears.
Cole watched her secure it, then nodded. He patted the seat behind him. “Just hold on tight,” he said, and for a second, the old playful smirk was back in his voice. “Don’t worry, I don’t bite. Unless you ask nice.”
She climbed on, the motorcycle seat unfamiliar and precarious. She hesitated, then wrapped her arms around his waist, her hands clutching the front of his jacket. He was solid, real. He reached down, patted her clasped hands once, a brief, unsettling gesture of reassurance.
Dex took off first, the Harley roaring down the empty street like a declaration. Cole followed, the Triumph threading smoothly into the wake of sound. The city blurred into streaks of neon and shadow, and Jade closed her eyes, feeling the engine’s vibration travel through her body.