Roni Loren - Loving You Easy

So she did the only thing she thought might work.

She let the fight go out of her body and sagged like a sack of stones in his arms. He was here for Lenore. She was supposed to be submissive. She prayed he would buy it.

“That’s it,” he said, his words gentling. “I know you like these kinds of games, but we can’t be so loud, babe. That could get us in trouble. Your neighbors won’t get it.”

She nodded enthusiastically behind his hand. Yes. I’m totally on board with you, psycho asshole.

“Do you think you can be a good girl?”

Instead of screaming again like she wanted to, she whimpered. The sound was pathetic and pitiful. It made bile rise in the back of her throat. But she could feel some of the tension in his body give way. It was working.

“Shh, girl, it’s okay. I know you’re sorry. I’m going to show you how to make it up to me. I know what you need.” He pressed his hips into her, letting her feel his erection. “And I can’t wait.”

She closed her eyes, willing herself not to lose it completely or vomit behind his hand. Her entire body trembled from the effort of trying to appear calm.

“I’m going to move my hand now,” he said against her ear. “You know we’re just playing now. You don’t have to be scared. You don’t need to scream. We’re just going to have a fun night for real this time. I’m going to give you what you want.”

She nodded her promise. But the second he moved his hand away from her mouth, she screamed like she was on fire.

“Shit!” His hand instantly clamped back down, but it’d been enough. Within a few seconds, her neighbor’s door flew open and Josh came charging out in his boxers, blond hair wild. Carlos was right behind him, mostly dressed and carrying a baseball bat.

“What the fuck?” Josh’s eyes went wide as he took in the scene.

Cora yelled behind the guy’s hand.

“Oh, hell no.” Carlos charged forward, rage in his eyes and the bat looming in his hand. “You better get your fucking hands off her, asshole.”

Her captor dragged her back a step. “Whoa, man, chill out. It’s not what it looks like.” The voice behind her had changed completely—from deep and menacing to dude-bro speak. “We’re just playing a game. She’s in on it. Tell him, Lenore.”

The hand moved away from her mouth and words burst out of her in a rush. “Get the hell off me, you crazy fuck!”

“Lenore?” The guy’s voice turned confused.

“Her name’s not Lenore,” Josh said, stepping up behind Carlos and looking ready to throw down. “And if you don’t get your hands off her, my boyfriend’s going to show you how good his batting average is.”

“Damn straight,” Carlos said. “Your big-ass head will be an easy target.”

“Jesus. Calm the hell down.” The man released Cora at that and she nearly fell on her face as she bolted away from him in those godforsaken heels. She ran to the spot behind Carlos and then spun to face BigMan. The guy was a big dude. Beefy and barrel-chested and thick around the middle. But his face was young—a college-boy face. And he seemed . . . bewildered. He lifted his palms to them. “Look, bro. I think this is just a big misunderstanding. I wasn’t here to cause trouble. She wanted this. She’s got a safe word.”

“Call the cops, Josh,” Carlos barked.

But Cora reached out and put a hand on Josh’s arm. “Wait.”

Josh gave her a what-the-fuck look. “Hon, we have to—”

Cora didn’t have time to explain about how complicated it could get with her mom the police captain knowing or one of her mom’s officers interviewing some guy Cora had met in a kinky video game. “Just . . .”

“Wait, you’re not Lenore.”

The blurted statement from BigMan drew all of their attention.

The guy stepped closer, his eyes evaluating her face, her hair, her body in the light coming from Josh and Carlos’s open doorway. “And if you are, you’re a goddamned liar.”

Carlos waved the bat. “Back off, man.”

The guy halted his step but shook his head. “Jesus Christ, I’ve got the wrong girl. You’re . . .” His gaze traced over her again and he winced. “Yeah, there’s no way you’re her.”

The words were like a bucket of ice water. She didn’t want anything to do with this nutjob, but the dismissiveness of his words cut deep. She could hear his opinion as loud as a bullhorn: How could someone like her possibly have anything to do with the sexy, beautiful Lenore?

Cora straightened her spine, gathering every ounce of will she had to look righteous and unaffected. “I don’t know who the hell you are or who you’re looking for, but if you’re not off my porch in the next thirty seconds, I’m—”

But it was too late. The sirens blared from down the street. Another neighbor must’ve called.

BigMan jumped the railing and bolted.

—

A few hours later, Cora had been interviewed by two cops she knew, which meant her mother would find out—yay—and she’d drank too much of Josh’s gourmet coffee, which had left her jittery. She hadn’t given the police the full story. She’d stuck with the lie that she had no idea who the guy was and that it was apparently some case of mistaken identity.

Carlos had given her a raised brow. He’d probably grill her on another day, but she wasn’t going to admit to anything more than that on record. And she appreciated that after the cops left, he and Josh had hung around with her for a while to make sure she was okay and hadn’t pushed for more information.

But now she was alone and should probably go to bed, but there was no way she could sleep. Instead she wrapped herself up in her grandmother’s afghan and sat in front of the dual computer monitors in her makeshift office space in her bedroom. She pulled up the Hayven game. She’d missed the window of time to chat with Dmitry by many hours, but that wasn’t why she was signing in now. Hell, she may never chat with anyone in the game again after what had happened tonight. If someone like BigMan could get her information, she wasn’t safe from anyone. She hadn’t gathered a lot from BigMan in the few times they’d chatted, but she’d figured out quickly that he wasn’t the brightest bulb on the Christmas tree. How the hell had someone like him gotten her personal information?

Time to find out.

She opened up the log-in box and used her password manager to enter the long, complicated string of numbers and characters. Then, she clicked the checkbox for stealth mode. She didn’t need anyone knowing Lenore was online right now. The game queued up. Her inbox was stuffed with unread messages. Dmitry had sent her an invitation to play privately but, of course, she’d been too busy being attacked to answer. She minimized the mailbox to get into the main part of the game. The interior of the house she’d built for herself in Hayven came into view, a cute little cottage in the woods. The game was first-person style, so she was looking out from the perspective of Lenore, who was currently lying in bed.

But Cora wasn’t there to be Lenore right now. She was on a mission. She opened chat mode and went into her list of people she’d interacted with before. Their screen names were there along with an icon letting her know who was actively online and who wasn’t. BigMan wasn’t online. Neither was Dmitry.

She clicked BigMan’s name to open up his profile. It was relatively vague but had more than hers did. He listed his profession as athletic trainer and his age as thirty. Yeah, okay. No way was that guy a day over twenty-two. She scanned down. Located in north Texas. No pets. Favorite sports team—Dallas U Coyotes. There were multiple exclamation points behind the team name.