“Is this your car?” she asked, motioning to the Range Rover.
He nodded and opened the passenger door for her. “Hop in.”
“Hold on. One second.” She walked around to the front of the car and took a picture of the car and license plate and sent it off in a quick text to her best friend, Emily.
“Did you just take a picture of my license plate?” he asked, one brow raised as he watched her.
“And texted it to my friend,” she confirmed, waltzing past him and climbing into the passenger seat of the car.
He chuckled, leaning against the doorframe. “Can I ask why?”
“In case you murder me.” She turned to face him, giving him a deadpan expression like it was the most obvious thing ever.
Her mother had taught her that trick years ago, though growing up in Las Vegas had been an education in and of itself. Men were a lot less likely to act nefariously when they knew they were being held accountable by an anonymous third party.
A grin spread wide across his face, and it only made his beautiful features all the more glorious. “Smart lady.” He closed her car door, and she watched with interest as he walked around the car and then climbed into the driver’s seat. The way he moved… Jesus, it was a sin. He stalked around the car like he was searching for prey, and it made her shiver—in the best way.
“Where to, Ms. Precaution?” he asked.
Maybe it was the tequila talking, or maybe it was the fact that he was daring her to throw caution to the wind, or maybe she was just fed up with the monotony of her life and wanted to throw a wrench into things. She wasn’t sure what made the next words come out of her mouth. All she knew was that she’d said them and she didn’t want to take them back…
“Take me to your place.”
Chapter Two
If there was one thing Callan hadn’t expected tonight, it was to meet her. Tight black curls that fell loose around her face and bobbed as she talked, bright-green eyes that seemed to gaze right through him, creamy brown skin that he wanted to run his hands across… She was every bit as intoxicating as he’d suspected when he’d first seen her across the bar pounding back tequila shots.
He’d considered approaching her, but she’d looked deep in thought and not in the mood for company. By the time he’d decided to do it anyway, she was already leaving, but he’d seen an older man follow her out. He wasn’t sure it was any reason for alarm, but he’d decided to check anyway just to be sure.
Thank God he had.
Now fifteen minutes later, she was asking him to take her to his house for the night.
“Don’t tempt me like that, Josie,” he replied, eyeing her sideways. “You’re a beautiful girl, and that’s a hard thing to turn down.”
“So don’t turn it down,” she replied, like it was the most obvious answer. He already was loving her wit and attitude—the spunk in the way she spoke and viewed the world was mesmerizing.
“How do I know you’re not drunk?” he asked, because hell if he was going to take advantage of a drunk woman.
She touched her fingers to her nose a few times and then started counting backward from one hundred by sevens. He wasn’t even sure if she was accurate, but she sounded right. Hell, she sounded sober enough.
“I’m telling you—the lipstick freak sobered me right the hell up,” she assured him. “Now, let’s go.”
Callan smirked, enjoying the change of pace of being told what to do for once. Normally, he was the boss. He made the rules and laid down the law, but here was this tiny woman barking out orders, and he loved every second of it. And he was pretty sure he was going to love every second of tonight, too.
“You’re a hard woman to say no to,” he said, putting the car into gear and pulling out onto the main road. “And I don’t think I want to.”
She flashed her pearly whites at him in a wide grin. He returned her smile, already wanting to do more than that.
She reached over and began fiddling with the radio dials on his car. Finally, she stopped when she got to a station that was playing Cardi B. She leaned back against the passenger seat and began singing along, not getting a single lyric wrong. Her voice was fantastic, and he glanced sideways more than once to watch her bop along as they drove.
“Wait!” she suddenly screamed out. “Go back!”
“What?” Callan glanced in his rearview mirror, checking to make sure he hadn’t hit anything.
“Did you see that?” Josie’s head was halfway out the window, looking at something behind them.
“See what?” He was thoroughly confused.
“There’s a woman lying on the ground over there.” Josie pointed to a figure behind them lying across the sidewalk.
He could see it now that he’d slowed down.
There were no other cars on the road, so he slowed to a stop and put the car in reverse. Pulling up next to the woman, he turned to Josie. “Stay here.”
He had no idea if the situation was safe or not, and he wasn’t about to risk her life on top of everything.
She nodded in agreement, green eyes wide.
Callan hopped out of the car and walked around to the figure. “Miss? Ma’am?”
The woman made no movement. Shit. He wasn’t sure he could handle seeing a dead body. That certainly wasn’t on his bucket list, and hell, his public relations manager would absolutely hate the nightmare this would cause for his career.
After gently tapping her shoulder, he moved his hands to her neck to feel for a pulse. “Miss, are you okay?”
Except there was no pulse.
Because it was a doll. One of the most realistic sex dolls he’d ever seen in his life. These things cost thousands of dollars, and this one was clearly well used and very…enjoyed.
“What the fuck?” Callan let out a loud laugh and then motioned for Josie to come join him. “Josie, it’s a doll.”
“What?” She scurried out of the car and over to him as he was flipping it over. It weighed over a hundred pounds—to be as realistic as possible—so she made a loud thunk when he flipped her onto her back.
“It’s one of those human-like sex dolls.” Callan had to admit, it was very realistic-looking and entirely creepy. He felt like he needed gloves to handle it because God knew where this doll had been or what had been done to it.
“Well…that’s just sad,” Josie said. “Leaving her like that, destitute and naked on the street. And, dang, what did they do to her lady parts? Poor girl has been through a lot.”
“People are animals,” he agreed, standing up and walking back around to the driver’s side of the car.
“Wait, we can’t just leave her here,” Josie said, calling him back. “She’s so…real-looking. It’s almost scary. We can’t just abandon her on the side of the road like they did.”
“What do you want to do with her? Toss her in the trash?” Callan grimaced because that didn’t seem like the most humane option either. “Seems just as fucked up, to be honest.”
“We have to give her a funeral and proper burial.” Josie shrugged her shoulders, like it was the most normal thing in the world. “Sienna deserves that much.”