Free RECKLESS — Bad Boy Criminal Romance by Anna Aletto Page A

exclaims.
                  “Well, I took it and made it mine.”
                  “No,” she says.  “I mean, I want more for myself than just this belt.”
                  “Like what?”
                  She opens the jewelry box.  “Like this and this.”  She removes a cheap gold bracelet that I don’t mind losing.  However, she also takes a two carat diamond engagement ring which I begrudgingly surrender.
                  “Just go back to your condo and hide those somewhere,” I tell her.  “Bye.”
    “See ya.”  Angela exits my room.
     
    That afternoon I have my suitcase on my bed.  I fold my clothes into it, readying to leave Pensacola.
                  Someone knocks at the door.
                  I look through the eyehole.  It’s Angela.  I open the door.  “Hey.”
                  “Hey, I need your help,” she says.  “Can I come in a second?”  Before I can answer she brushes past me into the room.  She’s changed from her bathing suit and is wearing low-rise jeans and a white T-shirt.
                  “What is it?”  I close the door.
                  Angela paces around the room.  “My mom saw the ring and started screaming at me.”
                  “How’d she find it?”
    “I had it on.”
    “Why?”
    “Because I was just sitting in my room looking at it when she came in.”
    “Just tell her you found it or something.”
    She sits on the edge of the bed.  “Her and my dad are really upset.  She started saying she was going to call the police unless I told her where I got it.”
                  I chuckle.  “It’s none of my business.  I’m leaving.”
                  “You are?  To where?”
                  “I don’t want to say.”
                  “Why not?”
                  “Because I’d rather no one know where I am.”  I zip up my suitcase and lift it off the bed.  “I’m checking out.  I’ll see you.”  I open the door.
                  “Hey, wait.”  She stands up.  “Can I come with you?”
    I look at her.  “No.”
                  “Why not?”
                  “Why would you?  You’re going to run away?”
                  “Well, what are you doing?”
                  “Look, I know you’re afraid your parents are going to yell and ground you.  And maybe you’d like to miss going back to high school so you can skip your homework.  But wake up.  You don’t want to run away.”
                  “I just don’t want to be bored,” she states, matter of fact.
                  I shake my head.
                  “Aren’t you lonely being by yourself?”
                  I stare at her.
    “I wouldn’t be any trouble.  And I’ll do whatever you say.  Wouldn’t you like to have me with you?”
    I consider it.  In the motel parking lot I place my suitcase in the trunk of my Toyota.
                  “How about my stuff?” Angela asks.  “Can we stop by my condo before we go?”
                  “Forget it,” I tell her.  “Do you have a cell phone?”
                  “Yeah.”
                  “Let me borrow it real quick.”
                  She takes a cell phone out of her pocket and hands it to me.
                  I walk to edge of the parking lot and throw the phone as far as I can into a vast, undeveloped area of beach land.
    Angela watches her cell phone sail away.  “Shit.”
     
    MOBILE, Ala. – Angela in the passenger seat, I drive my car into a Shell gas station.  I park on the side of the building near a phone booth.  Pigeons in the parking lot peck and fight hungrily over the remains of a discarded hot dog.  I leave Angela