Gangs Aren't My Style (A Black Death Novel)

Chapter 37 - The Gang Inaguration

Gangs Aren't My Style

Book I of the Black Death Trilogy

PART TWO: Memories That Don't Seem To Fade

Chapter 37 - The Gang Inauguration

The sky was dark when Ally stepped up onto the nerf bar underneath the driver-side door. The jet black pickup truck into whose cab she hauled herself was barely visible against the dank landscape, only the twin globes of light below the hood gave away its position.

Ally sighed, bending to slip under the roof of the truck and to her seat, but froze with the majority of her limbs still outside the large cab. The wind brushed her back, but the chill was not the cause of the shiver that raced down her spine. Kyle sat on the other end of the truck, his legs spread comfortably as he leaned against the padded seat. He had not seen her yet. His gaze was riveted on the bleak scenery visible out of the tinted cab window.

Ally backed away, nearly plummeting from the truck when she misjudged the distance and one foot slipped off the edge of the truck frame. She hastily grabbed at the interior, finding a handgrip and pulling herself back to safety.

He had seen her now, and he looked no more pleased than she.

Ally grudgingly entered the cab, claiming the seat as far from Kyle as possible. However, as she looked forward, she realized it was not meant to be. The steering wheel loomed before her, within direct reach of her hands and feet. She was in the driver's seat and her chances of James letting her drive equaled zero, maybe even negative one hundred.

When her brother finally finished his other business and entered the truck cab through the same door she had used, he simply said, "Move over Ally."

She gritted her teeth. "Can't Kyle drive?" Anything to keep him from touching her.

James scowled. "No, now move." The order was accompanied with a light shove as he forced his way into the driver's seat and slammed the door closed behind him.

Ally's entire right side was pressed to Kyle's, and the jerk made no attempts to move over. She cringed, refusing to look in his direction, as tingles erupted from where their thighs pressed together and from where their shoulders rubbed. James was simply oblivious as he turned the key in the ignition and the engine flared to life.

Ally dared not move the entire ride, for fear of rubbing herself further against the ex-boyfriend whose remorseful overtures she had turned down and then trampled. However, her caution turned to vain when James rounded a corner unexpectedly and she tumbled to her right in a mass of tangled limbs.

When she had steadied herself, Ally realized that her hand was pressed to a warm chest. She could feel the erratic beating of the heart encased within. It was fast, too fast, almost as fast as her own.

Ally glanced up through the veil of her eyelashes. Kyle's eyes reflected into hers with a pale blue light like the frost blanketing the flowers on a chilly April morning. Her fingers constricted of their own accord, bunching the front of his shirt.

His hand did something similar where it rested on the curve of her waist (presumably to have helped keep her from falling). His fingertips slid under the edge of her shirt where the fabric had ridden up, prickling at her nerves as he slowly massaged her skin. His other hand traced the line of her jaw with measured movements, then tucked a single strand of hair behind her ear.

She had not been aware of just how much room Kyle had been keeping for himself until she glanced down to where she haphazardly straddled him and realized that her left thigh fit comfortably between his hip and the edge of the seat. Ally looked back to him, her heart a puddle at her feet.