Thrill City Read Online Free PDF Page A

broad-shouldered with black hair, dark chocolate eyes, and big hands with veins on the back that roped all the way up his forearms. He favoured expensive shirts and wore this woody, earthy aftershave that did strange things to me when I smelled it up close.
    I’d always fancied Alex and had worked closely with him on a few occasions, but despite the obvious chemistry between us, getting involved would have been disastrous. He was a hell of a lot straighter than me, disapproved of pretty much everything I did, had a fiancée he was marrying in two days and, worst of all, was Sean’s best friend.
    Alex had been on leave from the service for the past few months because of an injury he’d sustained working on a case with me. He’d been in a coma and nearly died, and he still hadn’t completely recovered. He was getting physical therapy to regain full use of his right arm, and the docs suspected a slight brain injury may have affected his impulse control. Not real swell when your job involves packing a loaded weapon. The police service was his life, and every time I thought of what had happened to him I felt like crying because I knew it was all my fault. Him, my mum, my mum’s partner Steve . . . Don’t think about it . That was my mantra. Nothing wrong with a bit of repression.
    ‘What about him?’ I asked, as casually as I could.
    ‘Ever since you came back from his buck’s night you’ve been acting strange.’
    I’d unwittingly turned up at Alex’s bachelor party because some arsehole cousin of his had thought it would be funny to hire me to do a cop-themed strip. I strode into the room, came up from behind, and it wasn’t until I’d straddled his lap that I realised it was Alex. Soon as I clocked him I ran out of the function room and locked myself in a disabled toilet, mortified. Then he’d come into the cubicle with me, drunk, and— ‘See, you’re doing it now,’ Chloe said. ‘You’ve got this weird, faraway look in your eyes. Did something happen between the two of you at the party?’
    ‘I told you. Soon as I found out whose buck’s it was I left.’
    ‘Took you a long time to get back here.’
    ‘Waited ages for a cab.’
    She looked like she was going to keep hassling, and all I wanted was to put everything behind me and never think of Alex Christakos again. Desperate to change the subject, I plucked the passes out of my jeans pocket and dangled them in front of her. She squinted, examining the laminated cardboard.
    ‘Backstage pass?’
    ‘To a writers’ festival. Nick gave them to me.’
    She plucked one from me and read it closely. ‘The Summer Sessions!’ She sat up straight. ‘We have to go.’
    ‘Wow. Nice to see you’re so excited. And there I was thinking your idea of literature was Penthouse Forum .’ Mean, but I owed her for the ‘not the best stripper’ crack.
    ‘I read, sometimes. But that’s not why I wanna go. Curtis is doing a true crime panel there and I have to check up on him.’
    I did a double take. Far as I knew, Chloe didn’t particularly like Curtis. They’d dated for five months, then she’d got knocked up and decided to have the baby and ditch the boyfriend. He’d been hopelessly devoted, but she’d been rather cruel, using him for sex when she felt like it then berating him for continually hanging around.
    ‘Why?’
    ‘He didn’t answer my last booty call. It got me suspicious. I think he has a girlfriend.’
    ‘So what? You’ve had about five boyfriends since you two broke up.’
    Pregnancy hadn’t taken the edge off her libido, or her ability to attract anything with a pulse.
    ‘Not boyfriends. Roots. Big difference.’
    ‘Either way, why do you care?’
    Her hand fluttered to her chest and her voice went all breathy. ‘Simone, he’s the father of my unborn child!’
    What bullshit. She just loved having him at her beck and call. It was an ego trip and I told her so. ‘Chloe, you don’t want him, but you don’t want anyone else to have