Red-Handed Ch. 01

They cried out together as he rummaged in his phone pocket, a cacophony of spluttering panic accompanied by beseeching hands. Then Scarlet managed to articulate her thoughts. "Please no, not the police. We've made a mistake." She flinched at the response on his face to the final word. "More than a mistake. We've... We've been stupid -- really, really unforgivably stupid... We're sorry, right, Imogen?"

"Yes, we're sorry. We're so, so sorry."

"You're sorry?" His fury turned incandescent. "You're fucking sorry? You haven't started to be sorry. Your little mistake is going to have some serious fucking consequences. I'm going to school you both in the meaning of sorry." Scarlet went to stand, her palm outstretched in appeasement. "Sit there!" he raged, and she folded back into her position on the bed, looking crushed and miserable.

The blonde was blubbering now, mascara starting to trickle. "Oh God," she was mumbling to herself, "my parents will never speak to me again. What'll my boyfriend say? This can't be happening..."

"Imogen, shut up," her friend spat. "Look, please," she appealed to him again, hands gripping the duvet. "We're begging you, you don't have to do this. We're pleading with you here." Beside her Imogen nodded vigorously, murky tear-trails all down her cheeks.

"Pleading are you?" They nodded in agreement. Mac felt grim amusement, despite his anger, at the thieves' frantic efforts; their squirming attempts to disentangle their pretty selves from the net in which they had become trapped were undeniably entertaining. Calling the police somehow seemed too easy. Kind of a wasted opportunity. "You ferret about in my property," he persisted, milking the moment, "go through all my private belongings and then think you can plead your way out of it? Give me a reason." They stared at him, the scarlet's look rather more alert than her friend's. Surprisingly it was the blonde who attempted something.

"Because you're nice," she said simply.

"I'm sorry?"

"When we met you at that party -- you seemed nice. I think you are, really..."

Her words faltered. If the words were meant to disarm him, they had failed. The girl's assessment chimed with the one Miranda had made over dinner, shortly before she fucked him over. Quietly he let the words feed his wrath. "Imogen, right?" She nodded glumly. "No, Imogen. You've got that all wrong. I'm not nice. I'm not nice at all, and you'll soon know the truth of that. So go on, try again. Tell me why I shouldn't make that call." He looked back and forth at them both. "You're going to pay your way out of it? I'm guessing not, if you're both trying to grub money from Miranda this way. So tell me, you little house-breaking bitches, what exactly do you have to bargain with?"

It was as if Mac was grasping his own meaning even as he spoke. His body already knew it. His cock, which had deflated when he realised Miranda's deception, was rock hard once more. It had been engorging for some time, fuelled by his fury, without his even realising it. At any other moment in his life his conscience would have clamped down on the instinct, but tonight in the face of these two hot, panting thieves, his better angels didn't have a prayer. 'Good-guy Mac' had been banished from the occasion.

"Well?" he demanded, his erection swelling to full size as his mind embraced his body's demands. All his anger had concentrated into one huge, demanding hard-on and as the blood pumped through his veins, he knew his course. "Tell me."

Scarlet saw his intention first, and her face blushed a complimentary crimson. "We... We can make this right, can't we, Imogen?" she said, her stare not parting from Mac's.

Her partner's look faltered briefly, before the blonde girl nodded frantically once more, grasping at this single straw of hope, whatever form it was likely to take. "Uh-huh. Yes, we can."

A smile crept onto Mac's lips and for the first time he acknowledged his enjoyment in the unfolding situation. His heart was beating fast and a sense of his own emerging power was enveloping him. "Make it right how, exactly? Come on, girls, I'm not going to make this easy for you. Say exactly how you're going to make it right."

"God..." There was frustration in Scarlet's voice now; it clearly irked her to be played this way. "We'll do anything if you forget all this, right, Im?"

"Yes, anything, please!" Blondie's concerns over parents and boyfriend were clearly trouncing all other considerations in that moment. Her secret must be kept at all costs.

"There it is," Mac said, marvelling secretly at the words coming out of his mouth. "The magic word -- anything. Care to add some specifics?"

Scarlet looked at him with pure malice now, while Blondie awaited the next development, eyes teary and mouth wide open.

"I'll... We'll..." Scarlet attempted.

Mac's patience ran out. It was time to get things moving. "Fuck this," he said, delving into a pocket and plucking out his phone.

"No!" the team leader cried out, her tear-streaked associate screaming in unison with her. "Don't call the police! Please!"

"I'm not calling the police," he said, through gritted teeth, "I'm cancelling a morning engagement. One way or another, this is going to be a long night. But I swear to Christ," he added with a malevolent stare, "if one of you bitches isn't naked and sucking my cock by the time I've finished this call, the police are next." He hit a number on his speed dial and stared at both their stunned faces. "You think I'm fucking joking? Well, who's it going to be? You girls are flat out of time."

TO BE CONTINUED