The CEO’s Bad Boy

Chapter 1

Ash stumbled into the lecture room late, scowling; he had told them to hurry up, but no. He kept his head low, trying to ignore the professor teaching at the front of the hall as he sat beside Mae towards the front and pulled out his Macbook. He stared at the slides on the large screen, trying to understand what was being taught. He opened the lecture notes as he pulled open the app he used to write down all of his notes on one side and the other side of the screen.

Mae knocked his elbow, and he looked at her. She stared at her screen, so he did, too. He stared at her notes from this class, and f**k, he had missed so much, but as he continued scanning her messages, his eyes landed on the sentence at the bottom of the screen.

‘Why are you late?’

He sighed as he scrolled through his app and wrote, ‘Not my fault. Send me your notes after.’ She sighed but nodded, and the two didn’t speak after that. Once they were freed, Mae turned to stare at him. Her blonde lashes were coated in a thin layer of mascara, and her brown eyes stared at him as she adjusted her white jacket.

“What is it, Mae?”

“I’m going into the centre. Do you want to come?”

“No, I’m meeting Liv.”

“Oh, okay. Say hi to her for me.”

“Will do.”

He texted Liv to tell her that he had just finished, and he told her to meet him on the balcony of the Jacob building. He walked through the large building, students bustling around, talking to one another in an array of languages, and when he got to the fourth floor and outside, he pulled out a cigarette.

He spotted her long dark hair and walked over to the edge, where she was leaning against the railing. “You were late,” she said as he walked over.

“It was the other two's fault. They wouldn’t hurry up. And you left without us.”

She leaned against the railing, placing her elbows on them and her head on her hand and shrugged. “I told you I would leave if you were late. Did your professor say anything?”

“No. I did miss the first ten minutes, though, which is annoying. I’ve asked Mae to send me her notes. She also says hi.”

“Aw, tell her I say hi too.”

“Tell her yourself,” he grumbled.

The two stood beside one another in silence as they basked in the sunlight and stared down at the students coming and going over the bridge. “Mama’s been stressed,” Olivia said after a while as she fiddled with the hem of her grey graphic t-shirt; it had a tarot card on, the fool.

Ash blew out a puff of smoke while staring at the people. “I know.”

“Should we?” she said, trailing off.

“Lucky said no,” he replied, staring at the people below.

“He doesn’t need to know,” she said, waggling her eyebrows.

“No, but for it to work, we also need Dai, and we both know Dai will tell Lucky.”

“We can threaten him?”

“Tried it. He laughed in my face,” Ash grumbled as he put his cigarette out and then went over and binned his butt. He walked over to his sister, who was smirking.

“Who is cooking tonight? I want lasagne,” she said as she closed her eyes, tilted her head up so the sun hit her face, and smiled at the feeling. Ash smiled as he watched her. Her dark skin looked glowing under the light, her lashes casting faint shadows on her cheeks. He spotted two other students staring at her, so he glared at them, and the two looked away.

“Dai’s turn.”

A smile crept across her face as she ran a hand through her dark hair. Her eyes widened as she gasped, whacking his arm. “Did I tell you about Scarlet?” Scarlet was the department's ‘it’ girl. Ash found it ridiculous that it was even a thing, considering they were all university students, and the popularity thing should have been over way back in high school, but no.

“No? What did she do now?”

“I heard from Lana, who heard from her brother and his best friend that she’s seeing someone.”

His eyebrows shot up. Ah, f**k. Did he home wreck? He inwardly groaned; he had one rule. And only one rule: he did not want a home wreck, but he did sleep with her last night.

“Who?”

Liv shrugged as she fixed her white jacket. “No clue. She says she slept with him last night and that he’s good in bed. Like really good.”

“Okay, I’m going to need you to be quiet,” he groaned, running his hands down his face. “And how do you even know that?”

“I was sitting behind her. She’s not very quiet.”

“I know.”

Olivia’s eyebrows shot up as her mouth dropped open. Her brown eyes widened as she turned to stare at him, and then a smile danced across her red lips. “Now that I think about it, you came home late last night. Around 4 a.m., if I am right. And you went straight to the shower.” Her face contorted in disgust. “Tell me you’re not the one Scarlet is talking about, Ash.”

He sighed as he ran a hand down his face and stared at Liv, who had her right arm across her chest, and with her left, she fiddled with her long earring with a star on. “It’s not me?” he said.

“You’re f*****g dating her?”

“No. I said it was a one-night stand or a mutual we f**k kinda thing. I said nothing about dating. I don’t have time to date.”

Olivia stared at him, her eyes narrowed. “You said you f*****g quit,” she hissed, whacking him on the arm. “Ash, what the f**k. We don’t need the money anymore. We’ve built the house, and everything else all five of us work. We would continue building it up, and you said you would f*****g quit. You told Lucky you would quit.”

“I can’t just walk up and say, hey, I wanna quit.”

“We told you not to get involved with them in the first place. What the f**k is mama going to think?”

“Don’t tell her, Liv,” he groaned. “You know she’ll be heartbroken and then go on a f*****g rampage. Do not tell her. I’m managing with what I have, so it’s fine. Okay? I can do this. Don’t worry.”

Olivia’s nostrils flared, and as the wind blew her dark hair across her face, she violently smacked it back. “You’re an absolute f*****g moron. But for our sanity, I am not going to tell her. I can’t believe you were stupid enough to become a dealer for a crime group, Ash! Do you know how f*****g risky that is?”

He scowled at her as he bit his lip, focusing on peeling the skin off it. “We needed the money,” he replied tightly. “The five of us were living in a two-bedroom house with damp. And we all know that dampness was worsening Lucky’s asthma. Since we moved, he’s been so much better, so no. I don’t regret it. It worked. I made the rest of the money in under six months, and we had enough from the rest of you to get some nicer things. And the layout is done; we can add the furniture as we go along.”

She scowled as she whacked him on the arm again. “You’re a f*****g moron and-”

“Why is Ash a f*****g moron?” Dai asked as he walked over. Liv and Dai both turned to stare at him; his dark skin was stretched across his toned muscles, and his eyebags were still prominent. He looked sleep-deprived as his blue eyes narrowed in on them. “What did he do now?”

“He’s still working for them,” Liv deadpanned, crossing her arms over her blue sweater as she smirked at Ash.

He scowled as he looked down at his sister. “I can’t believe you told him. Yous aid you wouldn’t.”

“No, I said I wouldn’t tell Mama. I never said anything about not telling Lucky or Dai.”

Dai scowled as he walked over and punched Ash on the arm roughly. “I will beat the s**t out of you, Ash. What the f**k? You said you stopped months ago.”

He frowned at the two of them, rubbing his arm. “Is today beat the s**t out of Ash day. Why am I getting so many bruises?”

“‘Casue you’re being f*****g stupid. How stupid are you! Do you know how much s**t you are in? When you came to us from day one, we told you not to f**k with that s**t. And what did you do? You f****d with that shit.”

He sighed as he stared at the two of them. “Just don’t tell Lucky, okay? Let me borrow your car, I need to do a few runs, and then I’ll be home. My bike still isn’t ready.”

Liv stared at him, and she begrudgingly handed the keys over. “Just don’t die, okay? You can’t f*****g die on us. And find a way to get out of this sooner rather than later.”

“I know,” he replied. “I’m working on it.”

He took the keys from his sister and said goodbye to them before walking away, rubbing at his eyes. How did he tell them he had already asked to be let out and that they had already said no? He hadn’t met the boss; he’d met one of his right-hand women, or at least that’s what he thought she was. He shivered at the thought of her.

Katrina had been terrifying, with her blood-red lips and dyed black hair contrasting her pale skin. Her nails had also been fake but were pointy and red, and she had two colours in her wardrobe: red and black. Ash had asked her about it once, said they hid the blood stains, and to prove her point, she had dragged her fingers across her chest to show red blood across her fingers. He had made a point to talk to her as much as needed. Otherwise, he would avoid her like the plague.

So, he did what he was told and made his runs, dropping off the drugs and taking the money. He did this for almost three hours, meeting people in dingy little alleys hidden between luxury buildings, stopping by some homes where the air was rotten with m*******a and more. And he said nothing.

At the end of the day, he stopped by one of the gang’s warehouses, a little over half an hour away from his house, in the next town over in the middle of some fresh fields, and he paused when his eyes landed on the sunset. The colours of it all blended, the pale blue sky, with the reds, oranges, pinks and drops of purple all unfolded in front of his eyes. He scrambled to take a picture before staring up at it once again.

“Hey!” he snapped his head over to see Katrina standing in the warehouse doorway, the shattered windows and the door barely hanging on by its creaking hinges. She wore a short black dress, a leather jacket, and ankle boots with chains dangling off them. Her hair flowed behind like spilt ink. “Get inside!”

He frowned; he usually never went inside. He would count the money and hand it over, and if he had any excess drugs left on him, he would also hand them over.

As if reading the confused look on his face, Katrina smiled. “Good day for you, newbie; you’re meeting the boss.”

He stared at her blankly. “But I don’t want to meet the boss?”

She scowled as she walked over, grabbing his arm. “Don’t speak back to me.”

“But is that not how conversations work.”

Ash inhaled, and when he looked down, a knife was pressed against his torso, the silver glinting in the sunset. “Say that again?”

Ash did, in fact, say something. “I said that was how conversations worked. And that I don’t want to meet the boss. I mean, come on. I just run drugs for them. Why would they want to see me? Let’s be honest. I’m not exactly the best dealer for him to be meeting. And, I want out. So, I have a feeling, boss man, woman? Person, won’t let me out if they see what I look like or worse. I see what they look like. Mate, I’ve seen too many movies. I know how this ends.”

She pressed the knife further into his skin. “You should have thought of that before you agreed to become a dealer. Let’s go.”

~*~