Evil Enemy (Saint View Strip Book 1)

EVIL ENEMY SAINT VIEW STRIP, #1 ELLE THORPE WWW.ELLETHORPE.COM For Sam. Beta reader and candle maker extraordinaire. Thank you for all the years of support. Elle x BLURB Cops and strippers go together like…they don’t. I’m the ruling queen of Saint View Strip. After growing up poor, taking my clothes off and dancing for men is all I know. My thriving club and the people I employ are everything. They’re my ride or die, and I’m theirs. Nobody is taking them away from me. So when a local politician announces plans to bulldoze everything I’ve spent the last ten years working for, I won’t be silenced. Not by some suit. And not by the cops. Joshua Boston can arrest me all he wants. He can come at me with strong arms and piercing eyes that make my insides tingle. He can push me up against the wall and cuff me all day long. I’ll still hate him. I’ll still want him. In this town of gangs, shootings, and dangers around every corner, no one is safe. I’m no damsel in distress, but when a violent threat ups the stakes, it’s Boston I’m forced to turn to. We may hate each other, but the real enemy is the one neither of us will see coming. Please note this story was first published in the Hate to Want You Anthology. It is dark M/F romance set in the Saint View world. It may contain scenes that trigger some readers. Copyright © 2021 by Elle Thorpe Pty Ltd All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. Editing by Emmy at Studio ENP. Proofreading by Karen Hrdlicka at Barren Acres Editing. ISBN: 978-1-922760-25-8 V:1 CONTENTS 1. Eve 2. Boston 3. Eve 4. Boston 5. Boston 6. Eve 7. Eve 8. Boston 9. Eve 10. Boston 11. Eve 12. Boston 13. Boston 14. Eve 15. Boston 16. Eve 17. Eve 18. Boston 19. Eve 20. Boston 21. Eve 22. Eve 23. Boston 24. Eve 25. Eve 26. Boston 27. Boston 28. Eve 29. Eve 30. Boston 31. Eve 32. Eve Epilogue Unholy Sins (Saint View Strip #2) Prologue Also by Elle Thorpe About the Author 1 EVE “Pretty sure I’m going to burst into Hell-spawned flame if I step one toe over that threshold, Eve.” Augie stared at the quaint whitewashed church with the same sort of expression he had when it was his week to clean the bathrooms at the club. He crossed his arms over his broad chest, nose wrinkled as if the entire thing was offensive to his morals. If he’d had any. Lyric stopped beside him, her long red hair flowing down her back in waves, and squinted past the crowds milling around us on the church lawn. “As much as I hate to agree with Augie about anything, I’m with him this time. What the hell?” I rolled my eyes. “Don’t be dramatic.” Though dramatic was both Augie’s and Lyric’s middle name. Which was exactly why I hadn’t told either of them where the press conference was taking place. Neither would have come. I actually hadn’t told any of my crew where we were going. I’d just said I needed help with something, and the four of them had piled into my car willingly. But now, even Phoenix’s usually quiet demeanor felt more like he was waiting for an explanation, and Fawn who was usually all sunshine and rainbows, nibbled on a fingernail nervously. I grabbed her hand, pulling Fawn’s fingers away from her mouth. “Hey. You’re not going to spontaneously combust because we’re at a church.” “I know that.” But she didn’t look entirely convinced. “You worried about being struck down by some almighty being, too?” I asked Phoenix. His gaze raked over the milling crowd, who all edged around us as though we were a pond of alligators, ready to launch out of the water, snap our jaws around their ankles, and drag them down into the murky depths of our lair. One older lady, in her Sunday best, gaped up at Phoenix with his tattoos, scars, and scowl. He gave her a moment. At six foot five, and a wall of pure muscle, Phoenix was used to people staring at him. But when she made no move to carry on, he leaned down and whispered, “Boo.” The woman gasped and scuttled off deeper into the crowd, darting glances back at him as she went. I sighed. “I can’t take you guys anywhere.” “Not true,” Lyric piped up. “Bar? Good. Beach? Good. Church?” She stuck both thumbs up then made a show of turning them upside down. “Seriously, though, what are we doing here?” Her gaze strayed to the young priest lingering in the doorway of the church. “I mean, he’s hot for a guy dressed in a robe, but if you’re hoping to save our souls, you probably should have told us to dress down a little.” Lyric’s tiny shorts barely covered her perfect ass, and a low-cut top showed a healthy amount of her impressive cleavage. She wasn’t wearing a bra, she had no need to, her boobs were courtesy of a great surgeon and sat high and proud without the assistance of an underwire. “You look great,” I told her. “But that’s beside the point. We aren’t here for some god to judge your clothes. Or your sins.” If there was a God, He already knew our sins, and between the five of us, we had plenty. “And we aren’t here to check out the priest.” “Did you see the tattoo peeking out beneath his sleeve though? I’m so intrigued.” I ignored her and passed over a creased piece of paper. “You’re here for moral support.” Dragging her attention away from the apparently tatted up priest, she took the