by Hazel Parker
I laughed at that, trying to deflect the more powerful emotions creeping in at the moment.
“When I got to the top… and it was always a clear blue day, perfectly clear… he would…”
My eyes began to water.
“He’d point up and he’d say, ‘I bet Mom is watching you right now. I bet she’s proud of you.’”
I felt Tracy’s arm go around me. I sniffled, and the first tears started to fall.
“I never knew my mom, but whenever I came on these hikes, it just felt like she was with us, you know? And now that I’m back here with you… it’s, it’s like they’re both here with us.”
Tracy pulled me close, and I let some tears fall onto his shoulder. If I had known that I would cry like this, I probably would not have let Tracy pick this place.
But if there was anyone I was comfortable revealing this to, it was Tracy. Tracy knew everything that I had gone through on a much more intimate, personal level than anyone else had. Tracy loved my father and probably had some memories of my mom, albeit likely very fuzzy ones.
And frankly, there was no one who made me feel more loved and appreciated than Tracy. It was more of a protective, watchful eye relationship in my youth, but college and med school had never brought anyone who made me feel the same way as Tracy, if I was being fully honest with myself. No one had ever had the history with me, no one ever knew me better, no one could appreciate what I had gone through more than Tracy.
Maybe that was why most of my previous relationships had never lasted that long. Of course, there was a whole host of reasons that I had suspected, many of which now flooded my mind since I didn’t have to protect myself against crying.
The death of my father had affected me terribly in this regard. I didn’t have anyone to look up to as a man anymore, didn’t have anyone to warn me about boys, didn’t have anyone to threaten to kick a boy’s ass if he mistreated me.
The death of my mother had likely played a role too. Right from the earliest days of my consciousness, I had learned that loved ones died, and a certain nihilism had probably settled in to some degree. My father’s death had only perpetuated and entrenched that mindset even more.
And, of course, once things became patterns, they were much harder to break. What had started as keeping flings short to avoid getting hurt had simply become the way of thinking—of course, most relationships only lasted a few months. Of course, love between anyone other than a parent and a child was fleeting.
I would always look for things to prove myself right. The divorce rate. The fact that my peers also weren’t getting married. The deaths and grieving that widows had to go through.
But…
It all felt different now.
Ironically enough, of all the people I could have dated, Tracy might have been the least stable, certainly not in personality but in where life might take him. I didn’t know anyone else from med school or before whose job could have killed them because of a jealous rival. I didn’t know anyone else so skilled in fighting and with a likely rap sheet having dozens of crimes.
But…
Well, sometimes, damnit, love didn’t make sense. And I knew full well that any one of my medical school peers who saw me on the date with a president of a motorcycle club would wonder what the hell had gotten into me. Enough had already been said when word got out I was going to Green Hills—it was only going to intensify…
But most of those friends would never come to Green Hills, and I wasn’t about to travel anywhere. Not with a debt—no matter what the Saints called it, it was a debt—to pay off.
“I’m sorry,” I finally said. “I know I’m a hot mess right now.”
“Nonsense,” Tracy said. “You’re remembering your parents. It can be easy to feel alone if that were the case.”
He kissed my forehead then, a kiss that was perhaps more intimate than anything he had ever done to my lips.
“But you’re not alone, Jane. The Saints have your back. And that’s true whether you pay us back nothing or pay us back everything.”
“Guess you got the envelope, huh?” I said.
“Yep, and I guess you left us no choice,” he said, squeezing me tighter. “But you don’t have to pay it back. Actually…”
He pulled me back from him, creating enough distance so he could look into my eyes. I hated that he could see how red and puffy they looked, but he seemed unaffected by this overly sensitive display I had on.
“You want to pay us back? Pay us back by being the Jane that we grew up with. Don’t be distant. Don’t avoid us. Be with us. Come to our hangouts and meetings. When we raise funds for anything, don’t be afraid to show up. We promise not to treat you like some celebrity if that’s what you’re worried about.”
Admittedly, the thought tugged at me in some bad way. I just felt nervous about getting back into that life; Tracy was one thing because I could have passed him off for a friend under any other circumstances. But the rest of the club? Sensei, BK, all of those guys? As great as they were, there was no mistaking them for anything but what they were—hardass motherfuckers, not the kind of guy that you took to formal events or the like.
But for Tracy, I supposed I could make an exception.
“You got it,” I said.
He smiled, put his hand on the back of my head, and gently leaned in to kiss me.
“OK, enough emotional drama,” I said with a laugh as the last of my tears fell. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be,” Tracy said. “I have my own issues. We all have our issues.”
“Do you?” I said. I didn’t mean the question to sound sarcastic—I really didn’t know his background that well at all. “Like what?”
He took in a long breath.
“I just want to make sure I say this the right way,” he said. “What I’m about to tell you, you may hear me talk about it differently in the club.”
“OK,” I said assuringly.
“About a year ago, I had been seeing this girl, Becky, for about a year and a half,” he began. “I… you don’t mind if I’m fully honest, do you?”
“No, please, I want you to tell me everything,” I said, patting his chest gently.
“OK,” he said, taking a deep breath. “I loved Becky. I did. I wasn’t going to leave the Saints for her, but I was certainly willing to take a step back. She kept telling me I had to leave, but what she didn’t understand is that once you’re a Saint, you’re always a Saint. Even if you’re retired, you’re still in our world. We try not to involve people, but it inevitably draws them back in to some extent. In any case… I loved her enough that I got a rock. I was prepared to propose to her. I…”
I could tell he was getting nervous about this story, but I just kissed him on the cheek and told him to continue. I knew this was in the past, and he couldn’t possibly top what I had just spilled out. So long as he hadn’t murdered or raped this Becky girl, all would be fine.
“So yeah, I was prepared to propose to her. I even had the Saints throw a ‘bachelor party’ of sorts two days before I was going to propose to her, as a sort of ‘goodbye to the old life’ sort of thing. But funny enough, when I showed up for this party, I just saw the six officers of the club waiting for me, arms crossed, all looking serious. There wasn’t a sip of alcohol or another lady in sight anyways. I made a joke about them giving me an intervention, but when none of them so much as even coughed, I knew it wasn’t going to be good.”
He let out a long sigh.
“They showed me that Becky had been cheating on me for the previous three months with some Hollywood suit guy. Said the guy was some assistant producer for Warner Brothers or something. And when I say show, I mean they really showed—they had photographs of her kissing the guy and everything.”
“Jesus, Tracy, I’m so sorry.”
He shook his head and kept going.
“They offered to go and kick the guy’s ass for me, which, in retrospect, would’ve been kind of cathartic. But I said no. It wasn’t his fault
. I mean, it was in that he went after her, but Becky was the one who should’ve said no. She was the one who chose to hook up with him and be with him. Mostly, when they told me what happened, I just sat there dumbfounded. Usually, we’re the bad boys, the ones girls turn to to get a break from their stuck-up boyfriends who don’t have the balls to do whatever it is we will. Eventually, I just stood up, grabbed an empty beer bottle, and threw it against the wall in frustration. I don’t lose my temper often—or rather, I should say I don’t act out like that often—but that particular time? I was pissed.”
“No one would blame you for that. A year and a half…”
I couldn’t even say anything, given that I hadn’t had a relationship that had lasted so long.
“Eventually, I approached her about it, and she said it was all true. She didn’t even put up much of a fight in trying to hide it. To her, it was just kind of… it was almost like she wanted me to discover her cheating but didn’t want to take the step to tell me herself that she was cheating.”
“That’s fucked up,” I said.
“Yeah, well, it made breaking up with her a lot easier. I asked her why, and the most that I got was that she wanted something more stable.”
“Jesus,” I said, thinking about how I’d had those very same thoughts—would they come back to bite me later? I would never cheat on anyone, but would it mean that eventually, I couldn’t handle the lifestyle and would dump Tracy?
“Yeah, it was rough,” I said. “My brothers asked me if it changed anything for me. I said it did. I said I would only ever date someone and make someone my old lady if they understood the MC lifestyle. This isn’t for everyone, clearly. Hell, most boys can’t handle being in the club. We don’t take every prospect for good reason, you know. But yeah, I just said that if I wound up being with someone, they’d have to know what it was like.”
“Hmm,” I said, finding a moment to lighten the mood. “I think I qualify.”
“You don’t say.”
We both shared a laugh that allowed us to get past the heaviness of the past few minutes. When the laugh faded, we kissed once more. While physically, the kiss might have been the same, emotionally, it was so much different.
It was like the barriers we had thrown up to prevent us from having future relationships had been shown to the other person, removing a serious layer of vulnerability. There were plenty more layers to be sure, some of which we had not even identified in ourselves, but it felt like now, when I kissed Tracy, I wasn’t just kissing him—I was kissing his soul, a part of him that had not been revealed to me before. It made the intensity of the feeling that much stronger.
“You’re so special,” he whispered.
I felt a shiver go down my spine. I wondered just how far removed that was from another three words couples uttered to each other.
“You too,” I said breathlessly.
I couldn’t wait any longer.
“Come on,” I said. “You want to have some wine at my place?”
“Wait, you sure? I had other plans, you know, we could—”
I shut him up with a well-placed, firm kiss on his lips.
“Save it for future dates,” I said. “Come on.”
Tracy knew what was about to go down as much as I did, but he also now had the awareness and knowledge of who I was to know he wasn’t just about to be with Jane, the daughter of the president. He was going to truly get the chance to be with the real Jane Peters, the soul that stood before him.
That, more than anything else, made me feel comfortable taking this back to my place.
* * *
The only question en route was if Tracy would drop me off at the hospital first so I could get my car to drive home, but I wasn’t about to do that. Doing so would have given him an excuse to leave before dropping me off at work, and by now, I didn’t want to leave his side until the last moment possible. I knew what was about to happen, and any chance that he would take off right after was one I didn’t want to take.
It wasn’t that I didn’t trust him. I knew full well he’d stay by my side when everything was said and done. But I wanted to be with him even if something happened that diverted his attention away from me.
I punched in the gate code, asked him to drive quietly around to the back, and hopped off the bike as soon as he parked. I hurried up the stairs, wanting to make sure that my apartment at least looked half presentable when he got inside. Thankfully, my compulsion toward cleanliness ensured that I had no such issues.
Tracy walked inside, put his helmet on a nearby table, and kicked his boots off.
“Nice place,” he said.
“Yeah, thanks,” I said as I did some last minute pick up of some mail. “It’s—”
But then he grabbed me and planted a strong kiss on me.
“Nicer girl.”
Oh… oh shit…
With that, the time for talking was over. He grabbed at my ass and lifted me into his arms, and this time, not only did I not resist; I craved it. I dug my nails into his back as he guided me to the different doors, kicking each one open gently until he found my bedroom. When he did, he laid me on top of the satin comforter, drawing a yelp from me when he dropped me harder than expected.
But whatever time would have been spent in shock was immediately replaced by pleasure as he kissed at my neck, pressing his weight into me. I tore at his shirt, desperate to have it off so I could feel his body pressing into mine. In the dimly lit room, with just the full moon and stars providing light, I saw enough of an outline to see that Tracy had worked himself up since the days of high school, adding sculpted abs, some very broad shoulders, and a perfect chest.
I didn’t get to see that outline for more than a second, though, because he was right back at me, spreading his kisses around my neck and my ear, as if trying to make sure every square inch of my body had felt the warmth of his lips pressing into me. I arched my hips into his, feeling his hardening cock and yearning for it. I reached down, feeling him, and already, even through the jeans and underwear, I could see that he was much bigger than I could ever have hoped.
He then worked his way down to my collarbone. Hurriedly, I took off my top, leaving me with just my bra on. In a sexy display of strength, he flipped me over him, giving him a chance to remove my top with ease. All the while, he worked his kisses around, pressing his lips onto my now-free breasts and using his hands to squeeze the other one.
Then, as if he just needed a temporary stay, he flipped me to my back once more, continuing to handle my breasts with the proper touch of aggression and tenderness. Once he had both of my nipples hard and ready, he ran his kisses down my stomach, causing me to shiver and tremble with the anticipation of where that mouth would soon wind up.
Keep his face close to my hips, he unbuttoned my jeans and yanked them and my panties off. I was lying fully naked now before Tracy Cole, and there was no one I would have rather given myself to than this sexy man before me. Tracy Cole embodied everything I wanted in a man, and my trembling hips and wetness below gave him all of the signs that he needed.
He started by kissing the inside of my thigh. Just the anticipation alone was pushing my arousal levels beyond their normal levels, and I knew it wouldn’t take more than a minute or two to come from Tracy’s efforts. When he got to the spot where thigh met groin, I tried to thrust myself into his mouth, the better to get him to hurry the fuck up and eat me out.
But as if toying with me, with a chuckle, he moved to the other thigh! Oh, the bastard.
Oh, my God, how it just seemed to increase the pleasure even more.
And then, hovering over my pussy, he looked up at me with the most sexual eyes that I had ever seen a man possess. Now this, this was a fucking man—and this was a man who had a gaze so intense I’m pretty sure I could have come just from looking at it.
He only added to the intensity of the moment by kissing me there, bringing a sharp, involuntary shiver.
“Jesus Christ, Tracy,” I gasped out.
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He started as slowly as he could, running his tongue over me so gradually that it felt like it was barely moving at all. It was the exact right move—it meant that the orgasm would be slow to build, relatively speaking, and when it came…
Just don’t kick him in the face. That’s about it.
Slowly, though, his flickering and licking picked up in tempo. And, at a faster rate than he was picking up his speed, my orgasm was approaching.
It wasn’t just the tongue that was getting me to physical orgasm. And it wasn’t just the delays or his eyes or his aggressiveness that brought me to psychological orgasm. It was that the sum was greater than the individual parts. It was that Tracy Cole, though I had never realized it until now, was the embodiment of everything a man should be. He wasn’t perfect, but he was making this moment too damn perfect.
“Fuck, fuck, Tracy,” I gasped as I felt myself reach the point of no return. “Don’t stop, don’t stop; please, God, don’t stop.”
As if taking the cue, he pushed his hands under my ass, cupped me up, and pushed his mouth harder against my clit, his tongue darting all over the place. I released myself to his actions and let the tightness and fire increase inside of me. I began panting as the moment drew nearer and nearer and nearer and…
Then, with a slip of his tongue from south to north, he had me screaming as I came, shuddering out of control, blushing like a rose, and shaking like an earthquake. He kept a tight grip on me, refusing to let me go, and it was good, too, because given how I was moving, I might have fallen off the bed otherwise.
Finally, after what seemed like an eternity of sheer bliss, the bliss started to overwhelm my senses, and I pushed Tracy’s head away with as much force as I could muster at that moment.
“My God,” I gasped, in disbelief.
How had I never come so hard in my life before? For all that I had said about Tracy… how the hell had he managed to get me off so damn easily and so strongly?
It was a pleasant mystery to me that might have been left better off not answered. For now, though, I wasn’t going to inquire too much about it, because I had a new target.
