The Mechanic

by Reina Torres

  Once he had it on, he only had to focus on one thing. Making his girl happy.

  Moving closer, until his knee bumped up against her thigh, he gave her a look. “Hand me a pillow, baby.”

  Her eyes widened a hint, but she reached back and grabbed a pillow without questioning him. He tugged it out of her hand.

  “I can’t wait to get inside you, Blake. I’m going to make you lose your mind.”

  Breathless, she gave him a smile. “Do it. I want you so bad.”

  He dropped the pillow over his knees and reached under to lift her hips. She set her feet down on the bed and helped him, giving him the most amazing view of her body. She was perfection. Beyond her dark chocolate curls, he could see the glistening folds of her sex, and he was done waiting.

  With the pillow under her hips and the dark depths of passion in her eyes, his heart was thundering in his chest. The need to love and protect her, body and soul, was more than instinct, it was a need like his next breath.

  Rising halfway up on his knees, his cock in his hand, he leaned into her and felt the first pull of her body. As the tip sank into her body, he heard her soft, breathy sigh in his ears.

  “More.”

  “You’re a greedy woman, aren’t you?”

  She looked up at him and smiled. “With you?”

  He couldn’t help feeling his back teeth grinding against each other at the thought of any other man with her. “Of course.”

  “Yes.” Blake lifted her arms and held out her hand to him. “Yes, Adam. With you, I want everything.” She pulled her lower lip into her mouth and he saw her teeth bite down as her lip pulled free. “Fill me up.”

  How could he tell her no when that’s all he wanted for the rest of his life? Leaning forward he caught her hands and pressed them back against the mattress as his cock pushed all the way inside of her body. When he bottomed out, he let out a groan and heard Blake answer him with one of her own.

  Balls deep and hovering over her gorgeous face he felt as if he might be in the middle of a dream. “You feel so good.”

  She stretched beneath him, her breasts rising to trail her nipples across his skin. “You too.”

  When she wiggled under him the edges of his vision darkened. The friction of her body around his, the soft swell of her body cushioning him, every inch of contact was bliss.

  “I can’t make this slow.” The admission killed him, but it was the plain truth.

  “Good.” Blake squeezed his hands and met his eyes with a level gaze. “Because I want you hard and fast, Adam. I need it. I need you.” And if he wasn’t already on the edge, she pushed him closer when she wrapped her legs around his middle and pulled him impossibly deeper. A soft laugh burst from her lips. “Yes, like that… deep, like that.”

  Could she be any more perfect?

  He rose up higher on his knees and felt her legs ease up on their hold as he withdrew from her body almost to the tip of his cock before he pushed right back inside.

  Adam felt her body stretch around him and once he was fully seated again, tightened like a hand, grasping at his length. “Just like that,” her smile lit her up from inside and he repeated the motion, “yes.”

  Blake nodded and then shook her head as he withdrew again. “Don’t leave me.”

  “Never, baby.” He surged back inside of her body. “Never.”

  Over and over he sank into her body, slowing only to lift one of her legs and draw it up along his chest, pressing a kiss to the inside of her ankle before repeating it with her other leg and it was worth the momentary hesitation when he sank into her again and heard her throaty cry.

  “Yes! Oh god, yes!”

  He felt it. Felt the eager pull of her inner walls against his cock. Felt the tightening of her muscles as he continued to move within her again and again. And her voice, a long string of words and hungry sounds pouring from her lips, told him he was close, so deliciously close to giving her the kind of pleasure she deserved.

  “Come for me, baby.” He ground himself against her at the end of each thrust and saw her reach her hands up to grasp the sheets above her head. Watching her head tip back and turn side to side as she struggled to catch her breath made him feel like a king, a conquering hero. “A little farther, Blake. Hold me tight.”

  Adam sucked in a breath as her body gripped him, pulling at him with each successive thrust.

  “So. Damn. Close.” Her hips lifted from the pillow and he almost fell over her, but he held on.

  “More,” she panted and his hungry eyes saw the way her breasts shook, “just a little more!”

  And he gave it to her.

  The sheets pulled free of the mattress and her hands pulled them close about her head. Her eyes were wide open but she couldn’t seem to focus them on his face, but what mattered the most was the way she seemed to float in his arms.

  She came apart and her body caressed him like a velvet glove, her muscles contracting along his cock in waves. She pulled his orgasm from him, sending electricity arcing through his spine as he emptied himself inside of her.

  And when he felt the last shivers of his orgasm echoing through his body, he gathered her close, held her gently against him as he found enough of his blankets to cover her.

  Blake pressed a kiss to his shoulder and then to his chest as she settled her hand over his heart.

  Adam wrapped his hand around her to stroke the curve of her hip.

  “Adam?”

  He managed to make his throat work to answer her back. “Yeah, baby?”

  Her sigh feathered across his heated skin. “Thank you.”

  He had to turn her words over and over in his head before he understood them. “Why?”

  “Because…” She snuggled in against his side and started to fall asleep.

  “Babe?” He didn’t want to nudge her or anything like that, but he wanted to know the answer. “Why?”

  “Because,” she yawned, “I finally feel safe.”

  And then she fell asleep.

  Chapter 13

  Robert climbed out of his car and looked around at what looked to be the main cross streets of Eagle Rock, Montana and ended up squinting to avoid the early morning sunlight. “What a backwater piece of-”

  “Well, hello there, stranger!”

  Turning, he found an old man sizing him up from the sidewalk. The man’s cowboy hat was pushed so far back on his head that his receding hairline was just visible in the afternoon sun.

  “You moving in or through?”

  Robert stared at the old man, hoping he’d get the point and walk on.

  “Well, either way, I should welcome you to town.” He looked down at the beagle on a leash beside him. “Don’t mind the dog,” he chuckled, “he ain’t one to bite more than once a decade.”

  Nodding, Robert bit back a few choice words for the talkative old man.

  “If you’re hungry. There’s a diner just across the street and a bit. Don’t forget to go to the Moose if you’ve a taste for something more than coffee or pop later in the day. You here to sightsee?”

  His shoulders sagged a bit, silence wasn’t working. “Just here to stretch my legs and fill up on gas and food.”

  Nodding his satisfaction, the older man gave the leash a tug. “Well, you better get on down to the diner. Seats fill up around this time of day.”

  With a tip of his chin, the old man continued down the sidewalk and Robert swore under his breath. “The last thing I need are a bunch of nosey people getting in my way.”

  Closing the driver’s door, Robert moved around the hood and stepped up on the sidewalk to stand under a bright colored awning. He needed some time to take a look around and the awning gave him some shade to work with and a tree nearby gave him even more shadows and cover.

  He wasn’t expecting there to be much of a problem finding the girl. There couldn’t be more than a hundred people living in and around the main part of town. A couple hundred in the outer lying areas.

  It wasn’t going
to be possible to snoop around Sadie Patterson’s house. The whole ranch was likely a security nightmare, for him. Still, if the people in town were as friendly as the old man was, he was going to be back on the road by nightfall with Blake Lennox tied up in his trunk.

  His stomach rumbled and he looked across the street for the diner the man was talking about it. He found it easy enough. There were, what, a half dozen businesses on the other side of the street.

  The diner was near the center. Even though the town wasn’t anything to speak of, he bet it would be a step up from the usual greasy spoon if he was lucky. It would be easy enough to get information out of a waitress. They were always looking for ways to get a better tip and women would notice a new girl in town. No one liked competition even in a Podunk town like this one.

  Clicking the lock on his key fob, Robert stepped out into the street and crossed without any danger. There wasn’t even one single hayseed cowboy on a horse trotting down main street. So much for that quaint country town experience reporters talked about when they mentioned Sadie.

  He’d made it up onto the curb when the door to the diner swung open and a young woman ran out with a couple of brown paper bags in her arms. She saw him and looked up in surprise. “Oh, sorry. In a rush.” And yes, she was. She moved off down the sidewalk in her ugly sneakers, but the calves visible between the ankle socks and the blue pastel waitress uniform were worth a second look.

  Come to think about it, her ass was decent, and the face he’d seen in passing was pretty.

  The diner wasn’t going anywhere. Turning on his heel he started to walk in her direction but kept his strides easy and casual. He wasn’t there to attract attention.

  She had a big brown paper bag tucked up under her arm, but she still managed to keep her steps quick and purposeful.

  Cutting through a parking lot, she passed by a car and disappeared around a corner.

  Robert looked up at the sign. Masterson Mechanics.

  His gaze dropped down to the car in the parking lot. Pulling his phone from his pocket he laid his thumb on the face of the phone and unlocked it and found the picture he took of the old woman’s scrapbook. The same crappy paint-job on the VW Bug. Same old crooked rear fender.

  It couldn’t be this easy. The car limping into the same town that Sadie Patterson lived in? Perfect.

  He started a call and ground his back teeth until the line picked up.

  “Found the car. I’ll have the girl soon. Have Nolan head toward my location. I may need a little help. No, I’m sure I can handle it, but this town is tiny. If we want to get her out of town quietly, it will probably take the two of us.”

  He listened as Seth threatened him, but it all sounded like blah blah blah, because while Robert might be paid muscle, he wasn’t as stupid as Seth thought he was. He was watching out for himself too. He’d seen Seth burn others when they’d outlived their usefulness. Now, he was going to get Blake Lennox under his control and then he was going to make sure he had control of the situation. It was time to grab a little power for himself.

  Just in time, he saw the waitress come back into view. Robert switched his hold on the phone and stared at it like he was intent on reading something on the screen.

  Humming to herself, the waitress moved passed him and walked back into the diner.

  Taking a step to the side, Robert cast a side-long glance up the side of the building, intent on getting a good look at the structure, but movement in an upstairs window drew his attention.

  The curtain bunched and fell back down into place.

  Someone was upstairs.

  Dropping his focus down to the ground floor he saw a man moving under a four-door sedan up on a lift. He was wearing an old-style coverall, but the man wasn’t the kind of pot-bellied, beer guzzling gomer he expected. Nope. The way the man moved, he had training in something more than oil changes.

  There was muscle that came from hard work and dedicated training.

  If Seth thought she was alone in the world, he was wrong, and she’d likely already enlisted Sadie’s help.

  If that was true, this was going to be even more difficult. Robert had his own training, but he’d learned his own limits the hard way. None of them had a thing to do with women.

  He’d do what he had to.

  And when it was done, Seth would realize he was more than just muscle. He deserved his own measure of power.

  Seth would learn.

  They all would.

  Blake sat down at the table and looked at the brown bags that Annalise had left with her. She was starving but it took a moment for her to open the bags and start to unpack the plates that she’d brought. Apparently, Adam had flagged his sister down on her way to work and asked her to bring food over for breakfast.

  Somehow, Annalise had gotten the impression that Blake might be tired and hungry.

  Well, his sister had used words with more color and the look in her eyes had told Blake that she knew exactly why Blake was dead tired and a little tender.

  Worse than the walk of shame, Blake had to deal with the fact that her boyfriend had basically told his sister that they’d spent all night long… doing things.

  Yeah, she couldn’t even think it, let alone say it, but it still made her blush. All over.

  And boyfriend?

  Where had that thought come from?

  Ugh.

  Blake laid her forehead down on the table and squeezed her eyes shut. What was she doing?

  Her morning sip of whine gave way to her hunger as the scent of maple syrup reached her nose.

  Popping the top off one box she saw four thick slices of soft, pillowy French toast. “Oh, thank heavens!” Setting aside the little container of butter, she quickly cut up the triangles of doughy battered goodness and poured every single drop of maple syrup over her breakfast.

  And that was what she focused on for a few minutes, but soon enough Blake’s mind found its way back into the same cycle of worry. She just couldn’t escape the feeling that things were about to change. It felt like the very ground beneath her feet was shifting by millimeters.

  Maybe it was just that she was used to the way things were in Los Angeles and here in Montana everything seemed so different.

  Easier.

  Slower.

  But there was no ignoring the rising tide of unease that was welling up inside of her.

  This, she knew, could all end.

  Time with Adam. Enjoying his gentle manner and the passion of his kisses was a heady experience.

  It was all too easy to forget the world outside when he was holding her against his body. His muscles against the softer curves of her breasts, her thighs, created a delicious friction.

  She had never enjoyed sex much, but just the touch of his hand against her body, even through her clothing, made her quake and shiver.

  And he never pushed.

  Never made a move that might scare her.

  It was all perfect.

  Maybe too perfect.

  NO.

  She shook her head and popped the last bit of syrup-covered toast into her mouth.

  Don’t look the gift horse in the mouth. Enjoy the moments. This was what she had never even allowed herself to hope for, so what was the harm in enjoying it. Taking happiness securely in both hands because she knew sooner or later she would have to go back and face… whoever she had to because Zoe had been a good friend to her and to return the favor she would have to stand up to Seth and possibly whoever he owned in the LAPD and make them take a second look at her death.

  She knew, deep down inside, that Zoe hadn’t taken her own life. Blake had been through the exact same thing, but no one had stopped it for Blake. Seth had touched her all over and crawled into her head just as deep as he had been inside of her body.

  So, Zoe wouldn’t have done that to herself.

  Right?

  Dropping her fork onto the nearly empty take-out container, Blake stared down at the hands she’d dropped into her lap. “Thin
k, Blake, think!”

  How was she going to make this happen when everyone else seemed to believe that Zoe had taken her own life?

  How was she going to make it back to Los Angeles and get the memory card from its hiding place without drawing unwanted attention to Sadie’s family and Adam’s as well?

  The more she thought about it, the more she realized that she was out of her league. That was probably the reason why her career had been one seemingly endless list of quirky, best friend roles instead of the bigger role she had as ‘Sharpshooter Sally.’

  Blake shook her head. Even that was kind of laughable by Hollywood standards.

  Just how was she supposed to pull this off without dragging innocent people in?

  Standing up, she picked up her take-out box and headed over to the trash can. Dumping it in she couldn’t help but feel like the action mimicked the feelings inside of her, all going down in the dumps.

  “Pathetic,” she groused at herself as she decided what to do next in her pretty little prison of her own making.

  Something was gnawing at the back of his mind.

  And no, it wasn’t Annalise’s overt hinting that she had their mother’s engagement ring in her jewelry box.

  There was something dark in the back of his head, like someone waiting in the shadows to take Blake away from him.

  If he thought that falling in love might purge his dark thoughts and nightmares, he would be wrong.

  Falling in love with Blake Lennox had only brought home even more fear and worry. What if someone did take her away? What if she went back to Los Angeles and realized that what they’d shared had been little more than a diversion from her life?

  Would he be able to convince her it wasn’t?

  Should he even try?

  “Damn it!” Adam stared down at the blood streaming from his finger. He’d taken his mind off his work and now he was paying the price.

  Heading to the sink at the side of the shop he looked out the window and his gaze settled on Blake’s car. Hissing with pain as the water coursed over his wound he swore under his breath. “I’ve got to move that thing in here and cover it up.”