by Olivia Fox
Captive Thirst
Rough Redemption Book 4
Olivia Fox
This book is dedicated to my amazing readers, with hearts of gold hammered into shape by tragedy. Who in spite of it all, continue to try, continue to love, and sometimes stumble upon secret gardens full of joy.
You know who you are.
You deserve oceans of delight.
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1
Gabriela
The soles of my leather riding boots shuffled back and forth over the floor, kicking up stable scents and I swore, if they bottled and sold the smell of horse sweat and sawdust, I’d bathe myself in it like French perfume.
My career as a jockey was off to a shaky start. I just wanted to win the Briarville Derby.
Here I was trying to hide my boobs so no one would know I was a girl on the track, and it was harder than leveling Half Dome with a nail file. The chest binder strapped me down tight, and discomfort took the focus off the fluttering butterflies in my stomach while I curried small circles over Native Prancer’s black, shiny coat.
“I’ll hide the boobs, you hide your eyes.” I whispered, stroking his velvet nose, comforting us both. I deliberately placed the blinkers against his temple, limiting his vision so he’d concentrate on running and not get distracted on the track.
Bras were bad enough. I went without whenever possible, which was not very often with a dad like mine. “Put some clothes on, Mija! You’re indecent.” Mija meant “daughter” in Spanish, and it was supposed to be a term of affection. But sometimes being the female child of Señor Seranno felt like living through the inquisition on the daily. “Where are you going? Who will be there? When are you coming home?” He didn’t appreciate it when I reminded him I was no longer a kid. My age was an unwelcome reminder that my ovaries were shriveling like the dried-up skin of stale pinto beans on the pantry shelf.
The only offspring of the Serrano household, female or not, had no business racing horses. Being a coveted child and coming from a powerful family sounded great and all except for one thing. Freedom remained a matter of fairy tales.
My father let me know under no uncertain terms that I’d study a respectable field and breed many sons in order to continue our lineage. According to our tradition, when I married (not if) I would keep my name, Gabriela Serrano, and add my husband’s surname at the end. Thus, the legacy of Serrano clan would remain obvious.
I was no better than a brood mare.
Private school, a generous allowance, all the saddles, bridles, riding lessons, and horses of my own, made privilege great. My father never denied me anything, except for one very important item—choice.
Today I was going against his will, and I’d be racing somebody else’s horse in the trials, disguising my sex from even my trainer.
Not difficult.
I’d never been a girly girl.
Giggles and gossip had always left me cold.
My mama never understood it. Nor did she protect me from my father’s plans for me to have a litter of little Serranos ASAP. I didn’t blame her. She’d jumped a gazillion social classes to get to where she was today, and rocking the boat was not in her nature.
She went from field worker to first lady of a mob boss within the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, or Jaliscos for short. My dad still got shit from his lighter-skinned relatives for marrying an “India”, an indigenous woman, with skin like milk chocolate. Maybe his motivation to escape Mexico and live in Northern California was more about that than he cared to admit. He wasn’t so different from me, both of us bucking against the reigns that our families used to keep us on their chosen paths.
Fuck that.
I was born to ride, not breed babies. If my father knew I was here, readying myself to race Carlos Drago’s promising colt in the Briarville Derby, he’d kill me dead.
Heir to his throne or not, no one disobeyed the orders of Javier Serrano, El Jefe.
That fact didn’t help my already frayed nerves, and I paced around Prancer, checking his cinch for the third time, and rubbed the back of my neck.
My anxiety wouldn’t benefit either of us on the track. The colt read my emotions like a clairvoyant on steroids, and he relied on me to be his steadfast human. “Not to worry, buddy.” I scratched his forehead. “Use your wings out there on the backstretch. I’ll keep you safe and you just fly.”
He snorted air out his nostrils in response, and I blew a sympathy gust of breath past my lips and felt immediately better.
We were two of a kind: high-strung, jittery, relying on each other for comfort. Prancer had me. I had him.
The one thing I lacked was not to be found in a cow town like Briarville where people still professed, “The West Was Not Won on Salad.” Beef was definitely what was for dinner, and I feared the cow pokes and dairy dudes in this “Victorian Village” would never give me what I wanted.
A soft dom.
A gentleman who knew when not to be gentle. A Dom who pampered me and then fucked me hard. The kind of man who cuddled me and took me over his knee for a naughty funishment.
The men my father paired me with were overbearing and boorish, and so far, more concerned with pleasing papá than satisfying me. My heart was holding out for the sort of guy I read about in books. A man who’d treat me like a princess and fuck me like his naughty girl.
In order to find Mr. Right, one had to be on the lookout. Presently, I didn’t have time to spend on the pursuit of pleasure and relieving my ever-present state of horniness. Besides, I’d read that a woman’s chance of orgasm during a hookup was a measly twenty percent, and the average duration of said experience was seven minutes. My fingers and vibrator did better than that, and they were a lot safer.
I had no idea what actual fucking felt like. So far, it was an act as remote as the lost city of Atlantic.
The only action my pussy got was posting against the saddle, and that made me sexually aroused more often than I cared to admit.
Squaring my shoulders, I stated mine and Prancer’s affirmation, willing it
to be true, “You’re a winner. All the world will cheer with you as you cross the finish line first, leaving the other horses in the dust.”
It gave me hope to know that a powerful, charging beast like Native Prancer had his fair share of demons in the closet. If he conquered his fear of flapping trash bags and his hatred of tires laying on the ground, to get out there and wear The Look of Eagles: cool, calm, collected confidence—then so could I.
“Time to fake it til we make it, baby. Just run faster than everything else, and nothing scary will catch you. Lead the herd to safety.” I patted his muscled neck and scraped my fingers into his mane, putting my forehead against his glossy coat, inhaling his intoxicating aroma, and hanging on for dear life so I wouldn’t flee the scene like my body was begging me to do.
With more courage than I felt, I grabbed the lead rope under his chin, and walked out into the foggy morning air, which placed wet kisses on my cheeks and lips. Prancer’s hooves clopped against the cobblestone road to the racecourse, and my belly rolled with excitement.
Avoiding my father’s ire was exactly why I disguised myself as a boy. It was much better this way.
My masculine alter ego, Jorge Diaz, promising apprentice jockey from South of the Border, could take credit for all I cared. I didn’t mind about his riding along for the win. On this early summer day, he bore my same wide nose, my coffee-with-milk colored skin, but thanks to the binding, he was missing my size B breasts. They were as undetectable as my jitters.
Or they’d better be.
Otherwise, my pipe dream of being a jockey would be put out to pasture faster than you could say “boobie trap.”
2
Carlos
I always used my head—with one exception. That particular deviation had to do with the sweet spot to be found between a woman’s legs.
It was one of my great loves, along with horses, winning, and baking.
I scoured the bottom of my copper cookie sheet with a mixture of rock salt and lemon pulp. Since childhood, Nonna taught me special kitchen tricks like this when no one was watching. It all started with me asking her to teach me how she made apple pie.
She whispered in Italian, “First slice the lemon in half. Cup the rind in your palm, now rub. Circles.” Then yelled at me for show, “That’s right, little boys who don’t finish their supper, get to help out in the kitchen.” God forbid my cousins find out Carlos Drago wanted to get his hands dirty in the kitchen.
I laughed at the memory while scrubbing a stubborn spot, and then looked at the golden pasture where Native Prancer spent his free time.
The horse was a beast.
As soon he was for sale, I knew I had to have him. I’d been tracking his sire’s lineage for years, and this colt was stacked up to be a sure bet.
The clock read nine fifteen.
“Shit, no time for lollygagging.” The race started in an hour and I needed to be there with time to spare to check in on Prancer.
Indulging in one last peek out the window, the sight made my chest light and I rolled my shoulders back, chin lifting as if on a corresponding pulley.
This was what it was all about. The blood, the risks… all worth it for the view I’d fashioned on a hill side just above the Pacific, prize horses in the foreground.
I’d kill to protect my family.
Most definitely tonight would be an occasion to celebrate victory, and I’d sink my cock into some Grade A pussy in honor of the finest colt to ever race on the Briarville track. He was going places far beyond the local derby, and this was as good a place as any to start his winning streak.
Maybe “love” was the wrong word to use to describe how I felt about that feminine sweet spot that could make any woman shiver with ecstasy when properly treated.
I hungered after it.
Chased it like an addiction, same as Prancer pursued that finish line.
I hadn’t done a hit in years.
The last time I got my hands dirty was cleaning up after a little problem for my cousin Dante before he became a made man.
Little problem in the shape of a stalker who came after Dante’s fiancé.
But arriving at the stable, watching a local reporter snatch the back of my jockey’s shirt, it made me remember the exact physical feeling of blood lust and my trigger finger tensed at the urge to kill him dead.
I reached for the gun shoved safely in the back of my pants, hidden from view by my blazer. “Get your fucking hands off him!”
The pushy reporter had his nerve, but he wasn’t completely stupid. Taking a single step away from my rider, he dropped his shirt and spoke in a wavery voice, “So-so-sorry, Mr. Drago. Just trying to ask a few questions before Jorge here mounts up and races. Lots of speculation about Native Prancer and I’d really appreciate the story.”
“You got a funny way of showing your appreciation. More like mutilation if you ask me.” I snarled at him and he took an involuntary step backward.
I grabbed the nervy dude by the back of his shirt to stop his retreat, lifting him in the air using the collar as a handle, and it gave me no small satisfaction to hear him struggle for air. His dock shoes drug over the cobblestone and I dropped him at the edge of the stable yard. “This area is for riders, trainers, and owners. Get your ass out and stay out before I kick it so hard your vertebrae pop out of your mouth one by one like a pez dispenser.”
A small shove from me was enough to jump start his momentum as he jogged away from my horse.
The bugle played “First Call” over the loudspeaker, and I cupped my hands below Prancer’s belly, forming a step so that the jockey could mount.
“Remember, don’t give him his head right away. Hold him back until the last furlong.” I said to the rider, and he nodded his head in understanding.
Jorge was a man of fewer words than I, but I didn’t hire him for his conversation. He had a reputation of taking inexperienced colts and turning them into quicksilver. “Damn, Jorge. You need to come over more often to my cousin Lorenzo’s for dinner, you’re not only light as feather, you about flew off to the heavens when I helped you into the saddle.”
I’ll be damned if Jorge’s cheeks didn’t pink-up like a blushing girl. “I’m kidding you. Seriously though, you always make weight, I think you must be ten pounds under this time.
Jorge clucked at the horse and held him to an elegant jog until he was on the track and gate side. My stomach clenched as Prancer stretched his neck towards a competitor, threatening to bite. It was the most aggressive move a horse ever pulled and a display of dominance.
True to form, my jockey used his wimpy assed arms to turn Prancer’s head and take him for a short canter away from the gate. He rode beautiful figure eights, making me forget for a moment that this was a race instead of a dressage competition. Those broom stick arms were deceiving; must be made of carbon steel instead of human flesh.
The black beast flared his nostrils wide, and that son of a bitch had the nerve to rear and paw at the air, literally rearing to go. On cue, the audience began to cheer and whistle their appreciation, and once settled, Jorge led the racehorse at his signature prance back towards his designated spot on the track.
I’ll be damned.
When did Jorge teach my charger to dance like a Lipizzaner? It was too much. The noise from the crowd swelled from the stand like a crashing wave upon the shore, while the attendants below secured each racer into its cage.
“Come on, boy—restraint. No stupid moves and this is all yours.” I whispered under my breath, as if he could hear me.
I caught my jockey’s eye and held his stare. He nodded sharply at me as if to say, “We got this.” I squeezed the railing beneath my hands as Prancer shook his head in the cage, protesting his temporary captivity.
Sure, I could afford to pay premium price for box seating, but I preferred to be track side, smelling the fresh cut grass and sun-warmed dirt, close enough to see the clearly marked finish line and hear the sounds of thundering hooves getting louder as
horses came back around the track.
We were one of a kind that horse and I: nobody caged us in, and when they tried, we broke free and ran untamed to escape the devils that chased us.
3
Gabriela
To the right, there was a shriek so loud, it nearly broke my pre-race trance but I noted it as I’d been practicing in my online mindfulness course, and let it go. I’d find out later my gate neighbor had his leg crushed against the cage so hard by his horse he’d lag behind at the start, leaving me the perfect opening.
Prancer’s stomping footsteps crunched into the warm dirt of the track as we waited for the starting gates to open. This might not be Church Hill Downs, but every time we entered the track to train, it felt like a helium balloon filled my chest. An intense focus descended over me so that when we took off, all I could see was the spot between his ears.
It was as if that special place existed to pinpoint my sight like a rifle scope, and sling shot us both towards the finish line.
There was no more sound after the starting gate closed behind us.
I knew the other riders murmured at their horses to reassure them, just as I did to Prancer. But only he and I existed in our world between the metal bars, waiting for the only sound we wanted to hear.
The bell.
If I held this heightened attention close enough, he became part of my essence. My boy felt safe. There was no need to spook, or chase off our crowding competitors, not when our priority was the prize pot and there was only one way to get there.
Straight ahead.
Fast as we could go.
The bell rang to signal the start of a race, and the starting gates clanged open.
Prancer’s body coiled beneath me and sprang ahead on the track. I balled my hands into tight fists, watching the space between his pricked-up ears, holding him back from taking the lead.
