by Naomi West
“Hmm,” Damien said. “But how did Cat find out that she was a double agent?”
“I don't know,” I admitted. “There's a lot that still doesn't make sense to me about this. All I know is that...” I glanced over at Liv. “Well, we're free. As far as I'm concerned, the packages were all delivered, I upheld my end of the bargain I made with Cherri, and Liv is safe. I'll have nothing more to do with the Gemini Riders.”
Damien frowned at me. “What about when the organization is under new leadership?” he asked. “I have a meeting already set up with—”
“No,” I said, holding up my hands. “I don't want to hear anything more about it. My days of belonging to a biker gang are over.” I grimaced a little. “I guess you could say that I've lost any feelings of immortality that I ever entertained.”
Damien smiled a little at that. “Well, that at least is a benefit from all of this.”
“What are you going to do instead?” Liv asked. I couldn't read her expression, but there was something in her voice that I responded to.
I shrugged at her. “I haven't decided yet,” I told her evenly. “I'm keeping my options open.”
The thing was, I didn't really want to be separated from her. After everything that had happened, I realized I had developed some very real feelings for her, and having nearly lost her to Castor and everything else had really cemented those feelings for me. I had no idea what she was thinking, though. She had her nice, ordinary life to go back to. I doubted she wanted me to have any part in her future, not with all the mayhem I had caused in her life over the past couple weeks.
“Well, if you need buddies to ride with sometimes, you know where to find me,” Damien said, smiling a little. I had a feeling he knew exactly where my thoughts were turned, what I'd like to do with my future. But he was nice enough not to blurt it out. Liv and I would need to have a serious talk at some point, but the lunch table wasn't the place to do it.
“So what did Cherri say about the box of explosives anyway?”
I shrugged. “She called it vigilante justice and didn't say anything more about it. The more I think about it, the more all of it seems strange to me. Cat clearly didn't use the guns in her escape from prison, and—”
“Well, she couldn't have used the guns,” Cherri said, slipping into a seat at the table with us. She shrugged at my surprise. “I knew I needed to talk to you a little more before you left town, but not in the interrogation room, where anyone could hear. So I had you tailed back to the hotel.”
I rolled my eyes. “Okay. But what do you mean Cat couldn't have used the guns? You delivered the packages, didn't you? All the pieces were there.”
“When I took the packages from you, yes, all the pieces were there. But mysteriously enough, when they ended up in Cat's possession, the parts necessary to actually fire the guns were missing. Basically, all she got were some little toy guns. I doubt you would even have been able to use them as water guns.”
I stared at her. “How did you…”
“But how did Cat escape, then?” Damien asked, a look of consternation on her face. “And why didn't she come after you? She must have known you had something to do with it.”
“I think she suspected Rip had done it, given his earlier moral qualms about the mission,” Cherri said, shrugging. “That's why she was so keen to make a deal with you in exchange for Liv's life.”
“But how did she escape, then?”
“Easy,” Cherri said with a little shrug. “She picked ten of the most brutish guys that she could find, armed them all with what everyone thought were real guns, and overpowered the guards at the gate. Unfortunately, most of the others died in the escape attempt.” Her face twisted into a sneer. “Cat didn't care, though. All she cared about was getting herself out of there and back to safety.”
“So what was the whole point of your ... mission?” Liv asked suddenly.
“Castor Pollux,” Cherri said grimly. “He got away with murder and whatever else when we managed to put Cat behind bars. I'm still not sure how he walked away from that one. But this time, he won't be so lucky. Not after everything with Rosetta.” She cocked her head to the side, staring at Liv. “You could testify as well. Get him locked up for even longer.”
Liv laughed a little, shaking her head. “And then I'd have a whole host of Gemini Riders loyalists coming after me,” she said.
“We might be able to arrange something for you,” Cherri said. “You've heard of the witness protection program, I'm sure...”
“Sure,” Liv said, sounding a little surprised. “But would you really extend that to me, after everything that...”
“If you testified against Castor, yes,” Cherri said firmly. “You'd have to leave behind your family and everything that you've ever known, though.”
Liv winced and shook her head. “I couldn't do that,” she said. “My brother Barry...”
I reached over and put a hand over hers, sensing her distress. “That's not an option,” I said, as though I had any right to have a say in this.
Cherri shrugged a little. “It was worth a try,” she said. She narrowed her eyes at me. “I'm holding you at your word, though, Rip Stevens. You aren't a member of the Gemini Riders anymore. Don't get caught up in another scheme with them or we'll have no choice but to prosecute you.”
I nodded at her, and she turned to Damien. “And Damien Bradley, you'd better make sure that this new organization of the Gemini Riders quits causing us so many problems, do you hear?”
I stared at Damien. “You guys know one another?” I asked. “Have you been working together on this all along?”
Damien shrugged. “That's part of being in a leadership position in one of the most well-known gangs in the country,” he said. “You have to know who to pay off.”
I shook my head, wondering just how long he'd been planning this overthrow. But I didn't really want to know that.
In fact, I didn't really want anything to do with any of this anymore. I stood up and held out my hand to Liv. “Let's go upstairs,” I said to her, even though I had only picked at my lunch. I had other things on my mind.
She grinned up at me and stood as well. “You'll have to excuse us,” she said to Damien and Cherri. “Have a nice afternoon.” Then, she followed me giggling upstairs.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Rip
Once back in the room, I wasted no time in pulling Liv into my arms. For a moment, I just held her, still amazed that I somehow managed to have her back in my life. “I really missed you,” I told her honestly. “I couldn't stop thinking about you. I was kicking myself for letting you go through with such a risky plan to start with. Castor—”
“I don't want to talk about that right now,” Liv interrupted. She leaned up on her tiptoes in an attempt to kiss me, but I pulled back away.
“Liv, I'm serious,” I said.
“Me too,” she said. “Look, I love you Rip, now would you please fuck me?”
I blinked at her, wondering if I had just heard her right. But from the challenge in her eyes, I knew that I had. “All right,” I said simply, pulling her up into my arms and carrying her over to the bed.
I slowly started undressing her, unable to tear my eyes away from hers even as I stroked reverently over each plane of her smooth skin. When I reached the cleft in between her legs and trailed my fingers over her panties — which were already pleasantly damp with her desire — she gave a shaky sigh, eyes slipping shut.
“Rip, it's been so long,” she reminded me. “I need you.”
“Easy there,” I murmured, kissing into her skin. “I know.” I quickly stripped myself down as well and then crawled on top of her, lavishing her skin with soft little licks and bites and kisses, doing my best to explore every inch of her body as she mewled and moved restlessly beneath me.
Eventually, I dipped my fingers into the honeypot between her legs, applying pressure to those needy little spots, reveling in every muted whimper that I wrung from her. I sped up the
movements I was making with my hand, causing her to shudder and her eyelids to flutter closed.
“Mmm, just like that,” she said, already sounding totally fucked-out and open for me. She bit her lower lip and turned her face against the pillow, sliding her palms down my arms and chest. “Just like that, Rip. Oh!”
I leaned down to kiss her, manipulating her lips in the same way as I was manipulating her lady-parts. Then, without warning, I withdrew my fingers, leaving her walls clenching around air for a moment before I replaced my fingers with something even more filling.
Liv just sighed into my skin, clinging to me. “So perfect,” she murmured, lightly kissing my collarbone.
I grinned down at her, making slow circles with my hips in an attempt to drive her utterly wild. She looked so serene against the pillows, though, letting soft little noises fall from her mouth as though she no longer cared who might overhear us. She gave herself fully over into her passion, letting herself fall utterly slack against the bed, letting me use her form however I wanted to.
I thrust with increased fervor, feeling absolutely desperate to achieve my own climax. I had never felt this level of desire before — desire that had my cock thick and swollen, throbbing in the space inside of her. I could already feel my balls drawing up tight, ready to shoot my thick seed deep inside of her core.
Sure enough, one more stroke, two more strokes, and I was spilling into her, coming with a soft cry of her name.
In the aftermath, we lay there sticky and panting on the sheets, and I reached over to pull her into my arms. “Look at you,” I murmured, kissing her forehead. “You're so wonderful.”
“I love you,” Liv said again, quietly.
It was almost as though she was holding her breath, waiting to hear if I said it back to her. I laughed a little and held her even closer, tightening the grip of my arms around her. “I love you too,” I told her, my voice raw with honesty. I wasn't entirely sure what that would mean for us, but I knew I had to say it.
We lay there in contented silence for a long time, until I shifted against her and realized that I was hard again, ready to plunge back into her. I rolled her onto her back, staring down at her and pinning her there with my arms. “I love you,” I told her seriously, then positioned myself and delved into her one more time.
This time, I didn't spare anything, and I didn't take my time. Instead, the heat of our passion consumed me, made me frantic with desire. I slammed into her, with a force that suggested I was trying to skewer her, to press all the way up through her navel.
And she loved it.
She couldn't seem to form words anymore, didn't seem to realize that every time I thrust into her, she cried out. It wasn't long before she was absolutely gasping. I slowed down a little, only to let her recover herself some, but she seemed hardly able to focus. Her fingers twisted restlessly in the sheets, and she kept uttering this soft pleas for me to keep going, to tear her apart.
I ramped up the speed again, watching as her body practically convulsed against mine. She screamed out my name before her entire body stilled, falling lax against the bed. But I didn't stop there.
Instead, I kept going, until she was practically sobbing. Her hands came up to grab my hips, and I wasn't sure if she was trying to slow down my movements or speed them up. She didn't seem to know either, caught in that state of over-pleasure where everything was almost too much but also just perfectly enough.
I watched her come again and then again, leaning down to nip at her earlobe and toy with her full and perky breasts.
But suddenly, it was my own orgasm overtaking me, sending me spiraling off into a white abyss. I groaned my way through it, collapsing down against her when my arms would suddenly no longer hold my weight. She cradled me there against her chest, though. And even when I tried to pull away, she held me still for just another moment, relaxing with my weight surrounding her.
Finally, we pulled apart, and this time when I pulled her into my arms, I could feel that we were both about to doze off, well spent after our exertions. I tugged the blanket up around us and pulled her close, and for a long time, I knew no more.
Epilogue
I drummed my fingers against the countertop as I looked over at Liv, who was still looking around the place with wide eyes. “Are you sure that this is what you want?” I asked her one more time.
She turned towards me, rolling her eyes a little. “Are you sure that this is what you want?” she asked me, raising an eyebrow at me. “I can only assume that you keep asking me over and over again because you're secretly hoping that I'll back out and you can—”
I broke her off, kissing her lips and cutting off whatever else she might have said. “I want this,” I assured her as I broke away, staring seriously down into her eyes. “You know that I want this.”
“Good,” she said, giving me a little secret smile of pleasure.
I went back over to the counter and signed the paperwork to make this places ours — Liv's and mine. Afterwards, I took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
“Already having regrets?” Liv asked teasingly. But I could see something there in her eyes, a wariness. I knew she was still expecting me to split out on my own at some point, to just take my bike and leave again. But I was perfectly content in the life that we were building for ourselves.
“Nope, no regrets,” I told her, smiling at her. “You picked a good place.”
Liv looked around again, grinning. “Yeah,” she agreed. “I'm still not sure how I feel about living in the city, but I suppose it can't be too bad with you by my side.”
“I'm all for settling down with you, but there was no way I could settle out in suburbia,” I told her, shaking my head. It was a conversation we'd had from nearly the time that she'd asked me to move in with her.
“I really want you to move in with me,” Liv had said, trailing her hand down my chest as we'd lay there together in bed. We were supposed to be going our separate ways that day. I wasn't sure where exactly I'd go, but everything was done with that mission, Damien had taken over the Gemini Riders, and it was time for us to leave town.
“Don't say that if you're not serious about it,” I told her, still feeling lethargic and half-asleep.
Liv snorted. “Like you'd ever agree to move in with me anyway.”
I shook my head. “Like you'd ever ask me for real,” I said. “I'm sure you have ten thousand reasons up in your head about why we shouldn't move in together, starting with the fact that over the time that you've known me, I've been involved in criminal activities and ending with the fact that those criminal activities ended up with you the prisoner of a dirty sex fiend for a week.”
Liv pulled away, sitting up a little. “No, Rip, you misunderstand me,” she said, looking as serious as I'd ever seen her. “I know the last time I agreed to do something spontaneous, it didn't go so well, but this… I'm actually asking you to move in with me.”
I stared up at her, reaching out to cup her cheek in my palm. “I wouldn't fit into your nice suburban life,” I reminded her, even though there was something inside of me that wanted to agree to what she was proposing. I knew it wasn't a smart idea, but at the same time…
“Why not?” Liv challenged. “You aren't going to be a member of the Gemini Riders anymore, right? You'll have to find a job doing ... whatever it is you know how to do. And you'd probably have to get some sort of mufflers for your bike. But we could make this work.” She bit her lower lip. “I love you.”
“I love you too,” I responded reflexively. I shook my head, pushing myself into a sitting position as well. “You should have waited to have this conversation until we at least had our clothes on,” I grumbled.
Liv rolled her eyes and hopped out of bed, tugging on her panties and then pulling on my teeshirt. “There, you happy?” she asked, a glinting challenge in her eyes.
I couldn't help laughing. “That's not what I meant, you minx,” I said, eyeing the way her breasts poked out against the soft fabric o
f my shirt. I reached out and tweaked one of her nipples, then sighed and tried to sort out my feelings enough for this conversation.
“Look, why don't you at least consider it?” Liv asked. “It's not like you have anything better to go back to, right? You'd still need to find a real job and whatever else. Why not do that from my place? If nothing else, the house is at least big enough that you could stay in one of the guest bedrooms and we wouldn't even really need to interact with one another. And if I really started to hate you, I could always kick you out again.”
I stared at her and then sighed, running a hand back through my hair. “I am so not the suburban guy,” I reminded her. “If you had an apartment in the city, then maybe I could do it, but your house out in the suburbs is...”
“Fine,” Liv said, looking even more calculating. “So we'll stay in my house until it sells and then we'll find a place together. I could do with getting out of a place that the Gemini Riders could locate anyway; the last thing I need is some of Castor's goons to come knocking on my door one day and decide that it's time to play some more.”
