by BETH KERY
Hope's eyes opened wide. She'd been stunned at the power of Ryan's climaxes before—all that pent-up, concentrated energy being released in a single, enormous explosion of pleasure. But this— this feeling of him coming while they were joined, hearing his anguished groans, clearly sensing the rush of his warm seed inside of her while his penis jerked in her tight channel—this was an experience that scorched her very soul.
He slumped forward, his breathing ragged and heavy. For a long moment he struggled to regain equilibrium. It made her strangely proud that loving her could make this big, fierce man so vulnerable. As if he'd read her mind he leaned down and nuzzled her cheek.
"You slay me, little witch."
"I do not mean to," she whispered.
She caught a flash of his curving lips before he gently withdrew from her, making her gasp. She stuck her head up and watched him while he released her wrists from the velvet rope. Then he came down on his back next to her and enclosed her in his arms, pulling her upper body over him so they were face-to-face, chest-to-chest. He brushed her hair back from her face and lightly kissed her parted lips.
And Hope was left wondering if this was not the best part of all of their lovemaking—quiet, sated, different than the blazing hot tempest, but no less sweet for it.
"I'm kind of having a hard time believing that you're regretful about causing me to lose control," Ryan murmured next to her lips.
Hope's eyelids flickered open and she caught his expression of amusement. Her gaze lingered on his bold, rugged features, eating him up with her gaze. What a miracle it was that he was here with her.
"I—I wanted to bring you pleasure."
"If you had brought me any more, I'd probably be dead from a heart attack. I'd have died a blissfully happy man, though," he murmured as he ran his hands along the sensitive sides of her body. She shivered at his touch.
"That was a very"—Hope's cheeks flushed with heat— "unusual way of making love."
She wondered what he was thinking as he studied her for several seconds. His hand rose and he brushed back her hair from her face. "It was making love, though, Hope. Never forget it. You're very brave for giving yourself in that way when you hardly know me ..."
He hesitated, as though he wanted to say something else but wasn't quite sure how to put it. She felt her lower lip quiver as she stared into cerulean eyes that reminded her of the color of the Mediterranean Sea around the Greek islands on a clear, balmy day.
"You're welcome, Ryan," she whispered.
His dark brows went up in slight surprise before he smiled. "Are you all right? Are you in pain?"
Hope shook her head. In truth, her bottom felt a little sore, but pleasure still tingled in her sex all the way up to her tailbone as well, making the slight discomfort seem more than worth the price.
Ryan leaned up and seized her lips in a kiss that struck Hope as both possessive and cherishing at once. He leaned back and spoke softly against her lips while her fallen hair created a curtain around their faces.
"Then it's time for us to escape, honey."
"Now?" she asked in surprise.
He nodded as he held her gaze.
"Very well. Tell me what to do."
"When I give the word, I want you to dive off this bed—quickly, you understand? One second you're here, the next not." Hope nodded. "Crouch down as low as you can to the floor, and move to that corner of the alcove," Ryan said, his eyes moving to the right side of the bed.
"But they took my clothing."
"Crawl across the hallway to that closet on the far wall and pull down one of Sadie's robes or dresses—something easily slipped on. Whatever you do ... stay down low and keep hidden."
"Should I stay hidden because you want me to make a surprise attack on someone if they come in the room?" Hope asked, all too eager to vent her anger on Diamond Jack Fletcher or one of his minions after what she'd seen him do to Sadie Holcrum.
"What?" Ryan asked, looking stunned. "No. Of course not. I want you to stay down and keep hidden to keep you safe."
Hope scowled and opened her mouth to argue.
"Quiet, Hope. We're not going to do anything at all unless you agree to this. The chances of me getting you out of here safely are small enough ..."
"What?" Hope whispered when she saw Ryan's expression stiffen. For a moment he didn't speak, seeming undecided.
"No. We must act. Staying put might be playing into the hands of fate just as much as choosing to act," he mumbled, as if to himself. His faraway expression sharpened on her once again. "The only thing you need to worry about is staying down close to the floor and keeping out of the way until I tell you to move. Okay?"
"But, Ryan, I want to help you—"
"You'll help me by promising to do what I ask. There are things you don't understand about this situation that I don't have time to explain right now. Do I have your word that you'll cooperate?"
When she hesitated his dark brows went up again, this time in an intimidating fashion.
"This is not the time for an H. G. Wells brand of adventure, Hope. One or both of us may be killed if you don't follow my instructions."
"All right, I agree to—"
But Hope had no opportunity to tell Ryan to what she agreed or to hear any more details of Ryan's plan for escape, because suddenly a loud, furious voice that bizarrely seemed to be coming from the wall itself bellowed.
"Daire!"
FIFTEEN
Jack gritted his teeth in rising frustration when he heard New-comb stifle his groans of climax as he watched Daire fuck Hope Stillwater's ass with unrestrained lust. It infuriated him to know that even though he put on such a top-notch sex display for his most powerful business associates, he himself could not enjoy it.
Mel tried her damndest to suck his dick back to its former glory, but despite the fact that Jack was mentally as aroused as he'd ever been, his damn cock wouldn't respond. Hearing Newcomb find his pleasure was bad enough, but watching the starkly virile Daire plunder the beauty was like having a knife twist in a wound.
"Get off it, Mel! You're losing your touch. You—Betsey—you take over," he demanded bitterly as he watched Daire slamming his big cock into Hope Stillwater's bobbing little ass.
The fucking mick hadn't been lying when he said he could make her respond. How had he been so confident? That self-righteous little minx seemed to love every moment of being sodomized, Jack thought grudgingly.
It became obvious that Betsey had nothing on Mel's skills at fellatio. He pushed down on her head roughly in rising frustration, heedless of her gags and cries of discomfort. He strained for his own pleasure so greatly that he was hardly aware that the photographer took another picture or that Mason finally gasped in a hard-won orgasm.
Daire bucked into Hope one last time before his body went rigid in climax. He let out a full-throated roar. His pleasure seemed so concentrated, so immense that Jack could almost feel it resonating through the walls. A profound sense of fury and jealousy made his gut burn like he'd just swallowed acid.
He pushed Betsey off his now-limp dick, scraping her cheek with one of his diamond rings in the process. She whimpered in pain. When Mel pulled back the young woman's head and checked the bleeding scratch with a concerned look on her face, Jack's fury escalated.
He pulled up his underwear and pants, fastening his suspenders. "The men who come here are idiots. I can't believe they pay me good money to sample such a worthless whore."
Mel looked up at him with glittering eyes.
"There are some things money can't buy, Jack. A sense of decency and a working cock are two of them," Mel said quietly.
For a few seconds a tense silence prevailed in the stuffy little room.
Jack's eyes widened slowly in stark disbelief. It was all because of his limp dick that he was losing respect, even among his whores. He raised his hand to backhand Mel's smart mouth when someone burst into the room, distracting his attention. He'd assigned Big Mario to stand guard in the hallway a
nd not to allow anyone into the viewing room, so he couldn't imagine who dared to enter.
"What'd'ya want?" he barked in a surly fashion when he saw it was Big Mario himself, still looking disgruntled and worse for wear after waltzing with Daire in the ring. Another man followed Mario into the room. He only came up to Mario's shoulder but the guy was barrel-chested and thick with muscle. Jack noticed his pale hair looked disheveled and that like Mario, he also sported a swollen, black eye.
"This man's name is Kendall, Boss. He works for Shapiro in the stockyards. He says he's the one who Shapiro sent over to fight me tonight," Mario said, fury spicing his deep baritone.
Kendall was busy staring at the women on their knees and the men standing before them, a puzzled look on his broad face. He finally cleared his throat and addressed Jack. "Some damn cokie jumped me on the way here. I just woke up twenty minutes ago in the alley.
Damn thief stole all my money. So ... is it true the fight's already over?"
For a second or two Jack just stared as the acid anger in his gut seemed to bubble up in his throat. It exploded out of his mouth along with one word.
"Daire!"
He shoved the barrel of Daire's bizarre pistol into an unused peephole at waist level.
When he peered into the room he could no longer see Hope Stillwater at all and Daire perched at the edge of the bed, poised to spring. Jack's forefinger pulled on the trigger but nothing happened.
"No!" a woman cried out below him. His thumb fumbled and found a lever. Jack flipped it back. He had to squeeze with all his might on the trigger but he fired at Daire's moving chest even as he lunged off the bed. Someone jerked down forcefully on his wrist just as the gun went off. A light fixture on the far wall of Sadie's room exploded.
"You bitch" Jack snarled in disbelieving rage when he saw Mel still hanging on his wrist.
He tried to pull back the hand that held the gun, but Mel held on to his wrist with all her might and pushed his hand toward the wall. The barrel of the gun shoved further into the hole.
Mel looked over at Betsey and said one word.
"Mario."
Then she sunk her teeth into Jack's wrist. He howled in stunned disbelief and pain.
Betsey scurried quicker than a crab threatened with a steaming pot across the small room and launched into Mario's knees, giving an eerie, bloodcurdling scream as she did so.
Maybe it was just surprise on Mario's part, or maybe it was that he was still unsteady from Daire's pummeling earlier, but the giant wavered on his feet. When Martha followed Betsey's example and threw her body weight against Mario's thighs, the giant toppled to the floor for the second time that night.
A piercing scream rent the air and the other prostitute in the viewing room flew into the fray. All three women fought like rabid dogs, swarming the still stunned Mario and attacking with fists, knees, fingernails and teeth.
A door opened across the hall and someone gave a loud, piercing whistle. The next thing Jack knew Molly Sayles fell to her knees behind Mario's head.
"You worthless piece of shit," she screamed as she jabbed a long fingernail into Mario's only functional eye and gouged. Mario roared and threw two of the women off him violently as he reared up in pain. They were back almost immediately, however, throwing their weight on Mario and pushing him back to the floor, biting, beating and clawing like madwomen. Meanwhile a bare-breasted
Molly grabbed Mario's ears, twisted them until he shrieked in pain and proceeded to whack his skull into the wood floor again and again.
"You'll never .. . ever ... ever beat me again, you monster," she yelled, punctuating each word with a crack of Mario's head.
"Stop them!" Jack bawled at Ambrose and Newcomb as he tried to pull his hand away from the wall, but Mel clamped down with her teeth on this wrist and pushed his hand tightly into the wall. Jack tried to use his left fist to beat her off him, but their positioning was awkward and Jack's right arm inadvertently protected Mel's head as he tried to take a swing at her. He refused to let go of Daire's gun for some reason, gripping it tightly as though he held on to it for dear life. The barrel fixed faster in the peephole the more Mel pushed on his hand.
"Hey" Jack bellowed at a stunned-looking Ambrose. "Get this bitch off me!"
Ambrose unglued his eyes from the spectacle unfolding before them as several more prostitutes rushed to the scene, a couple of them screaming balefully as though they were warriors running into battle. Ambrose wasn't the only one who had frozen in disbelieving shock. All the men in the room stared, pale-faced, at the horrible but mesmerizing sight of the mighty behemoth disappearing beneath a mound of writhing, furious women whose painted faces were alive with malice.
"What did Mario do to them?" Lander muttered under his breath.
"I think we should get out of here. They'll be after us next," Ambrose said. His words seemed to galvanize Mason, Lander and Newcomb. Divorak was the first to bolt, however, clutching his black box camera and doing his best not to step on any body parts in the pile of twisting limbs before he finally leapt out the door to freedom. The rest of the men followed quicker than Jack could blink and shout, "Get your yellow asses back here!"
But the useless cowards were already gone. Jack struggled against Mel's clamped jaws, hissing curses at her, but his attempts only seemed to sink her teeth further. He hit her about her ear but she remained doggedly latched. It hurt so badly that tears flowed ceaselessly down his face. The thing that Jack was most aware of, however, wasn't pain.
Pure, undiluted rage throbbed in every cell of his body at the fact that his authority was being challenged.
Pretty soon every whore in the Levee District would be looking at him with cold contempt, just like his mother had.
The man who was supposed to be Mario's contender in the boxing ring looked frightened when Jack caught his gaze.
" You, Kendall," Jack said quietly. "If you don't get over here and get this bitch off me, I'm going to hunt you and every last member of your family down and treat them to a slow, terrible death."
Kendall swallowed and glanced longingly at the doorway before he came toward Jack and Mel.
The sound of a shot and shattering glass made Hope yelp in surprise at the same moment that Ryan's body thudded against the floorboard.
"Hurry" he prompted a stunned-looking Hope before he army-crawled over to the fireplace and retrieved a metal poker. Out of the corner of his eye he saw that Hope had pulled down a frayed satin robe and struggled to pull it around her shoulders while she remained crouched. Ryan blocked her with his body and reached inside of his boot.
"Lie down flat on the floor," he ordered before he handed her his knife. Her eyes widened when he released the clip and removed the blade. "Use it if you have to. Don't hesitate."
He waited for her to look up at him and nod her head before he crawled along the hallway and rose to a crouching position. He'd half expected Jack to be firing like mad into the room—and Lord knew Ryan's weapon was powerful enough to penetrate the wall at close range—but no shots occurred beyond the first.
The noises he heard emanating from the wall and hallway confused him: women screaming in a bloodthirsty manner and male grunts of pain and fury. Seconds later he heard footsteps running past, but no one tried to enter their room.
There was nothing for it. No matter what was going on out there, staying holed up in here wasn't going to help Hope escape.
He raised the poker and brought it down heavily on the door, breaking through the lock after two swings. He glanced back and saw Hope peering around the corner at him as she lay on her belly, her hair spilling wildly around her shoulders, the knife clutched in her hand, her expression livid with excitement.
There was ho doubt about it. If Hope Stillwater lived in his time period, she'd undoubtedly spend her time bungee jumping or climbing harrowing mountain peaks.
Christ, what had he gotten himself into, anyway?
"Somebody has been kind enough to provide us with a distraction,"
he whispered, "but I want you to stay down for now, Hope."
She nodded in agreement and he eased open the door a few inches. The sounds of women shrieking in rage amplified along with increasingly fading grunts of pain. Ryan froze when he saw two men running down the hallway. A quick glance told him it was the tall, blond man who'd stood guard at the bottom of the stairs along with the doorman who wore a black hat. Both of them had pistols drawn as they passed him. Apparently the debacle that was going on next door was more of a concern for the henchmen than Ryan or Hope.
Ryan waved for Hope to come near him. Whatever was going on was a heaven-sent distraction. Just as he felt a tendril of Hope's soft hair brushing his bare waist, however, one of the men bawled over the din.
"I'll shoot your brains out, Molly, and you, too, Nancy! Get off him."
"Go back," Ryan mouthed fiercely to Hope. "Go," he whispered when she hesitated and grabbed his knife with both hands as though she were steeling herself for battle.
"Shoot 'em! Go ahead," Ryan heard Diamond Jack Fletcher roar.
"'Back" Ryan ordered.
A scowl of mixed irritation and uncertainty creased Hope's forehead at Ryan's warning, but something she saw in his eyes must have made her fade back toward a place of safety—in regard to flying bullets, anyway.
No place was safe in this madhouse, at the moment.
Ryan gave a regretful glance to his cut and bruised knuckles before he entered the hallway. He had a quick impression of several women looking up from a pile on the floor just inside the viewing room doorway, their hair wild and tangled, their faces wary and showing clear signs of battle. He saw what appeared to be the bald head of Big Mario beneath the heap. As Ryan silently approached, he saw the behemoth's head move sluggishly and then go still.
He tapped on the blond man's shoulder.
When the man turned in surprise Ryan served him an uppercut to the jaw, immediately following with a left directly to his face. Although the man already was falling, Ryan gave him a forceful shove into the other henchman. The guy with the hat stumbled, losing his balance.
