by Callie Hart
“Because! You know. You’re a smart guy. There’s no way you’d ask a girl to marry you if you’d met under the circumstances we did. Especially only a month after that meeting, too.”
“Why not?”
Oh my god. I’m beginning to think he’s lost the plot. “Because you’re meant to date for a couple of years, see if you like someone before you marry them, Rebel.”
He pulls a dismissive face, rolling his eyes. “It takes you years to know if you like someone? Sounds like horse shit to me.”
“Of course not. That’s not what I—” I pause, take a deep breath, then start over. “There are steps you’re meant to follow. You’re meant to live together first.”
“You’re already living with me.”
“You’re meant to meet each others’ parents.”
“You’ve met my dad. He’s a total ass-swipe but you’ve met him. And anytime you want, I’d be happy to meet your folks. You know, I scrub up well in a good suit.” He winks at me.
I ignore him, because this is all far, far too absurd. “You’re out of your damn mind. You’re being a jerk, pushing this because you know I’ll say no and you just want a reaction out of me.”
“If thinking that makes you feel better, Sophia, then that is totally okay. Though, I think in the profession you were studying back in Seattle, the way you’re acting at this moment might be termed as avoidance.”
“Get the fuck out of the way, Rebel. Am I supposed to be shooting these cans or not?” Even as I snap at him, I realize that what he’s saying is true, though. I am deep in the grips of avoidance. But, hell, shouldn’t I be? I mean, what a crazy, half-baked, insane thing to bring up. We barely know each other. And I’m more than a little intimidated by the man. If and when I get married, it’s going to be to someone who didn’t pay a considerable amount of money to buy me from a Mexican skin trader. I’m going to know my future husband intimately. I’m going to know his favorite color and what he thinks of Stevie Knicks. I’ll have heard stories from his childhood so many times already that I’ll know them by heart. We’ll have traveled together and explored different countries, seen and done so much together that…that it will feel like we’ve already had all of our adventures? That we have nothing left to learn about each other?
It hits me like a punch to the gut. People place so much emphasis on getting to know your partner before you agree to spend the rest of your life with them. Perhaps…god, I don’t even want to think it, but I can’t seem to stop myself. Who ever said knowing someone inside out is a good thing? Could that be why so many marriages fail? Because there are no adventures left to be had? No secrets to be uncovered? No mysteries left to untangle?
I shake my head, forcefully shoving the thoughts out of my mind. What the fuck is wrong with me? My father would have conniptions if he knew what was going on in my mind.
Rebel’s wearing a shit eating, I-know-what-you’re-thinking-and-I-like-it look on his face when I climb back out of my head. “You wanna shoot the cans, that’s okay with me. You forget…I get to strip you naked either way, though, Sophia. It’s win/win for me.”
A shiver crawls up my spine, my skin breaking out in instant goose bumps. This bet is a win/win for him, but does that mean it won’t be a win/win for me, too? Would obeying him, doing what he tells me to do without question, be that terrible for me? I somehow don’t think it would. “Maybe I’m…maybe I’m curious,” I whisper.
“Then why bother with our little shooting lesson? You’re clearly a crack shot. Why not just say, ‘Jamie, I want you to take me back to the cabin, and I want you to show me what it means for you to be my master.’”
My hand is trembling on the gun so badly that I’m suddenly worried I might accidentally shoot him. Despite the cool night air of the desert, my palms are slick with sweat, as is the back of my neck. “You told me I shouldn’t call you Jamie,” I say quietly.
Rebel leans in, filling my head with the smell of him. “Oh, sugar. If you were going to say those words to me, I’d definitely want you to call me Jamie. At least then, when you eventually do run away like any sane person would, I can replay the sound of your voice telling me that. And it will be for me. Not the guy who’s wrestling to keep his people together. Not for the guy who didn’t protect his uncle. Not for the guy who’s been searching for his best friend’s missing sister for what feels like forever. It’ll be for the guy who came back from Afghanistan never thinking he’d find a woman strong enough or brave enough to take him on.”
I lower the gun, letting it hang down by my side. “I’ve already told you. I’m not going to run.”
“Then it looks like you’re the crazy one, not me.”
“Looks like it.” I can’t believe what I’m about to do, but I know it’s happening. I’m ramping up to it, a part of me panicked and scared yet unable to talk me out of voicing the words he wants to hear me say. “Jamie, I want you to take me back to the cabin—”
Rebel moves like a whirlwind. He catches me up, wrapping his arms around me, pinning me to him so hard that it feels like our bodies are fused together. He’s kissing me, then. Kissing me so intensely that pinpricks of light start exploding like fireworks behind my closed eyelids. His hands are in my hair, roaming all over my body, palming my breasts, moving over my thighs. The moment is so unexpected and fierce that I begin to wonder if I’m imagining it. My imagination has never been this good to me, though. He slides his tongue into my mouth, exploring me, tasting me, and I follow his lead.
The gun I’m holding drops to the ground, and then my hands are in his hair, arms winding around his neck, and he’s lifting me up so I can wrap my legs around his waist. His hands cup my ass, holding me up. When he pulls back, he’s breathing heavily, his chest heaving, his eyes bright and shining in the near darkness. “We can still have amazing sex without you finishing that sentence, Soph. Don’t say something you don’t mean. Don’t say something you can’t take back.”
A frisson of fear sparks in the pit of my stomach, but that’s all it is—a small nagging sensation. When I look into his eyes and see what’s in store there for me, how giving myself over to him will be so, so much more, that fear fizzles out and vanished entirely. “I trust you,” I tell him. I lean closer, crushing my breasts up against his chest in order to whisper in his ear. “And I want it.”
His reaction has me gasping out loud; he grabs hold of my hair in his right hand and makes a fist, pulling my head back. “Then do it. Say it,” he growls.
“Jamie, I—I want you to take me back to the cabin, and I want you to show me what it means for you to be my—my master.”
A slow, wonderfully sinister smile spreads across Rebel’s face. “Sophia?” he says.
“Mmm?”
“You may not want to talk about it this second, but you are going to marry me. You know that, don’t you?”
I feel weak and helpless in his arms, but not in a bad way. I also feel safe. Protected. At peace. I know, no matter how many other men I could potentially meet in my lifetime, no matter how special they might be able to make me feel, I will never meet another man like this. I will never feel as special as the way he makes me feel. I bury my face in his neck, hiding from the truth in his eyes and the truth in my heart. I can’t face it yet. It’s too damn frightening.
Rebel laughs silently, his shoulders moving up and down. He presses his lips against my temple and then stoops to collect the gun I dropped on the ground. I’m still clinging to him, legs wrapped around his waist, arms around his neck, when he shoots out the remaining cans.
“Come on, sugar,” he whispers into my hair. “Let’s get you home. Time to show you what you’ve been missing.
THIRTEEN
REBEL
I take a corner, leaning my Monster into it, and Sophia’s thighs tense ever so slightly. My dick is suddenly harder than reinforced concrete. Fuck Maria Rosa. Fuck Agent Lowell. Fuck Hector Ramirez and his evil piece of shit right hand man. All I care about right now is what’s gonna h
appen when I get Sophia through the door and into my damn bed. I doubt very much we’ll make it to the bed in all honesty. At this rate, as soon as we pull up outside the compound I’m probably going to be bending her over my motorcycle and fucking the living daylights out of her just to warm her up. She has no idea what she’s getting herself into. No clue whatsoever.
Up ahead, the compound is lit up against the darkness like a beacon. We pass the huge tree where Carnie found Bron’s body as we head toward home, and I can feel Soph judder against me. No matter how much time passes, that tree is always going to have evil connotations for her. For me, too. I’m not normally one for wantonly destroying living things, but I make a mental note to come out here tomorrow morning to take a chainsaw to the damn thing. I’ll use a pickaxe to dig the stump out, and then I’ll fill in the hole so it looks the same as the rest of this desolate landscape. Shame, really.
There are plenty of people milling about when we pull through the compound gates. I park my motorcycle up alongside the long line of machines behind the barn. Cade’s out the front of the clubhouse smoking a cigarette. He sees us, gives me a curt nod of his head, but he doesn’t come over. He’ll have things to tell me—if anyone can make Maria Rosa part with information, it’s Cade—but he must see the small shake of the head I give him. He’ll wait for me to come find him later. After my business with Sophia is at an end.
The girl beside me has her shoulders drawn back, chin tilted proudly. She’s set her jaw, and looks extremely defiant as I gesture for her to lead the way up to the cabin. She sets off without batting an eyelid.
“That woman hates me,” she says.
“What woman?” I don’t really need to ask, though. There’s only one possible person she could be referring to. Shay needs to calm the fuck down, or she’s gonna get called into my office and we’ll be having words. Really unpleasant ones. Sophia jerks her head to the right, where Shay is leaning against one of the storage units, talking to Dex, one of the Widow Makers’ longest standing members. She’s glaring at Sophia, sending her the foulest look imaginable. She seems completely oblivious to the fact that I’m even here. When she does notice me I shoot daggers at her and she looks the other way, eyes to the ground. When I was a kid, Ryan taught me how to treat a woman. Southern manners are hard to shake off, regardless of where you end up living and regardless of how other people may treat the fairer sex. Shay’s something else, though. She’s enough to make me forget my manners entirely.
“You guys used to sleep together, right?” Sophia asks.
She’s far too astute for her own good. I can see the awkward look on her face out of the corner of my eye; I know telling her the truth is only going to make her feel weird, but in the same vein I’m not going to fucking lie to her. I never will. “Yeah. Couple of times, back when she first showed up here. I put a stop to it very quickly.”
“Why? I mean, she’s a beautiful woman. You didn’t think so?”
I laugh, placing my hand non-too-subtly on Sophia’s ass as we climb the hill toward the cabin. “Sugar, a girl can be just about the most stunning thing to ever walk the surface of this planet, but if she’s ugly on the inside then it’s only a matter of time before she’s ugly on the outside, too.”
“So she’s a bad person?”
I take a beat to think about this. “No, not bad. Just damaged. Seriously, seriously damaged. This club is a family, though. You don’t kick out the problem child just because they have problems, right? You try and help them.”
“And if they just don’t want helping?”
“Then you lock them in their rooms until they start behaving themselves.” I am really not beyond considering this with Shay if she continues to act like a spoiled little bitch. “The thing about Shay is she hates to lose,” I say.
“And she thinks I’ve won?” Sophia sounds incredibly amused by this idea. I slap her on the ass. Hard. She stifles a cry, which has my cock throbbing in my pants. She can try and stifle her cries all she wants, but before the night is out I swear she won’t be able to help herself anymore. Her throat will be sore from all her screaming, in the very best way.
As soon as we’re through the door of the cabin, I have her in my arms, feet off the floor, and I’m charging across the other side of the room toward the bed. I must take her by surprise, because Sophia goes rigid, stiff as a board.
“Shit,” she hisses.
I throw her down on the mattress so hard she bounces. There’s a look of poorly disguised fear in her eyes as she blinks up at me, her breasts straining against the thin material of her t-shirt as she breathes in and out in quick time. “Are you afraid of me, Sophia?” I growl.
Her cheeks are stained with a delicate, rather attractive shade of crimson, as are her lips and the base of her throat. She swallows, and then nods. “A…little.”
“You can’t be. If this is going to work, you can’t even be a tiny bit frightened.” I crouch down at the foot of the bed, grabbing her by the ankles. Pulling her forward, I only let her go when her legs are either side of me, her feet almost touching the floor. I look her in the eye along the length of her beautiful, perfect body, and grin. “Sit up.”
She slowly props herself up on her elbows, and then pushes herself upright so her breasts are at my eyelevel. They are so incredible—I want to tear her shirt right off her back and go to town on them, licking and sucking, but I don’t. I need to make sure she understands what’s about to happen first. And what will never happen. “Look at me, sugar,” I whisper. “Look me in the eyes.”
Until now she’s been looking everywhere but at me. It’s so important that she knows I’m telling the truth when I say what I have to say now, though. If she doesn’t, she’s likely to flip the fuck out and panic and I don’t want that. I may be about to make some serious demands of her, but I want her to enjoy them all. I want her to come so fucking hard on my dick.
“Soph, tell me what you’re afraid of,” I say.
She bites down on her bottom lip so hard, the skin turns white. I reach up and press my index finger and middle finger against her mouth, making a disapproving sound. She releases her lip and takes a deep breath. “I’m…I’m afraid I’m not going to like not being in control. I’m afraid I won’t like being told what to do. I’m afraid—I—” she stumbles over what she wants to say, but I already know what it is. I give her a moment to finish, but when she doesn’t I complete the sentence for her.
“You’re afraid you’ll feel trapped and unable to escape. You’ll be frightened, because you think I’m going to treat you the way Raphael wants to treat you. To hurt you. To take something from you that you don’t willingly want to give.”
She looks away. Again I reach up, but this time it’s to gently turn her face back to me. “I’m not Raphael. I don’t like to hurt women. I would never, never force you to do something you didn’t want to. We’re going to push your limits, perhaps, but having those limits is okay. If you honestly don’t want to try something, then all you need to do is say so and that’s it.”
A slow smile gradually forms on her face. “So… we’re going to have a safe word?”
I laugh. “Sugar, ‘no’ is the only word you ever need to say. ‘No’ should never not be enough.” It makes the blood boil in my veins to think that she’s told someone no before and it hasn’t been enough. I’m sure she didn’t welcome Hector inspecting her to see if she was a virgin. I’m sure she didn’t consent to Raphael pawing all over her, breathing down her neck, telling her all the vile things he wanted to do to her. If he’d taken it further…if he’d actually… Fuck, I can’t even think about that. My rage would be a brutal, swift, consuming thing.
“Thank you,” she says softly. “No’s good enough for me.”
“Good. Now. Do you want to know what I’m afraid of?”
It’s very rare that Sophia looks shocked. She does now, though. It’s almost comical to be honest, but I can’t laugh because I actually am freaking out a little. Today isn’t the best day
to tell her this; I know that. But the thing about perfect moments is you don’t know they’re perfect until they’ve already passed you by.
Fuck it. Here goes.
“I’m scared because I’m in love with you, and I don’t know what to do about it.” I sound confident as all hell when I tell her this, but my head actually feels like it’s about to implode. I only manage to sound that way, because it’s true. I am in love with her. It’s fucking inconvenient, and a genuine surprise to me, but it’s true.
Sophia’s eyes grow really round. She sits very still, not breathing or moving. Eventually, she says, “You’re not joking, are you?”
I shake my head.
“Well, fuck.”
“I know. Messed up, right?”
“Ha!” She stares at me, and I think she’s not really taking this in. Not believing me, anyway. I can tell by the mildly angry look on her face. “That’s really low,” she says. She laces her fingers together, gripping tightly, her knuckles blanching. “Why would you do that? Why would you tell me that?”
“Because…I’ve never told anyone before. It seemed like the right thing to do.”
“You’ve never told anyone you loved them before?”
“No. Never.”
“What about your…” I know she was going to say my father, and I know she then realized how stupid that would be; I watch it all play out on her face. “What about your Uncle, then?” she says. “What about Ryan?”
“Nope. Never. He was a pretty stiff kinda guy. I know he loved me in his way, but he never said it. I think he would have kicked my ass if I’d have told him.”
“And there were never any girls you dated? You…you never fell in love with any of them?” She’s beginning to sound incredulous. I don’t know if I should be offended, or I should be finding her complete and utter disbelief entertaining.
