by Sophia Gray
“Oh, Jesus.”
“Yeah. It was really hard. I was the oldest of five kids. The youngest, my sister, Liza, was only three. Mom went into a deep depression. Some days, she couldn’t get out of bed.”
“And you had to take care of everybody else,” I whispered.
“Yeah. And go to school. But I did, and I handled it all right. On the days when she was with it, life was easier. She always tried to stay strong for us. When she was too depressed to get up, she would just say she didn’t feel good. But my room was next to hers. I heard her crying at night.”
“Oh, Vince. I’m sorry.” I kissed his chest, wishing there was something I could do to make things better. I thought about the little boy he must have been, listening to his mother cry in the middle of the night. How he must have felt when he heard it.
“As time went on, things got a little better. She pulled it together mostly. I could go back to focusing on school. I didn’t wanna end up like my dad, working in some shitty factory for the rest of my life and end up dying there with nothing to show for it. But then she died, too. When I was sixteen. Sleeping pills she borrowed from a friend. Took too many, and that was it.”
My heart ached for him. I could tell he was holding back—he’d been keeping that story looked away so tightly in his heart for so long. Just the words alone, and what they meant for a kid at that age, were enough to leave me speechless.
“So there was just the kids and me. Shit, I couldn’t take care of them anymore. I didn’t have the money to do it. But then I heard from a friend of mine that I could make money if I went along on a job he was doing with the club he had just joined.”
“This club,” I murmured. My head was still against his chest, and I felt the murmur of assent as a rumble in his chest.
“He told me I could make a couple hundred bucks, and he vouched for me with the rest of the guys. I figured, what the hell? Some quick money. I could use it to buy groceries, keep the electricity going, that sort of thing. So I went. And I kept going back for more jobs, and I earned more money. It was good to feel a little bit of security, you know?”
“What about school?”
“I had to stop going. I couldn’t do what I was doing at night with the club and get everybody out the door for school in the morning and go to school myself. Somebody had to take care of things. So I did. Until the state stepped in and broke us up.”
“Oh, no.” All that for nothing, I thought. If it hadn’t been for his mother’s death, he would never have joined the club in the first place. But then I never would have met him.
“Alex took me in. He was president of the club then. He didn’t have any kids of his own, and he sorta took me under his wing. I needed somebody, you know? I needed a family.” He let out a long, shuddering sigh. “I haven’t seen any of my brothers and sisters since we were split up. That was more than ten years ago.”
My tears ran down his chest, and he gently lifted my head. “Don’t cry,” he whispered, wiping the tears with his thumbs.
“That’s just the saddest story.”
“I could have turned out much worse. A street kid. Same with the others. They were all placed with other distant family members, so it wasn’t like they got lost in the system.”
“Oh, that’s a relief, anyway.”
He nodded. “I haven’t had the guts to find out what happened to them.”
“Why not?”
“I guess I feel bad for letting us get split up in the first place, you know? Like I should have tried harder.”
“Not at all! You were just a kid. It was the law. What could you do?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. I just felt like it was my job to keep us together, and I failed.”
I shook my head. “You didn’t fail. You did the best you could. Nobody could have done better.”
He was quiet for a long time, staring off into space. I told myself that if we stayed together when this was all over, all the craziness, I would help him find his family. I could tell how much they meant to him, even though he was afraid to admit it either out of guilt or some weird macho thing.
“What about school? Did you ever finish?”
“Nope. No time for it. Nobody seemed to care, so I didn’t. Besides,” he grinned, “I wasn’t exactly encouraged. But! Do me a favor and open the armoire.” He nodded to the piece of furniture in the corner. I was confused, but did as he asked after wrapping myself in a sheet. When I opened the doors, I gasped.
Books. Hundreds of them crammed in there. Not a stitch of clothing. Novels, histories, biographies. The Bible. Shakespeare. The Art of War. I ran my fingers over the spines of the books, somehow feeling even sadder for him. He had to hide his self-education from everybody else. They wouldn’t understand why he still felt called to learn.
“What about getting your GED?” I asked. “Online. They offer the test.”
“What’s the point?” he asked. “I like to read and learn new things, but I don’t need a piece of paper. I’ve graduated the School of Hard Knocks. A GED isn’t going to help me be a better leader.”
Maybe it was only important to me, then, and a little chill ran through me. It was just one more difference between us. Me, I’d do everything I could to get my diploma and even take college courses online. But it wasn’t important to him. Learning was important, not degrees. Would we ever make it if we were so diametrically opposed? It wasn’t just this. The school issue was a small example of a bigger problem.
It was fine to have a connection and mind-blowing sex. But was it enough?
I pulled out one of the books at random. A biography of Theodore Roosevelt. “He was amazing,” Vince said, sitting up in bed with a smile. “So kickass. I wanted so much to be like him after I read that.”
“I’ll have to give it a read,” I said with a smile.
“Hey…come here.”
I glanced up from the pages I was flipping through to see him patting the bed. I sat down beside him and ran a hand through my disheveled hair.
“I’ve never told anybody what I just told you,” he confided. “Not even Brett.” My body tensed, and he felt it. “Listen, Brett and I…we’ve only ever been friends. She’s the only other person beside you who has the heart and understanding you do. That’s all.”
“It’s maybe not the best idea to mention one woman while you’re sitting in bed, naked, with another.” I grinned, holding up the hefty book. “Especially when the woman you’re with is holding a deadly weapon in her hands.”
He pulled me onto the bed, rolling over until he pinned me under him. I laughed, but my laughter was drowned out by the feeling of his mouth on mine. It didn’t take long before I felt his hardness pressing into my belly again.
“I guess recovery time is over,” I whispered huskily between kisses. I opened my legs and felt him slide inside me, and we started again.
Chapter Sixteen
After our second quickie session, we both fell into a light sleep. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to spend all day making love with him. Our passion ignited so fast, we were both finished in a matter of minutes. When that burst of pleasure died off, I was exhausted.
I sure hadn’t gotten a good night’s sleep the night before—I might have passed out quickly, but remembered tossing and turning. That, plus the emotional stress of my close call with the Wolves, had me snoring within minutes of my head hitting Vince’s shoulder.
I was dreaming, and I knew it was a dream. I didn’t want it to end. It all felt so good—I felt secure and right, like I was where I was meant to be. I just wasn’t sure where that was.
Vince was with me, I knew that much. I was behind him on the motorcycle with my arms around his waist. We were on a trip somewhere, cruising down a highway somewhere. I just didn’t know where. There was nothing familiar anywhere. But I trusted him, and I gave him a little squeeze.
He turned his head slightly to one side, and I could see a smile on his face. I was so lucky to be with him. What were the odds of us f
inding each other? It was all so perfect.
The sun was setting, and I watched as it dipped below a line of trees on the horizon. Just like that, everything changed.
Now I was afraid. The road was dark. There were no lights. Only the lights from the bike guided us. Still, Vince didn’t seem worried. He rode at the same speed, not slowing down a bit. In fact, it felt like he was going a little faster.
“Maybe we should slow down!” I tried to make him hear me, but my words were swept away in the wind. I couldn’t even hear myself, no matter how loudly I screamed for his attention. He just kept going, on and on, down an increasingly winding road.
Fog rolled in, and all of a sudden I felt cold and damp and more frightened than before. Everything around us was so dark. I couldn’t get off—we never stopped, just kept riding. He didn’t turn back to me anymore. I might as well have not been there.
I realized we weren’t on a highway anymore. Now we were on the street. It was still just as dark. There were no cars, no street lights. Just an endless stretch of pavement, with tall buildings all around. I had the feeling there were eyes watching us from inside the buildings, peering out at us, laughing at us. Waiting for something bad to happen. Waiting for the chance to make something bad happen.
Then, suddenly, we stopped. And there was the alley. The same alley.
“No! No!” I screamed. “Go! Don’t stop now! He’ll see me!”
I couldn’t look away. There they were, the two men I’d seen that night. I cried out for them to stop. I wanted to warn Lance—no matter what he did, he didn’t deserve to die. It was like I wasn’t there at all. There was no stopping them.
I tried to get off the bike. I wanted to run before they saw me. I tried as hard as I could, but I was stuck—right down to my arms around Vince’s waist. There was no escape.
“Please, please, let’s go!” I was weeping, begging. Why didn’t he listen to me? Why didn’t he care? I thought he cared about me and wanted me to be safe!
Then he turned to me, and I screamed when I saw the face of the man in the alley. The same face I had seen leering at me just before Vince came to save me.
I couldn’t let go of him. I couldn’t get away. All I could do was scream.
“Erica! Wake up!”
My eyes flew open. I was frozen in fear. Dreams did that sometimes when they were scary enough, and we woke up so suddenly.
I was safe. Slowly, my muscles loosened and I could move again. It was still daylight, but the light was warmer than it had been before we fell asleep. Hours had passed, and now it was nearly sunset.
I shuddered at the memory of what sunset meant in my dream.
“Wow,” Vince whispered, holding me close.
My heartbeat finally slowed down, and I could speak again. “I’m sorry,” I replied. “Bad dream.”
“I could tell. Poor thing. What was it about?”
I shook my head. “I don’t remember now. Isn’t that the way it always is? Scared half to death, but I have no idea why.” I laughed shakily. I glanced up at him. His face told me I was a worse liar than I thought I was.
“Come on,” he whispered. He got out of bed, giving me the chance to indulge in the sight of him for a minute.
“Come on where?”
“We need to get cleaned up.” At the time, I wasn’t concerned with anything sexual. I needed to be close to him. I was far more shaken up than I wanted to admit. It was like all the fear of the past day came up at once.
He pulled on a pair of shorts and handed me a robe, then we tiptoed to the bathroom. Well, I tiptoed. I was still shy about letting everybody hear me. Though I knew they’d heard plenty of me while Vince and I were going at it.
The shower was nice and big, leaving plenty of room for the two of us. I was surprised, not for the first time, at the level of comfort this clubhouse featured. A nice bed in Vince’s room, good quality sheets and towels, big bathrooms, that stunning lounge with its video games and pinball. A lot of money had been spent to make this a home away from home.
And I was grateful for every penny as I stepped under the hot shower spray. I felt the stress and strain of the last twenty-four hours wash away, just as the heat helped my muscles relax.
Vince stepped in behind me. I smiled when his arms encircled my waist. I leaned back, resting my head on his broad chest. I wished we could stay like this forever, just the two of us. No world to hold us back or get in our way. Just us being together in our little bubble. Hadn’t we earned it yet?
I sighed as I reached for the soap. No, it wasn’t that easy. I remembered something my grandmother used to say, something about the best things only coming as a result of sacrifice. Nothing in life was free, she used to say. The more you paid, the more you were rewarded. She was full of cheerful pearls of wisdom like that one.
If that was true, Vince and I were in for one stellar future.
Vince washed my back with his hands. At first he was all business, efficiently soaping me up. It didn’t take long for his hands to slow down, though. He was clearly getting a little too much enjoyment out of sliding his hands over my soapy skin. Not that I wasn’t enjoying it just as much—if not more.
Just that fast, everything changed. We went from taking an innocent shower to groping each other. Be honest, I thought. It was never an innocent shower. Nothing between us would ever be innocent. It took nothing, just the slightest touch from him, to spark my need. And my need was bottomless. I’d had him twice already. I came more times than I could count. I needed more.
I leaned against him while his hands cupped my butt and gently squeezed. I felt his hardness against me back there, and I slid over it. He groaned, squeezing me harder.
Then, his hands slid around to the front. He cupped my breasts, kneading them. My nipples hardened, and he flicked them with his fingers. I was always so sensitive there, and he took advantage of that. The louder I moaned, the faster he worked me over. My head fell back against his shoulder as I whimpered and begged for him to never, ever stop.
One hand slid down my front. “Have to make sure you’re clean,” he whispered in my ear. I shivered when he found my soaked, swollen lips. Then he dipped his fingers inside to stroke my button. I gasped, writhing against him.
Vince’s tongue traveled up and down my throat, while his hands drove me wild. That, and the urgent hardness pressing against my butt, were all too much. When he started gently thrusting against me, breathing hard in my ear, I came with a shuddering cry.
I wasn’t even finished yet before he turned me and pushed me against the wall. I felt his knee between my thighs, spreading them, while his tongue plundered my mouth. All I could do was give in to him. There was no sense in trying to fight it. I didn’t want to anyway.
Instead of impaling me with his thickness, Vince surprised me. He fell to his knees between my legs, then draped one leg over his thick shoulder. At the first touch of his tongue against my lips, I gasped. My entire body tensed. Pleasure washed through me, all centering there, where his tongue lapped at me.
I held onto his other shoulder with all my might, my knees going weak the longer he went on. He flicked my bud, then sucked gently on it before flicking it again with the tip of his tongue. I stood completely still, focusing on the pleasure. “Don’t stop,” I begged. “Please.” I didn’t want to move, it was so exquisite. Water ran over my body, trickling down my skin, filling the room with steam.
The faster he went, the higher he pushed me. I dug my nails into his skin, making him hiss through his teeth before going back to tormenting me with his mouth. I went higher, higher, the pleasure building to an almost unbearable tension the longer he licked me. Then, when I felt his fingers slide into me and start pumping rapidly in and out, I lost it.
“Vince! Yes!” I arched my back, whispering my relief as I came. Even a whisper echoed through the bathroom, and I struggled to hold back the cries that wanted to come out.
It was even more difficult when I realized he was still fucking me with
his fingers. He was a blur, slamming his knuckles against me with every thrust. I moaned softly, urgently, building again, begging him to go faster and harder.
But he slowed, and I was so surprised I opened my eyes and looked down at him. He only grinned up at me before curling his fingers toward himself and massaging me inside. It was like a bolt of lightning zigzagging through me. I rode his hand, fighting against the urge to stop because the pleasure was so intense. I wanted to see where he would take me. I trusted him.
I leaned against the wall, moaning endlessly as we worked together. I felt a deep throbbing in my core that only got stronger the longer we went. It spread throughout my body, pulsing, building, running through me until I was totally enveloped in bliss. I didn’t know if I was coming, or just at the edge, or somewhere in between. The pleasure never seemed to end, it just went on and on without peaking.
