by Kati Wilde
But I’ll never adjust to this. Never get used to the feel of Gunner holding me tight, kissing me in this tender way. Even if I welcome him into my body and my bed every night for the next fifty years, I don’t know how I’ll ever feel anything but the disbelief and wonder and sheer joy that are coursing through me now.
Then he lifts his head, fingers tangling in my hair. And his gaze burns into me as he says, “I love you, Anna Wall.” His voice sounds thick. “I know you don’t love me back yet. But if you let me, I swear I’ll give you any future you want.”
I thought this was a dream. But I was wrong.
I’m dead. And this is heaven.
Silently I stare up at him, hope and fear and joy and all the old hurt building up so high, until he laughs and groans at the same time, gently kissing my lips, then the corners of my eyes.
“No tears, sweetheart. We’re going to fix what hurts. I’m going to make you feel so good. Is my cock deep enough?”
So deep. Breath shuddering, I nod.
His fingers tighten in my hair and he says roughly, “But I’m not as deep as I can be,” then shoves forward, bottoming out inside me.
I cry out, my back arching, my pussy gripping him tight, so tight.
“Fuck yes.” He pushes into me again, so long, so thick. “That good?”
“Oh my god. Yes.”
So good I’m sobbing with pleasure against his lips. It’s never been like this. I don’t know if it’s because my delicate tissues are swollen with such fierce arousal or because he’s so thick, but my inner muscles are clenched around him, the ache inside me so sharp, as if I’m on the verge of coming, but I never go over. Instead I just hang there on the edge, his cock making it better and worse with every long thrust. My fingers claw at his shoulders. Jaw clenched, he grinds against me before setting a slow, steady pace until I’m begging, writhing beneath him.
“That’s it, sweetheart.” Neck taut with strain, he bends his head, tastes my panting lips. “Now tell me when I get you just right. When I’m sliding against your clit. When my cock’s giving your pussy what you need.”
His hand wedges under my ass, lifting me—and I don’t have to tell him when he gets it just right. His cock pushes inside me at a new angle, the thick head rubbing hard across the nerves lining my upper wall. My entire body stiffens and clenches, a strangled cry breaking from my lips.
“Just like that, Anna,” he groans. “Oh fuck, your pussy squeezes my dick so tight.”
His mouth crashes down on mine, kissing me hot and hard, fucking me like he can’t get close enough, holding me tight and his cock pushing deep, deep, deep. But I can’t take it anymore, and my lips tear away from his, my hands clenching and unclenching on his shoulders.
“Gunner! Please, please—”
He doesn’t cease his relentless thrusting. “You going to come, sweetheart? Then come on my cock, baby,” he urges roughly. “’Cause when I feel you go off, I’m going to come right up inside you. All my hot cum up inside you. You want that?”
“Yes. Oh god.”
Groaning, he licks my open mouth. “Just look at the way I’m filling your cunt. I’ve never seen anything so damn beautiful as your pussy stretched around my dick, your sweet clit so wet and swollen. Does your pretty clit ache, sweetheart? Do you need more?”
I’ll die from more. Each filthy word is like a lick across my clit, and he knows it, he knows it.
“I can’t, Gunner—”
Then his fingers are there, too, sliding over my clitoris and his voice is like the rasp of a rough tongue. “You like this, Anna? Me playing with your hot little clit with my thick cock pumping deep inside you?”
So deep. With my pussy so tight and I still can’t get enough, and I can’t make any response but a desperate stuttering moan, my head thrashing as if I’m saying no but he knows I’m not, because he’s still fucking me and fucking me.
Harder now, each thrust sharper. “You like me filling you up with my big cock? Filling up every inch of your pussy?”
Yes. But I can’t make a sound, my body stretched taut like a bow and shaking, shaking.
“Then come on me, sweetheart. Let me feel you squeezing me tight so I can fill you with my cum. Because I’m going to come inside you, Anna. I’m going to come so fucking deep inside you— Oh, fuck yes, baby. Like that. You’re so fucking beautiful, Anna.”
Then he’s not talking, but groaning deep as I begin convulsing around him, my hips locked in wild gyrations as if trying to ride his cock harder, deeper. But he’s still fucking me, pounding deeper and deeper until his mouth covers mine and his body stiffens and I feel him come, the thick pulse of his cock spilling hot semen deep inside me, triggering more convulsions through my inner walls.
I’m still shaking when he collapses over me, my breath shuddering, crying a little, laughing even more.
Burying my face in his sweaty neck, I wrap my arms around him. “Oh my god, Gunner. I’m a cum slut.”
Laughter rolls through his big body as he pulls me over, lying on his back with me straddling his hips—and with his thick cock still a delicious pressure inside me.
“You’re my cum slut, sweetheart. Because you love everything that comes out of my pouty, filthy mouth.” Fingers tangled in my hair, he kisses me, long and deep, then holds my gaze when he lowers his head again. “You’re beautiful. And I love you so fucking much.”
My heart so full, I stare down at him, my fingers tracing his lips.
“No, Anna. No tears.” His beautiful smile flashes, then he catches my fingers, presses a kiss to my palm while his other hand slides down my back. “I see I’m going to have to make you feel good again.”
Swiftly, he rolls me over and claims my mouth in another deep kiss.
And once again, he lasts a hell of a lot longer than ten seconds.
27
Anna
I do feel good. Better than I ever have, my entire body boneless as I lay in Gunner’s strong arms, our skin covered in sweat. I’m almost half asleep when I force myself to roll over off the bed.
Big hands catch my hips and pull me right back. A deep voice in my ear says, “I still have a real slow one planned.”
I grin, tilting my head to rest against his shoulder. “I have to clean up.”
His palms slide up the sides of my ribs, cupping my breasts, and I hear the smile in his voice when I shiver against him. “Why? We’re just going to get dirty again.”
“Okay, well—‘clean up’ is actually a code phrase for ‘I have to pee.’”
“Then stay and we’ll get really dirty.”
Oh my god. I start giggling so hard it might be out of my control in a second. Then he lets me go with a playful swat to my ass, and I get moving, picking up my nightshirt along the way.
“You won’t need that,” he calls after me, so I turn at the bathroom vestibule to flip him the bird.
And stop, because Gunner naked in bed? Holy shit. I’ve fantasized seeing him like this a thousand times but the fantasy’s not even close to the real thing. He sees me staring and a slow smile spreads over his lips. His big hand slides down his taut stomach to grip his hardening cock.
Arousal and amusement deepen his voice. “You going to stand there and watch?”
I want to. But I really can’t.
Rushing into the bathroom, I pull on my nightshirt so I won’t freeze while going through the necessary. Then I do clean up, washing my hands and using a washcloth between my legs, where I’m sticky and tender.
This definitely isn’t heaven. Or a dream.
Because I’ve never had to wipe away drying cum from the inside of my thighs after dreaming about him. In my fantasies, my face isn’t bruised and my lips swollen by anything except his kisses, and I never imagined knowing what I’d smell like with Gunner’s scent all over my skin.
And I never thought he’d be so fun and filthy and sexy and intense.
I’ve imagined him saying I love you a billion times, though—and even that was all
wrong. Because I had no idea it would feel like this. I imagined triumph and happiness. And there is happiness, but also fear and hope and doubt.
Because this isn’t a dream. But right now, what Gunner and I are sharing doesn’t extend beyond the walls of this hotel room. So I’m not even sure if it’s real.
I don’t know if it ever will be real outside of this room. Not when there are so many factors still keeping us locked in. His family. Finding Stone.
And what happens when I go back home?
But I’ll worry about that another time. Right now, I’m grabbing onto this opportunity—grabbing onto him—while I can.
While it lasts.
I brush my teeth and finish up my nightly routine. I’m not sure if he really does have another round in mind, but if he does, I intend to pass out from exhaustion afterward. When I emerge from the bathroom, Gunner’s moved to his own bed, sitting up against the pillows with a thick paperback in his hand. I hesitate for a moment, until he throws the covers back and invites me in.
“No wet spot to fight over,” he says. “But you have to be on that side.”
So he’s between door and me. Snapping off the entryway light, I slide between the cool sheets. “That can be our humping bed and this can be our sleeping bed.”
“Nah, I’m pretty damn sure they’ll both be our humping beds.” He draws me closer against his side, his arm coming around me as I pillow my head on his shoulder. “But that’s the beauty of maid service. No dried spots to avoid tomorrow.”
God, he’s so warm. I snuggle in closer. “I guess it’ll also help to throw off any of your brothers who come in and inspect the number of beds we slept in. This way, they’re both used.”
“Yeah.” On a deep sigh, he reaches over and sets the book on the nightstand but doesn’t turn off the light. Instead he settles against the pillows again, his hand smoothing up and down my back. “I’m sorry you had to deal with all that. All of it.”
“It could have been worse. I liked the brides. They were nice. And I really liked Grace. Which was almost the worst thing—not being able to hate her. Because I kind of wanted to.”
A hint of teasing colors his reply. “Jealous?”
“No.” Not really. “Just…it wasn’t so awesome. Realizing what they had planned for you. And because of this morning.”
Because it hurt so much thinking he’d touched me before heading off to meet his intended wife.
Gunner must realize it, because his amusement’s gone. “There’s no one but you, Anna. I didn’t even think about a bride until earlier tonight. I forgot you’d meet one. I’d have prepared you. I’d have told you all I felt for you before you met her, if I’d realized. And I told my mother that wearing a kutte’s as far as I go. I’m not taking a bride.”
I believe him. Nodding against his shoulder, I trace my fingers along the defined edge of his pectoral. “How’s your family going to react to that news?”
Expecting a quick answer, it surprises me when he takes a moment, then says slowly, “I’m not sure—at least not sure about three of my brothers. Adam, he’ll keep pushing me to fall completely in line. Mama will, too. She won’t give up.”
That sucks. I pull in air through my teeth for a second, then tell him, “I don’t think Grace was all that thrilled you showed up.”
“I had the same impression—that she was at least uneasy. Which wouldn’t be surprising.”
“No, it wouldn’t be.” Meeting some guy and knowing his mother would push you into his bed that same night? That would make any girl uneasy, even if the guy looked like Gunner does. “What really surprises me is that she buys into the whole cult thing. That any of the brides buy into it. Because they’re all super smart. Which, I realized, is great for the farm. If the end of the world comes, your mother is going to have a doctor, an engineer, a vet, and an agricultural expert who specializes in soil fertility and sustainable crop production. So if one group had to rebuild society…jeez, your mom picked the right women.”
“And the men are the muscle.”
“Yeah.” Suddenly lying against him and only feeling his reactions isn’t enough. I come up on my elbow and turn to meet his eyes. “In so many ways, it’s kind of awesome. Not to get all ‘girl power’ about it, but—”
He grins and wraps a strand of my hair around his fingers, tugging gently. “Get all girl power if you want to.”
Easy to do. “It’s like your mother knows that the world is basically screwed if the important shit is left up to the men.”
A laugh shakes through him. “Yes.”
“But…oh my god. It’s so bad, too. Because it’s all based on something so awful.”
“Yes.” His smile fades.
“So I can see why these women might buy into it. I mean, that place. It’s like a utopia. You just have to put up with husbands who stick their dick into anything and who think they’re chosen for some special destiny, and also buy into some pretty hefty racism. But, you know, aside from that…” I trail off, rolling my eyes.
“Aside from all that,” he agrees with another smile, his pale gaze never leaving my face, as if he’s enjoying watching me talk almost as much as he is listening to my observations about his family.
“And even the racism is weird. Not even so much, ‘I’m superior to you’ or ‘I’m afraid of you’ but like ‘You’re just fine, but there’s no place for you in a peaceful and perfect world.’ Oh, and ‘Your kind has to be eradicated from this earth before we’ll have a true widespread utopia, because there will always be strife between different races. So sorry, no offense. That’s just the way it is.’”
“It’s self-evident, right?” Shaking his head and grinning, he says, “While we were sitting at lunch Muncher began laying out all this shit that’s happened since I’ve been gone—because, not living on the farm, I wouldn’t see the truth of how everything taking place is fulfilling my father’s vision of the coming race war. Everything going on overseas, the riots here, illegal immigration. So he’s telling me all of this, reminding me that my father was just speaking the truth that no one else wants to hear or has the balls to say. About how it’s going to come down to us and them.”
“And I’m a them,” I say wryly.
“No offense, though. Right?” His tone is light, but he cups my cheek in his big hand, and the warmth there slips through every part of me.
“Right,” I agree just as lightly. “But your brothers believe it, don’t they? Like really believe it. Your mom, too.”
“They do.”
I study his face for a long second. So like his brothers…yet so different. And I don’t know how he did it. He grew up just as they did. “So how’d you get out?”
His gaze searches my eyes, and I don’t miss the slight hesitation—as if he isn’t sure whether to say.
As if he isn’t sure of my reaction.
I press a kiss into his palm. “You don’t have to tell me.”
“I can,” he says. “It’s just that there’s a long story and a short one.”
“The short one first?” I suggest, playfully walking my fingers up the center of his chest. Maybe I’m not quite as tired as I thought I’d be—and I want him to know I’m here, that he doesn’t have to be uncertain with me.
“It’s not the kind of story that makes you want to fuck after hearing it.” There’s no anger in his voice. Just something tired and heavy. “Come here.”
I scoot closer and he slides his arms around me, pulling me back down to pillow my head against his shoulder again. So I can’t see his face, I realize.
His hand slips into my hair, brushing it back from my cheek. So he can watch me, judge my expressions.
Maybe worried what I’ll think of him.
I spread my hand over his heart. Wait for him to start.
“The immediate reason I left was David,” he says after a minute. “I told you Adam killed his girl.”
“Yes.”
“Shot her on her way home from school. Left her in a dit
ch. No witnesses. And no one looking at him—they looked at David for a minute, but Adam made sure it wouldn’t come back on him. He did it when David and Mama and me were in San Francisco one day. But David guessed, or he figured it out, or maybe he overheard something. I don’t know how. But he knew. And it just fucking broke him.”
His voice is deeper, rougher. I slide my hand across his chest to curl around his side and hold on tight.
“And those days we were always working our asses off. Always some chore or another. That afternoon we were out at the woodpile up behind Mama’s house, splitting logs into firewood. Which means I was the one working, because by then everyone except me and David were patched in to the Few. That meant my older brothers and my father sat around smoking and drinking while David and I worked. Sometimes David and I bitched about it, but it was essentially how we served our time as prospects.”
In the club hierarchy. “So David wasn’t there?”
“Not at first. But he does finally come out our way. And I’m tired and hot, and I know he’s torn up bad over Ivy but one way we’ve always gotten through shit together was working so hard we didn’t have time to dwell on what hurts. So I tossed him the ax. And he went after our father with it. Chopped halfway through his neck.”
Oh my god. “Killed him?”
“Yeah. After a minute or two, bleeding out.”
“Why not Adam?”
“Because my father was the club’s prez. David knew that even if Adam fired the gun, he wasn’t acting on his own initiative.”
So the orders came from their father. “Did David go after Adam then?”
“Maybe he would have. But Adam’s hauled off and knocked him down. Benjamin and Jacob and me are trying to save Prophet, and Isiah’s on his crutches and shouting for Mama. Then she comes running out, and Adam goes to intercept her, because he’s thinking that she doesn’t need to see what’s happened to our father. But of course nothing’s keeping her away from him. And in that time David picks up that ax again and heads for her, shouting that he knows she made the decision. But before he can get to her, Adam pulls his gun and shoots him. Three bullets in his chest and gut.”
