Menace

by J. M. Darhower

  I’m guessing that’s his name, since he reacts to it. Not that it matters. Nothing about them matters to me, personally, but it clearly matters to Scarlet.

  Rocksteady vacates the room. The chaos in the club dies down as the intruders leave. Everyone else has fled, or hell, maybe they’re all dead. Again, not that it matters, but I just stand here, hands still fisted in my pockets.

  “Don’t move,” I say, knowing Scarlet can hear me. “I’ll let you know when it’s clear.”

  I quietly stroll from the red-tinted room, crunching on glass as I walk down the hall, passing bullet-ridden walls. It’s not the worst scene I’ve ever been involved in, but it’s not exactly pretty, either. I make my way through the main club, looking around, eyes skittering past the bouncer at the front door, dead in a pool of blood.

  Calling that one karma.

  I stall in the doorway to the office, looking at the wall of monitors, most of them destroyed by the AR-15. Amello is nowhere to be found, probably the first to run like a little bitch when the bullets started flying.

  “When the boys came out to play,” I mumble, “Georgie Porgie ran away.”

  After checking the rest of the club, I make my way back to Scarlet. The police won’t be far behind, which means I need to get the hell out of here. Scarlet is still in the same spot, behind the bar, knees pulled up to her chest, arms wrapped around them.

  I pause, regarding her as I pull my coat off. She’s wearing very little, still topless, trying hard to cover herself—not out of some sense of propriety. She’s just nervous. I wordlessly hold the coat out to her and she takes it, slipping it on, zipping it up. She’s so petite it almost goes to her knees, longer than the dresses I’ve seen her wear.

  “Come on,” I say. “I’ll walk you home.”

  I hold my hand out to her. She looks at it, like she isn’t sure if she wants to touch me, but she concedes after a moment.

  She’s rattled. I can tell. Her knees are practically knocking together, her hand shaking in mine as I help her to her feet. She pulls away from me as soon as she’s upright, shoving her hands in the pockets of my coat.

  Scarlet keeps her head down as she quickly walks down the hall, toward the back exit, but instead of going outside, she veers to the locker room.

  “Whoa, where are you going?” I ask, grabbing her arm to stop her. “We need to go.”

  She yanks away from my clutch. “I need my stuff.”

  “Just leave it,” I say. “Fuck it.”

  “You don’t understand,” she mutters, ignoring me as she goes about her business, heading over to a locker to pull out a duffel bag. It only takes her a few seconds, doesn’t slow us down much, so I drop it, even though it’s absurd.

  It’s just stuff.

  She hurries out the back door of the club, eyes surveying the neighborhood, on guard, like she fully expects the boogeyman to leap out at her from somewhere in the darkness.

  My cock is an icicle within minutes of stepping outside. Every inch of me is frozen solid except my feet… my feet keep on moving, keeping up with Scarlet. She only lives a few blocks away, so it doesn’t take us long to get there. Nobody followed us that I could tell, and I’m pretty damn good at gauging when someone is watching, so I think she’ll be safe for now.

  But still, there’s some part of me not yet okay with letting her out of my sight.

  Curiosity, maybe.

  Mind your own business and you’ll live a hundred years. Problem is, you know, a hundred years is a long time. Do I really want to live that long?

  My curiosity says, ‘I don’t think so’.

  So I follow her inside, and I trail her up the stairs, watching as she turns the knob to her apartment and walks right in. The place hadn’t been locked any of the times I’ve shown up.

  “Locks broken?” I ask curiously, stepping into the apartment as she leaves the door wide open behind her, probably the closest thing to an invitation I’m going to get from the woman. I linger there, flicking the deadbolt, watching as it slides out just fine.

  She doesn’t respond, which doesn’t surprise me, since she hasn’t said a single word since back at the club. She kicks her shoes off, leaving them lying in the middle of the floor on her way to the bedroom. She doesn’t shut herself in there, doesn’t even attempt any privacy as she unzips the coat and takes it off, snatching up a wrinkled plain white t-shirt from on top of the messy unmade bed and pulling it on, covering herself. She walks back out, lugging the coat along, and shoves it at me, punching me in the chest with the damn thing. She lets go of it and turns, heading into the kitchen.

  If she comes back with a knife, I swear to fuck, I’m going to slaughter the woman…

  “You’re welcome,” I call out, putting my coat back on. It smells like her, and I turn my head, inhaling along the collar. Huh.

  “Thank you,” she says quietly as she reappears in the doorway, clutching a clear bottle of something. Rum… vodka… something. She takes a drink of it, lingering there, leaning against the doorframe, her eyes questioning as they regard me… as they watch me smelling my coat, like some panty-sniffing pervert.

  I shrug, zipping it up. “It smells like you.”

  “What do I smell like?”

  “Like sex and shame,” I say, smirking at the scowl she directs my way as I inhale again. “And something distinctly vanilla.”

  “It’ll fade.” She takes another large swig of the liquor, grimacing, before continuing. “It’s just my lotion… vanilla orchid. The sex, well, I’m afraid you’ll have to wash that off.”

  “And the shame?” I ask, strolling toward her. “How long until that fades?”

  She laughs dryly. “I’ll let you know if it ever happens.”

  I take the liquor from her, glancing at the label. Rum. The bottle’s made of flimsy plastic, utterly cheap, the kind of rum that puts hair on chests and can put a motherfucker through puberty again. It’s not for the faint of heart, no, but neither is she.

  She’s gritty and raw, but goddamn, the woman is beautiful. The more I look at her, the more I see it.

  I take a swig, not reacting to the bitterness, and hand it back as I stare down at her. “Why don’t you lock your door, Scarlet?”

  “No point,” she says. “Locks won’t stop someone determined to get in.”

  “So you make it easy for them?”

  “I’m just realistic. I could seal myself up in here tight, with a hundred locks on the windows and doors, but all that’ll do is trap me, like some caged animal, and I refuse to do it. Besides, you know, all of this?” She waves around the apartment. “None of it means anything to me. If people want to help themselves to it, so be it… they can have it all.”

  She takes another swig before pushing away from the doorframe. Shoving by me, she strolls across the room, that vanilla scent wafting toward me.

  “I hate to break it to you,” I say, glancing around, “but I don’t think you could give half of this shit away. No offense, but it all kind of looks like, well… shit.”

  “That’s because it is,” she says, pausing at the window to look out. “Most of it I found or stole.”

  “What do you do with all of your money?”

  “Is that your business now?”

  “No.”

  “So why are you asking?”

  Why am I asking? I don’t know. I don’t even know why I’m here, why I’m bothering with this woman at all. “Just trying to riddle you out.”

  “Don’t bother,” she mutters as I stroll closer, pausing behind her. “My problems are my own.”

  “Ah, come on. You can spill all your secrets to me, Scarlet. I’m good at pretending to listen.”

  She laughs, a genuine kind of laugh, as she tilts her head, regarding my reflection in the grimy, cracked glass of the living room window. “I’m sure you are, but I learned long ago not to bare my soul to just anyone. It seems to make people think they’re entitled to every part of me, like I owe them everything and can keep nothing f
or myself.”

  “Yeah, well, I’m not just anyone,” I tell her. “Besides, it’s a little late to try to keep everything under lock and key, considering what went down tonight. So how about you show me yours and I’ll show you mine?”

  She turns around, eyebrow raised as she leans back against the cold glass. It’s chilly in the apartment, the heat barely working, but that doesn’t seem to bother her. Not much does.

  “Go on,” she says. “You first.”

  “Me first?”

  She nods. “Excuse me if I don’t trust you to live up to your end of it, considering the bullshit you tried to feed me last time. So yeah, you first.”

  “Fair enough.” I pause, trying to think of something to tell her, something dark enough to entice her own little demons to want to peek out and join me today. “I’ve killed people.”

  “You’ve killed people.”

  “Yes.”

  She stares at me. Hard. She doesn’t look horrified. Hell, she kind of looks bored again. “That’s your big, dark secret? That you’re a murderer?”

  I shrug a shoulder. “Not dark enough?”

  “It’s plenty dark,” she says. “It’s just not exactly a secret.”

  Well, damn.

  “I lie, cheat, steal, rob, pillage, plunder, slaughter... seventy-five other fucking words you find in a dictionary associated with the word ‘criminal’.”

  “That’s nice, that you know how one of those works,” she says. “That’s kind of vague, though.”

  “You want details?”

  “I want something I don’t already know.”

  Pressing my hands to the windowpane on either side of her, I lean closer. Her breath hitches, her eyes fixed to mine, back flat against the glass. She’s flustered, having me so close.

  “I wanted to kill your boss tonight,” I tell her. “I showed up, walked into his office, wanting to end his life, but then I saw you were working. You were on one of the screens, leading that man into the back, and just like that, I changed my mind. Because while killing him would’ve been a thrill, it wasn’t nearly as enticing as you. He lived to see another day thanks to the little hero in red fishnet thigh-highs.”

  She blinks a few times. “Did he?”

  “Did he what?”

  “Live?”

  It takes a second for me to realize she’s asking if the Russians got him after I left him alive. “I didn’t see him lying around anywhere, so I’m assuming he’s fine.”

  She nods slightly, like that doesn’t surprise her. “You should’ve killed him.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “Because he ordered someone to kill you.”

  “Did he?”

  She nods again.

  Huh.

  Maybe I’m supposed to be worried about that, but I let out a light laugh, amused that he had the guts. If the rat bastard wanted me dead, he had ample opportunity to try it himself tonight.

  “I’ll have to remember that,” I say. “Your turn, Scarlet. Tell me something I don’t know.”

  “I just did.”

  “Something about you.”

  She hesitates.

  She hesitates so long I know she’s not going to say a word.

  I lean down, sliding my nose along her skin, inhaling that warm vanilla, before saying, “Come on, I showed you mine, didn’t I?”

  “You don’t understand,” she whispers.

  “Then make me.”

  As soon as I say that, she pushes away from the glass, shoving against me, forcing me to take a step back, but I resist, refusing to move. We had a deal, goddamn it, and if she didn’t want to make it, well, then she should’ve thought about that before I told her something.

  I step to the side, in front of her, when she tries to go around, blocking her path once again when she dodges the other way, pinning her there by the window.

  Frustration clouds her face, and I half expect her to hit me, to swing that fist she clenches and punch me right in the jaw, but instead she comes at me, shoving against me, before thrusting up on her tiptoes. Her mouth is on mine, those red lips forceful as they kiss me hard, furiously moving, like maybe she couldn’t find the words to speak so she’s trying to steal them from me.

  Figures.

  Fucking thief.

  A chill runs down my spine as I roughly grasp the back of her neck, holding her there, and kiss her back. My tongue slides into her mouth, meeting hers. The woman tastes as good as she smells, so fucking good that I groan. My other hand slides up beneath the edge of her white shirt, grabbing her hip, yanking her closer.

  “This is how you want it?” I ask between kisses. “You’d rather fuck than talk?”

  “Shut up,” she growls, making me stumble back as she shoves me toward the bedroom, dropping the bottle of liquor to the floor, discarding it, not giving a shit as it splashes out, pooling along the wood and splattering the two of us. Frenzied hands unzip my coat, tugging at it. “Just… shut up.”

  I oblige—for the moment, at least—and let her push me toward the bedroom, kissing her the whole way there, even letting her tear at my clothes. Every second that passes, her frustration seems to grow, the woman close to Hulking-out and just smashing every goddamn thing. She yanks at fabric, like she thinks she’s strong enough to rip it apart, so I help her out, tossing my coat aside and breaking the kiss so I can pull my shirt off.

  Her hands tremble as they fumble with my pants, like she’s nervous, or excited, or fuck, maybe both. I’m having a hard time getting a read on her, especially when I reach for her shirt and she blocks my attempt to strip her. A voice deep in the recess of my mind screams something about this is off, but that voice is snuffed out quicker than a gunshot to the temple when her hand slips into my boxers and grabs my cock.

  BAM, all pussyfooting gone.

  “Fuck,” I groan, my voice gritty, my eyes closing as I tilt my head back. Her hand is warm, her skin velvety soft, but her touch is firm as she strokes, hitting just the right places to set me off. Her thumb massages the sweet spot on the underside of my cock, the sensitive outer ridges of the head, right where those nerve endings are bundled.

  Jesus, this woman knows her anatomy.

  A+

  Top marks.

  Summa cum laude.

  Valedictorian of her motherfucking class.

  I could stand here and feel it forever, just get lost in the sensations rolling through my body, but if she’s this good at a hand job, her pussy will without a doubt blow my mind. My pants slide down my legs, dropping to my ankles, and I try to kick my boots off, but they’re not budging, and you know what?

  Fuck this.

  I can fuck her with my clothes on.

  Grabbing her wrist, I pull her hand away before I explode already. Wouldn’t take long, that’s for sure, not with the way she’s touching me. I pull her onto her bed, damn near falling from my shackling pants, my hand still clutching her wrist. My thumb presses against her pulse point, feeling the thump-thump-thumping from her heart racing.

  Twisting around, she uses her free hand to reach over to a bedside stand, yanking a drawer open to retrieve a condom. She rips the golden foil wrapper with her teeth, and I let go of her wrist, watching as she rolls the condom on me.

  I don’t undress her. If she doesn’t want me to, hell, I won’t. Shoving her legs apart, I settle between them, hitching her knees up. Her thong is barely a piece of string, easy to shove aside as I reach between us, caressing her bare pussy.

  Her mouth falls open, a soft sigh escaping, when I push my middle finger inside of her, pumping it in and out. My thumb roughly rubs her clit, the simple touch making her moan. It doesn’t take long until she’s soaking wet, writhing beneath me.

  Grasping my cock, I rub the head along her warm pussy, stroking her clit with the tip, before lining up and pushing in. Fuck, she fits perfectly, like a leather glove. Her breath hitches, and she clutches a hold of me, wrapping her arms around me, her red-painted nails digging into the skin of my back
.

  I pound into her, on top of her, covering her with my body, digging my boots into the cheap mattress for traction with each hard thrust. Those nails rake across my skin, leaving stinging trails as she claws her way through me with each whimper, and moan, and cry, her legs wrapping around my waist, welcoming me inside.

  Fuck, this woman...

  Yeah, I’m actually fucking this woman.

  She grows quiet, her grip loosening, scratches becoming barely-there touches, her body shifting every time I thrust into her.

  She’s limp in the bed.

  Pulling back, I look down at her tucked beneath me. She’s staring off into the distance, gaze fixed to a nearby wall. Dazed. Zoned out. Gone.

  “Oh, no, no…” Grasping her chin, I turn her head, forcing her to look at me. “You’re not doing that blank slate shit with me.”

  She blinks a few times before her eyes narrow.

  “Go ahead, get mad,” I say, continuing to thrust. “But when I’m inside of you, Scarlet, you don’t get to fade.”

  “I’m not,” she says defensively.

  “Liar, liar, pants on fire...”

  She growls, hands running up my back before she fists my hair, tugging on it, yanking me back down toward her. “I’m not fading.”

  “Damn right you’re not,” I say, brushing my nose against hers before I kiss her.

  She doesn’t fade again, those moans returning, turning to sharp cries as I stroke her clit, bringing her to orgasm.

  Again.

  And again.

  And again.

  I hold myself back for as long as I can, watching her as she comes apart at the seams, the sounds escaping her primal, like a wild animal, before my body just can’t take anymore. If I don’t come soon, my balls are going to revolt. They’re seriously going to close up shop and go the fuck home. Grunting, I thrust hard, knocking the flimsy bed into the wall, as a swell of pleasure runs through me.

  “Fuck,” I groan, gripping her tightly, fishnet-covered legs still wound around me as I spill into the condom. Stilling, I press my forehead to hers, catching my breath, inhaling her scent. The vanilla is still there, yeah, but the smell of sex overshadows it now, and the shame?