by Brook Wilder
She watched his hands itch near his erection, desperate to touch but he knew the consequences of that. He needed to calm down, but she was going to make that as difficult for him as possible.
Next were the pants. They were already undone. She simply hooked her thumbs in the waistband and pushed down, shimming again to get the jeans loose from her skin. She felt goosebumps hit her skin as the drafty air hit her there too. She was far too sensitive for any of this. She’d never imagined a crappy storage dungeon as a place she would find the best orgasms of her life, but she couldn’t exactly deny the chemical energy she was feeling here and wasn’t going to complain.
Underwear was next, peeled off in much the same as the pants and then there she stood, naked and shivering slightly in front of him. His eyes seemed ready to bug right out of his head, he was sweating, even from where she stood she could see a bead making its way down his face and disappearing behind the shirt on his chest. His breathing was a tidal wave, his chest rising and falling like the moon itself was pulling on it and releasing it for a second before taking it back again.
“Ready?” she asked.
“Beyond ready,” he husked out.
She stepped toward him, straddling his lap, pulling his pants down just far enough to get a good vantage point over him. She lifted herself up, her quad muscles flexing there. She lowered herself onto him and they moaned together as her hips became flush to his. She waited there, just for a second, feeling him inside her, touching parts of her that hadn’t been touched in so long, and never with that much intensity or emotion.
“Ready when you are, sweetheart,” he whispered into her ear, gently kissing her cheek.
She began to move up and down, to bounce with smooth grace, letting her insides run along the surface of him. He met her movements almost immediately. They moved together, riding the tidal waves as they moved towards a crescendo. Their moans were out of sync but their hips were flush together at nearly every turn.
He came first. It was usually the case. But he didn’t stop once he’d drained himself, his fingers coming down to play with her sensitive flesh between them until she was spasming on top of him. No man had cared enough to make her come after he was done. It had always been a case for her own fingers or pulling out a vibrator in the bathroom. But here he was, pushing her towards ecstasy while he was still inside her. The father of her child.
“You’re so beautiful,” he whispered, breathless, against her neck.
“So are you,” she said and meant it.
Chapter 23
The post-coital glow was not something that Hanna ever really bought. It was a cheesy thing movies that tried to convince virgins was a real thing, that men would cuddle them and bask in the beauty of making love. It never happened. But there Hanna was, in Roarke’s arms, not caring how their skin stuck together with sweat and other fluids that passed between them. His arms were wrapped around her and it was hot and only making her sweat more but she wasn’t about to move.
She was pretending she could feel the baby in there already, though she knew it was a little more than a bundle of cells at the moment, it was there, pressed safely between their bodies. She wanted to ask him what he would name it, which sex he hoped for. She wanted all the domestic fantasies, things she’d never wanted before. She wanted them with him now. She meant it when she said he was beautiful. He was a gorgeous person and she saw it every time they were alone.
“One of these days I’m going to take you to one of those five star hotels in Vegas and we’ll have rose petals on the bed instead of holey blankets from my sister’s linen closet,” he said.
She snorted. “A little romantic don’t you think?”
“The mother of my kid deserves romantic. Besides, I want to prove that I have other places I can take a lady than the basement of my own bar,” he said, laughing.
“Me. Not a lady. There are no other ladies,” she said, feigning a sharpness in her voice but giving him a smile.
“Not a single woman on Earth exists besides you,” he said, kissing her forehead.
It was the overly sentimental talk driven by hormones and overly active glands. But she was okay with it. She’d hold him to these things he was saying. She wanted all these things. She’d laugh for a while, but the idea of having a romantic weekend away of champagne and rose petals and mirrors on the ceiling was any girl’s fantasy. She wasn’t exempt just because she needed to put on this tough exterior.
The magic was broken, however, when there was a crash upstairs, followed by several pairs of feet moving.
“The hell?” Roarke asked, sitting up, sliding her off of him.
He stood and pulled his pants up, looking up at the ceiling as the feet moved quickly. There seemed to be a lot of them. She worked on getting her clothes back on, forgoing the underwear that was a little too ruined with her own arousal. She’d find them later and toss them. She slipped her shirt on and followed his gaze as he watched dust knock from the ceiling with heavy boots.
“Something’s not right,” he said gravely.
“A fight?”
“No fights in my bar, even Rick knows that. This is something else,” he said.
Before she could ask more questions or they could discuss the possibilities of what was waiting for them upstairs, the door to the room swung open and several guns and flashlights were pointed their direction, telling them to come out with their hands up.
***
Roarke knew Isabelle was behind this. It wasn’t just because he was sure she was the orchestrator of everything awful that happened to him in recent weeks. And now the police were staring him in the face, pointing the rifle end of a fun at him, while they trashed his bar and stormed down into the room below. He hoped they could smell all the sex that had just happened down there. At least they’d know he was getting some.
“Roarke Withers?” the cop said, staring him in the face and talking louder than he needed to.
“That’s me.”
“And you are?” the cop asked.
“Hanna Isaacs,” she said, glaring at him.
They stared at them both, writing the information down or at least looking like he was to feel important.
“Have we done something wrong?” Roarke asked, his eyes moving around the bar to see half his gang being questioned or put into handcuffs.
“Besides the fact that there is a warrant out for your arrest?”
“Isabelle dropped the charges,” Hanna said, calling the police officer’s bluff, he gave her a look but went back to scribbling on his notepad.
His attention, however, was pulled towards the police officers scanning behind the bar, likely looking for drugs. He felt himself gulp, however, and tried not to be too obvious, keeping his eyes trained on those officers behind the bar. He knew that, waiting to be found back there, was something more important than drugs or unregistered guns and ammunition. The old Tequila Jack bottled, seamlessly blended in with the others, held the ledger of the gang and the fates of everyone in the room if it were found.
He began to sweat.
Chapter 24
The magic of the few weeks she was having with Roarke seemed to vanish as the next few days went past. The cops couldn’t find anything, but that didn’t stop them from waiting and lingering around as long as possible.
“Don’t think you’re getting off that easy,” one of the officers said to him as he stood there with his arms crossed.
“I never get off easy. I’m a tough man to please,” Roarke said with a shit-eating grin but Hanna could see the fear in his eyes that couldn’t be hidden by his own arrogance. Something had him spooked. The cops may not notice, but she narrowed her eyes in his direction.
“You’re on thin ice, Withers,” the cop said.
“Aren’t we all? Until you’ve got a warrant or a reason to cuff me, I’m perfectly safe where I’m standing,” he said. “Now I kindly ask you to leave my property.”
“We’ll be back.”
“I’m sure
you will.”
He watched the cops shuffle out until the last one was gone. Rick watched the window, giving the signal when actually left the property, cars and motorcycles speeding off into the night. Hanna didn’t trust that they hadn’t bugged the place, left something behind. They made a show and knew they were likely not going to find anything, that was a textbook bugging assignment.
She set to work, running her fingers under ledges and looking for wires out of place. Roarke was watching her with a raised eyebrow.
“And you are doing…?”
“I’m willing to bet they bugged this place,” she said.
“Girl has a point,” Rick said. “That was a little too showy for no reward on their part.”
“Well then I hope whoever’s listening can go fuck themselves,” Roarke said loudly and marching away to the back office, slamming the door behind him.
That was the start of what Hanna knew was going to be an insufferable two weeks. She had deep feelings for Roarke, she cared about him, she knew the man he could be underneath. But she also knew that this was going to be the beginning of all the ugly parts of him coming back to light. He was so easily angered, so easily set on a hot boil. For whatever reason, this got under his skin and she was going to be the one suffering for it.
***
“Get off my back.”
“I’m just trying to get you to relax.”
They were in Roarke’s apartment, several days after the raid. Roarke hadn’t so much as kissed her on the cheek since then. He took to pacing constantly, checking his phone, calling people. He watched the TV blankly, not really taking in any of the news or whatever sitcom he let her put on. He didn’t complain about her staying over night after night and continued to make sure she got food and water and she caught him, once or twice, checking some pregnancy websites.
But his face was hard and his tone was harder. He was giving her tough love, of some sort. She knew it wasn’t her fault. He wasn’t punishing her for anything, but he was taking out his foul mood on the one person he knew he could. Rick would have punched him in the face by now, Amber would have told him off, but Hanna was just concerned about trying to make him calm down, feel safer, feel happier.
It was around the fourth day that she decided to give it back.
“I know the big bad cops got you spooked but you could maybe not take your petty shit out on me,” she said sharply and he stared at her.
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about you playing the tough guy act all over again since the cops showed up at the bar,” she said, standing up to get some height on him as he sat in the couch. “This isn’t you. You like to put on shows but not for me.”
“Maybe this is me?” he spat back.
She shook her head. She’d had that fear, for just a moment. She was afraid she’d been wrong, that she’d imagined the man who had been so kind to her over the course of the past few months. She could have easily seen what she wanted to see and it wouldn’t be too hard for him to give her the illusion of what he wanted her to see as well. In the middle of the night, she thought that could be true, that this all had been a huge mistake.
But when she watched him sleep, he was peaceful then, he’d hold her, reach for her without realizing it. She knew that was the real him, that was the one hiding and this was the facade. But she couldn’t put up with much more of his nonsense if he insisted on being cruel to her to take out his fears.
“What is it that you’re afraid of now? The cops are gone, the Caracals have been quiet. What the hell has got you acting like an ass?” she demanded.
He sighed. His glare and furrowed brow dropped and he looked at the ground. Now he was more of a scolded teenager than the hard-ass wannabe gang leader. She rubbed his neck and twisted it around until it cracked.
“I’m sorry,” he mumbled like it was the hardest thing in the world for him to get out. “I know I’ve been a huge ass and I don’t mean to be, though that’s just going to be something that’s part of who I am.”
“Well, I won’t argue with that,” she said with a smirk.
He smiled back at her. It was small and a little too self-conscious but it was there and she’d take what she could get from him. She wanted it all, but this was a start. She moved to sit down next to him and squeezed his knee firmly.
“It’s way too early in all this to be fighting,” she said. “That’s exactly what Isabelle wants. She knows you, or thinks she does. She wants to try to turn you on the people who care about you.”
“I know,” he sighed, placing his hand over hers.
“There are small ways to get back at her, and that starts with not giving in to her mind games, no matter what has you spooked,” she said.
He smiled and, for the first time in days, leaned forward and placed a soft, warm kiss on her lips. It was quick, barely more than a brush, but that’s all Hanna wanted right now. She didn’t need searing passion or something hot to make her feel alive. She just needed to know that he was there, that he was present. That the person she knew he could be was waiting underneath the surface of all that show and leather.
They would be okay. She wasn’t going to let Isabelle or anyone else change that.
***
The bliss of it all didn’t last very long, however. The next day they were having a meeting in the bar and Roarke’s agitated self came back out to play and was far less willing to be nice and gentle and be forced away by some cuddles now that he was in front of the gang. Hanna wanted to smack him, just level a chair over his head, wring his neck just a little bit.
“We need to go after her,” he said, plainly.
“Why? So she can set another trap?” Hanna said. “She’s excellent at staying three steps ahead of you because you’re so damn predictable.”
“I’m prepared, I’ve got a code, and I’ve got plans, nothing wrong with that,” he said.
“Until she uses that against you, like she is now,” Hanna said. “She knows what you’re going to want to do. She’s got something waiting for you if you try to go after you, I’m sure of that. But she doesn’t know me. She doesn’t know what I’m willing to do or not do. We should use that to our advantage.”
“So suddenly you’re the key to sorting this whole mess out?”
“It’s a better fucking start than doing exactly what she wants you to do,” Hanna spat, beginning to see red. “Last time you went off on your own to do things your way Robert ended up in the hospital.”
It was a low blow and the room got quiet after she said it. She may have crossed a line but she didn’t care. She needed to get through to him and if hurting him or shocking him was going to get the job done, then so be it, she’d do what she had to. She wasn’t going to let him risk more lives and any advantages they had on his own pride and stupidity.
He stared at her, his lips a thin, tight line. She held his gaze. She wasn’t going to back down. She didn’t want to hurt him but she’d do what she needed to make sure he understood. She needed him to knock it off and it was this or scold him in front of his entire gang and she knew how well that would go over.
Before anyone could break the tension by speaking up, the door busted open. It was Mouse. He was out of breath and pushing his way into the circle of the meeting.
“We got a problem, boss,” he said, hands on his knees.
“Did you fucking run here?” Rick asked
“I had to ditch my ride a while back, I’ll get in the morning,” he huffed out. “The point is the cops are snooping around my grandma’s barn. They know the guns are there. They don’t have a warrant but it won’t take much for them to get one.”
“Oh fucking hell,” Rick said, throwing down his drink and pulling on his jacket.
“Guns?” Hanna asked.
“Smart guy over here swore it would be fine to house all the guns in one spot,” Rick said, pointing at Roarke.
“They’re unregistered,” Hanna concluded for herself.
&
nbsp; “Yes,” Roarke said, getting up. “And we’ve invested virtually everything into them so if the cops get their hands on them we can say goodbye to the bar and the auto shop.”
With that, Roarke and Rick walked out of the bar and Hanna was powerless to stop it.
Chapter 25
Hanna decided to do the responsible thing and make a doctor’s appointment. She’d been putting it off for a number of reasons, many she didn’t understand herself. She didn’t want to admit that this was real and happening, she also didn’t want to give anyone a reason to suspect her. It had been quite a while since Roarke had her followed and Rick seemed to have stowed away his fangs for now, but she didn’t 100% trust that. So she avoided the doctor’s appointment she knew she should have made the second she realized she was pregnant or the second after she told Roarke and he was okay with the situation.
