by Jessie Cooke
He pulled back and looked at her face just as she tucked something into his hand. He looked down at the cold metal against his palm. It was Zoe’s pendant. He looked back up to ask her what it was she wanted him to do…but she was gone.
Levi woke up in his bed at the Skulls clubhouse, gasping and panting for air. As he threw off the blankets and sat up in bed, he looked down at his closed fist. The pendant had been on the nightstand when he fell asleep, but he knew, before he even opened his hand, that would be what he was holding. “Fuck me,” he said, as he looked down at it. He closed his eyes and pictured Krissy’s beautiful face. “I’ll try, baby. That’s all I can promise for now. I’ll try and live without you.”
21
Levi pulled Zoe in to his chest and squeezed her so tightly that she felt like he was trying to mold them together. She wanted to stay right there, where she could feel the beat of his heart and the rise and fall of his chest as he breathed against her. But she knew it was wrong. He was looking for a replacement for Krissy, and that couldn’t be her. She pushed with all her might, against his chest, until he let go of her.
“What? What’s wrong?”
“I’m not her.”
He touched Zoe’s face with the back of his hand. “But you are, you’re a part of her.”
“Maybe. Maybe some weird, cosmic thing did happen and when I touched her that night, part of her went into me. But you can’t be with me because of that. Because whatever part she became of me…is still me. Do you understand?”
“I don’t understand any of this.” His brown eyes were filled with tears and Zoe wanted to drop the whole thing…but she knew that she couldn’t. One thing that growing up with a druggie for a mother and raising herself on the streets had taught her was that she had to stand up for herself. She had to protect herself because no one else was going to do it.
“It’s confusing to me too. But the bottom line, Levi, is that I’m a whole person. I was a whole person before that night. I deserve someone to love me for who I am, not who they wish I was. I’m not her and I never will be. Do you understand?”
He nodded. “I’m sorry. This is all so…”
“Fucked up?” she asked with a smile.
He smiled back and said, “You said it.” He put his hand on her face again, this time letting her hair fall through his fingers. “I know that you’re not her. But I can also feel the part of you that is her…I’m not sure that makes any sense.”
She nodded. “It does. I’m getting used to that part myself. It’s like I don’t even know you, but that one part of me knows everything about you.”
He pulled her back into his chest and she let him. He held her for a minute and when she felt his face lowering down to hers, she didn’t try to stop him. She put her arms up around his neck and she let him kiss her. She kissed him back. It felt so right and so wrong at the same time. Once again, she wanted it to go on forever, but she knew she needed it to stop. She pushed back and stood up. This time, however, Levi wasn’t going to be content with that. He was finished talking, she could see it in his sad brown eyes. He leapt to his feet and wrapped his big hands around her thin waist, lifting her up off the floor and tossing her back onto the bed like a caveman. He leaned down over her with his chest heaving and his eyes locked into hers. He had her pinned to the bed and she couldn’t move if she wanted to…but he didn’t scare her. She was just pissed off that the man she wanted so badly belonged to someone else.
“What are you doing? You’re insane.”
Levi smiled. For a second she was able to imagine that when he looked down at her like that, he saw her…Zoe, and not Krissy. He leaned down further and nuzzled the side of his rough face against hers, and then began to kiss and nibble down the side of her neck and back up to her earlobe. She shivered almost convulsively as he sucked it into his mouth. While she let herself enjoy the feeling of his lips and his tongue and his teeth, she forgot everything else for a moment. He let go of her earlobe and slid his lips up so that they were right over her ear and he whispered, “I’m confused. You’re confused. But…we both want this. Tell me you don’t want this, Zoe, and I’ll leave you alone.” She opened her mouth, but the feel of his breath in her ear still lingered and the feel of his body against hers was front and center in her mind. She did want it. She wanted it so badly that she couldn’t form the words to tell him otherwise. She couldn’t lie about this one thing no matter how hard she tried. “Tell me, Zoe. Tell me to get off you and go away.” She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t even speak. Levi was running his fingers softly up and down her arm, and the sensation was like tiny little electric currents running down her spine.
After a few more seconds of her not resisting and not telling him she didn’t want exactly what he wanted, he pushed himself up further and used one of his fingers to draw a line from underneath her chin, all the way down her chest and in between her breasts. Zoe sucked in a hard breath as he brought up the other hand and used one finger to draw a slow, sexy circle around one of the hard nipples standing at attention underneath the nightshirt she was wearing. She lay there reveling in the feelings as Levi pushed the shirt up over her hips and stomach, and finally exposed her breasts. He leaned down further and pulled one of her nipples in between his lips. He sucked on it and licked at it and the whole while, he ground his hips into hers, letting her feel how hard he was…For me? She wasn’t sure, but it was like a runaway train; she couldn’t stop what was happening. He bit down on one of her nipples and she cried out as the feelings rushed from her breasts all the way down to her throbbing, wet pussy. She finally put her hands up on his shoulders and began running them down over the tense muscles in his arms. She followed his right arm as his right hand began to make its way down her abdomen, toward that aching pussy. He slid his hand down inside her panties and when he finally reached her burning, aching center, he wasted no time taking her swollen clit between his fingers and putting pressure on it, making her want to scream. He began rubbing it in small circles with his thumb and while she was lost in that feeling, he slid first one and then two fingers up inside of her. That was when she couldn’t stay quiet any longer.
“Oh, Levi! Jesus! Fuck!”
Her eyes were almost closed, but open enough that she could see him smiling up at her. He slipped his fingers out and tasted them and then put them back up inside of her and began to move them in and out while rubbing her clit with his thumb the whole while…hard. She was bucking her hips up off the bed, barreling toward an overwhelming orgasm and a scream that might send the neighbors running to her rescue. Levi’s breathing matched the intensity of hers as he increased the pace of the fingers moving in and out of her hot, wet tunnel. She bucked and moaned and whimpered and ground her pussy lips into his knuckles. Levi was still smiling as he leaned down and bit one of the nipples. That did it. She was suddenly lost in the haze of the most intense orgasm that she’d ever experienced, and it took her several long seconds to realize that the ear-splitting scream had come from her body as she came.
Levi waited until she came down, and then he pulled his fingers out of her and put them to his mouth. He licked each one of them and then said, “You taste like honey.” Zoe was panting and gasping for air, staring at him like he was a God, or an alien. What am I doing? How can I give this up? I can’t. She knew she should, but she just couldn’t. When he lay down next to her, she curled her body into his and let him wrap her up in a tight embrace. He held her there until the breathing of both of them was back to normal and then once again, he kissed her. This kiss was almost frenzied, with both of them sucking and biting at each other’s lips. After the orgasm she’d just had, she should be satisfied for a year, but she wanted more. She wanted to feel him inside of her. She wanted to feel like she was a part of him. He kissed her until she had to fight for breath again before he pulled away. When he did, he got to his feet and began stripping off his clothes. When he finished undressing, he stepped close to the bed and she reached for him. He grabbed her hand an
d stopped her. “If you touch me, or put me in your mouth, I’m going to come. I want to be inside of you when that happens. I want to feel that sweet, tight pussy wrapped around me when I explode.”
Zoe had to fight the lump in her throat as she swallowed. He took her other hand and used both to pull her to her feet, and then he sat down on the bed and pulled her down so that she was in his lap, facing him. After another hot kiss with his throbbing, hard cock pressed up against her pussy, he held her around the waist and lifted her up. She held onto his shoulders as he positioned her over his cock and then lowered her down, letting her pussy devour him inch by delicious inch. Once he was all the way inside of her, she let out the breath that she’d been holding. He smiled at her and used the hold he had on her waist to move her up and down. At first it was slow and sweet, but they were both too excited for that to last. She pressed her feet against the floor, and used them and her hold on his shoulders to move herself up and down in time with the thrusting of his hips. Her pussy was so wet that he nearly slid out of her each time he moved her up to the tip, but she’d never been so happy about gravity every time he let her go and she slid back down his shaft until she felt the tip of his thick cock, pressing into her as deeply as it could reach. Her clit was throbbing and her pussy was stretched to its limits and every nerve fiber in her body was alive. She felt like she was burning up from the inside out and even as she felt another orgasm building, she never wanted any of it to end. Levi’s hands began to move in exploration of every inch of her body as he rocked up into her, and she closed her eyes and let the feelings wash over her until they all collided once again in a soul-wrenching climax. She was afraid that she’d drawn blood because she’d held onto his shoulders so tightly, but he didn’t seem to be bothered by it. Once he’d coaxed the second orgasm out of her, he didn’t hold back. He drilled up into her over and over with primitive-sounding grunts until she felt his body tighten and the hot, thick, creamy evidence of his orgasm begin to run down along her inner thighs.
Levi continued to hold her in his lap as he pressed his forehead into hers. She had a broad smile on her face even as she sucked in one breath after the other…right up until she heard him whisper, “Krissy, I love you.”
The screeching of her alarm caused Zoe to sit straight up in the bed. It took her several minutes to calm down the rapid beating of her heart and realize she was at her nana and papa’s house, in her own bed. Levi wasn’t there. It was a dream. Another dream. A hot, wet, realistic…and heart-breaking dream. She used the top sheet on the bed to wipe the sweat off her brow before reaching for the phone and turning off the alarm. She had the day off from work but she had an appointment with the school counselor. She had to get on with her life. She had to figure out what to do about Patrick. She had to stop thinking about Krissy, and she had to stop dreaming about Levi. She’d told him what she needed to tell him and he was going to return the pendant, hopefully when she wasn’t at the diner…and then they could both just get on with their lives, she hoped.
22
Levi spent his first whole day at the ranch, taking tours of all the buildings and meeting people. He was doing his best to keep his mind off the dream or whatever it was he’d had the night before. It seemed so real that even after he woke up, he wasn’t convinced that he hadn’t just had a conversation with Krissy. Strangely enough however, he wanted to believe it was only a dream. If that was the case, then what she’d said about having to go away wouldn’t be true, and he’d get to see her and smell her and touch her like that again, any time he closed his eyes. For the time being, however, he was trying to concentrate on the decision right in front of him. Dax was offering him a hell of an opportunity and he planned on giving it careful consideration.
As Cody took him on his tour on the large ATV Polaris, Levi found himself thinking that to the outsider who didn’t know a motorcycle club owned and lived on the property, it might look almost like a hippie commune. There were cute little houses with well-manicured lawns, and almost every one had a garden in the back. A lot of the houses had children playing in the front yards or older people sitting in lawn or rocking chairs on the front porch. Cody waved at every one of them as they passed and every one of them waved back.
As they passed the area where the houses sat, they came to a grove of trees. Cody stopped the Polaris and both men got off the ATV. Levi didn’t know about trees, so he didn’t know what kind they were, but they looked like any other tree he’d ever seen. It wasn’t until Levi followed Cody through them that he realized the difference. In the center of it all was a large, canvas greenhouse with plastic sheeting in the windows. Cody pulled back the plastic on one of the windows and let Levi look inside. The big room was filled with large, green, lush cannabis plants. It was outfitted with state of the art lights and warmers and generators the size of small cars both inside the room and outside of the canvas greenhouse itself. Massachusetts had yet to legalize the growth, cultivation, and sale of marijuana, but right in front of him was the largest indoor crop of marijuana he’d ever seen, and he had seen quite a few. Growing cannabis was what his father did best and growing up, Levi had learned enough about it to be both curious and impressed by the Skulls’ operation. He said:
“My dad had a field up in the hills in Texas when I was a kid. It was in the center of a cornfield. He planted sunflowers all around the outside of the field so that when they knocked down the corn, the sunflowers would hide the cannabis plants if anyone happened to drive by on the dirt road. It was a big deal with the club until the younger guys took over the executive board and decided marijuana wasn’t going to make them the kind of money on the streets that other, more addictive and more expensive drugs would.”
“We were in the business of moving drugs at one point, but it put us in the middle of a war with some really dangerous people. We lost a lot of guys to prison or death before Dax finally said no more. We’re not choir boys, that’s for sure, but we don’t deal in anything anymore that’s going to attract a lot of violence or police action. If the cops found this place, they’d chop it down and slap us with a few fines and charges that Dax would end up with probation over, most likely. When I first got out of the joint and got a look at what Dax had done to the ranch and the club while I was gone, I thought he’d lost his mind. I’ve come around since then to realizing that the man is pure genius. If he was a greedy man and he didn’t share the wealth, he’d be a millionaire ten times over.”
“How long were you in?”
“I did six years of a ten-year sentence.” Cody didn’t say what he was in for and Levi wasn’t going to ask.
“I’ve been in county a few times. I’m not sure I’d last six years in prison. Just the idea of being locked up…” Levi caught himself and said, “Sorry, I’m sure you don’t want to talk about this.”
Cody walked back over toward the Polaris and Levi followed him. They got back on the ATV, and Cody said, “I don’t mind talking about it. It’s one of the things Dax has me do at the teen center. I can give them a first-hand account of what it’s like in there.”
“What’s up with that teen center?” Levi asked. He’d seen it out the window of the clubhouse and he was curious about it. He’d heard some ugly rumors over the past few years, but he didn’t want to believe them, especially now that he knew Dax and the handful of other Skulls he’d met in the past few days.
“Dax started noticing that a lot of the kids who had been raised in the club didn’t have the best lives growing up. There was a lot of abuse going on, thanks to drug and alcohol use or parents being in jail or fighting or whatever. The kids were being exposed to drugs and sex at an early age and they were getting addicted or pregnant, or taken advantage of. I was one of those kids and if it wasn’t for Dax, I would probably still be in prison. When we were in San Antonio on completely different business, he rounded up and brought back a bunch of homeless kids and child prostitutes. He’s built this teen center where there is someone on duty 24/7 to keep an eye on them, bu
t it also gives them their own space. They can work on getting their GED and they get counseling and we try and teach them life skills.”
“Wow, that’s pretty damned admirable,” Levi said. “I was one of the lucky ones that grew up in the club, but with parents who loved and nurtured me. But I saw what you’re talking about on more than one occasion. Our club has been increasingly violent over the past ten years and the kids growing up in the club have a front row seat to the aftermath of that violence. I don’t expect my club to be—what did you say?—‘choir boys,’ but there’s a big difference between stealing a few cars, growing marijuana, and benefiting off the porn business, and gunning people down in the streets.”
Cody nodded and said, “Yeah, I thought Dax had gone soft there for a while, but now that I have a kid of my own, I appreciate how important the kids…and family—are to him, and I sure as hell appreciate all he’s done for me.”
“Did you know Dax’s father?”
Cody nodded. “Yeah, I knew Doc. I was intimidated as hell by him, just about everyone that met him was. He was bigger than life and he never gave an order that wasn’t followed…at least not to anyone that lived to tell about it. Dax has that same ability to get people to follow his lead, but he’s mastered the ability to do it without using the scare tactics Doc used to use. People do what Dax tells them to do because they respect him.” Cody pulled up in front of the teen rec center and the two men went inside. Levi was given a tour of the building where kids were at work and at play throughout. It was a place that any kid would be lucky to be a part of, he thought. There were two gyms, an indoor soccer field, an electronics room with almost every kind of electronic stuff a person could think of. There were large-screen television sets in all the classrooms and Cody showed him one of the empty dorm rooms…they were nicer than Levi’s bedroom in his apartment. The kids that he saw there looked happy, or at least content. He even felt guilty about just listening to the rumors he’d heard about Dax’s involvement with the kids. One particularly nasty rumor was that Dax was rounding up child prostitutes in order to start his own kiddie porn ring. Levi was glad to find out that they had been way off base about that.
