by KB Winters
I smiled at him. “Cross isn’t hungry, Prospect Stitch. Make sure he gets his favorite, the kale and egg salad.”
“Asshole,” he grunted and I only laughed.
Even though the danger had passed, the tension remained. And I fucking hated tension. “Any word from Gunnar?” I asked, changing the subject.
Gunnar was the Reckless Bastards VP and he’d been MIA for months, checking in sporadically only with Cross.
Cross nodded. “He’s just about done settling his mother’s estate, but there’s some other issues that have cropped up. He should be back in another month or so. I hope.”
The stress was probably the reason our Prez was so quiet all the damn time. “Tired of picking up his slack?”
That caught me by surprise. I quickly reassured him, “Fuck no, just curious since you’re the only one he calls.”
“His head is all fucked up, you know that.”
I shook my head. “Our mothers weren’t exactly the same, so no, I have no fucking clue.”
He leveled me with a look. “Yeah, because little kids who watch their mothers overdose time and time again end up so fucking healthy.”
“Never said I was healthy, but thanks for bringing that up, man.” My life was no fucking secret but bringing it up like that to prove a fucking point, was a low blow. “Stop the truck,” I called out.
“We’re not there yet,” Stitch shot back.
“I said stop the fucking truck!”
The hummer slowed down and I jumped out.
“Catch you around,” I said, slamming the door and walking away. A walk would do me good.
Clear my head, since, according to my own Prez, it was all kinds of fucked up.
***
“Open up, Mandy!”
Even in my drunken haze, I realized I was loud and obnoxious, and banging on her door like I was an invading army. But like I said, I was drunk with a lot of shit on my mind, including the demons Cross kicked up earlier.
“Mandy!”
The sound of several locks disengaging practically vibrated the door and I stepped back just as Mandy’s blonde head appeared between a crack.
“What the hell, Savior?”
She didn’t look happy. Yeah, well neither was I. “We need to talk,” I yelled into the door.
Her lips were moving but I couldn’t hear her words because my gaze was on her swell of cleavage, all creamy and unbound. Tits loose behind the light t-shirt that barely hit mid-thigh.
“It’s one in the morning, what could we possibly have to talk about?”
I could tell she wasn’t happy to see me. “About why I’m such an asshole,” I told her and pushed my way inside. More like stumbling.
“I don’t need to know why,” she said, but she didn’t stop me.
“I owe you that much,” I told her because it was true. This wasn’t the first time I let Mandy down and my neglect was still impacting her life today, so yeah, I owed her the truth. I just let it rip.
“I have asshole blood in my genes. Dear old dad was long gone before I could even form a memory of his ass, though when Mom got drunk and high, which was all the time, she never passed up an opportunity to tell me just how much I reminded her of him. Then she’d shoot up or snort or smoke a little more until she passed out, sometimes she’d overdose right in front of me.”
It was more than sometimes but the truth is that very rarely is the whole truth necessary.
“Holy shit,” she sighed, because what else was there to say to something like that? “That’s fucked up.”
“Yeah, believe me, I know. I barely survived that shit.” I let out a long sigh and kicked off my boots, feeling fuzzy and uncomfortable and drunk as fuck. “So now you know. That’s my dirty little secret.”
I could feel the weight of those green eyes on me and I looked up to see the concern and frustration etched on her face. She shook her head and disappeared into her tiny kitchen, returning with a glass of icy cold water.
“Drink this,” she commanded.
After shoving the glass in my hand, she dropped down on the sofa beside me and curled into the other side.
“Thank you for telling me, Savior, but really you don’t need to. You don’t owe me an explanation and certainly not your whole history.”
“I wanted you to know.”
“Why?”
That was the fucking question, wasn’t it?
Why?
Why did I leave the air-conditioned car with my club brothers, go get drunk at some pub on the main drag and take a cab to Mandy’s apartment? No fucking clue.
“Because Cross called me a coward.” I told her all about my conversation earlier with the club president. “Why did he have to bring that shit up?” It came out as more of a whine than I wanted it to.
She sat quietly, contemplating her words before she spoke. “Probably to kick your ass into action? Just because your friend Gunnar had a good mother, doesn’t make the loss the same. Moms are special, even the shitty moms leave a mark.”
“Yours wasn’t a shitty mom,” I insisted like a pouting child.
“No, not as far as I remember. But she’s been gone more of my life than she was around, so I don’t have much of an opinion when it comes to the subject.”
She didn’t sound like it but I didn’t want to push. As Cross proved earlier, mothers were a touchy subject. She asked gently, “Why are you all out of sorts over any of this, anyway?”
I shrugged. “Fuck if I know.” And that was the kicker. I really had no damn clue what had brought on this bad mood.
She threw her hands up and rolled her eyes. “Well I’m glad I woke up for this. Totally worth the lack of sleep,” she grumbled and stood, staring down at me with kind eyes that didn’t match the bite in her words.
“Stay here tonight, sleep off the booze. I can take you to your car in the morning but I have to be up and gone early, Savior. Early.”
I nodded and stood on shaky legs, bouncing off the walls as I made my way to her bedroom and dropped down onto the bed. “Fuck, I’m hammered.”
“Clearly. Delusional, too, if you think you’re sleeping in here,” she told me as she came inside and climbed on what was obviously her side of the bed based on the rumpled bedding and dented pillow.
“Come on, Pixie. We’ve already fucked each other inside out and tonight I really am just trying to sleep.”
I didn’t wait for her to respond. I couldn’t. I’d be knocked out in the next few minutes so I stripped down to my underwear and slid beneath the sheets beside her.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m getting comfy,” I told her, curling my body around hers so her back was flush with my front. “You’re so warm and soft, a sexy little pillow I wish I wasn’t too drunk to fuck.”
Her husky laugh sounded, vibrating back and forth between our bodies. “Thank God for small favors, then.”
“Nothing small about it,” I mumbled before burying my face in her neck and drifting off to the best damn sleep of my life.
Chapter 15
Mandy
“That feels too good to make you stop, but how can it already be morning?”
Despite the tongue currently painting long strokes around one of my breasts, I felt too tired to be awake and too good to go back to sleep.
“Easy, the sun came up and now its morning,” Savior, explained, his blue eyes laughing at me, his tongue tickling over my nipples, one and then the other until I moaned and arched into him. “Besides, I had to wait till morning so I could see how hot you look when I make you feel good.”
His words brought a smile to my face. “Then make me feel good, Savior. Really good.” The words practically purred out of me when his tongue stroked my body, up and down my midsection, behind my knees and down my belly. Between my thighs.
“Your wish . . .” he said and trailed off as his mouth got down to work on other, more important things. Things like nibbling my inner thigh and swiping his tongue across it to soothe the tingling.
<
br /> “. . . is,” he murmured as his thumbs parted my pussy lips and he licked me from my opening to my clit.
“. . . my command.”
He ravished me, licked at me until I felt like I was climbing the walls, unsure if I wanted him to get closer or pull away.
“So good. Too good,” I moaned and sank one hand in his thick brown hair, massaging his scalp while also tugging on his ears. “More.”
His laugh sounded through my body, but his tongue moved faster and he added two fingers to the party, gaining intensity and speed until my skin broke out in a sweat. Moans and cries flew from my mouth like a prayer or maybe a song, I didn’t know.
All I knew was, nothing in my life had ever felt this damn good.
“You’re so close,” he growled and stared up at me for a moment, blue eyes intense, mouth slick with my juices. “I can feel those tiny little flutters in your pussy, telling me just how close you are.”
He laughed as his thumb circled my clit and I arched into him. “See how much faster you squeeze my fingers when I play with your clit?”
“Yeah, just like that,” I panted, unable to look away from the erotic picture he made with that sultry smile. “Oh, shit.”
“Yeah, come for me Mandy. You’re right there. Just . . . come for me.”
And I did. I let the pleasure swamp me, drown me in its weight and depth. My whole body shook as cries vibrated through my body, echoing against the walls. I shook and shook until my body was too spent to do anything other than lie there.
“That was the perfect way to wake me up, Savior,” I gasped, “and if you give me a minute, I’ll be ready for round two.”
His mouth dragged its way up my body, not stopping until he was at my mouth, taking it with as much passion, as much energy as he’d just lavished on my pussy.
“I think you’re ready right now,” he groaned as he slid between my legs, deep into my body. He was right where he wanted to be, driving deep and hard, going faster and faster as he chased the pleasure that had been building since his tongue began its glorious torture. “So fucking ready,” he whispered, and I wasn’t sure if he meant me or himself.
It felt good. Better than anything I had ever felt in my whole life. I lost myself in him. I couldn’t see or hear or feel anything other than the way he moved inside me with a slow pace that inched my passion up and pushed me closer to orgasm, but not fast enough. “More, please,” I pleaded.
Then, my alarm sounded. His deep chuckle sounded in my ear as his tongue swept from my neck up to my ear. “I love to hear you beg.”
“Fuck,” I grunted out, frustrated as hell at the impatient buzzing I wanted to ignore, but couldn’t. My hand shot out and smacked the alarm.
“Think you can get us there before snooze wears off?”
Savior’s grin lit up like a Christmas tree. “Fuck yeah. Challenge accepted.”
And he got us there, hard and fast and with a few minutes to spare.
It was the perfect way to start the day. Which meant it only had one place to go.
To shit.
***
Cupcakes. That’s what I spent six of my eight-and-a-half-hour shift baking. Fucking cupcakes. Not that I had anything against cupcakes, I didn’t. But it was another punishment from Landry, all because I had the audacity to call him on his shitty behavior.
I could have screamed and thrown a tantrum but it wouldn’t have done any good. Landry was a complete asshole and would always be one. So I went back to the first day of culinary school and made cupcakes. Butter and chocolate and strawberry. Boring but easy work.
The perfect way to spend the day after the most erotic morning of my life. My body still hummed at the memory of what Savior had done to me. The way his tongue, his fingers and that beautiful, thick cock brought me pleasure was intense. If I had five minutes and some privacy, I could get off just from the memory of his touch.
“Sutton, I need those cupcakes!” His big round body scooted to my work station and grabbed the cupcakes that I had just pulled from the oven.
“About damn time,” he grumbled.
“Those are still warm, Chef.”
I knew he heard me because I saw the small hitch in his step but he plowed forward, already preparing the next scathing comment. After cleaning my hands, I leaned against the table and watched as Landry passed several tables filled with already cool cupcakes, perfect to slather on his shitty sugary frosting.
Nevertheless, he took the warm ones straight to his station.
“They don’t teach you to let cupcakes cool before frosting them, at fancy New York culinary schools? Perhaps you should have gone to Paris, like I did,” he snickered, so fucking proud of his dim wit.
My gaze shot to the clock. Ten minutes left on my shift and then I could say goodbye to this place. For a few hours anyway, though the desire to leave forever grew stronger every shift. Ten minutes without killing my buffoon of a boss and I would make it another day.
“Is your hearing shot, too?” He laughed, looking around and waiting for the others to join in but they didn’t. They never did. It always made me laugh.
“Maybe if you weren’t so determined to try and humiliate me you wouldn’t have wasted a dozen cupcakes fresh from the oven.”
It’s not like he made the trip all the way over to my station because his fat ass enjoys exercise.
I should have kept my mouth shut but I couldn’t help it. I offered, “Or maybe in Paris they don’t teach you that cupcakes fresh from the oven shouldn’t be frosted right away. Chef.”
Two minutes on the clock and I began wiping down my station, ignoring his loud bluster. I was sure I would be without a job soon and I couldn’t find it in myself to give a damn. I’d come here to learn from him. Now, it didn’t even matter. I knew all I needed to know. He was a mean vile son of a bitch and I didn’t need him to advance in my career. Not anymore.
“Where do you think you’re going?” he demanded.
I looked up at him, trying to keep attitude out of my glance. “Away from here. My shift is just about over.” By the time the stainless steel was clean and dry, it was two minutes past time to go.
“I don’t think so. You owe me a dozen cupcakes.” Arms crossed, he held an angry scowl as his red face darkened in anger.
I forced a smile to hide my true feelings. “The ones you took were the extra batch. For your mistakes, of course.”
There were actually two dozen, but he could figure that out after I was gone.
“Later gators,” I called to the rest of the kitchen staff who always seemed amused by my run-ins with Landry.
As soon as the sun hit my face, the tension band holding my shoulders snapped and I could breathe. Finally. As happy as I was to be gone, to be away from Landry so I could press rewind on my morning with Savior, it was just temporary. He hadn’t fired me and I hadn’t quit, which meant I had to go back tomorrow.
I’d much rather focus on Savior but that wouldn’t do me any good. There was nothing to be done about him in the immediate future. Despite what he’d said last night, he’d told me all about his horrible, awful family as a warning. He couldn’t or wouldn’t give me more, and it didn’t matter to him that I hadn’t actually asked for more. It was a preemptive strike, just in case I got any ideas about him and forever.
As if.
“Mandy, Mandy, Mandy.”
Shit. I didn’t recognize those voices, which meant they were trouble. The kind of trouble I didn’t have the tools or weaponry to deter. My car was still too far away for me to make a run for safety, so I took a few steps forward before turning to face them, my fight or flight senses already kicking in. “Do I know you?” I said to the three assholes with the Roadkill MC patch on their kuttes.
“Not yet. Tell us you’ll have the money you owe us and you won’t have to.”
The blond with the buzz cut acted as spokesperson or maybe it was the jagged scar that ran from the corner of his right eye to his mouth.
“I don’t
owe you a damn thing, so I guess you got your wires crossed somewhere.”
Buzz cut tossed his head back and laughed. “Really? Because Krissy says you’re a crack card counter and that’s how she’s gettin’ us what she owes us.”
I wasn’t a liar but living the way I had as a kid meant I had a damn good poker face. “Well then she told you wrong. I used to count cards, about ten years ago. It took a long time to get good at it, more time than you —”
Buzz cut stopped my words with a backhand across my face.
“I didn’t ask for your fucking life story, bitch. Tell me you’ll have my money.”
I shook my head, shaking away the ringing that dulled every sound. “I won’t have it. Even if I did play that tournament, I’d never make it past the first round. And that’s if they even let me in the casino.”
“Shut the fuck up!” His fist came flying again, this time right to my stomach and I doubled over, coughing and struggling to breathe.
“Krissy said you never got caught.”
“Well Krissy’s a goddamn liar, isn’t she?”
I knew he was interested now and I kept talking even as I felt my cheek swelling. “She has no idea why I up and left the city years ago,” I told him, thinking as fast as I could before another fist descended.
A snivelly rat with greasy brown hair invaded my space. “She’s lying, man. Look at that lying little face.” He had a smile like a cartoon villain. “I hate a lying bitch,” he crowed and before I could take a step back, he punched me in the face and I hit the ground.
It took a second for my body to realize it had dropped to the hard, hot concrete, but when it did, all I could do was groan in pain. My jaw felt like it was broken in a thousand pieces. My teeth hurt. I wanted to cry and scream and yell. But I wouldn’t. Not now. Not ever.
Buzz cut leaned down and hissed like a serpent, “No more fucking excuses, Mandy. Get the fucking money or live with the consequences.” He wasn’t that close, at least from what I could tell through my non-swollen eye, which happened to be pressed against the ground.
“Or maybe you won’t live with them,” he added ominously.
I closed my eyes. A few seconds, maybe a few hours passed and then I felt it, a boot in my stomach, on my arm, my back, my face. I curled up into a ball the best I could. Over and over, blow after blow rained down on me until I couldn’t move. Could barely see, not that I wanted to open my eyes.
