by M. S. Parker
“Almost…” she whimpered. “Please.”
I curled my fingers, searching for that spot inside her. When her entire body jerked, I knew I’d found it. I rubbed the tip of my finger against it until she cried out, the muscles in her arms and legs quivering.
“What do you want, Chey?” I asked as I pulled my fingers out. “Tell me.”
“You,” she gasped.
“Be a bit more specific,” I said, tugging on her hair. “Tell me exactly what you want.”
She managed to turn her head enough for me to see her face, pupils blown wide, cheeks flushed. “Cock. Pussy. Now.”
I chuckled and leaned down to kiss her temple. “Such a sweet talker.”
“Please, Slade.” Desperation made the words come out in a whine.
“What if I want to put my cock somewhere else?” I moved behind her and palmed her ass, smiling at her hiss of pain. I rubbed my thumb between her cheeks, pausing to pay a little extra attention to her anus. She shivered but didn’t pull away. I eased my thumb inside as my other hand pulled down my pants. “Shit. I need to get–”
“No condom,” she said. “Unless you want–”
I cut her off the best way I knew how. By burying my cock in her wet, hot pussy.
Hard.
She moaned, arching her back, and that was all the encouragement I needed. I pounded into her, trusting that she’d use her safe word if I was too rough or pushed her too far. The only words she said were curses…and my name. Everything else was incoherent.
How the hell had I found a perfect little submissive masochist?
I yanked her upright against me, withdrawing my thumb so I could wrap my arm around her waist. I put my mouth against her ear, taking her earlobe between my teeth. I worried at it as my free hand covered one of her breasts. I gave it a squeeze, then pinched and twisted her nipple until she was writhing on my cock.
“Need to come,” she panted, nails digging into my forearm.
I moved my hand from her breast to her throat. She was so tiny that my thumb was under her jaw, and the tips of my fingers were halfway around her neck.
“You can touch yourself now,” I said.
I flexed my fingers, not hard enough to cut off her air, but enough to remind her that, unless she said otherwise, I was in control.
I drove into her, lifting her off her knees, and the pressure in my balls was nearly unbearable. Still, I fought to keep from coming. I just needed a little more time. She was close.
When she finally came, I wasn’t far behind. We went down on the bed together, and I curled my body around hers. She might not have been able to tell me that she loved me, but that didn’t change how I felt, or what I was willing to do to keep her safe.
Thirty-Two
Cheyenne
I didn’t like this.
Yesterday, after I’d woken up from a three-hour nap, Slade and I had moved from his bedroom into his kitchen where we had breakfast and a serious discussion. Basically, it’d boiled down to the fact that it wasn’t safe for me to go home, or to go to Austin. Which meant Estrada had to bring him to me.
I’d wanted her to stay too, but she’d simply smiled and shaken her head. She had a sister in Dallas and was past due for a visit. Fernando wasn’t going all the way to Dallas to find Estrada when Austin and I were so much closer. I didn’t doubt that he’d assume we were with Slade, or that he’d be able to find out where Slade lived, but Slade’s building was secure enough that Austin and I were safe.
I should’ve been able to think of it like that. Being safe. Secure.
Because he worked for the DEA. Not because he loved me. If he actually did. I knew he said it, but I wasn’t stupid enough to think that it was true. Or that I would even know what it meant if it was.
The thing was, all day yesterday when Austin, Slade, and I were at Slade’s place, I hadn’t felt like we’d been a burden to him. It’d felt so…normal. The three of us eating lunch, watching movies, playing games. We’d even made dinner together.
“Cheyenne, your turn.”
Austin’s voice pulled me back to the present. “What was that, sweetie?”
He pointed at the game board and rolled his eyes. He had more of an attitude than I did, and I liked that. It meant that he was growing into who he was supposed to be without fear forcing him to be quiet, to hide who he was. I was sure I’d regret it when he was a mouthy teenager, but at this moment, I was enjoying seeing him thrive.
I rolled the dice and then moved my piece four spaces. Austin threw his arms in the air and let out a yelp of excitement. Snakes and Ladders was his favorite game, mostly because I always had the worst luck with it. My four-space roll landed me squarely on the biggest snake and sent me from near the end to all the way back to the beginning.
“I like it here,” he announced as he rolled the dice. “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven.”
He continued to amaze me with how smart he was. He spoke clearly, precisely, for such a young kid. And he could count on his own, all the way up to twenty, without any prompting. He remembered all sorts of crazy shit.
I was going to be in serious trouble when he was older.
“Did you know there was a twenty-five feet long snake? I saw a picture of it.”
I frowned. “Where did you see a picture?”
Austin shrugged and handed me the dice. Ever since our conversation in the hospital where he’d told me about Iva and the milkshakes, he’d been telling me everything all the time. While I didn’t always want to know how many times he peed in a day, I preferred the honesty to him hiding things from me.
“Iva doesn’t like it when I ask lots of questions,” he said. “She gave me a book to learn stuff, so I’d quit asking questions.”
I looked at him. “Austin, did you read the book?”
“Some…” He shrugged, his narrow shoulders practically bouncing up and down. “Roll.”
I did, but I barely paid attention to the numbers. “What do you mean by some?”
He waited until I moved my piece. “Some of the words are too big.”
“When did you learn to read?” And how had I not known it? Had I been so caught up with Slade that I’d completely missed my little brother learning to read?
“Estrada’s been helping me,” he said. “But sometimes I learn it by myself.”
“You still have me read to you.”
He shrugged again, rolling the dice. “I like when you read to me. When you’re working, I read to myself.”
“Excuse me,” I said, scrambling to my feet. “I need to go to the bathroom.”
I managed to make it into the bathroom and shut the door behind me before the tears came. My little brother had taught himself to read, and I’d been fucking around with a guy.
I sank to the floor and wrapped my arms around my bent knees. I put my forehead on my arms and finally let myself cry. I cried for the time I couldn’t be with Austin and for the fact that he had a sister instead of a mother. A sister who was hardly there because she had to work two jobs and do whatever she could to keep him safe, but she couldn’t tell him anything. A sister who loved him with all her heart and felt guilty for needing to grieve for the freedom she’d never had.
Everything came pouring out, and I couldn’t stop it. The wall I’d built to keep all of it hidden away, to keep myself sane, had cracked, and each new thought that made its way forward just forced that crack wider. This was the wrong time and place for this to be happening, but I’d reached a point where my only choices were to let it happen or shove it all down so far that it’d never come back up. The second one was appealing. Damn appealing.
But it’d ruin me and everyone I touched.
I didn’t know how I knew it, but I did. I’d never been able to be there for Austin the way he needed me to be. I’d fuck him up. And I’d lose Slade because I wouldn’t be able to give him what he needed. I wouldn’t be able to tell him that I loved him too.
Fuck.
I did. I loved
him.
It wasn’t fucking around with him. And I didn’t want it to be that. I wanted more.
And if yesterday had taught me anything, it was that being with Slade didn’t mean choosing between him and Austin. I knew in my heart that Slade accepted Austin and me together, a package deal. Before Austin and Estrada had gotten here yesterday, he’d made up the guest room and told me that he knew it’d take time before I would be ready to explain our relationship to Austin, and that was okay.
If our time together yesterday had been any indication, Austin would be thrilled to know that his buddy would be spending a lot more time with us. Maybe forever.
Fuck, fuck!
Was I seriously thinking about forever with a guy I’d only just admitted my feelings about? My head was all over the place today.
“Cheyenne.” Austin knocked on the bathroom door. “It’s your turn.”
“Um,” I sniffed and wiped at my eyes, “I’ll be out in a moment.”
I stood and leaned over the sink. I didn’t even want to look at myself until I washed my face. I didn’t look so great even after, but if I smiled, Austin probably wouldn’t notice. Slade might when he got home, but my experience with him told me he’d understand.
Austin was frowning at the board when I sat back down at the table. “When is Slade coming back? It’s more fun with him.”
I glanced at my phone and tried not to frown again. He’d explained to me last night that the joint task force would be raiding all of Fernando’s businesses and properties as soon as the warrants came through, but that should have been done first thing this morning. He’d spent a lot of time on the phone yesterday, setting everything up. Before he left this morning, he told me that he was confident it would all go like clockwork, and he’d call as soon as it was done. He’d have to stay until all the necessary paperwork was done, but he’d call.
Except, he hadn’t called. Or texted. Or anything to let me know that he was okay, and Fernando was out of my life forever.
And no amount of board games or movies could distract me from that. Hell, I couldn’t even draw. I’d been trying to finish my tattoo design, but every time I started to work on it, I kept seeing it on him, and until I knew he was safe, I didn’t think I’d ever be able to finish it.
But I needed to take care of Austin, which meant I kept smiling and joking and laughing, even as I counted each minute that passed and wondered if something else in my life had gone horribly wrong.
Thirty-Three
Slade
What the hell was taking so long? I needed to get home to Cheyenne and Austin. She needed to know that they were both safe.
I looked at my phone and muttered a curse. I’d thought I’d be back in the office around lunchtime and be able to call Cheyenne and let her know how things had gone. She and Austin could stay at my place for as long as they needed to – hell, I hoped they’d stay for a while longer – but I didn’t like the idea of her sitting there, wondering what was happening. Not that I thought Cheyenne was worrying about me.
Or maybe she was.
“Hunter! Get your head out of your ass and get over here!”
I looked over to where Ramon was on the ground, his knee in the back of one of DDD’s massive bouncers. Judging by the way the guy was trying to buck Ramon off his back, he wasn’t interested in going quietly. Then again, no one from DDD wanted to go quietly. That was why we were all still in the parking lot, instead of back at the agency.
“Sorry,” I called as I jogged over to Ramon. I pulled a pair of zip ties out of my back pocket and leaned down to help.
“Any sign of Neely yet?” Ramon asked as he added my ties to his, securing the man’s hands behind his back.
“Um…” I glanced over my shoulder to where the FBI guys were standing around one of the vans. “About Neely…you’ll hear it when we get back–”
The bouncer started laughing. “Neely Burgin? Boy, you guys are stupid.”
“Shut it,” I snapped at him before turning back to Ramon. Time to share. “Neely’s been selling us out to Fernando. He’s dirty.”
Ramon stared at me, then let out a string of curses I’d never heard him say. “How long have you known?”
“Yesterday morning,” I said. “But I was sworn to secrecy. We weren’t sure if he was the only one, and they didn’t want–”
“I get it,” he cut in. “The more people who know, the greater the risk Fernando gets tipped off that his rat has been trapped.”
I nodded. “One of the out-of-town FBI guys pulled Neely aside before the raid. They got him in lock-up. Higher-ups figured it’d be better to have someone outside of local circles take him in. Just in case.”
Ramon moved out of the way as another pair of agents came over to take the still-laughing bouncer over to one of the vans. “Have you heard anything about the other teams?”
“I haven’t.” No one else looked like they were anxious, which was a good thing, but I still would’ve preferred to know what was going on.
“I would’ve thought you’d be pumped right now,” Ramon said. “You’ve been wanting to take down Fernando for weeks now. Why do you look like you’d rather be anywhere else?”
It was time to come clean with him. “That woman I told you about before, the one I needed advice about, she’s waiting for me.”
“You’ve never let women distract you before,” he said, giving me a strange look. “You’ve got it bad for this girl.”
“I do,” I admitted. I shot a quick look around. “She worked here.”
“Wait, what? Shit, Slade, what the hell?”
I held up a hand. “I know, I know. She was a waitress here.”
His eyes narrowed. “The pink-haired one Neely kept talking about.”
“Yeah. Fernando has some shit hanging over her head. That’s what got me looking into him, but I did the work too. He’s a bad guy. He threatened to hurt her if I didn’t bury the case. It’s why we needed to do this fast.”
I could see dozens of thoughts going through his mind, and I wondered what would come out first, the warning or the scolding. Then, suddenly, he zeroed in on something behind me and smiled.
“What?”
“You have a couple fans.”
I turned around and saw a sheepish-looking Cheyenne waving at me from behind the police barrier. Her brother was next to her, jumping up and down and waving both hands. It’d taken me about three minutes from the time I’d met him yesterday to fall in love with him too. I wanted him in my life as much as I wanted Chey in it. The three of us fit together in a way I’d never imagined possible. I’d never wanted to have a family, but now, I couldn’t imagine my life without them.
“Go on,” Ramon said. “Talk to her. I’ll come get you when we have to go.”
“Thank you,” I said, not taking my eyes off Cheyenne.
I forced myself to walk over to the barrier, looking as casual as possible. I’d probably catch hell for it if anyone realized what I was doing, but I was willing to risk it. I’d helped take down a drug-dealing human trafficker who was probably a murderer. I think I’d get a bit of a pass if I talked to my girlfriend instead of standing around with my thumb up my ass, waiting to be told what to do next.
“I know I’m probably not supposed to be here,” she said, twisting a long strand of pink hair around her finger. “But I was worried when I didn’t hear from you.”
I leaned across the barrier and gave her a quick kiss. “I’m sorry. Some of the guys didn’t want to come willingly.”
“But you got him?” Her eyes darted around, and I knew who she was looking for.
I nodded. “We did. They put him in a car all on his own and took him out of here about thirty minutes ago.”
“So, it’s over? He’s gone?”
I reached out and took the hand that was worrying at her hair. “He’s never coming near you again.”
“You can’t know that,” she said, squeezing my hand. “What if he gets out?”
“Half t
he guys we’ve arrested are already asking to make deals. He’s going away for a long time.”
The relief on her face made me want to step over the barrier and put my arms around her, but I’d been working on keeping my hands to myself around Austin until Cheyenne said it was okay.
“Can we go home?” Austin said, reaching up to tug on my hand.
“Oh, uh, yes,” I said with a smile. I reminded myself it was natural for a kid to want to be at his own place. “You can go back to your apartment whenever you’re ready.”
“No.” He shook his head as if I was dense. “Your home. Cheyenne isn’t any good at Uno. We’re going to play again, please?”
I looked at Cheyenne as I answered, “You two are welcome to stay as long as you want.”
“I-I have to tell you something.” Cheyenne’s cheeks were red, and for a moment I thought she was going to tell me that we were done, that she’d only needed me to protect her and I’d taken advantage of that. Then she said the words that I’d been waiting all my life to hear. “I love you. I was too scared to say it before, but I need you to know that.”
I lifted her hand and kissed her knuckles. “I love you too.”
“You two are adorable.”
I looked over to see Ramon and Joey, both grinning at me as they came over. “Ramon, Joey, this is Cheyenne and Austin.”
“It’s nice to meet you,” Joey said. “And let me say in advance that if you ever need someone to kick his a…” she looked down at Austin and corrected herself, “butt, give me a call.”
“I’ll be next in line to help,” Ramon said.
“Thanks.” I glared at them both. “It’s nice to know where your loyalties are.”
Joey shrugged. “Gotta tell it how it is.”
“Did either of you come over here for something other than giving me a hard time?”
