by Zoe Hill
“Holy... God.”
“I’ll take that as a yes?”
Lifting her head to look at me, Poppy gazes down at me with glassy eyes. “That’s a hell yes.”
This time, I’m determined to take my time. When I licked her in my suite last night, I was acting on instinct. Tonight, I want everything I do to her to be well thought out and deliberate.
I work her over with my tongue until her hips are jerking. Flattening my tongue against her clit, I push two fingers inside her wetness. She grips me tight, spasming a little when I lave her sensitive bud faster and harder.
Fingernails digging into my hair, Poppy screams. “Yes. Like that. Just… like. That.”
I do as I’m told, maintaining the exact speed and intensity with my tongue. The way she moves when I pump my fingers inside her makes my dick hard as a rock. I thrust against the mattress to ease the ache. It doesn’t help… if anything, it makes it worse. When Poppy’s internal muscles start to grip my fingers tighter, then loosen, I push them inside her faster.
She detonates around me, closing her legs around my head and grinding her pussy against my face. “Oh, my… Spenser. Yes. Yes. Oh… Sabra.”
When her spasms decrease, I pull my fingers free of her beautiful body. Her scent draws me in, so I lick her wetness until she’s writhing against the mattress again. Reaching down to touch my cock, I fist my length and pump my hand up and down.
I want to be inside her. So bad.
Can I do this without my skin burning?
What if I lose control and hurt her?
“We don’t have to do that. Not tonight. Not ever, if you don’t want to.”
“But I want to.”
Poppy groans when I push the tip of my tongue into her pussy. Letting go of my dick, I concentrate on bringing her back to the cusp of an orgasm. She moans when I push three fingers into her wet warmth. My dick throbs and I find myself surging forward before I’ve made a conscious decision. One hand holding her leg around my hip and the other touching her flushed face, I look Poppy right in the eyes. She nods and I begin pushing my length inside her.
Soothing her furrowed brow with kisses, I moan as her tight heat accepts my hard length. When I pause to luxuriate in the feeling of Poppy holding me within her, my eyes droop shut, and I find myself getting lost in the past.
“I—” My words are strangled. “I’m… it’s.”
Poppy takes hold of the other side of my face and forces me to look her in the eyes again. I lift my eyelids and to meet her soft melted-chocolate gaze. She kisses me. I hold still, grinding my teeth as I fight back the burning.
“It’s me. Just me. I’m not going to hurt you. If you want to stop, then that’s your choice. I’m going to love you either way.”
“Fuck,” I groan.
“Count, Sabra. One. Two. Three.” I thrust inside her on each new number. My voice joins hers as we move together, “Four. Five. Six. Seven. Eight. Nine. Ten. Eleven. Twelve.” Lifting her hips and arching her back, Poppy screams, “Thirteen,” and I find myself shouting it with her.
I lose myself, pounding into her without hesitation. Everything she just said is exactly what I needed to hear. Acceptance and love. It’s a potent mix that is coming from someone you love. When she drops her hands to my ass, pushing me deeper into her heat, all pretense that I’ll ever be able to walk away from her flies out of my head, and I declare, “Fucking love you, Zricha.”
“I know,” Poppy gasps when I thrust harder. Hands pressed flat against the mattress on either side of her waist, I drive myself in and out of her tightness. “God. Sabra. I’m going to come again.”
She lowers her hand between her legs and rubs her clit. I lower my lips to her nipples and draw the engorged flesh into my mouth. Her walls start to pulse around my cock as I move within her. Her tight heat builds into ecstasy at the base of my spine. Every ounce of lust that’s pounding through me centers on my dick. Poppy surrounds me. She envelopes my senses in a way that makes her the nucleus of my world.
Her scent. Her skin. Her voice. Her soul.
The light. The dark. The good. The right.
She is everything.
“Fuck, yes!” I shout as I recognize the initial signs of a climax building within me.
One hand clutching at my back while she uses the other to get herself off, Poppy’s walls grip me tight for a few seconds before her body freezes. In the next heartbeat, she moves again. The spasmodic jerk of her hips, the feeling of her pussy milking me, it all combines to send me crashing over the abyss. Punching the pillow next to Poppy’s head, I grind out a curse, then slump over her trembling body as my release is reached.
My full weight is on her, yet she wraps her legs and arms around me and hugs me tight. I smother her hair with kisses until I regain enough control of my twitching limbs to move off her. Rolling onto my back, I pull Poppy onto my chest and hold her close.
“That was,” I begin.
Wracking my brain, I fail to find the right word to fully encompass what just happened.
“Mind-blowing?” Poppy asks.
“Yes… and so much more.”
I dip my chin to my chest and peer at her. Her hair is a knotty mess, and her mouth is red from my kisses, yet she manages to look more beautiful than she ever has. The life in her eyes and the languid relaxation in her limbs fills me with pride.
“I love you.”
Grinning, Poppy wriggles along my body, then pushes herself up on one arm. I arch an eyebrow when she lays a fingertip on my forehead for a heartbeat before she runs her finger between my eyes, over my nose, and down my chin to the base of my throat. She places a small kiss against my throat, then lies back down.
Snuggling with her cheek pressed against my heart, Poppy sighs.
“What?” I try to sit up so I can see her face.
She pushes me back down, then swings a leg over my waist and sits up. With the same regal bearing as a queen, Poppy stares down at me with a quizzical look in her eyes. Again, I move to sit up. Giggling, she stops me again. Of course, if I really wanted to move her I could, but now that I can see she’s playing, I’m happy to play along to see where she’s going with this game.
Linking our fingers together, Poppy presses my hands above my head and leans down low. Her breasts swing in my face, but she remains just out of reach. She kisses the end of my nose, then sits upright and looks down at me again.
“Ask me why I’m staring,” she orders with a smile.
I roll my eyes. “Why are you staring, Zricha?”
“I’m cataloging your flaws,” she quips.
I take hold of her waist and toss her onto her back. Grinning, I lower my body over hers and nip at her neck with my teeth. My cock hardens as Poppy arches beneath me. Her breathing speeds up and she hooks her leg around my waist so she can rub herself against my throbbing dick.
“I’ll have you know that I’m the biggest catch in the city,” I tell her as I press my hardness against her.
Fully erect again, I’m raring to fuck the precious woman panting beneath me into oblivion.
Laughing, Poppy nips my chin, and then she corrects me. “Not anymore. You’re all mine.”
“Damn right.” I push my length inside her welcoming heat. “All yours.”
As we move together, my broken pieces meld with hers until we’re one, I thank my lucky stars for the chance to find my salvation. It took a long time, too many years of pain and loneliness, for me to reconnect with the girl who gave a small taste of trust and acceptance as a boy.
I almost don’t believe that it’s happened, but I’m finally at peace with the fact that my past can’t be changed. Every bleak moment I spent in pain was worth it. The bad times and the moments that drove me to pray for death were another step closer to her.
What’s done can’t be undone.
It doesn’t need to be.
Because I’d stumble my way through the dark days a dozen times over as long as they brought me back to my Zricha.
EPILOGUE
“When you finally find the one against all odds, you give him your best and let the magic of the world carry the rest.” ~E. Mellyberry~
POPPY
One year later
People like to believe that love fixes everything.
It doesn’t.
Acceptance does.
I’ve always loved my parents. My sister. My brother’s, even Chester—although you’ll have to drag me barefoot over hot coals to get me to admit that to him. Bella. Renee Clearwater. I spent my life surrounded by love and it fixed nothing.
Not even Spenser’s love was able to fix me.
With the love of a strong man as my base, I found the courage to acknowledge that my past couldn’t be altered. My future, no matter how carefully I planned and how softly I tread, would always be uncertain. The present was all I had.
Once I accepted that, I discovered that I didn’t need fixing after all.
That’s how I found my voice again. That’s why I choose to embrace every day as my last and ensure that every decision I make is as good as it can be with the information I possess at the time. It’s the only thing keeping me sane when our lives occasionally devolve into chaos again.
Acceptance is the key to my happiness.
Well, that and a good fuck at the end of the day.
“I hoped the insta-lust would’ve worn off by now. It’s beginning to get creepy,” Bella jokes. Shaking my head out the clouds, I grin when I realize that I’ve been staring at Spenser. My best friend pushes a fresh beer toward me, then she leans down and whispers, “Let me know when you need me to create a diversion.”
Running my tongue over my top teeth, I contemplate her offer while I search Spenser’s face for clues. After I’ve made my decision, I press a kiss on her cheek. “It’s not quite time.”
“Well, if I had to guess,” she quips. I follow her gaze over to my man. “I’d say it won’t be long. Drink up, chipmunk. You’re about to be picked up by a random stranger.”
“Very funny,” I drawl.
Bella laughs. “I thought so.”
“I told you that in confidence.”
“And I remain supremely confident that I’ve only told Chester,” she wisecracks. “Pillow talk is privileged information. He won’t tell anyone.”
Slapping her arm, I shake my head, then lean back with my elbows pressed against the top of the table and survey the room. The bar is filled with people. The DJ is playing the right music to keep the mood high. Spenser is coping with the crowd, for now, and Chester is devouring my friend from across the bar with his hungry gaze. She’s playing it coy since he continues to avoid committing to anything more than friends with benefits, but I know she’ll end up in his bed tonight, and he’ll call her daily when she heads back to New York for work.
On the surface, everything seems perfect.
Bubbling beneath the façade, our problems threaten to spill over.
I miss Ollie. I miss my job. I miss the ignorance I once had.
Despite his parents’ best efforts at faking his death, the Coalition continues to hunt for Spenser. We live our lives in hiding, rarely venturing out of the compound because we know that Roman has eyes everywhere. The other men with seats at the table are working hard to usurp his position without him noticing until it’s too late, but he’s proving a worthy foe. His sons have established themselves in the political spectrum and they continue to do his bidding while Stirling does his best to undermine them.
Untangling the web that Roman has woven during his thirty-five-year tenure at the top of the Coalition has turned into a full-time job for Spenser. While he delegates the killing to Axel Zidane, I’m aware that he sometimes finds it hard to take a back seat.
Thankfully, we’ve developed a new routine to help him cope.
The murder of Roman Averell’s secret son was the catalyst for a lot of changes within our country, the full of extent of which we will probably never know until they rear up and bite us.
Another motorcycle club moved in to take over Harrison’s sex trafficking routes. The Samaritan’s Soldiers continue to fight the good fight, although it seems to get harder every day as abuse rates rise. My brother was forced deeper into the Coalition. He hasn’t been heard from in months, and I catch my mom praying every now and then for his safe return.
For a woman who disavowed God when she learned what Harrison was doing to me, returning to her faith is a monumental step.
I only hope that it brings him back to us soon.
Seb hasn’t been heard from since the day Spenser shot him in my apartment. Our current working theory is that he is the mastermind behind the new motorcycle club in Connecticut. The Internal Affairs detective who suspended me turned out to be a member of the Coalition. Known in the underground as Rebel, she disappeared around the same time as Seb did.
I hope that it’s a coincidence and not a symptom of a larger conspiracy.
Bella’s sister died in suspicious circumstances after an affair with Gareth Averell, leaving behind a motherless little girl whose father refuses to acknowledge or provide for her. With assistance from her older brother, my best friend does her best to look after her niece.
We remain uncertain why Roman arranged for my best friend to be exchanged for me and Spenser, but the latest update from Zoran and Sophia informed us that she continues to be important to Roman and is safe… for now.
All in all, life is both good and bad.
It’s overwhelming, but I wouldn’t change a thing.
Maintaining my acceptance is hard work, but I try my hardest.
“Look out.” Bella nudges me with her elbow. “Random stranger incoming.”
As the DJ starts playing “Bad Things” by Machine Gun Kelly and Camilla Cabello, I turn my attention in the direction she points and discover she’s right. My best friend deserts me, dancing her way over to Chester without so much as a goodbye.
The tall, dark, and most importantly mean man keeps heading my way.
Dressed in an expensive suit, he looks like a serial killer masquerading as a businessman.
My heartbeat pounds in my ears as I realize that I’m his next victim.
“You’re staring,” he growls when he comes to a stop in front of me.
Arching an eyebrow, I retort, “I was cataloging your flaws.”
“I have no flaws,” he snaps. His sharp rebuke makes me take an involuntary step backward. “My fiancée tells me that I’m the biggest catch in the city.”
Quickly recovering my composure when the softness that coats his comments about the woman he’s going to marry registers in my mind, I lay my hand on his chest and lower my voice to a purr. “She’s a lucky woman.”
Without replying, the man slides his palm along the nape of my neck, then roughly threads his fingers through my hair. Goosebumps break out over my skin and desire pools in my lower belly. He fists my curls and uses them to tilt my head back. Having my throat exposed to this obviously lethal man causes a shudder to run the length of my spine.
“I want to hurt you,” he growls.
“I want to be hurt.”
“I’m going to make you regret that need.” He drags me through the closest exit by my hair before I can find my voice to object.
“Where are we going?”
“Somewhere your screams can’t be heard.”
Pushing me face-first against a cinder block wall, the man kicks my feet apart. He yanks the skirt of my dress up over my hips. Slapping my ass, he puts his lips against my ear and murmurs, “Look at that… no panties. I approve.”
Trailing his fingers along the inside of my thigh, he slowly inches toward my pussy. I buck my hips, trying to escape his touch, but he is relentless. When he reaches my heat, he thrusts two fingers inside me. With danger pulsing from him in waves, the man finger fucks me until my legs feel like jelly, and I’m groaning with pleasure.
“Listen to you,” he barks. “Moaning, already. You wanna be fucked against this wall li
ke a little slut, don’t you?”
“No.”
He spins me around, so I’m facing him. Before I can protest, he plants a hand on the small of my back to hold my mound against the bulge that strains against his trousers. Forcing the fingers he was using to drive me wild between my lips, the man asks, “Do you enjoy the taste of your lies?”
My cheeks burn with shame until he soothes my pride by removing his fingers and kissing me. In unison, we move closer together. Our hands explore the other’s body while our desire for each other reaches fever pitch. When he swipes the tip of his tongue along the seam of my lips, I give up all pretense that I’m going to refuse him by opening my mouth and touching my tongue to his.
When I sink my teeth into his bottom lip, he pulls away. Growling like a feral animal, he shoves me against the wall. I raise my hand to slap him, but he catches my wrist before I can connect with his face.
“I’m going to fuck you extra hard for that.”
I take hold of his tie and drag his mouth back to mine. The concrete scratches my back when he leans his weight against me, so he doesn’t break the connection of our lips while he frees his length from his trousers. There is barely time to catch my breath before the man cups my ass, lifts me off my feet, and impales me on his cock.
“Oh. Yes. God.” I jam my hands in his hair and pull. Pumping like a man possessed, he brings me close to climax within a minute. A moan that telegraphs how well he’s walking the fine line between pleasure and pain bubbles out of my mouth. “Fuck me, Sabra.”
“Trigger,” he corrects me in a harsh voice. “You’ll remember my name whilst I’m inside you, woman.”
My eyes roll back in my head as he pistons into me with lethal intent. Holding his shoulders, I try my best to arch my back so that I can absorb some of his hard thrusts with my body. He works out what I’m doing and stops me by turning around so that his back is braced against the cinder blocks, and the only thing I have to hold onto is him.
“God. It hurts so good, Trigger.”
“Shut the fuck up,” he snaps. “I haven’t even started hurting you… you’ll be crying by the time I’ve shown you real pain.”