by Jenika Snow
“Always, sir.”
And just like that things were right in the world. I had the man I loved beside me, and my father’s support.
Epilogue One
Lachlan
Two years later
I’d been waiting for this moment since I first saw Layla, since I knew she would be mine. I would have married her right from the beginning, would have told her how I felt if I’d had the balls.
But the truth was I was the luckiest man on this planet, no matter how long it had taken for me to get to this point.
When it came to the woman I loved, I was a possessive and territorial motherfucker, but I knew she liked that. I knew she wouldn’t have it any other way. I was a protector, her protector.
I stared at the guests who’d come to watch us get married, the majority of them Layla’s family and friends.
When the music started playing, everything and everyone faded away. I focused on the aisle, on where my bride would be walking down. Then I saw her with her father on her other side.
God, I loved her, would marry her over and over again.
They started walking closer, and I held in the tears of happiness that were starting to form. I was an alpha male, but hell, I could have cried like a fucking baby at that moment.
I held her hand as we said our vows, and we proclaimed our love and loyalty to everyone. God, never had I felt as happy, as complete as I did when I was with Layla.
“I do,” she said as she stared into my eyes.
“I do,” I said with everything I had in me.
I pulled Layla into an embrace and kissed her until she was breathless, until she was clinging to me and softly making those sweet sounds I fucking loved.
She’ll always be mine.
Epilogue Two
Lachlan
Two years later
I was going to be a father.
My heart jackknifed in my chest, the very knowledge that my woman, my wife was pregnant with our baby filling me with so much excitement and love that I suffocated from it. But I wanted to drown in that emotion, because what a way to die.
I squeezed Layla’s hand. She was so fucking strong, so beautiful.
God, I love this woman so much.
We stayed silent as the ultrasound technician did her thing, running the wand device over Layla’s slightly rounded belly. She pointed out the heart, the little fingers, and showed us the legs and arms.
“Do you want to know the sex?” the technician asked, a smile on her face as she looked over at us.
“Yes,” Layla and I said at the same time. I looked at my wife, lifted her hand and kissed it, and glanced at the ultrasound screen once more.
The tech started moving the wand, the baby seeming to jump around in Layla’s belly. I had this perpetual smile on my face, the fact that my baby grew inside the woman I loved making me feel pretty fucking proud.
She finally pointed to the screen and glanced over at us. “It’s a little girl.” She typed that announcement on the screen, and a second later I heard the slight buzz of the printer spitting out the image for us.
A baby girl.
“Oh man,” Layla said. “You’ll be even more protective than you were.” She was smiling as she said this, and I saw tears in her eyes.
The tech laughed softly after that.
“A baby girl,” I whispered and brought her hand up to kiss her knuckles again. “And damn right I’ll be protective of her. Boys looking to take her out better come with their background check in hand.” The tech and Layla started laughing. I was only half joking.
I’d already have their background checks done before they even knocked on the front door.
Once the tech left us alone, I helped Layla to sit up and immediately embraced her. I pulled away to cup her cheeks, stared into her eyes, and smiled.
“I love you.” I leaned in and kissed her softly, taking this moment to really appreciate all I had in this life.
“I love you, too, Lachlan.”
This was what it felt like to be the luckiest man in the world.
The End
ANIMAL (A Real Man, 15)
By Jenika Snow
www.JenikaSnow.com
[email protected]
Copyright © August 2017 by Jenika Snow
First E-book Publication: August 2017
Photographer: Wander Aguiar
Cover Model: Jonny James
Image provided By: Wander Book Club
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: The unauthorized reproduction, transmission, or distribution of any part of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.
This literary work is fiction. Any name, places, characters and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or establishments is solely coincidental.
Please respect the author and do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials that would violate the author’s rights.
Being bad never felt so good.
Rye
I'd been called bad, dangerous ... a criminal. And I didn't deny it. Everyone knew it, especially the one woman I wanted but couldn't have.
I should've stayed away, should've left her alone. Jessa was the daughter of my business partner, too young for me, too innocent.
But I wanted her in the worst of ways, and no amount of self-control could keep me from her.
I wanted to claim every part of her, make her know what it was like to have a real man between her thighs.
And I’d have her.
Jessa
He was older than me, dangerous, masculine in the best of ways. I saw the way he watched me, the looks he gave me when he thought I wasn't paying attention.
Rye wanted me, even if he'd never do anything about it.
I was just the virgin daughter of his business partner, not someone he'd ever get involved with. But that didn't stop me from lusting after him, from picturing his big body over mine, his hands touching me until I cried out for more.
But I was tired of waiting. I would make the first move, and damn the consequences.
1
Jessa
I'd known him nearly my whole life.
My father's business associate, the man who put fear in everyone just by looking at them.
Now here he was, sitting at our dining room table, the cigar in his mouth causing a cloud of smoke to fill the small room. He had a square-cut glass of bourbon in front of him, and although my father was speaking to him about the business, Rye watched me.
Rye Jaxon.
Even the sound of his name did something to me. He might've been a business partner with my father, their illegal dealings bringing in loads of money, so much they couldn't even count it, but Rye was the muscle of the two.
He was big and strong, muscular and tall. He was a beast and he put fear in people. All somebody had to do was look at him and they knew their place. They took in his size and knew to give him a wide girth.
“Jess, sweetheart, I need you to go to your room for a minute.”
Although I was nineteen and knew the illegal operations my father and Rye did in order to make money, my father still wanted to protect me. Maybe he was naïve in thinking I didn't know what he really did, how he sold drugs and guns, how he did underground business to make a living.
But I knew all of it, heard all the rumors. I’d even seen some of it go down.
I stood up but kept my focus on Rye. My father was speaking to him about something, but Rye had his attention right on me.
He lifted up his glass and took a long drink of liquor, his gaze locked on mine over the rim of the cup. I felt my body heat rise, but suddenly chill at the same time, goosebumps forming along my flesh.
I shouldn't want him—not just because he was my father's business associate, not because he was older than me, but because he was dangerous.
What I needed was to get myself under control because there was no way anything whatsoever was going to happen between us. Even if I threw myself at him, begged him to take my virginity, I knew Rye would never touch me.
But then what was with the looks he gave me? What was with the possessiveness I felt from him as he watched me?
Maybe I’m imagining those looks, that feeling?
No, that wasn’t something I could ever imagine.
I knew that I wanted Rye to be my first, wanted to feel his rough, strong hands on my body, holding me down, making me take all of him. This might be all in my head, a fantasy of mine, but it was something I wasn’t going to let go of.
And Rye was who I wanted, who I’d have even if I had to tell him, show him how ready I was for him.
Rye
I left Kash's house, my thoughts on Jessa. Hell, I thought about her constantly. She was too good for me, too sweet and innocent, too vulnerable. I was a dirty bastard for desiring her, for imagining the filthy things I wanted to do with her.
She'd been living with her mother since last year, when she’d turned eighteen. But even before she’d lived with Kash permanently she’d come to visit Kash regularly. I never saw her as anything more than the daughter of my business partner.
But then something in the last year had changed. At eighteen Jessa came and moved in with her father. Her mother had remarried and moved out of state. Jessa hadn't wanted to go with them, and so she stayed here.
I remember the day she moved in with Kash, no longer a child but a woman. She’d just graduated high school, her body all curves. But I told myself not to even think those thoughts of her.
She was far too young for me, nearly two decades younger, to be exact. But it wasn't the age difference so much that bothered me, but the fact that my life was not something I wanted her involved in, even if she was inadvertently because of her father.
Kash also tried to shield her, protect her from the work we did. Maybe it wasn't a living to be proud of, but it was who we were, what we did, and there was no going around it. The best we could do was make sure Jessa was protected, and I made sure of that just as much as Kash did.
I entered the bar Kash and I owned, walked past the customers, and headed to my office. The bar was a front, as were the other three businesses we owned: a strip club, a small corner grocery store, and one other bar that was on the other side of town. They were to make things go smoothly with the law, to pay our taxes and stay under the radar.
The illegal gun business was where our money came from, and where we got all our connections.
Once my office door was shut I moved to my desk and sat down behind it. I busied myself planning the gun drop for later this week, something to try and get my mind off the one woman who invaded my thoughts constantly.
Kash and I were criminals in every sense of the word. I never tried to downplay it, or lie about that fact. But we didn't hurt people unless they tried to do harm to us or the ones under our protection. We didn’t terrorize people, didn’t bully them or use illicit violence just because. We made money, albeit the illegal way.
We didn't deal guns to kids, didn't try to make an innocent into a criminal. We might not have been law-abiding citizens, but when someone needed our help we were there, no matter who they were, no matter what lifestyle they chose to have.
Kash might have thought Jessa didn't know what we did, how we brought in money. But I was fully aware that she knew how we made a living. Even before she lived with her father I could see in her eyes the realization and truth of what she knew. She might never have brought it up to us, but she was smart as fuck.
When the drop-off was secure I disconnected the call, tossed my cell on the table, and leaned back in the chair. I sat there for long seconds just staring at the wall, wanting to go to her, wanting to hold Jessa.
I'd never been a man who thought I could find love, thought I'd ever settle down. But I wanted that with Jessa. I wanted her to be mine in all ways. I wanted to show her that underneath everything I was a good man.
Or maybe I was a delusional bastard in thinking I could have her. Maybe I needed to get my shit straight and come to the realization that Jessa would never be mine. She could do better than me, could find a man who toed the line, who followed the rules.
I growled low, the sound involuntary. Just thinking about her with somebody else, imagining some bastard touching her body, making her feel good, pissed me the fuck off.
No. No one else would have her but me.
2
Jessa
I had my school papers spread out across the table, a pencil between my teeth, staring at the disarray that was in front of me. I was in my second year of college, and although my degree was undetermined, the prerequisites that I had to do were enough of a workload for me.
The flash of headlights coming through the dining room window had me turning my head and staring out the glass. My father's SUV came to a stop on the gravel driveway.
“Your dad here?”
I looked over at Trevor, my study partner from my social studies course. Although we should've just stayed at the library and worked on this project, I had no problem bringing him back to my house. But we probably would have been focused better at a school setting.
“You think he’ll be okay I’m here?”
“Yeah, it's okay. He won't have an issue with us working here.” It was late, and we were on a deadline for this report. I'd rather be home and relaxed than trying to study elsewhere.
Trevor looked at his cell. “You know what, I should be going anyways, to be honest. I have an early class tomorrow morning and have a few things left to work on before I can go to bed.”
I heard more than one door open and close, but the light from the kitchen and the darkness from outside made it impossible to see anything clearly.
“Yeah, it is getting late.” I looked over and watched Trevor start gathering his things. I heard gravel crunching under heavy footfalls right outside the house.
I heard the front door open and close at the same time I heard my father's SUV leaving. I felt my brows lower in confusion. If he was home then who was leaving with his vehicle?
And then Rye walked around the corner, his huge body filling up the entryway. He had on a pair of worn jeans, and his black boots seemed lethal ... shit kickers to be exact. He wore a white T-shirt, the material stretched across his massive, muscular body.
He was looking right at me, but when Trevor stood, his chair scraping across the floor, Rye turned his focus on my classmate.
Trevor looked at Rye once he had all his belongings in his arms, and I could see the way his eyes widened as he took in the man in front of him. Yeah, Rye had everyone reacting that way every single time. Trevor then looked between Rye and me, clearly not knowing what he should do.
“It’s late and best you leave now, boy,” Rye said, his voice deep, slightly serrated.
Trevor nodded and looked at me again and I lifted my hand in a wave. “I'll see you at school.”
Trevor nodded and walked past Rye, his body so much smaller than the man I'd been lusting after. Once Trevor was gone, Rye looked at me and the air seemed to heat, become thicker. I couldn't help but feel that Rye was annoyed that Trevor had been here.
“Did I interrupt something between you and your boyfriend?” Rye said, his voice seeming deeper, as if he was angry.
I stood and watched him walk into the kitchen, his focus still trained on me. He went to the fridge and grabbed a beer, popped the cap and faced me as he drank a long pull from it.
“He’s not my boyfriend.” My throat felt thick, tight. “Where's my father?” I was on edge, his close proximity always doing something to me. The air was so hot, so thick, that I felt perspirat
ion dot the valley between my breasts.
“He got a call and had to go back to the bar.” He took a step closer to me and I found myself moving one back. Having him so close had my entire body worked up, my heart racing and my palms sweating.
He was only a few feet from me now, his dark gaze locked on mine, his body heat spearing right into me. I couldn't breathe, couldn't even think coherently at the moment. And Rye didn't say anything, just continued to watch me.
“So you just have random school guys come over?” His voice was low, the scent of him making me drunk.
“Trevor isn’t some random guy. And when we have a report due then yeah, I have him over.”
He didn’t say anything after that, the dark look in his eyes speaking louder than if he’d shouted at me.
I thought about being bold, being brave and just telling him how I felt, maybe even reaching out and placing my hand on his wide, muscular chest. But I was a coward, and feared the repercussions of what my acts might do.
I feared his rejection.
“How long will he be gone?” I heard my voice shake, felt the tremble in my entire body.
“A long time.” He didn't say anything after that, just lifted his beer and took another long drink as he stared at me. “I’ll stay here until he gets back.”
God, he was so big, so masculine. If I pressed my body to his right now my head would rest right at the center of his chest. He made me feel so feminine and I never even touched him.
And that's what I really wanted to do right now ... touch him.
3