by Zoey Parker
My whole body was still aching from the gym, but now was not the time to be tired. I twisted my head to the side and the knife slammed into the ground right where it had just been. How the motherfucker missed, I would never know, but I couldn’t wait and count my blessings. I needed to end the bastard’s life. Now.
With a roar, I grabbed him by the sides of his shirt and hurled him off of me. He was lighter than I expected, as if the drugs had gobbled what was left of his bones and organs, leaving just skin and bones in their wake. He hit the dirt a yard away with an oomph, but he sprung upright immediately. I scrambled to my feet and crouched low into a fighting stance.
He eyed me warily, teeth bared, and started to circle slowly counterclockwise. I paced with him, keeping the yard separating us. All sound died away — the whistling of the birds, the rustle of the wind in the trees, even Corinne’s frightened whimpers. There was just me and this bastard. Only one of us would survive. I knew exactly who it was going to be.
Suddenly, Ricardo let loose a high-pitched banshee screech and pounced towards me. His fist was outstretched towards my chest. I leaned back, avoiding his knuckles, but as I did, he flicked his wrist oddly. In the quarter-second before I understood what was happening, I wondered what the hell he was doing.
Then the spring-loaded blade scythed out from where it was attached on the underside of his wrist. It extended a few inches past his knuckles, so that although I thought I’d leaned back far enough for the punch to miss, I ended up right in the path of the blade.
It tore across my bicep. Skin and muscle tissue ripped open; pain seared through me. Ricardo landed behind me with a savage grin as I stumbled away from him, pressing a wide palm against the open wound on my arm. The blood was coming fast and thick. He’d gotten me good.
I felt the sensation beginning to drain from my fingertips. I was losing an awful lot of blood in a short period of time. The strength started to dim in my hands and legs. Ricardo crouched down, coiling again like a snake as he got ready to dive at me once more.
I backed up, one weak step at a time. For every retreating step I made, he took one forward, until I was a foot away from the edge of the cliff and I couldn’t go backwards anymore.
“You are one ugly son of a bitch,” I said.
He scowled. “You, yes, want those to be your last words?” Another step closer. Two yards left between us. The blade on his wrist dripped with my lifeblood.
“Just saying it how it is,” I responded. I felt dizzy, light-headed.
“She will die after you,” he said, extending a finger to point at Corinne. Her eyes were wide open in fear.
“Don’t worry, Corinne,” I said to her with as much calm strength as I could muster. “I’m gonna lick this motherfucker, and then I’m gonna take you home. That’s a promise. Cross my heart and hope to die.”
Ricardo’s eyes narrowed. He twisted his other wrist, and a blade sprung out from there, too. He took one more step. Just a yard remaining. Viciously sharp blades were pointed straight at me on each of his wrists.
“The more blood, the better,” he said. Then he jumped.
I dropped onto my back the second his feet left the ground. Raising my legs straight up as he flew towards me, I shot my feet out into his chest. But instead of kicking him back in the direction from which he’d leaped, I used his momentum to carry him further forward.
I saw his eyes bug out as he passed over me. But there was no stopping. He went over the edge of the cliff.
I lumbered to my feet, wincing. The slice on my arm was ragged and ugly, and blood continued to leak from it. I peeled off my shirt and tied it like a tourniquet around the wound. The flow stopped, but I would need to get it taken care of soon.
Pivoting slowly, I peeked below. Ricardo’s body was impaled on one of the pointed pillars I’d seen as I first drove up. The rock had torn straight through his stomach. His blood was an unnatural black, and even from here, I could still see the gleaming red in his eyes. As I watched, their glow dimmed and dimmed until there was no life left in them.
Chapter 14
Corinne
Croak walked over and picked up his knife from the ground where it had fallen when Ricardo attacked him. Returning to me, he used it to slice the ropes off of my body. I sat up, rubbing my wrists to return the circulation to my hands.
I looked at him, but I couldn’t find any words that felt right. He was pale from the blood loss and clearly exhausted after the struggle that had just taken place, but his eyes were as calm and steady as ever. He gazed at me levelly.
“I…I don’t know what to say,” I whispered. My throat was aching from screaming.
Amazingly, he looked amused. “‘Thank you’ wouldn’t be a bad start,” he joked.
In spite of everything — the bloodshed, the kidnapping, how close I’d coming to becoming a human sacrifice for a man driven insane by toxic drugs — Croak still made me laugh. It started as a tiny giggle, but it took hold of me and wouldn’t let go. He smiled as I laughed and laughed until tears came out of my eyes, until I couldn’t catch my breath and I had to lean my head against his chest to stop from falling off of my seat on the top of the rock that had almost become my deathbed. My laughter echoed off of the nature around us, doubling in on itself, until it was all I could do and all I could hear.
After a long time, the laughing subsided, but I didn’t move my head from where it rested on Croak’s muscular chest. He wrapped an arm around my shoulders and squeezed me close to him. “You’ve got a dark sense of humor if you think all this is funny,” he remarked.
“You’re one to talk,” I retorted, though my voice was raspy and low.
“Momma always said I’d meet my death sounding like a wiseass.”
“Did she really say that?”
“No, but it’s still true.”
I giggled again, then fell silent. Leaning back, I looked up into Croak’s eyes. “I didn’t think I’d see you again.”
He was quiet for a while, but it didn’t seem like he was thinking. He was just staring at me with those deep, impossible-to-read brown eyes of his. Considering something. “You knew you would,” he said finally. “I knew it, too. I just didn’t want to admit it.”
“It was a bad idea to start this in the first place,” I said pointedly.
He shrugged. “I’m full of bad ideas. Sometimes they pay off.”
“Will this one?”
“I’m still waiting to find out.”
I smiled as he leaned down to kiss me. His lips were rough with dirt and chapped from the wind, but I didn’t care. I kissed him back, softly at first, and then deeper and deeper until my tongue and his were wrapped around each other, touching and healing.
His arm around my shoulder embraced me. I put my heels behind his legs to pull him closer to me, and gently rested my hands on either side of his torso. I felt the muscles slide smoothly under my touch. The fear I’d felt was gone, and there was only love for this man where it had been. I felt it everywhere I turned my attention to; it was in my heart, my hands, between my legs.
Suddenly, I felt the urge to be taken right here and now. I tried to ignore it — it was a crazy idea, after all; we were on top of a plateau, Croak had just fought a man to the death, and his arm was bleeding severely — but I couldn’t fight it down and it grew stronger and stronger with every passing second.
“I need you,” I whispered to him, fully aware of how ridiculous a suggestion it was.
But he took it in stride. He didn’t blink or fidget. He just placed his fingers softly on the underside of my chin and kissed me again. It was a warm, perfect kiss. He molded his lips to mine exactly and with the other hand, slid down to unhook the button from the front of my shorts.
I stood and let them fall to the ground. With his uninjured arm, he scooped me up like I was nothing, while he worked himself free with his free hand. He laid me on my back on the pedestal of rock.
My knees fell open. I was so wet and needy. It was physical, bu
t it was deeper, too. I needed to know that he was here with me and alive and that he wasn’t going anywhere ever again. How quickly he had become an addiction was a marvel to me, but I wasn’t going to question it. I had only my urges to follow, and they were screaming at me to pull him inside this second or I might just explode.
I reached between my legs and found his cock. He stared down at me as I pumped him quickly to full hardness, then rested the tip of it against my opening.
“Slowly,” I whispered.
“Slowly,” he repeated, just like before.
Resting his weight on the forearm of his right side, he pushed his hips forward and slid into me with patience. I grit my teeth as I adjusted to his girth, but when he had driven all the way in, I let out a long, satisfied gasp.
“Yes,” I said as I arched my back. “Don’t go anywhere, Croak. Stay with me.”
He responded with a quick retreat and then another steady thrust inwards. He began to stroke faster, my heels on his back urging him quicker and deeper into me.
I didn’t care if I came or not. All that mattered was this feeling of fullness, of completeness. “Keep going,” I begged. He growled and jerked hard, pushing, plunging, everything I could ever have wanted. “Just keep going.”
It was hot, quick, dirty, and against all reason. But when I felt Croak approaching his orgasm, I locked my feet together and kept him inside of me. I wanted all of his length to stay there as he came hard, filling me exactly the way I needed to be filled.
Chapter 15
Croak
My arm hurt like a motherfucker as we walked hand in hand to the bottom of the hill. Neither of had said a word since we’d tugged our clothes back on and left Devil’s Skillet, but we didn’t need to. Not like there was much of anything to be said. I held her hand and that was enough for the time being.
As we reached the bottom, the din of motorcycles greeted us. A pack of Inked Angels came roaring in, bristling with guns, Growler at the head of the fight-ready horde. They screeched to a halt when they saw us. Growler’s eyes widened immediately.
“What the fuck happened here?” he said.
I wanted to respond, but the blood loss had really done a number on my head. As I opened my mouth to answer, my legs gave way and I crumbled to the ground. I planted a fist in the dirt to stop from falling over completely, but the shapes of everything in my vision were blurring faster than I could keep them still.
I heard Growler barking, “Doc, do something!” and then hands propping me to a seat on the ground. Someone poured water down my parched throat while another fixed the tourniquet on my arm.
“He’s losing a shitload of blood,” someone said. “Let’s get him to a hospital.” I recognized the voice as Steezy’s, and I opened my eyes blearily to see him crouched in front of me, a look of serious concern on his face.
“You’re gonna be okay, Croak,” he said urgently.
“I know I am, you son of a bitch,” I said with as much of a throaty chuckle as I could muster. “You’re a rookie. Don’t tell me what I’m gonna be.”
Steezy and Doc helped me to my feet and guided me to Steezy’s motorcycle, where I threw one leg over and settled onto the back as best as I could. I wasn’t going to be able to take my own bike home; someone else was going to have to ride it back for me.
Off to one side, I saw Growler embrace Corinne. She cried as she pressed her face into his shoulder. He looked at me for a moment, then gave me a solemn nod before turning his attention back to her.
He was a salty old man. That was as much a sign of approval as we were ever gonna get.
Corinne explained what had happened as Steezy ensured I wasn’t going to get tossed off the back of his bike and Doc finished adjusting the tourniquet.
“Let’s get going,” Doc said, “before he passes out again.”
Steezy nodded and hopped on in front of me. I felt the vibrations between my legs as he started up the bike. We wheeled smoothly in a wide circle before getting back on the trail that led out of the park. I closed my eyes and focused on staying centered and upright.
We reached the hitch in the road. A bump almost knocked me off, and my eyes flew open as I scrambled for the handhold to stop from falling. As I did, I noticed something to my right.
“Stop,” I growled.
“What?” Steezy replied, confused.
“I said, stop.”
“Croak, you need to get to a hospital.”
“Goddamn, son, you need to learn to listen to orders. It’ll be quick. Just one sec.”
He slowed to a halt and I struggled off the bike. The pain had caught up to me all at once. It felt like a hot iron was being pressed against my bicep where Ricardo had cut me. I kept my arm from swinging as best I could as I walked off the trail and to the pillars at the base of the rock formation.
Ricardo’s corpse was speared on one of the shorter ones. His arms dangled towards the earth on either side of him. I reached up and unfastened the leather gauntlets from each wrists, then turned and headed back towards Steezy.
He gave me a curious glance as I walked up. “What was that all about?” he asked.
I tossed him the spring-loaded blades. “Got you a gift,” I replied. “Thought you might like to have a trick up your sleeve.”
He examined the weapons for a moment, then tucked them away. “Thanks, you crazy bastard,” he said gratefully.
Growler pulled up next to us. Corinne sat on the bike behind him, her arms wrapped around his waist. “Everything alright?” he asked.
I looked at Corinnè. She was as beautiful now as she had been when I first pulled up to her. Damn, had that only been last night? How could so much have happened? I felt like a different man. For better or for worse, only time could tell, but when she gave me a soft smile, I felt that thing lurch in my chest again. It seemed to like being around her.
Hell, maybe the girl was worth a shot.
“Everything’s great, prez,” I said. “Let’s go home.”
THE END
OTHER WORKS BY ZOEY PARKER
Click any of the covers below to go straight to the book page!
Stolen
He's a ruthless biker with a kingdom to run. She's a talented thief with a nose for trouble.
Things are about to get messy.
Sasha
I knew going in that this would be dangerous. But what choice did I have?
None, that's how much. You don't say "No" to a man like Fang, the mob boss I work for. Not if you want to live to tell the tale.
So I swallowed my fear and I took the mission: stealing drugs from the Hell's Overlords MC.
The first time was smooth. In and out like a flash.
The second time was just as easy.
But the third time…that's when everything went wrong.
Now, I'm trapped in a basement, staring into the stormy eyes of a man who doesn't like being robbed.
Everything I feared is present in those eyes. There's anger, and strength, and brutality.
But there's something else, too.
Something I didn't expect, and it's scaring me more than anything else.
He's hungry.
Hungry for me.
HER BODY ISN'T THE ONLY THING I'M TAKING AS MY OWN.
Cole
The first time I lay eyes on her, it feels like I got struck by lightning.
You've probably heard that before, but trust me – this is different.
This isn't the "struck by lightning" you see in friendly little rom-coms with happy endings.
It doesn't come with warm fuzzies.
It's not cute.
No, the kind of lightning I'm talking about makes me want to do things, things that you might not always like.
It makes me want to bite her lip like a feral dog, to squeeze her hips in my hands and rid her of every scrap of clothing.
The lightning surging through my veins makes me harder than carved marble.
There's only one release: to own her, aga
in and again, until the thirst is quenched.
I don't know how long that will take.
But I'm willing to find out.
Overdosed
I'M ADDICTED TO HER, AND I WON'T STOP UNTIL I GET MY FIX.
When a little girl shows up on the front stoop of the Fury's Storm HQ,
I tell her the obvious truth: "You're at the wrong place, hon."
But then she hands me a note that flips my world upside down.
It says she's my daughter.
I'm the last man on this earth who should be caring for a child.