by Raven Dark
Leaving me panting, Hawk sat partway up and tore my panties the rest of the way off while I tugged open his belt and pants, my fingers trembling with anticipation. Neither of us spoke. We didn’t have to. Sexual energy and need crackled between us, fierce in its intensity, and so plain it didn’t need words.
As soon as his pants were open, Hawk’s cock sprang free, already wickedly hard and glistening at the tip.
When he finally spoke, his voice was quiet, but gruff. “I should have waited until I had you the hell out of this place, but I couldn’t.” He ran his cock between my wet folds.
Desperation made my toes curl. “I know,” I panted. “I can’t either, Master.”
Hawk surged into me in one thrust. I raised my hips up for him, eagerly taking him deeper. Watching his throat work in effort not to groan, or perhaps curse. Watching his eyes blaze with lust. His fingers dug into my hips just right. He growled low in his throat and drove himself into me, thrusting wildly.
I lay across the ground and rocked my hips greedily. Loving the perfect feel of him, wishing I never had to watch him walk away from this.
“Fuck, I’ve never needed anyone the way you make me need you.” He lay over me, pinning my wrists in the dirt to either side of my head and driving in and out of me like a man possessed, all his Yantu self control be damned.
His confession, the rawness in it, sent me spiraling toward release. Hawk must have realized I was close, because his mouth crushed mine, swallowing my cries.
He fucked me fast and hard, his grip on my hands tightening until it hurt. The bite of pain sent me hurtling over the edge.
White lights danced before my eyes and I bucked wildly against him, mewling into his mouth. Hawk fucked me like a fiend, and as I went over again, he gave me three sharp thrusts, his body shuddered, and he cursed his own release.
His fingers stroked my clit, drawing out the last shivers of my orgasm.
With us both panting, he sat up again and straightened my dress. Then he shoved my panties in his uniform pants pocket.
I grinned, watching the cloth disappear.
Hawk rested his palm on my forehead. “It won’t be long now.”
The finality in his tone made my throat tighten. I could hear it in his voice, my last moment with him had come.
I shut my eyes. “I love you, Master.”
“I love hearing that.” He swept his lips over mine one last time. “We’ll be coming for you tomorrow. Be ready.”
I felt his body lift off of me. My eyes opened, and I sat up, reaching for him.
My hand clutched air.
I was alone.
Chapter 18
Into the Devil’s Lair
“Bear.” With my boot on his shoulder, I shook the bearded man lying on the floor of the cave. “Bear, wake the fuck up. It’s time.”
Bear, who usually served as Steel’s assistant, turned over in his bedroll and looked at me with a confused expression that might have been comical if the situation hadn’t been so serious.
“What’s that, General?”
“It’s time.”
“Right.” He squinted at the bright afternoon sunlight streaming through the cave entrance and rubbed his eyes.
I tossed him his disguise, a simple brown tunic and pants, the kind worn by merchants. He tugged the pants on, apparently not noticing that he was putting them on backwards.
“Sorry, General. I didn’t sleep well, not with Grim talking in his sleep the whole time.” He scoffed and turned the pants around before putting them on again.
“I heard him,” I said, slipping on the black, standard-issue protective vest the J’nai wore. I buckled it over the black tunic I already had on, tugging the three buckles at each side tight. “Wake him up.”
Bear turned and threw a nearby mug at Grim’s head.
Buried in his bedroll until the mug hit him in the shoulder, Grim sat up sharply and glared at him. “What the fuck, man?”
“Get up. It’s time to go kick some ass, Brother.”
“Your bedside manner needs work, Bear.” Grim scrubbed his hands down his naturally ghost-pale, tired-looking face and shook off a yawn.
I tossed him a tunic and pants that matched Bear’s. “What the fuck were you dreaming about anyway, Grim?”
He grinned and pulled on the shirt. “Wouldn’t you like to know, General.”
I rolled my eyes. Emmy. I swear, women turned all my men into horny-ass teenagers.
“Maybe you should let us bring pussy along on the next mission after all, General.” Bear yanked on his boots. “I’d rather hear him fucking Emmy than hear him talking to her in his sleep all night.”
“Not gonna happen.” I checked over my uniform to make sure everything was in place. Wearing a J’nai outfit made me immediately want a long bath. “Hurry the fuck up. We’re going into that compound in an hour, whether you two are ready or not.”
Blade came in, dunked his head into a pail of cool water at the entrance to the cave, then shook himself, sending water droplets showering everywhere from his flame-red mop.
“Doc says the stuff’s almost ready, General.” He gestured to his own J’nai uniform and then sheathed twin six-inch knives—his own personal weapons—in the sides of his boots. “I think I’d rather have dressed as a stablehand than one of Damien’s son-of-a-bitch yes-men.”
“Join the club,” I muttered, patting him on the back. If spending a few hours dressed in the skin of a man I should have been killing was what it took to get our woman back where she belonged, with us, then I’d live with it. Even so, when we got her out of there, the only time she’d leave my bed was to let me watch the rest of the Four fuck the hell out of her.
I stepped out of the cave, looking back at Grim and Bear who were finishing up getting ready, and then at the four men who served as guards under Hawk’s command, sitting around the fire at the mouth of another cave.
“Blade, Grim, Bear, get a bite and be ready to leave in twenty minutes. The rest of you, stay here and guard the camp. The bikes and other supplies will be staying here until it’s time to get back on the road.”
The four guards begrudgingly agreed and got themselves some of Blade’s too-thin porridge that cooked over the fire. They might not have liked the plan, but they knew as well as I did that the fewer of us there were on this mission, the better.
I made my way across the camp toward Doc, who sat in the mouth of a third cavern.
I still couldn’t wrap my head around what Hawk had told us during his visit to the camp last night. Julian was not only real, but a contingent of his guards had dropped in on Damien.
It had taken us so long to adjust to the idea of a living, breathing man controlling and terrorizing Setora, and while I’d suspected Olan was lying about him being part of some virus the moment the asshole doctor had taken her, it still unsettled me to hear that Julian had sent flesh and blood men to cart Setora off for himself. Those men being there wiped out any lingering doubt that Julian wasn’t a phantom—and that he wanted her.
My fists tightened with an annoyingly protective rage. Julian’s coveting Setora brought my hatred for Olan boiling to the surface. He and his lies about that damn virus. When Hawk had told us Damien had killed Olan, I’d been furious, wishing I could have done it myself.
Julian was after our woman. After the woman who’d wormed her way into all our lives and changed us so much that I could still hardly believe it. The woman who made us, and this club, feel whole in a way nothing else had.
On the bright side, knowing those men had showed themselves, that Julian had soldiers at all, indicated that he could be found and stopped. He was real, and that, at least, I hoped to fucking hell meant he could be killed.
We just had to make sure we showed up before his men returned and tried to drag Setora off at midnight. It would be difficult enough dealing with the J’nai if there were as many as Hawk indicated without adding Julian’s flunkies into the mix.
“Sheriff.” Doc lifted hi
s head with a nod when I stopped in front of him, then went back to his task.
I squatted in front of him. He was pouring black powder into a long, thin metal cylinder wedged between his knees. Six more cylinders, already filled with the same explosive powder, sat beside him, each tightly capped.
“Have I mentioned how much I hate these things, Doc?” I picked a cylinder up slowly, studying it.
Apparently, while that black powder filled the top half of the cylinders, some sort of clear liquid filled the bottom half. Separated by glass containers within, the two ingredients remained harmless as long as they didn’t come into contact with one another. Only when the glass broke and the two ingredients mixed would the whole thing explode. They reminded me too much of those flashbangs the Dregs used, only these homemade bombs were a lot more dangerous.
“So do I, but this is the only way we can take that fuck’s whole mansion down. These were the only supplies Bear and Grim could get at that factory they broke into. Don’t worry, they can’t go off unless you drop them and break the glass inside.”
“That’s reassuring.”
Doc gave me a grim smile and topped off the black powder in the cylinder he held.
“Is the truck ready?” I nodded over to the delivery truck Bear had stolen in the wee hours and stowed in a passage between two cliffs, out of sight.
“It is. Give me a minute to finish with this last explosive and I’ll show you what else Bear picked up.” He slipped the cap on the end of the cylinder and screwed it tight. “I hope this works. Explosives are Crank’s thing, not mine.”
“Hawk said last night there are a hundred J’nai in that place. As long those things bury all those fuckers when they go off, Setora is brought out safely, and none of us gets our limbs blown off, I don’t give a shit what else they do.”
Doc nodded, putting the cylinders carefully into a sack. He stood and waved me over to the truck.
I could see it in his face; it bothered him to create a weapon of destruction when he’d devoted his life to healing the sick. But he also knew more about blowing things up than the rest of us.
“Doc.” When he turned to me, I shook my head. “You don’t have to do this.”
“Yes, I do.” He lifted his shoulders. “I hate the idea of blowing people up like some asshole Dreg, but Setora isn’t just my friend. She’s like a daughter to me, Sheriff. You were right. For what Damien and his cronies are doing to her, they deserve this.” He held up the bag of explosives.
I nodded and clapped him on the back. The love my men held for her would never cease to amaze me. Doc might feel for her in a different way than Hawk, Pretty Boy, Steel or I did, but she’d gotten inside his heart nonetheless. I loved that he and Bear, Grim and Blade were willing to put their lives on the line for her.
Doc opened the back of the truck and set the cylinders carefully inside. Then he unlocked a hidden compartment Bear had constructed under the floor of the truck’s rear bed. Serving as a kind of smuggler’s compartment, Bear had lined the hole with thick cushions to keep the cylinders from jostling and the glass from breaking.
“So, once Hawk gets you, me, and Blade inside, he’ll come back to the truck for these.” Doc set the explosives inside the compartment, locked it, and covered it with a carpet.
Even if the J’nai looked for it, no one would be able to tell there was anything under there except the metal floor of the truck bed.
“Bear and Grim will then drive out and come back here to wait for the sound of the horn.” He made his way toward the back of the truck bed. “Hawk, Pretty Boy, and I will set those explosives off right before all of us get the hell out of there.”
I nodded, following him.
“Okay, so here’s how this part of the plan will work.” He pulled one of three large kegs sitting in the back of the truck over until it stood in front of me, then popped off the lid. The inside of the keg had been emptied and allowed to dry out.
He went over the same plan with me he’d gone over twice already.
Every night since Hawk had infiltrated the compound, he’d returned for at least a couple hours to touch base, get some rest away from the J’nai, and go over another part of the plan. By now, the whole plan was drilled so far into all our heads we could have recited it backwards.
“Hawk said the best time to strike is at dinner, didn’t he?” Doc waited for me to jump out of the truck bed before following suit. “He said Damien eats late, sometimes not until nine. That’s cutting it close if Julian’s men are supposed to come back at midnight.”
“Yeah, well, we need to hit Damien when he’s not surrounded by dozens of guards. The fewer of us that go into that compound, the less likely we’ll be noticed. That means that fuck has to have as few guards around him as possible. Hawk said he only eats with his highest men, no more than six, with only a few standing guard at the doors to a locked room. Any other time is too risky.”
“Right. I don’t like losing the day going in that close to Julian’s men showing up, but it makes the most sense. Well, we’d better get a move on then. Hawk’ll be waiting for us.”
I nodded and clasped both his shoulders. “It’s almost over now. We’ll be back in the Grotto before you know it. Then you can ask me what you’ve been wanting to ask me for the last two months already.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Oh, come on.” I grinned. “Diamond. Everyone knows you want her as your Old Lady.”
His mouth opened twice, but he closed it both times and dropped his shoulders. “Am I that transparent?”
“When it comes to her? Fuck, yeah.” I put a brotherly arm around him, mock consoling, and then called over to the others.
When everyone was ready and gathered around the truck, Grim and Blade hopped into the back compartment and started lifting the kegs down.
“If any of you have to drain your lizards, you better do it now,” Grim said. “You won’t get another chance for a long while.”
While Doc and I did our business, Grim and Blade finished lifting the kegs down and onto the ground. Blade stepped away from the truck and did his own.
Then he and Grim took the lids off of the barrels.
“Who’s first?” Grim looked around at us.
I folded my arms and waited for Doc and Blade to go ahead of me.
Blade climbed into one keg, and Grim shut him in, sealing the lid on. Shit, those things looked a lot smaller inside with someone crammed into them.
Once Blade was sealed in, Doc folded himself into the second keg, and Grim sealed the lid.
“General?” Grim prompted.
“Yeah.” I blew out a breath and climbed into the keg, sitting down and folding myself up as best I could.
The inside of the thing was barely large enough to fit in, even with my knees tucked up tight and my arms crossed over my chest. It also reeked of sour grapes.
“This is fucking insane.” I looked at Grim, though my words were meant for all of them. “If we lose Setora or we get killed, I’ll give you all the beat-downs of your lives when we’re in Hell.”
“We’ll get ‘er done,” Grim said. He winced when he saw my bigger frame stuffed into the keg. “I hope you’re not claustrophobic, General.” He gave a forced smile.
“Just cover me up, Grim, I’ll be fine.” I put my head down, resting my forehead on my knees.
He clapped me on the shoulder and slapped the lid on.
Near-complete darkness surrounded me, the wooden confines of the keg pressing in from all sides. With the lid on, the smell of wine was cloying. The only light came from two small slits in the lid, which Doc had made to let in air. I heard the lid being sealed in place.
I didn’t have an issue with small spaces as a rule, but enclosed in the dark like this, and knowing I had to rely on one of my men to let me out, made it difficult to keep focused. I was also far from weak, but these kegs were well made, designed to keep wine or liquor good for years, keeping water and other elements out. Only Steel
or Beast could have punched through them.
To make matters worse, according to Doc, if not for the slits in the top of the lid, I would have had only about twenty minutes of air. If those holes were accidentally covered, I’d be dead before the half hour trip into that compound was through.
Men’s voices reached my ears, muffled on the other side of the keg walls. I felt the barrel being lifted carefully and then set into the truck with a soft thud. Two more thuds told me the other two barrels had been put in beside mine.
The back doors of the truck closed. Footsteps went past the vehicle and the front doors opened. I didn’t make out what Bear or Grim said, but I heard them climb in, then the front doors closed.
The truck started up.
Minutes dragged on for what seemed like hours. Every pothole we hit jostled the keg, making my teeth rattle.
“You okay, General?” Doc’s voice was barely audible through his own keg.
“I’m fine, Doc—”
Bear hit a large pothole on the road, making my teeth clash hard.
“Hey, Bear, watch the damn road!” I roared.
“Sorry, General,” Bear called over the engine. “I think these roads haven’t been repaired in a few hundred years.”
I’d have shaken my head if there’d been room to do it. I was the fucking General of the Dark Legion, one of the most powerful clubs in the world. I was a pirate feared far and wide, and here I was stuffed into a wine keg like a damned sneak-thief.
Me and my men were meant to charge in, weapons drawn, fists flying, cutting off heads and laying waste to Damian’s house with fire and a river of blood, dammit.
I was going to kill Hawk for coming up with such a crazy-ass plan. And then, as soon as I had my hands on Setora, I was going to pound her pussy so hard she’d be hoarse from screaming.
More minutes dragged on. I closed my eyes and focused on the prize that waited at the end of this mission. On both prizes, hours of taking my pleasure out of Setora’s ass and sweet revenge against Damien Vale.