by Jessie Cooke
“Oh, is that her grandmother?”
“Her grandmother?”
“The other woman in the picture.”
He picked the picture back up and looked at it like he’d forgotten there was another woman there. “Oh, her. No…she was just some waitress at Hooters.”
22
Claire gasped and then her face turned bright red. “Oh my gosh, you’re horrible.”
He was laughing again. “And you…were jealous.”
“Shut up. I was not.”
“As evidenced by your bright red face.”
She rolled her eyes at him and pretended to eat. Hunter laughed until she finally said, “Okay, fine. I was a little jealous. Not that I have a right to be.” She looked down at her plate, obviously embarrassed. Hunter was impressed with her honesty.
“Hey,” he said. She glanced up at him from underneath her long eyelashes. “I wanted you to be jealous.”
“Why?”
“Well, if you haven’t noticed, I kind of like you. If it’s not evident by how I nearly devoured you at the clubhouse…twice…there’s also the fact that I tried everything I could think of to keep from sending your father to jail. Although as long as we’re being honest, I have to admit, I don’t even like him.”
She looked at him full-on in the face then and said, “Why? Why doesn’t anyone like him? He tries so hard.”
“Claire…” Hunter had a lot to say about Larry and the fact that he thought the old thief was looking to take advantage of his daughter’s kindness…he just wasn’t sure she really wanted to hear it.
“Go ahead,” she said. “I really want to know. I mean, obviously you were chasing him to put him in jail, so he wouldn’t be your favorite person. But I hit you in the head with a pipe and you still like me.”
He laughed. “Well, you got me there. I just see you going out of your way to take care of this guy that does nothing for you in return…”
“You don’t know that. Do you know how many men would have believed an eighteen-year-old that just showed up on their doorstep and said, ‘Hey, I’m your kid.’ He didn’t even question it. He told me how much I looked like my mother. They only had one night together and he never forgot her. I think that’s romantic.” Hunter almost rolled his eyes, but he caught himself. Claire caught him too. “Go ahead and roll your eyes, but I still think it is. And as for doing things for me, he’s helped me with the lawn and the gardens at the Inn, he’s fixed things around there, and when I…” She stopped, but her eyes were filled with tears.
“When you what?”
She stood up and picked up her plate. She’d barely touched her food. “Never mind. The point is that we do for each other. I don’t agree with his lifestyle, but when he was sober, things were good. They’ve just been crazy recently. Are you finished with that?”
Hunter looked down at his plate. He’d eaten over half of it without even tasting it as they talked. “Yeah. Here, let me help you.”
“No, I’ll get it.” She picked up the dishes and carried them into the kitchen,. Hunter waited a few seconds and followed her. When he pushed the door open he found her with her hands pressed into the sink and her head bowed.
“Hey, I’m sorry if I upset you.”
He saw her bring her hand up to her face and wipe at it before she turned around. She’d been crying. “You didn’t upset me,” she said. “Just old memories that I don’t want to have. I’m sorry.”
Hunter went over to her and used his good arm to draw her into his chest. He held her there, inhaling the fresh scent of her hair and willing himself not to get a hard-on and make her think that he was an incredible pervert. “Maybe we should get some sleep,” he whispered.
Claire nodded into his chest, and Hunter took her hand and led her down the hall to the bedroom. “You can have the bed,” he told her. “I’m just going to take a shower and then I’ll go sleep on the couch.”
She looked up at him and those eyes made it impossible for him to fight his growing erection.
“You can’t shower yet,” she said. “Let me help you out of those clothes and we’ll get you cleaned up.”
“Ah…no, it’s okay, really…”
“I came over here to take care of you. Please let me.” As she was talking, she was pulling up the shirt that he only had on one arm. He pulled his arm out of it and let her slip it over his head. Then she unbuckled his belt and jeans and said, “Take these off and lie down on the bed. I’ll be right back.”
Hunter watched her disappear into the bathroom. He stood there stupidly for a few seconds before he could focus again. Using one arm to push off his jeans wasn’t easy, but by the time she came back into the bedroom he was only in his boxers and lying on the bed. He was on his side, hoping the tent in his shorts wouldn’t be as obvious. Claire had a washcloth, towel, and a bottle of lotion in her hands. She had taken off her jeans and was now in a pair of tight spandex shorts and her t-shirt. It wasn’t helping the growing condition in his shorts any. He couldn’t help but smile. Even if he didn’t get to have sex, this was going to be interesting. She looked him over, her eyes lingering sadly on the bulky bandage, and then she said:
“Can you lie on your stomach?”
“Sure.” He rolled over and felt her climb up on the bed. His cock was pressed into the mattress painfully, and still doing somersaults. He felt her straddle his legs and his mind went to all kinds of places. Some people might call them dark, but he thought they were full of light. He rested his head on his good arm. The other one was beginning to throb, but he was trying to ignore it. He closed his eyes and concentrated on the wonderful feeling of her hands pressing into the washcloth as she ran it across his upper back and down between his shoulder blades. She used circular motions to clean his entire back and then did the same with the towel to dry it. The best was yet to come, though. He heard her squirt the lotion into her hands. She rubbed them together briskly and then began to rub it into his back. Hunter had had a lot of amateur massages, but Claire’s hands had a professional touch to them.
“Did you go to school for this or something? That’s fucking amazing.”
She didn’t answer him at once and he heard her take in a deep breath before saying in a shaky voice, “No. I taught myself.” Hunter wondered what that was about, but he didn’t want to darken her mood any further, so he let it go…for the time being. When she started washing the backs of his legs, he closed his eyes again. Every time she skimmed the tops of his thighs, his cock pulsated…it was already begging for release and she hadn’t even touched it. When she finished the backs of his legs, she used one hand to lift each one up and wash the front. That felt fucking awesome…but what really surprised him was when she started washing his feet. No woman had ever touched his feet before. He’d thought it a silly fetish. But not anymore…Fuck…that is hot.
Claire finished putting the lotion on his legs and feet before saying “Roll over now.”
Hunter lifted his head and cleared his throat before saying, “Um…I’m going to have to apologize for Seymour. I’ve tried to teach him manners, but he just doesn’t get it. His head is too small for all that information, I think.”
Claire giggled. “Seymour? Really?” She climbed off him and he rolled over with a grin.
“Loved Seymour Hoffman,” he said with a wink.
She shook her head and smiled. “You’re crazy.”
“So you keep telling me.” She sat down on the edge of the bed next to him. He was a little disappointed that she didn’t straddle the front of him, but once she picked up his hand and started washing his palm and each one of his fingers, he was excited all over again. He never knew how sensual a sponge bath could be. Claire washed up his forearm to where the bandage began, and then washed all around it before gently laying his arm back down on the bed.
“Are you in pain? You haven’t taken anything.”
He kept his eyes closed but grinned again. “You’re like anesthetic, I don’t feel anything but good.” He w
as lying. His shoulder was throbbing like a son of a bitch, but he didn’t want to do anything to interrupt what she was doing for him. She snorted, like she didn’t believe him, and started washing his neck and chest. As she washed down his abdomen toward the top of his shorts, Seymour went crazy. There was no way she couldn’t see him twitching. She continued the bath and the lotion and when she was finished, —or he thought she was finished anyways—he opened his eyes. She was straddling him now, with her legs across his knees. He couldn’t feel if she was wet or not, but he was imagining that he could. “All done?” he asked.
“Not quite,” she said, with a mischievous look. That was when she slid her fingers underneath the waistband of his shorts and his head almost exploded.
“Um…I can’t promise not to make a bigger mess if you go there.”
Still smiling she said, “Then we’ll just have to clean that one up too, won’t we?” He groaned out loud as she slowly slid the shorts down. Seymour was leaping for joy, especially when she wrapped the washcloth around him and began to move it up and down. Hunter had to close his eyes again. It felt so fucking amazing that he was afraid if he watched her do it, there would be no way he could keep from coming. He felt her take off the washcloth and he was waiting for the lotion when something even more incredible happened. He felt her delicious lips slide down over the head and she engulfed it as she slipped them further down his shaft.
“Oh, fuck, Claire!” He put his hands in her soft hair and opened his eyes. She looked so fucking sexy with his cock sliding in and out of her mouth. She looked up at him with her big, beautiful eyes and reached her hands up to his chest, raking her nails down the length of it until she got to the bottom of his stomach. He was moaning and his breaths were becoming ragged. His head was swimming with possibilities, but he was afraid that she had him too excited to even move without having the biggest orgasm of his life. She smiled around the shaft before letting him slide out of her mouth. He thought she was finished already, but when she enveloped the head of his cock and lapped at it with her tongue he cried out her name, and God’s, and he might have even cursed—a lot. “Fuck!”
He felt her smile again as she sucked him in as far as she could, until the head touched the back of her throat. She started sucking hard and each time he moaned or gasped it only seemed to egg her on to go faster and suck harder. He was thrusting his hips up and he could feel his already engorged cock filling with what blood was left in his body.
“Claire…baby…” He was gasping out every word. She’d stolen all the breath from his body. She brought her eyes up to his and with effort he said, “I’m so close. I want to be inside of you…please.”
She let his hard cock slip out of her mouth and it hit his belly with a slap. With one hand she reached down and slid his shorts all the way off his feet, tossing them onto the floor. He was then treated to the sight of her stripping off her own clothes. Fuck, she’s gorgeous. As she slid back up his legs she said, “You want me to get a condom?”
He shook his head and then he said, “It’s up to you. I haven’t had sex without a condom since I was a teenager, so I’m clean.”
She didn’t respond to that, but he watched in awe and anticipation as she moved up to straddle his hips and lifted hers until she could press the head of his cock into her hot, soaking-wet pussy. He groaned again, loudly, and when she started to let it impale her, he was almost brought to tears. Not only was her pussy soaked, but it was like sliding on a tight velvet glove. He didn’t realize what he’d been missing all of these years, not being skin to skin with a woman. It was fucking delicious. Once she had him all the way inside of her, he reached behind her with his one good hand and grabbed her ass and squeezed. She let out a little cry of ecstasy and started moving up and down on his cock. She went slow for a few seconds, but it was obvious by her breathing and the sounds she was making that she was as hot as he was. He tried hard to wait her out…to let her come first. His cock was aching, though, and as he realized he wasn’t going to be able to wait another second, he once again squeezed her ass cheek. She bent down and gave him access to those beautiful breasts and as soon as he bit down on one of her nipples, she stiffened up and cried out. He breathed a sigh of relief as he finally released the orgasm that was threatening to tear him wide open. He came more than he could remember ever coming before, hard, fast, and hot. Claire was gasping and her pussy was clenching around his draining cock. Things were exploding in his head. He’d never experienced anything like it and if he wasn’t so fucking exhausted that his eyes wouldn’t stay open any longer, he would have asked if she wanted to do it again.
23
Dax was holding the bleeding man by his throat. He had tried asking nicely, but the man was refusing to tell him where he could find Sam. The guys tied him to a chair and Dax knocked him around a little, hoping the son of a bitch would give in easily. He was about half wasted on beer and weed, though, so he wasn’t feeling the pain the way Dax had hoped. Now as he shoved him back in the chair with his hand around his throat he said:
“You listen carefully, motherfucker. That pig that you’re protecting has my wife. If he so much as pulls one of the hairs out of her pretty head, I’m going to cut you up in little pieces and feed each piece to the pigs out on my ranch. Where the fuck is he?”
The man was gasping for air and couldn’t talk if he wanted to. Dax felt the hand on his shoulder and heard Hawk’s voice say, “Boss, you’re gonna have to let him breathe if you want him to talk to you.” Dax wanted to crush his windpipe. There would be something so satisfying about feeling it turn to dust in his hand. But Hawk was right and he knew it. He let go of the bleeding bastard and as the man’s head lolled backwards and he began to cough and sputter Dax said, “Last chance. You tell me where to find Sam Winters or I will crush every bone in your fucking throat.” The man gasped something unintelligible out and Dax lowered his head next to his and said, “Try again, asshole.”
“He might be at the cabin. I don’t know for sure.”
“What cabin?” When the man didn’t answer him right away, Dax went back for his throat. As soon as he touched it, Hawk put his hand on Dax’s shoulder again and said:
“Why don’t you take a little break, boss, while he gives me the address?” Dax hesitated, but he let go. When he turned around, he saw that the eyes of all his men were on him. Most had never had the opportunity to see him really lose his temper. Their eyes were filled with a mixture of awe, worship, and fear.
“Saddle up,” he said. “If this motherfucker doesn’t tell Hawk what we need to hear, I’m tying his ass to the back of my bike and if he’s still alive when we get up to the hills, he can tell us which cabin it is.” The men began moving out of the small double-wide trailer. As Dax was stepping out into the cold morning air he heard the man begin to rattle off directions to Hawk. His body felt like it was coming apart from the inside out. If Angel was hurt…or worse…someone was going to pay, and pay big. He’d just slid onto his Harley and was pulling on his do-rag when Hawk came outside and headed for his bike. The men didn’t speak, they just all started their bikes, and Dax let Hawk take the lead.
As they drove up toward the foothills, his mind wanted to imagine all the things the fucker may have done to her. If she was dead, or hurt, it was his fault. He was the one that had made Cody’s father pay for what he’d done to Cody and Keller all those years ago. He was the one that had somehow allowed someone to see him doing it. When he finished with the old man, he’d used a vat of acid to make sure that no one would ever find a trace of him. But someone had watched him…and now Sam wanted Angel to pay for his sins. Poisonous rage seeped through his veins at the thought. He had spent the past few years cleaning up his life, mostly for Angel. He’d learned how to control his rage and he’d practiced eliminating people from his life without eliminating them from the world. He’d done all of that for Angel, or most of it, anyways. But if his past sins were going to come back and threaten her, then the old Dax Marshall was g
oing to resurface along with them…and this motherfucker was going to feel like he’d been confronted by the devil himself.
Angel woke up with a searing pain in her face and behind her eyes. She realized her eyes were swollen shut as she tried to pull them open. For several long seconds, she couldn’t remember where she was, or what had happened to her. It wasn’t until she saw the man with the blue eyes looking down at her that the terror returned to her heart.
“About fucking time. I was getting ready to just do you, but this is going to be so much more fun.” Angel tried to pull her hands and legs up. She wanted to fight…again. She realized with a whimper that he’d tied them down to the bed while she was unconscious. She couldn’t move them at all and they tingled with the circulation trying to return to them as she tried.
“You motherfucker. My old man is going to kill you. He’s not just going to kill you…he’s going to torture you first…” She started choking up when she remembered that he might be dead. She wasn’t crying for herself, it was for Dax, and Susie. Poor Susie…she was going to be an orphan. For a second she closed her eyes and prayed that Zoe and Levi would take care of her. Susie loved them and they loved her. If Angel was going to be able to think straight and possibly come out of this alive, she had to believe her little girl was going to be okay.
“You sound so proud of him. You spent most of your life being a good little Catholic girl, and then a cop. Now you’re just a worthless biker’s old lady, a slut, really. You’ll get what you deserve tonight, and you’ll probably like it so much that you’ll beg me for more…right before I choke the life out of you.” The pig looked so smug. Angel never wanted to crush the bones in someone’s face with her boot as badly as she did his.
Angel started spitting and cursing at him like a feral cat. He smiled down at her and then bent over to slap a piece of duct tape across her mouth. She screamed into it as he took out a big knife and began cutting off her clothes. He wasn’t careful, or gentle, about it, slicing into her skin several times before he got them off her. She thought he was a sick human being already, but she realized that he was a pathetic animal when he leaned over her and licked off the trickle of blood that was slowly rolling down one of her breasts. Suddenly, she was wishing that she had used that gun on herself. She wished that she had put it in her mouth while she was in the trunk and pulled the trigger. Susie, and Dax if he was still alive, would have both been better off than knowing she’d been raped and mutilated.