by Amelia Wilde
I shake my head. “I don’t know what that was. Some creep who watches the block? I don’t know.” I drop my hands from her face and pull my seat belt on. “Are you ready to go?”
“Yes. Yes.” Zelda fumbles for her own belt, clicking it into place as I pull the car away from the curb, picking up speed as we head down the block.
What the fuck was Domino thinking, calling me back for this? It was some chicken-shit amount of money. The one thing I was right about is that I was collecting from some college kid who thought he could wise-ass his way out of the situation. The whole thing reeks of bullshit. Domino just wanted to teach me a lesson, keep me on my toes.
Well, I’m fucking done being kept on my toes. I’ve been loyal to that guy for five years, and what do I have to show for it? An apartment and a savings account? None of that would be worth anything if that scumbag had gotten to Zelda.
I don’t know what the hell was on his mind, either. Breaking the car window with a chunk of curb? What the fuck?
We’re back on the highway before Zelda speaks again, and one glance tells me she’s shaken. Her face is white, and she keeps a nervous grasp on her phone.
“I have to know.” Her voice is barely above a whisper.
“Know what?” I take in a breath and let it out slowly. Stay in control. Stay in control.
“What your job really is, Sawyer. What was that?”
“The guy at the car—” I run a hand through my hair. “That wasn’t part of my job. That was some crazy bullshit. It’s a bad neighborhood.”
“But why were we there? What would you have to do in a place like that?” Her voice is trembling.
Is there any point in trying to hide it from her? Not after that fucking show.
There’s no point in trying to hide anything. Not anymore. Not from Zelda.
“My dad used to beat the shit out of me.”
Her mouth opens a little in surprise, and her forehead wrinkles up in concern. “He did?”
“Yeah. Nothing I did was good enough for him, and he’d spent his life working a piece of shit job in one of the factories outside of town. He was an angry drunk. That’s why I spent so much time at my Aunt Linda’s. That’s why I’m back there now, and not at his house.”
Zelda’s face is split: half sympathy, half determination. “I—I can’t imagine. But—”
“When I turned eighteen, I moved out of his house and went to the city. I was working shit job after shit job there just to pay the rent, but I didn’t want to ever get knocked around again, so every free hour that I had, I spent at a martial arts studio. That’s where I met my current boss.”
She gives a little shake of her head. I catch it out of the corner of my eye.
“He wanted someone to…do collections for him.”
“For what kind of business?”
“Drugs.”
Zelda sucks in her breath. “So you—you go and get his money from them?”
“If they haven’t paid already.”
“And you’re—” I can practically feel her eyes on my muscles now, seeing everything differently. “That guy on the street—”
“It’s usually not that bad.” I don’t know why I’m trying to paint this as better than it is, but it’s the truth. “It’s really not. Usually, I use some…harsh words, and the person gives in.”
“And this is your job.”
“This is my job.”
Zelda is silent for another long moment. “That’s not good.” These last three words are soft.
“I’m not good.”
Her voice drops to a whisper. “But you saved me.” She gasps in a breath, and I’d bet money that she’s replaying the scene with a different ending. “You saved me. That guy was—”
“That guy was fucking crazy. He was going to break the car window.”
“You saved me.” She’s breathing harder now, and she passes her phone from hand to hand.
“I shouldn’t have let you go with me in the first place.” A disgusted noise rises in the back of my throat. “That was my fucking fault.”
“I wanted to go.”
“That could have—” There’s no point. There’s no point. “It could have turned out badly.”
“It didn’t.”
“Give it time.”
“No.”
“What?”
“I’m done giving it time.” Zelda’s turned toward me in her seat, her entire body facing my way. “I’m done giving it time,” she says again, and then she whips around, staring out the window. “Stop here.”
“Where—” I almost don’t see the turnoff in time, because it’s just a narrow dirt access road. I catch a flash of a sign—Mayberry Nature Preserve—and then Zelda says, “Stop. Right here. Stop now, Sawyer.”
I press on the brakes, bringing the car to a gentle stop, and then I put it in park and meet Zelda’s eyes.
She might still be afraid, but one look at her and I know something else is going on.
The next second, she’s climbing over the center console, straddling my lap, her black dress hiked up over her thighs. My cock responds instantly, steel hard in a second, and then her hands are on my face, her fingers are tracing my jaw, and her eyes are pools of dark liquid desire reflecting in the bouncing light from the headlights. “You saved me,” she says one more time, and this time it’s got an undertone of pure need, want, desire.
“Damn right I did.”
“You would never have let him get to me.”
“Not in a million years.”
Even as her lips meet mine she’s reaching down, fumbling for the zipper on my pants, and I put one hand around the back of her head, reaching down to help her with my pants. My cock springs out, finally fucking free, and she bucks against me, her pussy soaking wet through her silky lace panties.
I pull back an inch. “Put your hands on my shoulders.”
She obeys instantly, bracing herself, her hot lips searing like a burning poker against the side of my neck, and I reach down and tear the panties off of her with one quick motion, the fabric ripping like paper in my hands.
Zelda rocks forward, spreading her legs to position herself over my cock. I can’t help grinning then, and an answering smile lights up her face.
She moves to lower herself down, but I put my hands on her hips, holding her up, teasing her, just a little.
It takes her no time at all to catch on. She leans down to whisper into my ear. “Please?”
Then I bring her down roughly onto my cock, entering her in one swift motion, and everything else disappears except for her slick wetness, her scalding heat, the muscles working my cock, and her sweet, sweet moans.
Chapter 29
Zelda
“Just maybe park at—”
“I’ve got it.”
Sawyer reaches out and puts his hand over mine on the center console. The air in his car is still scented with sex, and every breath I take makes me want more of it, more of him. Maybe it’s the adrenaline that’s still pulsing through me from what happened in that neighborhood, but my vision is still crystal clear and my heart still pounds, and between my legs is a throbbing need that hasn’t been decreased at all by the fact that I straddled Sawyer in the front seat of his car and…
There’s no nice way to say it. There’s just no way to put in polite terms. I straddled Sawyer in the front seat of his car and fucked him until we both came – hard – my cry muffled in the smooth curve where his neck meets his shoulder.
“Damn,” he whispered into my ear. It was several minutes before I could even move, but the flashing blue and red lights of a police car passing by on the highway had my heart in my throat as soon as I opened my eyes.
“Let’s get out of here.”
I’d climbed back into my seat and pulled on my belt, feeling Sawyer’s eyes on my every movement.
“Where to?”
“My place.”
His eyes lit up when I said it, and I knew he understood what I meant. Not to drop me
off.
But I wanted to be sure. Five minutes into the heavy silence of the drive, I couldn’t hold in the confirmation any longer. “I’m not—I’m not done with you yet.” The words escaped me on a gasped breath filled with heat and need. “I want more…of you.”
Sawyer reached across the console and took my hand, his blue eyes fiery in the light reflecting from the radio console.
“What makes you think I’m done with you?”
The slow grin spreading across my face matched a new flame radiating between my legs.
He didn’t let go of my hand the entire rest of the way back to my neighborhood, and I kept my mouth firmly closed when we turned onto my street.
He pulls neatly into the driveway of the house three doors down. There’s a light on in the front living room, its warm glow casting onto the curtains that hang closed at night, but Sawyer doesn’t hesitate. He climbs out of the car and is at my door in an instant, pulling it open, reaching down for my hand.
“Let’s go.”
He shuts the door gently behind me and puts his hand on the small of my back, and then we make the short walk up the street to my parents’ house. The paper bag from the restaurant hits my leg with every step, and the closer we get to my address, the more my heart is beating in my throat.
I try to force my pounding heart to slow down. I’m not in high school anymore. My parents and I agreed that the apartment in their basement would be mine for a nominal rent payment each month, and that they wouldn’t interfere. Still, as we turn into the driveway, I can see their shadows behind our own front curtains. It’s just past eleven and they’re still up. Most nights, my mom goes to bed between nine and ten.
They’re waiting up for me.
This is crazy. I press my lips into a determined line and lead Sawyer around to the back of the house and my own private entrance, then dig through my purse to find my keys. So what if they saw him? So what? I’m an adult. I can make these types of decisions on my own.
There’s only one prickling fear in the back of my mind, and it’s about what happened earlier. That’s the kind of life I could look forward to with Sawyer. A dangerous one. Far more dangerous than even what happened to me in high school.
You’ve got to get over that.
The train of thought doesn’t have time to reach its destination, because as soon as I shut the door behind us and flip the deadbolt, Sawyer’s hands are on me again, pressing my back up against the blank space of wall next to the door.
His movements are slow and deliberate, and absolutely, pleasurably torture.
His hands on the side of my face, his thumbs tracing a line following my jaw, down the expanse of my neck so that I tilt my head back, breathing hard, his eyes on mine. When his hands slide down to my shoulders, I hold my breath for an instant, but when the pads of his thumbs make contact with my nipples through the thin fabric of my dress and my bra, I gasp.
“I think we should play a game,” he murmurs into my ear, and the rugged sound of his voice sends a thrill all the way down my spine directly to the space between my legs. I move my feet apart another couple of inches before I realize I’ve even done it.
“What game?” I curl my hands around his forearms, leaning into his fingertips, and he moves one hand back up, lifting my chin, making my eyes meet his again.
“I’m going to fuck you until you can’t come one more time.”
“That’s the game?”
There’s a glint in his eyes, and his smile is an inferno that I desperately want to consume me. “The game is that you can’t make a sound.”
I open my mouth and take in a raspy breath.
“Just like that,” Sawyer says, and he leans down and kisses me, his lips hard against mine, and I melt against the wall. He pulls back. “No louder than that.”
“I don’t know if I can—”
“You can. You will.”
I’m not the type of woman who falls to pieces when a man tells me what to do, but with Sawyer issuing these commands in that voice, oh, my God, that voice, I can’t say no. I don’t want to say no. An electrical charge zings through my torso.
“I’ll play.”
He leans down one more time, his breath hot on my ear, and he kisses my earlobe while his other hand trails down the curve of my waist, making slow, slow progress around toward the front of my dress. “Let’s not waste any time.”
His fingers trail down to the hem, and he lifts it half an inch at a time, in slow motion, and if my head wasn’t already against the wall…
I arch my back as the dress slides up another inch. I’m already soaking wet, and soon he’s going to…soon he’s going to…
“No,” I gasp. “Let’s not. Let’s not.”
“Let’s start…” His hand is on the bared flesh of my hip. “Right…” His fingers are tugging at the waistband of my panties, moving them down just enough to give him access. “…now.”
His fingers slide into my wetness, and my knees buckle.
But I don’t make a sound.
Chapter 30
Sawyer
I catch Zelda with one arm when her legs give out, holding her up so I can explore the soft folds between her legs. I don’t really have any light to see anything, other than for the moonlight coming through the uncurtained top halves of her windows, but I can tell just by touching her that she’s damn exquisite, soft and wet and ready for me.
She moans a little, keeping the volume low, keeping it soft, and as my fingers explore a little further, a little deeper, her eyes fly open, her full lips parting. There’s a question in her eyes.
“That doesn’t count.”
She smiles at me, but then her lashes flutter, and damn right they do, because I’m stroking her hot core in a way that’s clearly driving her wild.
She spreads her legs another inch wider, but she can’t go any further because her panties are still on, and now she lets out a little growl of frustration. She is not a prude librarian, that’s for sure. No—it isn’t sex that she’s held herself from. It’s something else. It’s another kind of danger, and when we’re done with this—if we ever finish—I want to know what it is.
I slip two fingers inside her channel and meet with zero resistance, and her muscles suck in around my fingers. Holy fuck, it’s going to feel so good to have my cock buried inside of her again.
But I’m not going to rush this. It was hot as hell before, but now I want to take my time.
Her hands grip at my shoulders, trying to keep herself upright, but most of her weight is still leaning on my arm.
I have to get her panties off.
I scoop her up into my arms, and she lets out a low laugh. “A perk to visiting the weight room, right?”
“To lift up gorgeous women and take them to bed?”
“Yeah.”
“I don’t do this much.”
She nods her head in the direction of her bedroom, and I walk us there as fast as my legs will carry us.
“Stand up.”
I’m not going to waste any precious moments with the undressing, and neither is Zelda, because before I can reach for the hem of her dress she has it over her head and tossed on the floor. The few moments of concentration it gives me are all it takes for me to strip down, and then I’m wrapping myself around her again, lifting her hot, naked body and spreading her out on top of her comforter.
It’s a white comforter, of course. White and clean and pure. It’s a good thing Zelda’s no virgin.
I balance myself above her.
“Close your eyes.”
“Is that part of the game?”
“Just close them. No other thoughts but what I’m about to do to you.”
She obeys instantly, even though she doesn't have to, even though she’s perfectly capable of taking control of our encounter. As if I’ll ever forget that, after she jumped onto my cock in the car. I can guarantee she doesn’t do that kind of thing often, but what happened back at that house…it changed something.
And I’m damn glad.
I’m painfully hard now that she’s stretched out below me, closing her eyes because I said so, because I know it will make this moment even more intense, but I force myself to slow down.
I trace a finger over her lips, and she opens her mouth, letting me put the pad of my index finger against her teeth. Her breath comes fast and shallow, and I only linger there for a second before I trail that finger down her body, paying attention to her nipples, tracing circles around them for just long enough that she starts to wriggle against the bed, then pinching each one lightly between finger and thumb.
Zelda starts to forget herself, moaning a little louder than the rules of the game allow, and as soon as she realizes it, she brings a hand up to her mouth, covering her lips with her fingers.
“You’re such a good girl,” I growl into her ear. “Always following the rules.”
Her eyes open for just a split second, but the way her body tenses tells me everything I need to know. “No…” It’s a whispered word, but that’s all it takes. So she doesn’t want to be so good. Not anymore.
Well, I’m the perfect fix for that.
Only I can’t be.
I can’t sort it out in my mind right now, so I settle for leaning down toward her ear again, licking and nibbling at her earlobe, giving her shivers. “Not good, then. Bad.”
She presses her hips up away from the bed, and I slide my hand down to meet them.
“So bad…”
Zelda gives in to the pressure of my hand against her hips against the bed, and the moment my fingers make contact with her wetness again, she spreads her legs open wide.
“Damn.”
I fuck her with three of my fingers now. She’s so slick and open and inviting that it’s all I can do not to plow inside her right now.
“Do you want more?”
“Yes,” she whispers.
“How much?”
Her eyes lock on mine. “More than I’ve ever wanted anything.” There’s more than one meaning to this, but now is not the time to whip out a fucking decoder ring. So I take it at face value.