by Anna Lewis
“Then what are you saying?” Cherise snapped back, eyes burning into him.
“I’m…sorry, I guess I’m not very good with words,” Lynx replied. His voice was low and regretful.
Cherise took a step back and smoothed her blouse, taking the briefest of moments to collect her thoughts. After she’d calmed down a bit, she finally trusted herself enough to speak. “Then what exactly were you trying to say, Lynx?”
His green eyes narrowed suspiciously. “How do you know my name?”
“That guy back in the bar, J.P., said it,” she finally admitted.
Lynx sighed. “Yet another thing I need to pay J.P. back for, huh? I’m getting really tired of that name. I was going to introduce myself as Alexander, but I guess that ship has sailed, huh?”
“Alexander?”
“That’s my real name,” Lynx said. “Alexander Andrews. Lynx is just an annoying nickname that I was hoping to get rid of when I got out—I mean, got back. Anyway, I’m sorry if I sounded like a dick a second ago but, seriously, what the hell were you thinking?”
Cherise felt the hot anger bubble up in her again, but she took a deep, calming breath before she allowed herself to speak. “The girl at the motel told me that was the only bar in town and I wanted to, I don’t know, get out and meet some locals, I guess. That’s what people do when they visit new towns. They explore.”
Lynx snorted. “So you decided to go to the Olde Glory Inn? You’re crazy, lady—”
“Please stop calling me that,” Cherise frowned. “My name is Cherise.”
“Okay,” Lynx agreed, but didn’t stop his line of criticism in the least. “You’re crazy, Cherise. That place isn’t a bar, it’s a den of vipers.”
“Then why were you there?” Cherise asked, perhaps a little too quickly.
Lynx paused. “Maybe I’m a viper, too, Cherise.”
She looked up at him then—really, truly looked at him—and saw incredible sadness in his bright green eyes. His handsome face looked worn and tired.
“No,” she said at last, after giving his statement some serious thought. “I don’t think you are.”
Lynx sighed and roughly scrubbed one large hand over his stubbly cheek. “Let’s get you home, huh?” he asked suddenly, preferring to explore this new idea rather than responding to Cherise’s comment. “Where you staying?”
“The Camelot Inn, it’s just off of—”
“I know where it is,” Lynx said. “As you may have noticed, North Fork isn’t a big town. Everyone knows pretty much everything, including other people’s business.”
They climbed back on the large motorcycle, Lynx once again insisting that Cherise take his helmet, and sped back towards the town of North Fork. As they navigated the dark country roads, Cherise told Lynx her story. They didn’t have a radio or anything, and the silence was deafening.
So, she filled him in on her life: that she was a blogger, stopping in town on a cross-country drive to go conduct an interview with an app developer. Cherise left off the part where she was recently dumped and hopelessly, perennially single.
“An app developer, huh?” he yelled over the rushing wind, bright laughter evident in his rough voice. “Man, no wonder you wandered in to the Olde Glory Inn. You were desperate for some fun and excitement—even the terrifying, unsafe, biker gang kind of fun—with a boring ass job like that.”
“My job isn’t boring!” Cherise argued, having to raise her voice into a shout in order to be heard over the rushing wind.
“Sure, it isn’t,” Lynx laughed.
The lights of town came into view and, in very little time, they pulled up in front of Cherise’s motel, the Camelot Inn. The buzzing neon sign still read “Vacancy!” Cherise wondered if they were ever full-up in a small, out of the way town like this one.
Lynx dismounted the bike and held out a hand to help Cherise step off. She slid her slim, brown hand into his rough, tanned one. It felt solid, it felt safe. Cherise felt her heart racing, but she didn’t know if it was entirely due to the motorcycle ride alone. It might have much more to do with her motorcycle ride companion.
“Good night, Cherise,” Lynx said, his green eyes boring into her brown ones. “I hope you have an exciting time with your app developer in Omaha tomorrow.”
Lynx slung one leg over the bike, beginning to remount his steel horse, but Cherise reached out one hand and rested it softly on his firm bicep.
“I was thinking I might try and have an exciting time tonight,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper. “Would you like to come in?”
***
A litany of What are you doing? What are you doing? What are you doing? looped through Cherise’s brain as she led Lynx up the narrow stairs and into her shabby motel room. She always made smart choices, dated safe men, never, ever put herself willingly in the path of danger. But here, now, she was inviting a stranger—a complete stranger that she’d met during a fight in a biker bar, for God’s sake—into her motel room and into her bed.
Am I absolutely insane? Cherise wondered as she fit her key into the motel door, jiggling it harshly before she felt the old lock give way and click open, removing the last obstacle between herself and a potentially disastrous mistake.
“Nice place,” Lynx said, stepping through the door into the dimly lit, badly furnished motel room. Cherise couldn’t tell if he was being truly sincere or rudely sarcastic. She knew the motel room was shitty, but she had no idea where Lynx actually lived. His own home could actually be so much worse than this dump.
“Thanks,” she answered, trying to sound calm and neutral, as if the most beautiful man she’d ever seen in real life wasn’t casually standing in the middle of her seedy motel room in the middle of freaking Nebraska. “So, uh…”
Cherise had been trying to figure out how to gracefully segue from small talk into pulling Lynx into bed and having her wild way with him, but hadn’t quite figured out how to make that work. Luckily, Lynx had an easy solution.
The moment the motel door clicked shut, he was on her, against her, pressing her back against the old, warped wood as his hungry mouth ravaged hers. Cherise had kissed quite a lot of men in her three or so decades on the planet, but she’d never been kissed like this before. Claimed by a large, violent man, who also held her so tenderly, so reverently, with his strong arms and body.
“Tell me if I need to stop, okay?” Lynx said, breathing heavily as he pulled back from his kiss to check in with Cherise.
“I will,” she promised him, then wrapped one small, brown hand in his sandy blond waves and pulled him back to her, pressing her mouth to him, eager to regain what they’d missed in those brief, eternal seconds apart.
Cherise felt Lynx’s hands stroke over her, exploring, ghosting over the thick black twists that covered her head, then caressing her delicate neck before moving down to cup her thick, firm breasts.
As he fit one full breast into each of his strong hands, Cherise felt her body involuntarily quiver. She sighed shakily.
“Is that okay?” Lynx checked. “I’m going too fast?”
It was most definitely okay and he was definitely not going too fast. If anything, Cherise wanted him to go faster, harder, rougher. But she didn’t have the willpower to pull her mouth away from his and verbalize her request. Instead, she wrapped her arms around his waist and yanked him to her.
She pressed her hips against him, exploring, and her efforts were rewarded with a firm press back against her. Lynx’s arousal was evident; his cock was a firm, thick bulge in the crotch of his worn denim jeans. Cherise wriggled her hips against him yet again, eliciting a groan from her new lover.
“Oh, god,” Lynx moaned, the desire in his voice painful to hear. “Careful. It’s been a long time for me. If you do that again, I might…”
“Then I won’t do it again,” Cherise promised. “For now, I mean. I can’t say anything about later.”
Lynx couldn’t find his words, he simply cried out as Cherise neatly nipped his lowe
r lip with her strong, white teeth and pulled him toward the bed.
They fumbled across the room, shedding a mixture of biker gear and business casual workwear. Finally, they reached the edge of the bed, both clad only in their underwear, and Cherise gave him a good, solid shove.
The big biker crashed down on the bed, spread out beneath Cherise like a Christmas gift she never asked for.
Lynx reached up for her and Cherise lowered herself on top of him, every inch of her body pressing down on his firmly muscled physique. He was lovely, all firm muscle rippling under tattooed skin. She traced one finger down the swirl of the tattoo sleeve on his left arm and made a mental note to ask him about his tattoos next time. If there was a next time.
Cherise moved her focus from Lynx’s arms, now reaching a finger down along the solid wall of his abdomen and slid it under the elastic of his waistband, teasingly pulling it away from his stomach, then letting it snap back into place. Lynx was moaning beneath her, a small sigh of protest releasing each time Cherise teased him, playfully letting go of his underwear. Finally, with one firm tug, she pulled down his simple black boxer briefs, revealing his long, engorged cock.
She breathed in sharply at the sight of him. Cherise had felt him when they’d pressed into one another, so she had some vague idea about the size of him, but she wasn’t expecting this.
Lynx was enormous, long and elegant, his thick shaft disappearing into a small thatch of light hair gathered at his base. The smallest bit of moisture glistened on his tip.
He was ready. He was so ready
“Please, Cherise,” he moaned under her, jerking his hips toward her. “I need you, please, I need to be inside of you. Oh my god, please—”
Cherise didn’t need to another invitation. She quickly shed her delicate black silk panties and situated herself above him, the tip of his massive cock lined up with her damp entrance.
“Ask me again,” she purred, one hand wrapped around him, squeezing him ever so slightly.
He moaned, unable to form words.
“That didn’t seem like a request,” she laughed, teasing him gently. “Try again?”
“Please, Cherise!” Lynx burst suddenly, the words coming to him once again. “I need to be in you, please!”
That was enough for Cherise. She relaxed her curvy thighs and allowed herself to slide down his shaft, relishing the way every single inch of him pushed into her. The slickness was delicious and she shuddered when she felt the firmness of his crotch meet her. There was no more to take.
He was all the way inside of her now and she’d never felt so full.
Lynx, now fully seated within her, was unable to contain himself any longer. He thrust up into her like a wild creature, bucking his hips and claiming her as his own from beneath her. Cherise dug her hands into his shoulders, gripping tightly as he fucked up into her, riding out his mad pursuit of pleasure with her own reckless, wild abandon.
Lynx’s hands sought purchase anywhere—gripping the thin bed sheets, clenching and then unclenching fruitlessly at his sides—before they settled on the fullness of Cherise’s round ass. His deft fingers squeezed and Cherise cried out as she allowed his skillful hands to guide her toward orgasm.
She was close now. She was so very close. Lynx’s own thrusts were getting more shallow, more frantic and finally—finally!—he jerked up into her and stayed there, locked inside of Cherise, as he spilled inside of her, crying out in ecstasy at the intensity of his release.
Cherise could feel him come, exploding deep within her and the hot need of his release finally pushed her over the edge. She threw her dark head back and rode out the pleasure of her own release, panting and moaning as both of them let the aftershocks of mind-blowing sex tremor through their joined bodies.
Finally, after what could have been seconds or minutes or even perhaps hours, Cherise collapsed on top of Lynx and sprawled across his broad frame.
“Thank you,” he whispered, pulling her close and cradling her to his massive form.
Cherise tried to say thank you back, tried to make her mouth form the words but she was simply too exhausted. She relaxed against her unlikely lover and let herself fall into a deep, peaceful sleep.
***
The alarm on Cherise’s phone was blaring, screaming in her ear. She reached one arm out, fumbled with the phone until she found the snooze button, then curled back into her uncomfortable motel bed.
Her uncomfortable, empty motel bed.
“Lynx?” Cherise shot bolt upright, but Lynx was nowhere to be found. “Lynx? Are you there?”
The room was deathly silent. No sound from the shower, no movement anywhere at all. The curtains were drawn and the door was firmly shut, the handle locked but the bolt left open. There was nothing left of Lynx: no article of clothing left behind, no random bits of paper or loose change from his pockets, no note.
It was like no one had ever been here at all.
“He was real, right?” Cherise asked herself, the memories of the previous night breaking through the fog of her sleep-addled brain.
She rushed to the window to check for her car. It wasn’t there, of course, they’d left it in the parking lot of the Olde Glory Inn.
Shit. She was definitely going to need to go get her car, but Cherise was in no mood to go anywhere near that bar ever again. She’d call Triple A and ask them to tow it. She just hoped the Triple A guy carried a shotgun.
Glancing around the room, searching for some sign of her lost lover, Cherise’s eyes fell back on the bed. There, next to her own body print in the rumpled sheets was the shape of another human being. A large human being. A Lynx-shaped human being.
“He was real,” she muttered, her knees collapsing as she sat back down on the bed. The moment her hindquarters touched the mattress, a bit of soreness flared up between her legs. Oh, right, she had just had the absolute best sex of her entire life. Of course she would feel it. It was a comforting souvenir of the brief connection she’d forged the night before with the handsome, mysterious lone rider.
As much as Cherise wanted to lie in bed and replay the events of the previous night over and over and over in her mind, she needed to get to Omaha by that afternoon if she wanted to be on time for her interview. Cherise hated being late, even if her reason was a good one.
She heaved herself off the bed and headed to the warm, steamy sanctuary of the shower.
The hot water felt incredible against her skin, burning beautifully against every individual scratch and bruise Lynx had marked her with the previous night. She washed herself, taking special care as she soaped the tender area between her legs. The soap burned a bit and she was swollen and a bit bruised. Every single ache and pain was one hundred percent worth it.
Cherise stepped out of the shower, fat droplets of water soaking the thin bathmat at her feet, and dried herself off with a sandy, thin motel towel. This motel was a dive, but it had seemed like pure paradise the night before, when Lynx had been there with her.
Cherise didn’t know what it was about him, but the mere presence of the man made her feel happier, safer, and more whole than she’d ever felt before in her entire life.
She shook her head in denial. “That’s the morning after afterglow, silly girl. This was just a one-night stand, there’s nothing special about it.”
Cherise kept telling herself this, over and over, as she quickly got dressed in an outfit appropriate for an interview and repacked her small overnight bag, but she was never able to fully talk herself into it. The night before had actually felt special, something more than a fun one-night stand. Lynx had felt special.
There was something there, Cherise was positive of it.
She glanced around the room, giving it a final once over before she checked out, then pulled the door open, stepped out onto the motel walkway and nearly screamed.
Lynx was standing right outside her door, holding a to-go cup of coffee in each large hand and wearing a grim expression.
“You scared the sh
it out of me, Lynx,” Cherise exclaimed, unable to verbally process the relief that flooded through her the sight of the handsome young biker.
“Sorry,” he said simply and held out one of the coffee cups toward her. “It’s a latte. I didn’t know how you took your coffee, but it always seems like ladies on TV like lattes, so…here you go.” He sounded almost embarrassed.
Cherise’s cheeks glowed with pleasure at the simple sweetness of the small gesture. “Let me pay you back,” she began, digging in her purse for some cash, but Lynx cut her off.
“Don’t worry about it, Cherise,” he said. “Listen, there’s something you need to know…”
Her eyes snapped up immediately, dark brown eyes full of concern. “What happened?” she asked.
“It’s your car,” Lynx said.
It turned out that fleeing the Olde Glory Inn on motorcycle was a good idea for their personal safety, but not such a great idea when it came to Cherise’s poor little car. According to Lynx, it had been smashed with baseball bats and then set on fire. The police had been out to the Olde Glory Inn, but the security cameras didn’t actually work and no one there claimed to have seen anything.
“Those assholes,” she growled, clenching her coffee cup so tightly that Lynx had to take it away from her to prevent her from crushing it and spilling hot liquid all over her fresh, business casual ensemble. “Of course, they didn’t see anything, because they were too busy actually setting my poor car on fire. Those fucks. I want to see it, Lynx.”
“You don’t want to see it, Cherise,” he told her, setting the coffees aside and pulling her into a fierce, protective hug.
“I need to file a police report,” she said, fighting to hold back tears. Her little SUV wasn’t fancy, but it was hers. It had gotten her through grad school and an internship, it had helped her move to San Francisco. She was heartbroken at its destruction.
“The cops have already been to the scene,” Lynx said. He’d reported the incident and gone to the police station to help the investigating officers fill out the report. “All you need to do, Cherise, is go down there and sign off on the report.”