In the Arms of Danger

by Madison Hayes

  Replete and content, Julie graced him with a sleepy smile.

  “And you,” he informed her with quiet, teasing pride, “can leave this life knowing you’ve been thoroughly fucked.”

  Chapter Seven

  In the morning, Dicky drew the bedroom door closed behind him and padded barefoot across the sitting room. With one hand, he tugged at the loose denims riding low on his hips as he shivered in the chill room. He wore no clothing other than his trousers.

  Trying to decide if Nan could afford a little more heat, he considered the old woman, tucked up in blankets on the chair while the television flickered its gray light at her closed eyes. Eventually deciding that she probably couldn’t, he rubbed his arms and lit a cigarette, drawing the smoke deeply into his lungs as though it might warm him. With the cigarette dangling in his mouth, he filled the kettle and plugged it in then pulled out several kitchen drawers, rummaging through their contents. Impatiently, he flicked his head to shift the hair that hung in his eyes.

  “Can’t find your pencil, Dicky? Here, let me have a look for you.”

  “That’s all right, Nan,” he answered quickly. “Julie’s a pen in her backpack.”

  “Is the loo free?”

  “It is,” he answered. “Do you want a hand getting there?”

  “If it’s not too much trouble. I’m a bit stiff in the mornings.”

  After he walked the old lady to the bathroom door, Dicky swung Julie’s backpack off the floor and dug through it until he came up with a pen. He watched the closed bathroom door as he crept to a small cabinet in the sitting room.

  On the bottom shelf was a neat, sharp-edged, lavender box. Sliding the lid off, Dicky moistened a finger to pull out a sheet of faintly colored stationary. Carefully angling his smoking cigarette out of the way, he balanced the sheet on his hands as he crossed the room back to the table.

  Nan came out of the bathroom and stood at his shoulder to watch. “I’ll just make the tea,” she said when the kettle boiled.

  The pen moved on the paper, slowly at first then with more confidence. When Nan placed a cup at his elbow, Dicky continued without looking up, stubbing out a cigarette and lighting another as Nan shuffled across the room to her chair.

  The television was on but Nan watched the young man as she sipped her tea. Dicky expelled a long wisp of smoke as his eyes closed and his head went back, the pen gripped tightly in his fingers. When his eyes opened, his attention as well as the pen returned to stroke the paper on the table before him.

  Abruptly, he dropped the pen as his head tilted. With a warm glow, his eyes assessed the paper in front of him. In that instant, Nan heard the bedroom door crack open behind her and she watched Dicky’s head come up. The glow in his eyes sprang to flames as the girl stepped into the room. Nan watched that intense gaze smoldering behind the ribbons of his slashing dark hair.

  The old woman nodded to herself. It had been a long while since she’d seen a look like that, but not so long that she didn’t remember what love looked like.

  Dicky swung out of the chair, sliding the paper under his hand as he turned into the kitchen. “Tea, Julie?”

  “Yes, please.”

  Looking about the kitchen, he finally slipped the paper onto the top of the small refrigerator before reaching for the ancient, chipped teapot. On his right, Dicky heard the chair being pulled out. After pouring the tea and putting a teaspoon of sugar into the cup, he joined Julie at the table.

  Dicky’s eyes rested on Julie’s face while she stirred her tea, her gaze directed to the small television across the room.

  “What is it?” he asked, when her gaze flickered. His eyes cut to the television.

  Julie peered at the TV a moment longer, cut a glance at Dicky, then returned her gaze to the screen. “I thought…that man…”

  “What man?”

  “He was standing behind the guy being interviewed. But it couldn’t be. Isn’t that the…”

  “Leader of the opposition party. Yeah.” The television screen changed as the news coverage moved to a protest in America.

  “Well, the man standing behind him looked like the man at the ferry. Did you see him?”

  Dicky shook his head. “The bodyguard? I didn’t notice him.” Dicky took a few moments to think. “The man at the ferry, the man you described, wasn’t in the police database, yet he’s concerned—very concerned—that he might be recognized. Concerned enough to kill a police officer in order to get to you.”

  “If he’s that worried,” Julie argued, “wouldn’t he have enough sense to avoid a television camera?”

  Dicky nodded at her. “That’s an old clip.”

  “What?”

  “It’s not a recent interview. I saw it a few months back.” Dicky rubbed a hand over his smooth, bare chest. “I wonder,” he said slowly. “If we were to go back through the old newspapers… I wonder if we might catch another glimpse of him.” He stared at Julie thoughtfully. “It might be worth a try.” Pushing to his feet, he swung into the kitchen with his empty teacup. “There’s a huge pile of old papers in the Swan’s kitchen. We’ll start there.” Leaning against the kitchen wall, he frowned at the housecoat she wore. “You need some clothes. Your others are a mess.”

  Julie’s eyes widened. “I lost my backpack. In the…police car.” Her eyes flickered with a bit of hope. “But you took half of my English money.”

  Dicky nodded. “We’ll need that later,” he said shortly as he dropped back into the kitchen chair and reached for his boots tucked beneath Julie’s seat. “Damn. I wish McCready—”

  “I talked to McCready.”

  Dicky frowned up at her as he tugged on his bootlaces.

  “I talked to McCready. When the…that police officer picked me up, she took me straight to Inspector McCready. Afterward, they sent us out to shop for some clothes. That’s when we were—”

  “Did they have time to do a composite drawing of the man at the docks?”

  “Yes,” she answered.

  “Did McCready see it?”

  “Yes.”

  Dicky glanced up at her as he knotted his laces. “How’d it turn out?”

  “The artist wasn’t as good as you.”

  He smiled and nodded, stood and reached for his coat hanging on the chair. “I’ll bring you back something to wear.”

  “Dicky, you aren’t going to…” Julie shot a wary look at Nan, clearly unwilling to use the word “steal” in front of the old lady.

  “Yeah, I am.” He grinned at her.

  * * * * *

  “They’re a bit tight,” Julie suggested a few hours later as she turned her toe and frowned down at the new flare-leg jeans hugging her thighs. She zipped up the dark green anorak Dicky had brought her as she questioned him with a frown.

  “No,” he answered. “They’re just right. Come on, then. You ready, Nan?”

  The old woman scuttled toward the bedroom door. “Just let me fetch me cardigan and I’ll be right with you.”

  Dicky corralled his two females through the flat’s door, down the stairs and out of the building. Eyes sweeping the street, he trailed a few paces behind the women as he followed them to the pub. After installing Julie behind a tower of newspapers in one of the Swan’s booths, Dicky guided Nan back toward the door again. “The church is just in the next block,” he told Julie. “I’ll be back in an instant.”

  He shot a look around the pub and spared a smile for Mary before he left with the old lady.

  Back less than five minutes later, Dicky froze inside the door as it shushed closed behind him.

  Skin stood in the middle of the pub with his booted foot in the center of Julie’s back. Scattered chairs and dislodged tables indicated there’d been some sort of struggle before Julie had been pinned, facedown, on the pub’s oak floor. “Where is the little bastard?” Skin demanded.

  Mary’s angry gaze swung to meet Dicky’s. “Dicky!” she shouted, relief sharpening her voice. “I’ve called the police.”

&n
bsp; The skinhead’s eyes came up and registered an instant’s uncertainty before the big man swept caution aside and ground his heel into Julie’s anorak. “Hey, arsehole. Hope you don’t mind. The bottom of me boot needed cleaning.”

  Forcing his expression to remain neutral, Dicky curbed his rage as his gaze narrowed on the foot planted in the middle of Julie’s back. His fists clenched and unclenched, blood pounding fiercely in his temples, misting his vision with a thin wash of red fury.

  “Why should I care?” Dicky’s voice was a soft whisper, raw, like the sound of tearing paper. A few steps took him into the pub. Squatting on the other side of Julie, he cocked his head to look at her face then, as if to get a better look, leaned his weight on one hand.

  His foot slashed over Julie’s back and hit the leg Skin was standing on. With most of his weight on that foot, Skin went down as Dicky leapt to his feet, standing above Skin as he put his heel in the bald man’s face.

  And again.

  Then once more with pure, unmanaged violence.

  Reaching behind him, Dicky swung a chair over the man on the floor and pinned the thug’s upper body inside the chair’s legs. Dicky gave the girl a dangerous look as he slammed one booted foot on the chair.

  “I’m all right, Dicky,” she told him, scrabbling to her knees.

  “Of course you are,” he told her soothingly, in a voice that didn’t match his eyes, then returned his gaze to the man trapped beneath the chair. “That’s the only reason he’s still alive,” he said, with a voice like torn silk. “You got any money, Skin?”

  A slurred obscenity was his captive’s only answer.

  “Check his pockets, Julie. Take half of what he’s got.”

  Julie found a wallet in the skinhead’s coat pocket and started pulling out notes.

  “That’s enough, Julie. I don’t want to take more than I can pay back.” He took his boot off the chair and addressed the skinhead. “I’m leaving now. I’m going to turn my back and walk out that door,” he said, flicking his head toward the exit. “If you move, and I am close enough to know of it, I’ll kill you.” Taking Julie’s hand he moved her across the room, opened the door and pushed her through, then followed.

  Towing Julie a step behind him, Dicky headed down the street at a brutal pace. They hadn’t gone two blocks when he ducked into an alley. Three steps into the darkened interior, he pinned her against a wall as he held her jaw tightly between thumb and fingers he couldn’t stop from shaking. Then his hard lips were against hers. Opening his mouth on her closed lips, he caught them between his teeth and hers, bruising them roughly before he pushed her lips out of his tongue’s path. His tongue stabbed into hers as he crushed her body with his. His hand left her jaw to tighten in the hair behind her ear while his other hand caged her breast and his knee fought for a place between her legs.

  Suddenly he stopped and glowered at her lips, dark and swollen as a result of his passionate onslaught. Still watching her lips, he lowered his mouth slowly and caught her bottom lip, dragged it through his teeth and released it. His eyes lifted to hers, his dark irises fire-heated coals with blackened rims. “I can’t wait,” he said without apology. “I’m going to have you now.”

  Julie realized he meant to take her there and then, up against a wall in broad, gray Liverpool daylight, only a few steps away from a road filled with pedestrians. The prospect was both frightening and thrilling. The idea that Dicky wanted her badly enough—needed her badly enough—to risk discovery as they rutted together against a wall in a narrow alley, loosed a wash of blood-red, liquid lust that weakened her limbs.

  With his chest still hard against hers, Dicky leaned his lower body away enough to unzip her jeans and shove them past her knees. More than that, he didn’t bother with. Pressed tight against her, his long dark coat concealed their bodies as he pulled his own fly and, leaving his jeans buttoned at the top, dragged his cock through the placket. “Reach into my right pocket,” her instructed her harshly. “I picked up some rubbers when I was out this morning.”

  She found the small plastic package and brought it to chest height where she struggled to open it. Clearly impatient with her efforts, Dicky sank his teeth into the package. The thin plastic ripped as Julie pulled it apart. She caught the condom before it could fall. “Put it on me,” he told her.

  He made enough room for her to get to him. Hesitantly, she reached for him.

  Dicky’s breathing stopped and his eyes closed when she took him in hand. Opening his eyes again, his chin on his chest, he watched her fingers as she rolled the condom down the straining length of his cock. His hand slid to meet hers and he clamped her fingers around his cock as he lifted his eyes to hers. His hungry gaze was hot enough to scorch steel as he pulled her hand away with his and he forced his cock down between her legs. The wide head rode through the folds of her pussy once before he bent his knees and thrust upward, repositioned his cock head, and shoved into her.

  With the wet heat of Julie’s cunt sucking him in, Dicky drove against her, hips pistoning. His hands on her waist gradually raised her against the wall until he’d put her just within hard reach of his cock head—positioned her so he could hit her core every time his knees straightened. Her denims were scraped down past her knees and he fought for her left leg—fought to pull her knee up against his hip, then higher, past his waist. Her left foot came free from her denims and, with a hand behind her knee, Dicky pulled it up and pushed it back, never ceasing his brutal action between her legs. He watched her face as her eyebrows pinched together and her teeth cut into her bottom lip.

  Slowly, his body ground to a halt as he snagged her eyes and held them with an accusing question.

  “I’m not going to make it,” she admitted with reluctance.

  “Yes, you are,” he told her in a rough lilt.

  Stroking the length of her naked leg from thigh to ankle, he pulled her foot behind him. He smiled as she locked him into her leg’s embrace.

  “Remember how I fucked you last night?” he growled softly. “Remember how you spread your legs for me while I opened your sex. I had your pretty lips spread wide so I could see all of your hidden pink, so I could watch you while you played with your clit.”

  Pulling his upper body away from hers, Dicky worked his groin against the mounded cushion of her pussy, grinding the rust curls in his groin against the clit cloistered inside her pouting lips. With his hands either side of her face, he lowered his lips to hers in a long, gentle, lingering kiss. Kissed her until she whimpered into his mouth and pushed her pelvis forward, straining for his action. Watched her feeble attempts to thrust herself on him, helpless without leverage. Let her struggle for him as her cunt rippled and tugged at his erection.

  With her shoulder blades hard against the stone wall, Julie arched her back as she tried to capture more of him.

  As she twisted on his shaft, Dicky sighed with pleasure at the havoc her struggles created in his cock. Finally unable to hold back a second longer, he put his lips against her ear. “I hope you’re ready,” he said. And that was all the warning she got as he resumed his thrusting action with renewed violence.

  “Dicky,” she cried. Grappling at his hips, Julie strained to force him hard inside her. With his blunt cock head shoved tight against her core, he gave her an instant of still, hard pleasure to orgasm on, then banged his way forward to his own release.

  Afterward, he stood for several moments, his forehead damp against hers.

  “What are you humming?” she asked with a laugh in her voice.

  His shoulders tightened in a shrug. “I don’t know. I’m thinking it must be a love song, though.” He took a long breath and sighed. “I don’t want to move. Ever. I want to stay right here, inside you. Forever.”

  “Think we could sleep standing up?”

  “I’m sure it’s been done before.”

  When she smiled into his eyes, he felt himself stiffen inside her.

  “Is that you?” she asked shyly.

  �
��Oh, shit. I’d better get that rubber out of you.” He pulled out carefully, shielding her with his coat while she found the leg of her denims and got them pulled up again. Throwing the condom aside, he tucked his cock inside his trousers then remained standing in front of her, his palms flat against the wall. “Julie,” he started.

  She lifted her lips and nudged at his mouth with hers.

  “Ah, fuck, Julie. I don’t know what to do.” For several moments he stood there, his forehead resting against hers.

  “Maybe we should go to the police,” she suggested.

  He thought about this for a while. “No,” he eventually answered. “I’m not giving them another chance to fuck up. Not with your life. I want those bastards behind bars before you go to the police again.

  “We’ll go to London,” he said finally.

  Chapter Eight

  Dicky was smiling when he stepped into their room at The Regent Hotel in London. He gave Julie a sly look.

  The dull, dingy room was decorated in flat brown and ugly mustard, though decorated might be a generous word to describe what those colors did to the small room. Still, it had to be assumed the colors hid a multitude of sins—other people’s sins—which were better left unexplored. The room smelled of years and years of unmoneyed guests, plowing through glum weather in cheap raincoats, coming and going in a long damp procession.

  They’d been in the city three days. On the train south, they’d put together a composite drawing of the man at the docks. Every morning Dicky left early to trudge the streets between the parliament buildings and the opposition’s offices. Up until today, he’d returned late every evening.