by Paula Cox
“Listen,” I say, “we’ve shown once that we can outgun these men. And now they have a new leader, we’ll show them again. This Enrique is angry because his brother is dead. Fine. I’m fuckin’ angry too ’cause you know what? You know fuckin’ what? My fuckin’ brother is dead. Duster is dead. Duster was shot to death on that fuckin’ dock because some stupid fat Italian fuck looked down the barrel of a gun. My brother—your brother—was shot dead and that’s what we need to be thinking about. Fuck Enrique and fuck the Italians. If they think we’re going to start crying like a bunch of goddamn women they’ve got another thing coming.”
I look each of the men in the eye, one by one, going around the whole table. I look for the iron in their faces. Look for the fight.
“You are Tidal Knights. Fuckin’ act like it. Go to your contacts. Tell them business needs to continue. Keep an eye out for the Italians. It isn’t war yet, but if it comes to it, we’ll go to war. We have the men, we have the weapons. All we need is the fuckin’ fire in our bellies. Enrique is a man, and so are you.”
I step back, chest heaving.
“Get to work,” I say, and then turn away.
Anger can turn into passion pretty damn easily, I’ve learned. As soon as my speech is over and the men go about their jobs, the anger I’m feeling transforms into passion for Lana. My blood is up and it needs an outlet and I think it’s about time I took a couple of hours just for me and Lana, a couple of hours to forget about everything. I have a blonde, sexy, petite woman waiting for me, willing, and here I am working myself too ragged I can’t even get to her properly.
Fuck it. Fuck it all—for the next couple of hours, at least.
I’m almost at the door to the dorm when Scud appears at my shoulder.
“Boss.”
“Yeah?”
“I thought we were doing that thing.”
“The outskirts? That can wait.”
I make to leave, and then the man does something strange. He steps in front of me.
“The fuck you doing?” I say.
“I just thought . . .” He bites his lip like a nervous girl. “I just thought we were busy today.” His eyes flit toward the dorm door, as though he doesn’t want me to go in there.
“Later,” I say. I take a step forward, forcing him out of my way.
Maybe he likes Lana, I reflect as I walk down the hallway. Maybe he’s jealous. Well, I can’t exactly blame him.
I knock on the door.
“Yeah?” Lana says. Even that one word has an effect on me. Fuck, she sounds sweet.
“It’s me.”
“Come in.”
When I walk in, she’s sitting on the edge of the bed, wearing nothing but one of my shirts, naked legs crossed, leaning back with a mischievous smile on her face.
“I wondered how long you’d be,” she says. “I was beginning to get bored.”
Chapter Sixteen
Lana
I have waited weeks for him to look at me like this. For a few seconds, he just stands there, bluer-than-blue eyes staring at my legs as though he has suddenly remembered what they look like, and as though he can’t understand why he has waited so long to remind himself. Then he steps into the room and kicks the door closed behind him and stands over me. He just stands there, staring down, and I can tell that soon he’s going to jump on me. He twitches, hands shifting, temples pulsing.
“Maybe I’ve been cruel to you, Lana,” he says.
“How’s that, Kade?” I say, looking sweetly up into his face. He likes how I look in the shirt. Or maybe likes is a bit of an understatement. He wants to fuck me because of how I look in the shirt. He wants to destroy me. But the shirt has a second purpose, too. I’m not showing; I don’t think I’m showing; I’m almost sure I’m not. And yet if I am, even a little, it is hidden in the thick folds of Kade’s too-big shirt.
I look up into the father of my unborn child’s face.
He kneels down so that he’s level with me. He smells of oil and sweat, of leather and grease, manly cologne somewhere within the mix. He smells like a real man, the sort of man that drives a woman wild just at the sight and smell of him, the sort of man who makes other men—who makes all my past lovers—seem tiny and pointless.
“Just reckon it’s cruel to have a woman as sexy as you on demand and not take advantage of it, is all.”
“Can I steal those words for a story?” I ask, tilting my head playfully. “They are the most eloquent, romantic words I’ve ever heard.”
Kade laughs, and then his face becomes dead-serious.
“Funny time’s over, Lana.”
“If you say so—”
He dives forward, grabbing my arms and pinning them to the bed, pressing his body into mine, his leather jacket compressing my breasts against my chest. I let out a squeal and start up at him as he weighs me down.
He’s taking control of me, taking me hard and brutal, treating me like he owns me.
“You’ll take it rough,” he says. I think it’s meant to be a question, but his voice is a growl and it’s hard to tell.
I bite my lip, thinking about how I never took it rough before him, how I always thought in terms of love-making, sensual, candlelit crap. How I never once dreamed of a biker shoving me into a bed, his cock aching hard against my thigh. Then I whisper: “Yes.”
Kade reaches down and takes both my hands in one of his, pushing them up over my head and arching my back away from the bed. His other hand gropes my breasts, and I wince just a little; they’re so sensitive now. He likes the wince, though, I can hear it in how his breathing quickens.
“You’re my dirty whore,” he murmurs as he leans in, biting at my nipples through his shirt.
“Your dirty biker whore, baby,” I moan, just barely able to. “Oh, fuck, yes.”
He grins, wolfish, and then lets go of my hands, pushing up to his feet.
“What are you—”
He grabs me by the hips and flips me over. I let out another squeal as he lifts up my ass, propping me on my knees, and then yanks my panties so hard they tear away from me, digging into my skin before breaking. Then he brings his face so close to my pussy I feel warm breath on my lips, my clit, my hole and my upper-inner thighs. “We’re going to play a little game, and then if you’re very good, you can come for me. Understand?”
“I’ll come for you, baby—”
“That isn’t what I said,” he says, and his hands are massaging my ass, both sides at once, but frustratingly far from my aching cunt. “I said I wanted to play with your body. You’re so goddamn hungry. But is my cock the only thing you’re hungry for?”
I’m confused, and I don’t know what to say.
His hands harden on my ass, which has been filling out over the past couple weeks. I feel sensitive, edgy. And then without more warning, his right hand lifts off and then descends, coming down on my ass with a sharp crack. I lift up off the bed, shocked at the sound and the sensation. It was more the first than the second, but my cheeks—the ones on my face—flare red and hot. Children are spanked, and I am not a child, so why the hell do I want him to do it again.
“How does that feel,” he asks. His voice isn’t unkind, but it’s harsh. Demanding.
My toes curl so much they ache. My pussy tingles. Tingles like it’s ready to be fucked now. My breasts are pushed into the blanket and I’m so horny the friction against my nipples is enough to provoke miniature maelstroms of pleasure to spin around my chest. “More,” I manage to say.
“You’ll tell me how it feels after every strike,” he says, and his hand falls again.
I gasp out words, because I believe he’ll stop if I don’t. I don’t remember them after I speak them, because then he’s striking again. It’s never quite enough to make me want him to stop, it dances the edge of sensation between pain and pleasure, and my cunt clenches at the intensity of it all. He spanks me over and over until I imagine the skin of my ass must be bright red. I’m out of my mind with it, wanton and hungry, and jus
t before I can’t take any more, I hear the sound of a zipper, and then his cock is pressing into me, pressing me open. My ass is so offended and sore, and his hips pressing against me makes the sensation even more intense, but god, it feels so good to be full of him, and I’m closer to the edge than I’ve ever been before.
“You took that so well,” he grunts in rhythm with his body. “Come for me—”
I didn’t know I could come on command, but now my pussy goes tighter than I can ever remembering it going before and my entire body seizes up. I slump onto the mattress and the dam breaks and the tsunami surges into my pussy, throbbing pressure attacking every part of it, the lips and the clit and the hot spot inside, all of the time thinking about how he spanked me and used me and how he hit me hard like he owned me. I bite down on the sheets and writhe side to side, pushing my breasts into the sheets, rubbing my nipples against them.
I’m still shaking, aftershocks roiling through my cunt as I lay forward, panting. Then I prop myself on my elbows and twist around to look at him.
He places his hands on my ass cheeks. He grabs the raw flesh, squeezes. I look up his body—he’s still wearing his leather, making this dirty, making this illicit, like he’s so hungry for me he can’t wait long enough to take off his jacket—and into his face. His jaw is clenched and his eyes are narrowed, two flints of topaz staring hungrily down at my ass.
“I’m not done yet, Lana,” he says. “I’m going to fuck you until you’re sore.”
There was a time in my life when I would have complained, offered to finish him off with my mouth or my hand, said that I was spent. Not this time. “Good,” I reply, and lift up enough to press my hips back into him.
As he starts to move inside me again, I open for him without any hesitation, open wide and wet, inviting him in. He pushes deeper and deeper and it’s like the blood which flows into his cock is tinged with fire, fire which presses through him and into me. Fire which flickers out and spits at my sweet spot. I struggle to keep looking at him, but suddenly my eyes are bleary with sweat. The sheets cling to me.
“Oh my fuckin’ god,” he moans, as he slowly slides out of me, savoring every minute movement.
“Oh my fucking god,” I moan in return.
He slides in and out slowly a couple of times, looking down at me as though he cannot believe the pleasure my body is giving him. And then he looks into my face and growls, “You said you could take it hard.”
“Uh-huh,” I manage to mutter, before he pounds both of us into jolting ecstasy.
He fucks me like a man who has been waiting for a chance to fuck me: with uncontrollable ferocity. He fucks me harder than I’ve ever been fucked before.
I grab handfuls of the sheets and drive back with my hips, bucking on his cock, up and down, feeling his cock deep inside of me, fire-tinged, burning pleasure engulfing my sweet spot. He fucks me so hard that soon all I can feel is fire in my channel, just one long burning sensation of fire. I hear his grunts, hear my own own, hear the slapping sound of his huge cock inside of me. I feel his balls knock into my clit, which is strange at first and then adds to the pleasure.
I drive back harder and faster, all the time talking to myself in my head, a constant stream of words which pushes me toward orgasm: “This is the father of your unborn child. This is the leader of the Tidal Knights. He’s fucking you hard. He’s spanked you so hard your ass is bright red. He’s using you. He’s going to come inside you. He wants to feel you come all over his cock. He wants to feel you explode on him. He wants to feel you go super-tight with pleasure.”
I listen to his grunts and my own inner-words and my moans and then I drive down on his cock so hard I feel his pubic bone slam into my ass. I don’t care; I keep going. I bounce and he quickly matches my rhythm until we are fucking like starving animals, fucking so hard and fast that we know it’s going to hurt afterward.
“Fuck, yes, yes, yes,” I moan, as the pleasure begins to reach boiling point. “Yes, fuck. Kade. Kade.”
“Come for me.” He breathes out the words. “Come for me now.”
“I—I am.”
Everything stops. I know I am moving, know my hips are gyrating, but I don’t feel like I am. I feel as though I am sitting completely still as piping hot steam rising up into my pussy, spreads out in steamy hands, reaching into my belly, up to my breasts and tweaking my nipple from the inside, down to my toes, burning them so they curl, to the tips of my fingers, burning them the same way. I close my eyes and see red. It’s building, I think. It’s building right now. It’s going to—
And then it does. The steam burns every inch of me. My pussy goes super-tight around his cock, so tight he grips my ass harder and pushes in past my tightening lips and to my sweet spot, where he holds it almost still, shifting only slightly to massage the spot with the tip of his massive cock.
“Yes, yes, yes—”
He knows my body so well. Knows how to pleasure it so well.
The orgasm erupts from the tip of his cock and consumes me. I close my eyes tighter and see a deeper red. I shift my hips on his cock, moving to one side as he moves to the other, probing my deep sensitive spot. I moan loudly into the sheets, a mouthful of the bedding, moan so loudly that my words are clear even stifled: “You’re a fucking animal. You’re a fucking animal.” I pant, gasp, writhe, bounce, and then the orgasm explodes a second time and I reach around and grab his hand and press it hard into my raw red ass cheek.
“Yes! Yes! Yes!” I cry,
Then, slowly, the orgasm passes.
Kade knows my body well; he’s made me come enough times over these past weeks.
As soon as I’m done, he leans over me, cups my breasts, thrusts into me one last time and grunts: “Fuck.”
He growls as he empties himself inside of me, and then both of us roll aside.
“That was . . .” I smile, and he smiles back, tired but content.
“It was,” he says.
“Don’t wait so long next time.”
I roll to him, lay my head against the leather.
He wraps his arm around me.
“I won’t,” he promises.
Chapter Seventeen
Lana
Being around Kade is wonderful but difficult. Every moment has two versions: the version he and I share, right here in reality; and the version which exists in my mind in which I tell him about the baby. Over the next week, he comes to my bedroom, we fuck, make love, screw, whatever you want to call it, we do it, and then we lie together for a while before business calls him off. Every time, I tell myself, is the time I will explain everything to him. I will tell him about his child. I imagine how he will react. Extremes dominate these imaginings. I see him building a crib and I see him throwing me out onto the street.
I write more, start a novel, discard it, start another, do the same. There’s a kernel in here somewhere. I’m sure of it. I just have to find it.
Scud visits me, brings me sandwiches, lingers and waits for me to speak. He’s a nice guy, I tell myself. But nice guys can be a pain in the ass, too.
I’m sitting at my desk, a couple of Evergreen kids giggling in the street outside, sun shining onto the wall in front of me silhouetting my every movement, when my cell buzzes. I almost jump up from the desk when I see the number: Terry.
I swipe the cell to answer and say, “Terry?” I speak uncertainly. Since I left her outside the Twin Peaks, we haven’t spoken. I’ve felt too nervous to reach out and she seemed to be fine with that.
When she speaks, it’s the same old Terry, matronly and playful with an undertone which implies that, if it came to it, she could throw down. “Lana.”
A pause. In the background, I hear what sounds like the beep-beep of a removals van.
“Are you going somewhere?” I ask.
“Yeah,” she says. “I managed to get a job in Seattle, illustrating for a small children’s publisher. With that and the freelance work, I’m going to be able to finally call myself an illustrator. How weir
d is that, huh?”
“You deserve it,” I say.
“You helped,” Terry says. “I showed them our notebook. I never would’ve done any of that without you.”
“Don’t be silly. It’s all you.”
Another pause.
She wants to ask me something, I can tell. Or tell me something. But the way we left things before hangs between us, the proverbial elephant in the room—the elephant on the phone line, lurking somewhere between cell towers.
“Listen, Lana. I’m—I can’t say I’m sorry for how I felt about you leaving then and there with a man neither of us knew. But I handled it in the wrong way. I shouldn’t have gotten so angry.”