by Anne Martin
After I got off the elevator, I roared down the hall towards his room and burned rubber outside his door as I brought the motorbike on its back wheel to hit the door with the front tire.
When he opened the door, he stepped back and gestured me in. I maneuvered through the living room before I got off, my fur coat swirling impressively while my knee high boots helped me keep my balance.
He started unbuttoning his shirt. “I’m guessing this is the part where you make up for last night. You’re going to rip my clothing off under the tires of my bike, aren’t you? Why don’t you have a bike, Trix? Is that the next thing you’re going to buy with my money? Make sure it’s the most expensive model available.”
“The most expensive isn’t what I want, and no. Bikes get me in trouble. Too much velocity between my legs makes me want a man.”
He licked his lips. “You’d better take me before I forget what we’re doing here.”
I knocked his feet out from under him so he was on the floor and put my boot squarely on his chest. “My soles are disinfected, and your bike is disinfected, so unless your floor isn’t quite clean, it should be all right when I lick you right there later.”
He raised his eyebrows. “My floors are clean. I’ve even disinfected the tables. All natural cleanser. You’re still using natural products, aren’t you?”
I scowled at him because he wasn’t going to talk. I loved him hard and wild while his bike purred beneath us. After I was sated and bits of fur were stuck to my neck as well as floating in the air, I was so tired. Shopping was exhausting, and being pregnant, so tiring. We definitely weren’t staying inside the ‘normal’ parameters the doctor set for me.
“Horse, you’re going to carry me to my apartment while I sleep. I’m going to sleep all day tomorrow.”
He stared at me with those dark blue eyes. “Are you all right? Sharp pain? Bleeding?”
I sighed and shook my head. “No, just worn out. I hate shopping. Next time I’m going to make you personally spend your money on me.”
“That does sound like torture, choosing what you wear? Agonizing.”
“Shut up. Carry me.” I held my arms up and he swung me into his arms.
“You realize that you’re naked.” He bumped my nose with his.
I frowned at him. “Why did you make your nose smaller? It was a manly nose.”
He laughed and bumped mine again. “I didn’t have as many pieces left for the restructure. I went with smaller over foreign parts. I’m naked. If you’re tired, I could tuck you into the black bed. It wouldn’t mean anything.”
I pushed on his chest and escaped his arms until I stood on my feet. “Thanks for reminding me.” I grabbed his shirt and pulled it on and headed out the door all by myself. I didn’t need him to carry me or tuck me in. I didn’t need him at all. And that’s why I went to sleep with his blue shirt in my arms, my face pressed into its folds.
Chapter 16
Horse Demon a.k.a. Nathaniel David VanBuren
Trixie needed me. Otherwise she wouldn’t take me on sober rampages. That woman on my bike, footage of her roaring through the lobby in that fur coat, were everywhere.
Jezabel cornered me at work a few days later. We were doing a fifty-mile race. I was exhausted, but that wouldn’t stop me and my demons from killing Trix’s team.
“Has Trix been drinking?” Jezabel asked, hands on her hips, concern in her eyes.
“No. She just wanted to take me for a spin on the bike.”
“In your room?” She raised an eyebrow.
I shrugged. “I know it’s mild for her. Usually we’d be racing across the desert while she had her way with me and the bike, but she’s being careful for the baby.”
Jezabel smirked and spun back towards Nix.
We hadn’t been careful enough, but I’d lost my mind as soon as I saw the pictures texted of Trix in the lobby on my bike in fur. She was so wildly beautiful. I should have carried her to her room completely naked. I shouldn’t have asked her to stay again.
After the race, I was exhausted, had a swollen face, and needed Mac to fix my dislocated shoulder. He was the best at it. His golden-brown eyes glimmered at me.
“I just want to hear it from you,” he said gripping my shoulder and my arm.
“What?” I took a deep breath and tried to relax through the pain.
“That you still think Vegas fur is incredibly tacky.”
I growled at him and in that moment of distraction, he slipped my shoulder into the socket. Relief, pain and irritation all comingled.
“It all depends on presentation,” I said, breathlessly.
He shook his head. “Didn’t look like she was wearing anything else.”
“Her wedding band and boots.”
“So, she did ride that bike to your room?” He shook his head. “It doesn’t seem like her to stick with one lover so long. Now I know why you’re so exhausted. She’s burning both your ends.”
“Don’t be vulgar.”
He grinned at me. “She’s going to race you to death, but you’ll keep on going, foaming and blood-specked until the end.”
“Why are we having this conversation?”
He shrugged. “No offense, it’s just that you lack substance. If a no-good player has a long run with Trix, who knows if she won’t actually date once she’s finished with you.”
I scowled at him. “My wife will be too busy chasing a kid around to date. And she’s not going to be finished with me for a long time.”
He shrugged. “Then why is she riding you so hard?”
“Am I complaining?”
“The two of you never go out together.”
“We stay in.”
“She goes out with friends.”
“You’re spying on my wife?”
“I’m saying that you might want to have a relationship based on more than the bedroom if you want to keep her.”
I rubbed my shoulder. “You’re losing your touch. It hurts more than usual.”
“Naw, you’re just getting old.”
I certainly wanted more than sex with her, but any time I talked about anything serious, she pulled away. I tried not to, but every night after she’d driven me mad with pleasure, I asked her to stay. It was probably begging, but I needed to hold her in my arms and listen to her breathe. I needed some sweetness. I needed love. Her love, not just the mindless desire that she inspired in me. She felt in control with desire, but out of control with love and affection.
What was I supposed to do? I was a brilliant psychologist with all the answers, so why was I so lost?
A few days later, after a rough fight, I got home late, exhausted, and went to take a shower and shave. I was sudsing up when someone started pounding on the door. I heard yelling. I got out of the shower without turning off the water, grabbed a towel and barely had it over my front when I threw open the front door.
Trix stood there with laundry baskets and garment bags around her feet. “Horse, what are you wearing? Barb, just put down the stuff. I’ll let you know if I’ll need you tomorrow. Probably not.”
She had a desperate look in her eyes as she waved her arms around. She was wearing leggings and my shirt, the one she’d stolen the night with the motorcycle.
“Horse, she’s here! She’ll be here any minute. Get dressed! No, take my stuff. Come on! I can’t carry it!”
She waved her arms around like a crazy chicken while I gathered up her stuff, not worrying about the towel in the frenzy of putting her things in my room. She’d never gone in there before. I got all her stuff in, and pulled on a pair of pants that stuck on my still damp skin.
“Who is here?”
“My mom. She doesn’t know that we aren’t living together. If she finds out that we aren’t together…” She closed her eyes tight and shook her head.
I smiled for a second but the smile was transformed into a frown when she opened her eyes. “I see. That’s good. She can stay with you while I’m on the three hundred.”
/> Her eyes widened. “That’s this week.”
I nodded. “If you have any rampages, you’ll have to take her with you.”
“Oh no! There’s a motorcycle in the living room.”
“It’s not immoral.”
“That’s what Nix does, keep a motorcycle in his bedroom.”
“We can move it into the bedroom, if you’d like.”
She hesitated for a second before nodding. We pushed it into my room, at least I pushed while she held open the door. She couldn’t drive it because her mother might hear it. I barely got it parked and the bedroom door closed behind me when Trix’s mother was knocking on the door.
I walked over to it like I lived there.
“What are you doing?” She grabbed me from behind, her hands sliding over my bare slick stomach.
I swallowed hard. “Should I not answer the door?”
“You don’t have a shirt on.”
“You could give me the one you’re wearing, if you think that would be more appropriate.”
She looked down at my shirt and then flushed and her eyes went bright with anger or something else.
“I’ll answer the door. You go get a shirt on.”
She went to the door, waiting until I was headed into the bedroom before she opened it up.
I heard her mother’s voice, and Trix’s smothered one. I took my time finding a shirt that wouldn’t be too casual or too dressy. How did you dress for a visit from your mother-in-law?
When I came out, Trix was telling her mom that we’d love to pay for her hotel room, but she wouldn’t hear of it, of course. I walked over to my wife, put an arm around her waist and pulled Trix’s mom into a big hug with my other arm.
I kissed both her cheeks. “You’re more welcome than you know. Trix was getting nervous about being left alone during the big three hundred race coming up. If you’re here, I won’t have to worry.”
Trixie’s mom nodded rapidly. “I knew it was a sign. I watched the fight with Nix. Mick was proud of our boy.” She ruffled my hair and then went to the kitchen. Her exclamations over my stove were very loud.
Trix crossed her arms and stared at the floor. “Horse?”
“Hm?” I leaned against the wall, arms crossed.
She looked up at me, her eyes something between anger and terror. “Can I stay in your room? With you?”
I raised my eyebrows in faux surprise. “You don’t want to sleep on the couch? You could make me sleep there. It’s one of my favorite things in the world, in spite of the possible lack of hygiene. Upholstery just doesn’t clean up as well as impermeable surfaces.”
She sighed. “You want me to beg? Please, Horse. Let me sleep in your bed with you so my mother thinks that I have the perfect marriage.”
I frowned at her. “You don’t have the perfect marriage? That’s weird. What else is there? Motorcycles, couches, ridiculously impractical heels, horse print teddies, and fur…”
She shoved me and went into the kitchen. I stared after her while my stomach twisted and my heart pounded. She’d be in my arms tonight and every night for the rest of the week. She’d stay where she belonged until morning.
Trix’s mom cooked and talked, and talked and cooked, catching us up on the neighborhood exploits. Trix sat at my table, fiddling with her cup and saucer until her mother told her to go get dressed because we were going to a circus.
Once she’d left, she turned to me and took my face in her hands. “You’ve gotten so thin. Is Trix working you too hard? You can say no. I know my girl can be a bit much for anyone.”
I laughed and pulled her into a nice, warm, squishy hug. “She takes after her mother. She’s perfect. I’ll get tickets for the show.” I went into the bedroom and saw Trix with the front of her top unbuttoned. She covered up her chest with her hands and stared at me with big eyes.
“Do you need a hand?” I asked before going to the king size bed and stretching out on it while I ordered tickets. I didn’t stare at her. She was obviously not in sexy Trixie mode, so I shouldn’t notice how delicious she was.
“Horse, thanks for going along with things.”
“It’s what I want. You know that.”
She sighed. “You want my mother?”
“Your whole family. I’d love it if they all descended and refused to let us get them separate rooms. They’re good people.”
“Are the tickets expensive?”
“Should they be?”
She shrugged. “She never leaves the city. She’s never come out and visited me before. She hates the idea of Vegas, you know, the city of sin.”
“I remember. So should we wow her with all the sin, or show her the softer side of the city?”
“Softer side. She’s probably here to talk me into moving back to New York to raise the baby.”
“All right. We’ll give her a tour of the pretty strip, past the fountains on the way back.”
“Walking? That late?”
“We’ll go slow. Leisurely.”
She came over to me and lay down on the bed next to me. She put her hand on my cheek and turned my face so I had to look at her. She was so beautiful. Was she going to take me before we left? I wanted her sweet and slow, thorough and full of promises of forever.
“You look tired,” she murmured, running her hands under my eyes.
I closed my eyes and felt her fingers brush my skin. “After the three hundred things will slow down.”
Her hands pulled away and then I felt her lips brush mine, soft, sweet, lingering. She kissed me until we heard her mother yelling. I opened my eyes and Trix was sliding off the bed to pull on a light jacket over the white button-up and matching blue pants. She wasn’t a ruffles kind of girl. She was a fur and engine grease kind of girl. And boots. Always boots. Except for those ridiculous heels.
The show was a success. Trix’s mom gasped and covered her generous bosom with her hands several times, and afterwards, she talked nonstop about those girls needing someone to feed them some carbs before they wasted away completely.
She liked the colored fountains and we stood there for a long time, quiet while I held Trixie’s hand. She’d held my hand all evening.
When we got back to the hotel, Trix’s mother insisted on staying up on our couch and calling everyone back home while we went to bed. She could see how tired Trix was.
Trix didn’t argue, just went into my room and started getting undressed. I tried not to stare at her. She pulled on one of my shirts and went to the bathroom. I heard her exclaiming and then she stuck her head out to frown at me.
“No one needs a bath tub that big. What do you do in there?”
I raised my eyebrows. “Do you want a demonstration? It’s late and we were sent to bed.”
She bit her lip. “Demonstration.”
I made love to her in the jetted tub until she was soft and boneless in my arms, then I dried her off and carried her to my bed before she could protest. We slept like that, warm and naked in the bed we didn’t begin to take up. She held onto me as tight as I held onto her. Why couldn’t she just let me love her? She needed me to love her and I ached to fill her heart past the brim.
“Horse,” she murmured, shifting against me.
“Dragon?”
“I’ve never gone to the circus before. It was fun to go to a show instead of put one on.”
I kissed her hair. “I’ve never gone, either. Those poor emaciated women. Your mother will stuff them with bread if you don’t watch her.”
She laughed and I could feel it through my palm on her stomach. “Did you like the show? What was your favorite one?”
We talked in a murmur until the time between answers and questions grew far enough apart that we were both asleep as she murmured my name one last time.
Chapter 17
Trixie ‘Dragon’ O’Hara
My mother dragged us around Vegas every night until the race started. We went to that too, driving out together over the desert terrain, my mother in the back giving me
advice about how to dodge the rocks while Horse sat grinning next to me, looking very cool and sexy in his black leather and sunglasses.
“Will you be at the finish line?” he asked, shooting me a glance I couldn’t read because of the glasses.
I adjusted my own and pressed down the jeep’s accelerator. “Of course. I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”
“I mean, if you aren’t feeling well, if something happens and you need to be on bed rest…”
I covered his mouth with my hand and drove faster. “Don’t curse me like that. I’ve had enough lying on my back to last me a lifetime.”
He licked my hand and I pulled away. I hadn’t minded being on my back last night. I had to stop thinking about him in bed. His room was different from the rest of the house. It was dark blue, like dusk, and his bed had an old quilt with ragged edges. He had a twenty dollar bill framed above the headboard. He was sentimental, just not about machines. Not entirely. He had an engine part as a paperweight on his desk. I’d bet that it was whatever was left from the inferno I’d dragged him out of when he was a kid. He’d been heavier than he looked. My dad was worried about the gym in those days. I’d started racing back streets for cash to help out. I had to go further and further from home where people didn’t know my reputation.
I took Lucas with me as my middleman. He was slick, smooth, and he’d never treated me like a kid. I’d had my first period when we were in Connecticut before a race. He’d talked me out of my freak out and run to the corner store for me. That was an insane race that I barely survived, but somehow I won and brought home the cash we needed to pay the mortgage on the gym for another month.
I went directly to the bank, because my parents weren’t going to take that kind of thing. Patty gave me cover, and with all of my brothers and their prize fights and odd jobs, we pulled through the bad investment dad had made when he took a lien out on the gym.