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 shit 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 an
ything.
“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.”
“But what about my assignment?” Cherise realized. “Oh my god, I’m never going to make it to Omaha in time to meet with my guy.”
“You will if we drive really fast,” Lynx said.
“We?”
Lynx insisted on driving Cherise to the police station and held her hand as she signed off on the report. Then he loaded her onto his bike, shoved her overnight bag into one of his saddlebags and they hit the road.
Cherise had been on many road trips in her life, but none where she was straddling a Harley-Davidson motorcycle while desperately holding on to a big, burly biker with whom she was slowly falling in love.
As the wind of the highway whipped around them, Cherise thought that there was no better way to travel.
Finally, they arrived in Omaha and slowly tooled through the quiet streets of the large city.
“I’m supposed to meet my contact here, at the Magnolia Hotel,” Cherise yelled into Lynx’s ear, pointing at a large hotel on the corner in front of them. Lynx puttered his motorcycle over, helped Cherise off the bike and then wrapped her in an enormous bear hug.
“You can rent a car or get a flight home from Omaha,” he said, pulling back and looking down at her sadly.
“Wait, what?” Cherise said, incredulous. “Can’t you come with me and we could—”
Lynx shook his head. “This is as far as I can take you, lady. You can get home safely from here.”
“But—”
“No, Cherise, you don’t want anything more to do with me,” Lynx told her. “Last night was great—”
“Great?”
“Incredible,” he amended, finally smiling. “Last night was incredible, maybe the best of my entire life. Other than the, you know, fight with the biker gang.”
“Then stay in Omaha with me, we can have dinner after my interview, get to know each other a little better—”
“No. I’m sorry, but I’m not the kind of guy that you want to get to know better, Cherise,” Lynx said. “I’m trouble. And it would be better for you if you stay far, far away from me.”
With that, he pulled his helmet on and roared down the streets of Omaha, leaving Cherise standing alone on a street corner, heartbroken.
***
“And what inspired you to create this app?” Cherise asked her interview subject, trying to keep the boredom out of her voice. After the adventures of the previous night, there was no way she could even think about being interested in dating apps.
Daniel Traylor, her interview subject, beamed. He was a mousey little man—skinny, with a close cropped haircut and dark-framed glasses overwhelming his narrow face—and had probably never been in the spotlight before. This interview was likely the highlight of his entire life.
“Well, I have several little sisters,” Daniel said, the words gushing out of him like a broken faucet. “And they always end up dating these guys who seem nice at first, but there’s always some secret or shady past, you know?”
“Mmmm-hmmmm,” Cherise hummed politely, scribbling down a few pieces of information while her cell phone recorded their entire conversation so she could refer back to it later.
“And this app will do a background check instantly for any man you meet,” Daniel said. “It will dig up his deepest, darkest secrets. Well, any that are in the public domain of course: divorces, secret families, police records. All of those things in one handy app! You just type in his name and then—”
Cherise sat bolt upright. “Wait, did you say any man?”
Moments later, Cherise and Daniel were both staring, transfixed, at the screen of Daniel’s smartphone, gazing down at a mug shot of Alexander “Lynx” Andrews.
“He’s…a felon?” Cherise whispered.
Daniel nodded, then tapped another button on the app. “Looks like he was in for…oh no. Oh, that’s bad.”
“What?” Cherise did not like the tone of Daniels’ voice.
“He was incarcerated for aggravated assault and battery, Cherise.”
Assault and battery?
Daniel continued. “Do you know this guy, Cherise?”
Cherise nodded and then lied her face off. “I kinda know him,” she said. “I mean, distantly. A friend of a friend, you know, is interested in dating him.”
“Then you need to tell her to stay the hell away from this guy,” Daniel frowned, shaking his head. “See, this is exactly what this app is for. Keeping women informed about assholes like this guy. Seriously, Cherise, tell your friend to steer clear. He’s nothing but trouble.”
Those words—nothing but trouble—rang through Cherise’s head during the remainder of the interview, at the rental car place, and during her entire drive out of Omaha. She navigated the highway, retracing the path she’d taken with Lynx only a few short hours ago, and the picture of his mug shot seared her eyes.
He was a criminal, he was a felon, he was a liar.
Hot tears spilled down Cherise’s cheeks, burning her with sorrow and shame. She pushed them away with the back of one hand and smiled grimly, her sorrow suddenly replaced with white-hot anger. “We’re gonna get to the bottom of this, girl,” she said to her reflection in the rearview mirror. Her reflection looked stoically back at her. Cherise Clayton did not back down from a challenge, not now, not ever.
Cherise floored the rental car and sped down the highway toward Left Fork, Nebraska.
The sun was setting when Cherise reached the town and she whipped down main street, zooming past the Camelot Inn, past the police station, heading straight for the only place she could think of to find Lynx: the Olde Glory Inn.
She had no idea where Lynx lived or where to find him, but somebody at the Olde Glory Inn did, and Cherise intended to get that information through any means necessary. She couldn’t use force, but she had a few other tricks up her sleeve.
The barroom screeched to a halt once again when she walked in. If anything, the grizzled faces were even more shocked this night, considering what had happened the previous evening.
“What the hell do you want?” Zeke, the grizzled old bartender growled as Cherise stepped through the door. He grabbed a baseball bat from under the bar and started to come around to confront Cherise. “I told you to get the hell out of here nicely last night, and I’m not gonna be so polite today, girl.”
“I need to know where Lynx is,” she replied, reaching into her bag and plucking out a hundred dollar bill, balling it up and tossing in in Zeke’s general direction.
“And what makes you think that anyone here is willing to give you that information?” J.P. stood at her shoulder, just as menacing now as he’d been the night before.
“Money,” Cherise said simply. “I’ve got cash on me and, if you help me find Lynx, I’ll go back to the motel, get my ATM card and withdraw one thousand dollars to anyone who can help me find him.”
“What if we just take the money now, and throw you in a fucking drainage ditch?” J.P. growled.
“Then you won’t be able to get the rest of your cash,” Cherise told him, trying to k
eep her voice from shaking. This plan had seemed like such a great idea when she’d come up with on the drive from Omaha but now that she was back at the Olde Glory Inn, back in the presence of the putrid J.P., Zeke, and their cronies, the plan was starting to look less solid.
J.P. snatched her purse and dumped it out of the floor. A couple of hundreds floated out, nothing more. J.P. nudged the bills with the steel-toe of his scuffed motorcycle boot and then grinned up at her. “This looks like enough to me,” he snarled. “I’d rather just take this and not help you, bitch. Plus, I think you still need to be taught a lesson.”
Cherise began backing toward the door. This was a terrible idea, she thought as her back collided into a solid mass of human being behind her. Another one of J.P.’s cronies, she lamented, then saw the twin expressions of fear spread over both J.P. and Zeke’s faces as they began to back away.
The telltale click of a revolver being cocked sounded in her ear. “You’re going to apologize to the lady,” Lynx’s rough voice said, a low growl right near her ear. “You’re going to put everything back in her purse, hand it to her and then lay down flat on the floor.”
“Like hell we will,” Zeke snapped, and Cherise felt Lynx tighten behind her.
“If you don’t do exactly what I tell you, I will shoot you in the face, do you understand me? I will shoot you.”
Both men nodded, the color draining out of their weathered skin.
“Good,” Lynx said. “Then get to it, assholes.
Within seconds, the contents of Cherie’s purse had been put back together and her handbag returned to her. Zeke and J.P. lowered themselves to the ground, eyes burning with rage at both Cherise and Lynx as they flattened themselves against the filthy barroom floor.
A low voice sounded in Cherise’s ear. “They’re not going to give us much time,” Lynx whispered. “The second we get out that door, run to your car as fast as you can, okay?”
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