Slam (The Brazen Bulls MC #3)

by Susan Fanetti

Maverick dropped his jeans and sat on the bed. “Babe, no. That’s not what I want. I am never going to hit you. Not even in play. I promise.” He’d gotten her out of her father’s house just a few weeks before—he knew well why she wouldn’t be into spanking or anything like it. He wasn’t into that, either. He didn’t have any need to cause a woman pain, for any reason.

  She stared at the belt. “Why do you need that?”

  “Because I don’t own any ties, and the rope is out in my trunk.”

  “You want to tie me up?”

  Running a finger down her arm, he leaned in and said, “Just your hands. I want to tie your hands to the bed and cover your eyes.”

  “Why?”

  “So you can relax and not worry about what I’m doing.”

  “You think I won’t worry if I’m tied up and blindfolded?”

  “I think I’ll make sure you’re not worrying.” He caught her chin on his finger and lifted her head. “Have I ever hurt you?”

  Without answering, she got up, and Maverick thought he’d found her limit. He watched as she crossed the room to the dresser he’d bought her. She opened a drawer and pulled something out—a scarf. Long, silky, and red. Then she pulled another one, also red, but with a pattern. He hadn’t hit her limit after all.

  “I don’t like the belt.” She handed him the scarves. “Will these work?”

  “Those are perfect.” He ran the silky material through his rough hands. “Perfect. Lay down in the middle of the bed and put your hands over your head.”

  She did what she was told, wrapping her hands around the slats of the headboard. The position shaped her beautiful, soft body into something from a painting. After pressing his lips to each nipple and then to her mouth, he wrapped the patterned scarf around her wrists and around a slat of the headboard, making sure that the binding was tight enough to hold her but not so tight it would cut off her circulation.

  Her arms trembled so hard, he worried that she might tighten the bonds herself. “Easy, babe. Trust me.”

  When he moved to cover her eyes, she shrank back.

  “Trust me, Jenny. No hurt. If you tell me to stop, I will. I promise.”

  She closed her eyes, and he tied the other scarf around her head.

  And there she was, naked and bound and fucking perfect. Jenny usually followed his lead and let him go where he wanted—in fact, tonight had been the first time she’d resisted him during sex, and she’d done it twice. He found that especially hot.

  Then she’d let him tie her up, as much as it obviously scared her, and he found that profoundly hot.

  “Mav?”

  “Right here, babe.” He hadn’t planned any of this, and he wasn’t sure what to do. Food? No—he didn’t want to leave her, even to go to the kitchen; she was nervous, and he didn’t want to shake her faith in him. Feathers or beads or something? He didn’t have anything like that. Jenny might, but he wasn’t going to root through her stuff.

  Scanning the room without hope that the answer would just pop out at him, the answer did just that. A bottle of lotion sat on her dresser. She rubbed it all over herself after her shower in the morning and at night before bed. Unscented. Jenny wasn’t a fan of perfumes or scented lotions. She always smelled like her shampoo.

  He’d massage her. All over. That would calm her and turn her on, and he’d be completely gentle. He picked up the bottle and went to the bed. She gasped when his weight came down on the mattress, and her body went tense enough that she bowed upward a bit. The headboard rattled lightly with the force of her shaking.

  “Easy, easy.” First, without the lotion, he simply caressed her, calmed her. Running his hands, slow and steady, from the scarf at her wrists, along her arms to her shoulders, over her collarbones, down, sweeping around her quivering tits, over her belly, out to her hips, down her legs to her ankles, then her feet, pausing there to smooth his thumbs over her arches, then back up the way he’d come. He hadn’t touched her tits or her pussy, but by the time he reached her wrists again, she breathed more deeply and had begun to writhe against his touch.

  “Feels good, right?”

  She nodded, and her tongue slipped out to wet her lips. They looked so plump and inviting that he bent and claimed her mouth, sucking on her lips, sweeping his tongue over hers. She moaned and opened her mouth wider, offering him more.

  He had her—already, she was wholly focused on her own pleasure, and she would let him do what he wanted. The heady power of that made his chest feel tight. He didn’t understand it—there was a clubhouse full of chicks who’d do what he wanted. This girl right here on his bed had done what he wanted until this night, but the way she was giving over to him now, after he’d already pushed her too far—this wasn’t deference or shyness or naïveté. This was trust, and it bowled him over.

  He pumped lotion onto his hand and rubbed his palms together to warm it. Then, starting at her wrists again, he began a long, slow, sensual massage of every inch of her skin he could reach.

  Again, he took the path that detoured around her most sensitive parts, but this time, when he was back at her chest, he didn’t move away.

  As he approached her tits, her back arched sharply in time with every sweep and knead of his hands. She was panting now, and little whimpery moans escaped her lips every once in a while.

  Lingering over the top of her chest, her sides, her ribs, he waited until she was rocking toward his touch and moaning with every exhale. Then, and only then, he swept his palms over the rock-hard nubs of her nipples. Her gasp at that touch was nearly a scream. He caught her nipples between his fingers and plucked, and she did scream—short and stunted, but a scream nonetheless.

  His cock bounced every time she made a sound, and the tip wept with his need, but he wasn’t ready. Jenny was a great lay, responsive, vocal, and pliable, but he’d never seen her this worked up before. What a thing of beauty this was. He was going to tie her up regularly—and maybe do some research into bindings, to play around with that a little bit. Because holy shit, this was the best sex he’d ever had, and he wasn’t even fucking her yet.

  He massaged her tits again and plucked her nipples, and she screamed that chopped scream again. “Please, Mav. Fuck, please. Please.”

  And now she was begging. Maverick resisted the urge to grab his cock and give it the pump it so desperately needed, because he’d blow his wad all over her.

  “You need to come, babe?”

  Her head bobbed wildly up and down. “Please, please, please!”

  Wanting to watch her, to be entirely in control of her, he left her tits and filled his palm with lotion again. Massaging his way over her belly, taking his time until he’d kneaded the lotion into her skin, he pushed one hand between her legs—oh hell, she was dripping wet—and slid his fingers, first one, then, on the next thrust, two, into her.

  She took in a great, noisy gasp of air and planted her feet on the mattress, heaving her hips up. He grabbed her legs and dropped her back down. Then he gave her what she so clearly wanted—he fucked her with his fingers, hard and fast, pressing up, finding the spot behind her clit.

  At once, she came, so wildly and wetly that they’d have to change the sheets before they settled in to sleep. She shrieked and flailed, and he kept at her, keeping her going until her body began the twitching that meant her climax was truly over.

  But he wasn’t done. He reached into the nightstand drawer and snagged a condom. He hated the thought of the cool slime of the lube touching his swollen, frantic cock, but he rolled it on, because he needed to get inside her, and he wasn’t in the mood to play the pullout game. He was way too close already.

  The idea that he could have her ass now if he wanted it occurred to him, but he discarded it instantly. He could go up her ass—tongue, fingers, cock, she’d let him take what he wanted. But he didn’t want it now. Because he knew she didn’t. Whatever she’d allow in her languid afterglow, she’d told him that she didn’t want it. He couldn’t break faith with her. That was
more important than moving her limits.

  He wanted her trust. He wanted to be worthy of it. So badly that his chest felt tight as he pushed into her. He wanted her to know she was always safe with him. Always.

  God, the feel of her around him, holding him, keeping him. The feel of her body beneath his, molding to him, joining with him. The sound of her pleasure, the sweet whispers of yes oh god yes please—inconsequential words, but so full of love and trust. Nothing had ever felt like this. Jenny was special. Important. Life or death. Love.

  Jesus—he loved her.

  That truth slammed through his body like a thunderclap, and he thrust hard. With a trembling hand, he reached up and pulled the scarf from her eyes. He needed to see her, needed those dazzling eyes on his, needed her to see him. He thrust and thrust, and stared deep.

  “I love you. I love you.” His body’s effort turned the words into a growl.

  Her brow creased—just a flash and gone—and it wasn’t pleasure that had shaped her expression. But it was gone, and she was coming, and so was he, and yeah, it was life or death. This love. This trust he would never break. Ever.

  He would love her forever.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Jenny was in a foul mood as she worked the bar the next evening. Fridays were her least favorite days of the week. Weekends were hard at her house, when her father was entirely her responsibility, and closing the bar on Fridays sucked. The Friday night crowd drank harder and got ornerier than any other night of the week.

  The Wayside Inn wasn’t a big bar, and neither Jenny nor her father had ever gone in for ‘Ladies Night’ or ‘Happy Hour’ or any other kind of promotion. In his day, he’d run a big poker game or had a special event for the neighborhood occasionally, but those hadn’t been intended to draw strangers in. The only advertising they did was sponsoring a few kids’ sports teams.

  But The Wayside had been around for a long time, had a complement of regulars and good word of mouth, and was located in a primarily industrial area. They did a decent business every evening and were jammed on Friday nights, mostly with people who started drinking right after work and reeled onto the sidewalk when the lights went up.

  She kept the bar running with a staff of two other bartenders, three waitresses, and a couple of teens working as bar-backs. On weekend and holiday nights, she usually put two bartenders on the schedule together.

  On this particular Friday, she’d gotten sick calls at home from two people scheduled to work with her: a bartender and a waitress. The other waitress was off at eleven, as would be the seventeen-year-old bar-back on the schedule. Jenny was running the bar on her own all night, with a single waitress, and then, for the last two hours, she would be entirely on her own. On a Friday fucking night.

  She suspected that Dave, the ‘sick’ bartender, and Tawnie, the ‘sick’ waitress, were fucking. If she got anything remotely like proof that they’d blown off work to play together, she’d kick both their asses right out the door.

  Of course, that would leave her short a bartender and a waitress and saddled with the hassle of replacing them.

  Jenny fucking hated running this goddamn bar.

  Her mood was even worse because Kelsey had pitched a fit that morning when her daddy wasn’t there for breakfast. She’d already decided that he’d moved in—the very confusion Jenny had been trying to prevent had already happened, while she was unconscious, trying to survive her murderous head.

  She’d taken a puffy-eyed, pouty little girl to preschool that morning, half an hour late, and picked up a sassy, obstreperous little girl in the afternoon.

  And Darnell was working a shorter shift today because it was his week to take Saturday morning, so Kelsey would be staying with the Turners tonight. They had Maisie tonight, too, so they’d be in full grandparent mode, stuffing the girls full of sugar. Kelsey would have a great time, but she wouldn’t sleep well, and she’d be even crabbier and whinier all day tomorrow.

  In the twenty-four hours from last evening to this evening, three different people would have charge of Kelsey at some point—four, if she counted Mr. and Mrs. Turner separately. As a single parent, Jenny was not measuring up.

  Just say the word, babe. Maverick’s voice in her head. Goddammit. She wanted it. After last night, it was the only thing she could think of besides Kelsey. All afternoon and evening, she’d cast sidelong glances at the phone behind the bar, thinking about calling him and simply saying yes.

  Yes, please, take her and Kelsey away from this shitty life. Make the family they were supposed to have made from the start. God—to just be able to be Kelsey’s mom and to be good at it? Yes, yes, yes. Right now.

  But fuck! He’d been out of prison a month. One month. After four years away. She didn’t really know him, and he certainly didn’t really know her. Not anymore. They had to take things slowly. They had to make sure.

  And what about her father? She didn’t love him, but he was her father, and he was helpless. Because of what Maverick had done to him. She couldn’t have the two men in her life living under the same roof, she couldn’t put her father in a state home—she just couldn’t, no matter what—and she couldn’t afford to put him anywhere with better care.

  That was a problem without a solution. But she wanted it. On this bullshit day, with the bar crowded and loud, fending off passes from drunk men and hating everyone around her, she wanted nothing in the world like she wanted Maverick and the life he was holding out to her on his open hands.

  “Jenny?”

  “What?” She slammed the register drawer shut, spun around, and faced Jolene, the waitress slogging through this night with her. In Jolene’s flinch and frown, Jenny saw that she’d barked. “Sorry—what?”

  “Ice is low, and Kevin’s AWOL. He’s probably smoking in the alley. I’m going to run back and scrounge him up.”

  Jenny nodded. “Grab him by whatever you have to and get his ass back to work.”

  Jolene gave her the kind of smile that meant she’d decided humoring the snarling creature her boss had become was the best course of action.

  A customer leaned far across the bar and waved his hand. “Hey, sugar tits, I’m waitin’ on a Bud.”

  She turned on her fakest smile. “And you’re gonna keep waiting, until you learn some fucking manners.” She moved past him, bringing the change in her hand to a customer down the bar, but the guy grabbed her arm and gave it a hard jerk, pulling her off balance. The money in her hand went flying, and she slammed into the side of the bar, hitting her hip on the underbar and her shoulder on the edge of the bar.

  “No stupid bitch is gonna give me lip.” He managed to spit those words in her face before he was yanked away by a couple of regulars. By the time she’d stood straight again, Jenny had a brawl on her hands.

  If Dave had been there—six-foot-four-inch, former high-school offensive lineman Dave—he probably could have gotten control of the thing. But short of firing the shotgun her father had installed under the bar, which she’d never actually fired, Jenny could only make sure Jolene and Kevin stayed safely in back while she tried to protect the stock behind the bar, wielding a Louisville Slugger, the other weapon that had been behind the bar since long before her time. The shitty bastard who’d grabbed her had about four equally shitty friends, so even her regulars, who’d normally have her back and try to settle the situation down, had no choice but to fight.

  It went on forever, and she nearly called the cops—which would have brought a host of problems of its own—but eventually, as these things usually did, it died on its own.

  Most of the customers had gotten themselves gone as quickly as possible—this was the kind of bar where fights sometimes broke out, not the kind where the clientele came looking for one—and the rest were breathless and hurt and, now that their energy had been expended, mostly sheepish, looking around at the damage they’d done.

  “Okay, everybody out!” she yelled. “We’re closed!” It was more than two hours before closing, but Jolene an
d Kevin were off soon, and she had a fucking mess on her hands. For this night, looking at a substantial net loss anyway, she was done.

  Al, Chester, and Tom, three long-time regulars, heaved the instigators out the door. It was they who’d pulled the asshole off of her, thus starting the melee. Jenny didn’t know whether to thank them or punch them, but she settled on drawing them all a Busch before they hit the road.

  Broken furniture, broken glass, beer and booze. Everywhere. Jolene and Kevin stayed a little while past their shift to help her clean up, but after about twenty minutes, Jenny just needed to be alone, even if it meant she’d spend the whole night picking up the mess.

  “I got this, guys. Go on home.”

  Kevin looked up from the trash bag he was filling. “You sure?”

  “Yeah. You’re off the clock. Go on home.”

  Jolene had two kids with a babysitter, so she didn’t need to be told twice. They said their goodbyes. They went out the back, and Jenny stood in the middle of the rubble and gave herself a minute to cry.

  ~oOo~

  After she’d pulled herself together, Jenny finished stacking the broken furniture in the back room near the alley door, and she grabbed the big push broom, the smaller straw broom for corners and tight spots, and the dustpan, and she went back to clean up the glass and mess. It was past midnight, and she easily had another hour, maybe two, before the place would be remotely ready to receive customers. And then she had to do the regular closing work.

  She supposed she should be grateful they hadn’t broken out any windows—though the vintage neon Budweiser sign had been knocked from the paneled wall and was a total loss.

  At least Kelsey was at the Turners’ tonight. She was grateful not to have to worry about that. Sending out a thought to her wonderful next-door neighbors, Jenny hipped the swinging door open and dragged her armload of brooms into the bar.

  The jerk who’d grabbed her and started the fracas stood near the back end of the bar, not ten feet away. His friends were with him. They’d all converged near the back, like they’d been on their way to seek her out in the back room.