“Goddamn, you have pretty tits.”
She just moaned because he picked her up by the arms and put her down on the flatbed of her truck. He reached for a blanket and tucked it under her ass. Though he wanted to savor the moment, he didn’t have the patience to go easy. The rusty flatbed would scrape up the soft skin on her thighs.
The push-pull of his feelings when he was with her was what made this thing between them compelling. He was always in control, except when he was around her. He liked surrendering to his instinct to mark, to have to mate when they were together.
She sat on the back of her truck with her dress around her waist and her boobs almost up at mouth level. He couldn’t let an opportunity like that go to waste. He bent down and took her nipple between his teeth, gently abrading it until it got even harder and she whimpered. She laced her fingers into his hair and pulled it half-loose. Her fingernails dug into his skull; he loved that little bite of pain that let him know she wanted this just as much as he did.
“Harder.” Her voice sounded like it was a half-moan, and he wasn’t about to deny this woman anything she asked for, especially if it was something he wanted to give her. He moved to the other nipple and lifted her up to pull her dress down over her ass. When he got it free of her legs, he threw it on the sparse grass.
As good as she looked, he hoped the dress got ruined. It symbolized everything that would take this woman away from him.
He drew back his head and stared at her. Her panties matched the white bra he’d discarded somewhere on the lawn. And—Christ almighty—she had a garter belt attached to stockings. The kind with lace on top.
“Never wear these again unless you’re coming to see me.” He grabbed her upper thighs and ground out the words. “I’m going to fuck you in nothing but these damned stockings and the heels.”
Skyler gasped when Travis grabbed onto the sides of her panties and ripped them off with one pull. The lace dug into her skin for a sweet second before the fabric gave way. Every time she was with him, there was a little bit of bite. A flash of pain to remind them that they were animals—that he was wild.
Ever since she’d left town, she’d tried to subdue her primal urges—to do the proper thing and never rock the boat. With Travis, every touch, every intense look that said he was already fucking her in his mind—she let go of everything.
She sincerely didn’t give a fuck what anybody thought of her when his hands were all over her. And she loved being spread out like a midnight feast in the great outdoors for him. She’d never felt so feminine and wanted in all her life. She was glad she hadn’t told him the truth about Ian. Her time with Ian was long over; she’d found her home in Travis. His masterful touch had changed her. She couldn’t deny she belonged to him in that moment. As sick as it was, the fact that he didn’t like anyone else touching her made her feel safe.
“Spread your legs. I want to look at my pussy.” She shivered even though the night was warm.
“Take off the cut and your shirt.”
“Do what you’re told.” But he took off his cut and laid it next to her, and started unbuttoning his shirt. She spread her legs, could feel the air cooling her damp thighs. Every time she saw him, she got wet. His hunger for her soaked her.
He smirked and licked his lips. She could feel her whole body flush with anticipation. When he got his shirt off, he curled his hand gently around the base of her throat. She leaned back on her hands and arched her spine in silent offering.
He trailed the fingers of his other hand through her wetness. Not enough pressure to get anywhere near assuaging the knot of aching desire in her low belly, just enough to tease out another whimper.
“Do you know how I feel when you dress up for another man?”
“A-angry?”
“No.” He rubbed his thumb across her pulse and started fucking her with one finger. “This pussy is so tight. So fucking wet. And how can I be sure it’s for me?”
“It’s for you. Only for you.” Her head fell back when he added another finger and curled them both toward the front of her body. She thought her arms would give out. He pressed on a spot deep inside her that had her thrusting her hips toward him.
“Keep still. Don’t come yet. I want to play with my pussy.”
She answered with a low moan and clenched the muscles in her thighs and stomach to keep from moving. It made the pleasure that much more sharp and urgent. She cried out when he started circling his thumb against her clit and tightened the hand at her throat almost imperceptibly.
“Please.”
“Please, what?”
“Please, Travis, I—” She couldn’t get the words out, and she couldn’t stand feeling like she was going to fall off a cliff without anything to catch her. Then, he leaned and took her nipple back into his mouth. He was playing her like an instrument, and her body responded like a Stradivarius. When he sunk his teeth into her nipple and pressed against her clit, she almost went over. But he pulled back a moment later and took her down. It felt like he did that countless times, each crescendo closer to the edge than the last.
“No one else touches you like I do, do they?”
“N-n-no.”
“No one else will ever do what I do to you, will they?”
She made a noise, but apparently, it wasn’t good enough.
“Will they? You never let go like this with anyone else, do you?”
“No.” He pressed her clit again and nibbled the underside of her breast, just clear of her aching, tender nipples. Her arms gave out as he finally let her go over, her inner muscles clenching down on his hand in the most mind-melting orgasm she’d ever had. She looked up at the stars, unblinking, for several moments.
She vaguely apprehended Travis pulling his fingers out of her and licking them off with a self-satisfied grin on his face. As a virtuoso, he deserved it.
By the time she had her wits about her, he had his belt undone and had pushed his jeans and boxer briefs down to reveal his erection.
She wasn’t sure she could come again after an orgasm like that, but her pussy felt hollow without his cock in it. She might not be able tp sit up, much less ride him, but she was willing to try.
He stood still for a few beats, stroking himself lightly, staring at her as she breathed heavily and came down. They locked eyes in the near dark.
“You’re on the pill?”
“Yeah.”
“I got tested, and I’m clean. I want to feel you on my cock bare.”
The thought of him inside her, skin to skin, made her think another orgasm wasn’t out of the realm of possibility.
“Me, too.”
Without a word, he pulled her up by the waist. The warm skin of his chest banished any chill. His cock rubbed against her swollen tissues and she shifted her hips to get closer. She was going to feel him come inside her and he would leave some of himself with her. Even though she wasn’t going to get pregnant, there was something about having this man mark her that called to her. Just the same way his intensity, his jealousy, turned her on, the thought of his seed inside her body made the tension in her belly rebuild.
He ran his fingers through her hair and pulled her face to his by the back of her neck. When he kissed her, the taste of her on his mouth was primitive. She sucked his bottom lip, biting it before letting it go. She felt the growl deep in his chest as he thrust inside her.
It was better than she expected. She’d always used condoms; she’d never trusted anyone as much as she trusted Travis. She’d never wanted to get as close to anyone as she was to this man. Holy fuck, it was good when he thrust in and out of her slowly. She buried her head in the side of his neck and licked the sweat from his throat.
He pulled up on her thigh, and she wrapped her legs around his hips. Now, he didn’t keep her from thrusting. His skin slapped against her pelvis every time he pushed into her. She was tight and swollen from before, and he was large. He had to put some power into his moves. Every time he thrust in to the hilt of his coc
k, his pelvic bone hit her clit. Soon, she was spiraling toward another orgasm.
“Goddamn, Carrots. I want you every fucking day. Morning. Night.” He kept thrusting and she could feel his heartbeat speed up. “I can’t fucking think of anything but you. All the ways I want to fuck you.”
“Please.”
“You want to come again?” He punctuated the question with several short, sharp thrusts.
“Yes.”
“Then come.” He put his hand on the back of her hips, his little finger dipping into the cleft of her ass. She rolled her hips and arched her spine, straining toward another orgasm. He knew what she needed and sped up until she broke, bucking and screaming into his chest.
While she was still coming, he let go and rode her hard. It extended her orgasm until he tensed and spilled his heat inside her.
She was on her back, splayed out on the flatbed, and he was half supported by the back of the truck. He was a part of her, in more ways than one. He stayed inside her and brushed the ends of her hair with his fingers.
Three words she never thought she’d say to anyone again were caught in her throat. Even after she fought hard to stand on her own two feet and make her way in the world, she needed this man more than she could ever fathom. This was so much more than lust. More than a fling. If she ever had to leave him, it would break her.
She felt droplets of water run down her cheeks. She hadn’t cried since she got on the plane to head to Ithaca. She hadn’t cried when Ian had told her he just didn’t love her enough not to fuck other women. It wasn’t sorrow that had broken her open again, it was all this love she felt from Travis.
But she sure as hell couldn’t say the words after she was the one to put a time limit on this thing. So, she said the only thing she could. “Travis?”
“Yeah, babe?”
“This is really something, isn’t it?”
He laughed as he picked her up and carried her into the trailer. He left her clothes and his cut and shirt strewn across her lawn.
“Sure as shit, we are.”
19
Making dinner with Debbie was so simple, so domestic—something Skyler never thought she’d have.
Debbie and Ed lived in a hundred-year-old house, lovingly restored, close to town. She seemed really happy. She deserved to be happy more than anyone after losing her husband and what Isaac put her through.
Skyler chopped vegetables for the salad while the meat and potatoes cooked. Debbie Travis’s pot roast had always been Skyler’s favorite meal. She liked how long it took, as if the time and effort had a direct relationship to how much the cook loved you.
“So, when’s the wedding?”
Record scratch.
“Uh, I—” She and Travis hadn’t even exchanged “I love you’s.” She had almost said it several times after the truck sex. She knew she should say it if she felt it. But she wanted him to say it first. It was selfish and girly. She needed it.
“He loves you. I think he fell in love with you the moment you came back.”
“He hasn’t said.” Her skin flushed, and she almost dropped chopped kale on the counter instead of in a bowl.
“Want me to withhold pie on the condition that he tells you?” Debbie was kidding, but Skyler was uncomfortable talking about her relationship with Travis with his mother.
At the same time, she wished she had a mother to talk to about this stuff. But her mother was dead, too young for her to tell her how to handle being in love for the first time.
She looked at Travis standing outside watching—always watching her—and she realized what her parents might have felt for each other. She understood how scary it would be to lose that.
“Not necessary.” She turned to look at Debbie, who looked her in the eye. “I care a lot about Travis. But I think it would be best if we figured out what’s going on between the two of us. On our own.”
Debbie smiled and went back to cooking, as if pleased with her answer.
Skyler’s cell phone vibrated multiple times during dinner. The vineyard and winery work was done for the day, probably Michael. He always called her until she picked up—like a little kid who constantly demanded. If it wasn't Michael, it was her dad again. And she wasn’t going to deal with that now, not even to pick it up just to hang up on him. So, she ignored it and enjoyed a leisurely dinner with Travis and his family—her family.
After dinner, Ed and Travis excused themselves to the garage. Ed needed Travis’s help with a carburetor or something. When Skyler checked her phone, only one message showed in her voicemail queue from a number she didn’t recognize.
She only got through, “An inmate from Chino State Penitentiary is attempting to reach you…” before she disconnected the call and threw her phone in her purse almost violently. She leaned on the counter with her head in her hands and attempted to breathe.
He’d never been able to call her before—before someone had given him her number. She suspected Roy, but didn’t want to bring it up. She didn’t even want to seem curious about her father because it would only encourage him.
Coming home, even though it brought her and Travis back together, might have been a bad idea. She hadn’t spoken to her father since he was arrested. She wasn’t going to start now, but now he knew where she was and how to get a hold of her.
Although he had claimed he was just with the Diablos as a doctor—fulfilling his Hippocratic oath and all—an undercover deputy sheriff had gathered evidence that Jacob Clark—paragon of society—was the president of one of the most violent and notorious motorcycle clubs in Northern California. They ran meth and coke for the Mexican drug cartels. They bought guns from known terrorists. Executed prison hits.
And even though the Diablos Santos had allegedly washed their hands of her father, she didn’t doubt that he’d aligned himself with a prison gang of some sort. He wouldn’t have survived this long if he hadn’t been doing dirty business. At the very least.
Betrayal was too small a word to describe how she felt about her father. She’d thought she knew him. Hell, the whole town had thought they knew him. It was Skyler’s most important lesson from childhood—you could never really know anyone. People were impenetrable, so you had to keep your armor up.
Debbie put her arm around her shoulders. “Doc?”
Skyler turned her head and looked up at her. “How’d you guess?”
“Only thing that would have you so upset would be him.”
“He got my number from Roy.”
“Not everyone hated him. He did a lot of good—“
“I don’t want to hear about that. He didn’t do any good for me. He tucked me into bed when I was eight, and went out to kill people.”
“He loved you. Still does.”
She stood up straight then, and her mouth went dry. “Why are you defending him? He killed Isaac.”
“I’m not defending him. And even if he did pull my son into the club, he doesn’t…” Debbie’s voice broke, and Skyler immediately felt guilty for her outburst. “Even if…though, he did all those things, he doesn’t deserve to lose his child.”
Tears stung the back of her eyes. Debbie Travis was a really good woman, and Skyler felt shamed by her capacity for forgiveness. A man who took everything from her, her oldest son and her husband, who died from grief, didn’t deserve to lose the same? So much more tender and forgiving than Skyler was.
Travis picked that moment to walk in. “Where’s pie?” His eyes narrowed when he saw the tears in his mother’s eyes and the bewildered look on Skyler’s face. “Why are you crying, Mom?”
Debbie shook her head. “Nothing. Get out the ice cream, would you?”
He went back out to the second freezer in the garage after a long, warning look in Skyler’s direction. She’d never been the recipient of that look. No lust, just the silent admonition not to hurt his mother. Right now, she knew how it felt to be on his bad side. She didn’t like the feeling.
Debbie tried to make the best of a tense situ
ation over dessert. Ed—bless his heart—seemed oblivious to any tension. When Skyler and Travis were set to leave, Debbie pulled Skyler into her arms for a tight hug.
“Think about forgiving him. Not for him. For you.”
Skyler’s throat was full so she pulled back and nodded. Debbie squeezed her arms and winked at her.
20
Skyler was keeping secrets. There was the way she’d gotten pasty-faced and scared when Deacon had looked at her. She still hadn’t told Travis what happened with his mom in the week since the dinner, but something had changed. It was as if she’d put up a wall between them. She was still there, physically, but her mind and her heart were someplace else. And he was annoyed with the distance. There wouldn’t be anything between them after he’d laid it all out for her. Maybe tonight she’d let loose and tell him what was going on in that pretty little head of hers.
He was hosting the party out at the Foundry. She’d told him she was coming. The Heaven’s Sinners didn’t have a clubhouse like other clubs because they didn’t need one. But the Foundry had a barbeque pit and a dirt patch they could fight in outside and they could all fit in the building if it rained. Fortunately, it was a gorgeous, late-spring Saturday in the valley.
Between Skyler pulling away and the text he’d received from Ethan, telling him they hadn’t found any meth cooking supplies in Deacon’s garage when he went over for a friendly visit, Travis had a knot in his stomach that wouldn’t go away. In fact, Deacon had the garage door wide open to work on his bike when the sheriff rode past—nothing but tools and motor oil to be seen.
Fuck. He was about done doing the sheriff’s bidding, especially since the Diablos always seemed to be a few steps ahead.
Almost every member of the club was there, wives and children in tow. Later, the guys with kids would leave, and the party girls would show up. Mostly girls from Santa Rosa and Healdsburg who wanted to bag a biker without putting themselves in any real danger. Living on the edge without the edge.
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