Breaking the Bad Boy

by Vanessa Lennox

  He pulled her along the corridor toward the room and she balked. They would kill Buck given the chance; she had to keep them away from him, but they knew exactly which room they were in. The biker just prodded her along, slapping her with the flat edge of the knife on the back of her thigh. Virgil knocked on the door, and nodded to the biker who held Joss. Buck opened it and took in the scene in less than a second.

  Joss looked at him helplessly as Virgil dived into the room first and threw such a punch it would have knocked Buck out had he not just almost casually leaned out of its path, and wrenched Virgil’s head around, breaking his neck and letting the man fall to the floor of the room, immobile. Joss was amazed at Buck’s feline grace. He stood crouched to evaluate what else needed to be done.

  “Not so fast. Your pretty Bear’s Mistress won’t be much fun with a slit in her throat.” The knife pricked her throat and Joss jumped from the shock. Buck stilled. They stepped into the room and the biker kicked the door shut.

  “You should have shot me when you had the chance,” he said.

  “I won’t make that mistake again,” Buck said.

  “Sit down and watch while I fuck your bitch,” the biker said pushing Joss on to the bed, but still holding on to a handful of her hair.

  “That’s not going to happen,” Buck said.

  “Shut up!” The biker said as he looked around the room for something to make it easier. Virgil was supposed to knock the big guy out and then they’d tie him up, or kill him, and then take turns with Blondie. The bitch’s boyfriend was dangerous, though, he made short work of Elgin, and then Virgil, and he wasn’t going to get too close to him. Maybe he should just back away now, take Blondie someplace else. His best option was to keep the knife to the girl’s throat the whole time, but that was going to be awkward if he accidentally killed her, what was the big guy going to do to him then? Fucking Virgil was always messing things up for him. “You got any rope?”

  Joss turned to look at the biker. Did he really expect them to provide rope?

  “No rope? Then where’s the gun?” The biker looked at the panniers on the bike and grinned. He took Joss over to it and flipped open the bags. No gun. He moved Joss back to the bed and yanked her hair until she sat down.

  “Can’t you use your words? That hurts,” she said. She was holding on to the wrist of the hand that held her hair, her eyes open wide in fear. The biker looked at Buck; he stood very still, with every muscle in his body clenched, ready to attack. He put the knife to the girl’s breast and smiled at Buck.

  “You sit down,” the biker motioned for Buck to sit on the chair. Buck hesitated, but sat down on the hard chair and then shouted the most remarkable thing. “The gun is under the… what’s the word? The place where you put your head.” The fact that he said it in German didn’t immediately register to Joss, it was completely unexpected. The biker looked at Buck and then looked at Joss. She shrugged.

  “He does that sometimes,” she said and the biker looked at Buck again. “Das kissen?” Joss said.

  “Ja!” Buck yelled and stood up from the chair. The biker turned toward Buck and let Joss’s hair go. She reached for the gun under the pillow and turned holding it leveled at the biker’s chest, one of her feet was on the floor, one knee on the rumpled bed, the gun held in front of her gripped in both hands. Buck thought she looked like a cop.

  “Drop the knife or I will shoot you where you stand,” she said.

  The biker didn’t really know what to do. He stood for a moment considering his options. He knew the big guy was the real threat, the girl, not so much, even with the gun. Women were weak, in his experience, and she’d be too frightened and soft hearted to pull the trigger, and she probably couldn’t hit the blind side of a barn. She didn’t shoot when they were going to take her in the glade, and she wouldn’t do it now. Whereas, he’d be dead if the big guy got the gun, and both of them knew it. He made his decision and lunged for Buck, the knife held out in front of him.

  Without any hesitation Joss shot the biker twice, right in the center of his body, just before he got to Buck. The knife was still in his reaching hand, but Buck once again simply stepped out of his path. The biker fell dead on the thin carpet of the room.

  “Time to go, Duchess, the cops will come for that.” He pulled her off the bed, took the gun from her, put it in the waistband of his pants and undid the leather tie around her wrists. He closed the panniers and rolled the bike out of the room. Putting a hand out for her he said, “Come,” and she did, in a kind of daze she swung her leg over the bike and they roared away. Joss was shaking uncontrollably by the time they got to the first stop light.

  “Come on, Duchess, don’t fall apart on me. Hold me tight,” he said and she nodded absently into his back tightening her hold around his waist. They rode south.

  Buck had thought they were in Billings, but he guessed he was in pretty bad shape when they arrived last night and Joss thought better of going any further. He had to readjust his plans, such as they were; he was flying by the seat of his pants. First he had to feed his Duchess and keep her from going into shock, both his grandfathers, from different ends of the earth would prescribe tea. He had to keep her safe, soon enough the police would be looking for them, and they were both conspicuous in their appearance.

  Something deep inside you changed forever when you killed someone, and he hoped this wouldn’t break her. He had hoped to disarm the biker and break his neck before she would have to pull the trigger, but her impulse to protect him was flatteringly powerful and she killed him before Buck could get close enough, and now Joss was suffering.

  An hour into the drive she finally spoke. “There’s a cabin on Brent’s land, it’s a few miles away from the house to the north east.”

  She was back. “Do you think you could find it?”

  She hesitated for a minute and placed it in the map of her brain. “I can find it.” He put one big hand on hers and squeezed.

  “Does Cassidy know about it?”

  “No, at least, she shouldn’t, he bought it last year, I found it when I was sneaking around in his books,” she said.

  “That’s my girl. I’ll feed you at the first town we come to.”

  “Thank you, I’ve been eyeing your boots,” she said and he laughed. God, he loved her. He stopped laughing abruptly. Holy shit, he loved her. Oh no, but of course he did, he’d known for a while, he’d just avoided it. He couldn’t tell her either, because he couldn’t stay. They had no future. “Are you all right?” She asked.

  “You may not eat my boots,” he said and she relaxed against him again and ran her hand down his chest absently.

  This was the first time she had taken a life intentionally. She took a man’s life, just like Cassidy’s lover killed Brand. The only thing that made it different was that Brand would never hurt anyone, and the biker, whose name she didn’t even know, was inches from killing the man she loved. The thing that frightened her the most was that she didn’t care. A man was dead by her hand and she just didn’t care. She would have killed a hundred men to save Buck, and that thought made her feel subhuman.

  If not self defense, it was certainly defense, and she might not spend too much time in jail when the time came. She had started shaking again, and Buck slowed the bike to make a turn. He stopped at a creek a little off the road and under some trees.

  There was a rocky outcropping he parked underneath and he took her hand and led her to the top of it. It concerned him that she was allowing herself to be dragged up the hill, but he didn’t know what else to do.

  He sat her down on the rock, and sat right behind her and held her to him between his legs. “I don’t know what to say to you that will make it better. I’m not sure there is anything to say to make you feel better,” he said quietly in her ear. “You saved my life; he would have surely killed me, and then raped and killed you.”

  “I know that I am glad you are the one breathing instead of him. And I don’t think he was a particular benefit to
society, but I killed him… I’m a little freaked out.”

  “I’d be worried if you weren’t.”

  “Do you ever get over it?” She turned in his arms and looked him in the eye.

  He touched her beautiful cheek. “No.” He kissed her very lightly. “You just learn to forgive yourself. You can do that, you had no choice. Come on, Duchess, they’ll be looking for a lanky, beat up Indian and a gorgeous, leggy blonde, we need to keep moving. Are you okay?” She reached up and touched his face.

  “Yes,” she said looking at him with those impossibly blue eyes.

  “You’re my hero, Duchess.” She shook her head.

  “Don’t say that, I’m a monster, because I don’t care. I’d do it again in a heartbeat.”

  “You will make an excellent mother, Bear’s Mistress, you are powerfully protective, and you saved our lives back there. Explore your psyche when we’re safely out of this, right now you need to keep it together, and know you did the only thing that could have been done. Okay?”

  She nodded, still staring at him, and he nodded back.

  “You had a plan though, didn’t you?” She asked him.

  “Nothing as effective as two bullets to the chest, Duchess,” he said.

  He kissed her again and they went back down the rocks and to the bike. Buck opened the pannier and pulled out water and a blue bandana. He held the bottle to her and she drank. He watched her throat move as the water went down and thought it was the most beautiful throat he’d ever seen, even with the small gash the biker left her.

  “Tie your hair back with this, you’ll be a little less conspicuous,” he said and took the water from her and drank deeply. Putting both his hands on her shoulders he looked her in the eye. “Are you ready to do this thing?”

  “Yes,” she nodded bravely meeting his gaze.

  “Okay, let’s go.” They climbed on and went back out to the main road.

  After a few miles they came to a town and loaded up on apples, premade deli sandwiches and a bag of Snickers. At the last minute he bought a very ugly hat that would cover up that lovely hair that ordinarily she wouldn’t be caught dead in, but beggars couldn’t be choosers. They met at the bike and when she saw the Snickers he thought she might just cry.

  Without a word they remounted and she fed him his sandwich from behind, and they ate companionably as the bike ate up Montana. With food in her stomach she felt overwhelmingly tired and she nearly fell asleep twice, jerking awake at the last minute.

  Buck felt her struggling to stay awake, and called back to her.

  “Put your arms around me, and I’ll hold you. I won’t let you slide off,” he said.

  “I’m awake, it’s all right,” she answered.

  “No you’re not, let me hold you, and you can sleep. Every time you jerk awake you throw off the bike, you’ll have us in a ditch if you keep it up. I’ll wake you when we get close to the cabin.” He was exaggerating, but not by much.

  She wrapped her arms around him and he held them tightly in his left hand, keeping her fixed to his chest. They were screwed if he needed to break, but he loved the feel of her against him, and he was becoming very eager to get her to the cabin. The poor girl was spent though, they hadn’t had much sleep because he simply couldn’t keep himself away from her, and when they weren’t actively loving each other, they were frightened and running for their lives. And somewhere along the way he had fallen hard for the Duchess.

  When had that happened? If he was honest with himself he was already in love with her when she spent the long evening digging bloody t-shirt out of his chest. He certainly thought about her the whole time he was rounding up the errant cattle, but he was only human, and after he had seen that mole on her breast the night before he left, it had occupied his consciousness the whole trip.

  It was the morning at the hospital when she was ripping into him and her eyes were shining and boring holes into him, and she was luminous in her fury. That angry passion had quickly morphed into a lusty one at whatever bait he fed her, and when she trembled in his arms he was lost. Had he been a cave man that would have been the moment he grabbed her by the hair and took her to his favorite cave. No cave, he’d take her to a shady glade by the water and lay her gently back on a bear skin and never come up again.

  It turned out she wasn’t the spoiled brat he thought she would be when he gave her the mocking name, instead she was a woman with strength and bravery and intelligence. This blew his mind, because he should have been completely safe from that kind of woman. It wasn’t at all what he was attracted to.

  She was going to want him to settle down and raise kids in some suburb somewhere where all the men in the neighborhood would drool over her at barbecues, and she would give him that look she gave him like he hung the moon and take him upstairs to their bed where they would hold each other for the rest of their lives. Suddenly it didn’t sound so terrible.

  Their kids would run around like lunatics getting into all sorts of mischief, getting the other kids in trouble. He smiled evilly. They would be beautiful. They’d have big eyes, long legs, and good teeth, and they’d be an interesting amalgam of the two of them. Christ, he was fantasizing about their children. Hell, she may already be pregnant. He was lost.

  “What are you thinking about? You’re making funny growling noises,” she asked.

  “You, you’re driving me crazy,” he yelled back to her.

  “Me? What’d I do?”

  “Hosting barbeques,” he grumbled.

  “Barbeques?”

  “Forget it,” he said and let her arms go. She leaned back and put her hands on his hips, and he put his left hand back on the handle bars.

  “Where are we?” She asked a little subdued. Shit, now I’ve hurt her again.

  “Just west of Billings, I’d say we have another—“

  “Buck, it’s Cassidy,” she called.

  Buck turned away just in time and Joss was hidden by his shoulders, Cassidy and the other passenger didn’t see them.

  “That was Lanier with her, what are they up to?”

  “Turn left up here,” Joss said a few minutes later. “Turn right in about two miles, I think it’s the first right turn.” When they got to it she nodded to herself. “It’s another three miles on this road, and the drive will be on your left.”

  Well, I’m glad I’ve fallen for a genius; I just wish things were a little simpler for us, he thought. He slowed when he got to the turn, but kept going straight. Joss said nothing but gave the cabin a close look as they passed.

  “There weren’t any fresh tire marks, at least,” she said and he looked over his shoulder at her, he had to stop being surprised. “What?” She asked. He pulled over to turn the bike around and head back.

  “When we ate dinner that first night, you asked if I was military. What was that about?” He asked.

  “Your back was to the wall and you had your shooting arm free and unimpeded. You are on guard all the time, too.” She said. “You were either bad, which I refused to believe, very careful or a social butterfly, I made a wild guess.” He huffed out a laugh.

  “I’ve been doing this for twelve years, Duchess, and no one has ever made me. You made me, or at least believed I was a cop in the first what? Three hours? I’m glad you’re on my side.” He reached back into the pannier and grabbed his gun, put the bike in gear and they rode up to the cabin. It was deserted, no foot prints of any kind anywhere near it.

  “Do you have the key?” He asked. He could get them in, but a key would be easier.

  “Not yet, but Brent is predictable,” she went to the porch and lifted the third flower pot and there was the key. Buck parked the bike behind some prodigious rabbit brush in back of the cabin. They went inside. It was hot and stuffy; no one had been there for some time.

  “Familiarize yourself with the place in the daylight; we’ll keep the lights off when it gets dark.”

  “I’ll start by familiarizing myself with the bathroom,” she said and went str
aight for it.

  Buck looked around and checked once again how many bullets he had left. Painfully few. He locked the door and opened some windows placing objects on them to fall off noisily to wake him up if they were opened any further. He then looked in the refrigerator. Beer, diet coke, mustard and a jar of Spanish olives with an inch of mold on them were the entire contents. The freezer, however, was filled with choice steaks. Hot damn. He took two large ones out and put them on the counter to defrost and heard the shower start. He simply couldn’t resist her.

  Going to the panniers he pulled out one of the boxes of condoms and while he was at it opened the bag of Snickers. She’ll be putty in my hands, he smiled and went to the bedroom bath and opened the door. Naked except for her toe ring she stood directly under the stream, her hands on the wall in front of her, and the water bouncing off her lovely face. It was such a beautiful sight he nearly sat down just to watch. But he couldn’t. He stripped and stepped into the stall behind her.

  “Took you long enough,” she said as he cupped her breasts and pulled her back to him.

  “Open your mouth and close your eyes, my beautiful Duchess,” he said just loud enough to be heard over the water. She turned in his arms and opened her mouth and closed her eyes. He took the wrapper off and put the chocolate to her lips. She closed her full lips around it and he almost fell back with the lust that shot through his body. She felt his tremor and opened her eyes as she bit down hard into the candy and smiled. He put the rest into his mouth and they stood there smiling at each other, chewing the Snickers with the water soaking them.

  Thirty seconds later they were on the bed soaking wet. An hour after that they were back in the shower, taking great pains making sure they were clean.