A Step from the Edge (Tough, yet Tender Book 2)

by Loretta Palmer

  “Mmm!” Mmm-mm-mmm!”

  “Save your breath. You’re only gonna hyperventilate. Just take it easy, we’ll be at our destination in just a few minutes. In the meantime, how about a little music?” He flipped the radio on. It was tuned to a classic rock station. A song I didn’t recognize faded into one I did, but I couldn’t recall the title. I thought it was by the Eagles. Lew started singing along:

  “Well, I’m runnin’ down the road

  tryin’ to loosen my load.

  Got seven women on my mind.

  Four that wanna own me,

  Two that wanna scold me,

  One says she’s a friend of mine.”

  He wasn’t singing it right. It was supposed to be “stone me,” not “scold me.” One time, when I was really little and my dad was still around, my mom had laughed at him for singing the very same wrong lyric during a family road trip.

  You wouldn’t think you’d notice something like that while bound and gagged in the backseat of a psychopathic gangster’s car, but I did. I guess my brain was looking for something, anything to occupy itself with besides the horrible fate that presumably awaited me when we arrived… wherever it was we were going.

  Lew turned the radio down. “Thattagirl, just sit back and relax nice and quiet-like. I’d take off that tape and invite you to duet with me, if I didn’t think you’d start screaming bloody murder the moment we stepped out the car.”

  Needless to say, I didn’t feel much like singing.

  After three more songs, one Lew knew the words to and two of which he only sang the choruses, I felt the car stop moving. The shifty-eyed thug walked around back and, after untying my ankles, dragged me roughly to my feet. I felt the butt of a revolver prod me in the side.”

  “Just a little precaution, in case you get any ideas about kneeing me in the balls and running away.”

  I had to admit, the thought had crossed my mind.

  We walked across a gravel-strewn parking lot towards a big, ramshackle dive bar with neon signs in the window advertising Budweiser and Miller Lite. The sign out front said “Haskell’s.” Shit, I thought, it’s the place from Carly’s story!

  Lew shoved me through the door (“Ladies first!”), into a soup of beer fumes, loud music and raucous laughter. I held out hope the fat, bearded bouncer at the door would ask for my I.D. and eject me once he saw I wasn’t 21, but this clearly wasn’t the kind of bar where they cared about things like laws.

  In fact, it didn’t seem like a bar at all, so much as an MC headquarters that happened to serve pitchers of shitty lager. It was filled with men wearing the same style of denim vest I’d seen Adam in on Thursday, some with scantily-clad women on their arms. I assumed all the guys there were Seraphim, until I saw Adam himself leaning against the wall by the restroom. Why the fuck was he, a Claque brother, hanging out here? He certainly didn’t look like he was enjoying himself, but nobody was holding a knife to his throat, either.

  “Wondering why it’s so crowded on a Monday?” Lew whispered in my ear, his hot breath making me shudder. “Well, I’ll tell you. We’re inaugurating our new club President, Clem Hoffman. Maybe you remember him from the other day? Our old boss got in a little accident, and now he’s in charge. And, as if that weren’t enough reason to celebrate, we drove those Claque shitbirds out of town, and shot the ones that didn’t want to leave. All ‘cept that sad-looking specimen over there. He did us a solid, so he gets to be part of the new regime.”

  At first, I wasn’t noticed amid the general chaos, but soon the bikers began to gawk at the bound, gagged 19-year-old in their midst. Several wolf-whistles made themselves heard over the loud rock music piping through the room’s overworked sound system.

  Lew led me in the direction of the bar, where I recognized Clem chatting with several women in short skirts, one of whom looked like she could be my age. When he noticed me, he broke into that same savage, hungry grin he’d been wearing when I first saw him. He walked up to me and, without saying a word, pinched me hard on the side.

  “Well, well, well,” he said in a weathered, gravelly voice. “Asher’s girl is finally here. Took you long enough, Lew.”

  Lew shrugged. “Wanted to do it right. Real nice and quiet.”

  “Just ribbing you, Lew. Heh! Heh! And you, little lady, what do you have to say for yourself?” He reached out and ripped the duct tape off my mouth—fast.

  I screamed, at first because my face hurt like a motherfucker but then from terror, in the vain hope that anyone here could, or would help. For a moment, I’d forgotten Lew’s pistol was still pressed against my side.

  “That’s right, baby, let it all out,” Clem cooed. “Ain’t like anyone here’s listening. Now, why don’t we get you out of those clothes? In fact, what do you say we make a little show of it?” He led Lew and I toward the bar. “Scuse me, fellas, mind scooting those barstools just a little ways apart and grabbing your drinks? This’ll only take a minute.” Once everything was out of the way, Clem hopped up on the bar. “Now, Lew, how ‘bout helping me hoist her up here?”

  Lew grabbed me about the waist and Clem, crouching, hooked his hands under my arms. I’m 110 pounds soaking wet, so together they had no trouble getting me onto the bar.

  The whole room went quiet, as if responding to a signal broadcast on a frequency only Seraphim could hear. The music fell silent, too. Everyone shifted their gaze to Clem and I. Feeling the eyes of dozens of men boring into me, I started to sob violently.

  “Sorry to cut into your drinking time,” Clem boomed, “but we’ve got Asher Layton’s lady friend here, and I thought you might want to take a look at the goods.”

  “Woo!” shouted somebody in the back.

  Clem pulled a stiletto from the pocket of his black jeans and hit a metal stud on the handle, causing the blade to spring out with a shk! sound. I trembled harder. He grabbed my collar, stretched it, and sawed through it. Then he tore my thin cotton T-shirt straight down the front, revealing my plain white bra.

  The men around me started to hoot and holler. Clem silenced them simply by raising his hand. He slid the shirt down my arms, made another cut to accommodate my bound wrists and tossed the halves down to Lew.

  He unbuttoned and unzipped my jeans. I stood stock-still, fighting the urge to flee. The feeling of his rough fingertips against my bare skin made me nauseous, but I knew that if I leaped off the counter and lunged for the door, I’d only be running into the arms of another sadistic Seraph.

  Clem slid my jeans down my legs. He did it slowly, as if to keep his audience in suspense. Finally, I stepped out of them, one leg after another. There I stood, shivering, in nothing but a bra and panties.

  Let it stop here, please! I thought.

  Miraculously, it did. Clem took a bow and, after he pinched me in the side again, I did, too. The audience applauded enthusiastically, though, judging from the expressions on their faces, they were a bit disappointed.

  “Lemme see those titties!” shouted someone in the back. Everyone looked at the owner of the voice, who’d clamped his hand over his mouth as soon as the words had come out. The bouncer put him in a headlock and dragged him out of Haskell’s. No one else made a peep.

  “Lew, help the young lady down and bring her to her chambers, if you would.”

  “Certainly.” Lew motioned for me to sit on the edge of the counter and guided me to the floor. The crowd of bikers parted like the Red Sea as he led me through the barroom and up the stairs. When we were off, Clem shouted something, the music turned back on and the party returned to its previous volume.

  We walked down a narrow hallway and stopped in front of a sturdy-looking door. He unlocked the door, untied my wrists, opened the door and shoved me in, too quick for me to even think of resisting.

  The door slammed shut behind me. The first thing I saw was Asher on the bed, sitting cross-legged, wearing nothing but black briefs, utterly engrossed in a game of klondike.

  Chapter 14

  Asher


  Mixed emotions. Never has a phrase been so tailor-made for a turn of events, yet so insufficient to describe what was actually taking place. When I heard the door open and turned from my game of solitaire to see my stepsister there, my heart sank and soared at the same time, surging so hard and fast in two diametrically opposed directions that it damn near tore in half.

  In the same moment, I knew that I was in love with her and that I, Asher Layton, had signed and sealed her death warrant. Standing there trailworn and in tears, she looked more beautiful than any woman I’d laid eyes on in my life. I wasn’t sure what to say first: “Hello,” “I love you,” or “I’m so sorry.”

  It didn’t help that, instead of saying or doing anything, she stood there, staring, too, suspended between love and hate.

  Finally, she ran toward me and, instead of slapping me full in the face like I expected—and probably deserved—she fell into my arms and pressed herself against me, soaking my chest with her relief, terror, joy and torment, all mingled in an equivocal torrent of tears. I felt her eyelashes, her shallow breaths, her racing heart. I could have died happy there with her, if it weren’t for the unhappy death that loomed almost certainly around the corner.

  “Leah, I love you. Everything is going to be fine,” I lied, and kissed the top of her head, and held her closer.

  “What’s going on, Ash? What are we going to do?”

  “Some real bad shit. And as for what we’re going to do… I don’t know, but I’ll die before I let them harm one hair on your head.” I barely believed the words as I was speaking them, but if she had any doubts as to my ability to protect her, she didn’t show it. She didn’t say a word, just held on to me like a life preserver in a stormy sea.

  I buried my face in her chestnut hair, inhaling its subtle floral fragrance. She flattened her right palm against my chest and lifted her head, bringing her lips into contact with mine. They touched only lightly at first, but that was enough to liberate all the tender feelings I’d been struggling to contain since we first met. My initial desire to get on my stepsister’s nerves, I realized, was just a cover for the other, unacceptable feelings that drew me closer to her.

  That light, chaste kiss soon blossomed into a deep, passionate one. Our hands roved all over each other’s bodies. It was at least 10 seconds before we drew apart.

  We stared into each other’s eyes, awestruck. It was like we were meeting for the first time, all over again. I was breathing heavily, and I swear I could hear her heart pounding.

  “Leah… Is this right?”

  “It feels right to me,” she said softly. “Does it feel right to you?”

  “Of course it does. But Leah, you’re my stepsister. Imagine—“

  “What our parents would say?” She rolled her eyes. “Aren’t you thinking a little far ahead, given the situation we’re in? I love you, Asher, and I don’t give a fuck what anyone thinks. If and when we get out, we can take things as they come.” She paused a beat. “Plus, I am not going to die a virgin.”

  “I won’t let you!” I protested. “Die, that is.”

  “I’m not taking any chances with the ‘virgin’ part, either.” She narrowed her eyes and smiled—an expression that made my jeans instantly feel two sizes tighter.

  “I don’t know, Leah… Are you sure you want to do this?”

  She frowned. “I’m not a kid, Ash, so don’t you dare treat me like one. Here, I’ll show you have much I want it.” My stepsister slipped one hand under the elastic of my briefs and wrapped it around my penis, which stiffened almost instantaneously at her touch.

  “Oh God, Leah…” She began to stroke me, starting tentatively but gaining confidence from my rapt expression and sharp, shallow breaths.

  “See? You want it, too.” She was right, of course. A minute ago, maybe—just maybe—I could have hit the brakes. Now that my stepsister’s hand was on my cock, though, the die was cast. I had no choice but to make love to her.

  Even as my desire grew more urgent, it was Leah’s pleasure, not mine, that was foremost on my mind. It was her first time and, loath as I was to admit it, potentially her last. It needed to be amazing.

  Chapter 15

  Leah

  Ever poured boiling liquid into a chilled glass? More often than not, it cracks. Well, I was worried my mind would crack, even shatter thanks to the strange succession of emotions running through it that evening; in a vanishing instant, when my stepbrother and I locked eyes, I escaped from the icy clutches of terror and despair. I felt myself filled with the warm certainty of being in love—and the all-consuming heat of desire.

  My mind may not have broken in that dizzying transition, but it definitely checked out. My body and heart collaborated behind my ego’s back to propel me into Asher’s arms. I didn’t come back to consciousness till my lips were pressed against his.

  Even then I moved as if in a dream. As if I were watching myself from the outside. This was all so new to me—my experiences with men were limited to a few awkward, tipsy makeout sessions a high school parties—but all at once I knew exactly what I wanted, and reached for it with a womanly confidence far from congruous with the girlish fluttering in my stomach. To be honest, I was just as scared when I slid my hand down my stepbrother’s briefs as I had been when Clem undressed me in front of the leering Seraphim. Funny how a single emotion, fear, could feel so different from one moment to the next.

  At the same time, though, I’d never felt as safe as I did now that I was close to him.

  The sensations of Ash’s penis hardening against my left hand, his taut, muscular chest resting against the palm of the other, his strong limbs wrapped around me… the combination of it all awoke a warm, shivery feeling at my core. I’d experienced it before, but could never find it in myself to surrender to it. Even when I wanted to—when I touched myself—I could get myself hot, but I never quite made it over the edge. Maybe I was self-conscious. Or maybe I just needed help…

  Asher reached behind my back and undid my bra clasp with practiced ease. Clearly, he’d been with many women before me. Any jealous thought, however, was instantly vanquished when he lowered his head to draw one of my nipples into his mouth. Already peaking in the cold air, it stiffened quickly in response to his gentle suction and the teasing movements of his tongue. My hand stopped moving on his cock, forgetting myself as I closed my eyes, luxuriating in the pleasure he was giving me.

  After a few moments of this, he drew back. I opened my eyes and gaze him a questioning look. Wordlessly, my stepbrother slid backward on the bed, trailing his hands down the sides of my stomach, and hooked his thumbs under the elastic of my white cotton panties. I could feel his warm breath against the pale hairs below my belly button.

  My face reddened, all that womanly self-confidence momentarily deserting me. “Are you going to…”

  He broke into his trademark cocksure grin. Once infuriating, it now made me weak in the knees. “I was hoping to. Unless you don’t want me to?”

  “No. I mean, yeah. I do. It’s just, I’ve never… and I’m a little…”

  “Self-conscious?”

  “Yeah. That’s the word.”

  He slid forward again and placed his hands on either side of my face, stroking the hair behind my ears. “Leah, every part of you I’ve seen so far is beautiful. It would be, like, a scientific impossibility for that part not to be gorgeous, too. You don’t have any tentacles down there, do you?”

  I smiled shyly. “No… not that I know of.”

  “Then I think we’ll be fine. And if you don’t like what you’re feeling, just tell me, please.”

  I took a deep breath. “…OK.” He took both of my hands, interlacing his fingers with mine and drew away from me, until his face was once again hovering just above my white panties. I raised my hips to allow him to pull them down, gasping in spite of myself as he slid them down my legs. In my current state of excitement and anticipation, even the mundane feeling of cloth against skin carried an unexpected erotic charge. />
  When they were on the floor, he hovered there for a moment, gazing at the space where my legs met.

  “Didn’t your mother tell you it wasn’t polite to stare?”

  He made eye contact with me. “That’s like asking someone not to stare at the Sistine Chapel. When you see something wonderful, sometimes you just have to pause and drink it in.”

  “Oh, come on, Ash. Don’t you think you’re laying it on a little thick?”

  “Nah, that comes later,” he said with a mischievous glint in his eye.

  “Asher!” I sat up and play-slapped him. He caught my wrist and drew the tips of my first three fingers into his mouth. He sucked them lightly and let them go, then pushed me back onto the pillow and began kissing his way down past my navel, right to the spot where my pubic hair began. Then he transitioned to my thighs and kissed his way inward along each one. I was trembling with desire when he finally ran his tongue from the bottom to the top of my aching slit. I could feel my juices seeping out from between my swollen lips, mingling with the moisture on his tongue.

  He used his thumbs to carefully separate my outer lips and thrust his tongue as far in as it would go. I moaned. My hips rose involuntarily in response. Ash continued penetrating me with his tongue, darting in and out several times before diving deep inside me once again. Each time, I cried out louder. My legs began to shake. I reached for the back of my stepbrother’s head, grabbed two handfuls of his hair to encourage him.

  I was already nearing climax when he began to flick at my most sensitive spot with his tongue’s tip, first side to side, then up and down. More and more, the throbbing heat between my legs came to edge everything else out of my consciousness. My knees clamped down on either side of Asher’s head. I arched my back, bucked violently against him and let out a piercing wail of pleasure that, if the barroom downstairs hadn’t been abuzz with music and raucous laughter, would very likely have echoed through the entire building.

  My first-ever climax went on for what felt like an eternity—well, a good 30 seconds, at the very least. “Oh my God, that was amazing!” I groaned, when I’d finally caught my breath and released my stepbrother’s head from between my legs.