by Fox, Nicole
“Mhm.”
“Well. No one ever wants to watch them with me. They say they’re for old people—”
“They are—”
“You were always up to watch them with me, though.”
I knew what he was doing. That was the funny thing. I knew. And yet I agreed to his silly terms anyway, knowing that I was very much out of practice with pool, and very, very likely to lose.
What could I say. I was a glutton for punishment.
Grizzly
I let her make her sandwich up quick and eat it. After, I dragged her out to the front again. I knew I was going to win. I just knew it. I was the best pool player among the Butchers, and Ana had never been amazing at pool to begin with. I didn’t know if she had agreed to play pool with the boys just to humor them or not, but I was more interested in why she’d agreed to play with me, knowing that she was likely to lose.
Did she want to test fate again?
I did.
Every interaction with her drove me crazy with needing her.
“You know, if you want to back out at any time, you’re totally allowed to,” I told her, being cordial.
“Ha. In your dreams, Grizzly.”
“Whoa, boss, playing the new girl? Nice.”
“Aww, does that mean you’re not gonna play with us, Ana?”
“Maybe next time, boys. Blame your meat heat boss.” She laughed, and there were playful, not so serious complaints that came from the others. That didn’t stop their dumb asses from hooting and hollering like the animals they were as I set up the table for me and Ana to play. Honestly, I was just happy that we were having a normal interaction, and that there was something good that was going on between the two of us for the moment.
Plus ... I really wanted to win. I wanted an excuse to have her all to myself in my room again.
We started to play—she broke first. I knew immediately that I was going to win this little charade of a competition. I smirked at her across the way; she didn’t have a very good technique. What I loved about it though was that she didn’t back down just because of this. She raised her brow at me.
“Don’t give me that cocky smirk,” she said to me. “You haven’t won the game.”
Not just then, no. We took turns taking aim. I sank more than Ana did from the get-go—she almost caught up, but then I had her.
The whole time, I kept my eyes on her. The way she moved, the way that she leaned over the pool table, the way that she bit her lip when she was concentrating, and that determined glint that was in her eyes. My eyes were on all of it, but I wasn’t going to let her win. Besides ...
I was having a good time playing with the Duchess again.
When I got all my balls and sank the black, she still had three of hers on the table. The boys patted her on the back, and even teased me for beating a lady like that—wasn’t the gentlemanly thing to do.
“Since when have I ever been a gentleman?” I asked, honestly laughing because that was some funny shit and I hoped that they knew that it was some funny shit, too. I shook my head, setting the stick onto the table to let someone else take over. It was a little later now, and it was the perfect excuse to tuck in for the night. Kind of.
“What, you guys are leaving already?” Kid popped up from seemingly fucking nowhere and pouted. “I wanted to play you next!”
“I’m going to subject Ana to the shitty old movies that none of you uncultured bastards will watch with me.”
“Awww.”
“Next time, Kid.”
“I’m holding you to that one, boss!”
I laughed, and turned to Ana.
“Wanna let me cash in on my winnings now?” I asked.
She stuck her tongue out at me. “Might as well. You’re going to make me watch those old movies anyway.”
“You love them.”
“I do.”
I grinned at her and I was almost like a kid, bounding up to the stairs with Ana in tow. It was my guilty pleasure. I loved cult classics and those old black and whites and shit. It was something that no one else in the club really cared for, and I couldn’t blame them, but it was nice to have someone to chill out with them. Besides, I did know that Ana liked them, even if she was playing ignorant. She always used to watch them with me when we were younger.
I was happy that she seemed a little more comfortable around me. When she came into my room, there wasn’t any hesitance. I had worried that she would be too nervous to enjoy herself. But she plopped herself on my bed, looking around, impressed.
“It’s cleaner than I expected it would be,” she commented.
I rolled my eyes. “Did you think I lived in a pig sty?”
“You’re a man, aren’t you?”
“That is entirely beside the point.”
She laughed, kicking off her shoes so that she could pull herself up onto the bed without having them on it. “Go on, then. Pick us out a movie, since you’re going to subject me to this silliness,” she teased me.
I smirked.“Yeah, yeah, you keep talking like that when I know that you don’t mind this.”
She smiled at me cryptically, but said nothing to prove or disprove things, and I knew that I had her. I went about choosing a movie, and when I had one, I flopped by her on my bed, too, lying back. To my surprise, she snuggled up close to me, putting her head on my chest.
“You know,” she said, “it’s almost cheating when you intentionally bet a game of pool against someone who was never all that good at pool to begin with.”
“Some would say that it’s silly to have taken a bet on a game with someone that you knew would beat you,” I countered.
“Maybe I just wanted an excuse to spend time with you.”
It came out quick, like she almost hadn’t intended on saying it and admitting to it as openly as she did, but when it was out, it was in the air. I could even feel the heat of her blush against my chest, and I smiled a little at her, pressing a kiss to the top of her head like I had earlier.
“Don’t worry about it,” I said. “I’ll let you have whatever excuses that you want or need.”
“My hero,” she teased.
Always ...
The movie started, but admittedly I was distracted by Ana’s body pressed to mine. She scooted closer to me, possibly getting more comfortable. She slid her leg up, hooking it with mine. It was almost like being teenagers again—innocent little cuddles that had that underlying tension when it was with that girl that you liked, but you weren’t certain if you wanted to make the move.
No. That was a damn lie. I knew that I wanted to make the move. I just wanted Ana to make it first. I wanted her to come after me again, like when we’d been in the motel, before she’d gotten it all up in her head that what had happened between us was too complicated and wrong to let happen again.
My hand smoothed along her back as we watched the movie, and though I had seen it a dozen times now, I had no idea what was going on, because I was too busy thinking about the fact that she had her hands on my stomach, twirling her delicate little fingers over it and tugging lightly at my shirt here and there. She did that when she fidgeted. When she wanted something. When she was thinking about something.
I looked down at her, taking my half-there attention away from the movie to watch her. At the same time, Ana looked up at me. It was just the right time, I think. It just happened when it needed to. She leaned up ...
I kissed her like I had wanted to in the hallway that morning and not too long ago. Not on her forehead, not on a cheek—on her lips. Her sweet, sweet lips, so plump and beautiful that only a crazy man would deny himself the privilege of saying that he had had them. I indulged in her, kissing her deeply, letting my tongue explore her mouth. My cock already ached for her, but—
There was something else I wanted.
I rolled us so that she was below me, pressed against the bed. I kept my lips on hers, hoping that she wouldn’t make me stop, hoping that she wouldn’t tell me that she didn’t want th
is from me. I didn’t get that from her, however. I got her sweet little moans as she pressed against me, getting more kisses from me. Her fingers ran through my hair as I let my hand slip lower and lower down her body. She rolled her hips against me and she shuddered as I popped the button to her shorts. She let me nudge them down to her ankles and I slid my fingers over her panties. She was already hot, her panties slightly wet. That made me growl; she responded so quickly and so well to the way that I handled her, I didn’t know what to do with myself other than keep touching her.
I only teased her long enough to having her squirming beneath my hand before I was pulling her panties down along with her shorts. I nudged her thighs apart as I kept kissing her, moving from her lips to her jaw because I wanted to hear her moan for me.
The sweet, delectable sound hit my ears as soon as I slid my fingers over her dripping slit. I homed in on her clit, circling with my fingers. I matched the desperate little undulations of her hips, round and round and round as she moaned and groaned my name against my ear.
“Grizzly ... Fuck ... that feels so good ...”
I nibbled and bit her neck, growling a little because there was nothing goddamn better than the sound of her moaning my name in my ears. I had heard it from so many women over the years. None of them sounded like Ana. None of them made me want them like I wanted Ana.
None.
I kept my thumb on her clit and slid my fingers inside her, one by one, getting two in on the first go. I crooked and curled them, giving her the dual pleasures of my fingers on her g-spot and at her clit. I wanted her to know that it was about her, not about me. Maybe that’s the thing that was making her hesitant about doing anything with me further. Maybe—
Well, I knew it was more than that, but I was determined to show her that I cared about her, not just about what she could do for me, if that was even a concern. In and out, I moved my fingers. I wanted to just push my cock inside her and feel that warmth and wetness around my cock, but I abstained.
I felt her pulse around me and spasm—she was growing close. I bit and sucked at her neck a little harder, and right before she actually came, I pulled away.
“Wait—what the fuck—”
She obviously thought that I was stopping—not the case. This was about her, after all. I moved down her body quickly before she could think to stop me and nuzzled against her wet folds, sliding my tongue deep inside her. She arched and mewled for me, clawing the sheets like a little kitten.
“Oh, shit, Grizzly—”
I held her hips down so I could have at her, going from sliding my tongue in her to flicking over her perk little clit to sucking it, then back to her pussy to eat her out. She tasted so good, I swore it was like candy, and she had been so close before that it didn’t take me long to bring her sweetly over the edge like that, either. She came hard, moaning my name and groaning, rocking her hips as her thighs shook. I kept my mouth pressed to her thigh, letting her come down like that.
Her fingers found my hair, petting through them and tugging, twisting a little, even. I loved how she seemed to need to cling to me as she rode through her orgasm, and I loved how she let me kiss my way up her body.
“God, Duchess, you’re so fucking perfect,” I murmured, not realizing what I had said until I felt her stiffen beneath me and begin to pull away.
“Wait—”
“Thanks for the movie, Grizzly,” she said.
Fuck. I had ruined it by calling her that old name that she hated so much for some reason. The glow of pleasuring her fizzled out in front of me.
“Ana—”
“It’s getting late, and I’m going to be job hunting tomorrow, remember?” she said.
I clenched my jaw a little, and nodded. “Yeah. I’m sorry. Thanks ... the movie and everything,” I said, despite the fact that we hadn’t actually watched the movie, at least not in any kind of significant way.
“Good night, Grizzly.”
“Good night.”
Chapter Twelve Road Rage
One Week Later
Abandoned House
“You got what I want?”
The man across from him—the one they liked to call Road Rage—looked from side to side nervously, like he was afraid of something. That made Road Rage laugh. It was a little demented, and a lot of crazy, showing off a bunch of rotted, busted teeth.
“Answer the question, asshole.”
“Uh. Yeah. Yeah, I have what you want. The man pulled a baggie from inside his worn coat pocket, full of white powder.
Road Rage looked at it with a smirk. “Good. Hand it over.”
The man eyed him, apprehensive to what he was asking.
“Well?”
“Usually I get paid first. Money out, over. Then the drugs, man. You know how this works. Obviously.” The last little bit was muttered, as if Road Rage wasn’t supposed to hear it, but oh, he did.
“You say something, you little fucker?” The man raised his hands defensively and shook his head. He was starting to panic. He knew Road Rage’s reputation. Rage was an understatement of uncharted proportions.
“No, man, no. I just. This is how you do business, you know?”
Road Rage nodded, as if that made sense. “Yeah. Yeah. Business as usual.”
Before the man could respond or even stop him, Road Rage pulled out a gun. He aimed between his eyes and shot him, didn’t even give the poor guy time to respond, time to duck, time to even think that his life was about to end. Not like Road Rage really cared. He bent down where the man had slumped, retrieving the bag from him and pocketing it. He turned to his companions, who had their eyes on where Road Rage had stuffed the bag into his pocket, but snapped their attention to him immediately when he began to talk.
“Business, then?”
“Yeah.”
They walked into the house that was behind them, leaving the man’s body in the front. They were in the middle of nowhere; no one was going to come by and see the man, and if someone did, they wouldn’t care enough about his presence there to call the cops or any other authorities, either.
Inside, there were more people, about as uptight as Road Rage was, all in tattered kuttes and various states of highs, fucking, or unconsciousness. These were Rage’s boys, and as far as he was concerned, the real MCs of the area. Or at least they would be. He just needed to get rid of a little problem.
He and the others moved into a dirty, dingy back room. It smelled of smoke and sweat, but no one there was bothered by it; they were all used to the stench that hung in the air a little more than they should be. Rage sat them down at a table.
“It’s been, what ... three weeks?” Rage said.
“Yeah ... yeah, abouts, Boss.”
“Well?”
One of the men that had come in with Rage, a thing with sunken eyes and dirty hair, twitched a bit before answering. “None of them got killed in the little stunt, but you already knew—knew that. They been doing the normal. Nothing new. All the same.”
“And the girl?”
“She stays with them still,” another of those that were with him said. His eyes were a little glassy, speech slurred. He’d hit not an hour ago.
“Does she know ...”
“Yeah. Even got pictures, boss. Good ones—even inside. Well. Before they kicked us out—”
“Your fault for causing a fuss.”
“I didn’t cause a fuss—!”
“Shut the fuck up!” Rage shouted. All went silent. He looked to the one with the dirty hair. “Pictures, you say?”
“Yeah, boss.”
“Show me.”
The man fished around in his pockets, seeming to have forgotten where he had stowed his phone. When he finally retrieved it and pulled up the pictures, Rage snatched the phone from him, to see for himself.
“Duchess ...”
She looked as beautiful as ever. Changed, definitely. Longer hair. Filled out, too. He bet her pussy was still as pretty and tight as ever. She was behind the bar he kne
w to be at the Butcher’s club, where they operated out of and had their steady business. She was pouring out a drink. Right across from her was him.
Grizzly.
Back when he had been Rodent, Rage had had Duchess. She was his. Grizzly had been his friend. But he had always seen the way that Grizzly looked at Duchess, and had noticed when she started pulling away from him ... getting closer to Grizzly ... and then having to see him carrying her off when he was bleeding out that night—