by Nina Park
As he spoke the words, I realized how badly I wanted it too. Even though my body was still warm from my first orgasm, I ached for him. There was a carnal need inside of me that had yet to be met. I nodded and reached out to him, my fingers grasping along his sides, trying to bring him to me.
He smiled down at me and, satisfying my desire, pressed himself against my opening. With one thrust of his hips, he buried himself in me. I groaned and wrapped my arms around him, running my fingers down his back, feeling the muscles flex and move as he pulled out of me and then pressed back again.
It was a beautiful rhythm. I felt his chest heaving against mine, felt the way his muscles shook with exertion and pleasure. His breath was warm against my neck, and I hooked my ankles behind his back, trying to get rid of any amount of space between us. I lifted my hips as Cade thrust downward, meeting him halfway. Our bodies moved in perfect harmony, giving and taking in equal measure.
After several minutes of this constant rhythm, Cade lifted himself halfway off of me, firmly grabbed hold of my hips, and pounded up into me with abandon. His pupils were blown wide, making him look more animal than man. He grunted with each thrust, sending me closer and closer to the edge once again.
I loved being underneath him. I loved the feel of his hands on my body, of him between my legs. It was a sensation I was more than happy to get used to.
He thrust into me and paused. I felt him trembling, felt the restraint he was exercising to control himself.
“Come for me, baby,” I said, letting him know he didn’t need to hold back anymore. “I want you to come inside of me.”
Cade moaned, and immediately the tension left his shoulders and his face. His eyebrows softened, and he moved in and out of me in slow, easy movements, shaking with each wave of pleasure. My body wasn’t far behind. I clenched and unclenched around him while the warmth spread from my midsection to the rest of my body. My mind went fuzzy, and everything softened.
For a minute.
“God, that was amazing, Falyn,” Cade said, crawling up next to me and collapsing into the pillows. “I could fall right back asleep.”
“It was so good,” I said, running my hand across his chest.
“But?” he asked, tilting his head to the side.
He could tell. Of course, he could. Though Cade and I hadn’t known one another long, he always seemed to know what I was thinking. It was something I knew I would come to love and hate in equal measure.
“It was incredible, and I look forward to doing it over and over again in the future,” I said, tracing the line of his jaw with my pointer finger. “But I can’t stop thinking about the girls.”
“The girls at Marco’s clubhouse?”
I nodded.
He twisted his lips to the side. “I can’t either. I can’t believe anyone has to live in those conditions.”
“It’s horrible, Cade.” I fought back a sob. “More horrible than I even told you. We have to help them.”
“I can’t make another deal with Marco. He barely let you go.”
“We can call the police. We can turn him in,” I suggested.
Cade shook his head and said the same thing Angie had told me. “Marco owns this city. We can’t turn him in. And even if I could, it would ruin the reputation of the Stone Devils. Guts would never forgive me, and I’d be lucky to make it out of the ordeal alive.”
“Okay,” I said, trying to think. “Then, we have to help them escape.”
I could tell he wasn’t sure, but he didn’t want to tell me so. I leaned forward and kissed him softly, our lips barely brushing.
“Please,” I whispered, begging. “Please help me help them.”
He pressed his forehead against mine and took a deep breath. “I’ll try.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Cade
The next morning, Falyn met with Guts to talk to him about what Marco was doing at the clubhouse. I’d wanted to wait a little longer, give her time to settle in and for Guts to get to know her, to begin to trust her, but Falyn couldn’t wait. I could see the plight of Angie and Bianca hanging on her shoulders, weighing her down. Rather than feeling elated by her own freedom, she was riddled with guilt that her friends were still trapped in Marco’s sadistic grip.
And I couldn’t blame her.
Guts listened as she told him about the conditions under which they lived, the way Bianca was trotted out several times every day to sleazy drug dealers, how Angie was used to make connections with other mafiosos. She told him about the night of the auction, and I had to take deep calming breaths while she talked about the way Marco had touched and examined her when she first arrived at his clubhouse.
The whole practice was sickening. It was bad enough to keep a girl for yourself or work them on the streets but imprisoning them in his clubhouse and using them as sex slaves was another level of awful.
“Marco Santorelli is a loose cannon. Always has been. He can’t be trusted, and I won’t ever do business with him again,” Guts said.
Falyn’s eyebrows pulled together. She’d poured her heart out to Guts, and she had no doubt been expecting more outrage from him. Instead, he seemed subdued and unsurprised. She opened her mouth to respond, but I cut in, knowing Guts would take me more seriously.
“This isn’t about partnerships and business dealings,” I said calmly. “He has women trapped there like animals. He’s using them like blow-up sex dolls.”
Guts leaned back in his chair and crossed his hands over his chest, his posture reminding me of Marco. “I don’t mean to sound crass, but if this isn’t about partnerships and business dealings, then I’m not sure why you’re here to talk to me. I’m not here to police people’s morals. I’m here to make money and look out for my club.”
I could tell Falyn was appalled by this, but I understood Guts. He wasn’t a bad guy, but he had to try very hard to be a good guy. He needed to be convinced that Marco’s practices had some effect on the Stone Devils; otherwise, he wouldn’t care.
“It’s a risky business,” I said. “Even the police he has paid off won’t be able to look away from human enslavement forever. And when they do finally arrest him, he’s going to have a stash of guns that could be traced back to the Stone Devils.”
“They’re scrubbed,” Guts said, dismissing me with a wave.
“But we don’t know what kind of bookkeeping Marco does. What if he has your name written down somewhere? I know it’s a long shot, but I know for a fact Marco isn’t keeping the girls a secret. He’s parading them around like they are fireworks and it’s the Fourth of July. Someone is bound to turn him in eventually, and when they do, the cops might head straight for us.”
“It was your idea to sell him those guns, Dickinson.” Guts only called me by my last name when I was being reprimanded. I could hear the strain in his voice. He was beginning to believe me, and the thought was a stressful one.
“I didn’t know what I was stepping into,” I lied. “I didn’t understand the scope of it until it was too late to back out.”
“And by ‘too late’, you mean until you met her,” Guts said, gesturing to Falyn.
It wasn’t a malicious move, but I could tell he was annoyed with how things had happened. I’d persuaded him to make the deal with Marco, and now I was using the deal to persuade him to take further action. From his perspective, I could see how it would look like an underhanded move, but I never intended to do more than save Falyn. Now that she wanted her friends out, though, I couldn’t tell her no. I had to try.
“Yes, Guts,” I admitted, nodding. “Meeting Falyn changed my mind. It put a face and a name to the poor women Marco is holding in there. But even if Falyn wasn’t involved, you can’t deny that Marco is putting all of us in danger with how he is choosing to do business.”
Guts sighed and leaned forward. “You’re right. Marco is a blight. His selfishness and recklessness have no place in our town. His family’s mafia legacy makes him feel big and important, but everyone knows the motorcycle clubs run
this city. His risk-taking is unnecessary, and it will draw bad attention from the authorities on everyone around us, the Stone Devils included. Marco has the police under his thumb now, but as soon as he diminishes in power, the bad cops will scurry like cockroaches to the next bad guy with money willing to pay them.”
He stopped speaking, and the room fell into silence for several seconds.
Finally, I broke it, too impatient to wait for Guts to explain himself. “So, are you saying you agree with us?”
Guts rolled his eyes and then nodded. “Yes, I support you. You’re right. We have to free those girls and end Marco’s tenuous control of this city.”
“I’m glad to hear it. I didn’t want to do this without you.”
He raised an eyebrow at me. “You would have gone over my head?”
I shrugged. “I’m not sure, but I’m glad I don’t have to find out.”
The plan for the raid came together easily. It was the only way we could get the girls out without ruining our reputation. Calling the police would make us snitches and talking to Marco and trying to reason with him would not only be fruitless but it would tip him off that we had a plan. A sneak attack with all of our best men would free the girls and still maintain the badass reputation Guts had established for the Stone Devils throughout the city.
I’d been to the clubhouse six times to talk with Marco and meet Falyn, but I didn’t know anything beyond the lobby, Marco’s office, and the room where I met Falyn. This is where Falyn’s time in the clubhouse paid off. She knew several of the back exits, and she’d been paying attention to Marco’s security protocol.
“He made his security look good because there were always guys around, but if you’re paying attention, you’ll notice it’s the same three guys all the time. There is next to no security, and they could be easily overpowered,” she said.
“What about visitors to the club?” Guts asked. “If he has a high-profile visitor there when we attack, they may have security that would fight back against us as well.”
Falyn shook her head. “The only people who came regularly were Cade, the old fat mafioso who sleeps with Angie, and the low-level drug dealers Marco pimps Bianca out to.”
“Well, shit,” I said, laughing. “This is going to be even easier than I thought.”
“Marco is all talk,” Guts said. “I’m surprised he was able to pay you as much as he did for the guns if that is all the business he is doing. His family was huge in the last decade, but they are nothing now. This raid could be the final straw.”
“This raid could free the girls and officially make Marco a no one in the city,” I said, turning to Falyn and grabbing her hand, squeezing her fingers. “You and I could mark the end of the Santorelli dynasty.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Cade
We planned everything as well as we could. Falyn became a vital resource, offering up as much information as she could about the movement of Marco’s few guards, the doors that were usually guarded or locked, the best times to make the attack. With her help, everyone expected the plan to go off without a hitch.
We planned to ride to the warehouse, take out Marco and his goons, and save the girls. It seemed like a risky plan at first, but the more we talked about it, the clearer it became that everyone would benefit from Marco being wiped off the map. The other clubs doing illicit business in the area would see an increase in business and wouldn’t have to worry about Marco’s recklessness bringing the authorities down on them.
And with Marco no longer able to traffick weapons, the Stone Devils’ legal gun shop would definitely do better than it would have otherwise. Really, killing Marco would be a win-win-win.
Falyn rode with me in the car Guts lent out to MC members on official club business. I wanted to leave her at home, but she insisted.
“I can help you navigate the warehouse, and I know where Marco keeps the girls. Plus, the girls may not trust you. If you go in there guns blazing and kill Marco, they may run or hide from you, but I can act as a mediator. If I’m there, they’ll follow us out, and everyone will get to safety faster.”
I wanted to disagree with her, but she’d told me Angie and Bianca didn’t exactly trust me. I mean, I couldn’t blame them after everything they’d been through, but it still meant rescuing them could be complicated by their belief I was only there to make a sex enslavement ring of my own.
So, Falyn joined me. Her fingers fidgeted the entire drive, and by the time we pulled up in front of the warehouse, her knees were bouncing up and down uncontrollably.
“Are you okay?” I asked. “You can stay in the car if you need to.”
She shook her head, hands still restless. “No, I have to go in. I just didn’t think I’d ever come back to this place. Especially not so soon.”
“It will be for the last time,” I said, stilling her knee with my hand. “I promise.”
She looked up at me and nodded. “Let’s get them out and get out of here.”
Falyn wasn’t kidding about the lax security. All ten of the Stone Devils we brought with us were able to assemble outside one of the back doors of the club that faced the waterfront without anyone noticing a thing. I kept waiting for shots to come raining down on us from above or guards to start shouting for us to surrender, but nothing happened.
After a short countdown, I shot a single bullet into the deadbolt that locked the door, sending the metal flying to the ground in useless, mangled chunks. Everyone held their breath for a few seconds, waiting for the onslaught from Marco’s men, but again, there was silence.
“Are we sure this is the right building?” someone asked, giving voice to everyone’s thoughts.
“Positive,” Falyn and I both said at the same time.
The back door opened to a dark hallway and the troop of Stone Devils marched down it quietly, eyes open and alert. All the lights were off, but as we stepped into the lobby, I saw a chink of light coming from beneath the door of the private club. I gestured for the group to continued towards the door, but Falyn grabbed my arm and stopped me.
“The girls are over here,” she said, pointing towards a door behind the bar.
“We’ll keep going,” one of the men said. “You two get the girls out.”
I nodded, and then Falyn and I split off from the group.
“I’ll unlock the door, and then you get the girls out while I help the guys in the private club,” I said.
Falyn’s eyes were wide, and I could see the fear in her face. “No, you can’t stay in here. Leave with me.”
“I got these men into this mess. I can’t abandon them.”
She shook her head. “I got you into this mess. What will I do if something happens to you in there?”
“Nothing will happen to me,” I assured her. “If you were right, we far outnumber the guards and the guys probably already have them under control.”
I still didn’t hear much noise from that side of the warehouse, and I couldn’t decide whether that was a good thing or a bad thing. I supposed it at least meant there wasn’t a big fight going on that I was missing.
Falyn still didn’t look sure, but I pulled her against my chest for a quick hug and then kissed her cheek. “Save the girls, and I’ll meet you by the water.”
Before she could argue, I reared back and kicked at the door handle, sending the knob clattering to the ground. The door cracked open slightly, and I smiled at Falyn before jogging back towards the private club to help the Stone Devils.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Falyn
The small room was dark and quiet as I pushed the door open and stepped inside. For one horrifying moment, I wondered whether Marco hadn’t heard the Stone Devils coming and snuck the women out before he arrived. Had he already moved them to a new location where they would continue to serve him and his associates? Was I too late?
Then, I heard a soft whimper coming from Angie’s side of the room.
“Angie?” I was met with silence as I waited for my e
yes to adjust to the gloom. “It’s me, Falyn.”
There was a rustle of blankets, and I moved towards Angie’s bed and reached up for the top bunk, my hands sliding across the mattress until I felt a thin ankle.
“Angie, quit hiding. It’s me.”
She gasped and pulled her leg out of my reach. “What are you doing here?”
I was about to answer when I felt an arm slip around my neck and squeeze softly – a warning. I held my body entirely straight. It was Marco. He’d found me, and I’d be dead before Cade could ever make it back.
“What are you doing here?”
Relief washed through me as I realized the voice in my ear belonged to Bianca. Suddenly, I noticed the thinness of the arm around me and the tremble of the body it was attached to. She was terrified.