When the trunk popped open, sunshine beamed in on her dilated pupils. She couldn’t see Joe at first as he stood off to the side, probably so she couldn’t kick at him when the trunk lid swung open. He may have been an asshole, but he was smart enough to learn from the mistakes of the previous evening, and he knew Linda would fight back if he gave her an opening.
He bent over her, and the metal ring popped open. Then he backed off and ordered her to step out of the car. His pump action shotgun was pointed at her as her bare feet touched the stone driveway.
“Turn around and close the trunk,” he said.
As the trunk clunked shut, she saw that they were in the driveway of a two-story brick McMansion adorned with yellow crime scene tape.
“Time to go inside, Honey. The door’s unlocked.”
She stepped onto a cool marble foyer that opened onto a plush living room with a stairwell to the second floor on the left side and windows looking out over a creek to the right. More yellow tape crisscrossed the bottom of the stairway.
He marched her to a white leather couch and ordered her to sit, and then the cop in the overstuffed uniform sat opposite her in an overstuffed chair. “I hope you like your new home,” he said. “It just became available last week.” He smiled, and she decided that his teeth were entirely too small for his puffy face. “I’d give you a tour of the master bedroom, but a meth lab blew up under the stairs. It’d be a pity to see you fall into the basement.”
“How long do you think you can keep me here, Joe? How long before someone comes looking for you?”
“I’ve got a week off. That’s plenty of time to make you see the error of your ways and to put a beat-down on your little boyfriend. Maybe I’ll bring you some of his tender parts in a jar.”
“You’ll need a really big jar—bigger than I ever imagined before I met him.” She didn’t even know why she said it. She knew it was a dig at his insecurities, but she didn’t know why she made that particular dig while he sat across from her with a shotgun in his lap.
His ruddy complexion turned even more crimson as his jaw clenched and his eyes glared. He looked almost nothing like the man she had met and married. To think that they had tried to have children—that she kept trying even as his behavior became more controlling and her friends became more concerned. Now he sat across from her in puffy skin with a badge and a puffed-up ego surrounding a sad little core. And he thought she was his property, apparently, despite the fact that he had divorced her for another woman.
The divorce had been a blow to her, but she turned it into the blow that forged the blade. She was the stronger alloy now, and she sensed that he knew it as well; sensed that he could feel the rust in his veins and the lead in his gut, and it scared him.
And fear had led better people than him to do terrible things.
*****
Kirk knew what had happened the second he saw Linda’s phone and the broken coffee mug on the floor. He retrieved his semiautomatic pistol and a leather-handled fighting knife from a hidden lockbox in the closet and turned immediately back out of the apartment and called Mary, who asked for five minutes to contact a friend inside the Arlington County Police Department. It was seven and a half minutes before she called back.
“I’ve got a location on Officer Asshole’s patrol car, Kirk. It’s in northern Arlington County just northwest of Chain Bridge. I’ll send you the lat/long via text. Also, I talked to our friends on the FBI side, and there’s not much they can do through unofficial channels. I can try the Virginia State Police, but they may do a handoff to the Arlington County Police. ”
“And that’s a bad thing?”
“My contact worries that officer Platt may be monitoring their frequencies or that one of his buddies might send him a warning. There’s also the small matter of how my contact came to know about this in the first place.”
“No worries, Mary. I’m already heading north on the GW Parkway.”
“Are you armed?”
“Do you really want to know?”
“No. I’m pretty sure you know how to take care of yourself, Kirk. I suppose you can forget what I said about avoiding confrontation. I’ll get some kind of help to you as soon as I can. “
Kirk parked in a church parking lot off of Rt.123 and set off through the woods, staying parallel to the river. He reached a small creek and turned to follow it uphill to the target, but there was too large an open area and too many windows on that side of the house, so he worked his way back down to the river’s edge and moved fifty meters upstream. Then he turned ninety degrees and crept uphill again to where the woods were closer to the house.
He could see the back of the patrol car parked outside the attached garage, so the target was confirmed. The garage also offered the easiest and most concealed access to the roof, and it was always better to take a building from the top down, even if you had no grenades. Slow and smooth, he crept up to the garage, climbed onto a fence post and then onto the roof. He made his way to a window and checked for alarms before laying a few strips of electrical tape on the window pane above the lock and tapping the point of his knife at the center of the glass. The glass cracked in several directions, and he carefully removed it all, placing the rough triangles of glass on a shingle he’d bent up, to keep them from sliding off the roof.
The window opened easily enough, and Kirk listened for a minute before inching through it into an empty bedroom. He moved down the hallway in a combat glide and cleared every room on the second floor before turning back to the stairs. He scooted down the first few stairs sideways and leaned to get a view of the floor below. Linda and her ex sat across a low coffee table from each other in a large room. Kirk could see stainless steel handcuffs glinting on her wrists and the blue steel of a shotgun barrel in his lap. Their shoulders were to the stairway, and Joe seemed warier of the front door than the stairs. Kirk would be somewhat behind him almost all the way down to the landing. Linda would have the opportunity to see Kirk much sooner as he descended the stairs, and he hoped she wouldn’t react.
He was almost two-thirds of the way to the landing when the center of the stairway collapsed. He dove forward, feet twisting behind him, and landed on his right shoulder. His clavicle gave an unhealthy snap, and the pistol skittered across the landing to the main floor. Kirk rolled to his feet and lunged through police tape toward the towering police officer as the shotgun swung around quickly. The business end would be pointed at Kirk before he made contact. He was just ready to roll onto the deck when Linda crashed into her ex and the shotgun swung too far and boomed. Kirk hit the man high, and the low coffee table cut his legs from under him so they rode over the stone table top together. The back of Joe Platt’s head smacked to the floor just as Kirk’s fist smashed into his face. Kirk snatched up the shotgun with his left hand, jumped clear, and pointed the weapon back at his opponent, but it was clear that the man wouldn’t be getting up any time soon.
Linda stood across the table from Kirk with her handcuffed wrists extended toward him. “Now that you’ve made your grand entrance, can you help a girl out?”
He found the key in a keeper on Platt’s belt and released her from the cuffs, all with his left hand, since he seemed unable to lift his right arm. Then he rolled Joe onto his stomach and let Linda have the honor of cuffing him. That seemed to signal the real end for her, and her relief came out in silent tears on Kirk’s shoulder.
“That was quite a fourth date,” Kirk said.
She lifted her head from his shoulder and kissed him. “You really know how to show a girl a good time.”
*****
By that evening, it was clear that Officer Joe Platt would survive his injuries, but would not survive the security footage of him shoving his ex-wife into the trunk of a police car. Kirk would survive as well, but a broken right clavicle and a broken bone in his left hand were going to keep him off of the traveling team for a while. Apart from some soreness, Linda was fine, and she didn’t mind at all that her big, tough SEAL
needed some help in the shower.
She propped him up in bed that night sans clothing and then left to change into a sheer black babydoll she had fetched from her apartment. When she walked back into the bedroom his eyes widened and he gave a low whistle.
“Come to Papa, little lady,” he said, his fingers curling in a ‘come-hither’ motion.
She walked slowly up the side of the bed, letting her fingers trail up the inside of his leg and bump over his abs. “Remember: Some things are meant to be savored, taken in small bites.”
She bent to kiss him and let her hand drift to his navel and then slowly back up to his chest. Then she moved her lips to his ear and whispered, “Slow is smooth; smooth is fast, right?”
She stepped back, stripped the babydoll up over her head and tossed it onto his shins with an “Oops.” Then she pinched a corner of the garment in her fingers and dragged it up his legs and around his swollen penis where it climbed like a snake on a branch until it crawled off onto his torso and she flipped it up onto the pillow beside his head.
“Was that slow and smooth, Kirk?”
“You’re killing me,” he said, “and I just broke two bones for you.”
“Well, it seems I’ve helped you grow another one.” She touched over the glans with her index finger and drew a slick trail of his anticipatory emissions down the shaft. He twitched and moaned, and his hips rose ever so slightly. “I really need to be de-thonged again before I deal with that. It’s too bad that I’m the only one capable of a proper de-thonging at the moment.”
She turned her back to him and slowly bent at the waist as she stroked her hands down her hips and legs, drawing the lacy black fabric along as she went. She tried not to think too much about the show she was putting on for him, and felt some relief when she finally straightened and kicked free of her panties.
She turned back toward him and climbed onto the bed between his legs. She took him in her hand and kissed her way along the path her lingerie had taken and then continued upward. She felt his hot need press between her breasts and down her abdomen before it met with her own. She kissed him and slid back, taking him in millimeter by millimeter until he was fully sheathed.
“Was that smooth enough for you, sailor?”
“So smooth that I’m afraid it’s going to be really fast.”
“That’s okay. We’ve got all night.”
It wasn’t too fast. It was just perfect.
And they had all night and then some.
THE END
Bonus Story 19 of 40
Rugged Biker
Chapter 1
Liz
“Mom, I don’t know if I can make it for Christmas this year, work has been really hectic,” I said and stifled my sigh as I sat down with a cup of coffee in hand. It was bright and sunny in Colorado, but ice-cold outside, since we were in the middle of December. My mother had remarried a man named James. I didn’t know much about him since he lived in upstate New York. He and my mother met over an online dating site and dated long distance for a couple of years before she moved to New York and married him a few months later. My brother lived in New York too so he had already met James a few times and claimed he was a good guy. But Seth was a mama’s boy, and he was okay if our mother seemed to be happy. Apparently, she ‘needed’ a man to grow old with. Both she and James were in their fifties.
“But honey, it will be James’ and my first Christmas together. You didn’t come for Thanksgiving and I think it would be great to have our families together. That way you can get to know James and meet your new stepbrothers.” I rolled my eyes. She couldn’t have married a guy with at least one daughter?
“Fine, fine, I’ll see what I can do.” I sighed and my mother squealed in her usual Veronica excitement.
“Oh great! It’ll be so great to have everyone together for Christmas. Oh and don’t book a hotel, our new house has plenty of room for you to stay with us.” I paused and my mother fell silent, probably holding her breath.
“Mom… really?” I sighed again and placed my cup of coffee on the small coffee table next to the couch. I stared outside at the picturesque Colorado winter day, there was a blanket of snow on the ground that would no doubt be melted with the unhindered brightness of the sun. I would much rather stay home and have Christmas with friends than with a new family I didn’t know.
“Please Liz? I haven’t seen you in years. I feel like you’re distancing yourself from me and your brother, and I don’t know why.” Great she was pulling the guilt card.
“Fine. Okay, I’ll come Mom,” I said and I could practically hear the smile stretching across her face.
“Great! Just tell me when you’re flying in and I’ll have Seth pick you up from the airport,” she said excitedly. We ended the call shortly after and I made plans to fly out that night. I had closed a lengthy case at work so I was due for a holiday. I worked for the district attorney and usually the holidays were a busy time for us. But, I had worked so much overtime before closing my last case that my boss all but told me to not to work on another case until after the New Year. So really, I had no excuse not to go and visit my mother, her new husband and his son’s, and my brother.
I had to leave for my flight by six that night so I had time to do a little Christmas shopping and take my time packing. When I was settled at the airport that night, waiting for my flight to board, I called Seth.
“Hey sis! How are you? Are you on the plane yet?” Seth had inherited our mother’s bubbly and enthusiastic nature and I sometimes found it tiring. I knew I had to build up my tolerance again if I was going to be around them for a week.
“Hey Seth, I’m good. The flight hasn’t boarded yet, so I’m just hanging out at the airport,” I replied.
“Okay well, tomorrow Mom and James want to have this family breakfast at some diner they swear by. I think you’ll like James if you give him a chance,” Seth said. I was going to keep an open mind. It’s not that I didn’t want my mother to be happy or anything. I just felt that she made a lot of changes to be with James. He hadn’t made any visits to Colorado nor did he move across the country to be with my mom.
“I’ll keep an open mind. What about his sons? What are they like?” I asked and Seth chuckled.
“They’re cool guys. Caleb actually works near my company at a marketing firm in the city. Hunter, owns his own motorcycle shop near Rochester. He’s more rugged than his brother, but they seem like good guys,” Seth said succinctly. I chewed on my bottom lip and sighed when my flight was called to board.
“All right then. Well, they’ve just started to board for my flight, so I’ll see you in a few hours.” I said. Seth promised to be there when I landed. When I settled into my seat on the plane, I got comfortable and slept for most of the flight since it was non-stop to Rochester.
When the flight landed, I texted Seth to let him know. After I got my bags from the baggage section, I went to the bathroom and touched up my makeup. I didn’t need much, just some lip gloss and mascara. I brushed out my hair and studied my reflection to make sure I was presentable. My hair fell in soft waves around my shoulders. I didn’t look like I was coming off a five-hour flight. It was one in the morning so I doubted I would see anyone until morning anyway.
When I got outside, I spotted Seth easily as he was a tall, big guy. Seth loved to work out and he had all the muscle to prove it. He waved at me with a huge grin on his handsome face. I hurried over to give him a hug.
“It’s so good to see you! My goodness how much muscle are you going to pile on?” I teased and Seth laughed. He had my late dad’s good looks, square jaw and cleft chin, dark hair and hawkish features.
“Oh stop, I haven’t put any more muscle on, I just maintaining,” Seth said and I rolled my eyes as he picked up my suitcase as if it was feather light. “You on the other hand, are gorgeous as always. I feel like I haven’t seen you in years!” Seth said as we walked to his Range Rover. He put my suitcase in the trunk and then climbed in the driver’s seat a
s I got in the passenger side.
“So is everyone asleep over there?” I asked and Seth nodded.
“Yeah more or less. Hunter is out though, so who knows. He might be getting back by the time we get to the house, which is really nice by the way,” Seth said with a grin and I turned my head to look out of the window. It started to snow and I smiled, seemed like it would be a white Christmas.
Chapter 2
Hunter
“Yo’ Hunt! Charlie knows of this place we can hole up off the next exit!” I glanced over at John, one of my biker brothers in our crew. We were a group of ten guys and had formed a biker club. We usually just rode around, showed off at bike shows and gathered at dive bars, but occasionally, to keep our ‘outlaw’ status we committed a few petty crimes. We didn’t really have a name, but the owner of the bar we often hung out at called us ‘the boys,’ so we went with that.
I nodded to John and then followed the rest of the guys off the highway at the next exit. Sitting on my all black, Iron 883 Sportster, the wind felt like a force all its own as we sped toward the abandoned warehouse Charlie had been talking about earlier. Our pack roared through the streets until we reached a long winding road that was flanked by woods on both sides. Where was Charlie taking us anyway? We finally went down a dirt turn off and rode through the trees until we reached a huge warehouse. The sun had just set and the chill of the winter night was setting in.
“Hey, who has the spray paint?” Charlie got off of his Harley just as everyone else arrived, parked and turned off their bikes.
“John has it, but more importantly, who has the beer!” I hollered and a couple guys came forward and we forced open the huge warehouse doors so we could set up inside. The plan was to tag a wall with our name on it, then build a fire inside and sit around it with a few beers and cigars. It wasn’t a serious crime. But it wasn’t technically legal either. Charlie took his bandanna from around his leather clad arm and wrapped it around his nose and mouth before he picked up a can of black spray paint that John set down to get the beer. One of the guys tossed me a beer and I twisted the cap open and watched as Charlie painted, ‘The Boys’ onto the far left wall. He was actually pretty good at block letters.
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