The Wicked Horse Boxed Set (+Wicked Bond [5])

by Sawyer Bennett

  Chapter 3

  Cain

  I noticed the blonde woman the minute I opened the door to The Wicked Horse because my eyes involuntarily went to the table she sat at with her girlfriends for the past few nights. It's odd to me that I felt a weird sort of elation over seeing her there, and it made me realize how much I was looking forward to hopefully figuring out the mystery of this girl tonight.

  My powers of observation are keen. No more than three steps inside the door and I saw her friend across the table raise her eyes my way and tilt her head toward me. The blonde woman started turning her head my way, and I immediately averted my eyes and headed toward the bar. No sense in letting her know right off the bat I'm here for her. Make her work for it a bit, I guess. Otherwise, where's the fun in that?

  That little exchange also told me something important. The blonde was waiting for me to come in, and she shared that with her friends. I saw her friend clearly get her attention and nod my way, so that tells me one very monumental piece of evidence.

  I'm going to fuck that girl tonight.

  It's odd I'm attracted to her, but I'm only talking about her superficial beauty. She's a well-put-together package no doubt, because what red-blooded man doesn't love a blonde with curves? But it's more the way she looks with her hair curled in loose waves down just below her chin, wide-set innocent eyes of baby blue, and dimples to the left and right of her mouth when she smiles.

  She looks like a metaphorical piece of apple pie, all sweet and sugary.

  That's usually not my thing. I like women who are aggressive and know what they want. With as much dirty fucking as I do on a regular basis, vanilla women are just a tad too boring. Doesn't mean I won't fuck them, but it does mean they're forgotten sooner than the others are. But I have to hand it to the blonde. She's not been handing me shy smiles and surreptitious looks. No, she stares at me like a woman who knows what she wants, and that's just so contradictory to her naive look.

  That's what, in fact, makes her such a mystery. I wonder when she's crying out in pleasure, will it be in a wholesomely saccharine way or if she'll pull my hair out by the roots while screaming for me to make her come harder?

  It will be interesting to find out.

  Now, how to go about getting in her pants?

  I decide to drink a beer and ponder the question, because it's still early and what I know about the blonde is that she'll hang here for a good chunk of the night. At least, that's been her modus operandi so far, so I feel confident I don't have to make a move soon. And besides, if I miss the opportunity with her, that's no skin off my back. I've got The Silo sitting twenty yards off the back of The Wicked Horse. I can bust a nut there just as easy.

  "Beer?" Ted says from across the bar. Good dude and he's also a fantasy maker at The Silo. He and I have starred together in some group fantasies in the past. The guy will fuck anyone that has a willing orifice, so it makes him a more popular member of the club.

  I nod at him as I take one of the few empty seats and watch as he pours my favorite. After he sets the Hefeweizen in front of me, I slide a ten-dollar bill his way and thus is the extent of our exchange. I'm not an overly chatty dude to begin with, but when I come here, I like to drink, people watch, and keep an eye on my crew.

  My back stays turned to the blonde for a few sips of my beer, but then I turn casually around on the stool and gaze out over the club. For a Thursday night, it's fairly packed, although it's still early yet. Give it another hour and it will be standing room only. My eyes first connect on Angel, our DJ, as she sits in a glass booth with a pair of headphones over her glossy, red hair. She's probably the only woman in the world who intimidates me, and only because she enjoys degrading and defiling men. She's a fem-dom, hardcore to the extreme. No matter how much weird shit I've seen happen in The Silo, it still blows my mind the amount of people who will pay to receive pain and degradation as a way to get off.

  But to each his own.

  I take another sip of my beer and casually move my gaze over to the blonde woman's table. I see it's empty but for their purses and drinks, but then immediately see her and her three friends dancing just a few feet away. Her back is to me and I have to say, it's not a chore watching her dance. Tonight, she's wearing a green floral pattern skirt that comes to mid-thigh and hugs her curves, and damn... she's got a delicious-looking ass too. She's wearing a blue, denim shirt that she has tied near her hips, baring the tiniest sliver of the skin on her stomach. It's unbuttoned to reveal a shadow of her cleavage, and she finishes the ensemble off with a pair of brown cowgirl boots. It's a sweet and sexy look, adding to the dual nature of this woman who is already sweet and sexy by leaps and bounds.

  I've watched her dance before, many times. She's damn good, but she's also particular. There's not been a man yet who has caught her eye as she's declined every offer. I hope to God she's not waiting on me to come ask her, because even though I've been told on more than one occasion I have incredible hip action, I do not swing them around on the dance floor.

  She doesn't look my way, and in fact, keeps her back to me. Perhaps playing a little hard to get?

  Makes me want to spank her ass, if so.

  I go to take a sip of my beer as I pin my eyes to her rotating hips, wondering how long she could keep that motion up if she was riding me, when I see a guy move into position behind her on the dance floor. She has no clue he's there, but he's openly leering at her ass, bending his knees and thrusting his pelvis suggestively behind her. Must be drunk, because no woman would ever find that sexy.

  Oddly, my first instinct is to stand from my stool and march across the room, right onto the dance floor, where I'll put him in a headlock and drag him off before he touches her, but that would just be silly. What I should do is motion to one of my guys on duty and point out the potential problem, but when I look over at Gary, who's one of two guys in charge of the dance floor, I see he's already well aware and watching.

  I ease my posture and try to relax. He'll handle it if necessary.

  And necessary apparently comes sooner than later, because the drunken, dancing fool moves right in behind the blonde and puts his hands on her hips. He does a weird, epileptic kind of move and pushes his pelvis into her ass.

  I start to stand from my stool again.

  Gary moves a step closer.

  We both watch to see if the guy backs off, but then I'm sure Gary is as shocked as I am when the diminutive blonde turns around, pulls her arm back, and slaps the shit out of the guy so hard, I can hear the crack of it over the blaring music. I'm momentarily stunned to inaction by this, but then the guy reels around, fury all over his face as he holds a palm to his cheek. He winds his other arm across his chest, indicating a clear intention to backhand the blonde, and I'm flying off the stool toward the dance floor.

  I see Gary make the same move, but we are both too far away.

  However, I'm brought to a dead halt, right in my tracks, again stunned to inaction, when the blonde pulls her right leg back and, before the guy can even swing his arm, she kicks him square in the nuts.

  Holy fuck!

  When the guy doubles over, she's not done with him. She balls her little hand into a fist, really so tiny it could never do damage, and lands a right hook to his face. The guy falls over onto the floor, one hand clutching his balls and the other his mouth, which is now bleeding.

  Gary is now on scene. Because apparently, the man on the floor needs protecting, he grabs the blonde from behind in a bear hold and pulls her back a few feet. She glares down at him and yells something, which prompts me to move.

  The dancing crowd has all halted, pressing in a tight circle around the combatants.

  Blonde girl--1.

  Douchey drunk--0.

  Won't be a second round.

  The minute my foot hits the dance floor, the blonde's eyes raise to meet mine. She stares at me with challenge, her face flushed red with fury.

  "Let her go," I tell Gary, who immediately releases her.
r />   To my surprise, she bends over the dude, who is now cursing through bloody teeth, and says, "Bet you'll think twice before rubbing your dick on a girl's ass, won't you?"

  The guy starts to push up from the floor, glaring daggers at the blonde. "You fucking cunt," he sputters with blood spraying. "You could have just said no."

  This infuriates the blonde, who steps toward him menacingly, and the guy isn't a fool. He leans warily backward, holding a hand out to stave off her approach. I have to suppress a laugh as I reach out and take her by the upper arm. Looking at Gary, I jerk my head to the guy. "Get him out of here safely."

  "Sure thing, boss," Gary says before grabbing the guy by the back of his collar and pulling him off the dance floor.

  "I'm leaving," the blonde says as she tries to shrug out of my hold. "You don't need to throw me out too."

  Throw her out? After that glorious display to all drunk men everywhere that they should heed hitting on the wrong woman? No way. I'm not throwing her out, but I am taking her out of here.

  "Let's get you cleaned up," I tell her as I start pulling her along. "Your hand's bleeding."

  Because I noticed that too. She must have scraped it on his teeth with that punch.

  She follows along easily behind me. As we walk past the table, she picks up her purse and calls out to the girls over her shoulder, "I'll be back."

  Yeah, that's not going to happen either.

  I lead the woman through the bar and toward the main doors. We step out into a mild, mid-July evening, right on the heels of Gary escorting the guy whose ass she just kicked over to a waiting cab. There's usually one or two lurking about waiting to take tourists back into Jackson. I turn in the opposite direction, heading across the wooden, covered porch of the club toward where I parked my truck.

  She pulls against me, and I turn to look at her in question.

  "Wait," she says in confusion. "You said we were going to get my hand cleaned up."

  "We are," I tell her as I turn back around and start walking toward my truck. "I'm taking you to your place, and I'll clean it up there. I'm thinking in your shower would be nice."

  Even though you'd never know it by the easy sway of my shoulders or my confident walk, I hold my breath wondering what she'll do. It was a bold statement on my part, but I don't feel like dicking around.

  Besides, I just don't flirt well.

  I'm immediately relieved when she says, "Sounds good to me."

  And I already start to get hard thinking about how easily she just capitulated.

  Chapter 4

  Sloane

  Cain has a beat-up, late 90's model Chevy truck. There's a dent in the front quarter panel, and it's covered in dirt. I'm surprised with his gallantry when he opens the passenger door for me and holds my non-punching hand in his while I navigate the running board.

  We pull out and head south on Highway 191 after I tell Cain I live in Jackson. He turns the radio on and adjusts the volume low. An unbidden smile comes to my face when I hear the sweet sounds of Soundgarden coming out versus a country song.

  "So," I say into the gloom of the interior. "We're taking a shower together, huh?"

  "To clean your hand, of course," he says in a matter-of-fact tone.

  "Of course," I murmur, turning in the cab to face him with the little play allowed in the seatbelt. "I'm Sloane, by the way. Sloane Meyers."

  I'm proud of myself that I don't even stumble over my fake last name.

  "Cain Bonham," he offers, and then says, "But I think I might just call you Right Hook."

  I laugh and turn back in my seat, giving my hand a tiny shake. I can't see what it looks like due to the lack of light, but it throbs like a bitch. However, I'm not about to let that interfere with my plans tonight. When I decided I needed something to get Cain's attention outside of flirty looks or a direct come-on, which wouldn't distinguish me at all, it's like God sent that drunken leech to hit on me. I didn't even really have a plan, just knew a spectacle would get Cain's attention, and I struck hard and fast.

  I figured it would get me thrown out of the bar, which I hoped would lead to some conversation with him, but never in my wildest dreams did I think he'd take me home.

  And tell me he was going to take a shower with me.

  I press my legs together as a different sort of throb starts to beat a bit further south than my hand. I have no clue if this half-baked plan to get in good with Cain will do anything for my story that I'm not even sure is a story, but I know one thing... tonight will be damn good regardless.

  "You didn't seem surprised by my offer of a shower together," Cain says in an off-handed manner.

  I could play this a hundred different ways. Most women in my position would want to solidify their status with a man such as this--do something that would stick in his memory for a long time. The best way to accomplish that at this given moment would be to take off my seat belt, crawl across the expanse of the cab, and undo his jeans. A hand job or blow job would be memorable, no doubt.

  But I have a feeling it wouldn't surprise Cain Bonham, nor would it be out of the ordinary to a man such as this. The guy who did Jasmine an apparently amazing favor by fucking her in the parking lot between beers. A man who is potentially embroiled deep within a fantasy sex club has probably seen and done it all.

  It's at this moment that, even as adventurous as I am in bed, I realize I might be out of my sexual element. There's probably not anything I can do to cause this man's eyebrows to raise and say, "Hey... this girl right here... she's special."

  So I simply answer, "Well, there's an attraction there for sure. I'm personally glad we aren't wasting time on lame come-ons and you buying me cheap beers to get me drunk. I'd like to remember this night, personally."

  Cain gives a husky laugh of appreciation and promises, "Oh, you'll remember tonight. I promise you that."

  The throb between my legs gets insistently stronger, and I press them tighter together.

  *

  The minute I pull my key from the lock and step into my tiny apartment, I'm immediately filled with broiling tension. Do I just strip out of my clothes and head to the shower? Or will he pounce on me?

  "Got anything to drink?" Cain says from behind me as he shuts the door.

  When I turn to face him, I find he's turning the deadbolt and closing the short set of blinds over the glass panes in the door. Locking us in and away from prying eyes.

  A tiny shudder runs through me.

  "Maybe some whiskey?" he asks, and I blink at him. When he notices confusion on my face, he gives a chuckle and steps toward me, tapping his index finger on my nose. "Did you think I was going to fuck you the minute we walked in?"

  "The thought had crossed my mind," I mutter as I turn away and head to a cabinet above the sink. I pull down a fifth of Jack Daniels, because I'm a Tennessee girl after all.

  "Need your first aid supplies too," Cain says. "Might as well get that taken care of sooner rather than later. That dude you punched looked like he could have rabies or something."

  "That's all in the bathroom," I tell him by way of explanation as I set the bottle and two shot glasses on the kitchen table and turn toward my short hallway. I hear the scrape of a chair indicating Cain must be pulling it out to sit in and I imagine he's twisting the bottle open as I step into the bathroom.

  After I turn on the light, I immediately look down at my hand. I must have projected my middle knuckle in the punch because it's slightly swollen. There's also a tear in the skin. It's the only open wound and didn't bleed that much; just a welled-up, large drop of blood that ran in between my middle and index finger before it started to clot.

  As I reach toward the mirrored medicine cabinet above the sink, I catch my own gaze in the mirror. I study myself for a moment, noting the hint of determination in my eyes and the tiny flush to my cheeks that is indicative of my excitement.

  Am I really going to do this? Am I really going to sleep with a man to try to gain a foothold on a story?

&
nbsp; My blue eyes blink back at me without a clear-cut answer.

  I mean, it's clear that I am going to sleep with him. I was attracted to him in that way long before I ever considered him a pathway to my end goal. But am I really going to use that intimacy to further my own agenda? Do I care if he gets hurt in the process?

  I stare back at myself, and I know I don't have any answers to those questions. Shaking my head, I open the cabinet. After grabbing some peroxide and Band-Aids, I head back out to the kitchen.

  I find Cain leaning back in the chair with his hands folded and lying right over his belt buckle. It's not a country-western type belt, but a plain, thick black one with an unadorned and unremarkable buckle. He does indeed wear black biker boots. On the table is a roll of paper towels he took from the holder over the sink, presumably to clean my hand. I can't imagine anything kinky we could do with that.

  My eyes flick to the bottle, which remains unopened. "Thought you wanted a drink?"

  "Lot of things I want." His voice is rich, low... rumbling. I feel it in my gut. "But there's a proper order to things."

  "Let me guess," I say with a smirk as I pull the chair out adjacent to his, turn it to face him, and sit. "Fix my hand first?"

  "Exactly," he says with a wink and takes my hand, pulling it toward him to inspect. He turns my hand before prodding at the swollen middle knuckle. "Hurt?"

  "A little," I tell him with a shrug.

  "Can you move it?" He holds his hand, palm up, and spread wide under me to cradle my hand.

  I give him an answer by curling and stretching my fingers. "All good."

  He nods and then silently cleans my hand. Peroxide, a good wiping and drying, and then a Band-Aid over the middle knuckle. I'm silent as I watch him and when the wrist on his right hand turns, I see all four of his knuckles are scraped open.

  "What happened to your hand?" I grab it just as he finishes pressing the Band-Aid onto my skin. I turn his hand palm down, lightly running my index finger over his knuckles, which are already scabbed over with tiny cuts.

  "I might have a right hook of my own that got used today," he says with a mischievous grin as he takes his hand away. He reaches over, grabs the bottle of Jack, and twists the cap. I watch as he pours two shots, and then he slides one my way. "Now, let's have a drink."