His mouth came over me again, sucking deep. His fingers starting thrusting in and out and I grunted, muscles trembling as I stiffened. So close. He paused again, but I didn’t open my eyes to see what he was doing. Maybe I should have, it would have given me some warning. When he started f**king me with his fingers again, he found my ass with his other hand. I screamed as he thrust a finger in my back entrance, exploding into his mouth as my back arched off the bed.

It took me a couple minutes to come back to myself.

I opened my eyes to find him beside me, up on one elbow, studying me not with satisfaction but brooding, determined need. I blinked at him, dazed.

“Gonna f**k you now.”

“Sure,” I whispered, dazed. “Not sure I’m gonna be able to participate too much, think you blew a circuit or something.”

He smiled, a look of grim satisfaction. Then he carefully positioned himself over me, reaching down between us to position his wide c**k head against the lips of my slit. I came to my senses.

“Condom!” I gasped, pushing at his chest. “Stop! We need a condom.”

“Want you bareback,” he muttered, narrowing his eyes. “I’m clean.”

I shuddered, closing my eyes.

“Maybe you are, but I might not be. Gary was cheating on me.”

That caught his attention, and his eyes softened. He reached up and brushed his thumb against my cheek, where the bruise had been.

“He gave you that mark, yeah?” he asked. I nodded. “Your brother said he’s history. That right?”

I nodded again, looking anywhere but his face, which wasn’t easy with him right on top of me.

“I don’t want to talk about Gary. Do you have a condom?”

“Yeah, out in my saddlebags,” he said. “Believe it or not, I didn’t entirely plan on this.”

I laughed.

“Neither did I.”

“I know,” he said, rolling off me and flopping on his back. I turned on my side and looked down to see his c**k for the first time.

“Oh my god…”

It was huge. I mean, huge. Not just long, but thick and hard and flushed bright red so it looked almost angry. It curved up, wider in the center of the shaft before narrowing under the ridge of his head.

I couldn’t help myself. I reached down and traced the length, mesmerized by the heat of his soft skin over something so hard and formidable.

“Told you why they call me Horse,” he said. I dragged my eyes away to look at his face, reading satisfaction mixed with his desire.

“They make condoms that big?” I asked, halfway serious.

“You’d be surprised,” he muttered. “Saying this goes against everything I believe in, but you’d better let go of my dick.”

He rolled off the bed, reaching down to grab his jeans, pulling them on over his length with some effort.

“Goin’ outside to my bike. Don’t move.”

That wouldn’t be a problem.

He opened the door, then stopped in the doorway.

“Fuck,” he said, sounding resigned.

“The sweet butt’s a screamer, I like that,” I heard a man’s voice say from the living room, right outside my door. Oh shit. I grabbed the sheet, jerking it up and around me. I couldn’t believe we’d had an audience. The walls in this place were paper thin, they must’ve heard everything.

I turned and moaned into my pillow.

“Sounds like a hot little bitch,” said another voice. “She ready for another round? I’ll take a piece.”

Oh my god.

Horse walked out, slamming my door behind him. I heard him snarl something. Then laughter, followed by a thudding noise and a grunt. More laughter. The front door opened and slammed shut. A minute later Horse opened my door and came back in the room, carrying a leather bag. He sat down on the bed, digging in it and pulling out a handful of condoms, tossing them toward me.

“No way,” I said through gritted teeth.

Horse stood and pulled off his jeans, climbed up and over me on the bed on his knees, c**k thrusting aggressively. He narrowed his eyes and I shook my head quickly, feeling frantic.

He reached down, fisting himself and a droplet of pre-come beaded on his slit.

“I know you want this.”

I did, but not with an audience. I shook my head again.

“No, I mean it,” I said. “I’m not doing this with a bunch of guys in my living room. When did they get here? I didn’t hear any bikes.”

“Came in a cage,” he replied, squeezing himself hard, sliding his hand up and down. I’d never seen anything sexier in my life. He sucked in a ragged breath and I saw the pulse in his neck beating fast. “Doesn’t matter. Open the f**king condom. I want to feel you slide it on me.”

“No.”

Horse stilled, and something dark and heavy rolled into the room with us.

“No?”

“No,” I repeated, my voice small. “I heard what they said. I didn’t like it and I don’t want to have sex with them around.”

Slowly and deliberately, Horse let go of his c**k and leaned down over me, bracing his hands on either side of my face as he got real close. He held my gaze, eyes cold and hard.

“I f**k when I want and how I want,” he said. I shivered. This was the intimidating man I’d met that first day. I’d forgotten how much he terrified me. “So do my brothers. It’s my job to worry about them, not yours. You worry about taking care of me.”

“No,” I said again, scared but determined. “What we did earlier was incredible, and I’m sorry you didn’t get your turn. But I’m not having sex with an audience. Period. Get off my bed.”

“This is a mistake,” he told me.

“Get off the bed,” I repeated, holding my ground. I reached up and pushed at his chest. He exploded off me at the touch, spinning around to punch the wall. Then he grabbed his jeans, pulling them over his raging c**k commando-style. His cut came next, sliding over his bare torso. He grabbed the saddlebag and stalked out the door, slamming it so hard behind him I heard something crack.

Then I was alone in bed, stunned and covered in unopened condoms.

An hour later, Jeff knocked cautiously at my door.

“Marie, you okay?” he asked, voice quavering a little. “Um, did you know your door is cracked down the middle?”

“Yeah,” I replied softly, sitting in the middle of my bed, knees pulled up to my chest. I’d already gotten dressed and texted Denise, telling her I felt too sick for work. I’d heard Horse’s bike leave, heard Jeff and the guys arguing about something. Heard a truck peel out of the driveway. Now I just sat, trying to process what had happened.

I’d never been with anyone but Gary.

Horse had blown me away, first with his gentleness and then his skill. But he’d followed it up by scaring the crap out of me, not to mention doing some serious damage to the room. Which one was the real man? Would I ever see him again?

Did I want to see him again?

“Marie, can I come in?”

“No,” I said, looking around the room. Horse’s black t-shirt, emblazoned with the Reaper’s symbol, lay crumpled on the floor next to his boxers.

A neat pile of condoms sat on the bedside table.

Jeff didn’t need to see any of it.

“I’m going back to sleep for a while,” I told him after a long pause. “Let’s just leave it at that.”

Chapter Four

Sept. 17—Present Day

I gaped at Horse.

“You’re threatening to kill my brother just so you can sleep with me?”

Mohawk man walked casually over to Horse, draping an arm around his shoulders.

“She’s cute, but not real bright, brother,” he said, glancing toward me with a smirk. “Why don’t you let me take her for a ride, get her trained up for you?”

He gyrated his hips suggestively and the rest of the guys snickered. Horse turned fast, punching him in the stomach. Mohawk man doubled over but managed to stay standing as Horse grabbed my arm and jerked me out the door. He marched me away from the trailer into the orchard until we’d gone a pretty good distance, then pushed me back against one of the trees, leaning into my face and grabbing my shoulders.

“I don’t want to sleep with you,” he said, saying every word slowly and carefully, shaking me a little for emphasis. “I want to f**k you. Sleeping, cuddling, all that other shit is for girlfriends and old ladies. You’ve made it pretty goddamn clear you aren’t interested in any of that, so let’s get this straight. I’m threatening your brother because he stole from the club, which had nothing to do with you. You steal from the club, you pay in blood. You’re his blood. We take you, he pays. Fucking you is just a bonus.”

“So you’re taking me to show that people shouldn’t steal from the club?”

“It’s a f**kin’ miracle, she gets it,” he muttered to no one, throwing up his hands. “Your brother’s lucky, because I wanna stick my dick in you more than I wanna kill him. Otherwise this wouldn’t be worth the trouble. If Jeff-hole gets his shit together and pays back the club I might let you go—after I’m done with you. If he doesn’t, then I’ll find some other use for you. Got it?”

I nodded again.

“No games, no bullshit,” he said. Then he stepped back, running his hand through his hair roughly, pacing away from me. I started to follow him but he turned back around toward me. “You do this, it’s your choice. I’m not raping you. You’re making a decision to pay for your brother’s mistake on your back. You get me?”

Not exactly much of a choice, considering the gun pointed at my brother’s head. I didn’t say it out loud though. If the Reapers were willing to give us an out, I’d take it and call it whatever he wanted.

“I’m serious,” Horse said, glaring at me. “You call it off any time you want. I’m not gonna lock you up and watch you every minute. You make this deal, it’s up to you to keep it. And you don’t have to make the f**king deal. Your brother’s an idiot and he knew what he was getting into. This isn’t your mess and it’s not your job to bail him out.”

“You trying to talk me out of it?” I asked. “Well, you can’t. I meant what I said. I’d do anything for Jeff. Anything.”

His jaw clenched as he turned, growled and kicked one of the trees so hard it was a miracle he didn’t break a toe. Then he marched me back to the trailer.

We went inside to find the other guys sitting around, drinking beer and talking. Jeff lay on his side in the middle of the room, crying silently, the bruises covering what I could see of him getting uglier by the minute. Horse ignored all of them, pushing me into my bedroom and closing the door he’d cracked behind us. He ripped open my closet door, found a backpack and thrust it at me.

“You’ve got thirty minutes,” he said. “Then you’re on my bike and we’re headed home. Grab anything you want to keep.”

“Okay,” I replied, hoping he would leave me to pack in peace. Instead he leaned back against my still-cracked door, watching as I dug through my closet. I decided to go light on the clothing. I could always get more stuff to wear, but I wanted my pictures and what few keepsakes I’d managed to take with me from Gary’s. It was depressing to realize just how little I had.

I pulled out my shoebox of papers, tossing it on the bed. The box tipped over, spilling out photos. I ignored it, turning back to dig through the closet again. My mom had a pretty nice pair of leather boots in there somewhere, and while I’d never been a boot person, it seemed like wearing something to protect my legs might be important on a bike.

Horse sat on the bed, flipping through the photos. I ignored him, tugging at my cargo capris when they rode down, showing off my thong. Why had I decided to wear it today?

“You wear that shit for him?” Horse asked, his voice like ice. I turned and looked up to find him holding up a wedding picture smeared with dried blood. Me and Gary. So f**king young.

“Wear what?” I asked.

“That butt floss,” he snapped. “Why the f**k are you wearing a thong to work at a daycare? Are you seeing him again?”

“No!” I burst out, horrified. “I haven’t seen him since he beat the shit out of me, you should know that. He hasn’t called me, nothing. When I get all the papers ready, Denise’s husband said he’d serve them for me.”

“You keeping this?”

“Yeah,” I said, studying the picture. I’d had so many hopes and dreams then back then, and I let a man destroy them. “I don’t want to forget. At least not yet.”

Horse dropped the picture without a word and I kept packing, glancing at my phone periodically to check the time. Finally I surveyed the growing pile on my bed, sad that my entire life took up such a small space. All I had left to grab was bras and panties, which I really didn’t want to dig through with him watching me.

I didn’t exactly have a choice though.

I stood up and opened my underwear drawer. There wasn’t a lot, but if I was going to be Horse’s…um…whatever…some pretty panties might come in handy. He came up behind me, reaching down and cupping my hips in his big hands, pulling me back into his body as he leaned over me. He took a deep breath.

“I love how your hair smells,” he said gruffly as his hard c**k pressed against my butt. I heard Picnic and the others talking in the living room. Jeff was out there, waiting to see if they were going to kill him.

“I have ten minutes left,” I murmured, my voice tense. “Please.”