Page 25 of Violent Things
Now’s not the time to be cocky. I concentrate on what I’m doing, locking him down, making it impossible for him to move without extreme pain firing through his whole body. Maybe I’m concentrating too hard.
I’m ready for him when he tries to jerk me off him, using his hips to push backward. When he realizes I’m not going to let him off that easy, he rips his body around, growling against the discomfort of his arm nearly popping out of joint.
The next three seconds happen quickly. I’m on top of Ben in mount position, legs either side of him one second, and the next I’m on my back and Ben’s hammering his fists into my face.
They call it ground and pound for a reason. I have to get out of this position.Right. Fucking. Now.Ben’s too busy pummeling my face to guard any other area of his body. As his fists rain down, I somehow have the common sense to react. To move. To jab him as hard as I can. I am for his ribs, and pure determination takes over. I know I’m spraying blood everywhere from my mouth and my nose every time I gasp for breath, and I know Ben’s doing his fair share of bleeding onto the canvas too, but neither one of us stop.
Eventually, Ben’s winded enough that he pauses—just enough of an opening for me to get out from under him. It goes on like this for another three minutes, one of us bettering the other, the other taking a beating, and then the roles reversing over and over again. I’m so exhausted I can barely lift my arm anymore when the final bell rings.
The crowd starts hollering and screaming at the injustice of the fight being called to an end. Ben and I lay on our backs, chests heaving, blood all over our skin, in our hair, in our eyes, bloodeverywhere, and all I can focus on is the light swinging over my head, burning into my retinas, and the insanity of my heartbeat.
Carlos stands us up, clearly unhappy that Ben didn’t just wipe the fucking floor with me. He holds Ben’s arm in the air and the crowd cheers like crazy. Surprisingly, when he holds my arm in the air, the reaction is the same. A draw.
Well fuck me.
An hour passes where more people fight and me and Ben slump against the back wall, trying to get our shit together. Eventually Carlos comes and pays up the money he owes us, half each. Nine hundred dollars for me and nine hundred for Ben.
“Not bad for two black eyes and a mild concussion, huh?” Ben laughs. “Fuck, you punch like a heavy weight.”
“Sorry, man,” I sigh. Am I really sorry, though? Hell no. I hand over the one fifty he spotted me, feeling kind of amazing as I pocket what’s left over. Seven hundred and fifty bucks. I wouldn’t earn that working for Mac every day for two weeks. A couple of black eyes and a mild concussion were worth it all right.
Chapter Twelve
Zeth
A pineapple sits on the kitchen counter. Apineapple. It’s just not something you see everyday. It wasn’t there when I went to bed last night, that’s for sure. I’m all for eating fruit—you don’t get a body like mine by shoving Twinkies down your throat twenty-four-seven—but this thing looks like it requires preparation. It’s fucking spiky. I stand in the kitchen, staring at it for a while, contemplating how to proceed, and then I figure,fuck it, I’ll wing itand go on a mission to find a knife.
Sloane got sent home from work yesterday, and is still asleep upstairs in our bed.Ourbed. I never thought I’d be thinking those words. It gives me insane pleasure to run a playback of what took place in that bed yesterday in minute detail as I carve up the fruit for my girl’s breakfast. There was a lot of spanking involved. And a tiny clamp that I hooked up to Sloane’s clit, firing electrical charges into her sweet pussy that had her clawing at my skin and screaming out my name. I fucking love when she does that.
The memory of our heated sex is almost enough to put Agent Lowell and her damn skivvies out of my head. Michael’s on the case. He’s going to figure out what the hell she’s doing back here, and then the two of us are going to figure out how we make her disappear again. As if he knows I’m thinking of his last owner, Ernie lifts his head from his paws where he’s been sleeping by the back door and growls. Funny little bastard. I don’t want to think about Lowell at all today, so I take a deep breath and exhale the stone cold bitch right out of my head. Ernie sighs like he’s doing the same.
It’s one of those rare cold but extremely sunny mornings in Seattle. Like a damn finger of fate pointing straight down from Heaven, a pillar of light is shining straight through the glass doors at the front of the house, landing directly on the drawer where I stowed a small, velvet-covered box not so long ago. A gift for Sloane. A gift I’m not ready to give her yet. Seems as though every time I walk past that goddamn drawer, I can feel the box inside humming like a freaking signalling beacon. I really need to move it. Take it down to the gym or something. Leave it in my locker there. She’d never find it amongst all my sweat-soaked workout clothes, hand wraps and boxing gloves. But then, no. That just seems fucking wrong.
I carry the sliced pineapple upstairs on a plate, along with the eggs I’ve made and some fresh orange juice. Very fucking domesticated. I would never have done this for anyone else. The stars would have collided and the universe collapsed in on itself before I bowed and scraped to any other woman. I don’t see taking care of my girl as bowing and scraping now, though. I see it as making sure she’s fed. Making sure she’s content. Making sure she’s safe. Making sure she’s fit and healthy enough for me to fuck her the way I like, and for her to demand more.
She’s still asleep when I enter the bedroom. Her dark hair is spilled across her pillow in loose waves around her head, her almost-black eyelashes like charcoal smudges against her pale cheeks. She looks like she’s been drawn or something. Created out of thin air. I find myself thinking that a lot—that someone has crafted her, this mythical creature who’s turned my life upside down—because how else can she be real? It makes no sense. The universe just isn’t this kind to anyone, especially guys like me.
Placing the food down on the bedside table, I move up the bed, pulling the covers back from her body as I climb. She’s naked underneath—so fucking perfect. Her breasts lay heavy, crushed between her arms as she lies on her side. I can already feel my cock stirring in my shorts. Nothing new there. Poor Sloane’s eggs are going to be cold by the time she gets around to eating them. I haven’t even made any food for myself. I knewshewas all I was going to want to eat. Placing my hand on her hip, I gently turn her body so that she’s on her back. Unlike my cock, her perfect nipples aren’t erect yet, but I have plans on changing that. Slowly, carefully, I lower my mouth to her skin and I lick across her collarbone, moving down until I trace my tongue across the swell of her tits. So. Fucking. Amazing.
Sloane groans, body writhing a little as she surfaces into consciousness. Waking her up this way is the best goddamn part of my day. I know she’s aware of what I’m doing when I feel her legs press together underneath me. She’s been so good recently whenever we fuck, doing as I tell her when I tell her to without hesitation or question, that now I feel like being bad for her. She’s earned it. I bite down on the now hard, tight bud of her nipple, sending a jolt of pain through her, waking her up properly. She reacts quickly, sucking in a sharp breath, her body tightening underneath me.
“Morning, angry girl. Dreaming about me?” I whisper.
Her fingers wind into my hair, which is longer than it’s ever been. Not hipster long. Just long enough that she can get a good fucking handful of it and pull when she wants to. She moans, which is a good sign. There aren’t many women you could wake up after a twelve-hour hospital shift with a bite to the nipple and have them appreciate it. This is why we’re fucking perfect together.
“You planning on backing that up?” she mumbles, her voice still a little hoarse.
“What? This?” I bite her again, this time on the other nipple. Her eyelids fly open wide, her back arching off the bed. “Stay still, angry girl. Don’t you dare fucking move unless I tell you to. If you’re good, I’ll make you come. Would you like that? Would that make you feel better?”
“Yes,” she says breathlessly. “I think it would.”
I hold myself over her, lowering myself a little more so that I can speak directly into her ear. “Okay. Spread your legs for me, Sloane,” I growl. She shivers in that way she does. The way that lets me know she likes the sound of my voice, rough and right up close in her ear like that. She likes feeling my breath on her skin. Like the good fucking girl she is, she widens her legs for me, and I change positions, moving so I’m inside her legs now. My dick is so hard I’m pretty sure you could break rocks with it. I catch sight of her pussy and my balls begin to ache like they haven’t been emptied in months, instead of yesterday morning.
Fuck.
“You’re so fucking perfect,” I groan. “God. Your pussy is beautiful. So pink. So sweet.” I can smell her, that peculiar yet addicting scent that drives me absolutely crazy. I just want to bury my face between her legs and go to town. Not yet, though. “You want me to make you wet, angry girl?” I ask.
Sloane looks up at me with those big brown eyes of hers and nods. “I’m already wet,” she whispers. She used to sound ashamed of the fact when she admitted that to me, but not anymore. She knows how much it turns me on to see her dripping wet and ready for me. As if to prove the point, she rocks her hips upward, giving me a better view.
