Don't Look Back

This is a work of fiction. Any names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons--living or dead--is entirely coincidental.

Don't Look Back @ 2014 by Candice Owen. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles or reviews.

CHAPTER ONE

Ink’s was a no frill
s gym on Ellis Road amid the short, salt-air-worn rectangular buildings of the less glamorous section of Melbourne, Florida. A motorcycle club haven, Ink’s was one of the few places of neutrality, besides Lou's Blues, for the many clubs that made the beach their home. It was a place where the common value of fitness was more important than any rivalry motorcycle clubs may have had. The second rule for bikers, especially in a beach town, was to have their beach bodies.

Sharon Steele was a personal trainer and an achievement coach with a studio at Ink's. She also subscribed to the rule of being as perfectly fit as possible. With firm, full, natural breasts, sculpted arms and legs, and flat abs, she was in her mid-thirties and in perhaps the best shape of her life. At the moment, she was summing up her last session with a client suffering from gross self-esteem issues. Her genius was interrupted by the frantic buzzer of the gym receptionist.

Before Sharon could answer the intercom she had an unexpected intruder. She froze, shocked to see now standing before her Jason Larson, a man who had been the love of her life before he was hauled off to prison ten years prior.

He stood on her Flotaki rug—a rug that she and he had had sex on many a morn, noon, and night—with wild pushed-back hair and his swagger: dark shades and the leather coat he wore as the sergeant at arms of Rowdy Riders Motorcycle Club. The black boot cut jeans did not disguise his extraordinary quadriceps. His muscles bulged despite the tight restriction of the dark denim.

Ten years. It felt like it had been that long since Sharon had had sex, though she was now an engaged woman. But damn if Jason Larson didn’t make her think of sex. Want sex. Need it. She was wet in the instant she saw him. He had been away for such an incredible period of time and yet now her mind was picking up where they left off. She didn’t know what seeing him made her feel more of: bitterness or arousal.

"Why did you come here?" she demanded.

"I'm out. I've come for what belongs to me."

"That wouldn’t be me," Sharon growled.

"Temper." Jason peeked above the rims of his sun glasses. "My goodness, you let your hair grow long.”

Sharon’s hair touched the beginning curve of her firm, round buttocks. Naturally streaked by the Florida sun, it fell perfectly straight in multicolor silky strands. She loved it. She got lots of compliments on it. It was a slight nuisance because it got in the way, but still she enjoyed it.

"What are you doing here? You know the manager will have you out of here when I tell him I want you out," she threatened, weak from the sight of him. She was so secretly enjoying the erotic surge he gave her. He had her all wound up. The phone rang and rattled her. She grabbed the receiver like she was wringing its neck.

"Hello!" she said, taking her annoyance out on the unwitting caller with a threatening tone. No response. She plugged her free ear and shouted, "Ink’s Gym!" Jason Larson coolly closed in on her and took the phone from her.

"We'll call you back," he said and hung up the phone. He lifted her hand gently to his nose. "Still wearing that honey scented lotion I introduced you to."

Jason Larson's eyes practically glittered. His dark, thick rim of lashes lined the greenest eyes Sharon had ever seen. If she looked up into them for much longer, she would cave and admit her utter weakness to him. All the years while he had been in prison and she had been convincing herself she couldn’t stand him just about evaporated now that he was standing right in front of her. "You have to go. The manager—"

"Is my employee," Jason finished, cutting her off. "Like I said, I am here to collect what is mine. Obviously you work here," he said.

"I have clients here," she replied, stunned at the turn of events. Jason arched an eyebrow at her. "Not those kind of clients. I don’t have any reason to have those. I am straight as an arrow. I am into health, not drugs. I’ve been clean since you left. I’ve gone to school. I am now a personal trainer and an achievement coach. Marty lets me work here."

"Okay, I’m impressed. Genuinely," he said in that tone Sharon used to crave so much. She was a person lived by her wits her entire life and Jason Larson was the first person who saw anything of value in her. In many ways, even though she educated herself, had quit the self-destructive lifestyle that she had caught herself up in, and was her own woman, she still was vulnerable to his assurances. "That doesn't have to change. Lots of things will change now that I am out, but your working here isn't one of them."

In a fit of craziness, overwhelmed by the completely unexpected change, Sharon picked up a rolled towel from a small pyramid the receptionist had created with them and hurled it at him. "Out! Until I have proof, out! You can't just walk in my job and tell me that you own the place!"

It was a ridiculous tirade, and a feeble one at that. No one at Ink's would normally answer to her, but because she was one of the few drug-free employees and was a good looking woman, Marty—the manager—let her stand in for him when he wanted to have some down time. Still, Sharon had little clout and Jason Larson was a mammoth of a man. She wasn't going to make him do anything he didn't want to do. His arms were as big around as her thighs and his reflexes, for all her fitness and all his prison time, were much swifter. He swept her up and shuffled her into the office just off to the side of the receptionist area.

Maybe she egged him on. If she wasn't sure before that she secretly wanted him to throw his arms around her, she was awfully sure now. The warmth and hardness of his body was intensely intoxicating. Her head went hazy with the magic of their chemistry. Apparently the same was true for him, for when they had the privacy of the closed office, he took her mouth for his.

He tasted her thoroughly, sweeping her mouth with his hot, wet tongue. Sharon heard herself moan. He was hungry. Ten years in prison. Sharon didn't know about things like consortium visits or how that all worked; she only knew she hadn't visited him. Sharon found herself yearning, though she had someone. She was engaged to be married—a decision she made as a way to get on with her life more than anything.

Unfortunately, if that someone found out she was in the office at work with his rival's tongue in her mouth, no one would walk away too happy. It didn't matter; these few seconds with Jason were worth it to Sharon. No one turned her on like this man did now. She realized, entwined with him the way she was, that she had been in a prison of her own all these years, starving for what he gave her every time he touched her body.

Jason pulled away and whispered to her, "I am back, Shari, baby. I am sorry if that puts a fly in your ointment but if you give me a rough time or hurl things at me, this is what’s going to happen—or more. I tamed you once. I will tame you again." Jason lowered his head for one more taste.

"Those days are gone," Sharon said after indulging him for a little longer. "I am not the same woman. I am not your woman. I belong to Lance Sanchez." At the mention of that name, Jason's whole body stiffened and his face threatened to split off his skull. It was rumored, but never confirmed, that Lance Sanchez was the one who framed Jason and cost him ten years of his life. "I'm engaged to be married to him."

"Hm," he said. "So you've been in his bed. How was it?" Sharon turned away, not even able to think about being with Lance while in Jason’s arms. He chuckled. “Kind of figured on that.”

"It's really none of your business."

"I wasn't asking. I was remarking." He regained himself and as quickly as that, grew very dark. "I am now the last man you've kissed. And I aim to keep it that way."

She wanted to scoff him but he could make his threat a reality. The second he said that, Sharon knew her happiness—or rather, the calm and orderliness of her life—were in peril and things would no longer be the same now that Jason Larson was out of prison and back to reclaim her.

CHAPTER TWO

Just as soon as Jason appeared, he left. Well, first he had the hardware on the office door changed. And then he left. Ink's was really his gym, inherited along with the presidency of his bike club president, to which he was previously the Sergeant at Arms.

Darryl Haynes had been in charge of Jason’s crew when Jason was incarcerated. He operated the very popular, enormously busy biker gym until he succumbed to pancreatic cancer a month before Jason’s release. The club voted to honor Darryl’s dying wish in naming Jason the next club president. Sharon confirmed it all with Marty the first chance she got, then she harped on him for not giving her warning that all this was going down.

Marty’s only response was mumble. He didn't seem too happy about it. It was rumored that Marty, a recovering steroid user, was juicing again and skimming off the books to fund the practice. Sharon knew Jason. With him, the hint of dishonesty was resolved by making it impossible to continue. If Marty was on the up and up, he shouldn't have a problem with the new lock on the office door. And if he wasn't, the lock let him know his skimming days were over.

***

Sharon used the desk phone to call her own workout buddy, Polly, who rented a small bungalow on Lance Sanchez's property. The women were supposed to work out in the park near Paradise beach and then bring a picnic to the beach to watch volleyball players. Another surge of bikers filled the gym lobby with their gruff voices racketing around on the glass and cinderblock walls. Sharon could hardly hear. "Are you there?" she asked Polly. She was pretty sure she heard her pick up.

"It’s me!" Polly shouted back.

Sharon bent to hear better, finally squatting behind the desk. "Okay now I can hear you better. Are you at the park already?" Sharon inquired.

"Yes I am," replied Polly with just a touch of doubt in her voice. "What's wrong?"

"I will tell you later. I am on my way over," said Sharon. "I need to run over a few things with Marty and then I am on my way. Need anything?"

"Nope. We’re set. I have chopped salad from Lou's Blues in the cooler with a jug of sparkler." ‘Sparkler’ was Sharon’s non-alcoholic concoction of soda water and whatever fruit juice she felt like. She no longer used drugs or alcohol and her friends honored that. And even though it had been a while and she was faithful about attending her sobriety meetings, Sharon could use a stiff drink. Especially now, for even after she had just spoken to Marty on the telephone about Jason, she almost ran smack into him on her way out to meet Polly and something about him was bothering her.

She used to like him fine. She had known him since high school with Marty, though they had only really begun to interact the recent year or so when Sharon began training at Ink's. It was a gig that Sharon got through her fiancé, Lance. Now, she and Marty practically ran Ink's together.

"You look lovely," he growled. Because Sharon practically lived in the gym, she was always dressed in outfits that looked casual but nice and could still be worn for a workout. Male clients were constantly remarking at how sexy she was and Marty was always hinting at his attraction for her, but Sharon played it off as his idea of harmless charm. Marty now had a glint of warning in his eye. “Where you off to?" he asked.

"I’m heading over to meet Polly," said Sharon. "Zumba in the park."

“Polly? Are we sure now?" he asked.

Sharon wondered if Lance wasn't checking up on her through Marty. After her kiss with Jason, she was acutely aware that she did not even like Lance any more. She knew she had only settled for him. With Jason's kiss on her lips, the thought of Lance was barely tolerable. "Yes," she said to Marty, "Not that it is any of your business, but yes," she added. "The time cards are on the counter. I locked the ledger and the checkbook away in the strong box. You're going to have to work it out with Jason about the lock on the office. See ya."

Marty wasn't in the best of mental shape so he could be a menace if he wanted to be, and the idea that Sharon and he could be adversaries bothered her. He was a tall and, because of lots of gym time and steroids, was powerfully built with the body of an action figure. Before he crossed the steroid-line, he was sort of handsome. But he was steroid ravaged now and he just looked like a bad comic book character.

His golden honey hair was now brittle; his eyes sunken and his nose broad. He tried to engage with women who remembered from a healthier time. Many of them recounted those days when Marty was sane and nice looking. But everyone was a little put off by his reputation as a substance abuser and the fact that he might have underworld connections because of it. He affected the gentlemen with Sharon except for now because he was aggravated by Jason's return.

Jason's return bothered her too in many ways. It caused her to look at her life and who she was hanging around. Who she worked with and who she was engaged to. Lance Sanchez, president of Jason's rival motorcycle gang, La Calle, had a checkered reputation himself. "I will take care of it all," said Marty. "Say hi to Lance for me. Have a good'un. Drive careful."

"Same to ya," called Sharon on her way out the door.