Heart of the Hunter (30 page)

“What was that for?”

“Don’t ever speak to me like that. I’m not perfect, but the least I deserve is respect. You don’t even know me.”

“Don’t I?” he said, trying to lighten the mood again, but I wasn’t having it.

“Fuck you,” I said.

I was being unfair. I was blaming him for all that was wrong in my life. Through his shirt I could see the tattoos inked into his skin. They were intricate and so sexy on his perfect chest. I prayed he couldn’t tell how attracted to him I was.

“Look, I know Wolf. I know Los Lobos. I know how they treat their women.”

“You don’t know shit about me.”

“Everything doesn’t have to be the way Wolf says it is. Not everyone’s afraid of him and his cocksucker friends.”

“They’re killers.”

“They’re not the only killers.”

“Oh, that’s supposed to make me feel better? Leave one criminal to get in bed with another?”

“Now you’re talking,” he said.

He made me so angry. This was my life, and he was treating me like some random pickup in a bar. I suppose to him I
was
a random pickup in a bar.

“And what then?” I said. “After you’re done with me? After you’ve had your way with me and I’ve given you everything you want? What
the fuck
then?”

“Then we get married. Make babies. White picket fence.”

I slapped him again, harder than the first time. It was so hard my hand stung. I took pleasure from the fact his cheek reddened.

He shook his head. I’d angered him.

I was wearing a cheap necklace, a heart pendant on a silver chain, and he grabbed it in his fist and yanked it. The chain snapped and he put it in his pocket. What the fuck was that supposed to mean? That he’d stolen my heart? He hadn’t stolen shit.

“You’re cruel,” I said.

“Maybe I am, but I meant every word I said to you.”

“Give me my chain back.”

“I will, some day far in the future, when you don’t even remember I have it.”

I was going to cry, and I didn’t want him to see. I didn’t even know why. This guy was a primo asshole. He was toying with my emotions, pushing my buttons. He should have known better. He should have known I was trapped. You don’t walk up to a slave and ask them to go for a walk. It’s not fair.

I stormed out of the bar. As soon as the door slammed, I burst into tears. Fuck him. How dare he play with me like that. It wasn’t right. You don’t take the one thing a person wants most in the world and dangle it in front of them for fun. Talk is cheap. Where I come from, you either give a girl what she needs, or you shut the fuck up.

You don’t get to talk the talk and not do anything about it.

He could keep the shitty chain. Twenty bucks would get me a new one.

In the coming weeks, I forced myself to push him from my mind. And yet, nothing was the same after that.

Days turned to weeks and then months, and Wolf treated me worse and worse.

I didn’t even know the name of the jackass from the bar, but I couldn’t forget him. I couldn’t forget that there was someone out there with the balls to say, ‘Fuck Wolf Staten.’

And if he could say it, why the hell couldn’t I?

Chapter 2

Jackson

T
HE DAY OF MY FATHER’S FUNERAL.

I always knew it would be a violent death. What I hadn’t counted on was it having such an impact on me. It shook me up, brought me face to face with my own mortality. I was an only son, the last of the line, everything would end with me. That didn’t sit right.

I was out on the highway, headed to the Los Lobos hangout. I hated meeting those guys. They were nasty, and they had no clue how to live—no clue how to be men. I’d seen the way they locked up their women, terrified them, turned them into slaves. There was no honor in that.

Los Lobos was a syndicate of twelve grade-A assholes. They were killers, drug-runners, human-traffickers. All twelve deserved to be put in the ground. The fact that I was doing business with them made me sick to my stomach.

I was buying information from them for the Brotherhood. That’s my group. Four grade-A assholes, but not like Los Lobos. We’re different. We steal money, but we don’t hurt people. That’s a subtle distinction to most people, but to us it’s real. People think all criminals are the same. They’re not. Maybe I’m biased, I love the other three members of the Brotherhood as if they were my real brothers. They’re real men. Men you can trust—rely on—men who’ll do what needs to be done when the chips are down.

At sundown it started to rain. I was on a lonely stretch between Reno and Carson City and the glow of a vacancy light called out to me like a beacon.

I walked into the motel bar with one thing on my mind—getting fucked up. It’s not every day they bury your daddy.

There are certain nights in your life different from the others. The force of destiny weighs down on you. Everything that happened before seems to have led to that fateful moment. Everything after is a consequence.

This was one of those nights. I could feel it in my bones. I can’t say I was particularly close to my father, but his dying, it took the ground out from under me. It made me realize I hadn’t yet achieved the most important thing in life. I was risking everything on a daily basis, but I hadn’t planted the seed of the next generation.

I was soaked from the rain but didn’t care. I took a place at the bar and slapped my gloves and helmet on the seat next to me.

“What can I get you, cowboy?” the bartender said.

I looked around the room. It was a dingy place. Not too many customers.

“You got sugar back there?” I said.

He nodded.

“I’ll have a bourbon with sugar. The way the old man used to drink it.”

“I can make you an old fashioned,” he said.

“No. Just the bourbon and sugar.”

He put a shot glass in front of me. I downed it in a single motion and asked for another. As I downed the next, the door slammed behind me. I turned.

In walked trouble.

Chapter 3

Jackson

I
T WAS A GIRL,
little more than a kid, soaked to the skin, makeup running down her face in long, black streaks. She cut a tragic figure—a drowned kitten—desperation written all over her.

There was something familiar about her, and then I remembered. A few months earlier, the Los Lobos bar, she was Wolf Staten’s girl. Instantly, I could see what was going on. She was on the run.

She’d actually done it. She’d taken her life into her own hands. She was fleeing the most savage group of men you’re ever likely to hear of.

And how did I react? I’ll tell you.

My cock stiffened.

I’m not ashamed to admit it. I wanted this girl badly ever since that first time I set eyes on her. It wasn’t any normal lust, it was a hunger. I
had
to have her. She’d invaded my fantasies and I couldn’t get her back out. It was months since our first meeting in that bar in Reno, and every night since, I longed for her. I craved her.

I stared at her.

Twenty-four hours.

That’s how long I gave it until Wolf caught up. She’d be dead by sundown the next day if I didn’t help. There was no way in hell Los Lobos would let a woman like her escape them. They’d make it a matter of pride, and let me tell you something about the criminal underworld I inhabit—the bigger the asshole, the greater the pride.

She needed help, and whoever got involved would pay a hefty price. Twelve members of Los Lobos, all killers, all mean as fuck.

I looked at her more closely and fuck, if she didn’t take my breath away. Light brown hair, big blue eyes, a mouth made for pleasure.

She walked straight to the bar, and when she spoke, it was like the rest of the world went silent.

“Bartender,” she said, “a beer.”

The bartender’s eyes widened when he saw her. “Miss, are you all right?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

“You look—”

“What?” she said, her eye steady.

He shrugged, and got her a beer.

She picked up the bottle, brought it to her lips, and when she slammed it back on the bar it was empty. I was impressed. She drank like she meant it.

Her soaking dress was completely see-through. My dick pulsed with desire. I wasn’t going to let her slip through my fingers this time. Even as she stood at the bar, shivering from the cold, I promised myself I’d fuck her. I’d dominate her. I’d become her master.

She looked up and caught my eye. I nodded to her and told the bartender to give her another drink.

“Thanks,” she said.

“You seem like you could use it.”

She looked back at me, a challenge in her eye, but she took a swig from the bottle all the same. She was acting tough, I admired that, but it was clear she was in trouble. She was running out of time, and she knew it. Wolf and his cocksucker friends would be tracking her down, coming closer with every minute that passed. It would take them a while, but they’d find her. And when they did? Bye-bye birdie.

“I know you,” she said.

“Yes, you do.”

“You’re the asshole that tried to pick me up in Wolf’s bar.”

I laughed. She hadn’t lost any of her spunk.

“I didn’t try to pick you up,” I said. “If I remember correctly, you were so uptight only a fool would have tried that.”

“Exactly,” she said, smirking.

“Oh, so I’m a fool?”

“Well, you tried
something
.”

I nodded. I’d give her that. “Maybe I did,” I said. “Maybe I did.”

A coy smile crossed her lips. “And now you’re back for more.”

I laughed. “Right. I came here looking for you,” I said, sarcastically.

“Well, you’re here.”

“I was here first.”

“No you weren’t. I watched you come in.”

“You watched me?”

“From the parking lot.”

“Well, aren’t you full of surprises?” I said.

She looked into my eyes and licked her tantalizing lips. Well, fuck me, but she was making a move. She was trying to play me. I had to admire that. She knew what it would take to escape Wolf, and she was willing to pay the price. There’s not a lot of people willing to accept reality when it comes to situations like the one she was in.

Well, if she was going to play me, it wouldn’t come easy. Getting a man mixed up with Wolf Staten was no small feat.

“Last time we met, I promised you we’d fuck like rabbits,” I said. “Now, here you are.”

She looked hurt. She didn’t like it when I spoke like that. She put her drink down and walked straight back to the door she’d entered through. Her hand was on the knob. If I didn’t say something fast, she’d walk right out.

“Wait,” I said. “Don’t go. I shouldn’t have said that.”

“That’s twice you’ve said that to me, like I’m nothing more than a fifty-dollar slut looking to get fucked.”

“You’re right. I was out of line. You had every right to slap me last time we met.”

She looked relieved. I was cutting her some slack, which was what she needed. She came back to her seat.

“Last time we met, you were a massive dick,” she said.

“I know,” I said. “I can’t help it. I was born with it.”

She shook her head. God, I could have died looking into those eyes. She was like an angel from heaven.

“You just can’t stop yourself, can you?”

I shook my head.

She sighed. Then she said, mostly to herself, “size isn’t everything.”

I laughed. I couldn’t believe it. “Was that a joke? Was that a joke from the girl who smacked the shit out of me last time we met?”

She blushed. God, she looked pretty when she blushed..

“You were asking for it.”

“Yes, I was,” I said. “And you didn’t have any trouble dishing it out.”

She shrugged. “I can give you some more if you want.”

“Please don’t. This face is all I’ve got going for me.”

She looked me over, taking in my leathers, my wet hair.

“I’m sure it’s not the
only
thing.”

I laughed again. She was working it. Don’t think for a second I didn’t know I was being played. I knew exactly what was going on. The thing is, I wanted to get played by her.

“What’s your name?” I said.

“You first,” she said.

I shook my head. The poor thing. She had no idea what she was getting into. She was like a lamb to the slaughter. She’d just escaped Wolf. Little did she realize, she was tangling herself up with a monster ten times worse. Believe me when I tell you, whatever she was running from, whatever Wolf tried to force her to do, I would make it look like child’s play. The things I wanted to do to her, she’d cry out for mercy, she’d scream my name, and the more she begged, the harder I’d come.

If it was Wolf’s bedroom antics that she was fleeing, she was in for a rude awakening. I’m a piston-fired, turbo-charged, orgasm machine. I can out-fuck a herd of stallions. I can out-pump a locomotive. If she came to me hoping for mercy, she wouldn’t find any.

She thought she was playing me?
Please
.

It was like taking candy from a baby. She had something I wanted, and I was going to have it. I had to have it.

I put my drink down.

“My name’s Jackson,” I said. “Jackson Jones.”

“Jackson Jones?”

“Jackson-motherfucking-Jones,” I repeated, grinning.

She smiled, and I swear there was a hint of seduction in those lips.

“I’ve got a question for you, Jackson-motherfucking-Jones.”

She could ask anything she liked. All I could think about was bending her over the counter and sliding my bare cock into her naked womb till it throbbed hot semen into her. I wanted to fill her so full of my come it would be dripping down her legs for weeks. I wanted skin to skin, full contact, wet orgasm. I wanted to put a baby inside her. And in exchange for my help, she was going to let me.

“What is it?” I said.

She hesitated. She was scared. I could tell she’d been crying. I felt a pang of pity for her, but the desire flooding through my veins was stronger.

“Last time you met me, you said you didn’t give a fuck about Wolf Staten.”

“I remember.”

“Well, my question is, did you mean that?”

I let out a little laugh. My words were coming back to haunt me. I’d played it cocky and now she was calling me on it.