Move the Sun (Signal Bend Series) (5 page)

The fingers of one hand probed her core; the others moved over her clit. The pads of his fingers were calloused and hard, making her nerve endings catch fire. She moaned and put her hands on his, over her shorts, pressing him harder to her tender skin. Then, with a quick, forceful move, she shoved him back, gasping as his hands slid roughly out of and away from her. She turned and grabbed his
kutte, yanking him back. Leaning in and going to her toes, she pressed her mouth to the base of his neck and bit down. He jerked and grabbed her ponytail, pulling her head back. She liked it rough, but she wanted to make it clear to him that she gave as good as she got.

He laughed, his eyes sparkling. “You like a tussle, do ya? Why doesn’t that surprise me at all?” Grabbing her ass in his large hands, he lifted her up along his body, hooking her legs behind him, until they were crotch to crotch. He was hard against her core, and she could tell he had substantially more to offer than average. She draped her arms over his shoulders, looping his hair lightly around her fingers. He headed down the little hallway.

“Bedroom’s to the—” she stopped when he automatically turned left, the correct direction. She furrowed her brow at him.

He winked. “It’s a small town, Sport. Don’t think there’s a house I haven’t been in. You’re living in the Olsens’ old place.”

He went straight into the “master” bedroom. When he saw the bed, though, he stopped and let her legs drop until she was on her feet. “Well, gotta say, I expected sheets and pillows.”

There was nothing on the mattress but her sleeping bag. “Told you I had errands. I need to get some bedding. Are you saying you’re too soft to fuck on a bare mattress?”

“Saucy wench.” He put his hands around her waist and tossed her onto the bed. Before she could react, he snatched the sleeping bag out from under her, dropping it to the floor. Then he had her foot, yanking her running shoe off without untying it. Sock. The other shoe. The other sock. He took her bare feet in his hands and pressed his thumbs into her arches. He hit exactly the right spot to make her feet and legs—which had very recently run a long distance—relax exquisitely, and she moaned.

“Oh, I do like that sound.” He loomed over her and grabbed the waistband of her shorts. She lifted her hips, and he
tugged them down and away in one swift, determined move. He stood at the side of the bed and looked down at her greedily. Seemed like she had the kind of effect on him that he had on her. She sat up and scooted to sit on the bed in front on him.

When she put her hands on the big silver buckle of his belt, he growled again.
She
liked
that
sound, felt it right between her legs. As she opened his belt and began to unbutton his jeans, he bent over her and grabbed the hem of her snug running tank, his blunt nails grazing her back as he pulled it up. The tank served as bra, too, so it was tight. She stopped what she was doing and helped him pull it off. Now, she was nude.

“Fuck. You’re gorgeous, Sport.” The words were little more than a breath. When she looked up and met his eyes, his expression had changed to something intense and unreadable.

She opened his jeans. She was pleased to see that he wore boxer briefs—in this case, black. Considering the Johnny Cash vibe he had going generally, couture-wise, they were probably always black. As far as Lilli was concerned, there were only two ways for a man to wear underwear—boxer briefs or not at all. The lump of his erection was impressive and extended down his leg, even as it swelled and curved. She slid her hands into his waistband and pulled his length free. Wow. Nice. Long and thick. And hard as steel. She wrapped her hands around him and squeezed. His hips rocked toward her as he growled again.

He shrugged his
kutte off his shoulders and, while she held his cock in her hands, folded it and leaned over to lay it on the dresser. Lilli thought that said a lot about this man. She let go of him and raised her hands to unbutton the rest of the buttons of his shirt. He watched her, his hands on her shoulders. When she was done, he shrugged it off and let it drop to the floor in a pool.

Lilli took in the wide expanse of his chest. Jesus Christ, he was beautiful. Arms, chest, abs, all of it perfectly defined,
dark curls covering his pecs and then tapering to a trail into the black nest around his cock. Both shoulders and his arms to his elbows were covered in intricate blackwork ink. His chest and belly were free of ink. He was standing before her, tall and broad and beautiful, his long, sable hair loose on his back. Without thinking at all, she grabbed his hips and leaned forward to press her lips to his hard, ridged belly. She ran her tongue through the hair around his navel. She couldn’t recall the last time she’d been so viscerally attracted to another human being. It almost had to be a pheromone thing, their chemistry just perfectly in sync.

She felt his hand in her hair, curling her ponytail around his fist, forcing her to look up at him. “I want head. I want that fuckable, red mouth on me.”

He did, did he? She smirked at him. “Yeah? What are you gonna do for me? Tit for tat, love.”

He reached down and took her left nipple between his fingers, giving it sharp tug, making her gasp and moan. His mouth on her ear, making her heart race, he whispered, “Tit for tat, huh? How ‘bout I make you scream until your throat cramps? You swallow, Sport, and I’ll make it happen twice.” He stood straight again, challenge in his eyes.

After a beat to steady her voice, she smiled at him. “You think you’ve got that kind of stamina?”

“You doubt me? By the time we leave for breakfast, you won’t ever again.”

Gauntlet thrown. She nodded and sucked his length into her mouth. “Ah, yeah. Yeah,” he growled. It had been awhile, and he was big, but she was good at this. She relaxed her throat and took him all in. “Fuck!” he groaned, and then his hips were moving hard. His fist in her ponytail and his hips moving like that, he had control of the situation. She didn’t want that. She gave head on her terms. She put her hand around his balls and squeezed, steadily increasing the pressure until she had his attention.

“Hey! What the fuck’re you doin’, Sport?”

Easing the pressure on his balls, she pulled him out of her mouth and licked her lips. Meeting his glare steadily, she said, “My rules. I set the rhythm. Hold still or let go of my hair.” He stared for a few seconds and then nodded. Since he didn’t let go of her hair, she figured he meant to hold still.

And he did. As she worked him, taking him deep, sucking, licking, nipping lightly, he kept his fist loosely in her ponytail but did not constrict or try to control her movements. As he got close, his hips began to flex gently, but he tried to stop. He was grunting rhythmically, in time with her movements, until he put his other hand on her head, his fingers gripping her scalp. “Now, now, yeah, fuck yeah.” When he came he held her head tightly to him, but she didn’t care. He filled her mouth with hot, heavy liquid, and she swallowed around him. He tasted sweet and salty. Yep. Pheromones.

When he was finished, she pulled away and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. He was staring at her, dazed, his eyes at half-mast. “That was fucking incredible.”

She pushed back on the bed and spread her legs wide. “Better not have worn you out.”

He grinned impishly and stripped the rest of his clothes off. “No way. I’m tireless.” As he tossed his jeans away, he caught his wallet chain and pulled the wallet up. He took two condoms out and dropped the wallet onto the pile that was his jeans. Then he crawled over her on the bed. Propped on his hands, he hovered. “You are a fuckin’ sexy bitch, you know that?” He bent his arms and came down to kiss her.

She grabbed his hair in her fists and pulled him down to lie on her. Before he settled, she tried to flip them over, but he was quite heavy, and she only managed to rock him a bit. Laughing against her mouth, he pushed her shoulder flat on the mattress. “I don’t think so. My rules now.” His hands holding her shoulders down, he kissed along her jawline to her ear, sucking on the lobe for several intense seconds, then continued his journey, licking and sucking his way down her neck, over her collarbone, to her breast.

He was still soft; she could feel him on her leg, but when he drew her nipple between his teeth, sucking firmly and making her cry out and arch her back off the bed, she felt him lengthen and turn to steel. “Ah, yeah. That’s it, baby. Your tits are so firm and sweet.” He suckled her again, growling. The vibrations of sound against her flesh made her quiver. The tickle and scratch of his beard made her shiver. He released her shoulders to cup her breasts, and she wove her fingers into his hair. He kissed a trail across her chest and paid the same careful attention to the other breast. His hands moved down her sides. His mouth followed, kissing down her belly, his tongue laving her belly button, and then continuing downward.

It all felt great, but Lilli was too turned on for this sweet bullshit. She didn’t want him to make love to her. She wanted him to fuck her. He was supposed to be making her scream. Twice. She yanked hard on his hair, and he pulled his head up, his brow wrinkled. “You yanked?”

“Are you gonna fuck me or not?”

She’d hurt his feelings. That surprised her. Isaac did not read like a guy who preferred satiny, sweet lovemaking. He read like a guy who liked a rough, leathery grapple. As she did.

He pulled himself back over her so that they were face to face. “You want to get fucked, Sport? You’re gonna get fucked.” He reached over to the corner of the mattress, where he’d laid the condoms. As soon as he’d rolled one on, he grabbed her leg and shoved it straight up in the air, pushing it back to her chest, spreading her wide. He gave her a look that said he’d expected that to be uncomfortable, and it was indeed a stretch, but she had years of yoga to prepare her to get fucked like this, and she just looked steadily back at him. He yanked her onto her side and shoved himself into her, letting go of her leg and pressing it down with his shoulder.

Propping himself on one hand, with the other he grabbed her nipple and pinched it hard. She cried out. Okay, this is more what she had in mind. He was thrusting into her deep and fast, pulling and twisting her nipple. The unfamiliar position gave her few options to participate; he had her fully under his control. So she went with it, savoring the deep intensity of his sideways entry, the sharp thrill of his fingers around her nipple. She was elevating quickly, heat pooling in her joints. She started moaning loudly every time he went deep. She was working her other breast as savagely as he was working the one he had; when he noticed, his eyes got dark, and he sped up his thrusts.

When she could remember to open her eyes, she watched him, saw him concentrating. Sweat ran down his temples into his beard. His chest was wet with it, dewy drops beading in the hair over his pecs. Knowing that he had to work so hard to keep his promise thrilled her endlessly.

Then he grabbed her leg and pulled out, flipping her to her belly with a growl. He was growling almost constantly now. He yanked her onto her knees, grabbing her ponytail and yanking her head back, and he was inside her again, pounding hard, the hair on his legs scratching at her thighs every time they slammed together. Okay, she was coming; he was so fucking deep, stretching her wide. She bucked against him, making as much noise as he was, her breath coming in something like shrieks now. “Fuck, Isaac. Fuck, it’s good.”

“Not enough,” he rasped. “I want you screaming, baby.”

He yanked her hair again, pulling her off her hands, bringing her back hard against his chest. With his other hand, he reached around and slapped her clit sharply. The sensation was like an electric bolt through her, and she cried out and arched hard. He did it again. And again. Then over and over, quick, sharp slaps, until she was coming so hard she could feel her juices running down her legs, even as his thrusts filled her, and she was screaming and screaming.

When it was over, he laid her down on the bed, and she relaxed, her muscles liquid, her brain muzzy. That was way up on the list of her best orgasms ever. Top three, anyway. Maybe higher. But he wasn’t done. He was still moving inside her, still hard as granite. He hadn’t come. “I owe you another one,” he murmured behind her before biting down on her shoulder.

CHAPTER FOUR

Isaac was simultaneously exhausted, exhilarated, and so turned on he thought his cock might well explode inside her. Lilli. Beautiful name, beautiful woman.

Lilli. He’d have to get used to that. He’d known her only twelve hours, but “Sport” had stuck in his head.

She was completely relaxed beneath him, breathing heavily, her strong, firm limbs pliable, giving easily to his touch as he moved inside her. She was tight, the lingering spasms of her climax still holding him firmly. Drenched with sweat, as he was, she smelled fantastic. He much preferred the natural scent of a woman to the acidic crap so many of them sprayed all over themselves, and Lilli’s scent was intoxicating to him. Her taste, too. Damn, she made him hot.

“I owe you another one.” He bit down on her shoulder, sucking her sweet sweat into his mouth. “You think you can take me again?” Her eyes still closed, she grinned.

He reared back and pulled out of her in one fast move. Then he grabbed her legs and flipped her to her back. She laughed, and what a sound it was, rich and full of pleasure. He didn’t know what her story was—he’d damn sure find out—but she was something special, something to behold. Something dangerous.

Maybe it was just her newness. Living in a town like this, being single and wanting it that way, a man tended to cycle through a smallish number of willing women. Even the girls who came from other towns to hang out at the clubhouse were the same every week. Fucks got familiar pretty fast. The number of women not looking for more was even smaller. Isaac had been slowing down of late, wary of women looking for his ink. Not gonna happen.

But this wild thing writhing under him and looking up at him with bright, avid eyes—they were grey—she was something else entirely.

He hooked her legs over his shoulders and sank into her, pushing her thighs to her chest. She was strong and limber and hadn’t yet balked at anything he’d done—no stretch, no force, no depth had been too much. In fact, she wanted more. She’d taken his cock without complaint. Usually he had to soften a woman up a bit first, get her ready, but Lilli had thrown that back in his face, wanting him to come at her hard.

He was at her hard now, thrusting with all the force he could muster, even feeling the intensity of it himself, his hips and thighs feeling bruised as they slammed against her. She was grunting and moaning, clawing at his arms. He was beginning to have trouble holding himself off. The amazing head she’d given him had bought him a lot of time for a fuck this strenuous, but she was a wild one, hot as hell, and they been going at it for awhile. He tried to distract himself with mundane thoughts, but he just didn’t want to. He wanted to be present here, feeling her, hearing her, smelling her.

She brought her legs up even tighter to her chest, and then her feet were on his shoulders, and she was pushing against him hard. Confused at first, he looked down at her and saw in her eyes what she wanted. He knocked her feet off and gathered her up in his arms, coming up on his knees and lying backwards, putting her on top of him, her feet under his arms. He shifted to straighten his legs. “You want to ride me, that it?”

“Fuck yeah.” She leaned back a little, her hands on his thighs, and did just that. He wrapped his arms around her legs and just held on. Jesus, the muscles in her legs rippled beautifully as she drove her hips down onto him, riding him every bit as hard as he’d ridden her. Her head was thrown back, and her ponytail brushed his legs. Somehow he thought that, that silky tickle across his knees, was the thing that was going to undo him. He’d promised to make her scream again.

He sat up and grabbed her arms, folding her whole body tightly to his chest. Staring deeply into his eyes, she stopped, panting, her breath leaving her body in sexy little moans. For several beats, they simply sat there tangled together in a complex knot, sweaty and breathless, staring into each other’s eyes.

In that look Isaac felt something shift into place between them; he felt it like a thrill up his spine. He had no idea what it meant. But he grabbed her ponytail and brought her mouth to his, sucking the sweat from her upper lip and then kissing her deeply. But softly. She went with it, kissing him back in kind, her hands moving into his wet hair and holding him close. Suddenly, she pulled back with a little gasp and stared at him, her brow furrowing. She’d felt it, too, he knew.

Something dangerous.

She yanked on his hair. “I thought you were gonna make me scream again. That was the deal, right?” She kissed him again, biting his lower lip hard at the end. He tasted blood.

“Fuck! Bloodthirsty bitch.” He rolled abruptly, putting her on her back. Then he grabbed her ankles from behind him and held them out wide as he pounded into her, gaining more and more speed with every thrust. If this wasn’t enough for her, then she was just too fucking much for him.

“Oh, fuck! Yeah! Yeah! Fuck! Harder!” Harder? Jesus Christ. He found something more to give her. And then, thank the blessed baby Jesus, she was screaming, her nails embedded in his forearms. She was tight, so tight, around his cock, and he finally, finally, finally let himself go with a long, loud, extremely relieved groan that came through his chest, his throat, his clenched teeth like it was being yanked out of his very cells. He came for fucking ever.

When it was done, he dropped in a heap on top of her, between her legs. He was still inside her. He was gratified to hear the strain in her breathing, so like his own. At least he’d worn her out, too.

She laughed. “Okay, fuck. That was fantastic. I won’t doubt you again.”

“See that you don’t.” He kissed her cheek. With a weary sigh—he was wondering about the logic of this kind of exertion, since he hadn’t slept last night and wouldn’t have the chance again until late tonight—he pulled out of her and sort of dropped off her to lie at her side. Normally, he’d be up and getting dressed right now. When he fucked, he did it at the clubhouse or at the chick’s house, and he did not cuddle. Cuddling is where complications happened. But he didn’t think he could move.

Plus, he wasn’t done touching her yet.

She rolled to her side and grabbed her phone from the nightstand. “9:30. Does Marie’s stop serving breakfast at some point? Because you owe me eggs and waffles.” She put the phone down and started to roll onto her back again, but Isaac stopped her. Instead, he scooted closer as she lay on her side.

She had a line of text inked up her left side, from her hip to about even with her tits. It wasn’t English. That and a very pretty, intricate black and grey butterfly, about the size of his fist, on her left shoulder blade were her only tattoos.

He traced the line of text up her side. “Marie’s serves breakfast all day. What does this say?”

She looked back over her shoulder at him and didn’t answer right away. Then she said, “It’s Italian:
L’amor che muove il sole e l’altre stelle
.” The words in her voice were beautiful; she spoke as if she were fluent in the language.

“That’s beautiful. What’s it mean?” He spread his hand over her hip and rubbed a long oval over her thigh. He could not seem to stop touching her.

“The love which moves the sun and the other stars.” He couldn’t read her expression.

That sounded familiar to him, and he took a second and searched his head. “That’s Dante, right?”

She turned fast, landing on her back. “Yeah. It’s the last line of
The Divine Comedy
. You know Dante?” The look on her face was naked shock. That had rattled her. Not the fight last night, not a gun to her head, not him finding her and knowing her name, not the epic fuck. The fact that he knew Dante—that flattened her. He was offended.

“We hicks do go to school, you know.”

Now her look was skeptical. “You went to a school where you read Dante?”

No, he hadn’t. He grinned. “Well, we used to have a town library, too. I like to read. Always have. I told you, there’s not a lot to do around here. So, why do you have Dante inked into your side?”

“My dad’s favorite book.” Instead of saying more, she got off the bed. “I’m starved. You owe me breakfast. I’m getting in the shower.”

“Want company? I need one, too.” He wiggle his eyebrows at her. “Always good to conserve water—we’re on wells out here.”

She shook her head. “That’s okay. I’ll go fast, leave you some.” She walked into the bathroom and closed the door.

Isaac lay back, feeling like he’d done something wrong and not sure why he cared. But there was some insight there into the mystery that was Lilli. He’d need to work that out. He still had the condom on, now looking sad and deflated on his mostly-soft cock. He pulled it off and went hunting for a place to discard it. He ended up dropping it in the trash under the kitchen sink.

~oOo~

Lilli had refused to ride with him, saying she needed to have her car so that she could do errands after breakfast. So she followed him to Marie’s. On the ride, Isaac thought about the events of the past half-day. Far more eventful than usual, they were.

Jimmy had sacrificed only three fingernails to the truth. Meg had tried a couple of dodges around the facts, but Isaac was nothing if not perceptive, and after Vic pulled the nail from the middle finger of his right hand, with its broken wrist, she’d caved completely, ignoring Jimmy’s frantic head shaking.

So now, Isaac knew that the St. Louis crew the Horde was beefing with, The Northside Knights, had some kind of new player backing them, and they were looking to annex the cookers down the I-44 corridor—which was, in its entirety, from Illinois to Oklahoma, Horde turf. They’d just about turned Jimmy and Meg, among the biggest cookers in
Crawford County, but they were leaning hard on Jimmy to prime Will Keller for a buyout of his property—a family farm of 150 acres, held by his bloodline for a century.

All of that for three fingernails. Well, he’d known she’d be the weak link. Meg didn’t know why they wanted the property, but Isaac had a damn good idea. There was a lot of dense forest on that acreage—about half the property. The canopy was tight. Good obstruction from satellites. Built right, a fucking meth mass-production center could hide in there. Right smack in the middle of the pipeline.

Mass-produced crank on a scale like that was not going to happen on Isaac’s watch. No enemy of the Horde was going to own property on Horde turf, period. A backer for the Northsiders with that kind of capital—someone who scared Jimmy Sullivan enough that he was willing to be tortured rather than name—was a very serious, very dangerous problem for the Horde, and for Signal Bend itself.

And then there was Ms. Lillian Carson, allegedly from Austin, Texas, but with no discernable Texas lilt in her voice. Bart had come up against the wall quickly, but he hadn’t yet been able to breach it. He’d been perplexed, because she didn’t seem to have worked hard to hide the fact that she was hiding. Her created history would pass the most cursory and rudimentary of checks, some
thing typically businesslike—to rent a house, say, or get a job—but anyone who thought she might be up to something would quickly know she was. Conversely, the wall itself seemed strong. According to Bart, that was a very strange circumstance. He’d said it enthusiastically. Young Bartholomew liked himself a puzzle.

Interesting that she’d shown up the exact same day that Jimmy had gone off the rez. Isaac couldn’t understand how those dots connected. Maybe they didn’t; maybe it was pure coincidence that brought trouble to town on two roads at the same time. But Isaac was paying attention.

He wasn’t one normally to believe in coincidence, at least not without some deep inquiry first, but he found himself really hoping that whatever Lilli was hiding, it wasn’t something that would get in his way. He liked her. He would hate to hurt her.

He would, if he had to. If she threatened his people or his town, he’d end her without hesitation. But he’d be unhappy about it.

Isaac felt sure her name was really Lilli. He caught that vibe right away. She seemed perfectly comfortable correcting his usage from Lillian to Lilli, as if it was a reflex born of long habit. He wasn’t nearly so sure about “Carson.” At least “Sport,” he knew, was hers. He knew because he’d named her himself.

He pulled into Marie’s, Lilli right behind him. Not too crowded—10 o’clock was late in the day for breakfast. The lunch crowd would be coming in soon. For now, there were only four other vehicles in the lot, including the Sullivans’ pickup. That could be awkward. It wasn’t until right then that Isaac realized what a stir he was about to cause, the President of the
Night Horde walking into Marie’s for a late breakfast with the new girl everyone was talking about. The smokin’ hot new girl everyone was talking about. The one who’d been seen by the majority of the town this morning, running all over in what people were calling, variously, her underwear or a bathing suit.