Page 54 of Fixation

ANDERSON

H arper and I have been driving for hours. I’ve taken us through small towns and less-traveled roads.

There was no other choice but to drive that way up north.

Connecticut. Massachusetts. New Hampshire.

Then Maine. Our last stop.

We should’ve arrived sooner.

Except my little patient saw through my exhaustion. We pulled over twice in a secluded area so I could grab a quick nap.

With two bodies rolled up into rugs in my trunk.

She didn’t like that, taking this a short break while I napped.

She begged me to let her drive, to let her help. With her words, then with her mouth. My Harper sucked me off and I let her. I’m fucking addicted to her, I couldn’t refuse her sweet, hot mouth on me.

Such a good girl.

When she was done, my answer remained the same.

No.

I wasn’t lying when I told her I needed to be the one to fix this for her.

Out of everyone I ever treated or stitched together, Harper is the most precious.

I wanted to look after her. Be the one to see this through.

And I have.

We’re here now, parked on a gravel trail right outside of a remote forest where the ground is soft in some places, according to one of my dad’s journals.

Stars shine above us in the clear skies of Maine. I have my arm around Harper’s shoulders while we stare at them. Just us. Two people in black jeans and hoodies looking up at the sky.

Your average-looking couple, standing next to the trunk of a white Lexus.

“Are you okay?” she asks.

My heart hitches.

She should be freaking out, yet she seems completely unfazed. To the extent that she has time to worry about me.

Harper was sheltered her whole life before we met. The closest she’d gotten to the mafia had been on the production sets in Hollywood.

She told me herself she’d never seen a real gun. The worst injuries she’d been around were the ones she caused herself when working on her jewelry.

Then there’s me. I’ve been eating, breathing, and shitting blood, guts, and gore for the past sixteen years.

And still, she worries about me.

“Kitten.” My thumb traces the inside of her wrist. I couldn’t keep my hands off her the entire ride here.

There are moments, dangerous ones, when I think I’ll have to start bringing her to work with me.

“Yes?” She shifts, her arm grazing my side.

I turn my gaze to her, and she clenches her thighs. Restless energy surrounds her.

Yes, she cares about my well-being.

Her body is also a live wire. Tuned to tension, craving release.

“I’m not the issue here.” I put a finger beneath her chin, tipping her face up to mine. Her furrowed brow is adorable. Her green eyes shimmer beneath the stars. Fuck, I’m hard. “The real question here is, are you okay?”

“You’ve hardly had any sleep.”

“Shh.” I slide my finger from her chin to her mouth. Silencing her. Watching the way her breath catches. “I would’ve never gotten behind the wheel if I wasn’t anything but okay. Least of all with you in the car. Now tell me, how are you ?”

Harper shows me just how okay she is by tilting her head, parting her lips, and sucking my finger into her mouth.

The fight in my basement hasn’t lessened her sexual appetite. If anything, it’s made her hungrier.

Apparently, she gets off on violence. She takes my finger deep down her throat. Swirls her tongue around it.

Jesus fuck, those sounds she makes while sucking it.

“Bad girl.” Her wavy red hair is soft in my fist.

I’m anything but gentle, tugging on her locks, pulling her to me. I add another finger to her mouth, dragging both in and out of her.

Indulging myself, I fuck her mouth one, two, three times. When I pull out, I smear her spit on her cheeks. Marking her.

“Please,” she whispers.

“You want to get caught?” My tone turns threatening, and her throat bobs. “Want to be arrested for public indecency with two dead bodies and shovels in my trunk?”

“I want you.” The feel of her hand as she fists my cock over my jeans…

it’s intoxicating. “I want you to bend me over. Choke me. Spank me. Fuck me. I’ve been craving it since you killed those men for me.

For us. You showered me and dressed me, let me suck you on the way over, but you wouldn’t fuck me.

I need you so, so, so bad, Dr. Maguire.”

I’m not going to give in. But I can’t deny that her words are making me fucking delirious.

The shape they make when she says Dr. Maguire …fuck.

“Say that again,” I growl, my face inches from hers.

“Dr. Maguire.” At the sexy purr, my cock jerks in her palm. “Dr. Maguire.”

“Enough.” It hurts, tearing myself away. But it’s necessary. “Work first. Play later.”

“Please.” She sways closer to me. “Please. Dr.—”

I grab her wrist. “Later.”

The teasing look she flashes me means this isn’t over.

Which is why I punish her. Have to. I bend her over the trunk, pushing her face to the cool metal, right over the two dead bodies of Sergey and Stas.

She should be disgusted. Instead, I find relief on her face. Even in this dim light, I see her. I feel her as she arches her back, unbuttoning her jeans by herself.

Eager little thing.

I slap her hands away. Lock both her wrists with one hand behind her back.

“You’re going to unzip me?” Harper asks, her voice breathless.

“No.”

The first crack of my hand on her ass gets me a shriek.

“Quiet.”

“How are you going to fuck?—”

Smack!

“—ow! Me, when I’m in my?—”

Smack! Smack! Smack!

“That’s the whole point of a punishment, kitten.” She shivers as my lips move along her ear. “I’m not going to fuck you.”

“Why?”

Smack! Smack!

“This is me, taking care of you.” I nip the shell of her ear, my cock throbbing as a response to her shuddering body. “We get rid of the bodies first. I’ll tend to this pretty pussy once we’re done.”

“You’re mean.” Harper’s bottom lip juts out after I help her up. As we stare at each other. “We could’ve been done by now and?—”

I raise an eyebrow, crossing my arms over my chest. Really?

“Okay, fine.” When she huffs, I laugh, leaning in to kiss her insolent mouth. “It would’ve taken longer than that.”

“Good girl.”

At the praise, she melts. With a sweet sigh, she backs away and watches me round the car.

I pull out two large metal boards from the back seat. They were Harper’s, before today. She used them for her collections. She said she’d arrange all the pieces together on one slate gray backdrop to see if they’d fit together.

Each of the two has a new hole on one side. We had restraints looped through these holes to carry the bodies around.

Harper argued about why we had to use her restraints.

To think she told me she hated me for binding her with them only a few weeks ago.

A smile tugs at my lips as I position them on the ground behind the car.

“Uh-oh.” She giggles, eyeing me closely while I pop open the trunk. “You’re going to do something bad. I can tell.”

Seems like I’ve still got more to learn about Harper.

Beneath her polished surface, Harper is slightly unhinged.

Love it.

But first, the bodies. I place both men on the metal slabs, along with the shovel on top of each of them. I make sure they won’t fall, then close the trunk and lock the car.

Harper plants her hands on her hips. “Let me carry one of them.”

I’m this close to denying her that as well. It’s on the tip of my tongue to tell her I’ve got this. I’ll always be here to take care of you.

Problem is, it’ll take longer to get deep into the woods if I drag both of these assholes by myself. It’s time wasted when I could be touching her.

“Tell me if it gets to be too much.” My fingers brush hers as I hand the restraint over to her. Sparks fly between us. I clench my jaw, resisting the urge to take her. “Okay?”

“It won’t,” she sasses, flipping her hair over her shoulder.

Being a brat suits her. I’ll be able to appreciate it another time. When I’m not concerned about getting caught. About her getting hurt.

“Harper.”

With just one word, her smile vanishes. I’m willing to bet money that she teased me just for that. For the warning in my voice.

She gets so hot when I’m being awful to her.

“I promise.” She nods, and I reward her—who the fuck am I kidding, I reward myself—by kissing her. “Hmm. Loving you is weird.”

Whether she means for me to hear it or not, I’m not sure.

Doesn’t change my answer. “Loving you is everything. Let’s go.”

Together, we head into the woods. The bodies rattle whenever we hit a rock or uneven ground. We maneuver between tree trunks, able to see the path ahead of us thanks to the flashlight on my phone.

Twice, Harper stumbles and almost falls. Both times I catch her before she does.

I always will.

We talk during the walk too, stepping over fallen twigs as we make our way through the woods. I prompt Harper to tell me everything about her childhood, her family. Likes and dislikes. I even ask what I should bring for dinner with her parents.

I’m going to meet them next week.

Smiling, she answers every single question.

She also licks her lips, slow and deliberate, like she knows exactly what it does to me.

Harper stops to strip out of her hoodie, offering me a view of her peaked nipples that push through her black T-shirt.

I groan, rubbing my hand over my face, all so I don’t fuck her against one of these trees.

My little tease starts lifting the hem to flash me her breasts.

That earns her a warning gaze.

She yields. That, too, makes me want to fuck her.

Eventually, we make it to where I wanted us to be.

“I’m helping you bury them, and that’s that,” Harper exclaims, full of determination.

This time, I don’t bother arguing.

I love her dirty.

Love her sweating and fucking gorgeous.

Her red hair shimmers in the moonlight. Her lean muscles flex as she digs a hole in the ground for Stas.

Harper tilts her head just so, and for a second, I almost choke on the words beautiful from the inside out . I bite the cliché back like it’s poison.

I keep this shit bottled in, but I can’t stop staring. She tilts her head, and I want to devour that smirk.

I get back to work.

Shovel in, dirt out. In, out, in, out.