Tori—
Being back on Rafe’s bike is everything to me. I cling to him and get all touchy feely with him every chance I get. He falls to the back of the pack, where his brothers can’t watch us. I don’t think he was supposed to do that by some of the glares he got, but he didn’t seem to give a damn.
Usually, the van is at the back of the pack, but this time, they stay in front of us, speeding ahead.
I heard Cole tell them if Kyle takes a turn for the worst, they’re to immediately pull over.
Someone called ahead, because all the women are waiting when we pull in at the clubhouse.
The second the van pulls to a stop, Sutton and Crystal race to see Kyle.
Cole lets them have a minute, then orders the men to carry him inside and down a hall to a room with a bed. The club doctor follows.
Once she’s assured Kyle is okay, Crystal finds Fiona in the crowd and hugs her tight, rocking her while tears of relief run down her face. “Oh, my baby girl. I thought I lost you.”
“I’m okay, Mom. I swear.”
“You’re moving back home.”
“Mom!”
“Getting an apartment was a horrible idea.”
“Mom, I’m twenty-one.”
Rafe sticks to my side like glue, always a hand on me, either holding mine, touching my leg, or cupping my neck. Somehow, the boy keeps constant physical contact.
We move to the bar with everyone else, and the boys go over every detail of what happened with those who stayed at the bar.
“ Pop, pop, pop. Rafe blasts the glass door. It was cool as shit,” Billy says.
Fiona appears at my side and tugs my hand. “Mind if I steal her for five minutes, Rafe?”
“Yeah, I do,” he replies, tugging my other hand. Soon it’s a tug of war with me in the middle.
“Guys. Come on.”
Fiona arches a brow at her brother, and he huffs and releases me.
“Five minutes, Fiona. Not a minute more,” he warns.
“Sure. Sure.” She drags me away and down the hall.
“Where are we going?” I follow along.
She pushes into a bathroom, turns and locks the door, then pulls a box out from under her big Rusty Pelican sweatshirt. “I had Melissa bring this over.”
My eyes drop to it. “A pregnancy test?”
“Don’t worry, she’s got a bunch under her sink.”
I lift a brow. “Doubtful.”
“It’s true.” She shoves it at me. “Here. Get busy.”
“Get busy? Now?”
“Yes, now. Pee on the stick thing. Chop. Chop. Rafe only gave us five minutes.”
“You seriously want me to do this right now, while the doctor’s checking out your brother’s bullet wound ?” My voice rises on the last two words.
Her hands land on her hips. “Well, I need to know if I’m going to be an aunt. Which, by the way, I’ll be the best one ever.”
“I’m not doing this.” I shove the box back at her.
“Don’t you want to know?”
My shoulders drop, and I turn to the mirror. “I don’t know. I’m not sure I’m ready to know the answer yet. What if I am? Then what happens?”
“Then you tell my brother. He jumps up and down and kisses you, and we plan your baby shower.”
I actually laugh out loud. “Oh, you’re sooo sure that’s how he’s going to react? Five minutes ago, we were broken up.”
“Five minutes ago, you weren’t pregnant. Well, you were, but… You know what I mean.”
“I don’t want him if that’s the only reason!”
“That came out wrong. Look, Rafe is nuts about you. Your relationship was fucked with by that rich asshole.”
I wasn’t so sure we were going to be able to get back to where we were the last time we were here.
“Just pee on the damn stick already.”
“Fine. Go wait in the hall,” I snap, giving in because Fiona is like a dog with a bone.
She surprises me by hauling me to her and hugging me. “Good luck.”
Once she’s out in the hall, I stare at the box. “Good luck? That it’s positive? Or that it’s negative?”
I do the test and wait.
Fiona taps on the door, and I crack it open. “I’m waiting for the results.”
“Can I come in?” she asks, her eyes going to the test on the edge of the sink, then to me. “You okay?”
“I’m nervous as hell. There’s a pit in my stomach the size of a grapefruit.”
She takes my hands. “Either way, it's all good.” Her eyes drop to the test again. “How much longer?”
I shrug and realize neither her nor I have our cell phones or a watch.
She leans to look. “I think it’s done.”
“Already?” I ask but refuse to look. “How do you know?”
“Because there are already two blue lines.”
Oh, my God. I lean over and stare at them, and my heart starts pounding. “I think I need to sit down.”
Fiona drops the lid on the toilet and guides me to it. “You okay?”
“I’m pregnant. I don’t have a job. I’m not married, and I live at home with my father. No, I am not okay.”
“Rafe is going to change all that. Well, except about the job part. You probably still won’t have a job. And I don’t think he’s ever going to let you go back to the Huntington College where Connor goes.”
“What am I going to do?”
“You’re going to go out there and tell my brother the happy news.”
“Are you so sure he’s going to be happy about it?”
“I… I think so.”
“You think so?”
She wraps the test in a paper towel and shoves it in my hand, then crams the box in the trash.
Meanwhile, my pulse is racing.
“Come on.” She hooks an arm in mine and leads me down the hall. I look over at her, and she’s grinning. Before we get to the door to the main room, I pull us to a stop. “Wipe that smile off your face. He’ll know something is up.”
“Um, he may already know.”
“What?”
“I may have told him before he got on the boat to rescue you.” She at least has the good grace to wince. “I wanted him to know what was at stake. Besides, what if he got shot? He should know he had a baby on the way.”
“How did he react?”
“He, uh, was a little speechless.”
“I’m not going out there.” I fold my arms and lean against the wall.
“Okay, wait right here for a minute.”
Before I can stop her, she pushes through the door.
A minute later, Rafe steps through, a frown on his face. “You okay, babe?”
I drag a hand down the back of my neck. “Um, yeah. Sure.”
He searches my face, then takes my hand and walks down the hall, trying door after door until he finds one unlocked. There’s a bed and nightstand, and that’s all.
“C’mere, honey.” He sits on the bed and pulls me onto his lap. “Talk to me. What’s wrong?”
I can’t say the words, so I release the death grip I’ve had on the pregnancy test, and fold back the paper towel.
His gaze drops to it, and he stares. “Two lines. Does that mean yes?”
I nod. “It’s positive.”
His eyes lift to mine. “You’re not happy about it?”
“Are you?”
He clears his throat. “I guess it’s not what either of us expected. Question is, am I what you want, Tori?” He eases me off his lap and goes to stand at the window.
I move to stand behind him and touch his arm. “Yes, you are what I want.”
“What about your father?”
“I don’t care what he says.”
“Yeah, you do.”
“I have to live my life for me, and if he loves me, he has to accept what makes me happy and who makes me happy. That person is you.” I press my forehead to his back and feel his defenses fall away as his body relaxes, and the tightness leaves him.
He turns to face me and tips my chin up with his finger. “Look at me, Tori. Really look. I’m a biker, a patched member of the Evil Dead. I’m covered in tattoos. The first time you laid eyes on me, I was in handcuffs. I’m nothing like the man your father wants for you.”
I shake my head, tears in my eyes. “You don’t get it, do you?
I see beyond all that. I see the man who saved me today.
The man who came in, guns blazing because he wouldn’t let anything stop him from getting to me.
I see the man who saved me the night of the storm.
I see the man who’d rather see me in his old flannel shirt than the fanciest ballgown.
I see the man who makes me happy, who rubs my leg when we ride, who makes my heart skip a beat just by walking into the room.
” I search his eyes. “What do you see when you look at me?”
“I see the mother of my child. I see my everything.” He cups my face and kisses me, then presses his forehead to mine. “I don’t want to live another day without you, Tori. I want to move you into my house. But I need to know what you want, what you really want?”
“What I really want? I want to quit school and think about if that’s really right for me.
Maybe I’ll go back after the baby is born.
” I lift a shoulder. “I don’t know, but right now, I want to move in with you.
I want us to build a home for our child.
I want to wake up every morning next to you.
And I never want to be apart from you again. ”
His grin is huge. “Then that’s what we’ll do, and when and if you want to go back to school and finish your degree, I’ll be behind you all the way.”
He sits on the bed and pulls me down on his lap, wrapping my legs around his waist. Then his hands slide up my sides and under my shirt to cup my breasts.
“I want to make love to you. Right here. Right now. You gonna let me, beautiful girl?”
“Um, hmm.” I cup his face and stroke my thumb over his lips.
“God, I love when you touch me. Doesn’t matter how or where.”
“Then I’ll touch you all the time.”
“Lose the shirt, baby.”
I pull it over my head, and before my arms come down, he’s popped the hook at my back, and my bra falls free.
“Gorgeous.” He takes one in his hand and brings my nipple to his mouth.
I thread my fingers through his hair, running my nails along his scalp, and he groans, falling back and taking me in a roll until he’s on top of me with his hips between my thighs.
“Now this is right where I always long to be.” He drags his hips against my crotch, and I moan. Then he takes my hands and pushes them above me and lavishes my breasts with attention.
I can feel his erection pressed between us grow hard and long. I lift my hips and rub against him. It’s like I flipped a switch and drove him even higher. He pulls back and works my jeans open, then tears them and my panties down my legs.
Then he kisses his way up my bare thighs. “I ever tell you you’ve got fucking phenomenal legs?”
I shake my head, watching him move closer and closer to the apex.
“I remember the day I saw you standing in that red bikini.”
“You do?”
“Oh, yeah. That image is burned in my brain for life. Fucking gorgeous.”
His lips find me, and he presses a soft kiss there. I arch at the sensation, my head going back. His tongue makes a long stroke, and he groans. “My girl is wet for me.”
“Always,” I whisper.
He slips two fingers inside me, and his thumb strokes my clit. He’s tender and gentle, and I lift my hips, seeking more. He keeps me begging with his barely-there touches. “More. I need more.”
“Then I’ll give you more. Whatever my baby wants. Like this?”
I nod and put a fist to my mouth, biting down on it. “I want you inside me.”
“Ladies first.” He begins a steady rhythm, and it doesn’t take long to ramp me up until I know an orgasm is hovering close.
It feels so good, and I don’t ever want it to stop.
He dips his head and sucks on my nipple, and suddenly that orgasm isn’t hovering on the edges anymore; it’s barreling toward me like a high-speed freight train, whistle blaring, and then it washes over me like a blast of wind as it roars past, and I shudder and come all over his hand.
He withdraws his fingers and paints my nipple with my release, then laps it up and sucks hard, making the orgasm linger ever longer.
I moan and writhe on the bed, and a moment later, he moves over me and covers my mouth with his, making me taste it.
One hand reaches down and undoes his belt and jeans. He shoves them down far enough to grab his rock-hard dick and bring it to my slick, waiting pussy, burying it deep inside me.
My back arches again, my mouth falling open at the filling sensation. He’s over me, he’s in me. He is me. We’re one.
My breasts thrust upward, and he takes one in his hand and pinches the nipple.
A new jolt zings through my body, following that same track as my orgasm, sizzling all the nerve endings along the path once more.
It’s exquisite. He begins to move, rising long enough to tear his cut and shirt off and toss them beside me on the bed.
Resting his palms flat on the mattress beside my head, he begins thrusting hard against me, and I love every minute, watching his muscles strain and bulge and glisten with sweat.
His palms run along my ribs, my waist, my hips, and lock there, holding me in place as his breathing accelerates, his body curving and moving in and out. It’s so fucking hot I can’t take it. I want to do this three times a day, maybe four. Will even that be enough of this man?
He’s getting close; I can tell, and I tighten around him.
“Fuck, yeah. That feels so good. Don’t stop, baby girl.”
I slip my hand behind the base of his cock and press, and he detonates, going still, buried deep inside me. His chest heaves like he just ran a mile, and he drops on top of me.
I wrap my arms around him and shower his neck and shoulders with tender kisses. It takes him a minute to recover, and then he goes up on his elbows and does the same to my face, kissing my chin, my cheeks, my forehead, my nose, and finally my mouth.
He moves across to my ear. “I love you, Tori.”
My arms tighten around him. “I love you, Rafe.”
He rolls off me and takes me with him, until I’m sprawled on top of him. His hands stroke over the backs of my thighs, my ass, the small of my back, my ribs, my shoulders. His touch is smooth and strong, and I melt against him, moaning.
“Don’t stop,” I whisper.
He kisses my temple. “Never, baby. Never.”
I don’t know when I fall asleep, but when I wake up, I’m still in the same position. His body is my warmth, and I don’t want to move, but I know I need to. I try to slip off him to lie curled to his side, but he stops me, his hands tightening on my ass.
“Where you think you’re goin’? Get back up there.”
I grin to myself, and do as he says, pressing a kiss to his chest.
“That’s my good girl.” His warm hands drift over my back and ass until I fall asleep, listening to the sound of his heart beating. Heaven. Why would I ever want to leave this spot?