Holed up again. Hiding in the walls of Chicago like frightened mice while a killer cat prowled the streets. This was his worst nightmare now.

He was dreaming a few days ago, his heart and soul soaring high above it all, reunited with the woman he loved. Accepted and forgiven. Now plummeting to the earth, whipping through the clouds and crashing to reality. They had to solve this problem. His Daniella's life was in danger. They didn't know from whom. There was a mysterious cat out there, lurking, waiting to pounce. It had been toying with them, batting and tossing. But eventually it would get them if they didn't get it first. The problem would be so simple if he had a name. If he had a name the man would be dead. His soldiers would be dead. Daniella could rule the city like her father did and he would stand at her shoulder and chop down anyone that looked at her the wrong way. Or they'd move on. When the heat subsided over his heist, when they had a fence for their treasure, he and Daniella could disappear together. They could go and do whatever they wanted, be whoever they wanted. Just a name, Killian. Just give me a name. The rest is easy.

He was laying with her, laying on a mattress on the floor in a different dining room. This one small and compact, low and claustrophobic ceilings. A dusty chandelier hung above them with dim little bulbs. Daytime now. Daytime and he was feeling better. Felt like he could take on the world, take on this hidden killer. She was in the crook of his arm and she was curled against him. He was pretty sure she was naked. He'd like to check but he didn't want to disturb her.

She breathed. Made soft little Daniella sounds while she slept. Her eyes were closed, her lips pouted and misaligned against his chest. The bottom lip puffed with her exhales. She had a hand tucked underneath her chin, a fine and delicate hand, bent sharply, her little fingers curved and relaxed. Her nails were chipped and broken. He smiled. She was such a princess it was so strange to see her like this. He liked it. He kissed the top of her head. Her thick hair smelled of shampoo, something tropical and fruity. Could see the scar Killian had stitched there. She told him she'd been hit with a gun butt. Someone had cracked his angel on the top of her sweet head. She said who'd done it was dead. He wished he was still alive so he could take his own pleasure.

Outside it was getting dark now, growing to dusk. Killian had been gone for two days. Armed with new information his vigor was renewed and he'd headed out of here like a dog lunging on its leash. He’d clicked it loose and watched that fuzzy Irish pit bull go out in the world and he knew it would bring him back a name. Then he’d put the world right again and he'd have the woman he loved safe. They could live and love again. But for now he would rest. When the time came he would be lunging at his own leash but no one had the strength to pull him back.

He lay with his arm around Daniella, his big hand curled around her fine and narrow shoulder, his head turned so his chin rested against her crown and his eyes were cast out the window, watching the sky go from gray to charcoal, a brief moment when it turned the color of a bruise, then it was black.

* * *

His heart beat its powerful squish-squish in her ear pressed to his chest. She sighed. Contentment was superficial, her heart tasted it but couldn’t surrender to it. There was work to be done. A man from Italy wanted her dead. Until this was resolved there would be no contentment.

She kissed his chest. Lifted her head and let her chin settle in his muscle, watched him sleep. It was night now but the moon splashed its light on his masculine face, cutting deep shadows in the hollows of his cheeks and his strong brow. The rims, the high points, were painted in silvery lines. He was her beautiful Rocco. He breathed deep and heavy, his head turned to the window, its heavy weight settled in the soft pillow. They were under the covers and they were naked. It should be heaven but it wasn’t. Murderers looking for them, they were hiding, they’d almost been caught, both of them almost killed. Her lover took two bullets. His body destroyed by metal hurtled down the barrel of a gun at supersonic speed. He should be dead. He was tough but he could be killed. They could have killed him so easily, shooting him in the back. And her killers? ...Wished her to be hurt, not just to stop breathing. Wanted to set her on fire, burn her with wire, and she suspected they had other plans as well.

Her hand formed a loose claw and she let it explore his body. Nails scratched lightly over his chest, down the ridges of his hard muscled stomach, back up again. He began to stir, his eyes twitching but not opening. Her mouth took his nipple. She sucked it past her lips, her tongue teasing it. He’d been so injured. So devastated by the trauma of the impact of that bullet. He’d been lucky, but he wasn’t unaffected. They’d slept for two days. She’d slept with him, clung to his side like she would never leave him. Her hand came down again and now it went low. Through his thick patch of pubic hair and down between his legs. Her fingers explored the shape of that warm sagging weapon. He lay on his back and it had settled, pointing straight down and touching the mattress. She toyed with it. Fingertips exploring its sleeping shape, then gently lifting it and feeling it camber and squirm in her grip. He might be sleeping but he was gaining arousal. Her hand went up and down, brought stiffening life to it. Now his eyes fluttered and the black line of his lashes was broken and a wink of moonlight was reflected back at her from his wet eye. He inhaled deeply. His cock grew. She asked him, “Do you want me to finish?”

“Finish?” he grunted, his eyebrow cocked, his mouth curved in a quizzical smirk.

“Make you come?”

He laughed, a closed mouthed grumble that heaved his chest and twisted the smirk higher on one side. “Just lay here and let you jerk me off?”

“I want to,” she said.

He frowned.

She smirked now too, said, “You know, because you’re injured, I would—”

“Like a nurse?”

“Right, you know, keep you happy until you’re well enough to—”

He had her on her back in a heartbeat. She was pinned and she was laughing. He was over her on all fours, his hardness she’d encouraged lay on her belly. Her wrists were in his iron grip, her hands held up above her head. Kisses came to her with surprising avidity, and her nipples swelled with their tickle as he bit and sucked on her neck and her collar.

“Well enough?”

“If you make yourself bleed I’ll be so mad at you,” she whispered.

“How’s your head?” he whispered as he let her wrists go. “Your neck still sore?”

“I’m better,” she said, her nails running along the slabs of muscle at his sides, then up and around his shoulders. She was, too. Yesterday the knock she took on her head had traveled into her neck and she couldn’t look left or right, but now she was feeling much looser. She only wanted to look straight now anyway, right into his eyes. There was a renewed strength there, a fierceness that told her all he was thinking about was fucking her, and killing the man who tried to assassinate her.

“Kiss me,” she said, and she raised her head, let her lips and tongue get taken. She breathed him in. His sweat, his bandages, his soap. Her hands swooped underneath him, her palms rubbing up and down his rock hard stomach, her wrists bumping his erection, his hardness was startling. She stroked him.

His kisses worked across her chin, her jaw, then up under her hair. His lips tugged her earlobe, his tongue delicately flicked at her auricle. He whispered, “Does that feel like a man who’s weak?”

“No,” she gasped, her hands struggling with his size. He was like steel in her grip.

“Does that feel like a man who’s recovering?”

“No,” she gasped again, this time falling into a breathy chuckle. His cock was hot, the skin like it was consumed by a fever. His maddening pulse flitted at her palms.

“Roll over,” he said.

Her eyes went to his and she bit her lower lip. She complied, rolling over in place while he hovered over her, watching her. When she was flat on her belly his strong hands gripped her. Worked his thumbs into the knots of her back and she saw brilliant white sparks of pleasure go off behind her eyes. His hands worked lower, kneading her all the way to her waist. She hugged a pillow against her, turned her head to the side and sighed when she felt his kisses on her back now. Working across the skin of her shoulders, their touch healing her as she went, swiping away all the hurt she’d suffered. She’d suffered it for moments like this. Moments of passion and ecstasy with the man she loved. She giggled a diffident rolling cough when his kisses turned to bites and the flesh of her sensitive cheeks was pinched in his white teeth.

“Oh shit, Rocco,” she laughed. He kissed her ass, bit her ass, his hands worked those strong fingers into her softness. He parted her and her eyes closed but her eyebrows climbed high as they would go. A manic giggle came again and her mind reeled; trying to remember the last time she showered, then feeling his warm breath on her, the pressing of his lips, she didn’t care anymore. He explored her, his tongue swiped and spread.

Soon his kisses touched the backs of her thighs and he had her muscles jumping. Belly heaving against the mattress, she cried out. She couldn’t stand it. Needed him to stop, but caught in the paradox of wanting him to do it forever. She gripped sheets into twists in both her fists. Her knees bent and she lightly kicked her legs and arched her feet. All the muscles of her sex—her hips, her ass, her tummy, her insides—had tightened to cords and she had to force herself to breathe. She had stopped somewhere along the way and now her brain grew dim and needed oxygen. She inhaled a long scoring groan and he slapped her ass, cutting her short. Her breath turned to a yelp. He slapped her again, right across the haunch. He growled, “Get up. On your knees.”

Again she complied, her back to him, wanting to see what he was doing but resigning herself to stare at the blank dining room wall. He helped her to get up, walked her forward until her knees were in the pillows and he guided her forward to bend, easing her until her forehead pressed the wall. Gripped her neck then, that massive iron hand holding her throat, careful with his pressure, being kind but she couldn’t deny the threatening strength he had; she could feel it vibrating through him. He was restraining himself. Her chin dipped, his thumb climbed and pulled her lower lip down and she kissed at it, bit at it. He let her, then held her face, his middle finger pressing down the corner of her mouth. Took that finger in her mouth. He fed it to her, bending her head back and if she opened her eyes she would see the ceiling, but she kept them clamped tight, focusing all acuity she had on his body heat at her back, the strength in his hands, his big finger in her mouth.

Her wrist was grabbed roughly, pulled behind her. Her finger-sucking intensified. He put her hand on one of her own cheeks, pulled her other wrist over and did the same.

When he pulled his finger from her mouth, let it slip from her, her lips coming to a point on him not wanting him to take it out, she knew what he wanted. Pulled on her ass for him, spread herself, sucked her lips into her mouth and waited. His finger stroked at her, wet and warm from her mouth, teasing, almost threatening. He pressed, explored, then found the weakness of her aperture and slowly sank his long thick finger inside her.

“Oh shit, oh shit,” she softly sighed over and over.

He worked her like that til she burned for him. Ached for him. His other hand came to her neck, held her, and she bent to the wall again. He eased himself in and out of her, giving her a building pace that had her begging for his cock.

He said, “Baby, put your hands on the wall.”

“What?” she squeaked.

“Spread em out on the wall.”

She did. On her knees, her hands coming out in front of her, his finger slipping out of her. Both hands spread out, fingers wide, laid now on the cool drywall. One of his hands touching the back of her thigh, making all her muscles tighten, he spread her legs wider.

“Not...not back there, Rocco.”

“He didn’t answer.”

“You’re too big, Rocco.”

He gripped his weapon, she felt it grazing the inside of her thighs, his hand angling it. With his finger still inside her anus, the rest of that hand wide open and cupping her cheeks, hefting them, Rocco’s large swollen glans pressed her, mushed her wet labia and then she was breached. She clamored, eyes bulging and staring, witnessing her hands turn to claws and rake the drywall, leaving grooves in the unmarred eggshell.

It spread her, and it passed deeply into her body. He was hard as stone and he felt magnificent. He coated himself with her excitement, stroking in and out of her, his finger inside, her ass in his palm. She bucked against him, took him, showed him she wanted it, wanted him and that they would do it all, they would do everything. He fucked her like that, her giving it back, both of them grunting and panting, until both of them had brought a sheen to them, a hot sweaty film. Their bodies ran with rivulets. The room was filled with their humid aspiration, the smells of their sex, the smells of their excited bodies and she imagined soon this is what their home would smell like. Sex and cooking and love.

“Rocco,” she gasped, “baby? ...”

“Daniella,” he groaned in her ear, his pumping still coming.

“I’m not about death, baby...”

“I know, I told you...”

“I...ah, shot a man...”

“You didn’t, mnh, kill him...” he growled.

“I...he would have died...if Killian didn’t kill him...”

“Yeah,” he grunted, driving deeply, “his life wasn’t...your responsibility...he chose his path...it was him who put himself, mm, at the muzzle of your gun...”

Her head began to roll on her shoulders, her hair swaying and snapping, her breasts bouncing from her incredible lover’s passion. “I don’t want, ah, to kill, I don’t want...p-people to die...

“Soon, baby Daniella, soon,” he crooned behind her ear as he fucked her smoothly, passionately.

His arm crossed her belly and he hugged her tight and she shut her eyes til she saw sparkling starry night behind them. “Rocco...I don’t...I don’t want to lead. I want you. I want life... My life. Our life... I don’t want you to kill...”

“Daniella...” he sighed.

“I know...I know…You hear me? …I know what I want…” She was lost, lost in him. Lost in the now. But when they were done, when their lovemaking was over, she wouldn’t be. She knew where she was. More important, she knew where she wanted to go.

“Fuck, Rocco, fuck,” she began, a low growling mantra. It quickened in pace, getting soft, louder, then softer again, but building in urgency as his thrusting was hurtling her in a wet torrent towards a milldam and Rocco’s rising swell would launch her over the top. The mantra grew to a cry, an undulating mournful sound, as she sought to be washed over the crest…and when his hand came to her front, swooping down the sensitive V of her hip, where it met her thigh, his fingertips working through her hot wet folds, finding in there that glorious eager button, she thought she might black out. Just for a brief moment, a blip, a heartbeat, a sliver of time where everything stopped—then it was the obverse, electric pleasure jolted her synapses and she saw bright capillary light behind her tightly shut eyelids. She cried out as she came. Rocco worked her swollen knob, his beautiful cock slipped in and out of her and she moiled her hips against his palm, squeezing and tugging on his finger with her insides. Her head whipped forward and back, and her hair made slashing noises against the wall. Sweat dripped from her nose, and through warbled wet vision she saw droplets pattering to the pillows. Rocco’s thrusting grew in urgency, she could feel him swell within her, the head of his cock, flared and angry, passing through her like a knot. Then it cabled, went tense, and he pumped it as deep as the angle would allow and she felt his eruption in her belly, felt his hot nectar splash her insides and she gripped him, held it in place until his throbbing and splashing subsided.

He grumbled and heaved against her back, slick with sweat and they were both left gasping.

Then he stopped. His head cocked at an odd angle like he was listening. His ears attenuated to sounds Daniella wouldn’t hear because she had grown up a princess. But sounds she was learning to be wary of, her new life of danger forcing her to be a quick study.

He withdrew his cock and she hissed. Under her hiss, aware of a foreign sound as well. Rocco jumped off the bed and she rolled. Down on one knee, her hands sweeping the floor to find her clothes. She didn’t have a holster yet but her gun would always be near now. Found it under the jeans Killian had brought her and she’d stripped to the floor when she crawled in to bed with Rocco. Then she was up, naked, aroused and wet still, though it was fading. She put her elbows on the bed, her gun aimed to the ceiling for the moment. The foot of the bed pointed towards the open archway that led to the hall. The front door and living room was to the right, the kitchen where Killian had patched them was down to the left. Rocco was at the edge of the archway, pistol in hand, taking cover but listening. His engorged cock bobbed like a horse’s.

There was the sound again, someone was in the house. It came from the left, towards the kitchen. Rocco was angry at her, his face pinched to a scowl and waving her to take cover. She wasn’t going to let him out of her sight. She shook her head. He mouthed something to her, his face hidden partially in shadow, and by his expression she could tell it wasn’t very nice. She waved the muzzle of the gun towards the arch. He shook his head, angry at her, but he acquiesced. Now was not the time to argue with her and he knew it. He knew his tiger.

His shoulder rolled against the wall, his face and the barrel of the gun dipping out to the hall, low to the ground, not where an intruder might expect to see it. Then he rolled back.

Now he crouched low and he made his way towards her, back to her, facing the door, gun extended out. He was widening his view of the hall and the kitchen without exposing himself too acutely. Then his crouch turned to a shuffle and he was moving to the hall with his gun up and at the ready.

From the kitchen she heard Killian hiss, “Jaysus. Put some pants on. What’s the matter with you?”

When Rocco came back he said, “It’s Killian.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder.

“I heard,” she said, relieved enough she should laugh, but she didn’t really appreciate the humor. She hoped in a few days this would be over and it would be safe to laugh again.

Killian called to them from the kitchen, “And bring Daniella out here. I know who wants her dead.” Her skin humped to gooseflesh.

There was a clink of glasses from the kitchen and a thump like a heavy bottle was plunked on the kitchen table. “I brought whisky,” he added, and Daniella tingled with dread, feeling a further awful seriousness settle on her.