It’s late, probably close to one in the morning, and I can’t sleep. I lie in bed for a long time, tossing and turning, drifting off for a moment only to startle awake seconds later by voices I know aren’t real but still whisper to me about my sins. Even using one of the other refugees from my Army days, an old, rough blanket that stretched over quite a few beds a lot like this one, can’t help.

Giving up, I pace the floor, dropping every few laps to pump out pushups in a failed attempt to center my mind. I’m home. I’m safe. There is no threat. I play the mantra on repeat in my mind, over and over, trying to get it to sink in and feel true.

But no matter how much my brain tries to believe it, my body fights it. Outside the window, I can see the night. Out there is my enemy, and my enemy wants my blood, the voices say. I can’t see them because they always know how to blend in like mythical ninjas out of a movie. Every person could be the one who has a bomb around their waist or an AK behind their back.

My heart racing, sweat on my brow, and a coiled spring of aggression ready in my belly, I give up. I need to get out, get away. Just like always, I know what I need to do. I pull on some jeans, dirty from the floor but I don’t care, and grab a black t-shirt from the top of the clean pile.

Pulling on my boots, I tie them quickly before heading down the backstairs to the garage. The grinding of the door rollers over the sand that invariably gets in the track is loud, but my bike will be even louder. The neighbors will be pissed but there’s nothing I can do about that because I have to ride . . . now.

I thumb the ignition on my Harley before tweaking the throttle up to a growling roar, then I let it drop down to a relatively gentle purr and pull forward slowly, just getting out the door. I press the button to lower and lock the garage, ready to ride. Zipping up my jacket, I turn onto Main Street toward the mountains.

I see McKayla’s light turn on above the salon, bright in the dark sky, and the blinds move. I can’t hear her knock on the glass, but I see her wave and then she holds up one finger. I’m tempted to roll out anyway, but something makes me hang a hard right and pull into the Triple B’s parking lot and wait.

I don’t have to wait long. In what seems like a second after she waved, she’s coming out the front door of the salon, pulling on boots with her romper pajamas. She’s bare-faced, her hair wild with sleep, wearing what basically equates to a sweet onesie and combat boots.

It should be ridiculous. I should be laughing my ass off, but to me, she’s never looked more beautiful. Without a word, she climbs on the back and wraps her arms around me and we’re off like a shot. How does she do it? I wasn’t going out for her tonight. I just needed to clear my head, but there she was, ready to ride with me without a moment’s notice or even a word spoken. This time, though, I turn toward the highway, avoiding the high elevation of the mountains for her sake. It’s chilly enough. Up in the mountains, it’ll get frigid. Fun for me to see what that could do to her nipples, but not so fun what’ll it’d do to the rest of her.

We ride for what seems like hours, no destination in mind, just letting the asphalt stretch out under the wheels. The moon rides with us in the clear black velvet sky, rising to its peak before cresting and starting to descend.

As McKayla holds onto me, peace settles into my bones from her touch. She’s an easy rider, an extension of the bike and my body, just leaning and riding without fighting the flow. And it feels good to have her hands wrapped around me, her body pressed to my back, grounding me to the here and now, helping me fight back the demons’ hold on my night.

Somewhere over an hour west of town, I pull over at an all-night truck stop for gas.

As soon as I turn off the bike, she hops off. Doing a little squirmy dance, she announces, “Gotta pee, need anything inside?”

I laugh out loud, just unable to wrap my head around the fact that after hours of riding, what she says is gotta pee, need anything? This woman amazes me.

“Nope,” I say after a moment. “I’m good.”

With a smirk and a saucy little salute, she turns, strutting inside like she’s not wearing pink pajamas in the middle of the night with a biker in the sticks of God knows where.

While she’s inside, I swipe my card and fill up my bike, letting the tank guzzle the high-test goodness. I know, I know, the engine runs just fine on regular . . . but I like to baby my bike. When the pump clicks off, I put the nozzle away before mounting my bike and leaning back, letting the welcome but unfamiliar sensation that McKayla seems to create sweep through me. Perched on my bike, I stare up to the stars and let the cool air filter through my lungs.

It’s hard to believe that these are the same stars, the same sky I saw as a kid when TJ and I would sleep outside in our tree house. Back then, it was all so easy. We’d spend hours pretending we were pirates, using the bright lights to navigate to our riches. We always found the riches too, considering Mom would pack a midnight snack for us every time and leave it in the treehouse before she went to bed herself. Fuck gold, fuck diamonds . . . back then, give me a grilled peanut butter and banana sandwich any day.

I sigh wistfully, remembering back to the happy, innocent days before another memory creeps up. Looking up at these same stars, I recall as I stood guard in some windswept village that might have had just as many enemies inside the perimeter as outside, and night movements where we had to navigate to targets instead of treasure, although the Army pretty much considered them one and the same. Back then, the stars were a bitter comfort, a normalcy of home in a place that was far from it.

I always preferred the night for the nasty missions. It’s just a little easier on the soul to do ugly things under cover of night than in the bright lights and scrutiny of the sunshine.

I shake my head, letting the past slip away as McKayla walks out of the store. With the light surrounding her, I can see her better, and I realize that the romper is likely all she has on, her nipples peaked up beneath the thin top and not a panty line in sight below.

Is it bad that I want to order her to do a spin for me, show me a little jiggle of her unrestrained ass? Probably, but fuck it, she knows I’ve got a bad side to me. “Turn around.”

McKayla stops, her head tilting like she didn’t hear me. “You’ll have to be a little more specific. Turn around and go back inside the store? Turn around and do a fucking pirouette? Do I look a damn ballerina in this getup? Turn around . . .”

She trails off and I realize that for all her sass, she really doesn’t know what I want. If anything, it turns me on more, giving her an innocence that has my cock throbbing in my jeans. “Turn around and let me see your ass.”

McKayla’s eyes sparkle as her lips twitch in a sex-laced smirk that just makes this whole scene in front of me surreal and at the same time, arousing as hell. “Well, why didn’t you say so?”

She turns around, leaning forward a little to stick her ass out, her head turned back, watching my every move. Shaking her hips back and forth, I can see the outline of her pussy lips against the fabric of her pajamas. She gasps in arousal as she spanks the bottom of her ass with her palm, a nice smack sounding out in the quiet parking lot.

I can’t stand it anymore. I have to satisfy my curiosity . . . and maybe something else. “Princess, you got anything on underneath that jumper?”

McKayla turns back, a fake innocent act all over her face. “Oh, this thing? What’s underneath this thin little pink romper? Well, nothing, I guess. Just me. All me.”

She drives me fucking crazy.

“Get over here,” I growl, reaching out a hand. When she’s close enough, I realize just how tiny she is without her usual sky-high heels. I grab her, picking her up and setting her down in front of me, straddling me and the bike but backward, her legs lying on top of mine. I can feel the warmth of her body through the thin cotton of her pajamas and the curve of her ass as my bike pushes it up into my palms.

She hugs me, arms on my shoulders to keep from falling, but I’ve got her. She’s not going anywhere. Knowing that a gas pump is not the place for this, I fire up my bike only long enough to pull over into the far edge of the parking lot, where the lights are low and we’ll have a bit of privacy at least.

I grab her shoulders from behind, laying her back over the gas tank and handlebars, and she looks up at me, the stars reflecting in her eyes. This might be my favorite view of the sky ever, but I don’t tell her that.

McKayla runs a hand down my chest before reaching over and tweaking my left nipple hard. “I’m not fucking you in a truck stop parking lot. I’m not a lot lizard.”

I laugh despite the pain, pulling her up to press her luscious body against me again, grinning. “How does a girl like you even know what that is?”

She smirks and kisses the tip of my nose. “I’m not one to kiss and tell, but remember . . . Prince, Vegas, teenage years?”

I chuckle and kiss her lips again. “You’re right. But let’s get one thing straight. If I wanted to fuck you right here in this parking lot, I damn sure fucking would.” I pause, looking at her fiercely, daring her to disagree, but she stays silent. Instead, she looks at me with a type of brave vulnerable intensity that says she’s serious, she doesn’t want to, but at the same time, she won’t tell me no. It decides it for me. She’s better than a parking lot. “But I’m not . . . this time.”

McKayla smiles, relaxing at my acquiescence and laying back out over the gas tank, her head resting against the handlebars. I begin mindlessly tracing my fingertips up her legs, from her ankle, to her knee bent over my thigh, and up her inner thigh just shy of her pussy, where I tease her, knowing she wants more.

I do it over and over again, and finally, she breaks the silence. “What happened tonight?”

I’m silent for a minute, not sure if I’m going to answer, but something compels me to. “Just a bad night. Sometimes, I can’t sleep and the memories get to me. I hate sleeping pills, so I tried to work out, tried to relax, but sometimes, riding is the only thing that works.”

She nods her head, thinking for a minute. “Stuff from when you were in the military? Those kinds of bad memories?”

I don’t want to talk about it. It only dredges it all up again, so I distract myself with the sensation of her soft skin under my fingertips. “Yeah, missions and stuff. I did some fucked up shit in the name of following orders and protecting my country. It’s hard to deal with that. It’s just dirty and ugly on my soul. I’m FUBARed from the inside out.”

My fingers trace up her legs again, dipping into her loose shorts to find the wet, warm edge of her pussy. I stroke her puffy lips slowly, moving up to loop gentle circles around her clit.

She gasps, trying to writhe, but I stop her with a press of my hands. “Be still or we’ll fall over. I’ve got you, but don’t move.”

I go back to rubbing, slipping a finger into her pussy and rubbing her clit with my thumb, smearing her juices around her pleasure center in light circles.

She’s unfocused on the conversation, lost in pleasure, but she tries to continue, her eyes widening as I curl my fingers and rub her G-spot. “I don’t think you’re FUBARed. Fucked up, maybe. But not beyond all repair.”

I speed my fingers up, and she moans lightly, her hands clutching at my shoulders as I study her beautiful face. “It’s nice you think that way, but make no mistake, Princess. I’m dark inside, barely keeping a lock on my damage to function around all the civilians.”

McKayla arches her back a little, bringing her cotton covered nipples closer to the dark sky as she tries to keep herself under control. “I think I like you just the way you are.”

I laugh harshly, but it’s not in humor. It’s because I know she’s wrong despite being innocent inside. I stroke her G-spot a little harder and flick her clit with my thumb, knowing that if I were really a decent man, I wouldn’t be making her break her word about not fucking me in a parking lot right now. I may not be balls deep in her, but I’m certain her earlier declaration has been blown to bits with my fingers plunging in and out of her tight pussy.

She cries out in pleasure and I lick my lips before rasping, “You like me a little dangerous, Princess? You think you’re safe with me, safe from my damage? Think again.”

With no warning, I shove a third finger into her pussy, curling it forward to her front wall, making her come instantly and violently.

I hold the bike steady by locking my legs on either side as her whole body tenses and shudders and she groans my name.

I keep teasing that spot until she fights back, begging for mercy. What makes me stop isn’t her words, though, but seeing the trickle of tears down her cheeks because she’s lost so much control. I know they’re tears of pleasure . . . but I can’t stand to see McKayla cry, so I withdraw them, licking them clean before holding her close and letting her know she’s okay.

After she settles back down, she looks up at me with a wild light in her eyes, relieving any worries I may have. It makes me fucking proud that I did that to her, brought out her own little touch of wildness, even if that’s just another sign that I’m fucked up.

“Hey . . . you ever seen a shrink for that?” she asks in a light, casually airy voice.

I growl, instantly pissed off because countless fuckers have told me to see a shrink, but I had enough of Army shrinks. Besides, I’m not a fucking pussy. “No, I don’t fucking need to see a shrink. You think I’m crazy now too?”

She grabs my hand, pressing it against her chest where I can feel her heart beating, and it makes me feel like shit. “Evan, I’m from LA. Everyone has a shrink. It’s no big deal. You need help, you get help. Around there, it was the people not seeing a shrink you had to watch because you knew they were fucked up and weren’t getting help.”

Her casualness about it swirls inside me. I thought she understood, at least a little bit. But no, she’s just like everyone else. She thinks I’m some pet project that can be fixed with a little jabber-jawing.

How can I explain how it feels to be the cause of an innocent civilian losing their life, or to hear your friends screaming for their mothers as their lifeblood bled out to someone who has never put themselves any closer to danger than maybe going jet skiing one time during their honeymoon in the Keys, probably while wearing a helmet, wetsuit, and life vest? No, shrinks can’t help me.

I know I’m fucked up, but talking about it sure isn’t gonna fix the shit I did or the stains on my soul.

I don’t answer, the walls that had cracked mere minutes ago going solid once again. I help her get back on the bike behind me and head home. It’s gonna be a long ass ride if we’re going to get her home by sunrise.