Nine puts his laptop back in the van.

When he comes back he stands at the counter, eating his pasta slathered in his ‘world famous’ sauce. I pass because one more taste will surely set fire to my stomach and I’ll turn into a dragon.

Nine cleans up while I go change.

I need to go outside. To breathe fresh air.

To think.

The weather is beyond beautiful. Eighty-five degrees and cloudless blue sky. The world around me is obviously unaware that it’s not supposed to be so lovely under the circumstances.

It’s odd to think that despite if I’m here or not, everything will still go on without me. Good weather. Bad. Droughts. Storms. Day and night will still take shifts.

Just because I know what might happen to me doesn’t mean I’ve given up hope.

Not yet, anyway.

I want to take advantage of the beautiful day so I rummage through the big storage container of clothes and pull out the only bathing suit I can find. Along with everything else in the box, it’s new with the tags still attached.

It’s a simple black string bikini that ties at my hips, behind my neck and around my back. It’s a size too small so my ass cheeks hang out the bottom as do the bottom swell of my breasts, but it’s all I got so I pull it on and tie my hair into a messy bun on the top of my head.

I grab a towel from the bathroom and one of the romance novels I found on a small bookcase in the corner of the living room. I need a distraction after seeing that gruesome scene on Nine’s computer, and I decide that Mercy by Debra Anastasia, a romance I’ve read several times before, will be just what I need along with a little sun on my skin.

I let Nine know where I’m going, and he tells me he’ll be out in just a sec. He’s on his phone, talking in a hushed voice at the dining room table.

I lay my towel down in the middle of the small front yard, the only section for miles that isn’t a tangled web of vines and weeds. I’m not two paragraphs into my book when The Warden appears, nudging my book with his wet nose.

“Okay, okay, boy” I laugh, taking the tennis ball from his mouth and tossing it across the yard.

After a few minutes of play, The Warden tires and lays down next to me, content to chew on his ball instead of chase it. I do the same and pat his head with one hand while lying on my stomach and holding up my book with the other.

“Mind if I join you?” Nine asks. I look up to find him shirtless. A big goofy grin on his face.

I sit up and put down my book. “You’re the babysitter. I think if you left me alone that would kind of be beside the point.”

“True. Although Smoke’s on his way back. He just called so I’m gone soon. I just wanted to give you something first.”

“What’s that?”

Nine hands me a mini zip drive. “Hide it. I hope you can somehow use it to help your cause.”

“Thank you,” I say, taking the drive and tucking it into the pages of the book.

“And there’s one other thing,” he says. His hands come around from behind his back and before I know what’s happening he’s spraying me with cold water from a hose. The Warden barks, and I yelp in surprise, then spend the next ten minutes trying to take the hose from him to get him back.

When we’re all out of breath, we collapse onto the towel, and I dry my hands, picking back up my now somewhat soggy book.

Nine is on his back with his hands behind his head and his eyes closed to the sky. I’m next to him on my stomach, again with my feet in the air.

“I hope things work out for you,” Nine says, sitting up. “And just for the record. I would save you if I could.”

“Thank you.”

He lights a cigarette. “If nothing else. It was nice getting to know ya. I hope Smoke does the right thing as soon as he figures out what that is.”

“Me, too,” I say with a sigh.

The sound of a rumbling engine shakes the ground. We both turn our heads.

Smoke pulls into the pebble drive and kills the engine.

“I guess this is good-bye,” Nine says. He takes me by surprise when he leans in.

“What are you doing?” I ask.

“Just go with it,” he whispers. “Trust me.”

I’m too shocked to pull away. His lips land on mine for a kiss two seconds too long to be considered a peck. I feel Smoke’s presence behind us.

“Who knows? Maybe, we’ll run into one another one day,” Nine says, standing. He looks to Smoke and smirks. “Good thing I parked in the back.” With a wave to an approaching Smoke he turns to leave, but then pauses and kneels to quickly whisper. “The thing on your leg? It’s not a bomb.” He stands back up then disappears behind the house.

I don’t even have time to process what he just said when a familiar shadow is cast over my entire body.

Smoke.

I look up and am met with his stone hard gaze.

“Shit,” I swear.

His jaw ticks.

“What’s going…” I’m lifted off the ground and tossed over Smoke’s shoulder with ease. The leather of his cut is hot against my bare skin. “What are you doing?” I ask, kicking and yelling, pounding my fists against his back.

“I should break his fucking neck,” he seethes.

“Whose neck?” I shriek.

Smoke doesn’t answer. He doesn’t even stop until we’re back in the bedroom. He throws me down on the mattress and removes a set of cuffs from his wrist, cuffing my wrist to the headboard.

“What the hell!” I yelp.

“I should do a lot fucking more than cuff you.” He looks as if he’s trying to gain control over himself but he’s losing. His breaths are rapid. His vein is pulsing in his neck. His knuckles are white.

“I don’t understand. Why…” I don’t get a chance to finish my question because he’s already gone. The bedroom door is left partially open. I hear the front door slam shut and his bike engine roar to life.

I’m so wound up. I can’t think straight. There’s a sinking feeling pulling me down into its depths. I’m pissed the hell off. If I had any chance in hell I’d strangle Smoke with my bare hands. The pain and anger is crippling.

What the hell just happened?

All signs point to Smoke being jealous but is that even possible? He can’t be mad that Nine kissed me. It was just a friendly kiss. But then I realize that’s exactly what he is.

Smoke’s jealous.

I scoff. He has no right to be. Not after the redhead. Not after he kidnapped me. I’m furious and hurt and feeling more alone than I ever did at home.

I’m also frustrated, annoyed, and yet again trapped —cuffed to the fucking bed.

But there’s something empowering about having that effect on Smoke. Something satisfying about making him feel even a small dose of how he made me feel when he brought that girl here.

I scream out my frustrations into an empty house, kicking my feet against the mattress. I pull at the cuffs as if they will somehow magically release me.

They don’t.

I’m wound up so tight I could burst. Maybe, I should show Smoke the drive when he comes back. Maybe, it will mean something to him, enough to set me free.

I remember the deep V in Smoke’s forehead.

Or maybe, it will be my final undoing.

I try to calm my erratic heart and racing mind, but as I lay in the quiet room I find myself something beyond restless.

I stare at the ceiling, unmoving, heart beating wildly.

The empowerment over being able to make Smoke jealous turns into another kind of feeling that starts as a tingle between my thighs, growing and morphing into something more powerful until I’m pressing my thighs together to calm the growing ache.

I tell myself it’s the romance novels that’s ignited this need within me to feel more.

To feel something.

But I know, even as it’s happening, that it’s a lie.

With my one free hand, I try to untie the bathing suit top from around my back, but I can’t reach. I pull up the top instead, freeing my breasts.

I’ve touched myself before but have never found it to be all that satisfying. Most of the time I can’t bring myself to climax. But I needed to calm the storm in both my mind and body. Being tied to the bed limited my options.

I push off my bikini bottoms.

I close my eyes and rest my head against the pillow. My feet are flat on the mattress. Knees up. I squeeze my nipple, then run my flat palm lightly over the pebbled peak. A shot of desire pools in my lower stomach.

I bite my lower lip and move my hand to the other nipple. It feels better than I remember, although it’s been a while. I pinch it lightly and my mouth drops open in a silent gasp.

I might even be able to come just from this. I’m wet, my thighs slippery. I move my hand down my body. I imagine that it’s someone else’s hand touching me.

Wanting me.

The first face that pops into my mind is Smoke’s hoovering above me. I shake my head and decide on Duke instead. I remember his kisses. His good looks. It’s working until my fingertips reach my clit, then the image switches from blonde curls and goofy grins to dark eyes and rough hands. Tattoos and frown lines. Handcuffs and scars. Lips that were made for sin. A perfect body with a corrupt mind.

I remember the way it felt to be on his lap. The way he used my hips to rub me against his hard shaft through his jeans. I circle my clit with my fingers, using my own wetness to glide over and over it again and again. I lift my hips off the bed and imagine that it went further. That the phone or Zelda hadn’t stopped us. I imagine the sound his jeans make hitting the floor. That he flipped me over with my back against the couch and sucked on my nipples while his fingers found my wet, aching folds.

I come before my imagination has a chance to get any further. It’s hard. So hard. Shattering me and putting me back together with pleasure and pain and frustration. It’s so wrong, but I don’t care. I just care about this feeling running through me like a wild rapid-filled river. I’m screaming out into the otherwise quiet house. It’s a wild cry, desperate, loud and unforgiving. I’ve never experienced an orgasm this strong before. This unpredictable.

My hand is still between my spread legs, my finger lazily flicking over my clit as I ride out the waves of pleasure. I shiver from the sensation of my hard nipples against the breeze coming through the window.

I’m coming down, my mouth still open in ecstasy, my fingers dipping inside me briefly to again trace lazy circles over my swollen clit with my own juices.

Smoke’s name is still echoing through the house and through my ears. I roll my head to the side and open my eyes.

I freeze. My movements. My breathing. My thoughts.

Because, there, standing in the doorway, is Smoke.