Dax lay in the dark with Angel in the crook of his arm, watching the rise and fall of her chest. They’d finally gotten up off the couch and gone into the bedroom and once they lay down she’d started crying. She cried into his chest for almost an hour before finally crying herself to sleep. It broke his heart that he didn’t know what to do to make her feel better. It broke his heart that he’d accused her of talking to the cops…or being a cop. He wasn’t even sure what he thought she’d done. He had spoken to Dan twice while she was around, but he hadn’t said anything about the plan. The plan was only talked about behind the closed doors of the meeting room, and Dax and Handsome were the only two with keys to that room. The sergeant at arms, Turbo, and Clay didn’t even have keys and even if they did, he trusted them explicitly. Especially now that Clay had died for the cause and Turbo was probably going to spend the rest of his life in prison. The only other key to that room that existed belonged to his vice president, Mad Max, and he’d been out in California for the past six months.

Dax looked down at Angel’s pretty face. He’d never felt anything remotely close to what he felt for her. It consumed him; when Handsome had suggested she snitched on them, it had taken everything in him not to knock him right off that barstool. But Handsome planted a seed, and by the time Angel showed up Dax had almost convinced himself it was her. But she had that story about her uncle and she’d handed him her phone and told him to call her cousin. And then, she’d cried like her heart was broken. Those sobs were sobs of grief. She couldn’t have faked those…could she? He looked at her again. He loved the way her blonde hair shone, even in the little strip of light that came through the blinds from the streetlight outside. He loved the delicate shape of her face and her full, sexy lips. Her long neck was exposed and even in the midst of all of this chaos, he was tempted to bite it. He loved the way she smelled and the way her skin felt. He loved her, and no matter how much he might deny that, it was just a fact now. He’d gone and done something he promised himself he’d never do. He’d fallen in love, and he wanted to keep her, and he had no idea what he would do if it turned out that she was the one who had notified the cops. If it was her fault that one of his best friends was dead, one was in the hospital, and three others in jail…he just didn’t know what he might do.

He closed his eyes and a memory slipped into his conscious and all-too-awake brain. Yesterday morning when Handsome had woken them up to tell him about Scar’s death, he’d gotten dressed and before he left the room, he realized that his keys weren’t in his pocket. He didn’t think anything about finding them on the floor. He’d just picked them up and put them back in his pocket, thinking they’d merely fallen out. Now as he lay there remembering, he remembered her asking for the keys when he was outside…because she’d locked the guest room door and left her phone inside. He opened his eyes again and looked at her pretty face. He thought about the way she looked at him with those gorgeous green eyes of hers. They were filled with lust sometimes but other times he saw things there that he could get lost in, that he could drown in. He saw real, deep feelings. Could she be faking that too? Dax was a great judge of character. It was kind of a gift; he was so good at it. No part of him got a bad feeling about her. Even when he’d been accusing her earlier, his heart hadn’t been in it. No. It couldn’t be her. It. Just. Couldn’t. Be.

He closed his eyes and the next time he opened them, sunlight was streaming through the window and his phone was ringing from the pocket of his jeans on the floor. He sat up and threw his legs over the side of the bed and fished his phone out of his pocket. It was Handsome.

“Hey.”

“Hey.

“Bobby was released from the hospital. Vaughn said they booked him into County. Have you heard anything from Dan?”

“Not yet. He’s probably plotting my gruesome, painful death.” Dax had never met Dan face to face, but he sent work their way every so often. What Dax knew about him was that he paid well and on time, and if you screwed him over in any way, you disappeared. Dan had been referred to as a “ghost,” since no one actually seemed to ever see him, but his presence was well known. He also sent work to the Sinners, or he had been before they pissed him off on the last job. Dax heard a rumor that the guy at the center of screwing that all up disappeared. He had no doubts that Dan had made that happen. Dax expected him to call anytime. He was probably gathering his facts before he did. But Dax knew the call would be coming, and soon.

“Fuck. What a mess,” Handsome said. “I called out to the ranch and everything is okay there. So far, no sign of the cops. Is everything okay with Angel?” Dax felt that defensiveness well up inside of him again, even though he’d just been having suspicions of his own.

“She’s fine. We’re fine. You guys go on home. I’ll be there soon. Get some rest. We’ll meet this afternoon.”

“Alright. Dax…I’m sorry, about what I suggested last night.”

“We’re cool, man.” Dax ended the call and looked over at Angel. She was still sleeping. He reached back into the pocket of his jeans and pulled out a joint and a lighter. He lit the joint, pulled a long drag into his lungs, and held it there. As he exhaled he heard Angel stir. He looked over at her and she was looking up at him with her sleepy green bedroom eyes and suddenly everything he was thinking about her was gone, just like that. He realized at that moment that he wanted her, no matter what. That almost scared him more than anything ever had.

“Hi,” she said, in a raspy whisper. Her voice was hoarse from crying and her pretty eyes were red and swollen.

“Hi.” He held the joint out in her direction. She sat up and took it from him, inhaling a long drag of her own before handing it back. Once she exhaled she pointed at the phone lying in his lap and said:

“Is everything okay?”

He sighed. “No, baby. Everything is pretty much still a fucking mess. How are you feeling this morning?”

She smiled sadly. “Like shit.”

He nodded. They finished the joint together in silence and then he dropped the butt in the ashtray next to the bed and lay back down. Angel snuggled down into the crook of his arm and buried her face in the side of his chest. For just a second he wondered why he didn’t just put her on the back of the bike and take off. They could go anywhere. They could start over, just the two of them. He knew it was a fantasy that would never happen, but it was a fantasy that his overworked brain needed at the moment. It was like a vacation in his head. He pulled her in tighter and let his lips brush across the top of her silky hair. She pulled her head up and looked at him. She looked so sad that all he wanted just then was to make her feel better. He wanted to make her forget everything that was making her sad, if only just for a little while.

Dax bent his head down, and Angel didn’t hesitate to stretch her neck so that their lips met. He loved the way she always wanted him, no matter what. There was no fucking way she was a cop. He’d heard about cops taking desperate measures to make an arrest…but they’d been fucking like rabbits for over two months now. There was no way any cop would go that far…was there? His dick twitched in his shorts and another frightening realization hit him. He didn’t care, and none of it made him want her any less.

* * *

As Dax kissed her, Angel wondered if she was supposed to want him so badly the morning after she lost her father. Was she turning into something she didn’t even understand? As his lips covered her bottom lip and he gently sucked it into his mouth, she realized that she didn’t care what she was turning into. Nothing she did could bring her father back and nothing would change the fact that she was partially responsible for his death. But for this one moment she could lose herself in Dax’s arms and his sexy body, and maybe have just a little bit of peace before she had to face the reality of a life without her father.

Dax put his hand on the side of her face and while they kissed he let it slide around to the back of her neck, underneath her hair. He used his hold on her to tip her head back and expose her neck. He kissed down the side of her face and then his sexy full lips were on her neck. As he softly licked, kissed, and sucked on the tender skin there, a surge of electricity—or maybe it was adrenaline—rushed through her body. A chill ran down her spine when she felt his teeth nipping at her flesh. He brought a hand up and cupped one of her breasts through the t-shirt she was wearing. He massaged it gently as they kissed, and she felt herself growing wetter between her legs from that simple touch. She moaned into him and he pushed gently against her neck, bringing her in closer and deepening the kiss.

She was pressed into his chest; she could feel his heart beating against hers. He reached down and pulled up her t-shirt, breaking the kiss long enough to pull it over her head and toss it aside, and then he slid his hand down her body as he kissed her again and slipped his hand into the front of her panties. She shuddered in ecstasy as his fingers played across her wet lips and he let his thumb slide down her slit. He broke the kiss again and looked down at her face and, proving that he was as sweet as she insisted he was, he said:

“Are you okay to do this? Is it wrong of me to want to make love to you after everything that happened last night?”

He said “make love.” That was the first time he used that term and it wasn’t at all lost on her. “I want you to,” she whispered. Her throat hurt from crying the night before and even her stomach muscles ached. But his touch was like an elixir that cured all her ills. The look of lust and desire in his blue eyes, as he raked them across her bare breasts, was enough to set her body on fire. He dipped his head down and captured one in his mouth, letting his tongue roll slowly and seductively across the nipple. He took his time with it, licking it like it was a delectable treat. The feelings she was having as her nipple puckered and hardened went straight through her belly to her pussy and caused another gush of hot wetness between her legs.

He moved over to the other breast and licked that one for a while before at last using his teeth to gently bite and nibble at it. Angel was arching her back up off the bed, begging silently for more. Her hands were in his hair and she was tugging at it, trying to bring him in even closer although their bodies were molded together already like they’d been glued.

After he’d driven her nearly mad with his slow seduction of her breasts, he brought his mouth back up to hers and covered her lips with his own soft, warm ones. They lay there for a long time just kissing, exploring each other’s mouths with their tongues and licking, sucking, and biting at each other’s lips.

He pulled back and pushed her onto her back. Looking down at her again with a look of reverence in his eyes, he began to touch her body, all over. Light, gentle strokes of his fingers covered her hot skin from her neck down to her thighs. Once again, he leaned over and kissed and licked her skin. She was so hot that she thought it a wonder his wet lips didn’t make her skin sizzle each time he touched it. Not for the first time, she wished that they could stay like this forever…just the two of them, without a care in the world.