For the first time, the warehouse feels crowded as nearly a dozen people sit around the office and outside in the main room, tiredly shooting the shit. They just got off shift protecting the neighborhood and protecting me, and while I should feel grateful to these ten men and two women, all I can think of is Ryker.

I feel like an outsider. These people, they grew up in housing projects nearby, learning in the streets. They grew up fighting, and while trying to become a teen actress wasn’t exactly all fun and games, they’ve had a harder life than I’ve had.

Even their language is different. When they throw around the street slang that the scriptwriters used to get me to try occasionally, they sound comfortable with it. They know exactly how to use it, what it means. They don’t look like they’re going to stumble over their own tongues, forcing the words out and trying not to giggle like I used to.

Still, the conversation is quiet, and as Marcus takes a seat next to me, he hands me a cup of coffee. “You know, you don’t need to be up yet. For sure, you don’t need to be sitting around here with us deplorable types.”

“Kinda lonely lying on the bed, and I couldn’t get back to sleep,” I whisper, looking down. I don’t know why I should be so emotional, but I am. After sleeping fitfully for only a few hours, I decided to get up. “They keep looking at me . . .”

“It’s been a while,” Marcus says simply, sipping his coffee. “A lot of the crew is wondering about you.”

“About what?” I ask, and one of the other people laughs.

“We’re wondering if you really are Rygirl or not,” someone jokes, earning a few chuckles before an icy stare from Marcus shuts him up and people start to leave the office area. “Fuck, man, just making a joke.”

“Would you say that if Ryker were here?” Marcus asks, and the man shakes his head. “Then get the fuck out.”

The man closes the door behind him, and Marcus sits down, shaking his head in frustration. I’m totally confused, and I look at him. “Rygirl?”

Marcus nods. “It’s just a stupid term the crew came up with for when he found a real girlfriend, not a part-time fling. For most of the time that Ryker’s been in charge of our gang, he’s been single. Our lives sort of demand it outside of what you can guess. Oh, by the way, sorry about walking in on you guys earlier.”

“It’s okay. You were concerned about your brother,” I reply, reaching out and patting him on the shoulder. “You know, for all the tough guy act you show the crew, you’re pretty sensitive.”

Marcus chuckles, shrugging. “Maybe. I do know that I hope you are Rygirl. He needs someone in his life besides me.”

“Ryker’s Girl?” I ask as I make the connection, and Marcus nods. “But I’m not his girl! I mean, sure, you saw us, well . . .”

“I saw,” Marcus says. “And I’m man enough to admit that I was a little jealous of Ryker. Back when we were kids and you were on TV, I was the one with the bigger crush on you than him. I actually wrote you a fan letter once, although all I got back was a form letter from your talent agency.”

I chuckle, nodding. It helps, Marcus’s admission, helping me recenter a little. “At one point, I was getting ten thousand letters a week. Now I get none. To be honest, I prefer getting none. But still, just because the two of us were . . . together, that doesn’t make me his girl.”

“No, it doesn’t,” Marcus agrees. “But when he turned around to give you that kiss before he left, that’s all I needed to see. Everyone knows it. Except for maybe you, it seems.”

“It’s only been a few days, Marcus. Maybe a little over a week?”

He shrugs. “When you know what you want, you know what you want. Ryker’s always been like that. Either way, he’s been different and I like the new Ryker I’m seeing this past week. More heart, less cold-blooded. Tell you one thing—he needs more than me in his life.”

I nod, looking down. “Still, it’s not like that.”

“You never know. Like I said, Ryker doesn’t fuck around,” Marcus says. “And you two have chemistry. I saw that back at the penthouse. The way you’d talk about him when I was keeping you company, the way he talked about you . . . I could tell something was happening.”

“Can we change the subject?” I ask finally, and he hums, shrugging. “Uh, if I can ask, you’ve talked about your father. What about your mother?”

Marcus finishes his coffee, sighing. “Took off when Ryker and I were still in junior high. Pop was dedicated to the life. The gang came first, and she couldn’t deal with that no more. Last I heard, she met a guy out west and got remarried. By now, she might even have another kid or two.”

“That’s gotta be tough,” I say, and Marcus shrugs again. There’s a defeated tone to that shrug that makes me sad. It’s like Marcus understands that it’s wrong for a man to not make his wife and his family the most important things in his life, but that’s the way gang life is. It sucks, but there’s nothing that can be done about it. It scares me and saddens me that Ryker might feel the same.

Finally, Marcus gets up, pouring himself another cup of coffee before he sits down and speaks again. “It is what it is. I understand why she did it. I don’t have any hate for her or anything like that. For Pop, the gang was number one, and that has to suck for any woman, whether that number one is a business, a gang, the army, whatever. I used to wonder what my life would have been like if Mom had taken Ryker and me with her, but it don’t matter now.”

There’s a rising murmur of sound outside the meeting room, and Marcus looks up, a smile coming to his face. “He’s back.”

I turn, getting to my feet just as I see him cross the warehouse, blood all over him. “Ryker!”

Marcus hears something in my tone of voice and laughs. “Sure seems like you’re Rygirl to me.”

“It’s not like that!” I yell, but Marcus’s grin never wavers.

The door opens, and Ryker comes closer, his face and body exhausted, but his eyes sparkle when he sees me. “What’s not like that?”

There’s a crowd gathering outside, everyone almost silently respectful as Ryker leans against the door frame and Marcus gets a chair for his brother. “Nothing, brother,” Marcus says. “We’re just glad to have you back, that’s all.”

I can feel the heat rise to my cheeks as I sit back down, and Ryker comes over, pulling out the chair and sitting next to me. A few of the idiots outside mutter, but it dies as soon as Ryker glares back over his shoulder. He turns back to me, his eyes softening as he puts a comforting hand on my leg.

The fact is, I don’t know what to think. Feeling his hand on my thigh, I feel something I’ve never felt before. It damn sure isn’t at all like Jacob’s charm when he was dating me and I didn’t know that the charismatic smile hid a monster on the other side.

Ryker is different. As his hand rests on my thigh, he’s not demanding and he’s not saying he understands. Just that . . . it feels like he accepts me. Finally, I look up at him, swallowing the lump in my throat as I take in the blackened blood that’s covered half his face. “Is he . . .?”

Ryker nods. “By my hand.”

“Was there anyone else home?” I ask, and Ryker nods, the look in his eyes sending a chill down my spine. “Oh, no . . . Stanzie?”

“A blonde girl. She was dead when I arrived,” Ryker says. “I’d have called when it was done, but I broke my damn phone in the fight, and then I had to get other things done. Marcus . . .?”

Ryker’s words hit me hard, and I think about poor, sweet Stanzie, who never had a chance. If there’s anything that I can do for her, I swear to myself, I’m going to do it. She had a piss-poor life that I couldn’t do anything about, but she’s going to be honored in her death, that I can swear.

All of this flashes through my mind in the heartbeat after Ryker’s question. Marcus’s phone rings before he can answer, though, and he pulls it out, listening quickly before saying one phrase in reply. “Yeah, we’ll call you back.”

He turns to Ryker, his eyes looking at his brother in wonder. “That was a contact from the mayor’s office. They want to meet.”

Ryker nods, leaning back in exhaustion. “Then it’s done. Marcus, get a car. I want to go home.”

* * *

I have to help Ryker from the elevator to the bedroom when we get up to the penthouse, shaking my head when Marcus offers his hand. “Okay,” Marcus says. “I’ll make sure this building’s on lockdown. You’ll have plenty of people downstairs just in case. No worries for the next few hours.”

“Thank you,” I tell Marcus. “Marcus . . .”

“Don’t worry, just take care of him.”

Marcus leaves, and I turn, going over to the bed, where Ryker’s lying stretched out, his right arm over his face and his chest heaving. I close the bedroom door and sit down next to him, laying a hand over his heart. “You okay?”

Ryker takes his arm away from his eyes and looks at me in the soft light filtering through the shaded windows, swallowing. “I . . . I watched him die, Sarah. I thought I’d feel different about it.”

“How do you feel?” I ask, feeling his heart hammering in his body.

“Good . . . and hollow,” he says. “I did what needed to be done. Not for vengeance—that’s what I feel hollow about—but for you. I’m glad I killed him.”

“So am I,” I whisper. I lean down, softly kissing him on the lips before tracing his lips with my tongue. Ryker stirs at my caress, his hands coming up to pull me down onto his body, kissing me back.

“You know you don’t have to,” he says when we pause for breath.

I smile, stroking his face as I straddle his hips and run my fingers through his hair. “I don’t, which is what makes you so wonderful. But Ryker, you’ve won your prize. Now take what’s yours.”

He looks up, the exhaustion dropping in an instant from his face as my words make an impact. He reaches up, pulling me down onto him and kissing me hard. My breasts smash against his chest as he reaches down, crushing me to him and grabbing my ass, massaging it and setting my pussy on fire with need.

“Yes.” I groan as Ryker’s hand slides inside my sweatpants and strokes my skin. Pushing away, I pull my shirt off, rolling off him to lie on my back, submitting to him completely.

Ryker gets to his knees, tearing his shirt off and getting off the bed long enough to push his pants down, stepping out of his boots. “Strip for me, Sarah. Now.”

His command is like nothing that Jacob ever did. I feel sexy and powerful as I push my sweatpants down, playfully kicking them off before lifting my hips and pushing down my panties. When they’re off, I spread my legs for Ryker, holding my knees apart. “Do you really think I’m desirable?”

Ryker’s eyes tear themselves from my wet pussy to look me in the eye, and in his gaze, I see something that I thought didn’t exist any longer. He wants me, but at the same time . . . he respects me. He wants more than just to fuck me and prove his manly dominance. A lot more.

“I think you’re the most beautiful woman in the world,” Ryker says, climbing onto the bed and taking ahold of my left ankle. He adjusts my legs so that he’s in between, his cock standing out thick and hard from between his legs as he climbs higher. The whole time, he never breaks eye contact with me, but instead, he slips his hands behind my knees, slowly curling me up until the thick root of his cock brushes against my pussy lips, resting there and sending trembles through my body. “I think you’re an angel.”

Ryker starts thrusting his cock slowly, leaning down and kissing me and letting our tongues twist and tangle around each other as his cockhead rubs between my lips and over the head of my clit. I wrap my legs around him, hopelessly unable to resist him as my body is thrilled with every slow thrust, wetness coating Ryker until, with a stretching sensation that I never want to forget, he fills me with one long, deep thrust of his cock.

“God, you’re fucking perfect,” I hiss as he grinds against me, stretching me and electrifying nerves that still are not too sure they even exist. “Ryker, one request?”

“What’s that?” he asks, putting his hands on the mattress on each side of my head and looking down at me as he pins me down. “Am I going too hard?”

I smile and reach up, cupping the back of his head. “No. Not every time, but . . . give it to me as hard as you want. Right now, I’m a hundred percent yours, and I want you to take me that way.”

Ryker nods, a smirk coming to his sexy lips as he pulls back, pausing at my entrance. “Just remember, you asked for it. And if it’s too much, just say ‘please’.”

Before I can reply, he thrusts hard, my eyes flying open as his hips smack against my ass and my pussy feels like a pleasure explosion’s gone off inside it. I let go of Ryker’s neck to claw at his shoulders, holding on for dear life as he pounds my body with abandon.

It’s . . . there are no words to describe how it feels. I never thought I could let myself be put into a position of being like this again. Ryker risked his life to gain my freedom, and tonight, I give it to him, and he’s rewarding me by giving me the absolute most mindblowing fuck of my life.

I wrap my legs around him tightly, trying to squeeze and give as good as I’m getting, but it’s no use. Ryker’s a force of nature, thrilling me with every stroke of his cock, every inch of my skin tingling as his hard chest muscles rub against my nipples and our flesh seems to become nothing but an unending connection.

Time slips away again, carried away in the tide of our panting breath, the sweat coating our skin and making everything both slicker and more on fire. Ryker captures my mouth in another intense kiss before licking my ear and nipping at it with his teeth. “Nobody . . . nobody better than you.”

His words trigger my release, and I moan, digging in my fingernails as I come hard, pulling him deep into me. Ryker shudders, his cock swelling before he comes too, the feeling of his heat inside me drawing out the moment and making it feel like it’ll last forever.

Of course, it can’t, but as we collapse, lying next to each other, Ryker pulls me close, letting me rest my head on his chest. I feel both of us start to drift off, and that’s fine. I’m sure if anything needs to happen, Marcus will wake us.

“Thank you,” Ryker mumbles sleepily just as the gray curtain of sleep fogs my brain. “Thank you for giving me a few days of what I’ve always wanted. I only wish . . .”

I don’t hear anymore as sleep pulls me the rest of the way down, taking with it my reply.