Zoe was bent over in the garden, but she could feel someone staring at her. She’d been at her grandparents’ house for a few days and her grandfather had yet to say a word to her. She’d heard the argument between him and her nana the first night and since then, things had been silent. She rarely saw him and when she did, he normally turned around and went the other way. But she knew her nana had gone to the grocery store and it was Papa’s day off. It had to be him watching her, and with a deep breath she decided to just get it over with. She straightened up and pushed a lock of hair out of her face, no doubt leaving a trail of dirt in its wake. Her papa was standing at the edge of line of rose bushes, watching her. When she looked at him he said:

“So, how long will you be staying this time?”

She had to clear her throat to speak. He made her a nervous wreck. “I’m not sure. I’m looking for a job though, so I’ll try to be out as soon as possible.”

He cocked an eyebrow. “A job?”

“Yes. Nana’s been helping me apply for a few online.”

“Doing what? What on earth are you trained to do?”

She was shaking inwardly, but she was determined not to let him know he was getting to her. “Not much,” she said. “But I can learn. I’ve been applying for waitress jobs and I even applied for the fall semester at the community college and financial aid.”

He snorted. “You know you don’t get to keep the financial aid unless you actually go to school.”

She sighed again. “Papa, do we have to do this? I know my history as well as you do and I don’t have any excuses for it. Telling you that I’m ready to change isn’t going to mean a thing. You’ll have to see the changes before you believe them, and I get that. This is your home and if you don’t want me here, I’ll leave, but stay or go, I’m going to do this…this time.”

She wasn’t sure, but she thought she saw his features soften…slightly. “When was the last time you used?”

“Over three weeks ago.”

“And what brought about this sudden change?”

“I just don’t want to waste any more of my life. Nothing happened, really, before I stopped using. I was just done with it. I do that from time to time, as you know, and then usually I go right back to it, because I don’t know what else to do with myself. This time, I was clean for a week or so and I saw this terrible accident. I watched a girl about my age die and something clicked inside of me. I started thinking about how life can end at any moment and here I was killing myself, slowly. I don’t want to die, Papa. But I don’t want to live like I’m dying every day anymore either.”

He was looking at her like he always did…like he didn’t believe a word she was saying. It made her stomach hurt, but she kept up the mantra in her head that said she would show him. One day he’d see that she meant every word. Today, she was doing all she could do. “You can stay,” he said, in his gruff way. “We’ll re-evaluate things at the end of the month and see where you’re at. But there will be no drug use while you’re living in my home. Until you get a job…or financial aid,” he smirked, like that was completely unbelievable, “I will give you a small allowance for necessities. If one penny goes unaccounted for in my home, or anything valuable goes missing, I will assume you stole it and I will have you arrested. You don’t use our cars, and your nana won’t be your chauffeur. If you want to go anywhere you will walk or use public transportation, or the beach cruiser you talked me into buying you when you were sixteen, right before you ran off the first time. It’s still in the garage, where you left it. You won’t be given a key to the house, or the code to the garage. The door will be unlocked until ten p.m.; if you get home after that, you can get inside after seven a.m. the next day. You aren’t to bring anyone home with you, you’re to help your grandmother with the chores and if and when you get a job, you can start paying for your room and board because someday you need to learn that there’s no such thing as a free ride.” Before Zoe could respond, he turned and walked away. She didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. In his own way, he was giving her a chance…more of a chance than he’d given her any of the other times before. But the pressure that her papa put on her, his ideas of what and who she should be, had been part of what had always pushed her back out on the streets and into her old habits. She was just going to have to be stronger this time…she knew she could do it…at least, she thought she could.

Zoe spent the rest of the morning in the garden. When her nana got home, she made lunch and Zoe sat with her and Papa and they all ate in silence. By the time lunch was over and she’d helped her nana clean up the kitchen, she was exhausted from the sheer stress of holding it together while her papa stared at her across the table.

“Nana, I’m going to shower and take a little nap if you don’t mind. I didn’t sleep very well last night.”

Nana’s brown eyes looked worried. “I know. I heard you up at three a.m.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“You didn’t. I get up ten times a night to go pee in my old age,” she said, with a chuckle. “Is it the withdrawal?”

“I don’t think so. I’m past the worst of that. I’m just still having nightmares…about that girl.”

“I’m sorry, honey. That had to be hard.”

“I’ll get past it, I’m sure. I’m just going to rest for a while and when I get up, I’ll take the bus down to the Pancake House and turn in that application I filled out yesterday.”

“Okay, but you don’t have to take the bus, I’ll drive you.”

Zoe smiled at her grandmother. “Thank you, but I need to start doing things on my own. When I get back later, I’ll work on getting my old bike in shape and start riding that again. The weather is nice, and the exercise and fresh air will do me good.”

Her nana looked like she wanted to argue, but Papa walked in just in time to cut her off. Zoe excused herself and after a long, relaxing shower, she turned on the overhead fan and climbed into bed. As soon as she closed her eyes, she drifted off to sleep.

“Zoe!” She opened her eyes and looked around the room. She wasn’t in her room at her grandparents’ house, or the motel she’d been staying at recently. She was in a bedroom, an average-sized one with a dresser against one wall and a nightstand on either side of the queen-sized bed she was lying on. “Zoe…I’m waiting.” Her eyes went to the closed door next to the dresser. It was only then that she realized she could hear water running, …a shower, maybe. The voice obviously belonged to a man, but she didn’t recognize it. It had been quite a long time since Zoe had been with a man, at least one she remembered. She occasionally woke up with a man she didn’t recognize when she’d gotten really high the night before, but they rarely even knew her name; and, it was never in a place as clean and nice as the one she was in now. “Baby…I’m going to start without you.”

Shaking all over and wondering what she’d gotten herself into, Zoe slid out of the bed and realized only then that she was naked. The last thing she remembered was falling asleep in her room at her grandparents’ house. Her papa was probably telling her nana that he’d told her so about now. She looked around desperately on the floor and in the chair that sat in the corner, but she didn’t see any clothes. Cautiously, she made her way over to the dresser, but before she got there, the bathroom door swung open and a man stood in the doorway. He was big, muscular, tattooed, and gorgeous. He looked vaguely familiar to her, but it was hard to concentrate on his face since he wasn’t wearing a stitch of clothing, he was aroused, and almost alarmingly well-endowed.

“What are you doing, babe? All the hot water’s going to be gone. You promised me a shower.”

“Um…I’m sorry, I…” The man took a step toward her. Zoe thought she should run, but her feet wouldn’t move, they were glued to the floor. He slid a thick arm around her waist and suddenly his thick, sexy lips were hovering just above hers, and his thick erection was pressed into her stomach. Against her will, she felt a hot rush of moisture between her legs. He slid the hand he had around her waist down and grabbed one of her naked cheeks and squeezed it.

“Don’t be sorry, baby. Just fuck me.”

“Oh, Jesus…”

He grinned. God, he was hot. “Not Jesus, baby, Levi.”

Oh, fuck! Oh, fuck! That’s why he looked so familiar. He was “Her” boyfriend. The love of “Her” life. Fuck! “Levi,” she breathed out. “What…how…?”

He chuckled and let his lips touch hers. He brushed them back and forth before bringing his tongue out and swiping it across her bottom lip. “I think someone had too many shots last night,” he said, with his lips still against hers. Her body was burning up with lust, but her head was spinning with confusion. He took hold of her hand and turned toward the bathroom. She missed his body as soon as he was no longer pressed into her. “Come on, a shower will help with that fog in your brain, and then we’ll fuck the rest of the cobwebs out.”

Zoe had her mouth open as he led her into the small bathroom, but no words were coming out. The shower was still on and the room was filled with steam. He opened the shower with one hand and then stepped in and pulled her in after him. She was suddenly pressed into a hard, sexy, naked body and underneath a warm spray that cascaded over her shoulders and left a slippery barrier between them. She started to protest, or at least she thought she did, when he took both her hands in his and held them behind her back. He used his body to nudge her into the wall and before she could even express her shock, he covered her mouth with his. This time, he kissed her, hard and passionately, a kiss unlike any she’d ever experienced before. She heard herself moaning into his mouth and even as he let go of her hands, she didn’t try to fight him. He kept kissing her and started moving his hands all over her body. He brushed them down her sides and then back up, taking one of her breasts in his hand and rubbing his thumb along the side of her nipple. Her head was still screaming at her to stop this, but her body was out of control with the kind of insane lust that she’d only read about.

Levi brought his free hand up as he continued to massage her breast, and rested it against her throat. Then he pulled back and smiled at her and slid the hand from her breast down over her belly until his fingers found her swollen clit. She whimpered as he began to rub it. While his fingers moved in slow circles around it, he kept his big hand on her throat, not pressing hard or cutting off her wind, but just holding her there in a domineering way. She was surprised at how much it was turning her on. He stopped rubbing her clit for a second and then she felt his thumb press into it as two of his fingers slid up inside of her soaking-wet pussy. Her body convulsed and her knees went weak. His body was the only thing holding her upright, and when he began to rub his hard cock into her, she gave in to the desire she was feeling and slid her hand down his body to take it in her hand. He sucked in a breath as she curled her hand around his shaft and as she started to slide it up and down from tip to base, he increased his pace, shoving his fingers in and out of her hard and fast. He leaned in and kissed her again while she stroked his cock and he finger-fucked her. She was stroking him hard and fast now and Levi was moaning into her. His fingers were reaching depths inside of her that hadn’t been touched in so long, and that quickly she was on the verge of an earth-shattering orgasm. Levi had other plans for her, though. Just as she dangled over the edge, he pulled his hand away and using the hand that had been against her throat, he tangled up a fistful of her hair and used it to push her down to her knees.

Zoe didn’t hesitate to take his cock into her mouth. He put the other hand in her hair and held her head in place and began to thrust his hips. As he shoved his cock back into her throat, she used her tongue to lick it and then she tightened her lips around it and sucked as hard as she could. He was grunting and groaning and the sexy sounds were going right through her. The water had cooled off, but her body was so hot that she barely noticed, until Levi released one side of her hair and reached behind her to turn it off.

Zoe looked up at him then and she locked her eyes into his huge brown ones as she let his cock slide out of her mouth and paused to lick the tip before sucking it back in. “Oh fuck yeah, baby,” Levi breathed out. The sound of his deep voice only spurred her on and she began to devour him. She put her hands on the tight cheeks of his ass and used her hold to move his hips in time with what she was doing to him with her mouth. Every so often she’d look up at him, reveling in the look of pure ecstasy on his face. The more excited he got, the harder she sucked. She finally moved one hand around and took his thick shaft in her hand and began to pump him with it while her tongue continued its ministrations. She stroked hard and fast while sliding her tongue down underneath his cock and gently took one of his balls into her mouth. “Oh fuck…Jesus…where did you learn that, baby? Fuck yeah…”

He let her stroke him and lick him for a few minutes more, before taking her hair into his hands again and using it to pull her up to her feet. He pulled her up for a kiss, and then putting his hands on her waist, he spun her around and pressed her chest into the cold tile. Her nipples reacted to the cold instantly but that was nothing compared to the way her pussy reacted to his big cock sliding into her from behind. She felt her muscles grip onto him and hold him tightly as he advanced all the way inside of her. He was so big and thick that it hurt just a little at first. But he knew what he was doing and he held himself inside her, only moving slightly until her body had time to adjust to his size. He started moving slowly at first, sliding his hands up and taking hold of her breasts as he did. He rolled the nipples around between his fingers as he pumped his cock in and out of her sopping-wet pussy. She was grunting and moaning with the side of her face pressed into the tile. Once she was fully adjusted to having him inside of her, she wanted to keep him there. Each time he’d slide back, she’d thrust her hips back into him, taking him as deep as she could once more. The more she got into it, the more excited it seemed to make him. He grabbed her breasts hard and leaned down and bit her on the neck while he fucked her. Zoe’s head felt like it was going to explode. She’d never felt anything like what it felt like to have Levi inside of her. She was getting loud, unaware and unconcerned if there was anyone around to hear or not. She was on the verge of imploding when he let one of his hands drop down to her pussy and find her clit. While one hand pinched and squeezed and massaged her breast and nipples, the other one fingered her clit, and all the while he didn’t miss a stroke. Zoe wasn’t a screamer, or at least she’d never been before. But when she reached her climax with Levi, she screamed out loudly and felt every muscle in her body begin to convulse and shake as her pussy gushed with wave after wave of delicious orgasm.

Once Zoe finished coming, and Levi adjusted his body so that he was once again holding her up against the tile and keeping her from giving in to her weakened knees, he began to fuck her, furiously. Her body was bouncing into the tile and then into his body and back into the tile again. The thought that her body would be bruised by the time he was finished crossed her mind…but she didn’t care. Levi drove into her and pulled back, repeatedly, grunting and moaning and saying her name. Suddenly he put his arm around her neck and pulled her upright so that her back was pressed hard into his chest and his cock was buried as deeply inside of her as he could go. She felt the rush of his orgasm as he came inside of her and she briefly wondered why she hadn’t insisted he wear a condom. He was making guttural sounds as he came, though, and she found it so sexy that they drove the other thoughts from her head. He rocked into her until he was empty before spinning her around to face him. He was looking down at her with those huge, sexy eyes and his mouth was hovering just over hers as he whispered:

“My girl,” in a breathless voice. Zoe shivered and without hesitation she said:

“That’s right, I’m your girl, Levi.”

Zoe woke up then, alone and fully clothed in the bed at her grandparents’ house. Her body was covered in sweat and her hand rested in the V between her legs. Her pussy throbbed and her thoughts were muddled. It took her several long minutes to work through the chaos in her head. When she did, she only had one question for herself: What kind of weirdo has pornographic dreams about a dead girl’s man? Before she watched that poor girl die, she’d never had a wet dream in her life. Now suddenly, she was having them almost every time she closed her eyes, and they were so real. She closed her eyes again and this time she forced herself to see that poor girl’s face. But instead of making her feel guilty, a tingle ran up her arm and down her spine. It was the same tingle she’d gotten that night when she held the girl’s hand and a strange thought crossed her mind. Maybe the girl wanted her to be with her man. Maybe she didn’t want him to be lonely…Zoe threw the afghan covering her legs off her and sat up on the edge of the bed, laughing. No woman in her right mind would pick Zoe to replace her. She had nothing going for her, and even if she cleaned up her life, she’d always be an addict who was raised by an addict and one hit away from sliding back down the rabbit hole.

* * *

Levi sat straight up in his bed. He’d gotten up early and spent the morning in the shop with Mickey, one of the mechanics in the club, taking apart his father’s bike. He walked over to the clubhouse for lunch, but once he was there he’d decided that he wasn’t really hungry. Instead, he found an empty room and lay down to close his eyes for just a little while. As soon as he had, he’d been thrust into a dream. It was the kind of dream he usually loved, the kind that made him wake up to a rock-hard cock and a round of masturbation while he imagined doing all kinds of dirty things to Krissy. But this dream had been different. He was in his apartment, in the shower and he was fucking her from behind. It was so good…like it always was. But after he came and he turned her around to face him, he realized that it wasn’t Krissy he’d been fucking at all. The shock of that had woken him up, and as he lay there breathing heavily and trying to quiet the commotion in his head, he grasped at his memory, trying to get a picture of the woman’s face. But it was like trying to hold sand in his fingers, and just about the time he thought he had it, it slipped away. Levi’d had dreams about other women before…but, not since he’d met Krissy. She hadn’t even been dead for a month yet. His heart still ached every morning when he woke up and had to remind himself that she was gone. His pulse still raced when he remembered touching her and kissing her and making love to her. He still pictured her face and thought that she was the most incredibly gorgeous woman he’d ever seen. He still adored her. She was still his soulmate. He reached up and touched the tattoo on the side of his neck. His fingers were still shaking and he could feel the beat of his heart against his rib cage. His heart and soul were still grieving for the love of his life. So, why was he dreaming about a stranger, a woman without a face? He turned so that his legs dangled over the side of the bed and his feet rested on the floor. He reached down for his jeans and into his pocket. He pulled out his phone and looked at the picture on the face of it. It was the same picture frozen on Krissy’s phone for perpetuity. It was the two of them, the way they were supposed to be…together, and happy. The stress of losing her and his dad had just been too much, he told himself. The dream was just a product of that. He meant Krissy no disrespect and he still had no desire for any other woman. He repeated that to himself several times, trying to calm himself down. His pulse was still racing and his breathing was still erratic. When he realized that words weren’t going to work, he reached his fingers back down into the pocket of his jeans and pulled out the silver pendant. Almost as soon as he touched it, his pulse began to slow and his breathing returned to normal. Levi wasn’t superstitious and he didn’t believe in magic…but there was something about that little heart that made him feel like Krissy was right there with him. He just wished that he knew why.